Believing in tomorrow, p.6
Believing in Tomorrow, page 6
‘The bairn’ll enjoy herself, you know, stocking or no stocking,’ Jed said softly. ‘Just being here with you and the rest of us.’
Enid didn’t speak for some seconds. Then she said, her voice low and troubled, ‘I pray every day that her da won’t come looking for her.’
‘Now look here, lass.’ Jed turned on his side, drawing her into his arms. ‘Let’s knock this on the head once and for all. I don’t believe for one minute that man would bother himself to search for her, but if he did, and if he came here, I would deal with him. Your mind can be at rest about that. The bairn’s here and here she’ll stay now, and we’re going to have a grand Christmas. All right?’
Enid had always loved her husband but never more so than at this moment. She nodded in the darkness, her mouth finding his, and then as she pressed herself in to him and her hands moved over his body she felt him respond. It was rare she made the first initiative in their lovemaking and he always deeply appreciated it when she did, his voice revealing this when he murmured, ‘Oh, Enid, Enid, you’re me sun, moon an’ stars. You know that, don’t you? Sun, moon an’ stars.’
She knew he meant it and that she had always come first with him since the day they had wed, but she couldn’t in all honesty say the same. From the moment Mary had been born and she’d held her first child in her arms, she’d felt a love so powerful, so consuming it had taken her breath away. It had been the same with all of them, especially Matthew, and now Molly. She might not have given birth to the bairn but she couldn’t love her any more if she had. Jed was right, they would have a grand Christmas. She would make sure of it.
On Christmas Day Molly woke early. Outside the house, the snow was packed hard on the ground and a fresh fall was adding to it, making the pavements treacherous. She climbed out of bed, shivering as she emerged from the warm cocoon, and peered at her window. There was ice on the inside of it but after she had breathed on it and worked away with her fingernails she cleared a circle big enough to peep through. It looked to be a white hushed world; for once the town was taking its ease and all the normal sounds from the docks and industry were absent.
Downstairs in the kitchen it would be warm – the range was kept going day and night – and she hurried into her clothes, glad of the thick woollen socks and sturdy boots. In the hamlet her feet had always been cold in the winter months and sometimes her chilblains had been so bad they had reduced her to tears, often earning her a hard slap from her mother and the command to ‘stop snivelling’.
She pushed the thought away. She didn’t want to think of the hamlet and the people in it. That was her old life and she wanted no part of it to intrude into the new. She sometimes thought about her brothers and Fanny and wondered what they were doing, mostly when she was in bed and falling asleep, but although she had missed Fanny, and also Fred and Caleb to some extent, when she had first come here, she no longer felt that way. Her new family – and that was how she thought about Enid and Jed and the lads – more than made up for those she had left behind. She wasn’t quite so keen on Mary and Cissy when she had met them shortly after she’d arrived at the house – the sisters seemed standoffish – but she didn’t see much of them anyway.
Enid was already downstairs when Molly walked into the kitchen, her eyes going immediately to the stocking she’d hung up the night before on the mantelpiece, and in answer to the glance, Enid said brightly, ‘Aye, he’s been, hinny.’
Her stomach fluttering with excitement, Molly watched spellbound as Enid unhooked the big knitted stocking which would have fitted a giant’s foot and brought it over to the table. It was no longer limp and flat but bulging. Hardly able to speak for anticipation, she looked up at Enid with huge eyes. ‘Should I wait for the others to come down?’
Enid smiled. Molly’s reaction was everything she could have hoped for. ‘No, lass,’ she said gently. ‘I think we’ll have a sup together, just the two of us, while you see what he’s brought you, eh? Sit yourself down, hinny. I won’t be a tick.’
Once a plate of Enid’s gingerbread and two mugs of tea were in front of them, Molly emptied the stocking. It contained a bright blue woollen bobble hat and matching gloves and scarf; a book with dancing dolls and a party scene to cut out along with a set of crayons to colour everything in; a bag of assorted confectionery – a gobstopper, Ogopogo eyes, liquorice bootlaces and a pink sugar mouse – and down the side of it all was a barley sugar squirrel on a long stick which when held to the light proved to be magical, glowing a deep amber.
Utterly overcome, Molly flung herself on Enid and as they hugged, she whispered, ‘I love you.’
The family weren’t ones for outward shows of affection – none of the fishing folk were – and from infancy the children tended to follow the same pattern of behaviour as their parents. Enid knew her children loved her but it had rarely been said out loud.
She gathered Molly onto her lap and as thin arms went round her neck, she nestled the child close. The lump in her throat making her voice husky, she murmured, ‘An’ I love you, me bairn.’
It was nearly midnight. The rest of the household had long since been asleep but despite being warm and snug and tired, Molly was wide awake. It had been a wonderful day and she had enjoyed every minute – at least, she corrected herself in the next moment, until Mary and Cissy arrived in the afternoon. Although neither woman had said anything, she could tell they hadn’t liked their mother putting up the stocking for Father Christmas, and they didn’t like her either. She wasn’t imagining it. But – she buried herself deeper under the covers – she didn’t have to see them very often, so that was all right.
She lay picturing in her mind’s eye the events of the day. After a cooked breakfast – an occasion in itself as the normal fare was porridge and slices of bread and dripping – she had helped Enid prepare their Christmas dinner before going outside with Matthew and having a snowball fight with some of the neighbouring children. It was strange, she thought, because although Rory was only a year older than Matthew at fourteen, he seemed as old as Harry and quite grown up. Matthew, on the other hand, was full of fun and had a sense of humour that saw the comical side of everything.
They’d returned to the house rosy-cheeked and with bright red noses, and she’d helped Enid dish up their Christmas dinner. Her mouth watered as she imagined it. She’d had her first taste of beer, which she hadn’t liked, and she’d made Matthew laugh at the face she had pulled. In the afternoon they’d sung carols with Jed accompanying them on his mouth organ and she had shared her sweets round, and later the two daughters had arrived with their husbands and children and they’d all had tea together before they had gone home.
Tomorrow it would be just the six of them most of the time, until Harry’s sweetheart arrived for tea. She’d met Alice a few times and she liked her, although she was very quiet and barely spoke more than a word or two. Matthew had told her that he suspected Alice was nervous of his mother because she sensed his mam didn’t approve of them courting. His brother had said that Alice was quite different away from the house. She had felt sorry for Harry’s lass after that and had tried to overcome her own natural shyness and talk to her more. She wasn’t sure if she believed Matthew was right; Enid was lovely, the best person in the whole world, and she always made Alice welcome as far as she could see.
Molly nodded to herself in the darkness. Yes, Matthew must be mistaken. She was lucky, she was so, so lucky to have found this home and Enid most of all. She wanted nothing more than to live here for ever and be with her. Her da wouldn’t turn up now. If he had been going to come and find her he’d have done so before now. She was safe.
When the nightmare came it was the same as the ones that had gone before it but more intense: a big black figure chasing her through the cold darkness where her feet wanted to run but were bogged down so she could barely walk. She knew she had to escape before it caught her and sheer terror had her screaming and crying for someone to help her, but now she felt hot breath on her neck and she knew it was just behind her . . .
‘Me bairn, oh, me bairn, it’s all right. Molly, it’s all right, I’ve got you. Open your eyes, hinny, that’s right. Look, you’re in your own bed and I’m here. Nothing’s going to hurt you.’
She gazed up into Enid’s face and as Jed appeared in the doorway holding an oil lamp, she saw that she was indeed in her room in the fisherman’s cottage.
Enid gathered her into her arms and shaking uncontrollably, Molly choked out, ‘It – it was behind me.’
‘It was just a bad dream, lass,’ said Jed from the doorway, and then as Matthew and his brothers came onto the landing he added, ‘She’s all right, it was just a dream. Get back to bed, the three of you.’
‘It was going to catch me this time.’
‘Nothing and no one is going to catch you, me bairn.’ Enid hugged her tightly. ‘You hear me?’
‘I think it was me da.’
‘I daresay, but it’s just a dream. It’s not real.’
‘But what if he does come here? What if he finds me?’
‘If he came here Jed and the lads would deal with him, pet, and so would I. No one is going to take you from us, hinny, I promise you that. Not your da or your mam, no one. You’re here for good, you’re family, just as much as me other bairns. And listen to me, lass, no court in the land would make you go with him after me an’ Jed had had our say. You’re our daughter now, all right? This is your home and we love you, all of us.’
For the first time since she had escaped the hamlet, the tears that came were ones of release and deliverance. Enid wouldn’t let her da take her, she’d said she was their daughter now. This was her home. And she believed Enid; if she said it, it was true.
‘Now you snuggle back down and go to sleep, and this time you’ll dream about nice things, me bairn.’
As Molly slid down into the bed again Enid tucked the covers more closely round the small form. She and Jed had decided to tell everyone – even Mary and Cissy – that Molly’s family had died of the fever and the child had been going to be sent to the workhouse when they had stepped in and said that they would have her. Only the lads knew the real circumstances of how they’d found her, and they were sworn to secrecy.
Not that other folk were overly interested anyway, Enid thought. The fishing community had enough troubles to contend with, and earning sufficient money to put food on the table and pay the rent was their main concern.
She bent down and dropped a kiss on the smooth forehead. ‘No more tears, hinny,’ she murmured, stroking the silky blonde hair for a few moments. And it was like that, with the feel of the kiss still on her face, that Molly drifted off into a deep and dreamless slumber.
PART TWO
The Next Beginning
1904
Chapter Six
Sometimes she found it hard to believe that she had only been living with the Mallards for three and a half years, Molly thought as she walked back towards the town from the countryside where she had been gathering oak twigs for the smokehouse. It seemed there had never been a time when she hadn’t woken up in her little room in the fishing cottage and gone downstairs to help Enid prepare breakfast for Matthew and the others. Enid had been meant to accompany her today – they rarely did anything apart – but the older woman had been suffering with indigestion recently and a particularly bad bout had laid her low. Matthew had gone out early before breakfast to buy his mother some of the peppermint cordial she favoured.
Dear Matthew. Molly smiled as she pictured his tall figure in her mind’s eye, but then the familiar feeling of confusion took hold. Did Matthew feel the same way about her as she felt for him? Sometimes she thought so but then she wasn’t sure. He was always joking and teasing her, and his voice on occasion was deep and soft and quite unlike how he spoke to anyone else, even his mother, but he had never said in so many words that he cared for her in that way. The way a boy cared about his sweetheart. Did he look on her as a sister?
She knew several lassies hereabouts had been giving him the eye because his brothers ribbed him about it. Bess McCabe in particular had apparently been quite brazen in her advances, but when his brothers encouraged Matthew to take up with Bess he merely shook his head and said he was saving himself for someone special and wouldn’t be drawn any further.
She hated Bess McCabe. Molly’s lovely face fell into a scowl. She was always flaunting her voluptuous figure and making cow’s eyes at the lads, her with her long black hair and flashing blue eyes. Bess had no shame, that’s what Enid said, and she agreed with her.
She had been so lost in brooding about the girl she was jealous of that it was a few moments before she realized her name was being called. She looked up and Matthew was striding up the lane towards her, a big grin on his face.
‘Mam said where you’d gone and I thought I’d come and meet you,’ he called as he got nearer, taking her basket from her and tweaking her nose gently as he said, his voice changing, ‘What’s up? You look like you’ve lost a penny and found a farthing.’
‘Nothing, I’m all right.’ If he didn’t feel the same, she would die if he suspected how she felt about him. She wished her figure was more curvy like Bess’s; perhaps then he would see her as more than a little girl? She was fifteen now, after all, and some girls of her age had a lad.
‘You’re not.’ He stopped, taking her arm and turning her to face him. ‘Has someone upset you? Said or done something?’
She shook her head.
‘Tell me, Molly, ’cause I’ll sort them out,’ he said quietly and now there was no laughter in his eyes. ‘I said to Mam you shouldn’t have gone into the fields alone. You’re too bonny and some lads . . .’
‘What?’
‘Some lads don’t respect a lass the way they should.’
‘It’s nothing like that, Matthew.’
‘So there is something?’
‘Not really.’
‘This is like pulling hen’s teeth.’ He put the basket down and placed his big hands on her shoulders, looking down into the face that was so lovely it sometimes took his breath away. He had loved her for years, ever since she had first come to live with them as a young lass of eleven, but as his love had changed and matured into what a lad felt for his sweetheart, she seemed to continue looking on him as a brother. He didn’t want to do or say anything that would spoil their relationship but he’d made himself a promise he would wait until she was sixteen and then declare himself. Whatever transpired after that he would accept. He cleared his throat and said, ‘What’s troubling you? Tell me.’
‘I was just thinking about Bess McCabe.’
‘Bess McCabe? Why? What’s she done to put that look on your face?’
‘She hasn’t done anything. She’s just so pretty and – and all the lads like her.’
‘Well, here’s one that doesn’t.’ Her blue eyes flickered and for a moment he saw something in their depths that caused his heart to leap. ‘I don’t like her,’ he said again, more strongly.
‘You don’t?’ Her voice was low but like her eyes it betrayed an emotion that gave him the courage to speak out.
‘There will only ever be one girl for me, Molly, and I’m looking at her right now. I adore you, lass. I love you with all my heart and I know I’m no catch and you could do better than me but I can’t help what I feel, what I’ve always felt for you. I don’t want to be your brother—’
Her eyes were soft and shining with a light from within as she stopped his words by reaching up and putting her arms round his neck. As his lips took hers he pulled her tightly in to him, kissing her with a kind of gentle wonder at first and then, as he felt her response, more deeply and harder. They clung together, lost in the thrill of their first kiss and the knowledge of what it would mean for their future.
When finally they drew apart they stood staring into each other’s eyes for a long moment before they smiled. ‘You’re so lovely,’ he murmured huskily, reaching up and brushing a strand of sandy gold hair from her forehead. ‘I can’t believe you love me too.’
The dull March day that was overcast and threatening rain was filled with joy as she whispered, ‘I do, so much.’
‘You’ll marry me as soon as you’re sixteen?’
She nodded, then laughed as she almost sang, ‘Yes, yes, yes, Matthew Mallard, I’ll marry you,’ and then squealed as he swung her off her feet and twirled her round until she was giddy.
When he set her down he kissed her again and his voice was soft as he said, ‘I’ll love you all the days of me life, I promise you that, and into eternity.’
They walked home hand in hand, Matthew carrying the basket of twigs, so completely wrapped up in each other that neither of them noticed Bess McCabe when they passed her shortly before they reached the house.
When they entered the kitchen where Enid was knitting in front of the fire, she knew instantly what had occurred even before they told her. She opened her arms to them, her face beaming. ‘Oh, me bairns, me bairns,’ she murmured. ‘I couldn’t be any happier than I am right at this moment. You’re made for each other and that’s a fact. You’ll have a grand life, you mark my words. A grand life.’
‘We’re getting wed as soon as Molly’s sixteen,’ Matthew said, grinning like a Cheshire cat at his mother’s reaction.
Enid nodded, hugging them again. ‘And we’ll have a nice little do here,’ she said happily, ‘after the service, all right?’ Turning to Molly, she added, ‘Nearer the time we’ll go into town and buy some material for your wedding dress, hinny, and make it together when the men are on the boat.’
Molly smiled, her heart too full for words. How could someone be as happy as she was right at this moment and not burst? The months and years ahead were going to be wonderful, just wonderful, nestled as she was in the bosom of this family. Her family. She would never be unhappy again now she knew that Matthew loved her.
