The Leaving of Liverpool (31 page)

It was a cold, damp day and a heavy mist hung over the cemetery and seeped into the thin jacket, making her shiver. She longed to stand with Emily who was clinging to Albert, sobbing quietly, while Jack and Jimmy stood rigidly at Albert’s side. Fresh spasms shook her as she heard the dreadful, final sound as the first handfuls of soil fell on the coffin. The sound shrieked at her that her mam was dead and it was all her fault.

When she looked up, she saw the people drifting away and only Emily stood by the open grave, the grave diggers leaning on their shovels, a respectful distance away. She moved forward.

‘Emily.’

Emily looked up.

‘Em, I’m sorry . . . It’s my fault . . .’

Emily couldn’t speak.

Phoebe-Ann drew closer, praying that Emily wouldn’t turn away from her. ‘Em, say something . . . please?’ she begged.

Through burning eyes, their lids swollen from crying, Emily looked at her sister. She should hate her but how could she? She was as much to blame. She held out her hands and Phoebe-Ann seized them like a lifeline.

‘Oh, Emily! What am I going to do? How can I live with all I’ve done?’

‘How can we both live with it, Fee? I should have told her.’

‘Oh, I wish the
Maury
was back.’

‘So do I. Oh, so do I,’ Emily answered tiredly.

Emily managed to slip around to see her sister a few times, without the knowledge of her brothers. She went at night when it was dark so she wouldn’t be noticed by the neighbours. She’d given in her notice to Miss Millicent and Miss Nesta who were both reluctant to accept it.

‘If you ever change your mind, Emily, come back to us,’ Miss Nesta had said, pressing an envelope into her hand. It contained five, crisp, white five-pound notes. ‘For your future, Emily,’ she’d whispered.

‘And if there is anything at all we can help you with, don’t hesitate to come to us,’ Miss Millicent had offered, handing her a parcel which she later found to contain a white damask tablecloth and napkins. She’d written a ‘thank you’ note to them both with tears in her eyes at such generosity.

She was to keep house now in her mother’s place and she knew that she was the only one who could help Albert through his grief. Both her brothers had gone back to work; they couldn’t afford not to now for, until Albert had recovered enough to resume his business, there was only their money coming into the house as they’d both refused to allow Emily to use the money Miss Nesta had given her.

‘I want no arguments, Em. It’s yours. She gave it to you for when you have a home of your own and there’s an end to it,’ Jack had stated.

She had given up hope then that she would ever have a home of her own and at that time she didn’t want one. This was her home, it always would be. Edwin would agree and if he didn’t . . .

She went down on the tram with Phoebe-Ann when the
Mauretania
docked. Together, they stood waiting at the Canada Dock gate, both in the black of mourning for they had both dyed all their clothes.

Edwin was first off and when she told him, he took Emily in his arms and held her tightly. ‘My poor Em. My poor, poor Em, having all that to bear on your own. I’m sorry love, she was a wonderful woman.’

She knew if she broke down now she would never stop crying so she held it all back.

He stood with his arm around her shoulders until he saw Rhys pushing his way ahead of the crowd of stokers and trimmers.

When Edwin told him, Rhys’s shocked gaze went to Phoebe-Ann. She looked so haggard and thin. Before he had time to speak, Edwin had taken his arm and was pulling him aside.

When she saw Jake, Phoebe-Ann uttered a cry and, elbowing her way into the crowd, ran straight into his arms.

He looked down at her with undisguised horror. ‘What’s up? What’s been going on here?’ He looked across at the other small group: at Rhys whose face was like thunder, Edwin who couldn’t disguise the enmity he felt and Emily, red-eyed and accusing and also dressed in mourning.

‘Ask your wife!’ Rhys spat at him, before Edwin pulled him backwards. He wanted no confrontations here. Emily was upset enough already.

‘What’s up, girl? You look like you need a drink.’

Phoebe-Ann couldn’t speak so she let him guide her across the road and into the smoke-filled bar of the nearest pub.

‘Get that down you,’ Jake instructed, annoyed that his homecoming had been so miserable.

Phoebe-Ann downed the drink and gasped and coughed.

‘Come on, tell me what’s been going on?’

In a flat, expressionless tone she told him.

‘Ah, God! The poor feller!’

‘But don’t you see, it was my fault! She’d been to see your ma.’

‘What’s that owld biddy got to do with all this?’

‘Mam went to see her to try to get her to stop the wedding.’

‘But we were already wed, me ma knew that. Our Vinny can’t keep his trap shut after he’s had a few drinks. She’s not speakin’ to me, so the rest of them tell me. Not that I care.’

‘My mam didn’t know.’

‘I thought your Emily would have told her.’

She shook her head.

‘I wish I could trust me brothers like that. Rent-a-gob, that’s our Vinny. Oh, what a bloody mess. Still, she was all right with you, your Emily, I mean?’

‘She is but the others . . .’

‘Oh, sod the others! I’m home now so cheer up. We’re wed; all legal, like, so no-one can do anything about that. You’re my wife,’ he added with pride. Her loss hadn’t really touched him deeply and he couldn’t see how Phoebe-Ann was to blame for a bloody horse bolting. It could have been anyone’s horse. It could have happened in Lonsdale Street, so what was all this fuss over?

She wondered how he could be so offhand about it. Didn’t he realize that, apart from Emily, her whole family had cut her off? She leaned back in the chair, suddenly so very tired and utterly wretched.

‘You look worn out. We’ll get off home and we can both have a bit of a lie down, like.’

A spark of anger flared. She had just told him her mam was dead and her family had ostracized her and all he wanted to do was take her to bed. ‘No, we won’t! Is that all you can think of Jake Malone? Is that all, at a time like this?’

He stared at her. ‘What did I say wrong?’

She got to her feet. ‘If you don’t know, then I’m not going to tell you!’

‘Oh, that’s nice, isn’t it! That’s a nice welcome ’ome! Why don’t yer just say “sod off”!’

‘Stop that!’

‘You’re me wife and I won’t be able to get home as much in future!’

‘What do you mean?’

He hadn’t meant to tell her like this, but the way she had rejected him had annoyed him. He’d seen the smirks and nudges and heads nodded in their direction. If she was going to carry on like this he might as well go and make his peace with his ma, have a few bevvies with them all. ‘This is the last time the
Maury
will sail from Liverpool. It’s Southampton from now on, an’ if you’re going to have such a cob on then . . .’

She didn’t wait for him to finish. She’d been staring at him in horror; now she turned and, pushing her way through the crowd, ran out into the street, leaving him standing looking after her with a mixture of annoyance and bewilderment on his face.

I
T WAS HARD TO BELIEVE that Mam had been dead for almost a year, Emily thought. Now it seemed as though she’d always run this house, always coped with Albert, who was growing more and more withdrawn and morose, still unable to come to terms with the fact that he had been instrumental in Lily’s death.

Jack and Jimmy talked about nothing else but emigrating to America and she knew that when they had saved up enough money they would go. But saving was the hardest part although she fully intended to insist that they take the twenty-five pounds Miss Nesta had given her. After all there was still the money Richard Mercer had invested for her.

Edwin still came home as often as he could, but the travelling to and from Southampton meant he wasn’t home for very long. They’d spoken about the future but it didn’t look too hopeful. Work was getting harder to find in the city and, for Edwin and others, there was little choice but to stay at sea. It was work, even if it did mean they had little time with their loved ones.

Emily had told him that when Jack and Jimmy finally left she couldn’t leave Albert on his own. He’d agreed with her but had silently wondered if he could persuade them both to move down south. He’d see more of her that way but his hopes weren’t high. She went every Sunday to take flowers to Lily’s grave and Albert joined her. His grief had healed a little but he’d never be the same man, they both knew that.

 

Life for Phoebe-Ann hadn’t improved. Jake did make the effort to get home when he could, but the days and nights were long. She had seen her brothers twice on the street and both times they had cut her dead, crossing to the other side of the road. Emily came when she could but that wasn’t often because it had to be dark and the evenings were getting longer. She was at work all day. Sometimes she thought that if it hadn’t been for her work and Alice and Ginny she would have gone mad. She’d changed; it would have been a miracle if she hadn’t. She’d grown up and she’d become quieter. Jake couldn’t, or wouldn’t, understand how she felt and he even seemed to have given up trying lately.

He’d been full of profuse apologies after that first row when he’d come home well past midnight, singing and staggering up the road and collapsing in the lobby. But on his last shore leave they’d had another row.

Jake’s disillusionment was increasing. He’d hoped that, while he’d been away, Phoebe-Ann would have overcome her initial distaste for love making. She hadn’t.

She’d tried to explain to him but he couldn’t grasp what she was saying.

‘It’s no use you goin’ on an’ on about all these feelings an’ imaginings, it’s not solvin’ anything, is it? I’m not a bloody mind-reader nor a bloody monk either! You’re my wife an’ that’s that!’

‘Can’t you understand that I can’t help it? I don’t want it to happen, it just does! Something just . . . snaps in my head and I feel so . . .’

Jake’s eyes narrowed as a thought crossed his mind. ‘Who’s been talkin’ to you, Phoebe-Ann?’

‘No-one!’ she shot back, praying he hadn’t heard something about Emily. ‘You know how they’ve all been acting since Mam died! And, that’s another thing, I thought you’d be more sympathetic, more understanding! ’

‘I am!’ he retorted hotly. It wasn’t his fault that she had this problem and now she was accusing him of not being sympathetic. All right, he was sorry about her mam, but she should be getting over it now. It wasn’t the end of the bloody world. He stared at her hard. The pretty, laughing, loving girl he’d fallen for was changing and not for the better. Was this what he’d changed his whole life-style for? Why he’d given up all his pleasures; the happy nights spent drinking with his brothers. All right, so they often had too much to drink – nothing to moan about. So, he’d chased other women, again encouraged by his brothers. Aye, they’d had some good times together. If she was going to carry on like this every time he came home . . . He shrugged. ‘I’ve said I’m sorry about your ma a hundred times, now come ’ere and let’s kiss an’ make up.’ He’d winked meaningfully, thinking a light-hearted approach might work.