Walking Back to Happiness. Anne Bennett

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СКАЧАТЬ her nose and lodged at the back of her throat. She thought the canal, that Hannah pointed out with such pride as she explained that Birmingham was ringed with such waterways, was horrible. She’d never seen such brown, oil-slicked, stagnant water and it made a sharp contrast to the rippling stream near her old home that had glinted in the sun as it babbled over its stony bed.

      As the bus rumbled its way towards Erdington, Josie felt depression settle on top of her. She thought everywhere drab and without a blade of grass anywhere. Homesickness swept over her, so strong she felt tears prickling her eyes. She wondered how Hannah could stand living in such a place. She was frightened of arriving at her destination, frightened of Mrs Emmerson and her guesthouse where Hannah worked and wished with all her heart she was back in her home in Wicklow.

      But Hannah had not exaggerated about Grange Road. It was lovely. The pavements were as wide as the road and had trees planted every few yards and that alone went some way to making Josie feel better.

      Gloria Emmerson wasn’t frightening either. She was plump and motherly. Even her face was round, but it was kindly-looking with a smallish mouth and a squashed-up nose and really bright sparkly eyes. Josie smiled at Gloria as she swept them into the house and through to her personal rooms at the back. She had a casserole cooking in the oven and the smell of it revived Josie’s spirits somewhat as she realised that, despite the sandwiches and tea at Crewe, she was still very hungry.

      Gloria watched them surreptitiously as they ate. Josie, she thought looked very pale, though she supposed that was from the upset of her mother dying and the tiring journey they’d had. She thought her a plain little thing with her large brown eyes standing out in her head and her brown, nondescript hair.

      Not a patch on her aunt, she thought. Not that it had done her much good in the long run, she reminded herself with a sigh. She didn’t know whether she was doing her a favour or not pushing her into marriage. But then, Arthur Bradley was nothing if not respectable and after all, it was the best she could expect in the circumstances.

      Arthur was waiting for Hannah in the house he’d inherited in Harrison Road, just off Erdington High Street. It was a fine terraced house with three stone steps up to the front door, while an entry ran around to the back door and strip of garden.

      Initially, it had given Hannah a thrill of pleasure to realise that, after her marriage, she would be mistress of such a house. The front door opened onto a marble-tiled hall with the door to the front room with a bay window to the right-hand side, which Hannah decided would be the parlour, and carpeted stairs to the left. Behind the front room was another slightly smaller room and at the end of the hall was the door to the breakfast room, leading through to the kitchen and scullery, while a large cellar ran from front to back beneath the whole ground floor.

      It had originally had three large bedrooms upstairs, but at some time Arthur’s relative had cut one of the double rooms in two to make a much smaller bedroom and an indoor bathroom and lavatory. It was an unheard of luxury, though Arthur said in the daytime, he would prefer the lavatory outside to be used so as not to spend time traipsing up and down the stairs and thereby wearing out the stair carpet.

      Still, not to have to go out in the middle of the night was a bonus, and there was running water into the bath, provided you remembered to light the geyser. They had proper bathrooms at the hotel of course, one between four rooms, and Gloria had one in her living quarters which she allowed Hannah the use of once a week. Other times, Hannah had to make do with a bowl of water in her bedroom. What luxury to be able to have a bath when she liked.

      In fact, the whole house would be a joy to care for. It was even adequately furnished. It wasn’t her choice, but, in those austere post-war days with shortages and utility being the watchwords, she thought herself and Arthur fortunate to have the problem of furnishing a house solved for them. ‘In time, when things are easier, we might replace some of the furniture,’ she told Arthur on her first visit.

      ‘Hmph, yes, my dear,’ Arthur had said. ‘But you know money might not be so plentiful. I shouldn’t want to go into debt for anything. This hire-purchase scheme is not one I should like to get involved in.’

      Hannah, who’d never owed a penny in her life, agreed with Arthur’s sentiments. Gloria, when she told her, said it just showed what a sensible man he was, and wasn’t it just as well they hadn’t to buy even the basics before they could start married life, though she advised Hannah to buy if not a new bed, then certainly a new mattress.

      But that day, Hannah had more on her mind than a new mattress. She hoped Arthur would come to see that she had no alternative but to bring Josie home with her, without getting cross about it.

      He wasn’t the sort to rant and rave, but he could go very cold if he was displeased. And she knew this news would greatly displease him. He’d made his views adamantly clear in his last letter and would have presumed that Hannah would have carried them out.

      That was why Hannah had asked him not to come to the guesthouse that evening after he finished work, but go to the house instead where she would meet him as soon as she could get away.

      When she’d been a few minutes in the house, having told Arthur straight away about Josie, she knew she’d been right to come alone. He made no shout or cry of protest, but instead had gone very still, his mouth a tight line of disapproval, his nose pinched, his eyes coal black and sparking with anger, while a tic beat at the side of his temple.

      Arthur Bradley had looked forward to seeing Hannah again after a few days away. He didn’t love her – he’d never loved anyone but his mother, but he admired her.

      Before he’d had the house, his mother having died some years before, he’d stayed often at Gloria Emmerson’s guesthouse for he was more often in the Midlands area than anywhere else. For a start, the factory and head office he worked from was in Aston, just outside Birmingham. And then, Birmingham itself and the surrounding area being the home of light engineering, had many factories making the goods his firm needed to make the wireless sets they put together.

      Arthur disliked the travelling and staying at indifferent guesthouses. He’d done it for years and he’d been complaining to Gloria about it yet again one day when she seized her chance. ‘My boss, Mr Banks, is a family man himself, you see,’ he’d told Gloria. ‘He likes married men in the firm. Says you can rely on them. It’s all the married men who work in the offices and seldom have to go on the road.’

      ‘Maybe you should think about marriage yourself then?’ Gloria had suggested.

      ‘I never thought to marry,’ Arthur had said. ‘Anyway, I know no one suitable.’

      ‘What about Hannah?’

      ‘Hannah!’ Arthur had noticed Hannah of course, he couldn’t have failed to. Everyone who came to the place noticed Hannah.

      ‘Well, if you’ve got to be married, you could look further than Hannah and fare worse,’ Gloria had said. ‘She’s a well set-up lass.’

      ‘I know that all right,’ Arthur had said. ‘But I know my faults, none better. I’m a dull sort of chap for someone like Hannah.’

      ‘She’s not in the full flush of youth,’ Gloria reminded him.

      ‘I know that and I’m surprised. I thought someone would have snapped her up before now.’

      ‘Aye, well there’s been a war on, you know. The one who might have married Hannah never came back from it.’ No harm, Gloria thought, in telling him that much. ‘Ask her,’ she urged.

      She СКАЧАТЬ