The Narrowboat Girl (46 page)

‘You’ve been very good to us,’ Joel said. ‘I’m ever so grateful to you, Nance.’

‘Oh – that’s awright,’ she said, struggling not to cry.

She and Maryann flung their arms round one another.

‘Thanks, Nance – for everything. We’ll be back to see yer – often as we can.’

‘You’d better—’ Her voice was choked. ‘Hark at me – I must go.’ Hastily she held out her hand. ‘Goodbye – Darius.’

‘Tara.’ He spoke very quietly, painfully reluctant to let go of her hand.

She turned and climbed back over on to the bank. ‘Don’t go falling in, any of yer!’ she called, and Maryann could hear her tearfulness. She watched Darius as Nance gave a final
wave and slipped away into the dusk which lay in thick folds along the wharves. His eyes didn’t leave her until she was out of sight.

Though they spent the evening busily, somehow Nance was still with them. Darius and Joel spent some time peering into the engine as Darius explained how it worked and how they had to maintain
it, while Maryann fried up their evening meal and then they sat in the tiny cabin together: Darius on the step, his plate held in his enormous hands; Maryann and Joel at the table under the little
lamp bracket. It was as cosy as she remembered and she felt herself glowing with happiness. Here she was, on the
Esther Jane
with her two favourite people in all the world.

‘Soon as Joel’s up to scratch,’ Darius announced, ‘I’ll go back and work for Fellows, Morton and Clayton. That way we’ll ’ave another wage coming in. I
don’t think our dad’s going to be up to coming back on the cut. You two can make this your ’ome. Essy Barlow’ll give us another butty to tow so you can get a decent
load.’ Putting the motor in had taken up some of the space previously occupied by cargo.

Joel nodded. He knew how sore Darius was about Nance, but they would not put this into words. And on the cut necessity meant getting work and keeping moving at all costs. ‘Thanks,’
he said. ‘You’ve held everything together, Darius. I ’ope it won’t be long now – this blessed chest of mine.’

‘Keep her in the family any’ow,’ Darius went on. ‘You’ll ’ave another family growing up on ’ere.’

As soon as they’d eaten, Joel said he had to lie down and Darius pulled down the cross bench for him. Blushing, Maryann wondered where she was going to sleep. She’d have the bench,
she decided – until she was married. The two brothers could sleep together.

As soon as Joel was settled, Darius said, ‘I’ll be off out for a couple of pints,’ and out he went.

Maryann finished the washing-up. Joel was quiet, sleeping, she thought. She tried to put the plates away quietly, not clatter them and wake him. She eyed the cabin. She’d get the place
spick and span again. She wasn’t having any of the other boatwomen saying she couldn’t keep it nice. The crochet work was looking worn and grey. She was going to learn how to do it and
make her own, all fresh! When they were tied up somewhere she’d get one of the women to teach her.

Turning, she saw Joel was watching her.

‘Ooh – you made me jump!’ She laughed. ‘I thought you was asleep!’

‘Come and get in ’ere with me.’

‘Joel! We ain’t married!’

‘We will be soon enough. Go on. Just a cuddle.’

She went and sat beside him. ‘I thought you were tired?’

‘Not that tired.’

‘What if Darius comes back?’

‘He won’t. Why d’you think ’e went out?’

She unfastened her frock and lay down beside him in her slip. They lay very close together on the narrow bed, looking at one another in the rosy light of the cabin. She saw the speckled colour
of his lashes and his loving expression.

‘Back home.’ He smiled. ‘Maryann – my lovely Maryann.’

She stroked his face. After a week at Nance’s his cheeks were covered by a down of gingery hair. ‘Your beard’s coming back. You’re starting to look right
again.’

He laughed. ‘That’s nice to know.’ His arm pulled her even closer and they kissed. Their bodies were pressed together and in panic she realized how aroused he was.
‘That’s not the only thing that’s coming back,’ he murmured.

She stiffened and he sensed it immediately.

‘It’s all right.’ He kissed her flushed cheek, drawing back a little, and stroked her hair. ‘It’s awright, little ’un. I ent going to force myself on you
without your say so. It just shows how much I love you, that’s all.’ He kissed her face in between talking to her. ‘You’re my little bird and I don’t want you flying
away. Just let me love you a bit tonight – bit by bit. I want you to love me too – not to find me horrible.’

She felt herself relax at his assurances. This was Joel – she had always been able to trust him.

‘Oh Joel – I could never find you horrible. And I know how long you’ve waited. It’s just – we ain’t married and I’m – I’m a bit frightened
of it . . .’

‘I know . . . I know. But don’t be frightened, lovely one . . . You’re meant to like it.’

Gently, slowly, he began to love her body into life. She was moved by his desire for her as he stroked her.

‘Your hands are softer these days,’ she said.

‘Oh – that won’t last long on ’ere!’

She began to relax as he ran his hands under her slip and touched her breasts. Gradually he pulled the slip down and kissed her and the sensation made her gasp. Excitement rose in her, sudden
and strange. For a moment her mind rebelled – no, no, it was wrong to feel this, it was horrible! And she tensed, but when he continued to touch her and she saw the pent-up pleasure and need
in his face she tried to relax. No, it wasn’t wrong. It had to be right. She and Joel could make it right.

She clung to him, stroking him. ‘Oh Joel . . . oh . . .’

‘It’s all right—’ He moved his hand between her legs and she flinched, then forced herself to relax. All the vile poking and prodding that Norman Griffin had done flashed
back to her for those moments and she moaned, forcing her eyes open.

‘It’s all right, my love,’ he kept saying. ‘I don’t want to hurt you – just to love you . . . love you, little bird . . .’

After a time he leaned close, his breathing very quick. ‘Can I – please?’

She knew she couldn’t refuse him. She loved him too much to refuse him anything and she gave a tiny nod. She must do it for him.

That first moment, feeling the weight of him and his moving inside her she almost screamed, but she watched him, seeing the love in his face, the way he didn’t abandon her for his own
pleasure but stayed with her, looking into her eyes. ‘My love . . . my love,’ he gasped. ‘Oh my little love . . .’ When he had reached his climax he kissed her again and
again, and they lay holding one another tenderly.

Maryann was full of wonder, of relief. They’d done it! She knew it was something every married woman had to get over with. And it was going to be all right. With Joel it could be. She
could be married in every sense, and not have to dread any part of it.

She woke next morning before dawn, cramped and stiff, and lay looking round, for a few moments, beside Joel’s warm back. There was very little to see, but she could just
make out the dark shape of the range and hear Darius breathing loudly on the other bench. She was here, on the
Esther Jane
! It was really going to be her home. How long would it be before
she could stop pinching herself and really believe it?

And last night – Oh Lor’, she thought. Did I really . . .? The thought that they’d fallen asleep and Darius must have come back and found them both side by side and dead to the
world was mortifying. But this was outweighed by her happiness. She smiled, sleepily. It’ll be all right, I can love him – I can be a normal woman! It was really too late to worry about
Darius now. The next night she’d suggest sleeping on the other bed. But she found herself hoping Darius would refuse to let her.

She kissed Joel’s warm back, then eased herself off the bed, pulled her clothes on in the dark and crept out, taking the bowl to relieve herself, thankful that there was little sound from
anywhere around. Then she went back in and lit the lamp and got the range going to put a kettle on and by the time she’d done that, Darius was up and she heard others around them beginning to
stir.

‘We need to be on our way,’ Darius said. ‘I’m going to get her going.’

Maryann got a huge shock when Darius started the engine. It felt all wrong without old Bessie hauling away on the bank. He had said the boat vibrated, but when all the china in the cabin started
rattling and she felt as if she was being shaken up inside a salt cellar, she realized life was going to be very different from when the
Esther Jane
had Bessie pulling them serenely through
the water. Soon she could also smell the acrid fumes from the funnel as well as the constant phut-phutting sound of the engine. It woke Joel.

‘It’s
horrible
,’ she said, dismayed. ‘How on earth’re we s’posed to get used to this?’

Joel didn’t look too happy either. ‘Darius says you do get used to it after a bit. Thing is, Maryann – it’s this or selling her altogether. At least we’ve got our
home, eh?’

‘I s’pose so,’ she conceded, handing him a cup of tea. She smiled shyly, kissing him. ‘Our home. That sounds nice, don’t it?’

Darius swung in through the door. ‘We’ll untie and be off now—’

The boat seemed to make a lot of noise starting off, but when they were moving, she settled down to a more regular sound. They eased away from the other moored boats. Joel stood at the stern,
watching in amazement in the pale dawn light.

They were just straightening up to move off when they all heard a cry from on the bank, a voice shouting with all its strength, ‘
Maryann! Darius!
’

‘My God—’ Maryann peered through the door out into the dim light. ‘That sounds like Nancy!’

‘
Wait! Don’t go – wait, wait!
’

Darius instantly steered the
Esther Jane
towards the bank where Nancy was frantically shouting and running to keep up with them. He brought her in rather awkwardly and they bumped the
side, almost causing Maryann to fall over.

Nance was panting so hard she could scarcely speak. Darius held out his hand and she jumped in.

‘Nance – what the hell’re yer playing at?’ Maryann was quite annoyed. She’d said her goodbyes – that was that. Why spin it out even longer? She saw, though,
that Nance had a fresh shiner on her left eye, which was only half open.

In any case, it was not Maryann Nance wanted to speak to. All her attention was fixed on Darius. ‘I ’aven’t slept a wink!’ she panted. ‘It’s no good –
I’m coming with yer! ’E gave me this as a present last night—’ She pointed at her eye. ‘I ain’t never going back, Darius – it’s you I want to be with
– for ever!’

Darius’s face took on a look of wonder and disbelief. ‘But . . .’ he stuttered. ‘Nance – you, I mean . . .’

‘Nance – what’re you saying?’ Maryann asked her. ‘What about Mick – I mean, you said you’d never . . .?’

‘I know what I said. I married ’im, I took vows in church and I can’t divorce ’im and I’m most likely damned into the bargain. But it’s you I love, Darius.
I’ve never felt the way I feel when I’m with you –
ever
before. I’ve only got one life and I can’t spend it with ’im when I can hardly stand the sight of
’im and ’e knocks me about and there’ll be no babbies neither. It ain’t a marriage, it’s a prison sentence. If you’d not come along, Darius, I might
never’ve known I could fall in love. I know we can’t make it legal and regular but out ’ere it don’t seem to matter. It’s you I want to spend my life with – if
you’ll ’ave me.’

‘If I’ll have
you
?’ Darius said. He could scarcely believe what he was hearing. He handed the tiller to Joel and pulled Nance into his arms. ‘How can you even ask,
girl?’ He was laughing with sheer joy.

‘Flamin ’ell, Nance!’ Maryann was only just beginning to take in what had happened. ‘Joel – this family’s getting bigger every minute.’

Nance, laughing and crying at once, hugged each of them in turn. ‘I can’t believe I’m doing this! I’m going to wake up any moment!’

‘Well,’ Darius took command of the
Esther Jane
once more, ‘let’s get going before you do.’

With the water churning behind them, they weaved their way through the shadowy Birmingham Cut and out towards the fresher country air.

December 1934

The day of their wedding, Maryann woke in the little house where she and Joel were staying with old Darius’s sister in Oxford. Joel’s father was still in poor
health and was staying on the bank for the forseeable future.

Maryann had been given a bed upstairs and Joel was sleeping on an old sofa down in the tiny back room. She could see that the sun was shining brightly behind the curtains and she climbed out of
bed, shivering as she pulled her woolly on and then going to draw back the curtain. The sight that met her eyes made her laugh with pleasure. It was a diamond-hard, cold day, creaking with ice and
from the roof hung huge icicles glinting in the bright sunlight. The rooftops were white and the tree she could see a little way along the street looked as if it had been dipped in icing sugar. She
couldn’t have asked for better than this sparkling white perfection.

Old Mrs Simons, Joel’s aunt, had married away from the cut and spent her wedded life in Oxford, where her late husband had a grocer’s shop. She was a diminutive lady with scrubbed
pink cheeks, little spectacles and she wore black, old-fashioned bombazine dresses with white lace collars. She was delighted that Joel and Maryann had decided to be married at St Barnabas Church,
just a couple of streets away, and where she attended regularly.

‘Now, moy dear,’ she said to Maryann later in the morning when they were ensconced together upstairs away from the men and she was helping Maryann dress. ‘Just you stand still
so’s I don’t nick you with this.’ She bent over with a needle and thread in one hand, finishing a seam in the woollen dress Maryann had chosen. It was second-hand but in good
condition and a lovely violet-blue colour. ‘Looks very nice with your pretty hair.’ Maryann’s hair was fastened back in a shiny, raven twist behind her head, and with her rosy
cheeks and bright, happy eyes she looked very beautiful.