Chapter Two ‘Ee, lass, I’m sorry I’ve kept you so late and on Christmas Eve an’ all, but it seems like everyone’s left their shopping till the last minute this year. We’ve been rushed off our feet, haven’t we?’ ‘We have, Mr Foster.’ Molly Kirby smiled at the shopkeeper, and not for the first time she reflected that she could have worked for a lot worse than William Foster. He was a nice man and a fair and kind employer, and generous too, always slipping her the ends of the bacon or ham to take home for the bairns along with a wedge of cheese or a couple of stale loaves. Not that she could admit to Edgar that Mr Foster had given her the extras; she always made out she had paid for them. Edgar’s jealousy didn’t take much to fan into a red-hot flame. William Foster looked fondly at the young woman he liked and respected. Gossip had it that her husband was something of a ne’er-do-well, and that he’d returned from war as whole as the day he had left Sunderland but that he sat on his backside all day and did nowt. Of course you couldn’t altogether trust the old wives’ tittle-tattle, and what they didn’t know they’d make up, but he’d seen Edgar Kirby once and the man looked all right to him – no missing limbs, no scars, no signs of the gas poisoning that some poor devils had to cope with. But Molly wouldn’t hear a word against him, bless her, and perhaps that was as it should be. Reaching behind the counter, he brought out a bag of groceries, saying, ‘These are some extra bits for the bairns, lass. There’s some nuts and fruit and half a ham, and a box of crystallized jellies. All the bairns like them, don’t they. And this’ – he drew an envelope out of his white overall – ‘is for you, lass, a Christmas box from me an’ the wife. Buy yourself something nice, eh? You deserve it.’ Molly couldn’t say anything for a moment for the lump in her throat; it wasn’t just the gifts that had her fighting back tears but the way Mr Foster had spoken, so kindly and gently as if he understood how bad things were at home. But not all the time, she corrected quickly in her mind. Sometimes Edgar reached out to her, saying that he needed her, that he didn’t know what he would do without her and that he didn’t know why she stayed with a mental case like him. But he wasn’t mental, he just needed help, help the doctor refused to acknowledge was necessary despite her pleading with him on more than one occasion when she had gone to his surgery without Edgar knowing. Not that she would go again after the last time. ‘Your husband ought to be thankful that he survived what so many did not,’ Dr Graham had said coldly, when she had told him yet again about the screaming nightmares Edgar suffered most nights, the terror of loud noises, the inability to think or talk clearly at times and the blackness that enveloped him like a dark suffocating blanket. ‘I’m sorry to be blunt, Mrs Kirby, but he needs to pull himself together and act like a man. We could all wallow in depression and melancholy at times but we choose not to. It’s an act of self-will. He has a home, wife, children – he’s a lucky man.’ Molly had stared at the doctor and but for the fact that she knew he had lost his three sons at the beginning of the war in the bloodbath that had been Mons, she would have shouted that this wasn’t about self-will or choice, it was about being terribly, desperately ill. But it was useless. As far as Dr Graham was concerned his sons were dead and Edgar was alive so Edgar was the lucky one. And it wasn’t just the good doctor who felt this way; so many of her neighbours had lost loved ones, and she had met with closed faces and tight lips when she had tried to explain why Edgar hadn’t found work and why he rarely left the house. Mrs Shawe, from three doors up, had even gone so far as to take her aside one day when they had met in the back lane and tell her that everyone thought it was a crying shame that she’d been forced to go out to work to keep a roof over their heads. ‘Your man needs a good kick up the backside, lass,’ Mrs Shawe had said with a self-righteous sniff. ‘There’s lads like my Kenneth, shipped home minus his legs and in pain every minute of the day but not a murmur of complaint or feeling sorry for himself, and there’s your man as whole as the day he was born and content to sit on his backside and do nowt. I pity you, lass, I do straight.’ She had told Mrs Shawe what she could do with her pity, Molly remembered now, and they hadn’t spoken from that day to this, but strangely, rather than discouraging her, the woman’s attitude had made her all the more determined they would battle through this harrowing time and Edgar would get better. ‘All right, lass?’ Molly came out of her reverie to find Mr Foster staring at her in concern. ‘Yes, yes, I’m sorry, it’s just that you are so kind and . . .’ She couldn’t go on, the tears spilling from her eyes. ‘Don’t take on, lass. You’re tired, that’s all.’ Mr Foster patted her arm, somewhat embarrassed. ‘Now you go home to them bairns of yours and have a grand Christmas. I’ll see you Monday morning, seven o’clock sharp.’ After wiping her eyes and putting on her hat and coat, Molly said her goodbyes, thanking the shopkeeper once again and then his wife who had come down from the flat over the shop to wish her a merry Christmas. It was now nine o’clock and the last-minute shoppers had dwindled somewhat, probably because the snow was coming down thick and heavy and the wind was raw. Stopping in a doorway a short distance from the shop, Molly opened the envelope Mr Foster had pressed into her hand. Her wage packet of ten shillings was in there, along with another ten-shilling note. A week’s wages as a Christmas box, she thought gratefully. Oh, they were kind, the pair of them, and she had the bag of groceries too. It would make all the difference this Christmas. It was a constant battle to put food on the table and pay the rent, and she was always weeks behind with the latter no matter how she penny-pinched. What she would do without the extra bits that Mr Foster regularly slipped her way she didn’t know. It was a life saver. She breathed deeply of the icy air, a smile touching her lips. She could get a fine bird for tomorrow’s dinner now, and a small toy each for the bairns to add to the orange and sweets and penny whistles she’d already put by for their stockings. And some tobacco for Edgar’s pipe. Two ounces. No, three. Molly set off for the old market in the East End a short distance away, her steps lighter than they had been in months, even though within a minute or two her feet were soaked through and numb with cold from the holes in her boots. She had first been introduced to the old market one Saturday night a few days after she and Edgar had got married. Edgar was a Sunderland lad, born and bred, but she was from the Borders with its hills and wide-open spaces and the old market was like nothing she had experienced before, so full of people and noise and light she’d felt she had stepped into another world. There had been boxing going on, and a stall where you had to throw footballs through holes. Duke’s – at the top of the market – was a roundabout, like a fairground, and there were shops of all kinds and a stall where a giant of a man with snow-white hair had sold different kinds of sweets, next to people with barrels of nuts and raisins and hot chestnuts, and a stall that sold tripe. She had been amazed and had stood stock-still, trying to take everything in, until Edgar had laughed at the look on her face and picked her up in his arms, holding her tight as he had kissed her smack on the lips in front of everyone. As Molly reached one of the entrances to the old market in Coronation Street, she stopped for a moment, lost in memories. That had been a wonderful day. Every day with Edgar had been wonderful until he had gone away to war. He had been thrilled when Abby was born and hadn’t minded that their firstborn was a girl, unlike some of the men hereabouts. It had been he who had chosen the name Abigail, after the matron in the orphanage where he had been brought up when his parents had died of the fever when he was just three years old. Matron Riley had been one of the few people to show kindness to him in that place, he’d told Molly, and when he had reached the age of fifteen and been able to leave, she had given him a small Bible with a little card wishing him well, inscribed with her full name. He had read a passage or two from that Bible every day before he had left for the front, but now it dawned on her that he hadn’t opened it since he’d returned from overseas. As she stepped into the noise and bustle of the market Molly shrugged her shoulders, as though throwing off a physical weight. She wasn’t going to think about how bad the last months had been or what the future held, not tonight. Tonight it was Christmas Eve and she had money in her pocket and two whole days at home with the bairns, Christmas Day falling on a Saturday as it did this year. The old market had been built ninety years before as an alternative to the open-air market in the town, and its brick walls and domed roof meant that it was considerably warmer than the bitterly cold night outside. As usual there were a motley collection of snotty-nosed ragamuffins gathered around the hot-potato stall and roasted-chestnut barrels, their pinched faces eyeing the shoppers as they edged as near as they dared to the warmth. Molly’s hand tightened on the purse in her pocket. Children as young as five or six were sent out pickpocketing by their dissolute parents, and the East End was a cauldron of petty – and not so petty – crime. In spite of the weather several of the children had no boots on their feet, and such clothing as covered their skinny frames was in tatters. One forlorn tiny tot caught Molly’s attention. The little girl couldn’t have been more than four or five and her long unkempt hair was white with nits, but in spite of the dirt and grime she had the sweetest face imaginable. Rickets had bowed her thin little legs so badly it was a wonder she could stand, let alone walk. Everything in Molly wanted to press a penny or two into the child’s hand, but she knew that would bring the rest of the children swarming like a horde of famished hornets, their hunger making them aggressive and persistent, and some of the older lads were already accomplished thieves. Nevertheless, she smiled at the little girl as she passed her, receiving a blank, hopeless stare in return. Molly continued on, sending up a quick unspoken prayer of thanks as she walked that her own children were warm and well fed. True, their home wasn’t the happy place it had been before Edgar had come back, and Abby and Robin were creeping about like small silent ghosts half the time, but there were worse things than having to tread on eggshells. When she reached Crawley’s butcher’s stall there was a crowd gathered round it. It was nearly half-past nine and the butcher always closed at ten. In the last half-an-hour of a working day, old man Crawley was well known for auctioning his remaining lap-ups – parcels of a mixture of different meat items – at knock-down prices, and for those housewives with not a ha’penny in the world who waited until he shut up shop, he always found a few meaty bones dark with congealed blood and sawdust that would make a broth of sorts. It wasn’t unusual to see young urchins, bones and ham shanks stuffed up their grubby jerseys or held close in dirt-encrusted hands, making their way out of the market with big grins on their faces. And with ex-servicemen reduced to a life of street hawking by the lack of jobs and the government’s Food Controller cutting rations, for some families such windfalls made all the difference between managing and the dreaded workhouse. But tonight Molly wasn’t looking for one of the lap-ups. She could see the butcher had three turkeys hanging up behind him and it was one of those she had set her heart on. Pushing her way through the waiting women with their shawls wrapped tightly round them and hungry faces, she reached the front of the crowd, catching the butcher’s attention as she called out, ‘How much are the turkeys?’ ‘The turkeys, lass? All of ’em or just one?’ Mr Crawley joked, grinning at her, his rosy-red cheeks like ripe apples. Molly was used to the stallholders’ banter in the old market but she still felt herself blushing. ‘Just one,’ she said shyly. ‘I can do you that big plump fella on the end for half a crown, seein’ it’s the end of the day, and I’m givin’ it away at that price, I tell you, lass.’ And then seeing her expression, he added, ‘Or one of the smaller ones for a couple of bob.’ Molly gulped. She normally made a ninepenny lap-up feed the family for two or three days. But it was Christmas. ‘I – I’ll take one of the smaller ones, please.’ The butcher stared into the pretty face in front of him. She was a bonny lass, he thought to himself, but clearly, like most of his customers, times were hard if the look of her old boots and threadbare coat was anything to go by. Give it ten years and she’d look as old as a woman twice her age. He reached for the large turkey. ‘Tell you what, seein’ it’s Christmas, you can have the big beggar for a couple of bob and I’ll throw in a tub of dripping for nowt. How about that?’ ‘Thank you, thank you very much.’ ‘Aye, well, like I said, it’s Christmas, lass.’ By the time Molly left the old market she was carrying the turkey which Mr Crawley had parcelled up for her under one arm and the bag of goodies from William Foster in her other hand, to which had been added some tobacco and Brazil-nut toffee for Edgar – his favourite – a football for Robin and a storybook for Abby. And she still had nearly fifteen shillings left. The snow was coming down thicker than ever but she barely noticed it as she made her way through the warren of streets stretching away from the market, her mind taken up with the pleasure her gifts would bring. On reaching the back lane of Hedworth Street, Molly straightened weary shoulders. It’d been a long and busy day and she was tired to the bone, but doubtless she wouldn’t get a lie-in tomorrow. Robin would be up at the crack of dawn to see what was in his stocking. A small smile touched her lips. He was so excited. Abby, on the other hand, was much more subdued and quiet these days, and she knew her daughter worried about how things were at home, even though she tried to keep the worst of Edgar’s disturbed behaviour from impacting on the bairns. The new fall of snow had covered the slides the neighbourhood children had made in the back lane, causing it to become treacherous underfoot. By the time she reached her own backyard, Molly was thankful she’d made it without breaking an arm or a leg, and when she lifted the latch of the back door and stepped into the warmth of the kitchen, she sighed with relief. It was short-lived. As soon as she took in the glowering expression on Edgar’s face she knew one of his rages had him in its grip, and that it was a bad one. At these times – and she wouldn’t admit it to a living soul for fear of betraying him – she recognized madness in his eyes. Not a fleeting angry madness, the sort people have when they lose their temper over something or other, but an insanity that took him over and made him into someone she couldn’t reach and didn’t recognize as her Edgar. Aiming to hide her fear, she said quietly, ‘Hello, love. I’m sorry I’m late but it’s been non-stop all day. I’ll just put these things away and then I’ll dish up, shall I? The bairns asleep?’ ‘Left him smiling, did you?’ It was a low growl. For a moment Molly genuinely didn’t understand. ‘Who?’ ‘Your fancy man.’ Edgar didn’t move, sitting unnervingly still as he watched her place the shopping on the table. ‘Gave him something to tide him over Christmas, did you?’ ‘Stop it.’ She met his eyes, her face white. ‘Please, Edgar, don’t start on this again, not on Christmas Eve. I’ve been working, you know that.’ ‘Oh, aye, I’ve heard it called that a few times.’ ‘I work in the shop, that’s all. Mr Foster is a good person and so’s his wife. They’re a nice couple and think the world of each other.’ ‘So she won’t ask him what he’s been doing in the shop till’ – Edgar glanced at the wooden clock on the mantelpiece – ‘till nigh on ten o’clock? Well, that’s up to her, isn’t it. But I’m asking why this “good” man didn’t shut shop at seven like normal and go upstairs to his “good” wife. Like you just pointed out, it’s Christmas Eve. But then no doubt he did shut shop and pull down the shutters. He’d want a bit of privacy, wouldn’t he? Does he laugh about me, Molly? The man he’s making a cuckold of? Told him I can’t get it up since I’ve been back, have you?’ ‘I have never discussed you with Mr Foster and I told you why I’m late – we’ve been rushed off our feet. And once I left the shop I went to the old market to see what I could get cheap. I’d said to the bairns I might be able to pick up a turkey or a duck for tomorrow’s dinner.’ Her voice had risen despite her telling herself she had to keep calm; it only made things worse when she bit back. Taking a deep breath, she said softly, ‘Look at what I’ve got. We’ll have a grand Christmas, just you an’ me an’ the bairns. That’s all that matters to me, us and the bairns. You must know that, deep down.’ Edgar still hadn’t moved, his hands gripping the arms of the chair as though he didn’t trust himself to let go. ‘It might have been that way once.’ He raised his tortured gaze to meet her eyes. ‘But not now.’ ‘It is, I swear it is.’ Molly didn’t know whether to go to him or to stay where she was. She had learned the hard way that when the blackness enveloped him like now he could lash out at the slightest provocation, real or imagined. Other times, like when he awoke shaking and sweating from a nightmare, she would cradle him to her and rock him as one would a child, soothing him with murmured words of love until he could sleep again. The pot roast was beginning to burn, she could smell it. She hadn’t realized she would be so late and it should have come out of the oven a couple of hours ago. Even more softly, she said carefully, ‘Why don’t I dish up and we can talk as we eat, all right? Come and sit at the table. Please, Edgar. You have to eat.’ He had been gaunt and thin when he had returned from the war but over the past months she was sure he had lost even more weight. For a moment she thought he was going to refuse but then he levered himself out of the armchair like an old, old man and walked over to the table. For the first time he seemed to become aware of the shopping she had placed there, for now his voice came harsh and suspicious as he said, ‘How come you could afford all that on what he pays you?’ Molly knew if she told him about the extra ten shillings it would be a red rag to a bull, so thinking quickly, she said, ‘I’ve been putting a penny or two into a Christmas Club each week that one of the regulars who come into the shop runs. You don’t miss it that way, but come Christmas there’s a bit extra for things.’ Edgar stared at her. Then his shoulders slumped. ‘Aw, lass, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’ Molly slipped off her coat and hat. She didn’t ask him what he was sorry for; she’d heard enough of his ranting about her employer to know what he had been thinking. Feeling uncomfortable about the lie she’d told, she walked across to the range and opened the oven door, telling herself it was far better to stretch the truth than have another row. She was unaware that Edgar had come up behind her as she lifted the heavy cast-iron pot from the oven with a folded cloth, until he said wearily, ‘I can’t go on, lass. I’m losing me mind, I know I am. Half the time I think I’m back there, and the rest of it . . .’ He cleared his throat. ‘Let’s face it, I’m no good as a husband or a da. I should’ve died out there with me mates. At least you could have remembered me as I was then.’ Molly turned to face him. ‘Don’t say that.’ ‘It’s true.’ His face was grey now his temper had drained away and it struck her anew just how thin he had become. ‘It’s not true. We’re going to get through this together, I promise you.’ She wanted to put the pot down so she could take him in her arms, but as she moved the lid came loose and slid forward. Instinctively she tried to save it from crashing to the floor, jerking the pot towards her, but in so doing the oven cloth slipped and her fingers came into burning contact with the red-hot iron. Her scream of pain accompanied the sound the pot made as it hit the stone flags with a deafening boom, the contents spilling everywhere. The shells were coming thick and fast, mud and blood and body parts filling the trenches. The Germans were straight in front of them, advancing in waves, and now it was hand-to-hand combat of the most vicious kind. He had lost his gun, damn it, but his hands were round the neck of the German trying to kill him and he squeezed with all his might, screaming as he did so. Even when they fell to the ground he didn’t let go, knowing it was kill or be killed. Mud was pouring into his mouth as he yelled but he couldn’t stop, he couldn’t stop . . .