‘THANK GAWD YER got me this gas stove while there was still a few bob about.’ Katie Mehan wiped the back of her arm across her sweat-soaked forehead, then, using both hands, lifted the big pan of neck of lamb stew from the hob. ‘Honest, Pat, I couldn’t have stood this heat if I’d had to have that old Kitchener going in here.’ She looked over her shoulder at the big, black-leaded range that took up the whole of the kitchen fireplace.
‘We bought that stove in time all right.’ Pat leant back so that Katie could put down the pan. ‘No matter how hot the weather would’ve turned, there’d have been no affording one now.’
Pat Mehan sat at the head of the scrubbed kitchen table, holding up his bowl in his big, rough hands, while his wife ladled thick, glistening gravy, pearl barley, chopped vegetables and dumplings into his bowl, then topped it up with the choicest pieces of lamb. During the past eighteen months Katie Mehan had learnt all kinds of tricks to stretch the bony bits of meat she bought in the market into tasty, filling suppers for her ever-hungry tribe of a family.
Pat put down his bowl in front of him with a nod of thanks, and ran his finger round the neck of his collarless shirt. ‘Yer know, I reckon it’s bloody hotter this evening than it’s been all day.’
Katie flashed her eyes at her husband. ‘Language, Pat,’ she said primly and jerked her head along the table to where their five children and Nora Brady, her mother, sat waiting for their food.
Pat winked conspiratorially at eighteen-year-old Danny, the oldest of the Mehan children, before turning to his wife. ‘Sorry, love. I forgot meself for the minute.’
Danny made sure that his mother couldn’t see what he was doing before grinning back at his dad: a man’s gesture of unity against women’s unfathomable ways.
‘I should think you are sorry,’ Katie said, and dropped an extra dumpling into her husband’s already brimming bowl as a reward for his apology. ‘You just remember to keep that language for down the docks, if yer don’t mind. We don’t need it here indoors, thank you very much.’
As she made her way round the cramped table, filling up her family’s bowls and correcting their manners, Katie hummed happily to herself. She was a woman who had what she had always wanted: a fine, healthy, happy family. And even though her kitchen was, like the rest of the little house, crammed full of second-hand odds and ends that even in easier times were all she and Pat could afford, she still considered herself a fortunate woman – a lot better off than many. Crowded and a bit threadbare the terraced two-up, two-down might have been, but Katie Mehan was thankful for what she had, and lavished as much care on her home as she would have done on any grandly furnished West End mansion.
She saw the upkeep of number twelve Plumley Street, Poplar as her duty, but she also took pleasure in knowing that she kept her place immaculately clean and would never be ashamed no matter who came knocking at her door. It all took a lot of effort, but so long as she had breath in her body there would not be any mouse droppings in her food cupboard. The fact that the cooking basins and pots stood on a simple, painted dresser rather than on shelves made of fine oak couldn’t be helped, but there was never a trace of grease left on any of them when Katie had finished with the washing soda and wire wool.
And, as she always liked to tell her kids, although she might not have much in her purse now, there was always the hope that there’d be better times just around the corner, but, until those better times arrived, she could still keep up her standards. A bar of laundry soap didn’t cost much, she told them, which was a good job, considering the amount of the stuff she bought from the corner shop. The evidence of her labours with the soap and scrubbing board could be seen in the pure white lace runner pinned round the mantelshelf over the fireplace, and the spotless vests and underpants airing on the cord stretched across the chimney breast.
Above the hearth, a wooden overmantel took pride of place, its gleaming looking-glass a testament to regular polishing. Katie never allowed junk to accumulate on the overmantel, nor to be poked under the mantelshelf below it, as happened in some houses in Plumley Street, including number ten next door, her mother’s house; not that she thought it any business of hers what her mother did in her own home. Even though Katie’s four sons slept in their grandmother’s two upstairs bedrooms, what happened in number ten was her mother’s concern. It wasn’t that Katie didn’t care about other people – she would always do anyone a good turn – it was just that she wasn’t the sort to go sticking her nose into other people’s affairs. She was content with making sure things were just so in her own place – that was her life, and she had no reason to complain or for it to be otherwise.
‘Here you are, Michael, love,’ she said, ladle brimming and ready to pour.
Michael looked up at his mother as she filled his bowl. At ten years old, he was the youngest but one of the Mehans; the advantages and the burden of being the baby of the family going to eight-year-old Timmy.
‘I’m glad we don’t have to have the range alight and all, Mum,’ he said, busily spooning through the gravy in a search of bits of meat, ‘’cos I really hate going down Levans Road to fetch the coke for yer. It’d be all right if I had a proper barrow, but all the kids laugh at me when I have to push that old pram down there.’
Banging the saucepan back down on the table, Katie straightened up and wagged her finger at her son. ‘But I’ll bet they don’t laugh at yer when yer tell ’em I treat yer for going, now do they?’
Michael wasn’t sure how to answer that one, so he gulped down a spoonful of stew instead, burning his lips and tongue in the process, making him cough and splutter all over the table. His grandmother, Nora, slapping him hard across the back only made matters worse. His eyes ran and his shoulders stung.
‘Good boy, Michael,’ she encouraged him. ‘Cough it up. Who knows, it might just be a gold watch.’ Despite living in the East End for over thirty years, Nora still spoke in the lilting Irish brogue that marked her out as not being Poplar born and bred as her daughter and son-in-law had been. ‘And even if yer did start gobbling down yer grub before yer should,’ Nora added, ‘yer a good boy for reminding me.’
Michael smiled, his smarting mouth forgotten; he was being praised.
‘I was having a look under those stairs of mine next door and I noticed me coke’s got a bit on the low side. So yer can go and fetch some for me later. How’d you like to do that for your old nanna, eh, Michael, love?’
‘But Nanna!’ he wailed. ‘It’s summer. Yer don’t need no coke in this weather.’
‘And how about me cooking?’ Nora demanded, looking around at the family for support.
Michael’s freckled forehead creased into an anxious, thoughtful frown. ‘What cooking? You have all yer dinners and that in here with us.’
‘And how about the heating up of the water for me bit of washing?’
His voice took on an even more desperate, whining tone; if he didn’t do something fast he’d wind up spending the whole of Saturday night running errands instead of playing out in the street with his mates. ‘But Nanna, you and Mum do all the washing in here.’
Nora thought for a moment, then leant back in her chair, her arms folded across her apron-covered bosom. ‘Well, I suppose that’s all right then. Yer’ll not have to bother fetching me none, will yer?’
Michael’s mouth dropped open. He appealed to Katie: ‘Mum! Nanna’s tormenting me again.’
‘You’re such an easy one to string along,’ grinned Nora, chucking him under the chin. ‘Like putty in me hands, sure you are.’ Her smug expression softened to a wistful smile. ‘Just like I was with yer grandfather. He could kid me into doing or believing anything. Talk about the gift of the Blarney.’
‘Here we go, let’s hear about the good old days,’ Michael said, his voice laden with sarcasm in an attempt to get his own back on his grandmother.
Katie glared at her son. ‘Button that lip now, Michael,’ she hissed into his ear. She lifted the pan and carried it round to the other side of the table and set about serving up a portion of stew for young Timmy.
Michael knew better than to argue with his mother but he allowed himself a sulky pout as he sat there, a picture of injured innocence, watching her through his gingery lashes as she finished seeing to Timmy and then sat herself down at the opposite end of the table from his father.
‘Bow yer heads,’ Katie said and pointed to sixteen-year-old Molly, her and Pat’s only daughter. ‘You can say it tonight.’
Molly sat up straight, dropped her chin demurely and put her hands together.
Danny curled his top lip into a sneer and whispered so that only his sister could hear him: ‘Goody-goody.’
‘For what we are about to receive,’ she began in a sweet voice that covered the fact she had one eye open, was sneering back at Danny, and was about to kick him hard in the shin, ‘may the Lord make us truly thankful.’
‘Amen,’ the eight of them said in ragged unison, as spoons and forks were lifted, ready for the attack.
But Katie didn’t seem interested in her food. She put her spoon down again and folded her hands in her lap. ‘Yer know what I saw this afternoon, Pat?’
‘No. What was that, love?’ Pat looked at her across the table, as he reached for the salt.
‘That welfare woman. She was over the road at number three again.’
‘What, over at the Miltons’?’ asked Michael, his mouth full of potato. ‘On a Saturday afternoon?’
‘Yes, over at the Miltons’ on a Saturday afternoon, but I don’t think I was talking to you, was I, Michael? Thank you very much.’
Pat shook his head and let his spoon dangle from his hand. ‘He looks haunted, that poor feller. Can’t be more than, what, thirty years old? And he’s bent over like an old man with the aggravation of it all.’
‘As far as I can tell, they ain’t had a carrot coming in from nowhere except the RO, not since he got laid off.’ Katie fiddled absent-mindedly with the edge of the oilcloth table covering. ‘See, what’s worrying me, Pat is . . . well . . .’ She lowered her voice. ‘I know it’s none of my business, but yer know what them welfare people are like.’
He nodded. ‘What’s happening in this world, eh? Tell me that.’
Nora sighed loudly. ‘They’ll take them children away from her, first chance they get, and they won’t be satisfied till they do neither. And you know what they’ll do then? They’ll put them in one of them homes. Terrible places. Terrible. And it’ll kill that poor girl, losing her kids, you see if it don’t.’
Michael and Timmy looked at their grandmother, appalled that such a thing might happen to their friends.
‘All right, Mum,’ Katie said under her breath. ‘Not in front of this lot.’
Nora shrugged. ‘It’s only the truth I’m speaking.’
Young Timmy looked wide-eyed at his grandmother, then turned to his mum, his little face tense and solemn beneath his heavy auburn fringe. ‘When we was playing footer this afternoon, I give Robbo Milton the bread and dripping what Nanna made me. Right starving he was, Mum. Growling, his belly was.’ Timmy clutched his stomach by way of demonstration. ‘But that filled him up. The welfare lady could have seen for herself he weren’t hungry no more. They can’t take him away if he ain’t hungry, can they? And our Michael’s got them spare shoes what don’t fit Sean no more. He could have them. They’d make him look right smart, they would.’
Katie narrowed her eyes and looked purposefully at her mother. ‘You was eating in the street, was yer, Timmy? Bread and dripping what yer nanna give yer?’ She slowly turned her head to look at her son. ‘And yer can wipe that gravy off yer chin and all.’
Timmy rubbed his shirt sleeve across his mouth. He looked offended. ‘I thought yer’d be pleased I give it to him. Yer always saying how we should share things. And he was really starving hungry.’
‘I suppose,’ Katie said warily. ‘But don’t you let me catch yer showing me up eating out in the street again, all right? Now be quiet and get on with yer tea.’
Nora didn’t seem in the least concerned that she had got her youngest grandson into trouble. ‘I see that Relieving Officer was round at the Miltons’ again and all yesterday afternoon.’ She snorted contemptuously. ‘Going in for his Friday nose around, I suppose. It makes me laugh. What does he think – that they’ve suddenly come into a fortune since last week and are trying to fiddle the flaming means test for a few bob?’
Timmy hadn’t learnt his lesson. ‘Robbo Milton says the Relieving Officer’s a rotten bastard. He taught me a song about it and all. Shall I sing it for yer?’
Katie reached out and rapped her son sharply across the back of his hand with her spoon. ‘No you will not.’
‘Ouch!’ he said, nursing his tingling knuckles and his injured pride.
‘See?’ Nora hissed at him. ‘Yer should have done what yer mother told yer and kept quiet.’
Pat, used to such goings-on around the table, had been eating as though nothing had happened, but now he put his spoon down. He had a faraway look in his eyes as though he were watching a scene playing in his head. ‘He was down the docks the other day – Milton – to see if there was any casual about. There was nothing, of course. It’s bad enough for the regular crews.’ Pat rested his elbows on the table and rubbed his hand over his chin. ‘I tried to have a word with him, to cheer him up, like, make him realise it was nothing personal, but he was so down, poor bloke. Couldn’t get through to him at all. Joe Palmer reckons he’s scared out of his sodding life they’re gonna make him go down to Essex to one of them labour camps. Poor bleeder.’
‘Padraic!’
The sound of their mother using their father’s full name alerted the children; all eyes were on Katie.
She was outraged. ‘Whatever’s got into everybody round this table? All this language. And just look at you with yer elbows on the table and all. What example’s that to set to the kids?’
‘Yer worried about language and elbows?’ Pat said the words ominously quietly. He picked up his spoon and jabbed it at Katie as he spoke. ‘Yer’ve told us what you see, well, d’yer wanna know what I see on me way to the docks yesterday morning?’
The children sat in fascinated silence as they waited to see if their parents were actually building up to a row. Their mother flying off the handle and almost immediately calming down again was a familiar sight to all of them. But even though their big, dark-haired father looked tough, and dwarfed his slim, red-haired wife, he was usually such a mild-mannered, gentle person that, no matter how she flared and blustered at him, he very rarely lost his temper with her, or anyone else for that matter – except when he thought that another man might even be thinking about looking at Katie – and it was this that made the exchange of rare interest to them.
‘I’ll tell yer what I see,’ Pat went on. ‘I wasn’t going to ’cos I thought it might upset yer, but yer need to get yer priorities right by the sound of it.’
Katie’s face was scarlet at being spoken to like that, especially at her own kitchen table.
‘Four miners, I see, with all their gear on – their lamps and helmets and everything. And what was they doing? They was singing, that’s what.’
Timmy wanted to ask what was suddenly so wrong with a bit of singing – they’d only just told him off for offering to sing them all a song – but the look on his father’s face made him change his mind.
‘They’d come down here all the way from Wales, they had. And they was standing by the dock gates singing for sodding pennies. Pennies!’ He spat the words out. ‘I ask yer. Skilled men who’ve risked their lives and their health for this country. And for what? For bleed’n charity, that’s what. Hoping that the few men round here what have still got a bit of work would feel bloody sorry for ’em and give ’em a handout.’
The sound of their father using so much ‘language’ had the children – all except Sean – spluttering into their hands. Their mother would skin him.
It was Sean, interrupting his father, who rescued him from Katie’s rising fury. Calmly, he put down his spoon and fork and said to no one in particular, ‘I’d rather go out nicking than have to beg.’
Katie’s focus was immediately on her son. ‘Would yer like to say that again, Sean?’
Sean looked at her, his blue eyes vivid in his pale, redhead’s face.
Katie bobbed her head towards him. ‘Go on. That, what yer just said. Say it again. Nice and loud, so’s we can all hear it.’
Sean, with the recklessness of his fourteen years, actually started to repeat himself but Pat stepped in, returning his son’s earlier favour of deflecting Katie’s wrath.
‘Least the boy’s got pride in himself. And he’s showing a bit of interest in things,’ said Pat. He gestured towards Danny with his chin. ‘Wouldn’t hurt for you to show a bit more interest in what’s going on in the world.’ He warmed to his subject. ‘All you seem to bother about is getting out and meeting them mates o’ your’n. Kids nowadays, no interest in nothing ’cept enjoying themselves. Terrible state of affairs. Terrible.’
Danny looked bemused. What had he done? His dad had never complained about him seeing his friends before. In fact he’d always encouraged Danny to have a good time – within reason – before he had to start taking on the responsibilities of keeping a home and a family of his own. ‘You enjoy yerself, son,’ he’d say.
Danny looked at Molly to see if she had a clue what it was all about.
Molly shrugged. ‘Don’t ask me,’ she whispered behind the cover of her hand.
‘You might be lucky enough to be working, Danny,’ Pat continued, ‘but yer wanna remember that’s only ’cos Joe Palmer’s good enough to keep you on. Most boys get the elbow when they’re coming up to eighteen. Soon as they start expecting a man’s wage they’re out, right out on their ear’oles. You should think yerself lucky – more than lucky.’
‘Dad . . .’ Molly said, smiling, using the voice that usually made him smile back in return.
‘And you, madam,’ he said. His tone was harsh, not what his daughter had expected at all.
‘Me?’ asked Molly. ‘What have I done?’
‘You? The world just passes you by, don’t it? Yer think yer so safe in that tea factory,’ Pat said, ‘but you take my word for it, no job’s safe nowadays. Not even tuppenny-ha’penny girls’ jobs like your’n. I mean it, no one’s safe, no one. Not even stevedores like me.’ Pat jerked his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the street. ‘There’s skilled men out there, on the scrapheap. Well, I’ve come to me senses lately. I’ve realised just how much we’ve all taken for granted in this house, and things’re gonna change.’
‘Have you finished?’ Katie asked serenely.
Pat’s face was rigid. ‘What d’yer mean, have I finished?’
‘Yer stew.’ She pointed to her husband’s bowl.
Pat nodded. ‘Nearly.’
‘A bit more?’
He nodded again and shoved his dish towards her. ‘It’s just that they ought to know the truth about things, that’s all,’ he said defensively, looking across at his wife as she began to scoop more stew from the big enamel pan. ‘They can’t go through life like it’s all one big lark. They’ve gotta learn.’
As Katie was about to pour the stew into the dish she saw Molly lean towards Danny with her hand to her mouth. Katie banged down Pat’s bowl on the table and glared at her daughter. ‘Before you two even think about making plans to go out tonight, I want both them dishes o’ your’n licked clean, right down to the pattern. D’you hear me? And you, Molly, I expect you to set a decent example to the young ’uns and clear the table without being asked. Not even once.’ Katie pointed dramatically at the saucepan as though it was evidence in a court case. ‘Yer father worked his fingers to the bone to put that food on this table and I expect you two to show some gratitude. And a bit of respect.’
Relieved that whatever their father had thought they had done wrong now appeared to be either forgiven or, more likely, forgotten in all the commotion, and that their mother was back in her usual position of supporting him, whatever he said or did, Molly and Danny nodded and got stuck into the remains of their supper, eating as quickly as they dared.
Satisfied that order had been restored, Katie handed Pat’s bowl to Sean to pass to his father. ‘I was thinking me and Mum might go hopping this year, earn a few extra shillings. Maybe put a bit by for Christmas, ’cos that’ll be here before we know it.’ She turned to her mother. ‘You’d like to go, wouldn’t yer, Mum?’
Nora swallowed a mouthful of dumpling. ‘I would, girl. Do me good to get down to Kent for a bit. Fill me lungs with some decent country air.’ She looked at her granddaughter. ‘And how about you, sweetheart? Would you like to come with me and yer mam? Get some of them roses back in yer cheeks?’
‘I ain’t sure really, Nanna. Me and Lizzie Watts was talking about it the other day, and she was saying, now she’s settled in her job with me and everything, how she don’t wanna risk losing it or nothing.’ Molly glanced across at her father. ‘And it ain’t just that I don’t wanna go without me mate, ’cos I ain’t a baby,’ she added, ignoring Danny’s sarcastic gasp of disbelief. ‘It’s just that I feel the same as her. Dad’s right, yer’ve gotta look after yer job nowadays. Me and Liz’re lucky to be in work.’
Nora grinned. ‘You sure it’s just that tea warehouse that’s got such a grip on the pair of yer, and that yer haven’t gone and got yourself a couple of young feller-me-lads? I mean, yer both young ladies now, so you are.’
Molly dropped her chin; she didn’t need the country air to put colour in her cheeks, not with her grandmother around. The last thing she wanted was for her little brothers, particularly Michael, to see her blushes. They teased her rotten as it was, whenever she even spoke to a boy. Molly loved her nanna fiercely but the trouble with Nora Brady was that she had no shame and worst of all, no inhibitions either.
Katie, having been the object of her mother’s embarrassing behaviour on many occasions herself, helped her daughter out by changing the subject. She pointed at Michael with her fork. ‘If you dare feed another one of them bones to that dog while we’re still sitting at this table, Michael Mehan, yer do know what yer’ll get, don’t yer? The back of my hand round yer legs.’
Michael looked stunned by the accusation. ‘But it ain’t my fault, Mum,’ he complained. ‘Rags nicked ’em off me.’
‘And don’t you lie to me neither, yer little monkey. God’s watching yer, yer know.’
Defeated, Michael slumped down in his chair and ran his greasy fingers through Rags’s tangled brown fur, muttering sulkily to himself about how it was always him that everyone picked on.
Molly glanced around the table, then said, ‘Right, everyone finished?’
They all nodded.
And so, with another rowdy family meal over, Molly stood up and began collecting the dishes and cutlery.
‘I’ll put the kettle on for the washing up,’ said Katie, ‘and then we can all have a nice cuppa tea.’
‘Not for me, girl,’ said Pat, stretching his arms high above his head. ‘I’m off down the Queen’s for a pint.’
‘Well, don’t bother making one for me neither then,’ said Nora. ‘I’ll have a nice stout brought over from the Jug and Bottle instead – if someone fancies fetching it for me, that is.’
Katie stood up, untied her apron and looped it over the nail behind the kitchen door. ‘I’ll go over for yer in a minute, Mum.’ She took a clean tea towel from the dresser drawer and draped it across the top of the saucepan. ‘I’m just gonna see to something first.’ She leant closer so that only her mother could hear her. ‘I’m gonna pop the rest of this grub over to Mrs Milton. Yer know how it is when yer short. If I was a gambling woman, I’d lay money she’s been going without so’s she could feed her old man and her kids. Like a bag of bones, she is.’
Nora touched her daughter’s cheek. ‘Yer a good girl, Katie. But will she take it off yer?’
‘Yeah. I’ll make up a story like I did before. I’ll say we got a load of lamb from down the docks or something.’ Katie paused and crossed herself. ‘God forgive me for lying,’ she said to the ceiling. She looked over to where Pat was standing in front of the mirror tying a paisley stock round his neck, and smiled. ‘Yer know how everyone reckons dockers are always on the thieve.’
Nora sighed. ‘And so they all are, except your sainted husband, more’s the pity.’
Ignoring her mother’s remark, Katie straightened up and turned to Molly and Danny. ‘Off yer go, you two,’ she said, jerking her head towards the door. ‘I’ll see to the washing up later on.’ She looked at Sean who, unlike the others, had made no attempt to move away from the table. ‘You going with your brother and sister?’
‘Might as well,’ he said sullenly, scraping back his chair.
Katie shook her head. He was so moody lately, but then, she supposed, weren’t all boys of his age? And he probably still hadn’t got over the disappointment of being let down by the cabinet-maker Bill Watts had introduced him to. Bill’s mate had promised Sean an apprenticeship, but had had to change his mind because his business had got so bad. ‘Well, mind yer all back in here at a decent hour. Mass in the morning.’
‘We will be. See yer later then, Mum,’ said Molly, pecking her on the cheek. ‘Come on, Dan,’ she urged her older brother. ‘Get a move on.’
He was peering round his father’s bulky frame trying to get a look in the mirror so that he could check his thick dark curly hair that made him look like a younger version of Pat.
Molly rolled her eyes. ‘You ain’t gonna stand there all night titivating, are yer? Yer just like a big girl.’
His hair forgotten, Danny slung his jacket over his shoulder and chased Molly as she ran jeering and sniggering out of the kitchen. They were followed in quick succession by Michael, Timmy and Rags, and finally Sean, who slouched over towards the door.
But the two youngest ones and the dog didn’t get very far. Katie stepped nimbly round Sean and blocked their exit to the passageway. She grabbed hold of Michael and Timmy by their shirts, tipped her head sideways, indicating that Sean could go round them, and then dragged the two little ones back into the kitchen with Rags trotting along after them, his pink tongue lolling from his grinning snout.
‘And where, would yer mind telling me, d’yer think you pair are off to?’
‘Out with the Milton kids,’ said Michael, trying to wriggle his way out of his mother’s formidable grip.
‘Well,’ said Katie, letting them go and, much to Michael’s shame, straightening his collar for him. ‘So long as yer keep yerselves out of trouble. And so long as yer keep away from . . .’ She paused, going through a mental list of forbidden activities. ‘Well, all the things yer meant to keep away from. And you, Michael, I expect you to keep an eye on Timmy. Do you hear me? I don’t like the way he’s been acting this evening.’ She raised her eyebrows first at Nora and then at Pat. ‘Eating in the street,’ she said pointedly. ‘And using language like that. Whatever would Father Hopkins have to say if he found out?’
‘All right, Mum,’ said Michael.
‘And no fighting.’
‘No fighting.’ With that, Michael and Timmy dashed from the kitchen, raced along the passageway and burst out of the ever-open street door, with Rags yelping and yapping close behind them.
‘Bundle!’ Katie heard her two youngest children yell as they launched themselves across the street towards the swarm of variously sized young Miltons who had been waiting for them.
Satisfied that he looked respectable, Pat checked the battered silver pocket watch that his father had given him just before he died, and pulled his cap over his thick dark hair. ‘That’s me ready,’ he said.
‘I’ll walk out with yer,’ said Katie, picking up the saucepan.
He motioned to Katie’s bare throat. ‘Yer top’s all undone.’
‘Leave off, Pat.’
He didn’t move or say anything, he just looked her steadily in the eye.
With a weary sigh, Katie put the pan down and did up the two topmost buttons of her dress that she had opened while she was cooking. She then dragged her cardigan from the back of her chair and pulled it roughly over the thin cotton. ‘That suit yer? Or shall I put me overcoat on and all?’
Pat still didn’t respond. He just stood there.
‘You just wait and see,’ Katie said, picking up the pan again. ‘Wrapping meself up like a suet pudden in this heat, I’ll wind up having a turn. Then you’ll be satisfied, will yer?’
Nora didn’t even have to look at Pat to know that by now he would be swallowing hard and scowling disapprovingly at his wife through unblinking, narrowed eyes.
‘I mean, I don’t wanna go showing meself off to all the neighbours now, do I?’ Katie said sarcastically. ‘’Cos let’s face it, Phoebe Tucker’d never let me hear the end of it if her old Albert got a look at me neck.’
‘Nor would your old man,’ Nora mumbled to herself, as she took hold of one of the kitchen chairs, ready to carry it out into the street for her evening vigil.
‘Here, gimme that,’ said Pat, lifting the chair as though it were made of matchwood.
‘Yer a good boy,’ said Nora pathetically. ‘Kind to yer poor old mam-in-law.’
Pat snorted. ‘Get away with yer, Nora. Yer still a young woman, and tougher than the rest of us lot put together.’
Nora waited for Pat to disappear along the passage. ‘I’ve said it before,’ she said to her daughter, ‘and I’ll say it again. He’s a good man, your Pat – been like a son to me, he has – but yer wanna watch yerself with him, think before yer let yer tongue run away with yer all the time. Jealousy’s a terrible thing, Katie. It can turn a man.’ She reknotted the strings of her crossover apron and patted her wavy auburn hair, an unconscious act of straightening herself up before she went outside to the street. ‘I’m telling yer, girl, you push that man too far with yer carrying on, especially when he’s got all these other worries driving him mad.’
‘Have yer quite finished?’
‘It’d do you no harm, Katie my girl, to listen to yer mother for once. I know you and your temper. You go on and off the boil like a kettle. But I’m telling yer, yer might think you can wrap Pat around yer little finger if he ever looked like really getting nasty, but there’s some things that are too much to take for a jealous man like him.’
Katie put down the pot yet again. She stuck her hands on her hips and cocked her head to one side. ‘Mum, what are you talking about? I’m not far off being forty. I’m hardly gonna have men chasing around after me, now am I? Even if I was stupid enough to be interested in that sort of thing. I know what Pat’s like, but if there’s anything worrying him, it’s all in here.’ She tapped her finger on her temple. ‘All in his own mind. His imagination. It ain’t my fault.’
‘I’ll say no more. But you just remember what I’ve said, and how well I knew his mother and father, God rest their souls. There’s plenty of stories I could tell you about what went on in this very house when they lived here. Murderous rows they had, murderous. Yet his father was a good man deep down, just like your Pat.’ She rolled her eyes heavenwards. ‘But jealousy turned him. That woman had more black eyes and split lips than a prize fighter.’
‘Aw, just leave off, can’t yer, Mum?’ Katie stuck out her bottom lip, making her look like a grown-up version of Michael when he was sulking. ‘You know very well, Pat’s dad had good reason to be jealous, the way his mum carried on. But I ain’t nothing like her – nothing at all.’
‘I never said you were, Katie, and I’d batter anyone who even suggested it, but when a kid’s been brought up seeing and listening to them sorts of carryings-on, well, it can make a deep impression on him. Make him nervous, like; make him think that maybe it could happen to him one day. That his wife might start taking a fancy to some other feller.’
‘Yer talking rubbish, Mum,’ Katie snapped.
‘Am I? I just think yer should realise what’s at stake, my girl.’ Nora waved her arm around her, taking in the whole of the kitchen, the whole of Katie’s domain. ‘All this could all go down the shoot tomorrow if yer not careful. You’ve gotta make that man feel secure.’
Katie glowered at her mother. ‘Yer talking to me like I’m stupid.’
‘If you two are gonna stay in there gabbing, I’ll be off down the Queen’s,’ they heard Pat holler along the passage. ‘Won’t be long, love.’
Katie smirked triumphantly at her mother. ‘See? Nothing’s wrong. He ain’t even upset.’
Nora shook her head. ‘For such a clever girl, Katie Mehan, you really can be stupid at times.’