Chapter 1
1886
The dockers paused periodically, catching their breaths as they wiped away beads of sweat that ran down their foreheads and stung their eyes. Those that had them used crusted and filthy handkerchiefs to stem and dab away the rivulets; those that didn’t used their forearms, leaving a smear of soot and dust across their brows. They looked at the crowd of idlers who had gathered around George’s Basin and muttered their resentment towards them before once again losing themselves among the barrels
and crates being unloaded from the three-masted barque.
“’Ere, you don’t wanna be putting your foot on his block sir!” A small boy emerged from the shadow cast by the Church of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas,
took a battered orange crate from under his arm and set it down.
“I’ll warrant he told you he’d shine your shoes for a copper, didn’t he?” He chirped as he efficiently
pulled at an arrangement of threadbare brushes and cloths secreted around various parts of his person. The bespectacled captain looked from one boy to the other, confused by the sudden complication.
“Oh he’ll black ’em and he’ll crack ’em but he’ll never get a shine on them, all he’s got is soot and vitriol, vitriol and soot, his father’s a chimney sweep
you see,” he continued as he meticulously spread out the tools of his trade. He took a lavish step back to survey them and finally satisfied, looked towards his competitor for the first time.
“Deny it if you can Johnny, protest to the good captain here.” The boy bristled but remained mute and the captain removed his foot from the block.
“That’s it sir, you come over here. I’ll give you somewhere to see your face without need of a looking glass and all for the aforementioned copper.” The captain shrugged at his initial choice, who could do nothing but stand in forlorn defeat, and moved over to the effervescent boy whose chatter didn’t abate as he rubbed, scrubbed and spat at the captain’s left shoe. He leaned back on his haunches admiring his work.
“There you go sir, now let’s have the other one and I’ll do it for sixpence,” he said, a grin spread over his face. The captain pulled back his half-cocked right leg.
“Sixpence, why you said you’d shine them for a copper; the boy there was charging me a penny!” He bristled.
“Well he’d have blacked them for a copper I can believe, but if it’s a matching shine you want it’ll cost you sixpence. You wouldn’t expect to catch
a weasel asleep now sir, would you?” The captain begrudgingly handed over the small coin and placed his foot on the crate.
Albert watched the whole scene play out with a smile on his lips. The smile twisted into a grimace and his body froze as he thrust his hand into his trouser pocket with instinctive sharpness and, with a vice-like grip, held on to the small hand he found already in there. Jobe, sitting astride the broad shoulders, was jolted forward as his father craned to peer at the imp who owned the hand. The urchin, snared and with no chance of escape, flapped and writhed with the shock of a hooked fish. Albert immediately relaxed his grip, relieving the bone- crushing pressure. He looked into the boy’s face
and was shocked at the features, which had been sharpened and chiseled by hunger.
“Your hands would be better employed helping the stevedores over there or perhaps scavenging cotton from under a scutching machine my lad, wouldn’t you agree?”
The small boy stopped jerking at mention of a cotton mill and looked mutely up at his captor, an anxious defiance etched across his prematurely wizened face. Albert looked away from the accusing eyes and scanned the outskirts of the crowd. Jobe was involuntarily twisted and turned at the mercy of his fathers movements and placed a hand on his cap to stop it from falling to the ground. Albert found what he was looking for and again addressed the boy.
“What is your name?”
The boy, guessing that the man holding his hand had spotted a copper, remained mute. Albert fished around in his pocket with his free hand.
“On the edge of the crowd there’s a woman selling penny pies; here, go and fetch three. Attempt to cheat me again and there’ll be a consequence, do you understand?”
The boy, slack-jawed, nodded at Albert and took the offered threepenny piece in disbelief. Albert released his hold completely but the boy remained in place rubbing his liberated hand.
“Off you go then! Three penny pies!” stated Albert, waving the boy away.
The boy blended into the crowd in a daze. He turned back in case the man thought better of his leniency and was pushing through the crowd in order to re-apprehend him. He was assured that this wasn’t the case, as he could still see that the boy with the best view on the dock remained stationary.
Although Albert hadn’t reconsidered his show of compassion a witness to the exchange had taken offence. He approached Albert and addressed him with a well-practised air of superiority.
“Do my eyes deceive me? Am I to believe that you have just released that scoundrel to go and prey on some other poor unfortunate?” Albert looked down at the squat, well-heeled man addressing him.
“No, I’ve released him with orders to fetch myself and my son a penny pie,” he replied blithely. Jobe was
again forced to lean backwards to safely retain his perch, such was the extent Albert was forced to look down in order to converse with his accuser.
“Have you taken leave of your senses, man? I must say I find it an outrage, nothing less than an outrage, to release such a fiend into the crowd - and with a tuppence reward to boot,” stated the man, his high- pitched voice corresponding perfectly with his small stature. Albert remained nonplussed.
“It was thruppence actually, and I assure you he’ll return with my pastry.” The man became exasperated, confusing Albert’s light attitude with some hidden weakness of the mind. He began to wave his hands at the taller man, revelling in the spectacle he was creating.
“Return! Oh I’m sure he will, sir, and with a multitude of his High-Rip brethren. Why, once they hear that there’s a fool at the dock who rewards attempted robbery and impertinence with thruppenny bits I’m sure there’ll be a veritable
horde.” Albert remained a picture of composure and again fished around in his pocket until he felt the familiar shape of a threepenny piece.
“Well congratulations, my good man, although I could not accuse you of attempted robbery your impertinence has certainly earned this!” Albert flicked the coin at the man causing him to flinch.
“Now good-day, sir,” he said looking at the man squarely. The man, sensing he had made a
misjudgment, melted into the crowd with as much dignity as he could muster.
Jobe had not paid the slightest attention to either of the affairs his father had been engaged in. The bustle and confusion around the dock made no impression on him. He unconsciously shifted his position allowing the blood to flow through his haunches for a second before he settled back on his perch and re-impeded the arteries’ flow. He was oblivious to the buzzing sensation of paraesthesia building in his already numb legs. The throng of people around George’s Basin, comprised of people from every conceivable walk of life the city had to offer, shared his single-mindedness; as necks craned they marvelled at the hot air balloon floating high above the Mersey.
Silky slunk and threaded through the spellbound crowd with ease. His unconscious mind scanned and spotted half a dozen well to do targets in as many yards. Easy pickings were galore. His brush with capture hadn’t slaked his appetite. He’d made a mistake, that was all. He rebuked himself, why on earth had he attempted to dip the giant? He’d been on his tiptoes just to reach his pocket! He’d had a lucky escape an’ no denying. His initial fear hadn’t lasted though. He’d been confident of a reprieve as soon as he had met the giant’s stare; there was a
twinkle in the unusually green eyes and a twitching of his neatly trimmed moustache, as if he were trying to stifle a smile.
This lot would be different, dipped and flipped within the blink of an eye as they stood around George’s Dock gawping up at the balloon in the sky. Silky didn’t know what all the fuss was about. An over-inflated pig’s bladder bobbing above the
Mersey. He knew it was there to allow some Nancy a bird’s-eye view to produce a painting of the city. He imagined the rich toffs marvelling at the finished article hanging on a wall in a fine gallery as they slapped each other on the back, congratulating themselves on constructing such a fine town, the majority of which, they failed to notice, chose to ignore or avoided like the plague every day of their lives. But he wasn’t arguing. He’d heard it was going to take the Nancy another two days to finish his drawing and if the balloon attracted crowds like this one he wouldn’t be going hungry for a while.
He made his way to where he knew McGhee would be with her tray of mutton pies. Silky’s unconscious brain, which was every bit as forceful as that of his conscious one, screeched at him to continue dipping the cluster of snobs as he made his way out of the crowd and back up Chapel Street with the gift of
a threepenny bit and a good story to share at the corner. Instead he reached McGhee and ordered three pies.
“’Ere, how about four for three Missus McGhee?”
“Penny a pie,” came the stock reply from the barrel of a woman. Silky handed over the
threepenny piece and cradling the pies like new
born babies entered back into the crowd to his liberator and, Silky assumed, his son. He was tormented by the smell of the hot pastry but enjoyed the warmth of the pies against his perpetually cold hands when a heavy gentleman, who couldn’t quite crane his neck back far enough to view the balloon to his liking, took a step backwards and landed heavily on his bare left foot. Silky let out a scream and, acutely aware of the pies, attempted to stop his arms from fulfilling their natural reaction. He had partial success and kept two of the pies cradled but watched in helpless horror as the third and topmost pie somersaulted in mid-air before descending and splatting on the ground. He looked up at the owner of the heavy foot in anger. He was a tall but vastly rotund man with a crimson complexion caused by
a fondness for claret. His bulbous, vein-ridden nose, which was if anything a deeper red than his face, twitched in revulsion as he realized what he had stepped on. Silky was incensed.
“’Ere, if you didn’t have so many chins maybe you’d be able to look up in the sky like everybody else. Why don’t you go up Everton Brow, you’d be able to stretch your neck enough to see from there!” The man bristled at the laughter that came from a majority of the surrounding crowd and responded by planting his foot firmly into the fallen pie, his turkey neck trembling with the effort, ruining its pathetic contents.
“Ahh, that must’ve hurt you, trampling on good food.” He turned his attention to those who had dragged their gaze from the spectacle in the sky. “Keep an eye on this gent! I’ll give you a silver shilling each if he’s not on his hands and knees snaffling that pastry down his big fat gullet the
instant you next look up at that pox-ridden balloon.” There was more laughter from those in the crowd.
The working men, whose employment usually depended on them treating such a gentleman with a well-measured deference, ensured they added an extra element of derision.
Silky cut further into the crowd as the man took a step towards him. He was crestfallen. This is what you get for being honest he admonished himself.
He considered eating the remaining two pies and getting back to dipping. Maybe he’d have a go at the fat toff with the big foot. But something about the man with the boy on his shoulders drew him back and he knew it wasn’t the promise of a penny pie or the threat of consequences.
Albert wondered whether the irate stump of a man at the dock had been right. He had to concede that the fellow certainly had a point. Had he
done the right thing, not only releasing the little street Arab but also rewarding him with a pie and sixpence? Was he one of the High-Rip who were
spreading so much fear throughout the North End of the city? He thought it unlikely. The heel imprint on the boy’s dirty bare foot had certainly proved testament to the unfortunate fate of the third pie. Added to that, the boy looked as if he had not eaten that day or possibly the one before. He had split the two pies between the urchin and his son and also given the boy a tanner, warning him to get home before his good fortune was spent.
Although around the same age as his son, probably a little older, Albert reflected, Jobe’s expression of infancy and inquisitive innocence was one that, in all likelihood, had never had the luxury of gracing the other boy. The two were of similar stature and physique but where Jobe had the healthy glow of an eight-year-old, the boy was stunted and starving. Albert decided he was correct to afford the boy his liberty. It would do little harm to those in the crowd wealthy enough to own pocket-watches and silk handkerchiefs to be relieved of them in order to help fill an empty stomach.
The noise of Jobe still sucking remnants of the unfamiliar grease from his fingers interrupted his thoughts.
“Jobe, there can’t possibly be anything left of that pie. Now remember, no mention of it to your mother.” Jobe continued to turn and stare back at the balloon lingering above the Mersey as they
rose through the rolling hills of Everton. His father had eaten up the three miles from the waterfront
to their home, stopping only to place him on the ground in order to brush the pastry crumbs from the baggy knee pants of his grey knickerbocker suit. As the blood flow had been restored to his legs he had suffered terribly from the pins and needles that afflicted him. His legs seemed to be on fire. His father advised him to stamp up and down while he
massaged his son’s legs with huge hands, explaining to him that the pain was only caused because his blood was rushing to where it was needed. That
had made him feel better. Now he was back in his favourite place in the world and the view he had was astounding. The roofs of Great Homer Street, Scotland Road and Vauxhall stretched all the way to the docks in a black confusion, punctuated here
and there by the outlines of churches and chimneys, ending with the radiance of the Mersey, sparkling like a jewelled ribbon as the sun reflected from
it. The river was crammed from north to south with shipping and goods from all over the world.
Looking down on it all was the magical balloon. Jobe wondered if the artist could see him and his father. His father being a giant, Jobe thought it likely and gave a wave. He looked forward to seeing his father and himself when the painting was finished.
Jobe pushed down on his spinning top and watched in wonder as it blurred before his eyes.
But still failed to rise. He knew if he could just get it to spin a little faster it would take off and hover like the balloon he had seen with his father down by the river. He grabbed the top and put his full weight on it, attempting to induce as much power and speed as possible. The top’s handle snapped under the pressure and Jobe watched as the device
skewed off on its side across the small foyer and into the dining room. His mother entered the drawing room with the broken top in her hand. Although she had been baking and was wearing an old pinafore, Jobe thought she was beautiful. She was forced to continuously blow a loose strand of dark hair from her deep blue eyes as she spoke to him, her elfin face contorting as she did so.
“Jobe, d’you know how many children in the street I grew up in would kill for even a single spin of this top?” Jobe sensed his mother’s genuine emotion and wondered at it.
“You must be careful, toys like this are precious.
You need to be aware of how lucky you are.”
“I wanted it to fly, mother,” Jobe said by way of explanation. This seemed to turn his mother’s sadness to anger.
“So you threw it up into the air is that it? You need to learn to appreciate what you’ve got and how lucky you are to have it.” Kitty proceeded to collect the toys that Jobe had scattered over the floor, and once
returned to their box, she put it on top of Albert’s bureau.
“You shan’t be having these back until you learn to respect your belongings,” she chided him. Jobe heard the front door close and a second later his father entered the room. Albert immediately sensed the strained atmosphere.
“What’s all this, have my two angels had a falling out?” he asked, bemused.
“Oh Albert, I’m worried he’s becoming spoiled.
He’s broken his new spinning-top. He’s no regard for his belongings. I want him to know the value of the things he has.”
“Well, that’s certainly not like you Jobe. Let’s have a look at it, maybe it was faulty.” Albert looked around the drawing room floor.
“Where is it?” he asked.
“It’s up on your bureau with the rest of his toys. It’s not faulty; he’s thrown it into the air to make it fly. I’ve taken them all away until he learns their
worth,” explained Kitty. Albert located the box and reached up for it.
“Come now, Kitty. Haven’t we agreed we don’t want him to be deprived or to know want?” Albert nodded towards Jobe quietly sitting on the floor.
“Just look at him, not once has he interrupted or attempted to plead his innocence, and look at the rest of these toys, they’re immaculate. How
did he react to you taking his things? There was no
tantrum or beseeching, I’ll wager.” Albert was on his knees now sorting through the box of toys. He took out the top and its broken plunger, fingering the sharp metal where the break had occurred. He looked at Jobe.
“Can you tell your mother and me how it broke, Jobe?”
“Mother is right, Father. I was trying to make it fly,” he confessed.
“I didn’t throw it in the air, though,” he quickly added. Jobe knelt forward and took the two parts from his father, explaining his aim as he provided a reconstruction.
“The top spins so fast that I fancied if I could make it spin just a little faster it would take off. So I pushed down on it as hard as I could, but it snapped instead of spinning faster.” Jobe released the broken top to the floor and knelt back sadly. He looked at his mother.
“I wasn’t trying to make you sad, Mother. I’m sorry. I love all my toys.” Albert brought his hand to his forehead.
“The boy is a genius,” he said, more to himself than his wife or son as he scooped Jobe up and spun him in the air.
“Eight years old! An absolute genius!” This time he did address his wife.
“Don’t you see, Kitty? He was trying to create enough downward pressure to enable the top to hover.” He noted his wife’s total bafflement.
“Never mind,” he smiled. He kissed his son on the forehead as he placed him back on the thick rug before standing and taking his wife in his arms.
“We’ve created an absolute genius,” he said again as he bent and kissed her. Jobe looked happily at
his mother and father, glad that everything was harmonious again. His mother looked down at him, smiling now.
“Well Master Genius, just be more careful in future, that’s all.”
Albert took his pocket-watch out. The hands had barely moved since the last time he had checked.
He was well aware of the hungry glances his watch was attracting but for once discarded his caution. He had more serious concerns. He scanned the bar again. Being at least a head taller than the rest of the clientele in the poorly renovated parlour he was in no doubt that Potter wasn’t in the room. Potter was never late. The onset of worry began to gnaw at him, an odd sensation that he didn’t enjoy. He drained his glass flinching at the hot unfamiliar liquid burning his throat. Why did people drink? The question became more pertinent as he opened the heavy door
to find a man lying prone in the doorway. Albert bent and was about to heave the man into a more comfortable position but noticed the vermin that crawled over his body and instead stepped over the obstruction. Without a word being said, three men standing around a hogshead barrel drained their glasses and followed Albert out of the pub.
Although the sun shone brightly above neither warmth nor light permeated into the dank and narrow canyon that remained in constant shadow. So high were the black tenements on either side that the air itself was inert, causing a noxious atmosphere that Albert could almost feel pulling against the exposed flesh of his hands and face. His mind spun as he navigated his way through the refuse, sewage and uneven cobbles with a dexterity that belied his ignorance of the street. Albert wondered if he had misread Potter’s note but Kitty had also read it and indeed directed him on how to reach the venue named on it.
Potter, as tall as himself but even broader, enjoyed their clandestine meetings and wrung all he could from them by insisting they use a different public house for each of their monthly rendezvous. It seemed to Albert that the pubs had grown seedier and rougher over the course of the years, each one located deeper in the courts and entries than the one before. Albert had wondered how he carried out his reconnaissance and could only venture that Potter remained in the localities long after Albert had left.
He couldn’t blame Potter for attempting to wring maximum excitement from what must otherwise be a mundane existence serving Albert’s parents on the Wirral peninsula.
Albert’s usually reliable and self-preserving powers of observation and awareness were heavily diluted by the tumult of anxious and apprehensive thoughts cascading through his mind. He failed
to notice as mothers ushered their protesting, emaciated children out of the gutter and into the cellars and tenements on either side of him.
The shock of the heavy thud to the back of his head caused an instant explosion of stars before his eyes. His knees buckled and he was on the verge of sinking to them but on some unconscious level he was still aware of the filth that covered the street and it was his desperation to avoid falling into it, rather than self-preservation, that caused Albert
to shuffle forward and remain on his feet. He spun around and, again more through instinct than sense, threw a heavyweight of a haymaker just as the lead pipe was about to make contact for the second time.
The wielder of the pipe was bewildered that the toff, big as he was, had somehow remained on his feet. He prided himself on his strength and ability to fell an opponent with a single blow of his two- pound lead pipe. It always fell to him to land the blow that got the job done. The kicks and punches that followed, thrown by all three of them, as
their prey lay prone and penniless, were purely for pleasure, fuelled by spite and hatred. For one of his victims not to collapse instantly into the gutter was nothing short of miraculous, especially when he had the element of surprise on his side. These thoughts raced through Bernie’s mind as he trotted forward the couple of paces needed to deliver the second, and surely, killer blow. They also served to slow and weaken the strike that was aimed at the
same spot on the back of the head but never reached its destination. Bernie was helpless to avoid the crashing blow from the huge right hand that ceased all flow of thoughts through his head.
Albert leant forward and retched the fiery liquid he had just consumed on to the cobbles, adding to the plethora of human waste that already festered there. With both hands on his knees he looked up at the two remaining assailants.
“I’d give it a bit more thought if I were you,” he managed to croak. The two men looked at their fallen comrade face down in the filth and then back at the colossus in front of them who was straightening up to his full height, wiping his mouth with a handkerchief as he did so. They glanced at each other for an instant and, decision made, ran full pelt back to the safety of their abandoned hogshead.
Albert, unsure, of his legs waited for a second before approaching his assailant to pull him out of the filth he was quietly drowning in. He was a
dead weight and it took all of Albert’s diminished strength to prop him against the soot-covered wall.
“Yer wanna leave him in the gutter where he belongs, nothing but shite anyway.” Albert slowly turned in the direction the voice came from but the movement was still too quick for his aching head’s liking. It felt as though his attacker had found his way inside it and was hammering away with his lead pipe. Albert retched again, but this time nothing came up and his stomach and ribs ached with the exertion. An old woman stood in a doorway, her shape and face hidden by a swathe of black rags
that seemed to hover around her. Something about the woman affected Albert more than an army of assailants, and his heart sank. Children who had been dragged indoors by their mothers now flooded into the street and approached the unconscious ruffian cautiously. On seeing that he was no threat they descended on him and in a silent frenzy tore at him, removing anything of value including the lead cosh. His earlier dexterity and demeanour forgotten Albert half ran, half staggered to the end of the dank entry, bursting out of it into the relative security and sunshine of Great Howard Street, shocking a match-seller who stood on the corner into dropping her basket of wares.
Kitty had just finished basting the roasting piece of meat and was flushed from the hot stove when she heard Albert come in. She entered the parlour where her husband was sitting before the unlit fireplace.
A wave of relief flooded over her whole being and her nerves ceased their continuous jangling. She understood the necessity of his monthly meetings with the mysterious Mr Potter but couldn’t for the life of her imagine why they took place in such surroundings.
“Kitty, do you know where this public house is, dear?” Albert would ask, unfolding a luxurious piece of paper in front of her. Kitty would take the paper and although the scrawled street name would cause her stomach to lurch, and more often than not provoke a flurry of memories, she couldn’t help but marvel at the exquisitely fine paper.
As often as not she knew of the pub, or if she didn’t was always at least aware of the court, street or entry it was in. The meetings were always in the worst parts of her old parish or even less desirable neighbouring ones, and she would blanch as she gave him his answer and then directed him on how to arrive there by the safest and least unsavoury route.
She had stopped trying to talk him out of having his rendezvous in such areas for fear he would stop asking her advice.
“Well Kitty, if you’re going to worry so I shall have to stop asking your advice and not share my whereabouts with you,” he had told her.
She instead mollified her anxiety by forcing Albert to repeat her directions at least three times which would, please lord, negate the need for him to spend longer in an unknown area, going deeper into the depths until he was lost in the honey-combed labyrinth of tenements, alleyways and courts. Still she couldn’t help trying to curtail Potter’s risk- taking.
“It’s just common sense, Albert. Why not meet in the town? Why can’t your father’s man just come here?”
“It’s Potter’s prerogative, dearest, and if anyone were to see us…If mother found out he’d be in as much trouble as father. More. She can’t sack father!”
Kitty put down her tea towel and looking at Albert noticed that his face, usually so rugged and robust, was pale, clammy and his breathing shallow. He sank further into his armchair. She went over and sat on the arm stroking his head.
“Albert, are you hurt my love, whatever’s the…?” Kitty tailed off as her hand traced the huge lump on the back of his head.
“Oh my…” This time it was Albert’s interjection, a raised hand, which caused her to trail off. She fell to her knees in front of him, hands in his lap, waiting for him to speak.
“I’m fine dear, I promise, physically at least. I’ll let you fuss over me all you want in a moment or two but first please hand me Potter’s last envelope from the bureau in the drawing room.” Kitty, although shocked and with a hundred questions that needed answers, got up and carried out his request. She returned with the envelope her husband had brought home a month ago containing the precious pound notes. Now all that it contained was the beautiful paper with a pub’s name and street scrawled on it in a terrible hand. It reminded her of Jobe, although even at eight his writing was better. Thank God he was at school now and couldn’t see his father in this state.
“What does the note say, dear?” asked Albert. Kitty knew from memory, having given Albert directions at the beginning of the month and again that morning, but looked down at the note anyway.
“It says Nonpareil, Luton Street,” she said. She brought it over to Albert and again sat on the arm of his chair.
“You see, Nonpareil, Luton Street,” she repeated as she held the note in front of Albert, who held his hand up to his eyes.
“Yes, I knew already, and it’s the one off Boundary Street, just under the railway,” he said, his hand still massaging his eyes. Kitty’s nerves began to jangle again but she forced herself to stand, tall and bright.
“Yes, that’s the one Albert. Now c’mon, I want a proper look at this head of yours, and to know
where and how you got such a coggie, although I can well imagine. Didn’t I warn you they call the place Sebastopol on account of how rough it is!”
Kitty flinched on numerous mental levels.
The sheer size of the man was cause enough, he was bigger than Albert even, hugely tall, long- limbed and broad in the chest, though none of his
intimidating size was portrayed in a face that shone with geniality. The greatest shock was that this
was obviously someone from, or sent from, Albert’s family over the water, and he was addressing her as Madam.
“May I speak with your husband, Mr Albert Warburton, please Madam,” the big man said again. Kitty, to an extent, recovered herself.
“Yes, that is, I’m sorry. Please come in.” Kitty stepped back and opened the door fully. Although the doorway was large enough to accommodate him the man stooped in order to enter.
“From habit”, Kitty thought, then mentally rebuked herself.
“C’mon now Kitty, get a grip of yourself girl, this is important.” Kitty had entered into the habit of mentally chastising herself soon after being
estranged from her family. Although she had never been wantonly scolded by any of them, her habits always left room for minor chiding and as nobody was around to do it for her, she did it herself. Out loud when she was alone or with Jobe but inwardly at all other times. She saw the man in the hall looking at her, awaiting direction.
“God! Now c’mon Kitty will yer!”
Potter sat facing Albert. His sympathies were obviously genuine and Kitty found herself liking the man. Albert held on to the china cup in his hand so tightly that Kitty feared for it. Even though she shared the full pain of her husband’s bereavement she couldn’t bear to see something so delicate and precious damaged. Her prudent nature took over.
“Here my love, let me take that for you.” She gently removed the full but cold cup from Albert’s grasp. He looked at her as if waking and then looked at Potter.
“And the funeral was last month!” He looked at Potter but spoke to no one.
“I’m so sorry, Albert. Your mother has ensured I remained busy, which wasn’t difficult given the
circumstances. She knows I was your father’s man and has always had her suspicions that we met
on his behalf. He always spoke about wanting to accompany me…” Potter tailed off as Albert stared into the fireplace. He could only speculate at what was going through Albert’s mind. He wondered
if the anguish of the news had given way to pragmatism. If not the grief of losing his father must be accompanied, if not outweighed, by the worry of losing his regular stipend.
“I can’t believe she never let me say goodbye.” Albert’s words interrupted Potter’s musings and he saw that Albert was addressing his wife. Potter
took the opportunity to study Kitty unobserved. Her beauty was startling. He had been taken aback by it when she had pulled open the heavy front door. Only his ingrained politeness and years of service had allowed his face and voice to remain unaffected.
Potter had been well aware of what enticed Albert back to the Merchants Coffee House on Water Street; and he knew it wasn’t the quality of their beans
or the panoramic views across the Mersey. Potter had heard of the serving maid’s beauty but hadn’t witnessed it personally; he fully expected that, either the sating of Albert’s lust or the continual rejection of his advancements would bring the visits to an end. Potter was as shocked as anybody when Albert announced his marriage plans to his distraught parents.
He now appreciated Albert’s decision to defy his mother’s authority in order to make the serving girl, Kitty, his bride. Albert’s mother, as always, had been unwilling to have her totalitarian habits queried and responded brutally to her only son’s deviation from the path she had prepared for him. Her decree that Albert be ostracised by the family and deprived
of the benefits of belonging to it, had met opposition, but when it was learned that his intended was a Catholic cellar-dweller from Liverpool, even the boldest opposition, that of his father, melted away. It was a heavy price to pay.
Potter cleared his throat, not knowing any other way to intimate he had something further to add. Albert and Kitty both looked at him. Potter returned their gaze. Unwilling to add to their burden but having no other option he looked Albert in the eye.
“I’m afraid the will has been read, Albert. Your mother was the sole beneficiary.”
Fergus’s permanently stooped back became even more pronounced as he tackled the steep brow. His knees screamed in protest with each step of his threadbare but heavy hobnail boots. The impact of the gradient on his physical condition was equivalent to that of the vicinity on his mental state. His sensibilities grated as he travelled further into Orange territory. He’d never crossed the invisible divide between Scotland Road and Great Homer Street into the Orange enclave before Kitty, his only daughter, had been banished there. He crossed Byrom Street and followed the ever- ascending Richmond Row across its junction with St Anne Street and so on to Everton Brow itself.
Fergus tensed as he crossed St Anne Street, into
what he considered staunch Orange country. He was ready to defend himself against the angry horde of Orangemen, the O’s, gathered to dislodge him, the Irish Catholic, from their territory. As usual the outraged mob never materialised and the people continued with the daily grind of their existence,
a huge majority of which mirrored the struggles those of his own parish faced. Fergus turned his attention to the real battle ahead. Everton Brow was an unmerciful climb and given his almost decrepit physical condition it was one he was never sure he would conquer.
He attempted to observe the O’s without ever being caught looking. The better quality of air and life itself offered on the hills didn’t permeate to these lower reaches of the climb and Fergus only encountered the types of people he would on his own doorstep. Still they were queer fish. Sure there were the odd few Catholic families scattered in
the enclave of Protestantism but to Fergus’s mind their continual exposure to the O’s had somehow tarnished them.
“Tinged with Tangerine,” as his Nelly would put
it.
Nevertheless it had been wrong to ostracise his
youngest daughter and so force her into Orange clutches. He had tried to intercede on her behalf. Attempted to make his wife see sense, and so in her eyes “went against her,” something she found hard to forget or forgive. That was how she viewed Kitty’s
marriage to a Protestant. A betrayal so heinous it could never be rescinded. Kitty didn’t stand a
chance. Nell had not stopped rocking in her chair for an instant, as was her wont when she was perplexed.
“But mam, if you’d just give him a chance,” implored Kitty.
“A chance! A chance! Did they give us a chance when they were setting fire to the roof over our head? Did they?” responded her mother.
“But mam, what’s that to do with Albert? He’s never even been to Ireland. He’s loving, kind and gentle,” she continued.
“Ah well, isn’t that always the way with the devil until he’s tricked you out of what he wants.”
“Well, he’s had it mam. I’m having his baby and we’re to be married next week,” blurted Kitty. Nell’s rocking stopped and she pointed at her daughter as though she were cursing her.
“Then you’ll leave this house Kathleen Flynn and you’ll never darken its door again! I’ll have no bastard Orange in this house!”
Fergus almost collapsed against the set of railings that surrounded the pleasure gardens on Shaw Street. A group of young women with bonnets and perambulators sat inside the fenced summer seat casting the odd furtive glance in his direction.
Fergus gulped in a lungful of the fresh spring air. It couldn’t hold a candle to the good clean Irish air he’d been raised on but compared to the fug those
in the rest of the town were forced to inhale it was an elixir. Kitty was better off up here away from the degradation and despair of the slums, even if she was surrounded by O’s. He couldn’t shake the melancholic feeling that the haphazard swirl of thoughts that accompanied him up the hill like an extra weight had caused in him. He dragged his calloused palm across his sweating forehead before wiping it against his trousers. He’d had to get involved when he realised the enormity of the tragedy facing his family.
“Well hang on there, Nelly. If the girl is pregnant and to be married then this is a situation that needs discussion not hot-headedness.” His wife had
twisted on him like a viper, her rocking regaining its momentum.
“Hot-headedness is it? Is that the hot-headedness that got us out of our burning house as they barricaded us in? Is that the one? Sure Fergus, you’d have had a hot head all right, never mind just a singed one, cowering inside as you did! Wasn’t it my hot head that broke us out and lambasted the Orange!” Fergus had spent years trying to impress on his wife the fact that he wasn’t cowering at all
but trying to protect his youngest from the burning thatch that had begun to fall upon them.
“I’m just saying…”
“Well you’ll say no more Fergus Flynn, or you’ll be out on your ear with her.” Nell scooped up the quart
of ale from the table and after filling her pot fixed her eyes stubbornly upon it. Her rocking gained an extra impetus but she didn’t spill a drop.
Kitty looked at her Da and seeing there would be no further intervention on his part ducked under the lightly laden washing line and ran from the dimly lit room.
Fergus had looked at his wife who kept her eyes averted from him. He took up the quart of ale and emptied its remains, every last drop, into a jam jar on the table. He stood over his wife as he swallowed the contents in one go. He slammed the jar back on the rickety table causing it to tremble and, confident his point had been made, which was verified by Nell’s lack of protest in the face of such blatant antagonism, left the room. Nell picked up the quart jug and threw it with force against the opposite wall where the heavy pottery smashed into pieces.
There was no way Fergus would ever sever ties with any of his, let alone his youngest daughter, of that he was sure. He hadn’t fought all these years to keep his children alive just to forsake them when they made a decision that went against the grain.
It was true he had had to fight far harder to protect his eldest children from the grasp of death. From the very outset it had been against all the odds that any of his eldest would live. And he had to concede that without the strength of his Nell there wouldn’t be one of them left.
Vincent had been born to great joy just before the first blight. Fergus, who never drank, went into the village and celebrated in style in O’ Shea’s that night, ensuring that everybody in the tavern, fisherman and farmer alike, shared in his joy. He stood them all at least one jar of poteen each. It would prove to be the last true celebration the village experienced. Fergus could still put a name to the face of every man that congratulated him with a slap on the back, shake of the hand or a toast to his first-born son’s health that night.
The first blighted crop had been a disaster. Black stalks replaced healthy green ones overnight. There was no warning, no opportunity to rescue any portion of the crop. Fergus had experienced bad crops before, as had everybody else, but this one was different. News of spoiled crops was coming from every corner of the country. It seemed the whole potato crop of Ireland had been reduced to a pile, no, a mountain, of dry black shoots whose foul smell pervaded the entire island.
Taverns, there were always enough potatoes or corn to make poteen, were full of talk about a bad fog that had blown in and settled over the fields at the worst possible time. The optimistic nature of the locals decreed that a toast be raised to the easterly wind that would ensure the fog didn’t settle the following harvest.
“Have no fear boys and raise a glass to the easterly that’ll blow that accursed fog straight across the sea to the Godless English’s fields.”
Fergus wasn’t so sure. This was something he had never experienced. It was as though there was an invisible and island-wide pestilence. He worried it didn’t bode well for the next year’s crop or the one after.
His young wife had not only detected his fears but acted on them. She spent every spare moment collecting and preserving every scrap of food nature’s larder had to offer. She would be seen up in the hills, on the coast and in the woods with Vincent strapped to her back and a sack in her arms. Every vessel she could put her hands on was sanitised, made airtight and utilised. Everything she Salted, pickled, dried or smoked Nell would somehow preserve and then bury in the cool dark mud, sowing the earth with a bounty that had no chance of growing but would provide sustenance when so many others were starving. Blackberries, turnips, mushrooms, herring, shellfish, even roots, nettles and seaweed all found their way on to the
table while others were laid with nothing but broths made from roadside weeds and grass.
“Good God Nell! Is there no end to these jars?” he would say in mock exasperation each mealtime.
“You’ll know about it when they’re gone, Fergus Flynn,” would be her stock reply.
The situation became worse as each succeeding crop failed. The village and surrounding farms, although spared from the viciousness of the food riots and influx of English soldiers that the bigger towns and cities were experiencing, was still subjected to the hated landlords and the barbed pangs of hunger that heralded slow starvation.
Fergus and Nell, together with their neighbours, witnessed ships loaded with Irish oats and grain sailing up the coast to feed the world while they watched and starved. Then Fergus and Nell watched as the village itself depopulated daily. In the majority of cases there were only two destinations on offer. One was to follow the oats and grain into the world, namely Liverpool; the other didn’t bear thinking about. And so it was either on the coast
or in the cemetery, on a steamer or in a coffin that Fergus had bade his family, friends and neighbours farewell. Both were heartbreaking. In days gone by he had known people who travelled for new starts in the relatively close city of Liverpool and, those that could afford it, further afield to exotic places like America and Canada. But such was the news coming back about the degradation and disease that festered in Liverpool that he was of the opinion it
would be better to stay and be buried in his local and ancestral cemetery than a strange and English one. The cost of travelling to America was so prohibitive he had more chance of taking Nell and the nippers to the moon.
In the end it was the landlord, or rather his hired mob, who forced the issue.
The opportunity to transform the hovel and potato-pit-strewn land into lucrative fields full of cattle and sheep was not one to miss for the
landlord. Tenant farmers up and down the country had found themselves evicted from their land to make way for livestock.
Nell had ensured that the landlord’s agent never left the Flynn door without his monthly dues.
Just as she produced meals from barren coastlines and the thin air of misty hills so she conjured up pennies from out of the blue that she saved behind a loose brick in the blackened fireplace in order to ensure the roof over their head was one that would remain. The landlord, frustrated by the lack of
arrears which he could manipulate to his advantage had tried to pay the family’s passage to Liverpool.
When that didn’t work his agent employed one of the many gangs who had been sent over to Ireland from England to evict and terrorise tenants. Bigger towns had began to form their own gangs to defend their own against this threat but such was the small scale of the village and its surrounding farms there wasn’t the strength in numbers or bodies to fight, such was the shortage of food. It was his Nell, alone, just as she liked to remind him, who had confronted their particular persecutors. As he cradled the three- year-old Vincent and his baby brother Bog into the protection of his body she smashed her way out of
the barricaded front door with their only knife in one hand and a poker in the other and scattered the group of English, who although not wanting to come within striking distance of the flame-haired
banshee had retained their masculinity by laughing and calling obscenities. The following day they were on board a steamer looking at their Ireland grow further and further away as England loomed ever nearer.
Fergus looked down on the city and traced the line of the Mersey back to its mouth. He stared into Liverpool Bay and wondered where it was that the Irish Sea began. Unaware of his vacant expression, the passage of time or the people of
Everton deviating from their routes in order to avoid the bedraggled stranger, he simply stared as the events of a different life tumbled through his mind. He unconsciously licked his lips in anticipation of the pints that would numb, if not flush away, his melancholic mood, to be bought with the money he would allow his youngest daughter to force on him.
“Da,” Fergus straightened as his daughter ran the length of the fence and threw her arms around him. He was forced to strain against her weight or risk falling back against the railing, such was her force. He felt her body begin to rattle as sobs shook
her slight frame. Bewildered, he stroked her hair and patted her back.
“Hey now, what’s all this? My brave Kathleen all of a fluster?” Kitty remained nestled in the rough fabric
of his overcoat. The coat was redolent of her early years and the sobs became audible.
“C’mon now, let’s have a look at you, get your head out of this stinking coat,” Kitty allowed him to gently grasp her cheeks with his rough hands and look into her eyes.
“Oh Da, I’m so scared, I don’t know what we’re to do.” She gained a modicum of control and
disengaged herself from her Da, instead taking him by the hand.
“Are you ok to walk a bit, Da?” Kitty led Fergus out into the rolling pastures where the
population dwindled and they could talk alone and undisturbed.
“Albert’s father has died, Da.” Fergus was surprised that Kitty was showing so much grief for an in-law who, to his knowledge, she had never met. Fergus removed his greasy cap and Kitty ruffled the flat hair that was pasted to his scalp. Now that it had been disturbed the gentle breeze played among his jet-black locks, which were incongruous sitting atop his worn, narrow face.
“Well God rest the man, I’m sorry for your husband’s loss.” He sat down in the field, his knees cracking loudly and looked up into the unbroken sky for a second marvelling at its blueness.
“I’m a little surprised that you’re so upset, Kathleen?” Kitty had sat down next to her Da and, knees tucked under her chin replied,
“I am grieving for Albert’s loss, Da, but it’s not him losing his father that has me in such a state.”
“I don’t understand, Kathleen, what’re yer telling me?” Kitty rested her forehead on her knees, obscuring her face.
“He was our only source of income, Da. Albert received a monthly stipend from him. It’s what’s kept us for all these years.”
“But I thought he was a writer?” Fergus replaced his cap on his head.
“You should leave that cap off for a bit, Da, let some fresh air at your head. He is a writer but for all the money it brings in it might as well be voluntary, you’d make as much for a day down the docks. We’ve no income Da, all we’ve got is what I’ve put away.” Fergus was still struggling to grasp the situation fully. He knew his daughter’s husband came from a wealthy family over the water. He looked across the Mersey and over to the rolling hills of the Wirral.
“Am I remembering right, he’s the only son?” he asked. Kitty nodded her confirmation.
“Ach Kathleen, you’re worrying over nothing, he was a rich man, there’ll be a will. You’ll be better off than you are now.” Fergus was troubled that this reduced Kitty to tears again.
“No Da, the will has been read. His mother was the only beneficiary. Albert suspects trickery but we’re powerless to contest it, we could never afford a solicitor.” Kitty sniffed and wiped at her eyes with
her cuffs. Fergus blinked as his daughter regressed into the little girl from Vauxhall Road; he half expected her to drag her sleeve across her nose. Kitty felt the need to explain further.
“She’s like mam, Da. Stubborn to the core, only she’s worse, she’s rich and powerful. He didn’t even get to pay his respects. She’s never forgiven him for marrying a Catholic, and a slummy to boot. He’s in the same situation I am, Da, ostracised by his family and now his father has gone all ties are severed.” Fergus had difficulty deciphering the torrent of information but was able to grasp the situation.
He glanced furtively around, ensuring there was nobody in earshot. Even though the fields were empty, Fergus spoke in a whisper.
“They’re a queer lot Kathleen, you’ve always known that.” Kitty stood up in exasperation and paced around her Da.
“Oh Da, you sound like mam. Albert couldn’t care less about any of that nonsense, it’s what he writes about, satire he calls it. Isn’t it him who’s forfeited
a life of luxury to be with a cellar-dweller like me? It’s not us I’m worried about Da, it’s Jobe, this is the only life he knows.” Fergus held out his hand so his daughter could help him to his feet.
“He’s a lucky man to have you Kathleen, and don’t you go letting him think otherwise.” Fergus brushed the grass from the frayed backside of his trousers.
“And if all he does with his writing is poke fun at the sectarianism in this town then it’s small wonder he makes nothing from it! He must be the only person I’ve heard tell of that reckons it a joke.”
Fergus took his daughter in his arms and kissed her head.
“Now c’mon, will yer walk an old fella a little way down the hill. Give him safe passage past all these bloodletting O’s.” Kitty smiled for the first time that day and as she always did wordlessly opened her Da’s hand in order to slide a few coppers in. Fergus kept his fist tightly shut and closed his other hand over hers.
“You’ll be all right girl, you’ve more of your mam in you than you’ll ever know.”
Albert stared at the pile of notes and coins that Kitty deposited on the table. He began to drag his hand through it. Kitty slapped at his arm.
“Be careful now Albert, you’ll scratch the surface,” she scolded. Albert straightened up, taking his hand from among the money, and looked at her. Kitty immediately licked her thumb and wiped at a small scuff mark.
“But how? I don’t understand!” He brought his hand to his face and played it along the length of
his moustache. Kitty detected his discomfort and attempted to downplay her achievement.
“Ah c’mon Albert, you’ve been giving me a small fortune for an age now. What d’you think I do with it all? The house is furnished. You know I refuse to waste money on hiring help. Apart from food and fuel the only real outlay is the rent and Jobe, his school fees, clothing and such, oh and the toys you insist on spoiling him with of course. When you’ve had nothing all of your life it’s only common sense to put a bit away for a rainy day.” Albert looked at her.
“You truly are a wonder to behold, Kathleen Warburton.” Albert looked at the money again, remaining utterly confounded. Kitty broke his reverie.
“C’mon, let’s count it together and then we’ll decide how it’s best spent.” Kitty fell to her knees before the low table. Albert took her hand and pulled her up and into him. He nuzzled her head as he spoke.
“I promise you now, Kitty, I will begin writing in earnest, no more of these pieces for pamphlets or newspapers, or my own vanity come to that.
I will earn the money to keep us in the life we’re accustomed to.” Kitty looked up at her husband and kissed him on the lips.
“There’s not a bone in all of my body that doubts you will, my love.”
