10

By the time I got in from school, Dad was waiting. He looked sad rather than angry, and for a moment I let myself hope that Mrs Emerson-Jones’s letter hadn’t arrived. Then I saw the envelope in his hand.

‘Let’s get this over with, shall we?’ he said.

I sat down at the kitchen table. My dad stayed standing. He was in his shirtsleeves, coal smuts all up his arms. He’d been stoking the boiler, which never improved his temper. I wished Mum was home. She had a knack for taking the sting out of Dad, and she’d at least have asked how my hand was, and bathed it in a bit of warm water.

‘Do you know what an embarrassment this is?’ Dad held the letter in front of me. ‘My own daughter fighting in school?’

He wasn’t expecting me to answer, thankfully. It was easier just to stare at the salt pot.

‘Why did you do it?’ he asked, baffled. ‘Was someone making fun of you?’

I shook my head. ‘Not me, no. A friend.’

‘So you thought you’d sort it out with your fists?’ Dad asked.

‘They were saying things about her colour!’ I cried. ‘It was horrible!’

‘And your friend, what did she make of you wading in? Wouldn’t she rather fight her own battles?’

I didn’t know what he was getting at. ‘She wasn’t there.’

Dad took a deep breath, but if he was trying to calm down it didn’t work. ‘Do you know how hard we pushed for this place at St Kilda’s? An opportunity like this – to better yourself by going to a good school – and what do you do? Throw it away!’

I flinched.

‘Don’t you know how important a good education will be? You’re a girl, Lil, and a poor one at that. Life out there in the big wide world is going to be tough. All this talk of votes for women, equal rights. There’s still a heck of a long way to go, you know.’ He leaned in, hands flat on the table to stop them shaking.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Sorry?’ Dad fumed. ‘You’ll be sorry when you leave school with nothing, and watch all the jobs going to the local boys who’ve not an ounce of your brains!’

I was taken back. The last thing I’d expected was Dad to argue for girls’ rights.

‘One day, Lil, I want you not to have to live in a tiny flat and do a job that’s god-awfully dull. I’d like you to go to university. I don’t want you to be held back because you come from a working-class family or because you’re a girl.’

I frowned. ‘Me, go to university?’

‘Maybe. Your grandad’s not the only one who knows there’s a world beyond London.’ Looking suddenly tired, he straightened up, moving back from the table and reaching for his coat. ‘You’ve had your punishment, and let that be a lesson to you. Your mother’ll be home soon. You can tell her yourself what’s happened. I’m going to the pub.’

I listened to him stomp all the way down the stairs and out into the street. In the quiet of our kitchen, my ears were ringing. I didn’t know what to think of what Dad had just said, but I’d a strong feeling it wasn’t a telling-off.

*

Only ten minutes or so later, Mum came hurtling through the door. She was red-faced, out of breath and holding her side like she’d been running.

‘What’s happened?’ I asked warily.

‘You’ve had … an invitation …’ she gasped.

I stared at her. ‘A what?’

‘A lady … came into work … Mrs Mendoza,’ Mum puffed. ‘Says you’re friends with her daughter from school.’

‘Mrs Mendoza came into Woolworths?’ I sat forwards in my seat, sore hand forgotten. Now I was worried. Had something gone wrong at the last minute? Had Tulip’s mum rumbled our plan?

‘Don’t look so horrified!’ Mum smiled. ‘She’s asked to take you to Egypt, all expenses paid. It’s a very important work trip, apparently, but her daughter’s refusing to go without you.’

I was bewildered. What was Tulip playing at? I couldn’t go to Egypt: I’d already told her so and explained why. It felt doubly cruel now that I was having to turn the offer down all over again.

‘It’s a shock to me too, Lil,’ Mum admitted. ‘I mean, we haven’t even heard of this new friend of yours.’

‘Sorry,’ I muttered. ‘Tulip’s very kind to invite me, but I know I can’t go. Dad won’t want me to miss school.’

Mum wasn’t listening. ‘Wait there,’ she said.

Moments later, she came back with her cardboard suitcase. ‘They’re catching the seven o’clock train from St Pancras. Mrs Mendoza said to meet them there if you were coming.’

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘But Dad said—’

‘And I’m saying,’ Mum interrupted, ‘that you’d better get packing if we’re going to make the train. Come on, I’ll help.’

I jumped to my feet before she could change her mind.

‘Thank you!’ I gasped, kissing her cheek. ‘Oh, thank you!’

Rushing to my bedroom, I grabbed what clothes I could find. Not that I’d much to take – underwear, a couple of faded summer dresses, a sweater, my best blouse, a nightdress and a comb. I shook with excitement. It hadn’t even begun to sink in that I was actually going to Egypt.

Yet when Mum laid the suitcase on the bed, and the lid sprang open, suddenly we were both staring at the slip of paper, and the word BOY in bold letters.

Everything went still.

I didn’t know what to do, whether to close the lid or keep packing.

Mum moved first, smoothing her eyebrows with her fingertips, like she did when something was complicated.

‘I should have left it somewhere less obvious, shouldn’t I?’ she said wearily.

‘Is it yours – the label, I mean?’ I asked.

She sighed. Nodded. ‘You’ve seen it now. It’s as good a time as any to tell you.’

Taking my arm gently, she made me sit on the edge of the bed, before perching beside me.

‘Years ago, I had another child …’ She cleared her throat. ‘I was only sixteen, and your dad and I couldn’t afford to get married, so a nice family who couldn’t have their own kiddies adopted him.’

But my mind was on Egypt and the journey I was about to make. I had that distant confused feeling Mum was talking to someone else.

A brother?

I looked at her in amazement. ‘You had a baby?’

‘That’s about the size of it, love.’ Mum got out a hankie to blow her nose.

I didn’t know if I felt sorry for Mum or was fuming angry. Something had certainly stirred deep in my chest.

‘But you gave him to someone else? Couldn’t you keep him?’

Tears rolled down her face. ‘That was the hardest part. We weren’t married. It wasn’t the done thing to have a baby like that – your grandmother was terrified I’d bring shame on the family.’

‘And Grandad?’ I wanted to know, because surely he wouldn’t have cared what other people thought.

‘He was in Egypt at the time. He didn’t know about it until he came home, months afterwards. But we never forgot our baby, your dad and me.’

I didn’t know what to say, or how to comfort Mum. But thinking of it now, I’d never seen my parents laugh much, or even look especially happy. Like most people did, I blamed the war, but maybe this baby they’d given up was part of it too. Maybe it was him Mum was thinking of in the evenings when she sat by the fire.

‘What was he called?’ I asked.

Mum sniffed, then smiled. ‘Ezra, after his grandad. Every year on his birthday we go back to the convent where he was born. Just, you know, to say a little hello.’

‘Which was why you went to St Mary’s yesterday,’ I said, because it was starting to make sense – or bits of it were.

Mum looked surprised. ‘How d’you know that?’

‘I thought you were taking Dad to see Grandad.’

‘Fat chance of that happening!’ Mum almost laughed, then looked teary again. ‘Your dad thought it best not to tell you, but secrets have a sneaky way of coming out, don’t they, eh?’

I felt too stunned to speak.

‘We’d better hurry or we’ll miss that train,’ Mum said, smoothing down her skirt and getting up from the bed.

I didn’t move.

‘Come on, then!’ Mum nudged me.

‘I can’t go. I can’t leave you, not after what you’ve just told me,’ I cried.

Mum took my face firmly in her hands. ‘Now look here, Lil, this is too good an opportunity to miss. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime trip. Think how incredible it’s going to be! Your grandad would be so proud.’

‘Would?’ I looked at her. ‘Don’t you mean will?’

‘Would … will …’ She hesitated. ‘I’ll be truthful, he’s not getting any better.’

Which gave me the last push I needed. I couldn’t deny either the little anxious voice in my head telling me it was no coincidence that something so heart-wrenching had happened to Mum and Dad at the very time Grandad was in Egypt discovering ancient jars. ‘Are you sure you don’t mind me going?’ I asked.

She nodded. She had tears in her eyes, and so did I.

‘Just come home again, that’s all I ask,’ she said. ‘I can’t lose both of my babies, can I?’

I almost told her there and then about the jar, about Grandad and the curse, but it was a long old story and we really didn’t have time.