Twopence to Cross the Mersey. Helen Forrester

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СКАЧАТЬ to him, while he shivered with cold and rubbed his blue hands together to restore the circulation.

      Finally, the priest said to him, ‘First things first. You must have a fire or your youngest child will die. Probably I can persuade old Wright to bring up a hundredweight of coal. I have some small funds and I will bring some food. After you have eaten perhaps I can advise you a little.’

      He put his hand out over the children’s heads in a gesture of blessing, said goodbye, strode out of the room and let himself out of the house.

      The boys immediately broke into jubilant conversation with each other at the idea of food, and gradually Father began to relax a little for the same reason, though his face looked pinched and white. He had spent hour upon hour in the employment exchange, being chivvied from one huge queue to another, until he had finally got himself registered for work as a clerk. He was not eligible for unemployment insurance as he had never contributed to that fund, and the employment exchange clerk just laughed when he asked when he might hope to be sent to apply for a job. There were, he said, a hundred men for every job, and my father’s age was a grave difficulty – at thirty-eight he was too old to hope seriously for employment.

      He had hardly finished telling us of his adventures, when the doorbell rang again. I answered it quickly this time.

      A surly voice from beneath a large hump inquired where it should put t’ coal, and not to keep ’im waiting cos ’e ’adn’t all night to run after folks as ’adn’t enough sense to get it in the daytime.

      The landlady had shown me where our coal could be stored, and the coalman clomped through the house behind me, scattering slack liberally around him, and heaved the coal expertly over his head, out of the sack and into a broken-down box in an out-house. Then, still muttering about improvident folks, he stomped back through the passage and departed into the darkness.

      I flew in to Mother, and it seemed no time at all before we had a huge fire glowing, with Father’s coat and jacket and Edward’s nappy steaming in front of it. The already heavy atmosphere of the room was intensified by the cloying stench of these garments drying, but we did not care. We learned then that, when one has to choose between warmth and being half-fed, except in the last extremities of starvation, warmth is the better choice.

      An hour later the priest presented himself again, carrying two large boxes and accompanied by a boy carrying two more. The boy dropped his burdens on the step and trotted away. The priest came in, at my shy invitation. He smiled at the sight of the comforted children kneeling by the fire between the drying clothes, and, with Father’s aid, he unpacked the boxes.

      The table was soon loaded with six loaves of bread, oatmeal, potatoes, sugar, margarine, a tin of baby milk, two bottles of milk, salt, bacon, some tea, a bar of common soap, a pile of torn-up old sheeting (for cleaning, and for the baby, he explained apologetically) and, wonder of wonders, a towel, a big one.

      The priest sat down, and called the boys to him, while Father and I made baby formula and porridge, and Alan collected all the dishes he could find. It felt oddly like a Christmas celebration, and even Mother seemed to come a little out of her apathy as she sipped the tea and ate the porridge Father eventually brought to her. I fed the baby while the children stuffed themselves with porridge, bread and margarine and chattered excitedly, Avril’s shrill falsetto and Brian’s contralto occasionally emerging from the general hubbub. At the priest’s insistence, Father and I finally ate, and Father became more his old, lively self.

      We boiled another panful of water, and I took Fiona, Brian, Tony and Avril to the bathroom, and washed their hands, faces and knees. They had not had their underclothes off for thirty-six hours and did not smell very sweet, even after my washing efforts, but a quart of water does not go very far in washing four people, and I reasoned that the beds stank so much that they were bound to smell by morning no matter what I did.

      Afterwards I took them into the bedroom, tucked their overcoats over them, covered these with a greasy blanket, heard their prayers, and returned to Alan and my parents.

       Five

      Unemployment was so rampant in Liverpool that the young priest felt it necessary to warn Father that getting work would be a very slow process – he was too kind to say that it would be virtually impossible. He suggested that Father should apply for parish relief.

      ‘What is that?’ asked Father.

      ‘Well, it is really the old poor-law relief for the destitute, but it is now administered by the city through the public assistance committee. More help is given by way of allowances rather than by committal to the workhouse.’

      Father went white at the mention of the workhouse. I stared in shocked horror at the priest. I had read all of Charles Dickens’s books – I knew about workhouses.

      ‘I see,’ said Father, his voice not much more than a whisper. ‘I suppose I have no alternative.’

      The priest asked about our accommodation, and sat, drumming his finger-tips upon his skirt-clad knee, when he was told that our landlady wanted her rooms back for another tenant, at the end of the week.

      At last he spoke.

      ‘There are a lot of older houses in the south end of the city. You might find a couple of rooms in one of those. Some of them are still quite respectable. There is also a High Church school in that area, which is a little better than an ordinary board school. However, you might have to pay twopence a week for each child at the school – and that might pose a problem.’

      Father said optimistically that he could not imagine such a small amount being a problem, once we got settled.

      The priest smiled at him pityingly, opened his mouth to speak and then decided otherwise. We would soon learn.

      ‘Would you like to ask me about anything else?’ he inquired.

      ‘No, thank you,’ said Mother suddenly. ‘You have been most kind.’

      I was surprised at her firmness, and then remembered that neither she nor Father had ever had any great respect for the Church. In addition, the priest represented to her the class of people who, she must have felt, had left her in the lurch when she most needed friends. She had accepted this stranger’s help because she had to, but her grey eyes were steely, when she politely held out her hand to indicate dismissal.

      I could see Father beginning to dither, like Bertie Wooster. He was obviously loath to let the priest go and yet was afraid that, if he said anything, Mother might start another bitter family row.

      The priest settled the question by getting up abruptly. There was a hurt expression in the mild eyes. He ignored Mother’s hand but inclined his head slightly towards her, as he moved through the crowded room to the door. Alan, Father and I hastened to see him out, with many protestations of gratitude. He bowed gravely, blessed us and, with slow, dignified tread, went down the steps into the darkness.

      I closed the door, and stood leaning against the inside of it, while the others went back to the family. I had hoped so much that the young priest would have noticed that there were five children of school age in the family and realized that only four had been enrolled in his school. I had envisaged him instructing Father to send me with the others for lessons the following morning. But he had not noticed. I fought back my disappointment and told myself that I would probably go to school as soon as we were settled in a more permanent home, and then I СКАЧАТЬ