The early weeks of 1914 were the happiest Maggie could remember. She was an outcast from her old life in the teeming streets of West Newcastle, yet she was experiencing the greatest freedom of her life. It seemed to mark the dawning of a new age of optimism and progression. Ready to continue her campaign of militancy when instructed by headquarters, she felt increasingly that they were winning the fight for the vote. More and more politicians were speaking out on their behalf and the publicity given to the treatment of women prisoners was beginning to sicken citizens with a conscience. She had been told to lie low for several weeks, until the furore over the arson attack at Hebron House had died down.
Yet she managed to meet other suffragettes in discreet tearooms in the east of the city, in parlours of sympathetic supporters. She frequently wondered what Alice Pearson thought of her now, but all she could learn about the magnate’s daughter was that she was touring on the Continent.
Maggie continued to work part-time for the coal merchant and in the evenings she looked forward eagerly to George’s return from the shipyard.
Sometimes she shook her head in amazement at how they had been thrown together in adversity. She had thought it impossible that she would find such a soul-mate in a man, least of all in a man like George Gordon, raised in a tough community that took men’s superiority over women for granted. But beneath his brawny, aggressive stance, George was as much an idealist as she was.
At night they would curl up by the small fire and express aloud their dreams of how they would better the world together. Sometimes they went to the house of a friend of George’s, a Jewish musician called Isaac Samuel who attracted around him a small group of intellectuals. George had met him at the Pearson library and been amazed by the thin, bearded Russian who had fled persecution and arrived on a merchant vessel up the Tyne. He scraped a living by giving music lessons, while his sister Miriam took in sewing.
Maggie enjoyed the cosy evenings in Isaac’s over-furnished rooms, sitting among chairs strewn with music and books, arguing with the others about religion and imperialism, capitalism and the new Bolshevism seeping out of Russia. She was the only woman who took part in the discussions; the enigmatic Miriam chose instead to read or embroider by the corner lamp, unperturbed by their arguing.
‘Lenin’s right,’ George announced one evening. ‘The workers need to organise more into a revolutionary force. Organise and protest - disrupt production if necessary. Not like our lot who allow the bosses to divide them into different classes, so each thinks they’re a step above the others.’
‘But your bosses,’ Isaac Samuel said with a wave of his long bony hands, ‘allow a great freedom of speech among the working classes. You have open-air meetings and say things that would get you shot in my Russia.’
‘There’s precious little freedom of speech for us lasses,’ Maggie interjected.
‘Ah, the lasses,’ Isaac nodded his bearded face. ‘In Russia they are respected once they are old and toothless.’
Maggie laughed and shook her head.
‘But the working classes here have been bought off,’ George said, returning to what preoccupied him. ‘Every time we organise and push for more rights, they build us a park or an institute or a church to keep us quiet and grateful.’
‘Or a library to read in,’ Isaac mentioned with the ghost of a smile.
‘Or a rowing club to compete in,’ Maggie added, grinning at their host.
George, realising they were teasing him, grunted. ‘All right, I’m just as easily bought as the next man. But reading and sport should be there for everyone, not dependent on the whim of some patron whose money was made by the sweat of the workers anyhow.’
Miriam rose and poured them all tea from a huge hissing and steaming machine they called a samovar and the discussion changed to religion. George would have none of it in his workers’ Utopia, while Maggie and Isaac demanded complete freedom to worship without persecution.
‘The Sabbath was invented to occupy the working classes, so they wouldn’t cause trouble on their day off,’ George announced, playing devil’s advocate.
‘If it wasn’t for God and the Sabbath,’ Isaac parried with a smile, ‘the working classes would not have their day off.’
‘It’s hardly a day off for the women anyway,’ Maggie reminded them quickly. ‘They still have to dress the bairns in their Sunday best and slave over the stove making the Sunday dinner, then clear up while the men sleep it off.’
‘Sounds like paradise, doesn’t it, Isaac?’ George winked.
Maggie gave him a playful push. Miriam promptly invited them to lunch on Sunday without glancing up from her sewing and Maggie realised that the quiet, grey-haired woman had been listening all along.
Later, stamping through the raw, dimly lit streets, oblivious of the cold and energised by their debate, they hastened to bed and made love.
At times Maggie felt utterly free and fulfilled by her new life, but at others she was overwhelmed by a desire to see her mother and family and return to the streets where she grew up. The wanting would start as a dull nagging, like mild toothache, then worsen into a sharp pain of needing that left her irritable and restless. As the winter wore on with no missions to undertake for the WSPU, Maggie felt her inaction and creeping guilt about neglecting her family grip her like a malaise. Worst of all, she found she could not talk to George of her mixed feelings towards her family. He bristled when she mentioned them and bad-mouthed them for rejecting her, so that it was better to keep her worries to herself.
But every so often, George would catch her lifting the window blind and gazing out over the rooftops, preoccupied.
‘What’s wrong, pet?’ he asked one dark Saturday in late February. The sky was the colour of gun metal and had never grown more than half light all day.
She let the blind drop and sighed.
Her bouts of restlessness made George nervous, his greatest fear being that she would tire of her restricted life with him and return to her family. He wanted them always to be together, would have proposed marriage if she had not declared so forcefully that marriage was a form of enslavement for women that needed thorough reform in law before she would entertain it. They seemed to be of one mind on so much, George thought irritably, and yet he was aware of her holding back from him - not physically - but somewhere deep within her being.
‘Nothing’s wrong,’ she answered glumly.
‘It’s your mam, isn’t it?’ George said, a note of irritation creeping into his voice.
‘Aye,’ Maggie admitted abruptly. She was tired of pretending that nothing was wrong. ‘The last time I saw her she looked that poorly.’
‘We’d have heard if anything had happened.’
‘Geordie!’ Maggie was hurt. ‘Am I supposed to wait around until I hear she’s kicked the bucket? Wait for Mr Heslop to come creeping round like a ghoul with bad news?’
‘If that preacher sets foot near here again, I’ll kick his self-righteous backside into next week!’
‘You shouldn’t speak about him like that,’ Maggie said, crossing her arms in front of her. ‘Mr Heslop came here out of the best of reasons, to try and get me to gan to Susan’s wedding. And perhaps I should’ve - I feel that bad about it. I haven’t spoken to me sister or even sent her a gift - I’ve done nothing for her.’
‘And why should you?’ George replied indignantly, remembering how Susan had shown her disapproval of him. ‘She turned her back on you when you went to prison, remember,’ he said, his temper growing with his anxiety. ‘Why should you bother with her now?’
Maggie was annoyed to be reminded of how her family had been quick to disown her over the launch episode. She realised suddenly how much their rejection hurt, not just her sisters’ open hostility but her mother’s seeming acceptance that she was no longer part of the family.
‘It’s not just Susan and me mam,’ Maggie answered crossly. ‘I want to see Granny - and Tich. I -I miss them.’
‘Am I not enough family for you then?’ George asked, at once hating his carping words.
‘That’s not fair, Geordie. You can go and see your family any day of the week. It’s not my fault if you’re not close to them and don’t visit from one month to the next.’
George was stung with guilt and anger at her words. ‘The only reason I’ve stopped going regularly is to protect you! They don’t even know where to find me if me old man drops dead.’
‘They can fetch you from work,’ Maggie pointed out harshly. ‘But I might as well be dead for all my family know about me.’
‘Perhaps that’s the way they want it,’ George said in a quiet, hard voice. ‘Then they can forget the shame you’ve brought them.’
Maggie stared at her lover, wounded by his words and the awful realisation that they might be true. After all, none of her family had tried to contact her, only Heslop had come seeking her and been shocked by what he found.
‘Is that what you think?’ Maggie hissed. ‘That I’m someone to be ashamed of?’
‘That’s not what I said!’ George answered crossly.
‘But it’s what you mean!’ Maggie cried in panic. ‘It suits you to keep me cooped up here in secret, doesn’t it? I’m just a fancy bit that you don’t want your family or workmates to know about, is that it? My God, you’re just as conventional as the rest of them, George Gordon!’
George was furious; furious at the accusations and furious that this row had blown up so unexpectedly and uncontrollably.
‘How could you even think that was all I wanted you for?’ George shouted. ‘Well, gan back to your precious family if you think they’ll have you! But don’t blame me if they turn you over to the coppers as soon as you get there.’ He stopped pacing about the tiny parlour and grabbed his jacket from the nail behind the door.
‘Where’re you going?’ Maggie demanded, not wanting him to leave but too upset to say so.
‘Out - anywhere. To see me old dad that you say I’ve neglected and then maybes for a pint with Billy or Joshua. Aye, I feel like having a skinful. And what’s it matter to you if I do?’ he glared.
‘Matters nowt!’ Maggie shouted back at him. ‘That’s the way you lads always save the world, isn’t it? Over a bucket of beer!’
George raised a menacing finger and stabbed the air. ‘And when has breaking windows ever benefited anyone except glaziers?’ he said full of scorn.
‘Aye, gan on and mock me!’ she cried, advancing on him. ‘But it’s the closest you’ll ever get to revolution, Geordie. You’re all talk and no action. You’re as conservative as they come.’
George cursed and slammed the door in her face. She heard him running down the stairs away from her. Shaking, Maggie slumped to the cold bare floorboards, angry and hurt and bewildered by their sudden argument that had flared out of nothing.
No, not nothing, she thought. It had been simmering for weeks. Ever since Heslop had burst into their haven and fuelled her guilt at abandoning her family.
Maggie realised with a heavy heart that she could never escape her past and the messy tangle of obligations and emotions that bound her to her relations. No matter what lengths she went to erase her former life, she was still a Beaton.
Shivering in the cold gloom of the room that suddenly seemed lifeless and depressing without George, Maggie yearned for the chaotic comfort of Gun Street. Picking herself up from the floor, she knew she had to go there. At that moment she wanted her mother’s solid arms about her more than anything in the world.
It was late afternoon when Maggie reached Gun Street and to her bafflement and disappointment no one answered her knocking at the upstairs flat. As she hammered for a third time, Mary Smith popped her head out from the flat below.
‘No one’s there, hinny,’ she called at the shadowy figure. ‘Can I help?’
‘It’s me, Mrs Smith. Maggie.’
For a moment there was silence, then Mary Smith screeched, ‘It’s never!’ She advanced out of the door and up the first few steps. ‘Where have you been hiding yourself, hinny? Your mam’s been that worried. Eeh, and you missed Susan’s wedding. She looked a picture.’ Mary reached out and pulled Maggie by the arm. ‘Come in an’ have a cup of tea with me. They’ll not be long. Your Susan’s giving them all their tea at your Aunt Violet’s.’
Maggie needed little persuasion to keep her old neighbour company. She could not bear the thought of returning to the empty rooms in Arthur’s Hill and no longer knew if she was welcome there. They sat by the stove, drinking tea while Maggie listened to Mary Smith chatter on about the family and Susan’s wedding and how well Mr Turvey was doing.
‘Always so nicely turned out, is Mr Turvey,’ she said in approval. ‘And Susan’s never too busy to visit her mam. Over here every day, she is. Course she’s always been close to her mam - a real one for family.’
Maggie winced at the unintentional criticism but let the garrulous, lonely woman continue.
‘That Helen’s full of mischief, mind. Needles your Susan whenever she can. If you ask me,’ Mary said, leaning closer and dropping her voice as if someone might hear, ‘she shows Mr Turvey too much attention when he comes round. She’s going to be a terrible one for the lads. Don’t say a word of this to your mam, mind. She’s got enough to worry about with Granny Beaton and Jimmy.’
‘What do you mean?’ Maggie asked in concern.
‘Well, with your grandmother wetting the bed all the time and wandering off like a bairn. And Tich packing in his job because he thinks he can get summat better. He’s turning into a right tearaway - he’s out now somewhere with my Tommy. The devil knows where they get to.’
Suddenly Maggie could not stay another minute. She wanted to rush out and find her mother and hug her and ask forgiveness for the worry she had put her through.
‘Mrs Smith,’ Maggie said, putting her cup down on the hearth, ‘ta for the tea but—’
A door banged open in the hall.
‘That’ll be your mam back, I expect,’ Mary Smith said with a nod.
Maggie jumped up and rushed to the door, opening it without another word. Under the fuzzy gas light, she made out three wrapped figures, the one with a stick being helped in by the other two.
‘Mam! Granny Beaton!’ Maggie cried and dashed forward. ‘Helen!’
For a moment they all gawped at her as if they had seen a ghost, then her mother put out a hand and clutched her arm as if to convince herself she was real.
‘Maggie?’ she gasped. ‘Eeh, Maggie, you little bugger!’
Her mother’s arms went about her in a cold damp hug of delight and Maggie clung to her, not sure whether she was laughing or crying.
‘Get yourself upstairs this minute,’ Mabel ordered her daughter, pulling away with a sniff, ‘and you can tell us everything.’ She shouted at her mother-in-law, ‘It’s Maggie, Mrs Beaton, she’s come home. Maggie,’ she repeated to the deaf old woman.
‘Oh, Maggie,’ her grandmother smiled, understanding. ‘Dear lassie.’
Maggie was delighted. ‘Let me help you, Granny,’ she offered.
Helen harrumphed. ‘Typical! You blow in like a bad smell from goodness knows where and get all the attention. But what have you done for the family but get us a bad name?’
‘Hold your tongue!’ her mother ordered. ‘You’re beginning to sound like Susan.’
‘How is Susan?’ Maggie asked, ignoring Helen’s resentful words. ‘I wish I’d seen her wed. But it was too risky.’
‘Eeh, hinny,’ Mabel sighed as she mounted the stairs, ‘what sort of life are you leading?’
‘Different,’ Maggie said, blushing in the gloom.
They helped Granny Beaton upstairs and Mabel went over to light the lamp with a taper from the banked-up fire.
‘Mam,’ Helen spoke again, this time more sweetly, ‘shall I go and fetch our Susan? I’m sure she’d want to see Maggie.’
Mabel gave her a suspicious look. ‘What are you up to, offering to run errands?’
But Maggie interrupted eagerly, ‘That would be canny of you, Helen,’ she smiled. ‘I can’t stay long.’
‘You’ll stay the night with us, hinny?’ her mother pleaded. ‘You can’t turn up here after months of being missing and run off into the night again. You can share with Helen the night.’
‘Aye,’ Helen agreed ‘I don’t mind for a night.’
‘Well,’ Maggie considered, thinking it might give George time to calm down, ‘maybes just for the night.’
‘Shall I go then. Mam?’ Helen asked, buttoning up her coat again.
‘Aye, be off with you. But don’t breathe a word to Aunt Violet or we’ll have the police round before you get back.’
Helen was already at the door, tossing her fair ringlets in a habitual gesture.
When she had gone, Mabel sighed. ‘She can’t bear to be still for two minutes, that lass.’
‘Is she helping you with the business?’ Maggie asked, discarding her hat and coat over the back of a kitchen chair.
Mabel snorted. ‘It’s a constant battle to stop her wearing half the clothes we collect. She’s got an eye for what’s fancy but she’s a better spender than shopkeeper.’
Maggie automatically set about warming the teapot and reached up for the tea caddy on the mantelpiece. She noticed that her grandmother was content to rest silently by the fire, her knuckled hands lying loosely in her lap as she stared vacantly into the flames. It was as if her spirit had quietly slipped out of her ageing body and wandered off, leaving a pale likeness of the once intelligent and compassionate woman who had captivated the young Maggie with her tales of the Highlands.
Her mother seemed to read her thoughts.
‘She’s quite happy just sitting there all day long,’ she said quietly, ‘dreaming her dreams. She did well recognising you downstairs - she usually calls people names from her past life in Scotland.’
‘I wish I could look after her,’ Maggie sighed, ‘like I used to.’
‘So where are you living, Maggie?’ her mother asked and Maggie saw the worry shadow her dark blue eyes. ‘I know you’re not with that teacher Johnstone ’cos I had it out with her. She said you’d rowed and she didn’t see you anymore. But I knew she was keeping summat back. What was it that prim schoolmistress didn’t want me to hear, lass?’
Maggie was surprised to discover her mother had tried to trace her, but could she tell her about George? And if she did, would she throw her down the stairs in disgust, as she was capable of doing? Maggie felt her face go hot.
Mabel suddenly grabbed her hand. ‘Hinny, I wasn’t born yesterday. It’ll tak’ a lot to shock me, so you can tell us and know I won’t go blabbing to all the neighbours. You’re living with a man, aren’t you?’
Maggie looked at her mother in astonishment.
‘I thought as much,’ Mabel grunted.
‘Did Mr Heslop tell you?’ Maggie asked, her throat quite dry.
‘No,’ Mabel shook her head, ‘he told me nowt, but I could tell he didn’t approve of what he’d found.’
‘He didn’t,’ Maggie admitted, flushing deeper, ‘and I doubt you will either. I’ve been living with George Gordon.’ As she confessed, Maggie raised her head with a defiant jut of her chin, then added, less sure, ‘He might not have me back, mind - we argued over me coming here and risking being caught.’
For a moment she thought her mother was going to slap her, and she flinched as Mabel pulled her close, but instead found her mother’s arms encircling her tightly.
‘Eeh, me darlin’ bairn. Just let them try and tak’ you away - over my dead body!’ she cried.
Maggie clung to her mother and let the tears of relief stream from her closed eyes. For a moment she felt like the ten-year-old Maggie who had hugged her mother for comfort after the death of her father, drawing strength from the warm protective hold, the smell of cheap soap and mothballs and her rough love. Her mother had always been there to turn to; vital, permanent, sharp-tongued and forgiving.
‘Will you marry the lad?’ Mabel asked, rocking Maggie in her arms.
‘No,’ Maggie said firmly. ‘I’ll marry no one. Marriage does nowt but hold women back.’
Her mother sighed, ‘Aye, you might be right, hinny. But if you love the lad ...’
‘Who says I do?’ Maggie bristled.
‘I can tell by the way you’re carrying on, pretending you don’t mind that he threw you out.’
‘He didn’t throw me out!’ Maggie declared, pulling away. ‘It was my choice to come back here.’
Mabel laughed. ‘Eeh, Maggie. We Beaton women just don’t seem to click with men, do we? Since your father died, I couldn’t be bothered with a man interfering in the house. And there’s poor Susan, tappy-lappying behind Richard Turvey, doing whatever he tells her and getting her head bitten off if she doesn’t. The times I’ve wanted to shake him by the neck. But she doesn’t complain, speaks up for him if I try to interfere, so what can I do?’
‘Nothing, Mam,’ Maggie smiled wryly. ‘Susan chose Richard of her own free will. I warned her about him, but she wouldn’t listen, so now she’s just got to make the best of it. From what Mary Smith says, she’s enjoying spending his money and bragging about it round the houses.’
‘Aye, maybes,’ Mabel shrugged, ‘but I’d put money on it that she’s not happy. Perhaps I should’ve let Richard tak’ wor Helen off me hands after all.’
‘Helen’s just a bairn!’ Maggie replied.
‘I sometimes wonder,’ Mabel said with a roll of her eyes. ‘Anyhow, get that tea poured, hinny.’ Her mother pushed her gently away and went to poke the fire.
Maggie poured the tea and placed a cup carefully in her grandmother’s lap. The old woman smiled and thanked her, but without any recognition.
‘So what’s our Tich been up to, packing in his job?’ Maggie asked.
Mabel huffed and stabbed the fire harder with the poker. ‘That lad’s a loser if ever there was one. Lasted a month in that job Richard got him down the quayside. Said it was too long hours and too little money and he could get summat better - not that he has, mind. And he fights with Helen like cat and dog or disappears off with Tommy Smith - probably thieving. Well, I wash me hands of that lad. He’s neither use nor ornament!’
‘He’s still young, Mam,’ Maggie defended her brother. ‘He’ll grow into summat in time. Jimmy’s not a bad’un at heart.’
‘I know why you’re defending him,’ her mother snorted, ’cos he helped you in that daft carry-on at the launch.’ Mabel scrutinised her. ‘Is it true you set fire to the pavilion at Hebron House an’ all?’
‘Aye,’ Maggie confessed, ‘but you mustn’t tell a soul.’
To her surprise, her mother gave a cackle of laughter. ‘Good on you, hinny!’ she grinned ‘I wish you’d sent a few Pearsons to heaven with it.’
‘Mam!’ Maggie was shocked. ‘We’re not murderers. I only agreed to do it ’cos I knew the place was empty.’
‘No?’ Mabel questioned. ‘Well, you’re a better lass than me.’
Maggie smiled. ‘Mr Heslop doesn’t think so. I’m nowt but a fallen woman in his eyes.’
‘Heslop!’ Mabel ridiculed. ‘That man’s always trying to save us Beatons.’
They sat by the fire and talked for an hour, reminiscing and confiding and drinking tea. Maggie could not remember her mother being so open with her before, talking about her father with unusual tenderness, while Maggie told her of the past secretive months. She sensed her mother was just as relieved to unburden herself as she was.
Then Jimmy returned and was immediately sent out again to fetch a jug of beer before his astonished questions could be answered. A few minutes later Helen returned and the intimacy of the evening was broken.
‘Susan won’t come,’ she announced with a glint of glee, keeping to herself the unholy row that had erupted at Aunt Violet’s at the news of Maggie’s return.
Maggie was dashed.
‘What do you mean she won’t come?’ Mabel asked crossly. ‘Did you not tell her who was here?’
‘Aye,’ Helen pouted, ‘but she doesn’t want to see Maggie. Said if she couldn’t be bothered to see her wed, she couldn’t be bothered to come out on a cold night and see her now.’
‘By, she’s got above herself, that one!’ Mabel fumed. ‘I’ll have words with her the morra.’
‘It doesn’t matter, Mam,’ Maggie intervened. ‘I can understand why she’s not speaking.’
‘Well, I can’t!’ Mabel shouted. ‘She’s changed that much since she wed Richard Turvey.’
Jimmy’s return with the jug of beer quelled Mabel’s wrath and she settled down by the hearth to drink it. Helen went to bed, telling Maggie not to wake her when she joined her, and Jimmy lay on the truckle bed playing with some lead soldiers he had had since childhood. Maggie tried to talk to him, but he was moody and unapproachable, so she gave up.
Later, she helped Mabel get Granny Beaton to bed in the parlour and kissed the old woman goodnight, leaving the candle burning.
‘She sees things in the dark,’ Mabel whispered, ‘that frighten her, so I leave the candle burning till I come to bed.’
Maggie was struck by the concern in her mother’s voice.
‘You care a lot for Granny, don’t you, Mam?’
Mabel was brusque. ‘Someone has to, and she did enough for me when your father died. I’ll not see her end up in the workhouse.’
Maggie felt reluctant to turn in. She sat by the fire while her mother drank and dozed, wondering if George had returned to find her gone. Perhaps she would stay a few more days at Gun Street. If she drew no attention to herself, she would be safe enough, she decided. George would have to realise that she had other obligations in her life and would not be beholden to him for taking her in. If they were to live together again it must be on equal terms.
Maggie closed her eyes in the dark warmth of the kitchen, aware of Jimmy’s even breathing in the shadows and her mother’s gentle snoring at her side. She felt safe and content as her limbs and eyelids became leaden and overcome with sleep.
***
Susan leant over and was sick into the tin bowl by the bed. Richard did not even turn round as he buttoned up his trousers.
‘I told you. You’re not well enough to go running off to see that wayward sister of yours. Let her come to you if she’s so keen to see you.’
Susan fought off another wave of nausea, thinking that if her husband was so concerned for her health he would stop subjecting her to the nightly ordeal in bed.
‘Where are you going?’ she croaked, her throat stinging from the bile.
‘Out, darlin’,’ Richard said offhandedly. ‘I’ll be back at closing.’
‘Don’t wake me up then,’ Susan answered huffily.
In a second he had whipped round and leaned across the bed to seize her arm. She winced in pain. ‘Don’t nag, Susan,’ he threatened, ‘or I might take up with someone else.’
She stared at him bleakly, half wishing that he would be unfaithful so that she would be spared his attentions in bed. She still thought he was handsome but her fondness for him had gone. Looking at him, she felt only irritation at his selfishness and a quiver of fear at what he might do if he did not get his way. So she let him go without protest and curled up in the dark, feeling wretched and sick and frustrated at not seeing Maggie.
Of course, she told herself, she was furious with her sister for abandoning the family and failing to come to her wedding. Yet she longed to see Maggie again, to discover what she had been doing, to hear her acknowledge her married status and be impressed by how well she had done.
‘Oh, Maggie!’ Susan cried noiselessly and felt the tears hot on her face. ‘I wish we could go back to how it was before - just the family!’ She pulled the covers over her head to deaden the noise of her sobbing and thought she had never been so unhappy.
***
George woke stiff and cold. He had let the fire go out. The after-effects of the beer made his temples throb and his throat was thick and parched. He groaned and pulled himself out of the chair. Glancing in at the bedroom he saw at once that nothing had been disturbed since his return in an alcoholic haze earlier that evening.
Maggie was gone.
He pulled a blanket off the bed and wrapped himself in it. Lighting a candle he began to flick through a book on philosophy lent to him by Isaac, but found he had no concentration.
She must have gone to see her mother, George kept telling himself, and it had grown late and she had decided to stay. Who could blame her after the way they had argued? But she would come back, he assured himself, when that Beaton temper of hers had simmered down. He would be magnanimous and forgiving and they would have a loving reunion ...
George gripped the arms of the chair. But what if she didn’t come back? What would he do?
The thought was so bleak, so unanswerable, that George forced it from his mind. He would go to bed and stop thinking of Maggie until the morning. They were invited to the Samuels’ for Sunday dinner and she would not miss that, he thought.
But George found he could not move. He was frozen with foreboding. He sat on in the icy flat, lit faintly by the gas lamp in the street, and waited for Maggie to return and fill the room with her warmth.
He watched the door and waited, but she did not come.