A Daughter’s Sorrow

When I got to my house I turned and waved at Joe Robinson. He was still standing beneath the gaslight and nodded to me as I pointed to the door of my house, but he didn’t make a move. He was going to make sure I got inside safely.

Most of the houses in the area were just two-up two-down with a lean-to scullery at the back and a privy of sorts in the back yard. Ours was an end of terrace and luckily we had an extra small room built on over the back washhouse. It was this extra room that had made it easier for Mam to take in a paying lodger after Sam O’Rourke disappeared. Had it not been for the lodger and the little bit of money the rest of us brought in, she would have had to go out scrubbing floors at one of the factories, like most of the women in the lane, which, knowing Mam, would have made her temper even worse.

As I reached the bottom of the stairs, the front door opened and our lodger looked at me. He was a small, thin man with a pale face and sad eyes, and was just coming back home after visiting a friend. He often stayed out late in the evenings, but Mam never objected. She needed his rent too much to risk losing him. I put a finger to my lips, warning him not to give me away.

‘Don’t let on I’m here, Mr Phillips. I want to get upstairs before Mam sees me.’

‘What happened?’ he asked, looking at me in concern. ‘You’ve got mud on your dress – there’s blood in your hair …’

‘I’ll wash it out when I—’

The door from the kitchen opened and I heard my mother shout, ‘If that’s you, Bridget, you’d better get in here before I lay me hand round your ears. I hope you’re not after bringing that slut of a sister back with you …’

Mam came out into the hallway. She was a big-boned woman with a mottled complexion and dark hair streaked with grey dragged back into a bun at the nape of her neck. Her mouth was set in a grim line, her eyes cold with anger as she stared at me.

‘Bridget has had an accident,’ John Phillips said, standing in front of me as though prepared to defend me from her temper. He gave me a warning look and I took my cue from him.

‘I slipped and fell in the mud in the lane, Mam – must have banged my head. Leastwise, it’s bleeding.’

‘Perhaps I should take a look at it,’ Mr Phillips offered. ‘Come into the kitchen, Bridget.’

I followed as he went through the parlour to the back kitchen. The parlour itself was furnished better than most in the lane, with a half-decent sofa and two chairs, a table with ends that folded down, four chairs to match it, an oak dresser with a mirror and shelves for a few bits and pieces of china and glass fairings.

Mam lunged at me as we passed, giving me a slap on the ear that nearly sent me flying. I gave a yelp of pain and the lodger turned to look at her reprovingly.

‘Mrs O’Rourke! Surely such violence isn’t necessary? The girl has already had a nasty accident.’

‘You keep your nose out of it,’ Mam retorted, forgetting to be polite to him in her temper. ‘She’s a slut and needs to be taught a lesson or she’ll bring shame on us for sure. You ought to watch out, my girl. If your father were here he’d take his belt to you.’

‘I’ve done nothing wrong, Mam. I had to go after Lainie, you know I did. I tried to get her to come home, but she wouldn’t.’

Mam hit me again, making my head rock.

‘That’s enough, Mrs O’Rourke. I’ve told you before the girls will leave home if you continue to hit them like that. If you are trying to drive her on to the streets you are making an excellent job of it.’

‘He’s right, Mam. Lainie’s gone and she says she won’t come back – and if it weren’t for our Tommy I’d go with her.’

‘And where will you be going? No decent woman will take you into her home at this hour of the night. It’s after pickin’ up a man you’ll be. You’ll bide here and do as I tell you or you’ll feel the back of my hand and harder than you’ve felt it before, my girl.’

‘Bridie Macpherson will have me,’ I said, my voice rising with anger now. ‘She’s always looking for girls to help out in that hotel of hers. That’s where Lainie’s gone and if you hit me again I’ll go with her!’

My threat was not an idle one. Bridie Macpherson’s small but scrupulously clean hotel was only three streets away from Farthing Lane. It was patronized by the captains and first officers who preferred somewhere better to stay than the Seamen’s Mission, or the special hostel for foreign sailors. Jamie had told us the mission had been set up some forty years earlier, to protect the Lascars from being preyed on by river thieves. Before the hostels were built, they had often ended up penniless after being cheated or robbed of their pay by the rogues who lived in the dirty alleyways close to the docks.

Until now, both Lainie and I had worked in the brewery, which was just across the river from St Katherine’s.

St Katherine’s Dock was originally built on twenty-three acres between the Tower of London and the London Docks, making it conveniently near the city. The site had been home to more than a thousand families, a brewery and at one time St Katherine’s hospital, which had always been owned by royalty. Its land had been cleared though, despite the hardship it caused, and the docks given a grand opening in 1828. Commodities such as tallow, rubber, sugar and tea had all been stored in the sturdy yellow-brick warehouses some six storeys high, but for some reason the docks were not a financial success and had become part of the London Docks in 1864. However, to the people of the lanes, especially those that worked there, they would always be known as St Katherine’s.

There had been breweries near the river since the time of Queen Elizabeth when they supplied beer to the soldiers in the Low Countries, but Dawson’s, where Lainie and I worked, had only been built in the last five years, and produced ginger beer as well as three kinds of ale.

Lainie worked in the brewing side, but I had recently been taken on in the office. Before that, I’d had occasional work down the market, helping Maisie Collins with her flower stall, and giving Mam a hand with work in the house. Being in the office at the brewery was much better. At the moment I made the tea, tidied up and ran errands for three shillings a week, but I was learning to help keep the ledgers because I could copy letters in a neat hand and I was quick at figures. Mr Dawson had promised me another two shillings a week soon.

I brought my thoughts back to the present as Mam started on at me again. ‘Walk out of this house and you don’t come back! I’ll not have a slut livin’ under my roof. You’ll mend your ways or I’ll see the back of you.’

‘Now that’s foolish talk,’ Mr Phillips said. ‘Bridget has always been a good girl, Mrs O’Rourke. You would find it hard to manage the house without her.’

Mam’s face screwed up and I thought she was about to explode, but although she opened her mouth to tell him to mind his own business, she shut it again.

‘Get to bed before I change me mind,’ she said and scowled at me. ‘You can think yourself lucky that Mr Phillips spoke up for you. If I had my way I’d give you a good thrashing!’

I turned and fled towards the stairs, not stopping until I was in my own room.

Tommy sat up and looked at me. ‘Where’s our Lainie?’ he asked sleepily, clenched fists rubbing at his eyes.

‘She’s gone out to see a friend,’ I said and hushed him with a kiss on the top of his head. He smelled so good after I’d had him in the bath and scrubbed his hair with strong soap – the same as I used to scrub the house. Tommy hated it, but he hated the nits worse and I made sure he went to bed clean – even if he came back filthy every night. ‘Go back to sleep, darlin’.’

I held my brother closer, feeling protective towards him as I felt how thin and frail he was. There was no way I could ever walk out on him because he wouldn’t stand a chance left alone with Mam.

‘What happened to you, Bridget?’ Tommy touched my cheek and found a smear of blood. ‘Are you hurt?’ He looked anxious, as if afraid that I might suddenly disappear too.

I glanced down at myself, repressing the shiver that ran through me as his words reminded me of what had almost happened. Rape was something all decent girls lived in fear of, which was why we took notice of our mothers and didn’t go walking alone at night.

‘It’s nothing, darlin’ – just a tumble on some mud in the lane. You know how dirty it gets at this time of year. It was probably a bit icy, it’s freezin’ out so it is. I fell and banged my head. It knocked me out for a moment, but I’m all right.’

‘Let me look.’ Tommy scrambled out of bed.

‘Can you see anything?’

‘It’s cut open. Shall I bathe it for you, our Bridget?’

‘Will you, darlin’?’ I caught his hand as I saw the troubled look in his eyes. ‘Don’t look so worried, it’s nothing much. I might have a bit of a headache, but I’m all right.’

I poured some water into the earthenware bowl from the washstand and sat on the bed for Tommy to bathe the cut on my head. He was as careful as he could be, but it stung and I winced a couple of times.

‘I’m sorry, Bridget.’

‘It’s all right, Tommy. Let’s get to bed, darlin’, or you’ll be too tired for school in the morning.’

We got into bed together, me holding him as he settled to sleep. I wished I could sleep as easily and I fought desperately to stop myself thinking about Harry Wright and what he had almost done to me. I knew Jamie would have gone after him if I’d told him, and he had such a temper there was no telling what he might do.

It was quiet down in the kitchen now. Mam would be having a drop of the good stuff with her lodger before they came up – to separate rooms. Mam had made it plain to her lodger there was to be no funny stuff. She slept with Tommy as a rule and Mr Phillips had the room that had been Jamie’s and Tommy’s before Da disappeared. If Jamie came home at all, he would sleep on the couch, but most nights he stayed with a friend, leastwise that’s what he told Mam. I had heard stories that would make Martha O’Rourke’s hair curl, but I kept them to myself. There was enough trouble in the house as it was without stirring up more. Still, now that Lainie had gone perhaps things would settle down for a while …

As I lay sleepless beside my brother, I wondered what had happened to turn Martha O’Rourke into the hard cold woman she was. Had it happened when her husband had killed a man in a violent fight on the docks?

I knew Mam’s life had been hard these past years, but that didn’t account for her violent rages. Some of our neighbours had it even harder than us – though we were going to miss Lainie’s money. But there was real hatred in Martha O’Rourke.

Lainie was right when she said that Mam had always hated her. She’d never been as bad with me as she was with Lainie but that might change now I was the only daughter at home.

I shivered and snuggled into the warmth of my sleeping brother’s body. There wasn’t much point in worrying over something I couldn’t change. I’d had a lucky escape thanks to Joe Robinson and I would take good care not to give Harry Wright another chance to attack me.

Sighing, I closed my eyes and willed myself to sleep. It would soon be morning and I had to be up early.

Two

Mam looked heavy-eyed when she came down the next morning. She had slept late and I’d already scrubbed the front step and given Tommy his slice of bread and dripping. He hadn’t wanted it, complaining that it made him feel sick, but I’d coaxed him into eating it.

‘Have you done them stairs yet, you lazy little cat? You can tell that boss o’ yours this mornin’ that I want you setting on in the works. You’ll earn more there than in that fancy office.’

‘You know he won’t give me Lainie’s job. She was on the ales and I’m too young. He gave me my job because I can’t start in the brewery proper until I’m eighteen. It’s his policy and he won’t change it for me.’

‘His policy is it?’ She sneered at me, an ugly expression on her face. ‘What fancy talk is that? Don’t you put on your posh airs with me, miss! You tell him what I said. If he won’t pay you at least four shillings a week you can go scrubbin’ floors.’

I didn’t want to work on the ales or scrub floors, but knew better than to answer my mother back when she was in this mood.

‘Get your brother ready first,’ she said. ‘I’m off down the market before the best stuff is gone.’ The front door slammed as she went out.

‘What do you want to take for your dinner at school, darlin’?’

‘Nothing. I ain’t hungry.’ Tommy coughed, a harsh sound that made me look at him anxiously

‘You must eat something,’ I urged. He was so thin, a puff of wind might blow him away! ‘Bread and jam do, love?’ He nodded unhappily. ‘Take it with you and promise me you’ll eat it and I’ll get you an egg for your tea.’

‘A whole egg just for me?’ Tommy brightened a little. ‘With bread and butter and not dripping?’

‘I get my wages today. Mr Dawson promised me a rise. I’ll keep a few pence back for us. Mam won’t know any different. Just eat your dinner in the playground like a good boy. Then I promise I’ll get that egg for your tea.’

‘Mam will hit you if she finds out you didn’t give her all your wages.’

‘If she can catch me.’ I was relieved to see a smile poke through at last. I loved this brother of mine more than anything or anyone in the whole world, and sometimes I was desperately afraid I was going to lose him. ‘You and me won’t tell her, will we? I’ll let on Fred Pearce gave me the eggs.’

‘Mam says he’s a dirty old man.’

Fred lived at the end of the lane in a house that looked as if the windows hadn’t been washed since he’d been there, and people often avoided him when he was trundling his little cart up the street, but I liked him and we often stopped for a chat when we met.

‘He doesn’t wash much, but I don’t suppose he can afford the soap,’ I said, deliberately ignoring what I knew was implied by Mam’s harsh words.

‘I don’t think that’s what Mam meant. She pulled a funny face the way she does, and said he’d have your knickers off you, if you don’t watch it.’

‘Mam says a lot of daft things – but don’t tell her I said so. Fred Pearce isn’t like that. He’s kind and he just likes to talk to me, that’s all. He’s never tried to touch me – not like some of the blokes round here.’

Tommy stared at me. ‘Does Mr Phillips try to touch you, our Bridget?’

‘No, o’ course not! I never heard the like. He’s a decent bloke. I like him. I just hope he doesn’t leave us. Mam would lose her rag. What made you ask me that, Tommy?’

‘Nothing. I just wondered if he was one of them what tried it on with you.’

‘No, he isn’t. Mr Ryan from next door tries it on when he’s drunk – pinchin’ my bum that’s all. He’d better not let Maggie see or she’ll go for him with the rolling pin. Do you remember in the summer when she chased him all the way down the lane?’

Tommy nodded. He had lost interest in the conversation and said he was going out the back to the lawy. I reminded him to wash his hands before he went to school. He nodded and promptly forgot my instructions as he shot through the kitchen without so much as a good morning to the lodger.

Mr Phillips was just preparing to leave for the day. I thought how smart he looked in his dark overcoat and bowler hat. He worked as an accountant in a big import firm on the docks and earned more in a week than I could in months. I knew how important it was that he continued to live with us and pay his rent of ten shillings a week.

‘Was your breakfast satisfactory, Mr Phillips?

‘The bacon you cooked was very nice.’

‘Have a good day at work, sir.’

‘I shall have a busy day,’ he replied. ‘I’m afraid no days are particularly good ones for me. Good morning, Bridget.’

I stared after him as he went out. I hadn’t thought of him as being a miserable sort of man, though he was a bit odd sometimes.

However, I certainly hadn’t got time to puzzle over it now. I’d better scrub the stairs and get off to the brewery or I would be late for work.

As I crossed the cobbled yard to the brewery office. I heard a shrill wolf whistle. Men were loading heavy barrels on to the wagons ready to deliver the beer to pubs all over the East End, and the smell of the horses mixed with the sharp odour from the brewery sheds. I didn’t bother to turn my head at the whistle because I knew who was responsible. It was that Ernie Cole. The cheeky devil! He drove a wagon and two lovely great shire horses for Mr Dawson – and thought he owned the world.

Well, he might be a tall strong lad with a fine pair of shoulders, but I wasn’t about to encourage his cheek. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of showing I’d heard, so I stuck my head in the air and walked on by.

I supposed I liked him in a way, but I never gave him the chance to get too close. I rather enjoyed putting him down and seeing his face fall. He was too sure of himself for his own good!

He was after walking out with me, I knew, but I wasn’t interested in anything like that. Not yet anyway. I was seventeen and a few months – too young for courting. Besides, I wanted to get on a bit in my job if I could and Mr Dawson thought a lot of me.

Mrs Dawson had told me that only the previous day: ‘My husband thinks you might take my place as his secretary one day, Bridget. He would like me to take things a little easier, stay at home and meet my friends.’

‘Take your place?’ I had stared at her in surprise. ‘But I could never do all the things you do, Mrs Dawson.’ I had never dreamed of such a thing until she put the idea into my head, but I had liked it at once.

‘Why not? You’re bright, careful and industrious. I think it entirely possible that you could learn to do everything I do.’

‘But how?’

‘Well, I can teach you a lot of it,’ Edith Dawson replied. ‘But my husband feels it might be worth paying for you to have special tuition. There are places where you can learn in the evenings after work. You might even learn to use one of those machines – typewriters I think they are called.’

I hadn’t known how to keep my joy to myself as I’d hurried home the previous evening. I had hoped to tell Lainie my good news when she came to bed, but the row had put it out of my head.

Stephen Dawson was waiting for me as I entered the office. He grinned at me. ‘Pop the kettle on, Miss O’Rourke,’ he said. He called me that sometimes just to tease me. ‘We’ll have a cuppa before we start, shall we?’

‘Oh, yes, please,’ I said. ‘I didn’t get one this morning and I’m proper parched, so I am.’ I glanced round the small office. ‘Mrs Dawson not in the mornin’?’

‘No – she had some shopping up town,’ he said. ‘Wants to buy herself some fripperies I dare say. Our daughter is getting wed after Christmas. We heard the news last night.’

‘That’s grand news,’ I said. ‘Give Miss Jane my love and tell her I hope she will be very happy. Lainie might be getting wed soon. She told me last night that her feller had asked her.’

‘That’s good,’ he said. ‘Though I’ll be sorry to lose your sister when she leaves. She’s been a good worker.’

‘She might have to leave before the wedding,’ I said as I remembered she’d told me she was going to Mrs Macpherson’s. ‘You haven’t heard from her the mornin’?’

‘No – not yet, though she may have spoken to the foreman.’ He glanced through the window, which had rivulets of water trickling down the glass because of the cold outside. ‘Ah, I just need to speak to Ernie before he leaves.’

‘You’ll catch him if you hurry.’

I went through to the little kitchen at the back of the office. I filled a kettle from the tap over a deep stone sink, then lit the gas stove and put the water on to boil. I set the cups out on a tray – blue and white china they were and not one of them chipped – then poured milk from the can into a matching jug so that I wouldn’t spill it as I served the tea. Mrs Dawson was most particular. She liked things nice and hated the smell of stale milk on her pretty tray cloths.

I picked up a thickly padded holder as the kettle began to whistle. The copper handle got hot and I didn’t want to burn my fingers. I had a lot of copying to do that morning.

‘Bridget …’ I turned as Mr Dawson called to me from the doorway. ‘Leave that for a moment. I want to talk to you.’

My heart caught with fright. ‘Have I done something wrong, sir?’

He shook his head but looked displeased. ‘You’ve done nothing, Bridget … but your brother, Jamie, is in trouble yet again.’

‘What has he done?’

‘Apparently he was in a fight last night. The police want someone to go down to the station and sign for him. He’s in a bit of a state and they won’t let him go unless a member of his family takes him home.’

‘What do you mean in a state – is he hurt?’

‘I think he may have been hurt during the arrest. The police couldn’t find Mrs O’Rourke so they sent a young constable here. I really can’t have this sort of thing, Bridget. This is a respectable business.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said as I reached for my shawl. ‘I’ll come back as soon as I can, sir – and I’ll make up the time later.’

Mr Dawson nodded, but he was still frowning. This was the second time in as many months that the police had sent for someone to fetch Jamie, and he wasn’t pleased that his brewery should be associated with a known troublemaker.

I was anxious as I left the brewery office and hurried across the yard, ignoring Ernie Cole as he called out to me. He’d asked if I wanted a lift, which meant he knew where I was going. Everyone would know! I felt humiliated as I left the yard and set off in the direction of the police station, some ten minutes’ walk away.

Jamie was such a fool to himself when the drink was in him. Most of the time he was a good-natured, cheerful and generous man. There was violence in Jamie; it simmered beneath the surface, erupting every now and then in uncontrollable anger. Instead of thinking, he went in with his fists just the way Da had.

Hearing the rattle of a wagon on cobbles behind me, I glanced back and saw that Ernie had almost caught me up. He slowed the horses as he drew level.

‘Jump up, Bridget. You’ll get there all the quicker and it’s on my way, lass.’

‘Thank you, but I would rather walk.’

‘You’re a stubborn girl, Bridget O’Rourke. You’ll be quicker if you ride.’

‘No, I shan’t. I’m going to take the short cut by the river.’

‘It’s a rough area down there. Let me take you.’ He gave a sigh of exasperation. ‘Ah, Bridget, don’t be daft, lass …’

Ignoring him, I ran down a side alley towards the river. It was one of the worst areas in this part of the docks and I would normally have avoided it, but I had to get away from Ernie’s pestering. After the incident of the previous night, when Harry Wright had attacked me, I was less trusting than ever of men who wouldn’t take no for an answer.

The river looked dirty and oily where the waste from the ships lay floating in the shallows, and it was cold enough to freeze over. There were vagrants by the dilapidated warehouses on the banks, some of them hunched by a fire burning in an old metal pot, others drinking and lying on sacks.

I felt their eyes on me as I hurried by and a couple of them called out to me, but they were harmless enough, too beaten down by life to bother. It was the cocky ones like Harry Wright you had to be careful of – and Ernie Cole.

As I turned the corner towards the police station, I saw a young woman loitering on the pavement and recognized her at once. Her name was Rosie Brown and she was what Mam would call a whore. I’d heard that she had been seen hanging around the pubs with Jamie a few times.

As soon as she saw me she came to meet me and said, ‘Have you come for Jamie?’ She was a pretty girl, though her fair hair looked as if it needed a good wash and her clothes weren’t as clean as they might be. ‘They won’t let me in to see him, the rotten buggers.’