Miss Purdy's Class (41 page)

Christie came and sat by the hearth. He put his face in his hands. When he heard the sobs, Joey crept closer and sat beside him.

Joey sat up, hearing Christie move about, striking matches for the fire. Daylight forced into the room through crevices in the wood. No one was lying on Siobhan’s mattress. Joey rubbed his eyes, got up and put his boots on. He had an urgent need to relieve himself so he went out to the garden and pee’d in the bushes. He looked back at the dark bricks of the house. The hour was very early, the sky hazy, and the garden was quiet except for pigeons somewhere in the trees and one on the roof, cooing and puttering. Joey liked the sounds it made. He could see its plump shape perched on the ridge beside the chimney stack.

Inside, John was still asleep. He hadn’t taken his hat off to lie down but now it lay displaced by his head. Christie was blowing on smoking twigs.

‘Where’s . . .?’ Joey began to ask.

‘How the hell do I know?’ Christie snapped.

Joey slunk away and sat in the corner. Normally, when he spoke harshly, Christie would come to him after, in a kinder mood and make peace. But not today. He brewed tea in silence and woke John. He handed Joey a jar of tea and a lump of bread.

‘Where’s Siobhan?’ John said. He stared vacantly at the empty mattress.

‘Not back. I don’t know. There’s nothing I can do just now.’ Christie chewed in silence for a moment. ‘I expect she’s found a spot to sleep it off. She’ll be right by tonight.’ But his tone was desperate.

Joey spent the day with John shovelling coal for a firm at one of the wharves, and when they got back to the house, black from head to foot, Joey expected Siobhan to be there scolding him about coming home in a state when she had washed his clothes. In an odd way he was almost glad of the thought. It had seemed strange and empty without her there this morning. He noticed that John did not spend any of their earnings at the Outdoor this time, getting drink for her.

When they arrived home, the room was empty. John stood in the doorway as if he couldn’t take it in.

‘Where’s Siobhan?’ he kept saying. ‘She’s not here. Where’s she gone?’

Joey thought if John said it again he would explode. How did he know where Siobhan was? Silently he went into the garden and began looking for sticks for the fire to add to the assortment of bits they’d picked up on the way home. He tried not to think about Siobhan. He shut her out of his mind.

But Christie’s face, when he got back, cut through him. His gaze sweeping the room, his expression when he saw she was not there.

‘Not been back?’

Their silent looks gave the answer. Without another word, Christie left again.

It was hours before he came back and he was alone and so weary he could barely move. John handed him the pan of food and he sank down by the remains of the fire.

‘I’ve walked the streets for hours. I tried the pubs, the priest. Where would she go?’ His voice cracked and he put the pan down. ‘Oh God, where is she? Is she doing this just to anger me? I can’t think she’d do that. She can’t manage on her own. She’s like a child . . . She needs me with her . . .’ Once more he put his face in his hands.

Three days passed. A week. Each night they came home full of hope that she would be there, but each time the room was empty and there was no sign of her. Christie stopped looking for work and spent the days searching.

‘I’m not calling the Guard,’ he said. ‘We don’t want them coming here. If anyone can find her, I can.’

In the evenings he told them where he’d been, the streets, parks, pubs, churches. Then one day Christie did not come home either. They kept his food warm in the pan until late at night while they waited.

In the end, John said, ‘He ain’t coming, is he? We’ll eat the rest of this.’

Between them they shovelled down the potatoes and stringy bits of meat.

Thinking of Christie, Joey could barely swallow the food. But then he thought, he should’ve come back at the right time if he wanted it. Too bad.

Thirty-Seven

The summer weeks were flying past. They lived and breathed the party, the meetings, the debates at the factory gates and in the parks, flags and banners flapping over the scuffed summer grass. Every day in the offices they pored over the newspapers for news about the Spanish campaigns: the nationalists’ bloody push on Madrid, the waves of reprisals in the republican zone against the Catholic Church. Gwen watched Daniel as each fresh piece of news arrived. He showed no reaction, especially to his non-Catholic comrades, but she knew the situation hurt him deeply.

Gwen worried about him: the way he constantly drove himself. His face was thin, and sometimes he looked glazed from lack of sleep. She knew his mother was worried about him too. Gwen had grown very fond of Theresa Fernandez, and sometimes popped in to see her even if Daniel was not there. Theresa didn’t often talk about her feelings, but one afternoon when Gwen paid her a visit, she said, ‘See if you can slow our Daniel down a bit, will you, Gwen? He won’t listen to me, course, but he’s hardly been in his own bed these last few days. He’s starting to look like a ghost.’ Since the holidays had begun, she had dropped the formality of calling Gwen ‘Miss Purdy’, even in front of Lucy and the others.

Gwen avoided her eyes. Theresa was so upright in her morals, Gwen knew it would never occur to her that the main reason Daniel had been away from his own bed so much in the past week was that he had been in hers. Millie and Lance had gone away for a few days to Gwen’s great relief. They had started arguing more openly lately, as Millie got more heavy and uncomfortable and less tolerant about everything, especially her husband. Gwen and Daniel had been able to snatch a few hours together in the flat without anyone else about, before Daniel crept out in the small hours back to his own bed at home.

‘He’s so like his father,’ Theresa sighed over her teacup. She looked tired and strained herself. ‘On and on – driving themselves. They just can’t seem to stop. I’d thought coming to Birmingham would end all that, but . . .’ She shrugged. ‘I can see it coming out in Dominic too. Heaven help us when he gets older.’

‘Daniel says he wants to go back and see your brother and his wife,’ Gwen said hesitantly.

‘Our Anthony and Shân? Oh yes!’ Theresa’s eyes lit up. ‘You see if you can persuade him, Gwen! Get him to take a rest for a bit. Knowing our Daniel, though, he’ll go down there and be running up and down to Tredegar and along the valleys to every meeting he can get to! I don’t know . . .’ She looked forlorn. ‘I’m proud of him, God love him, I really am. I know he’s right and he’s trying to do the best for all our people. I just don’t want to lose him – have him go the way Arturo did.’ She looked up at Gwen as if a light had just dawned.

‘Tell you what – perhaps you could go with him? You could try and tie him down a bit!’

Gwen smiled at Theresa’s obliviousness to the fact that accompanying Daniel was exactly what she already had in mind.

‘Just for a couple of days,’ she pleaded with him. ‘You can spare a little while away – Esther and the others can take up the slack and you did promise your Auntie Shân . . .’

They were on their way back from a meeting in Small Heath Park, where voices had boomed through megaphones over the ragged crowd, while the ducks glided past on the pond behind. Daniel had not been speaking today: they had both been busy selling pamphlets and the
Daily Worker
. Gwen’s few remaining pamphlets were in the bag slung over her shoulder. The two of them caught a tram into town. It was a great relief to sit down; her feet felt sore from standing in the heat all afternoon.

‘There’s just so much to get done here,’ Daniel said, staring ahead of him. He was in one of his distant moods again, somewhere she felt she could not reach him, and he looked very tired.

Gently she touched his back. ‘Your mother really wants you to go. We could take all sorts of things over for them – books for Billy as well.’ As she spoke, Daniel gave a great exhausted yawn.

‘See!’ She kept a teasing tone in her voice. ‘You’re tired out all the time. You’ll be no good use to the revolution if you collapse in a heap, will you?’

He came to himself suddenly, was with her again, and took her hand. She was filled with happiness.

‘All right. Are you coming too?’ He asked so carelessly that she was hurt. She had taken for granted that they would go together. Didn’t they do almost everything together now?

‘D’you want me to?’ she asked uncertainly.

‘Yes.’ He squeezed her hand and forced a smile to his exhausted face. ‘Course I do.’

The local train pulled into Tredegar late on the following Thursday afternoon, and they caught the branch line to Aberglyn. It was a warm, muggy afternoon, and they had both slept for much of the journey. But the air grew a little fresher as they toiled up the hill, along the narrow streets to Anthony and Shân Sullivan’s house, Gwen carrying the bag with their clothes in and Daniel his mother’s bundle. Smells of cooking came to them on the breeze.

They stopped for a moment, panting, and looking back down the street. Two barefoot, ragged children were tearing down the hill away from them, after a runaway hoop, a small black and white dog barking excitedly at their heels. A couple of people had greeted Daniel on the way up. Everyone here, Gwen thought, looked so worn and weary. So ill fed. The children playing outside had pinched faces.

‘You did tell her I was coming with you, didn’t you?’ it occurred to Gwen to ask.

‘I sent a telegram. All I said was, “Coming Thursday p.m. Bringing friend.”’

‘Honestly! You could have put my name!’ She felt genuinely aggrieved. Fancy him sending a telegram about a ‘friend’ as if she were just anybody.

As they approached the houses higher up, they saw that Billy was sitting outside the front door. He soon spotted them and waved madly with both arms.

‘Mam!’ they heard him call into the house. ‘Our Daniel’s here!’

When Shân Sullivan stepped outside, Gwen was momentarily shocked by the sight of her. Her shawl had hidden the true extent of her emaciation the last time they met. Now she came to the door in an old pale pink frock with an apron over the top and Gwen saw the frightening thinness of her arms and neck, from which her faded hair was taken up into a loose bun at the back. But her tired face was full of pleasure at the sight of them.

‘Daniel!’ She came out through the gate towards them. ‘Oh and it’s you, Gwen
fach
!’ She sounded startled. ‘Oh, Daniel, you silly. Why didn’t you say it was young Gwen coming with you? I thought you were coming with another of those boys from the party.’ She kissed Gwen, a quick peck. Close up, Gwen realized she was probably no thinner than she had been the last time. Her wristbones were very prominent, her hands bony and raw from hard work.

‘Billy’s been waiting for you all afternoon! Come on, I’ll make us a cup of tea. Oh, it’s a treat to see you both!’

But as Shân turned towards the house, Gwen wondered if she imagined the momentary combination of worry and puzzlement in the other woman’s eyes as they fixed on her.

‘Daniel!’ Billy was pushing up on the arms of the chair in his excitement.

‘All right, Billy!’ Daniel cuffed him again in his friendly way. ‘Got something for you here. Pass us the bag, Gwen.’

He squatted down by Billy’s chair. From the bag he pulled out a book and handed it to his cousin.

‘There, that should keep you busy for a bit.’

Billy turned it over, stroking the red-bound cover.

‘
World Politics, 1918–36
,’ he read in awed tones. ‘Rajani Palme Dutt.
Thanks
, Daniel.’

‘Gwen’s idea,’ Daniel admitted. ‘It’s from this new thing, the Left Book Club.’

Billy shot Gwen a radiant look.

‘Don’t eat it all at once!’ Daniel stood up again and ruffled Billy’s hair. Gwen wondered if Billy minded being treated as if he were a child, but he grinned, seeming to enjoy it.

‘I’ll go and give Auntie a hand.’

Daniel went inside. Not liking to desert Billy, Gwen stayed out, enjoying the warm evening.

‘How’re you keeping?’ she asked shyly, squatting down so that she wasn’t towering over him.

‘I’m all right.’ He spoke guardedly, still fondling the book. Abruptly he looked round and words seemed to burst out of him. ‘I say I’m all right. What else can I say when my mam’s having to do everything for me like a baby?’ He looked down, blushing. ‘Don’t know how long I can stand it, that’s all.’

‘Oh, Billy, I’m sorry.’ She was surprised by this immediate outburst and somehow honoured by it, as if he had to say it to someone while he had the chance, with Shân out of earshot. ‘Not much help to say that, is it?’

He shook his head. ‘No. Not really. But at least I could say it to you. Don’t know why.’ He couldn’t meet her eyes but the words kept pouring out. ‘I try and keep a diary, see. I’m not much of a writer but it’s someone to talk to. I’d’ve liked more schooling.’ He gave a harsh laugh. ‘Not much hope of that round here.’

‘You like reading.’

‘Oh yes. I like Dickens. He’s a good long read –
Hard Times
, that’s my favourite. And
David Copper-field
. . . And Jack London . . .’ Billy seemed to get excited easily, with the least bit of stimulation and encouragement. ‘I read
People of the Abyss
. It was the best book I’ve ever read. It’s a proper demolition of capitalism. Everyone should read it – everyone should be made to, to understand! Have you read it?’

Gwen was just admitting that, no, she hadn’t, although she’d heard Daniel talk about it, when he and Shân appeared with a cup of tea in each hand. Shân handed Gwen her tea and perched on the doorstep, patting the narrow space beside her.

‘Come and sit here, Gwen. There’s enough space beside my old bones.’

Gwen obeyed, and they were so close together they touched at the hips and shoulders.

‘Billy was telling me about the books he likes.’

‘Oh, he’s a reader, all right,’ Shân agreed.

Daniel was squatting beside Billy now, near the gate. The two women watched them for a moment in silence, the dark heads close together, Billy apparently asking urgent questions about Daniel’s work. Gwen glanced at Shân Sullivan and saw her watching them. For a moment her eyes clouded with pain. Billy looked so like Daniel in some ways that seeing him must be a walking reminder of all that Billy might have been.