Eileen tried to hide her shock when she first saw Chrissie as she stepped into the hall. The child was very small considering she was almost eleven, and she was thin, as all the children from the workhouse appeared to be. Her cheeks were slightly sunken in her wan little face and her deep blue eyes showed the anxiety she was filled with. It was hard to know what colour her straggly hair was as it seemed matted to her head.
And if that wasn’t enough, she also wore a coat and boots in the worst condition that Eileen had ever seen. As they entered the hallway, Father John dropped the child’s hand and said, ‘Take off your coat now, Chrissie, and I’ll hang it up.’
Chrissie obediently removed it and Eileen saw the girl’s dress was in a worse condition than the coat – thin and washed-out – and the threadbare cardigan would do nothing to keep her warm. Her heart constricted with pity and her eyes met John’s above the child’s head, registering her horror and shock.
‘There’s more clothes there,’ John said, indicating the suitcase he had placed on the floor.
Eileen gave a small sigh of relief, hoping there were more suitable garments in the case, and said as she picked it up, ‘Come on, Chrissie, and I’ll show you where you are to sleep tonight.’
Chrissie followed her up the stairs, which were lined with patterned lino, and into a small room that was so beautiful Chrissie gasped.
There was similar lino on the bedroom floor and there was also a fluffy blue rug beside the most comfortable bed Chrissie had ever seen. It was covered with a beautiful pink coverlet that Eileen later told her was called a counterpane. All her life so far she had only ever been given a sheet and a blanket to cover her as she lay in her hard bed in the bleak, cold dormitory alongside all the other children.
Her head was reeling with the thought this whole room now belonged to her, because the bed was not the only amazing thing in the room. The room had what Eileen later told her was a wardrobe, something else she called a dressing table, as well as a chest of drawers. Though even if Chrissie had known the names of these items at the time, she wouldn’t have known what they were used for.
When Eileen opened it up, she found that all that was in the case, apart from the bag containing a toothbrush, hairbrush and mirror, was a dress identical to the one Chrissie was wearing, one pair of knickers and a raggy old thing she supposed she used as a nightdress.
Eileen already knew the first thing she was going to do was to replenish Chrissie’s clothes and she had enough money to do it. Then she was going to draw the child a good bath.
When her husband had died in the early years of the Great War, it had been just about the same time the housekeeper-cum-cook had left her brother’s employ to take better-paid work in the munitions. After that, with so many war-related and therefore lucrative opportunities opening up for women, Father John had trouble engaging someone else.
It had seemed sensible for Eileen to move in and look after her much-loved brother and he insisted on paying her as he would anyone else. Eileen had a widow’s pension and no children to provide for and did not need the wages John paid her. Never having been a big spender, she had opened a post office account and had a tidy sum in there now.
She looked at the thin, undersized ragamuffin gazing around the room with a rapt expression on her face and she had a sudden desire to see what she would look like with more flesh on her bones and better clothes. She couldn’t think of a better way to spend her money than buying Chrissie some good warm clothes and boots and a topcoat that fitted.
They would be taking a dander to the Bullring, but not until they’d eaten, for all it was only eleven o’clock. Eileen had made a sustaining broth and would like Chrissie to have that inside her before she went out into the cold of the day in such inadequate clothes.
Chrissie had noticed the picture on the wall of Jesus on the cross. She knew about the cross because she had heard about it at Sunday school, but there wasn’t usually a man fastened to it and she didn’t think she liked it very much.
Eileen followed her gaze. ‘That’s Jesus Christ,’ she said.
Chrissie nodded for she knew about him.
‘He’s the son of God,’ Eileen went on. ‘Did you know that?’
Chrissie nodded and said in her timid little voice, ‘He died for our sins.’
She hadn’t understood the phrase when she had first heard it and still didn’t understand it now. She had been so afraid of being punished at the workhouse she had gone out of her way to do nothing that might be deemed even slightly naughty. At the workhouse, they often talked about souls being as black as coal and full of sin – well, some people’s might be like that right enough, but she imagined hers was pretty good really. Maybe not spotlessly white, but certainly a light grey.
Eileen wondered what Chrissie was thinking about so hard and she said, ‘Do you know who I am?’
Again Chrissie nodded. ‘Mr Masters said you’re Father John’s sister.’
Eileen smiled. ‘That’s right, I look after him and I’m going to look after you as well now.’
‘Oh!’ said Chrissie, because that was a novel experience – for her to be ‘looked after’.
‘Will you like that?’
Chrissie lifted her head and regarded the woman in front of her. Though she was still incredibly nervous, she thought Eileen looked all right.
‘Um,’ she said. ‘I suppose.’
‘And you can call me Auntie Eileen. Can you do that?’
Chrissie nodded her head and Eileen went on, ‘Shortly we’re going to the Bullring and I am going to buy you some warm clothes.’
Chrissie’s eyes lit up. Warm sounded good for she was often cold.
‘Are you really?’ she asked, hardly able to believe it.
‘I am really,’ Eileen assured her. ‘But before that we are going to eat. Are you hungry?’
Chrissie couldn’t remember a time when she wasn’t hungry. A gnawing emptiness was always there and the thin porridge she’d had for breakfast that morning had not gone even near to filling her stomach. When she’d arrived she had nearly passed out with the nourishing smell coming from the kitchen. The only time she had smelled things like that in the workhouse was when the trustees had one of their famous dinners.
So she rewarded Eileen with a big smile and said, ‘I am really, really hungry.’
‘Come on then,’ Eileen said, catching up Chrissie’s hand.
When they reached the kitchen, Eileen set up a flurry of activity setting out bowls and spoons and cutting bread.
Chrissie’s head swam at the aroma of the broth simmering on the range in the kitchen. There was a solid-looking scrubbed table in the kitchen but she thought it highly unlikely she would be asked to eat with these fine people.
But when she asked where she was going to eat, Eileen laughed before saying, ‘With us of course.’ She crossed the room and held Chrissie’s hands between her own. ‘You’re part of the family now.’
Chrissie started, because she had never been part of a family before. She looked down at Eileen’s hands holding hers. She made no move to remove her hands as she struggled to control herself, feeling tears prickle her eyes. She dared not let them fall though, because the workhouse didn’t approve of tears. There a child could get punished for doing a lot of it and she didn’t know if the woman she was to call Auntie Eileen felt the same way.
Eileen wondered at Chrissie’s stillness and lack of response. She had surprised herself by saying the girl was family, and knew it wasn’t what she’d envisaged when she’d agreed to take in the foundling John seemed to see himself as semi-responsible for. But when they had turned up that morning and she had seen him holding the scrawny child’s hand, she had realised the girl was scared witless and her heart had been touched. The child needed love as much as she needed food and Eileen had seen her face when she said the words, and known it was right that Chrissie be part of their family now.
She released her hands and said to Chrissie, ‘Now you go and find Father John, wherever he is, and tell him there’s food on the table. You’ll probably find him in the church.’
A few minutes later Chrissie was sitting at the table perfectly still as Eileen ladled delicious food into the bowl before her.
‘Oh lovely,’ Father John said, coming into the room and rubbing his hands. ‘Eileen does a very tasty broth, very tasty indeed. Just the thing to stick to a body’s ribs in this weather.’
Chrissie swung her head round to look out of the window. She shivered to see the day was so intensely cold that the frost from the night before still covered the yard.
Father John took his place beside Chrissie and said, ‘Are you hungry, Chrissie?’
‘Of course she is,’ Eileen said. Chrissie was glad she answered on her behalf since she was concentrating on the bread Eileen had put on the table. She didn’t want just one slice, she wanted slice after slice to cram into her mouth like a starving animal and eat and eat till she could eat no more. That was an experience she had never had and she used to fantasise about doing just that, like many of the workhouse inmates. But she knew she couldn’t shock Father John and Aunt Eileen with such a display of bad manners and iron resolve ensured her hands stayed meekly folded on her lap as Father John said, ‘Well, Eileen always maintains the best thing a person can ever bring to a table is a good appetite, isn’t that right, Eileen?’
‘It is,’ Eileen agreed. ‘And now, John, if you would like to say grace we can start.’
Chrissie was used to saying grace before a meal, and though she hadn’t heard the prayer Father John used before, she was just glad he didn’t linger over it. She waited for Eileen or Father John to give her permission to eat. And her head swam and mouth watered but she didn’t move a muscle.
At first, neither Father John or Eileen were aware that Chrissie hadn’t even touched her spoon. Eileen was surprised when she did notice for she had been expecting Chrissie to attack her meal with gusto.
‘Chrissie, what is it?’ Eileen asked. ‘You haven’t touched your meal.’
Father John, who knew more of the rules of the workhouse, said, ‘You’re waiting for permission to start, aren’t you?’
Chrissie turned grateful eyes towards him and nodded her head.
‘Well Chrissie, you have it and welcome,’ Father John said. ‘You are no longer at the workhouse and their rules don’t apply here. Once we have said grace you can eat straight away and as much as you want. So pick up your spoon and dig in.’
Even years later, after she was grown, she would never forget that first meal in the priest’s house: that first delicious spoonful, followed by another and another, the gravy dripping down her throat and sopped up by the crusty bread.
Father John and Eileen watched Chrissie in slight amusement. She didn’t talk to them because talking hadn’t been allowed in the workhouse, so it was not strange to her. If Father John or Eileen asked her a question, her replies were brief and to the point, though she answered respectfully enough. Chrissie didn’t want to be distracted from eating what she wanted to eat without censure for the first time in her life.
She ate and ate till she could eat no more and then she sat back with a small sigh of contentment. Her stomach felt as tight as a drum. Many times she had imagined what it would feel like to have a full stomach and it felt even better than she had imagined. But she remembered who had made the delicious meal and she turned to Eileen and said, ‘In all my life I have never tasted anything so delicious. Thank you so much.’
‘You are very welcome,’ Eileen said. ‘Let me tell you, it is a pleasure to cook for someone so appreciative. Now, there is little light these days in winter and now we have fed the inner man, as it were, we will have to clothe the outer one.’
Eileen saw her puzzled eyes and knew Chrissie hadn’t understood what she was talking about.
‘I mean,’ she explained, ‘that when we have washed up these things we will make our way to the Rag Market in the Bullring to buy you some new and warmer clothes.’
Chrissie was as excited to be going to the Bullring as she was at the prospect of getting new things to wear. She had never been. The only time she ever left the workhouse was to go in a crocodile to St Philip’s Cathedral, which was no distance away in Colmore Row. There she had listened to a man droning on and looked forward to the time when she would be syphoned off to Sunday school, which was usually better and often included a Bible story and sometimes colouring pictures.
Many had looked down on them in the congregation, even the Sunday school teacher, but that was so commonplace that it had hardly registered with Chrissie. What had registered was the life outside the workhouse. They had passed shops on their way to St Philip’s, all closed because it was Sunday, but she could imagine them bustling and full of life. They had passed a station called Snow Hill and what she would have given to have had a peep in there at the trains.
There were virtually no visitors to the workhouse. She heard from other inmate children that when the parents eventually arrived there, the families were split up. Mothers, fathers and children were separated and the parents expected to work to provide for their offspring. They didn’t see each other again until they left at fourteen. Some had relatives outside the workhouse but they didn’t come to visit. It wasn’t encouraged and, as one girl said:
‘Altogether there are six of us kids in here and we have a gran, but she’s had to give up her place and move with my auntie because she couldn’t pay the rent. My auntie also has a husband and four kids of her own and money’s always tight. But, if they came to see us, they might think that we expected them to get us out of here and they haven’t the money to do that. Tell you what though, I can’t wait till I’m fourteen and leave this place and see life beyond these walls. I’ll be in service and people say the hours are long, but I shan’t mind that if I get wages. At least in my time off I can do as I please and might even get to visit the Bullring that the warders are always talking about.’
If the warders were in a good mood they would tell the envious older girls what they did on their time off. The one place Chrissie longed to go to was theBullring, for the warders always made it sound like a magical place.
And she supposed it was, but she had been so used to walking with her head lowered she had only tantalising glimpses of it that first day. There were many things she would have liked to have asked Eileen too, but questions had not been encouraged at the workhouse. Holding Chrissie’s hand as they made their way through the throngs, Eileen was aware of the excitement running through her and yet she was quiet and almost still.
Eileen told her brother about her strange reaction that night after Chrissie had gone to bed.
‘She was clearly fascinated and yet she said nothing. I didn’t want to linger till I got her some warmer clothes, for she was chilled to the bone, and I didn’t want her to take a cold for I’d say she would have little resistance. But she gave me no indication she wanted to do that anyway and most times walked with her head down as we made straight for the Rag Market.’
Eileen went on to explain that when they had reached it, however, Chrissie had thought it a strange place for some goods were displayed on trestle tables while others were laid out on blankets on the floor. Eileen told her the Rag Market was where the bargains were to be had, and that there were second-hand stalls too which sold good-quality clothes relatively cheaply.
‘Was she pleased at any rate with the things you bought her?’ her brother asked.
‘John, she was speechless,’ Eileen said. ‘I mean, she isn’t loud anyway, but her eyes shone with happiness and I saw that before she lowered them to the floor again.’
‘Well, you spent a tidy sum on her.’
‘It was just lying in the bank doing nothing,’ Eileen said. ‘And it’s added to every week. Anyway, I didn’t buy anything she didn’t need: just undergarments; winceyette nightdresses; three winter-weight dresses for everyday and one better one for Sunday; two thick cardigans; three pair of thick black stockings; a pair of leather boots and a thick winter coat. And all bought at a fraction of the price they would have been in the shops. The woman was kind enough to let Chrissie step behind the curtain and dress in the new clothes right away. Once she was much more warmly clad we went back out into the Bullring again and with my encouragement she looked around the stalls.’
‘I did notice that she came back smarter than she went.’
‘I’ll say,’ Eileen said with a laugh. ‘What was really nice for her was that, as darkness began to fall, some of the stall-holders lit the gas flares and she was ecstatic about that.’
Chrissie could hardly believe the wonderful things that were happening to her. Later that same day, after a meal Eileen called a Lancashire hotpot, she was given a bath. They had never had proper baths of their own in the workhouse; sometimes they’d had to share baths with each other and the water was usually cold. The children avoided them if they could but when there was a lice infestation they couldn’t and it would be followed by kerosene being soaked into their hair … But this was a bath like she had never experienced before. Eileen rinsed warm and fragrant suds through her hair and the hot water made her feel sleepy and cosy.
‘Chrissie’s enjoyment in such simple things is making me look at things I’ve taken for granted in a different light entirely,’ Eileen said to John later. ‘I mean, she went into raptures about the warm bath. And by gum she needed that bath. I had no idea the dirt was so ingrained. As for her hair, that’s almost a different colour, and now it’s brushed and the tangles teased out, it’s very fair and quite pretty. In fact she’s quite a fetching child.’
The fetching child at that time was wondering whether she had died and gone to heaven. Her skin tingled from the bath and her hair was so soft she couldn’t stop running her fingers through it. Added to that, she was given yet more delicious food before dressing in one of the warm winceyette nightdresses and being tucked into the softest and comfiest bed she had ever slept in. There were blankets galore over her, all covered by the counterpane, so she knew she would never be cold in that bed whatever the weather outside, and she drifted into a deep and dreamless sleep.
Downstairs later, John was telling his sister about the missing locket, which still irked him. Eileen was outraged that anyone would take something from a child that had so little anyway.
‘Yes,’ Father John said. ‘It’s not the monetary value of the locket, though it might be worth something, but it might mean the world to Chrissie because it would show her that her mother loved her. Benedict Masters said it was pressed into her palm and her fingers had closed over it like a fist.’
Eileen asked, ‘How much do you trust this Benedict Masters?’
‘Before the locket went missing I would have said implicitly,’ Father John said. ‘Now I’m not so sure. I mean, even if he wasn’t involved in the theft of the locket directly, according to him it disappeared from a metal box that was in the safe in his office and he failed to safeguard it.’
‘Ah well, it’s lost and gone for ever and thank the Lord she wasn’t told of its existence,’ Eileen said. ‘What she never had she’ll never miss, as they say.’
‘Yes,’ Father John said with a sigh. ‘I’ll go and see Masters in a couple of weeks, just before Christmas, but I don’t hold out any great hopes he will have good news for me. Once the Christmas holidays are over they will be starting on the renovations so really if Masters has no news that’s the last chance gone.’
It turned out that Benedict Masters had news, but nothing really that benefitted Chrissie. Mortified that he hadn’t taken proper care of the locket, he had talked to those members of staff who’d reported things stolen from their rooms and called the police. Masters had had doubts about the honesty of a male warder but never had anything concrete to sack him for. When, as part of the investigation, the police searched the man’s room, a number of items were found, including some items that hadn’t even been reported missing, but there was no sign of a locket.
‘When the police took the man away I searched that room myself,’ Masters told the priest. ‘I turned it upside down, sure that if he had taken all those items he had taken the locket as well, but …’
‘He hadn’t?’
‘He may well have taken it, but he denies it and we can’t prove otherwise.’
‘Thank you, Benedict,’ Father John said. ‘It’s really only what I expected.’
‘Sorry I couldn’t do more,’ Masters said. ‘How’s young Chrissie Foley shaping up?’
‘Oh Benedict, you wouldn’t know the girl,’ Father John enthused. ‘Eileen is very good with her and becoming fonder of her as each day passes. She has a pension of her own because her husband was killed in the early years of the Great War. I pay her a wage too, not nearly enough, but the only figure she would accept and that reluctantly. Anyway, she took Chrissie to the Bullring and kitted her out with warmer clothes and she looks a treat and she’s filling out. Mind, she would do for she has an appetite like a hunter.’
‘Oh, you know what I felt about the food they got here,’ Masters said. ‘It always falls short of adequate, no matter how much I badger and berate the guardians to improve things. They prefer to line their own pockets.’
‘Well, she was thin when she came, almost gaunt if I’m honest, and though Eileen was upset about it, she looked at it as a bit of a challenge to feed her up and she is an exceedingly good cook. Mind you, we had to encourage the child to have more if she wanted.’
‘Children are not encouraged to ask for seconds in the workhouse, for there are none.’
‘And it wasn’t only not asking for seconds,’ Father John said. ‘She was initially scared to put a foot wrong in case she got into trouble. Once she inadvertently knocked a cup off the table and she couldn’t stop saying how sorry she was. She shook from head to toe. It was pitiful and when we said it had been an accident and it was all right, her relief was palpable. Apparently she thought she was going to be beaten. Anyway, that was two weeks ago and now she is transformed. She is best of friends with Eileen and they have decorated the whole house and church for Christmas. And as well as this, she has helped Eileen ice the Christmas cake, stirred the pudding and made mince pies on her own – under Eileen’s directions of course.’
‘Is she not going to school?’
‘Not yet,’ Father John said. ‘It was so late in the term there was little point when she arrived and, as Eileen said, she needed more meat on her bones before she faced the rigours of school. Anyway she would probably be very far behind the others for Eileen says she can barely read, though she’s far from stupid. Eileen was a teacher before her marriage and she wants to work with Chrissie and get her at least reading more confidently and better with her numbers so that she is not so far behind the others when she does begin school.’
‘Does she need that level of education for the type of work she will be aiming for?’
‘You’re deciding her future when she’s still a child,’ Father John said. ‘Chrissie’s future is a little brighter now because she will not be coming from a workhouse but from a private home. That might make a difference to the employment open to her. Anyway, Eileen says education is never wasted and helps to open doors.’
‘All right,’ Masters said. ‘Point taken.’
‘Now I must be off,’ Father John said. ‘Eileen is having a little birthday tea for Chrissie because she’s eleven today and I promised I would be there.’
No one had ever made a fuss of Chrissie’s birthday before and she was fizzing with excitement. Eileen had secretly made a sponge cake for it and, as well as the sandwiches, there were also little iced biscuits and scones and something very delicious called jelly and custard.
And if that wasn’t enough, Eileen had bought her a pair of nice warm slippers and a book. Chrissie looked at the book with slight alarm and hoped Eileen wouldn’t expect her to read it. It hadn’t even got any pictures in it to give her a clue what it was about. But Eileen had caught the look and, having expected such a reaction, said, ‘As well as poor teaching, I would hazard a guess that one of the reasons you don’t read well is because you couldn’t see the purpose of it. Am I right?’
‘I suppose,’ said Chrissie. ‘Though maybe it’s because I’m just stupid. That’s what they used to say at the workhouse.’
‘Chrissie, I used to be a teacher so know what I’m talking about and I am telling you now you are far from stupid,’ Eileen said. ‘What books did you have to read in the workhouse?’
‘A few picture books and the Bible.’
‘Well, there is of course nothing wrong with the Bible,’ Eileen said. ‘But it isn’t easy to read and understand and I think the thing to do is show you the magic that can be between the pages of a book. This book is called The Secret Garden and I could read a chapter to you every night and let the words paint pictures in your head. Would you like that?’
Though she had preferred some warders to others, Chrissie had never felt love for another human being before. But since settling in the priest’s house, every time she thought of Eileen, she felt a warm glow in her heart. She didn’t know if that was love, she just knew she would jump through hoops to please her, and so she said, ‘Yes, that would be lovely.’
Eileen smiled in satisfaction, knowing that once Chrissie realised what pleasure she could have from books, she would want to learn to read them for herself. Children learnt much better if they wanted to do something.
‘We’ll start this evening,’ she said. ‘And then after Christmas I’ll enrol you in the library. We can take two books out and keep them for a fortnight, so think of the pleasure we have ahead.’