Laceys of Liverpool (12 page)

And Cormac! John beamed most proudly of all upon his son, eleven the day before yesterday and certain to pass the scholarship next year and go to St Mary’s grammar school. He used to worry that his lad, so quiet and studious, his head always buried in a book, would be bullied at school, particularly when he’d been moved up a class and put with children a year his senior. But Cormac, with his sweet smile and gentle face, never made a show of his cleverness, never bragged. And he was good at games, not so much footie, but his slight, fragile frame could move like the wind. If the school played rugby he’d be a star.

‘John, Bernie would like some more wine.’ Alice smiled. ‘You were in a little world of your own just then.’

‘Sorry, Bernie.’John refilled her glass. ‘Alice was right. I was miles away.’

Alice! His wife had ripened over the years. No longer gawky, her movements were confident, self-assured. And she was growing more and more confident by the day. He felt proud of Alice too. He hadn’t thought she’d had it in her to run her own business. But, he thought drily, perhaps he’d driven her to it. She’d been given the choice of Myrtle’s or staying at home and, like any sane, sensible person, she’d chosen Myrtle’s. He watched her, flushed and lovely, blue eyes sparkling animatedly as she discussed hairstyles with Bernadette. She had her own hair in something called a French pleat, which he didn’t
like – it made her look sophisticated, a bit hard, he thought.

‘Not so much, luv.’ Alice put her hand on Fionnuala’s arm as she was about to take a third helping of Christmas pudding.

Did he still love her? John wondered. Probably. Probably just as much as he’d ever done. But now he felt they belonged to two different worlds – the world of the damaged and the world of the perfectly formed. He smiled to himself. And ne’er the twain shall meet!

The meal finished, the table was cleared and they played cards – Cormac could wipe the floor with everyone at poker.

At four o’clock John announced he was going out. ‘To the yard. I’d like to get a bit of painting done so it’ll be dry by tomorrer. I’ve got this urgent order, see.’

‘But it’s Christmas Day, luv,’ Alice wailed. ‘And surely you’re not working Boxing Day as well?’

‘I can’t let these people down, Alice. It’s the first time I’ve actually had an order from a big shop.’

‘And it’s dark, John. You should have done it this morning if it’s all that important. It’s blowing a gale out there.’

‘I didn’t want to miss seeing the kids open their presents. I’ll probably go for a drink later, so I’ll be late home.’

She fussed around, tying his scarf round his neck, buttoning his coat, and he tried not to show his impatience. Across the room his father-in-law was eying him suspiciously. He was so used to clandestine assignations himself that he automatically assumed John was off on a similar mission.

Alice came with him to the door, bemoaning the fact that he had to go all the way to Seaforth. ‘I’m surprised
you couldn’t have found a more suitable place much nearer home in Bootle.’

‘I tried,’ John said and closed the door.

When Alice returned to the parlour, Bernie and Danny were in the middle of an argument. Why had he bought her a pinny? Bernie wanted to know. Had he done it deliberately to emphasise a woman’s place was in the kitchen?

Danny winked. ‘I might have.’

‘Well, it won’t work. I’ll never wear it.’

‘I’ll not wear that jazzy scarf. I don’t know what made you think I had such dead awful taste.’

‘You,’ Bernadette said furiously, ‘are the most maddening man in the whole world.’

‘And you’re the most abominatable woman.’

Bernadette wrinkled her nose haughtily. ‘It’s abominable, actually.’

Danny chuckled. ‘Whatever it is, you’re it, particularly with that hairstyle. It makes you look like a convict.’

The girls and Cormac were listening with interest to the inevitable squabble between Grandad and Mam’s best friend. They found them highly entertaining. ‘Why don’t you two like each other?’ Maeve wanted to know.

‘It’s a long story, luv.’ Danny shook his head resignedly.

‘They’re only
pretending
not to like each other,’ Cormac wisely said. ‘They like each other really.’

‘Don’t be so ridiculous, luv.’ Bernadette blushed beetroot red. Danny found something tremendously interesting on the back of his left thumb, and Alice stared at her father and her friend, flabbergasted.

‘It’s time for tea, Mam,’ Fionnuala reminded her.

‘Oh, yes.’ Alice came down to earth. ‘Mind everyone while I set the table.’ They had guests coming – Orla’s
boyfriend, Micky Lavin, and two girls from the hospital, friends of Maeve.

While she prepared the sarnies, Alice tried to discern how she would feel if Cormac, clever little chap, were right. She’d always known Bernie was keen on her dad – not that she’d ever mentioned it – but it hadn’t crossed her mind the feeling was reciprocated. Danny was twenty-one years older than her friend, but still a vital, attractive man, a bit like Clark Gable, though not quite so tall and less broad – much preferable to the lacklustre Albert Eley. She’d not minded Danny’s never-ending stream of women in the past, because she’d always known they weren’t serious. But Bernie, only the same age as herself! Would she take her own place in her father’s heart?

Oh, what did it matter? Alice laughed out loud. They were two of the people she loved most in the world and it would be the gear to see them happy together. She began to plan what she would wear for the wedding.

It must have been a ten-force gale. John had to battle his way through the streets on his way to Seaforth.

These days, Alice wasn’t the only Lacey with her own business. Five years ago John had built bunk beds for his girls, which had become the subject of much interest. In an area of mainly small houses and generally large families, space was always at a premium. The Murphys down the street were the first to ask if John could spare the time to make them a set of bunk beds, or two sets if he had even more time.

John had obliged and the Murphys had insisted on paying, not only for the wood, but for his labour. Before long, orders for beds stretched ahead for months. Then he made a bed for himself in the parlour, because sleeping on the old settee was crucifying for a chap as tall
as he was. It was a very simple design and he managed to upholster it himself – a settee, with a seat that pulled forward and a back that slid down to make a double bed.

With many a parlour used to accommodate growing children, ageing grandads and grannies, spinster aunts and lonely uncles, even married sons and daughters, John Lacey’s folding beds quickly became as popular as the bunk beds.

Instead of months, he was deluged with orders that would have taken years to complete. It seemed only sensible to give up regular employment and concentrate on making furniture.

He had rented a yard, an old dairy, and there was more than one reason why he’d chosen Seaforth, so far away from Bootle. It wasn’t only because he wanted to avoid the neighbours and his family dropping in for a chat, preventing him from getting on with his work.

The wind was less fierce within the shelter of the narrow streets of Seaforth. The yard was on the corner of Benton Street and Crozier Terrace, the latter a cul-de-sac. Next door was the shop that used to be the actual dairy where milk and eggs had been sold. It had been empty for years.

John undid the padlock on the double gates. There was no sign yet announcing the name of the company inside, but the heading on the order books and invoices he’d had printed was B.E.D.S. It had been Fionnuala’s suggestion and he thought the capital letters and full stops gave the name a certain authority – much better than just ‘Beds’.

There was another padlock on the two-storey building inside the yard that had once housed the dairyman’s horse. John used the top floor as an office and kept the finished furniture downstairs. He climbed the ladder, turned on the light and removed a paper carrier bag from
beneath the table he used as a desk. Then he locked the stable, locked the yard gates and hurried away. He had no intention of doing a mite of work on Christmas Day.

The bag in his hand, John walked quickly along Crozier Terrace, his eyes fixed on the end house where light gleamed through the flowered curtains. The houses were even smaller than those in Amber Street, with only two bedrooms and no hall – the front door opened straight from the parlour.

The key already in his hand, John inserted it in the lock and went inside. The aroma of roasting chicken greeted him and music, which he had heard from outside – something classical and very grand.

Clare immediately rose from the chair in front of a roaring fire. The other chair was empty, waiting for him. She held a tiny baby in her arms. Another child, about two, with white-blond hair like his mother, was playing with bricks on the floor. He leapt to his feet.

‘Dad!’ He flung his arms round John’s legs.

John’s eyes met smiling grey ones across the room. ‘Merry Christmas, Mrs Lacey.’ He held up the bag. ‘Prezzies.’

Meg Lacey had been round for her Christmas dinner. Billy had gone missing the minute the meal was over and Cora did her utmost to encourage his mother to follow suit – Mrs Lacey still insisted on mauling Maurice, something which made Cora’s stomach curl.

‘I think I’ll pop round and see me friend, Ena. Her husband only died last July, so it’s her first Christmas on her own. You don’t mind, do you, luv?’ Meg seemed as anxious to escape as Cora was to see her go. ‘I’d call round our John’s, but that Danny Mitchell will be there. I can’t stand that man, forever making eyes at me.’

You’ll be lucky, Cora thought cynically. Danny
Mitchell liked his women glamorous – he wouldn’t be seen dead with a plump, grey-haired sixty-year-old like Meg Lacey. For women interested in such things, she supposed Danny Mitchell was dead attractive.

Only one man interested Cora and it wasn’t Danny Mitchell. It wasn’t her husband either. Not long after Maurice was born she’d begun putting Billy off: pretending to be asleep, claiming a headache, not going to bed until he was snoring fit to bust. She’d always had trouble sleeping, was usually awake at the crack of dawn, and up by the time Billy stirred himself and got ideas. She could only assume he paid for it if he needed it, or had a girlfriend. Either way, she didn’t care as long as he left her alone.

His brother, John, though, was a different kettle of fish. She’d always considered him the best of the Lacey brothers and would have much preferred him to Billy, but since the accident, she’d felt even more drawn to the man with the destroyed face. She visualised touching the puckered red skin, being kissed by the twisted mouth, when she’d always thought kissing disgusting and the thing that was done in bed beyond the pale. But now, when she imagined doing it with John Lacey, there was a fluttery feeling in her belly that she’d never had before.

She didn’t see much of him these days, only the times he came to visit Billy. He would nod at her curtly and not say a word. Cora was no longer welcome in Amber Street, hadn’t been for years, not even at Christmas.

It’s not fair, she thought. Alice was desperate for that twenty-five pounds. If it weren’t for me, she’d never have got that bloody hairdresser’s. Why should I take the blame just because she was too thick to understand a perfectly straightforward business agreement?

Cora was never usually in need of company. She enjoyed being alone, plotting and planning, thinking of
things she’d like for the house. But it was Christmas Day, Billy was out, Meg had gone, Maurice was in his bedroom, where he’d been sent to avoid his grandma’s mauling hands, and the house seemed much too quiet. It didn’t seem right that it should be so itchily silent, not on Christmas Day. Horace Flynn was coming to tea, and she remembered what would inevitably happen afterwards once Maurice was in bed and gave an involuntary shudder, though she didn’t usually let it bother her.

In Amber Street they’d probably be playing cards by now, or them parlour games she’d always considered stupid. But she wouldn’t have minded being there right now, part of the noise and bustle.

There
was
something she could do to become part of it. She could go round Amber Street with the paper Alice had signed and tear it up, throw it on the fire, redeem herself in everyone’s eyes, even Fionnuala’s, whose loathing for her aunt was palpable.

Cora felt an odd, unexpected pang at the thought of Alice’s warm smile welcoming her back into the fold. She fetched the agreement from the elegant bureau in the parlour. The words ‘in perpetuity’ seemed to stand out from the rest. She
had
told Alice a lie, misled her. But Alice was too trusting by a mile. Anyone with half a brain would have double-checked before putting their signature to a legal document.

Why should I tear it up? she asked herself. Why should I give up a regular income just because the house is a bit quiet? It’ll be all right tomorrer. Sod the Laceys, I don’t give a damn whether they like me or not. A little voice insisted she did, but Cora ignored it.

She went to the bottom of the stairs and called Maurice. ‘Would you like to go for a walk?’ she asked when he appeared, such a handsome, strong lad, at the top of the stairs.

‘OK,’ he said dully. Slowly he plodded down towards his mother.

‘How are you getting on with the Meccano set you got for Christmas?’

‘I’m still wondering what to make, like.’ Maurice couldn’t understand the instructions. He had no idea what bolt went where. What he would have liked was to take the kit round to his cousin, Cormac, and ask him. Cormac would no doubt knock up a crane or a lorry in no time. But it was more than Maurice’s life was worth to ask if he could go to Amber Street on Christmas Day.

‘When we get back, we’ll do sums together till teatime,’ Cora said.

‘Yes, Mam.’ Maurice sighed. He dreaded to think what would happen if he didn’t pass the scholarship with Cormac. He reached the hall, glanced through the door of the living room, saw the cane hanging on the wall and decided if he didn’t pass he’d run away. ‘Can we go down the Docky?’ he asked hopefully.