Chapter 48

The sisters did not speak to each other again for months. Kate suspected that Catherine called round to her aunt’s house occasionally, for she would sometimes wander in with her cousin Alec in tow, pretending they had met in the street. Kate was fond of the boy and fed him scraps of baking, but never mentioned his mother. Her anger eventually died down to a smouldering resentment that flared only in drink.

At such times, she railed against life’s unfairness and lashed out at her daughter for ever having brought the letters to her attention. Better never to have known, was Kate’s bitter thought, though deep down she knew Catherine had only been trying to please her. The girl had not known the content of the letters and could not have guessed the trouble it would cause by bringing them to light.

Their relationship was as full of quick-fire argument as ever, but Kate was secretly admiring of her daughter’s stubborn determination to get on in the world.

Shortly after leaving her cleaning job, Catherine had astonished both her and John by announcing that she was setting up in business painting silk and satin cushion covers and tray cloths.

‘But you can’t paint,’ Kate was disbelieving.

‘I can so!’ Catherine declared. ‘I had a lesson off Amelia at church. I’m ganin’ to paint birds and flowers. You can buy these transfers.’

‘Where you getting the money for this?’ Kate demanded.

‘I’ve got deposits off me new clients,’ Catherine said gleefully. ‘I’m buying the materials the morrow. Amelia’s ganin’ to help me chose.’

Within a week, Catherine had completed ten orders for people from church and had begun to canvass neighbours and friends. Despite the creeping slump on Tyneside and the shutdown of Palmer’s ironworks, she found more work than she could cope with. She would sit up late at night, eyes straining over her miniature paintings of flowers and fruit in the dim lamplight in order to finish a job in time for someone’s birthday. Sometimes, if she was not too tired, Kate would sit up and sew the finished pieces into covers or stitch pieces of lace to a mantelpiece cloth.

At such times they worked together in companionable silence as the gas lamp hissed and rain spat down the chimney on to the fire. Occasionally Kate would sing snatches of songs from the war or old favourites such as ‘Thora’. Once, she caught Catherine looking at her with tear-filled eyes. Kate stopped singing.

‘What’s wrong, hinny?’

Catherine said quietly, ‘I wish it could always be like this - just you and me ...’ She broke off unable to say that she wanted her mother to herself, without warring relations or drink or the censure of the outside world - all those things that kept them apart and fed the animosity between them. The shame of her illegitimacy was seared into her soul, but at moments like this Catherine could pretend that they were a normal mother and daughter with no one sneering at them.

‘Just you and me?’ Kate smiled at her ruefully.

‘Aye,’ Catherine blushed, and bowed her head.

Kate reached out and covered Catherine’s hand with hers. ‘You’ll always have me, hinny,’ Kate said softly, ‘always.’

When Catherine glanced up, she saw that her mother’s eyes were glistening with tears too. They smiled at each other, and for a moment, all the bad times of quarrelling and accusation receded into the shadows.

Without another word they carried on working, Kate humming quietly, each wishing the closeness they felt would last.

***

1922 wore on and Catherine turned sixteen. In a week or two, she would be forty, Kate thought. As she stared in the mirror hanging over the wash basin in the scullery, she was startled to see the beginnings of Rose’s haggard face looking back. She remembered her own mother at this age, old and care-worn after hard years when John worked little and she lived on the scrapings at the bottom of the pot. They had been living in Frost Street, or was it Napier? One of a series of dismal, overcrowded dwellings they had inhabited briefly like tinkers before having to move on. Rose must have been about forty when work had picked up and they had moved for a while to the luxury of the New Buildings and its veneer of respectability.

And she had been about sixteen; Catherine’s age. Kate sighed to think how full of energy and life she had been then, eager to work hard and see a bit of the world beyond Tyne Dock and Jarrow. Eager for love. Always singing. Sometimes she studied her daughter, head bent over her endless paintings, a frown of concentration on her wide brow. Auburn hair glinting. She was far more contrary, one minute playing the clown with her friend Lily, the next anxiously censorious and scurrying off to Confession. The girl could scowl like Father O’Neill yet laugh like a music-hall comic.

What would her daughter do with her life? She had sudden flashes of talent, such as her painting and a head for carrying words. She could recite verse after verse of poetry and song. Yet she did not strike Kate as a happy girl, one that could enjoy life and really let herself go once in a while. Kate blamed herself for much of the shortcomings in Catherine’s life, but she would not be blamed for that. She at least had known how to love, to seize each moment of joy, however fleeting. She had regretted bitterly Alexander’s abandonment of her, but she had known a man’s love and had returned it generously. She knew Catherine was far too cautious and devout to make the mistake she had, yet she pitied the girl if she never allowed herself the thrill of falling in love.

A knock on the back door startled her out of her reverie.

‘Come in,’ she called, quickly pushing back her tousled hair behind its pins.

The door pushed open and a broad-shouldered figure filled the doorway, the dazzling July light behind him throwing his face in shadow. Kate’s heart pummelled in her chest. The familiar wave of hair, the stocky upper body. Alexander! How long had she waited for this moment? An eternity.

‘Is it you?’ she gasped.

The man moved forward and threw down his bag.

‘Kate?’ he said quizzically. ‘I didn’t mean to give you a fright.’

Kate’s insides churned in disappointment. It was only Davie McDermott. How foolish of her to mistake for one instant this burly man with his chiselled face still grimy from the engine-room for her long-lost lover.

‘Oh, Davie,’ she said flatly, ‘haway in.’

If he minded her half-hearted welcome he did not show it. The seaman offered at once to refill the hod with coal while Kate made him a cup of tea. She busied herself at the stove, trying to rid her mind of Alexander. How had he come back so vividly to her after all this time? Would she never be rid of this hold he had over her thoughts?

She hardly glanced at Davie or noticed what she should have. Catherine saw it the moment she came in from delivering a parcel of cushion covers.

‘Who’s died?’

Kate turned from stirring the bean broth. Davie was fingering a black arm band self-consciously.

‘My Molly,’ he said quietly.

‘Your wife?’ Kate cried in pity. ‘That’s terrible. What happened?’

‘Heart gave out - she’s always been delicate.’ He paused and Kate realised he was finding the subject difficult, so just nodded.

‘When did it happen?’ Catherine asked.

‘Turn of the year - I was away at sea.’ He shook his head and sighed. ‘ “Always away at sea when I need you,” that’s what she used to say.’

‘You couldn’t help that,’ Kate said kindly, ‘and you did your best by her.’

There was an awkward silence, which Catherine broke. ‘I’ll say prayers for Mrs McDermott at Mass,’ she promised.

Davie smiled in gratitude and nothing more was said on the matter.

But when Kate’s birthday came and Davie was still ensconced at Number Ten, Catherine sparked off a row.

‘How long’s he stopping?’ she demanded crossly. ‘I cannot work with him spreading out his newspaper on the table and lying around sleeping half the day.’

‘The poor man’s got nowhere else to gan,’ Kate pointed out.

‘He must’ve other family,’ Catherine retorted.

‘Molly never gave him bairns - though I think he would have liked some. He was always canny to you when you were young.’

Catherine ignored this. ‘When’s he going back to sea, then?’

‘I don’t know.’ Kate grew impatient. ‘But I’ll not have him driven out by your black looks. He pays his way - which is more than you can say for most men round here now the steel mills are closed.’

‘He drinks it all away,’ Catherine muttered with disapproval.

‘That’s his business what he does with his wages!’ Kate cried. ‘He’s a right to a bit of fun after months stuck below deck grafting hard.’

‘He’s still in mourning.’

Kate was riled by her pious tone. ‘Well, we’re ganin’ down the Penny Whistle to meet Maisie for me birthday whether you and the priests like it or not!’

Catherine stormed out and up the street to Mary’s. It infuriated Kate that the girl always turned to her waspish sister when she was angry with her. No doubt Mary fuelled the fire of her daughter’s discontent. Maybe it was Mary who had turned Catherine against Davie these past weeks, in revenge for last year’s attack over Stoddie’s letters.

But when Davie came in from washing in the backyard tub, grinning bashfully in an ill-fitting suit of Jack’s, Kate determined to enjoy her birthday. John, who could no longer walk easily into town, was content with the jug of beer Davie bought him before they left.

They came home late, singing and laughing from a merry session in the snug of the Penny Whistle, Kate linking her arm through Davie’s to keep her from tripping on the uneven cobbles. At the top of the bank, they stopped and looked out over the dark river and the hunched cranes and gantries of the yards.

‘Look at that, Kate,’ Davie said with awe in his voice. ‘That bit of river never ends, does it? Carries on out to sea - goes on for ever and ever.’

Kate giggled. ‘Never heard you talk all philosophical before,’ she teased.

He laughed self-consciously. ‘That’s what I used to think as a lad. Just get on the sea and you can go anywhere you like - free as a fish.’

Kate was suddenly struck by the familiarity of his words. Where had she heard such dreams before? Alexander. He had talked of the sea like that, as a way to freedom. That’s how he had probably escaped from her and their unborn baby.

‘That’s what he used to say,’ Kate blurted out.

‘Who?’ Davie asked.

‘Oh, it doesn’t matter.’ She felt foolish.

He took her arm and pulled her round gently. ‘Do you mean Pringle-Davies?’

Kate gasped. ‘How do you know his name?’

‘You told me once.’

Kate tried to turn from him. ‘I shouldn’t have been so daft...’

Davie held on to her. ‘I’d heard the name before - I was sure of it. But I never said anything, ‘cos I couldn’t remember how.’

Kate looked into his face, her heart beginning to beat uncomfortably. ‘Did you ever remember?’ she whispered.

‘Aye, I did.’ He gazed out to sea for a moment. ‘It was on a voyage to Russia. We’d put in at Gavle in Sweden to take on timber, but we got storm-bound for a week. There wasn’t much to do in the place, so I did what I often do when I’m stuck on land.’ He stopped and looked sheepish. Kate feared he would say something shameful that a woman should not hear. But she had to know what he knew about Alexander.

‘Go on,’ she encouraged. ‘I know what seamen are like.’

‘It’s not that,’ Davie said at once.

‘Then what?’

‘I go and sit in churchyards - cemeteries,’ he confessed. ‘Read the headstones and imagine the people.’

Kate stared at him, her heart thudding. ‘What are you saying?’

He put a hand on her shoulder. ‘There’s a part of the cemetery in Gavle for foreigners - for all the sailors and them that are taken sick off ships. Some have no headstones or just wooden crosses. But there’s one that sticks out - more fancy, with a raven carved on the top.’

Kate’s heart jolted. The raven: symbol of Ravensworth.

‘And?’ she breathed with difficulty.

‘The name was Alexander Pringle-Davies from England. I remembered it because it said he came from County Durham.’

Kate felt her knees go weak. She grasped on to his arms. ‘Are you sure?’ she croaked.

Davie nodded.

‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’ she accused, tears stinging her eyes.

‘I wanted to be sure,’ Davie said gently. ‘Last autumn we put into Gavle with a load of coal and I went to check. It was the name I’d remembered.’

Kate closed her eyes and tried to squeeze back the stinging tears. So he was dead. There was no more vain hoping, however slim. Alexander would never come back for her or Catherine. It was just as she had feared all along.

‘Kate,’ Davie shook her, ‘there was something else on the stone.’

She opened her eyes in dread. Was he about to tell her Alexander had left a devoted wife and several bereft children?

‘His dates,’ he said, holding on to her. She searched his face. ‘He died in nineteen-o-six. July.’

Kate let out a cry of anguish. ‘Just after Kitty was born!’

‘But don’t you see what that means? He couldn’t have come back for you. He never even lived long enough to know you’d had the lass.’

She began to shake. ‘No, he couldn’t, could he? Or sent me money for the bairn.’ She gripped him. ‘Did it mention a wife? D-did Alexander marry?’

Davie looked at her with compassion in his weathered face. What good would it do her knowing the stone had been dedicated by his ‘loving wife Polly’? He could at least save her that extra anguish. Davie shook his head.

Kate felt light-headed with relief. ‘So he might have come back in time ...?’ She searched his face for reassurance.

‘Aye, he might well have,’ Davie comforted.

Kate was engulfed by a fresh wave of desolation. ‘He had a blood disease,’ she said quietly. ‘He must’ve died of that.’

Suddenly Kate crumpled and gave way to bitter tears of regret. Davie quickly pulled her to him and wrapped his strong arms about her. She sobbed into his shoulder, grateful for his kindness.

After a while, he stroked her hair and said softly, ‘Kate, we’re both on our own now. And it’s like coming home for me when I stay here. Why don’t we get wed?’

She pulled away and looked at him in astonishment. But his look was earnest.

‘Wed?’ she exclaimed. ‘What you want to marry me for?’

He smiled bashfully under his bushy moustache. ‘ ‘Cos I care for you, lass. Always have done - even when my Molly was still alive.’

She stared at him as the full implication of what he had said sunk in.

‘All that time?’ she whispered.

‘Aye. I could see it was Stoddie you cared for, not me,’ he said without rancour, ‘and I would never have said anything ... but with Molly passing on ...’ He squeezed her shoulders as if to give him courage. ‘What do you say, Kate?’

She was full of confusion. She did not love him, but he was a good man and in time she might grow to be fond of him. Yet she hesitated.

‘What about Father?’

‘He could live with us,’ Davie said generously, mistaking Kate’s fear of John’s refusal for concern. ‘And my pay from sea will keep him happy in drink, I wouldn’t wonder.’

‘But there’s Kitty ...’ Kate was still uncertain.

‘I’d be happy to take on the lass,’ Davie insisted. ‘I’ve always had a soft spot for her.’ He gave her a considering look. ‘And maybe in time, we could give her a brother or sister to help care for.’

Kate laughed drily. ‘I’m forty years old, Davie man. What you want with an old woman like me?’

He leaned forward and daringly kissed her cheek. ‘You’re still a bonny woman to me.’

Kate touched his bristly chin in affection. ‘I’ll think on it,’ was all she would promise.

When Kate told John that Davie had asked her to marry him, he blustered but did not say no. Catherine’s reaction came as a complete shock.

‘You’re never going to say yes to him?’ she said in horror.

‘I might,’ Kate was stung into replying.

‘What about me?’ Catherine demanded.

‘Davie’s happy to take you on as his daughter—’

‘Never!’ she cried. ‘He’s not me da - he’s a common stoker.’

Kate flushed in anger. ‘Those are Mary’s words, I bet. Don’t you turn your nose up at Davie McDermott. He’s as honest and hard-working a man as ever you’re likely to meet. I thought you’d be pleased he wants to marry your mam.’

‘Well I’m not!’ Catherine said tearfully. ‘Where am I supposed to sleep if he moves in with you? On the settle like a lodger? There’ll be no place for me.’

‘He’ll be away at sea half the time,’ Kate floundered.

‘You just want me out the way, don’t you? You’d rather have him than me any day. I bet you wish I’d never been born!’

‘Don’t be daft ...’

‘Well, don’t worry, I’ll not stop,’ Catherine cried. ‘If you marry that man, I’ll go.’ She gave Kate such a look of anger that her heart went cold. ‘And I’ll never come back!’

Kate was shaken to the core by her daughter’s vehemence against marriage to Davie, and began to have doubts. Perhaps she was better off alone if it would cause such conflict under her roof. When the day came for Davie to rejoin his ship, she told him regretfully, ‘I cannot marry you. The lass has taken against the idea. It wouldn’t work.’

For the first time she saw his mouth tighten in annoyance and his brown eyes blaze at her. ‘It would’ve worked fine well,’ he cried. ‘You’re just hiding behind the lass.’

‘No I’m not,’ Kate protested.

‘You won’t let yourself care for another man,’ Davie said angrily, ‘one that honestly loves you. Alexander’s dead and Stoddie’s married another. But I’m here! What are you frightened of, Kate? That I’ll treat you as bad as all the other men in your life? ‘Cos if that’s how little you think of me, then it’s best we never marry!’

He seized his duffel bag, swung it on to his shoulder and marched to the door. He turned, his expression desolate. ‘We’re sailing for South America - a year at sea. When I come back I’ll look for lodgings somewhere else.’ Before she could say a word, he was striding out of the house, the door banging behind him.

Kate sank on to the settle, trembling. What he said was so true! She did fear marrying him. He was nice to her now, but once he was master in their house, would he not turn tyrant like John? That was how men were with women like her, women held in contempt by all around them, women whispered about behind their backs for their immorality and weakness. They were the drudges that the world believed should be grateful for not being thrown out on the street.

Kate could not stop shaking. When had she turned into such a woman? When had her opinion of herself started to slide until she thought herself unworthy of anyone’s love? When she’d first become pregnant? When cowardly Alexander walked out of her life? Or was it the gradual poisonous drip of John’s scorn, of Jack’s unhealthy interest?

She sat all alone, too numb to cry. Catherine had gone out on her bicycle to avoid saying goodbye to Davie. John was drinking somewhere. She lay down on the settle and curled up like a frightened child, hugging herself and trying to stop trembling. The clock ticked as loud as a hammer. Half an hour passed. Davie would be boarding his ship. An hour. Kate dozed.

The clock struck four and woke her. Davie was gone. How achingly empty she felt. What had he said to her once? Stand up for yourself, Kate. Don’t let John or the lass lead you a merry dance.

Her head throbbed. What was she doing lying here feeling sorry for herself? If she did not move now, it would always be like this, taking second place to the wants of others. She had done that for too long.

Kate jumped up and grabbed her jacket. When was his ship sailing? Three o’clock, four, five? She dashed for the door and across the yard, not bothering to close the gate behind her. Kate picked up her skirts and began to run. Out of the lane and down the long Jarrow road to Tyne Dock. Her bad foot ached as she pushed herself on, her chest wheezing with the effort, pulse thumping in her throat.

Which quay was Davie’s boat sailing from? What was it called? She hurried on, stumbling down the hill, sobs catching in her throat. If Davie sailed without her ever saying sorry for her churlish refusal, she might never see him again.

As she gained the end of Leam Lane and the familiar streets crowded around her, she remembered the name of the ship.

‘The India Star.’ She stopped a man in passing. ‘Do you know where she’s sailing from?’

He shrugged. ‘Where’s she going to?’

‘South America,’ Kate panted.

‘Probably down Shields,’ he grunted. ‘You’d best get the tram.’

Kate let out a sob. ‘I don’t have the fare and it sails this afternoon!’

He took pity on her and fished out a penny. ‘I hope he’s worth the bother.’

Kate took the penny with a cry of thanks and dashed for the tram stand. It seemed to take an age for one to appear, rattling along its rails. Once aboard, she panicked. Where should she get off? Kate asked the other passengers in the dim hope that one of them might know.

‘The India Star?’ a boy answered. ‘It’s off the Mill Dam - by the Customs House. Least it was this morning.’

Kate almost kissed him. Squeezing her way through to the steps of the tram, she jumped off at the stop before St Hilda’s pit. The cobbled lane to the Mill Dam quayside snaked down between blackened housing and rough public houses. As a child she had been warned off from begging round there by her mother, in case slave-traders captured her and spirited her away on a ship.

Nothing was going to stop her running down there now. The quayside was a confusion of carts and lorries, men rolling barrels and humping sacks and fishwives calling their wares. How would she ever find Davie in all this crowd? Still, she hurried closer to the quayside, straining over the heads of others to try to see the name of the ships anchored there. There was no sign of the India Star.

A terrible thought struck her. Even if the ship had not sailed, Davie would be far below deck stoking up the fires in the furnace of the engine rooms. She would be too late to speak to him. She had missed her chance, her one final chance of happiness.

Someone touched her on the shoulder and she jerked round in panic.

‘What you doing here?’

‘Davie!’ Her heart hammered. Here he was in front of her! Suddenly she was incapable of speech.

‘You on your own?’ he asked suspiciously. She nodded. ‘You shouldn’t, it’s dangerous.’

She smelt the drink on his breath. Had he been drowning his sorrows or drinking to freedom? Kate had to know.

‘I -1 thought I’d missed you.’ She forced out the words. ‘I wanted to say - to say...’

Davie watched her with his usual guarded expression.

‘I want - I will,’ she stammered. ‘When you come back from South America - I’ll marry you.’ Kate held her breath. ‘That’s if you still want to—’

‘Want to?’ Davie exclaimed. Then his face broke into a happy grin. ‘Course I want to!’

He opened his arms wide and Kate fell against him in relief.

‘That’s grand,’ she cried, tears blurring her vision.

‘You’ll not change your mind?’ Davie asked, unable to believe in his sudden change of luck. Minutes ago he had been trying to blot out his failure with Kate with a gutful of rum. Now she was in his arms.

‘I’ll not change it, I promise,’ Kate smiled tearfully.

And right there, in the middle of the teeming quayside, she kissed Davie on the lips like a wife saying farewell to her husband. She did not mind the bitter-sweet taste of rum or the scratchiness of his bristling moustache. For in her mind, she saw their names on a marriage certificate, proclaiming to the world that she was a respectable married woman. Her past would dissolve and she would meet people’s look in the street with pride. She saw Davie sitting across the hearth from her, rolling his cigarettes, or lying next to her in the large feather bed, holding her tight in his sleep.

Joy bubbled up inside her. Catherine would come round to the idea. There was plenty of time for her to grow used to it while Davie was away. It was only natural for the girl to be a bit resentful of a new man coming into the family, when for so long she had had Kate to herself. But one day her daughter would thank her for giving her the father she craved. And Davie would be a kind father, given half a chance.

‘I’ll be a good husband to you, lass.’ He smiled at her warmly, as if reading her mind.

Kate thrilled at the words she had thought never to hear from any man’s lips.

‘Aye, I know you will,’ she smiled back.

Davie grinned and hugged her to him tightly. ‘I love you, Kate.’

A sob of happiness caught in her throat. ‘Show me then,’ she laughed through her tears.

Davie kissed her back.

***