‘How is Mary now?’ Jean asked.
‘Better for a rest.’ Ellen threw the end of her cigarette on the flag stones of the pub’s backyard and ground it out with her foot. She was feeling quite virtuous, insisting Mary stayed in bed for the last two days, and being back in charge of everything was good. And today was her reward to herself. ‘But she doesn’t want to overdo it again. She’s had a fright. So she’s kept her feet up today.’
‘I’ll call in later and see her.’
‘Best you don’t. No need to mither her.’
‘I won’t be mithering her.’ Jean looked affronted. ‘She’s my friend and I want to make sure she’s well.’
‘I’ve just told you.’
‘Yes, well, I’ll see for myself, won’t I?’
For a few minutes neither spoke.
Jean looked sideways at Ellen. ‘Do you think she’ll ever get back with him?’
‘Peter, you mean?’ God, Patrick’s bigotry really has rubbed off on her. ‘No, which, actually, I think is a shame.’ Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Ellen thought.
‘When I think what could have happened if they’d been found out during the war. And they put me in a dangerous position. They seem to have forgotten that.’ Jean folded her arms and pulled her chin in.
‘This isn’t about you, Jean.’ Ellen put one foot against the wall of the pub and leaned back, balancing. Chafing her arms to warm them she looked up at the sky. The sun had moved off the yard, only the roof of the little building at the end, housing the two lavatories, had a sliver of weak evening sun on it. She should have brought a cardigan with her. ‘She doesn’t want to talk about it. You have to go along with her.’
‘She can’t have the baby without being married. There’s enough gossip about this family as it is.’
‘She doesn’t care about that.’ Ellen took her cigarettes and matches from her skirt pocket and lit up.
‘Well, she should.’
‘Why?’ Ellen picked a piece of tobacco off her lower lip. ‘She doesn’t care what people think.’ She took a long drag and flicked the match away. ‘Anyway, she’s says she’s not going back.’
‘She’s so big now. They were talking about her in the Post Office.’
‘I hope you told them to mind their own business?’
‘I walked out.’
‘Oh, I’m sure that told them.’ Ellen inspected her fingernails, not even trying to keep her sarcasm under control.
Jean flushed. ‘Anyway, I’m going to call in on her later.’
Hell’s bells, why wouldn’t the woman take the hint? ‘She’s resting, I told you. Ted’s gone to work so she offered to stop in with William once we’d got him to bed.’ If he hadn’t insisted he had to go, she wouldn’t be stuck on her own with Jean. ‘He’s run off his feet getting ready for tomorrow. Where’s Patrick anyway?’
‘With the boy.’
‘Jack,’ Ellen said. Jean’s callous tone and the way she was refusing to say his name upset her. It was too much like listening to Hannah talking about Linda. ‘He’s called Jack. It’s a nice name. And it’s not his fault what’s happened, poor little bugger. You know what I went through with Ted’s mother, how she made sure I knew exactly what she thought of Linda, how I worried that Linda would hear her … understand. Do you really want to hurt a child like that?’
‘I’m nothing like Ted’s mother.’ Jean was indignant.
‘You should hear yourself.’
‘I wouldn’t hurt a child.’ Jean stopped, looked uncomfortable. ‘I wouldn’t…’
‘Look,’ Ellen said, ‘we’ve managed to go the whole day without bitching at one another but I can’t stand hearing you go on about the baby like that. What’s wrong with just calling him by his name?’
‘Patrick chose it.’ Jean pulled a face. ‘It … he,’ she said hastily seeing Ellen glare at her, ‘was called something else before.’
‘What?’
‘I don’t know. What I do know is he thought it clever to call some other woman’s kid nearly the same as our Jacqueline.’ Ellen looked blank. ‘Jacqueline … Jack?’
‘You don’t know what he was called before? Haven’t you seen the birth certificate?’
‘No, why should I have? I’m not interested.’
Ellen glanced indifferently at the large woman who stepped out of the pub’s back door, moved to one side to let her pass and was rewarded by a toothless smile.
‘Thanks pet.’ The woman shuffled across the yard. Her stout figure made the hem of her skirt uneven, showing more of her swollen calves from the back than the front. Her shoes, worn down at the heels, slapped against her feet.
Jean and Ellen stood in silence. The noise from inside the pub had risen steadily over the last hour and now the voices and the clink of glass vied with the bands making their way to the park.
Inside the lavatory there was a squeal of the chain being pulled, a pause and then another attempt. There was no following gushing of water. The door opened. ‘Bloody thing won’t flush.’ The woman hitched up her skirt and adjusted her large pair of white bloomers. ‘Sorry, no room to swing a cat in there, I couldn’t move my arms.’ She walked towards them. ‘I wouldn’t go in there if I were you,’ she said, tilting her head backwards. ‘Old Green’s ale’s right off today.’ She sucked her lips inwards. ‘Pretty bad, if I say so myself. Th’owd sod must be making a mint, he’s mixed it with summat and it’s not only water.’
She stopped in front of Jean and the two women stared at each other. Jean raised an eyebrow. ‘Yes?’
‘Don’t I know you from somewhere?’
‘I don’t think so.’ Jean wrinkled her nose.
Ellen lowered her foot and pushed herself off the wall. This was interesting. She knew Jean enough to know she was uneasy. Come to think of it, the old woman did look a bit familiar. There was something about her: her eyes, the way she lifted one bushy grey eyebrow, almost in comic imitation of Jean.
‘I’m Nelly Shuttleworth. I live on Barnes Street. You’re a friend of Mary Howarth, aren’t you?’
‘Yes, I remember you now. Frank Shuttleworth’s mother.’ Jean didn’t bother to hide her contempt.
Ellen’s mouth slackened. Frank’s mother? Oh God.
‘That’s right.’ Ellen saw the old woman pull her shoulders back and look straight at Jean. When she turned towards her and said, ‘You Mary’s sister?’ Ellen felt sick. It was the first time she’d spoken to her daughter’s grandmother.
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘You look alike. Well, except she’s got dark hair, of course. You got children?’
‘A girl and a boy.’ Ellen clenched her jaw. ‘Why do you ask?’
Nelly shrugged. ‘No reason. Does the little girl look like you?’
Oh God. Goose-bumps rose on Ellen’s skin. ‘Suppose so.’
‘That’s nice. I only had lads myself.’ She stopped. ‘Sorry, I suppose you know that already, don’t you?’ She looked long and hard at Jean. ‘Now, if I could just get past?’
Jean stepped aside.
Ellen stood inside the door, watching the woman push her way through the crowded tap room before speaking. ‘Nelly Shuttleworth.’
Jean moved her head in acknowledgement.
Linda’s grandmother. The words repeated in Ellen’s head. Why had she never thought about her before? ‘I need a pee.’ She made herself laugh. ‘I’ll have to hold my nose while I’m at it.’
Sitting in the semi-darkness, her head tilted back against the smoke of the cigarette in her mouth, Ellen’s mind worked furiously. Linda was Frank’s child. That woman, that dreadful woman was her grandmother. Stop it, she told herself, stop thinking about it. She felt quite ill.
When she came out she dropped her cigarette end onto the flags and screwed her foot on it. ‘We’d better find the girls,’ she said.