The Mersey Girls (41 page)

‘Hello! This is me first trip on the ferry, so I’ve been hopin’ it wouldn’t make me sick. Do you come over often?’

‘I wouldn’t say often, but this isn’t my first trip,’ the girl said readily. ‘I’ve been over before, two or three times, and I always enjoy it. What makes you think you might be sick, though? It’s a short crossing, you know.’

‘I was terrible sick comin’ from Ireland so I was,’ Lucy admitted gloomily. ‘I wanted to die so I did.’

The other girl laughed.

‘Well, the Mersey isn’t the Irish sea exactly,’ she pointed out. ‘But why don’t you come below with me and then we can have a cup of coffee, or a lemonade? It might settle your stomach.’

‘I think it might be safer not,’ Lucy said cautiously. She looked over the rail at the gently moving water, at the gulls bobbing on the surface, then glanced back at her companion. ‘I’d like a coffee so I would, but I durst not go below whilst the ship’s moving.’

‘Well, why don’t you sit down by the rail and keep your eyes fixed on Woodside – that’s the further shore – and think about the land, and I’ll go below and fetch a drink for both of us,’ the girl said in heartening tones. ‘And when I come back we’ll chat and that’ll keep your mind off your stomach.’

‘That’s awful kind,’ Lucy said. ‘Let me give you the money, though. How much does a coffee cost aboard this ship?’

The brown-haired one shrugged. ‘I haven’t the foggiest idea. Tell you what, if you’re going back on the same ferry as I am you can buy the coffee in the other direction. How does that seem?’

‘Grand. And I can go back on any ferry, since I’m only going for to see the Liverpool shore from the other side,’ Lucy admitted. ‘There’s a feller in me boarding house – shocked he was that I’d not seen the waterfront properly. So I said I’d spend an idle day, just lookin’ around me.’

‘And I’m only going on a message – when I get to Birkenhead I’m to buy some flowers and take them to an old lady who’s been ill,’ the brown-haired one said comfortably. ‘So if you’ve nothing better to do, why not come with me? It’s just a walk in the sunshine, you know, and then back to Woodside and the ferry again. Now you just wait here – I shan’t be two ticks.’

Lucy sat in the sunshine and fixed her eyes on the further shore as her new friend had suggested, and sure enough she did not feel at all sick, not even when a tug steamed across the ferry’s bows and the ship heaved on the swell. And presently, when the girl came back with the steaming coffee she took it, sipped, and then set the cup down on the slatted wooden seat beside her.

‘Well now, how can I thank you when I don’t even know your name?’ she said brightly. ‘I’m Lucy Murphy. How do you do . . . ?’

‘That’s odd,’ the brown-haired one said cheerfully, setting her own coffee down between them. ‘I’m a Murphy, too – Linnet Murphy.’

Lucy’s mouth fell open. She gaped, there was no other word for it. And when she spoke her voice was thin and high. ‘
Linnet
? You’re Linnet Murphy? Begod, but isn’t that the strangest t’ing ever?’ She grabbed the other girl’s hand in hers and squeezed it hard. ‘There can’t be two . . . but Maeve said you were the very image of me as a child, yellow hair an’ all!’

‘Maeve?’ The brown-haired girl was laughing; she thinks I’m an Irish madwoman, Lucy thought belatedly. ‘Well, now, and isn’t that odd? My mammy came from Ireland, way back, and there was a Maeve in her family – her eldest sister.’ She gently drew her hand out of Lucy’s grasp. ‘But Murphy’s a common enough name, I suppose.’

‘Yes, but Linnet isn’t,’ Lucy said triumphantly. ‘My mammy was on the stage at one time. They called her little Evie.’ She watched as Linnet’s thin face flushed to a delicate shade of rose, as her eyes rounded. ‘You’re me twin sister, the person I’ve come to Liverpool to find,’ she said triumphantly. ‘And now that I come to look at you, you’ve a great look of Maeve about you so you have.’

‘And now that I come to look at you, you’re rather like my mammy,’ Linnet said with a distinct wobble in her voice. ‘Oh Lucy, I can’t believe it – a sister of me own!’

Linnet couldn’t believe the extent of her own good fortune. Mammy had mumbled about relatives, but she had never even hinted that Linnet had a sister let alone a twin. And it seemed impossible that this golden-haired girl with the gentle, mischievous face had come miles and miles, just to find her, and had actually done so. The two girls sat on the sunny deck and at first could only stare at each other, now and again smiling with delight. My sister, Linnet kept thinking, my very own sister – a relative of my very own!

Presently, she put it into words. ‘It’s like Christmas and birthdays all rolled into one,’ she said. ‘To have someone of my own, I mean. I’ve got friends, of course, and a feller – do you have a feller, Lucy? – but no relatives, not that I’d met. I didn’t even know how badly I wanted a sister of my own until you turned up. But I wonder why your Maeve thought we would be alike, because we aren’t at all similar, really. You’re terribly pretty.’

‘You’re not so bad yourself! And I think other people will say we’re quite alike because we’ve both got the same sort of eyes and the same shaped face, only our hair’s a different colour and I’m a few inches taller than you,’ Lucy said. ‘That’s odd, that is, because Maeve always told me I was the small, sickly baby and you were big and bonny.’

‘People change,’ Linnet said ruefully. ‘My hair was fair when I was young, but it got darker as I got older. I wonder why yours didn’t?’

‘Lots of Irish cream and butter, and lots of Irish honey; it keeps you blonde,’ Lucy said with a giggle. ‘But I’ve not told you why I’ve come to find you, Linnet. Do you mind if I start at the beginning? Only it’s a long story and you’ll want a bit of background.’

‘I don’t mind at all,’ Linnet said, settling herself comfortably on the wooden slatted seat. She thought she would have been quite happy to have listened to this beautiful, golden-haired girl all day – this brand-new twin sister of her very own. ‘Fire ahead.’

‘Well, it was like this,’ Lucy said after some thought. ‘My grandad – and yours, Linnet – was an old man and he’d been very sick. But the Stations were coming to our home, we live near Cahersiveen, in County Kerry, so . . .’

‘What are the Stations?’

‘Dear God, you’re a heathen,’ Lucy said, smiling. ‘Forget the Stations, ’tis just a Mass said in the home and attended by everyone all about. As I was saying, the Stations were coming to Ivy Farm so of course I was very busy, and Caitlin chose the same month . . .’

‘Caitlin? Is she another sister? Another relative to me?’

‘Caitlin’s me best friend, she’s the daughter of . . . look, just let me tell it, will you? Or I’ll still not be finished be nightfall. Now, as I was saying, Caitlin chose the same month to announce that she and Declan were to wed, so . . .’

It would have been idle to pretend that Lucy was not a little disappointed to find Linnet was not a double of herself; the prospect of fooling people had been in its way rather fun. But to find Linnet had straight brown hair and was smaller than she and slightly built was, by and large, probably better for their eventual friendship.

She had not, at first, thought Linnet pretty, but as they grew easier together she revised her opinion. Linnet was fascinating; she would never lack admirers even without guinea-gold curls and a bee-stung lower lip. She had that quality of unselfconscious charm which soon had Lucy in its thrall, for all she had been determined merely to feel sorry for her sister. And Linnet was also a good listener. Having been told to keep her questions for after the story she sat there, hanging on Lucy’s every word, her eyes gradually widening as the story progressed.

‘And he’s left the farm to the pair of us?’ she gasped at the end, when Lucy produced her trump card. ‘A farm? But Lucy, I don’t even know how to keep a garden, let alone a farm. What good would I be to you if I did come back? And I’ve a well-paid job here, I’m a nanny so I get to save most of my salary and – and I’m thinking about getting married before the year’s end.’

‘I’m not saying stay for ever, Linnet,’ Lucy reminded her. ‘I’m just saying come over, see how you like it, and get things settled. Couldn’t your – your feller come as well? For a week or two, maybe?’

‘He’s a seaman, on a timber haul at the moment,’ Linnet said slowly. ‘We’ve talked about getting married but we’ve not set a date, only now I want to make it definite. You see, the man I work for has asked me to marry him as well and when I say no, I’m afraid things could get difficult. He’s a gentleman, he won’t kick me out, but – well, you know how it is.’

‘I can imagine,’ Lucy agreed. ‘So you’d better tell him no at once and come back to Ireland with me. Explain where you’re going and why, that should make things easier, if anything.’

And after a thoughtful pause, Linnet reached across and grasped Lucy’s hand tightly. ‘I’ll come!’ she declared. ‘My job will go down the pan but you said our grandad had left some money, too, didn’t you? That will tide me over.’ She beamed at her twin, her eyes brilliant with excitement. ‘And it’ll mean Roddy and I can get married just as soon as we can arrange it,’ she added. ‘Oh Lucy, I’m so glad we found each other! Will you dance at my wedding?’

‘With all my heart. And perhaps, in a year or two, you’ll dance at mine,’ Lucy said, and told her sister about Peder and her grandfather’s hopes that she would marry land and double the size of Ivy Farm. She tried to make it sound just what she wanted, and thought she had succeeded until Linnet reached out and squeezed her hand.

‘It’s not Peder you want, is it?’ she said shrewdly. ‘But there’s someone just right for you around the corner, Lucy. Just you wait and see.’

As it happened, it was a lot easier for Linnet to give in her notice than she had imagined it would be.

She arrived home with a sunburnt nose after spending most of the day talking to Lucy, full of trepidation over the task to come. She intended to tell Mr Cowan, as soon as she walked through the door, that she would be returning to Ireland at the end of the week because her grandfather had died. But she could well imagine the scene which could take place when she admitted – as she must – that she would not be coming back.

And then there was his proposal of marriage. She meant to tell Mr Cowan that she had considered very carefully, as carefully as he had implored her to, and was conscious of the great honour he had done her, but did not think she would make him a suitable wife.

It sounded easy when she rehearsed the words in her head; the snag came when she began to think of Mr Cowan’s lines. She could imagine all too well what his reaction would be – she feared he would be angry as well as honestly distressed. She did not intend to give way, knew, after her talk to Mrs Sullivan, that it would be very wrong to marry him, but he was a good deal older than she and a wealthy man; to turn him down was going to take courage.

So it was a surprise when she walked into the house to find Mr Cowan with Mollie and Emma, the nurserymaid, all dressed in their coats and hats, waiting in the hallway.

He knows! she thought, and opened her mouth to start explaining but was forestalled by Mr Cowan.

‘Ah, Miss Murphy, at last! I was in fear and trembling that you’d not come home before we had to leave – you’re very late. I’ve news which I scarcely know how to impart! Do you remember Mr Aloysius Paulett, Miss Murphy?’

Linnet gaped at him. ‘Aloysius who?’

He clucked impatiently. ‘Mr Paulett, the Chairman of the Eagle and General; you can’t have forgotten him!’

‘I don’t think we ever met,’ Linnet said slowly. ‘He was in the London office, wasn’t he?’

‘Yes, indeed. And two days ago the poor old fellow dropped dead in the middle of a board meeting. And today I hear that they’ve chosen me – me, Miss Murphy – to take his place! I am to go up to London immediately, the company will put us into a company house until such time as I purchase my own property, and I will be confirmed in the position within the next couple of days. In my wildest dreams I never thought . . . but there, I’ve always put the company before myself, always worked hard . . . and now, it seems, this is to be my reward.’

He sounded horribly complacent, Linnet thought. She frowned across at him, trying to take it all in. ‘And Mollie? What about Mollie? She’s happy at school, sir, she has friends in the neighbourhood . . .’

He laughed; behind his horn-rimmed glasses his eyes glittered. ‘Mollie will want for nothing! Advancement such as this will ensure her future – and, indeed, mine. I thought that you, Miss Murphy, might hold the fort for me here until such time as . . . as you decide whether you wish to come to London with – with Mollie and myself. But now I must go, the Board are sending a chauffeur driven car for us . . . I’ll ring up when I have time and you can tell me what . . . what you’ve decided to do.’

There was anxiety in the last words and Linnet responded to it at once.

‘I won’t be here,’ she said quickly. ‘Sir, I met a close relative in the city this morning who had come to tell me my grandfather had died recently and left me money and some property. I’m returning to Ireland at the end of the week to sort things out.’

Was it relief she saw behind those glasses? He tutted in vague disapproval, but . . . yes, it was definitely relief. The girl who was good enough for a provincial insurance executive would not, Linnet thought, be the right wife for the head of the company. He could not realise it, but she was every bit as relieved as he – more, probably.

‘I see; well you must go, Miss Murphy, your duty is clear, you must not consider us, we shall do very well.’ He could not hide his relief, his elation, almost. ‘And since you’ve not yet taken your annual holiday this year you must take it now – I’ll pay you for the full month.’ He reached into his pocket and withdrew a cheque book. He scribbled for a moment and then handed Linnet the cheque which she put into her pocket without looking at it.

‘Thank you, sir. May I wish you well in your new career? Will you be returning here in a week or so? To see to the house and so on?’

‘I think not. In two or three months perhaps . . . but for the next few weeks we’ll be busy people won’t we, Mollie, my dear?’