A Woman's Place (30 page)

‘But …’

‘All I’m doing is seeing that you and your ’usband – who’s the nicest, most upright man I know – can benefit from it now, not when I’ve popped me clogs. Waiting until then ain’t going to do you two any good at this very moment, is it? And it’s this very moment what matters, not ten years from now or, God willing, twenty years. I don’t intend to go all that quick!’

Her chuckle was full of amusement, but Eveline could only stare in silence, her thoughts in turmoil. Seeing it, Victoria grew serious. She put out a hand across the kitchen table and laid it on one of her granddaughter’s now lying tense and curled on its baize surface.

‘You take my offer, gel. It’ll do my ’eart good to see it put to some use. But one thing I want you to promise me – don’t say anything to your mother about this, or to anyone. What they don’t know won’t grieve them. In fact there ain’t no need to say anything about your Bert paying for ’is training. Just let them think he’s got ’imself another job. I’d ’ave
given
it to you both quite readily, but giving causes embarrassment. To my mind lending’s much kinder.’

Eveline’s eyes were filling with tears. ‘I just don’t know what to say.’

‘Just make sure he don’t give up ’alfway through this training thing. It’d grieve me to see that happen and money wasted.’

‘Oh, Gran, he won’t!’ she cried fervently, still unable to believe this was happening. Tears were trickling down her cheeks. ‘It’s always been his dream and he’s worked so hard, too hard to ever let you down.’

‘I know. I just thought I’d mention it.’

‘But I don’t know how long it’ll take to pay it all back.’

‘I told you, it don’t matter. In time I ’ope he’s earning a good enough wage for it to be no problem. It ain’t like he’ll be an apprentice what earns next to nothing. All I want is to see me favourite and nicest grandchild do well in life. You deserve it. You’ve ’ad enough ’ard knocks. He deserves it as well, after what he did for you. And I trust him.’

‘He will, Gran.’ She felt her grandmother’s hand tighten on hers.

Somehow, trying to say thank you seemed inappropriate, the words so trite that they would seem diminished in the uttering. The immensity of her gratitude was beyond words and her grateful hug felt just as insubstantial as she leaped up, Gran patting her shoulder as she clung to her.

‘Now go and tell him he can pay for this training of ’is.’ She gave Eveline a gentle little push. ‘Off you go now. I’ll sort it all out for you.’

Fourteen months Albert had been with Smarts Ltd, his dream of becoming a qualified mechanical engineer realised. It had been a struggle trying to keep the family on his small wage during his training with Eveline bent on repaying Gran’s generous loan, even though she insisted it wasn’t necessary.

‘But it
is
necessary,’ Eveline stressed firmly. ‘We’ve got you to thank for it and Albert can’t show his gratitude enough.’

‘That’s all the thanks I need.’

‘No, Gran. What you did was save his life. But for you, this would never have happened. He’s got his dream. And all thanks to you.’

‘Well, he worked hard for it too. And there’s no need to pay it back.’

‘But we’re going to, every last penny, and as quick as we can. It’s the least we can do to show our deep gratitude.’

But it wasn’t easy. Paying back would take years, bit by bit, week by week watching the debt grow less by such a tiny amount despite Gran’s refusal to consider interest. Sometimes Eveline felt it was a rope round her neck – a self-inflicted form of slow strangulation.

Her dream of a better flat had quickly faded as she viewed the small wage Albert had brought home whilst training.

He’d hand most of it to her for housekeeping and towards repaying the loan, keeping so little for himself that her heart bled for him. He’d even spoken of giving up cigarettes, his only pleasure, and she couldn’t even remember when he’d last gone to a pub. Then there was Helena to feed and clothe. She was growing so fast it was hard to keep up with her. It had all cost money and sometimes she’d felt sick with worry.

But now, April 1913, Albert’s training was behind him, though he intended to go on studying and become even better.

That Saturday after a week working as a proper engineer he came home, storming into the kitchen like some triumphant knight having floored his quarry, to empty his entire pay packet on the table as she turned round to greet him, his dinner all ready for him.

Two pounds, five shilling and sixpence!’ he blurted. ‘
Two pounds, five and six!
That’s only for starters. The more I study the better it’ll get. I feel like bloody landed gentry! What’ll we do with it?’

‘Put some of it away,’ she said promptly, her thoughts already flying to a nice flat in a few months’ time. ‘For a rainy day,’ she said as an excuse.

He stared at her then laughed. ‘There ain’t going ter be no more rainy days from now on.’

‘We’ve still got to pay back Gran’s loan. We can give her a bit more now. It’s only right.’

‘Yes, it is,’ he agreed, ceasing to laugh, but then brightened. ‘But we’ll still ’ave enough to live a lot better than we’ve done in the past. I can ’ave a beer when I want and not worry about spending on fags. I might even be able to afford a decent suit, not that second ’and stuff we’ve ’ad to get off stalls. And our Helena can ’ave nice dresses from proper shops.’

She loved the way he said
our
Helena as if she were his own child. It wrung her heart that she’d still not fallen pregnant yet. But there was still time. Helena was coming up to three; her birthday was next month and they had been scrimping to get her a cheap little toy for her birthday. Now they could buy something nice. Just so long as when another child was born, the affection he’d had for Helena wouldn’t fade in preference for a child of his own loins.

‘And you,’ he went on, his round, brown eyes shining. ‘You can ’ave a lot more nice things.’ Since leaving his job behind a counter his speech had roughened again, but she didn’t care.

‘I’m happy with what I’ve got,’ she said, but her mind was on putting away a bit each week towards the rent of a nicer flat, her heart’s desire.

Albert grimaced. ‘I’ve ’ated seeing yer scrimping and scraping ter look decent. Now yer can buy something really nice for yerself.’

Eveline laughed in sheer pleasure, viewing the coins spread across the kitchen table. Yes, a dress, new hat, another pair of stockings, a few bits of underclothing, she’d start putting a bit away each week from the better housekeeping, dividing it between three tins – one for clothing for herself and Helena, one to paying back the rest of Gran’s generous loan and one towards the day they’d move into a new flat as good and nicely kept as Connie’s. She would try not to let the feeling of superiority it would give her show, though it was already creeping in, as close and loving towards Connie as she was.

Connie stood in the centre of the as-yet empty Finnis Street flat. ‘Eveline, I’m thrilled to bits for you.’

It was said with genuine pleasure that made all sense of superiority melt into humility. ‘It’s not as nice as yours,’ she said quickly. ‘I’d have liked it to have been higher and have all the views you’ve got.’

A third-floor flat. There hadn’t been a lot of choice really, since few were willing to exchange to a basement; it could have meant waiting months for a transfer. This flat had come up suddenly, its elderly tenant having died. It had been the only one on offer and Eveline had felt she couldn’t wait much longer, so eager was she to get out of her dingy old letting.

Excitement clutched at her every time she glanced around at this new place. In the next block to his mother and brother, Albert had said, ‘I can keep an eye on ’er. With me brother courting, out most evenings, I can pop in there any time.’

With Wilmott Street separated from Finnis Street by the school, he’d never had time before to chase over there, with his studies meaning him wasting time walking even that small distance. Now he was happy, so long as he didn’t start spending all his time with his mother, Eveline thought, perhaps a little unkindly.

Connie was saying, ‘Except that you won’t have so many flights of stairs to climb as I,’ and for the first time Eveline realised the difficulty one had with a small child and a pushchair or pram.

She thought of the three flights she must now climb. In her basement flat all she’d had to do was ease Helena’s pram down the eight shallow steps, often leaving it outside the door. Here there’d now be three flights to struggle with. How much worse was it then for Connie? Along with lots of mothers she had solved the problem by carrying the child up first, leaving her secure in her highchair while she’d go back down for the lightened vehicle. ‘Still, she is getting older,’ Connie said. ‘Eventually I won’t need to go through that chore.’

Often several empty perambulators would be left unattended inside the entrance, getting in other people’s way. At times it caused quite a few angry words among tenants.

‘Maybe one day,’ she went on, ‘George will get another promotion and you never know, we might even be able to find ourselves a nice little house.’

As she left, Connie’s thoughts strayed to the fine house her parents owned, with staff, and a motor car driven by a chauffeur. She thought often about them, comparing their lifestyle with her own. What if she hadn’t met George? Her life would now be rather like theirs, with a lovely home and servants. She would never have known hardship or the misery of her separation from them; her father would still dote on her no doubt, and on his granddaughter. But she wouldn’t have had Rebecca. She might have had a son, or not have had any children. She wouldn’t have known the joy of loving George, and to even think of Rebecca never having been born made her go cold. One small thing, such as meeting a stranger on a train, changes so much in life.

Wheeling Rebecca along the street past Eveline’s grandmother’s block, turning into Three Colt Lane and then into her own street, she thought the whole time of her family and bitterness settled in her breast at all the small hurts that had occurred since Father had told her to leave.

She’d had a letter from her sister Verity earlier this year, the first in over a year. ‘I do wish Father would try to forgive you,’ she had included, even now after all this time ignorant of the pain those few words had caused.

Married now, Verity and her husband had a fine house, but it seemed money did not always bring happiness. Last year she had given birth to a stillborn son. She herself had been terribly ill. But not one word of it had reached Connie until this year, and it was hurtful; her own mother had decided not to convey the sad news to her. Verity’s eventual letter had said Father had been filled with grief at losing his first grandson, having looked forward to being a grandfather! She had almost torn her sister’s letter to pieces in anger. How could he not acknowledge that he was already a grandfather? How could he spurn a little child, his own granddaughter?

She had written back to Verity in case she had wondered why she hadn’t sent her condolences at the time, saying how sorry she was about her loss, that she’d had no idea and to please keep in touch, but so far there had been no reply. Out of a sense of duty she had also written to Mother, again receiving no reply. Remembering Mother’s previous cold welcome she had kept away. But so many times her parents’ faces floated through her head, together with those of Verity and her younger brothers, causing such pain as to bring her to tears – tears which she would wipe swiftly away in suppressed fury before turning her mind to other things.

Apart from her little family’s needs,
other things
meant concentrating on suffragette news. Despite all efforts, all the promises and negotiations, they were as far away from women’s suffrage as ever. It was so disheartening at times and sometimes it felt that even their leaders who strove so hard to keep everyone’s spirits up were losing heart.

It showed in the dissension between the different unions, especially between the WSPU, who still claimed that strong-arm tactics constituted the only argument men understood, and the NUWSS, who still insisted gentler negotiation with parliament was the only way. She still wondered if they weren’t right.

‘I’m not at all happy with the way our union carries on,’ she said to Eveline. ‘All this violence hasn’t brought us any nearer to getting the vote. I do wonder if I shouldn’t have gone over to the NUWSS.’

‘They’ve got no further than us for all their peaceful means,’ snapped Eveline.

She could snap at times. Connie had put it down to frustration living in that horrid little basement of hers and hoped she might now become more relaxed in her new flat. ‘The government just cocks a snook at them,’ Eveline continued. ‘At least we make them sit up and take notice.’

‘By cutting telephone wires?’ Connie reminded her as they drank coffee in Eveline’s new kitchen. ‘Smashing windows, burning empty houses, throwing acid on golf courses. It merely turns the public against us, makes parliament even more determined not to give in to us.’

‘One day we
will
achieve our goal, you’ll see,’ Eveline repeated for the umpteenth time, as if that was argument enough. It always irked Connie.

‘How can we when all they see is our apparent irrational behaviour? We are seen as incapable of dignified argument. All we seem to be achieving is to make fools of ourselves.’

‘Such fools as they still put in prison and force-feed as soon as they go on hunger strike! Such fools that they’re so scared of any being hailed as martyrs, they’re now releasing them as they weaken and as they recover take them back into custody to start the whole thing all over again. It’s brutal. Only those who’ve been through it know just how brutal.’

That always hit home; it evoked the memory of Connie’s father leading her away, in front of all those willing to go to prison for their beliefs. She’d fall silent, as ever putting an abrupt end to the argument.

It happened this Sunday morning as she and Eveline walked in the warm sunshine with their girls in Victoria Park. This time, remembering how she’d let her father control her, yet when she’d rebelled he’d turned her out, her fingers tightened around little Rebecca’s hand, so tight that the toddler, nearly two and three-quarter years old now, protested, ‘Oh, Mummy, hurting me!’