Josephine Cox - Three Letters

When Tom tried to get out of the door, she leaped forward to catch him unawares. Grabbing his hair, she caught him off balance and fought him down. But Tom was the stronger. Having swiftly wrestled her to the carpet, he made a dash for the door.

When she clambered up, intent on forcing him back, he instinctively hit out and sent her sprawling. Before she could get up, he was away down the street, the only thought in his mind to find Casey.

Spread-eagled on the floor, Ruth made no effort to get up. ‘You won’t have him for long!’ she shouted after him. ‘When I tell your dad the truth, he won’t even want the little bastard in his house!’

Tom ran down the street, leaving her yelling obscenities. ‘You’ve not heard the last o’ me! I’ll get him back, even if I have to fight you in court.’

Deliberately closing his ears to her screeching, he grew increasingly anxious that Casey might have overheard what she’d said earlier, and her vile threats played on his mind. She’s lying! he tried to convince himself. Casey is my son. She would say anything to suit her own ends; even labelling her own child a bastard. But she won’t get her claws into him, not if I have anything to do with it.

But he knew that keeping her at bay would not be easy and because of his own unfortunate predicament, might even be beyond his control.

‘Dear Lord, what am I to do?’ Slowing his steps, Tom glanced up at the shifting skies and, for the strangest moment, he felt a great sense of peace. The kind of peace that warmed and reassured; easing the restless soul.

But then he thought of the jeopardy Casey was in, and his peace was short-lived.

As he went down the street, calling out for Casey, the next-door neighbours were at the front door looking out. Sylvia Marshall and her husband, William, had lived next to the Denton family these past nine years. Having soon learned that she was trouble, they had given Ruth a wide berth, but they always had a smile for Tom and his son, Casey.

‘I’m worried.’ William was anxious. ‘Something went a hell of a bang. I’m wondering if somebody might be hurt.’

‘Well, thank goodness it’s not Tom or the boy, because we’ve just seen them go off down the street … poor little devil, having to put up with a mother like that! And if Tom’s given that wife of his a good slapping, then it’s no more than she deserves.’ Having overheard a snippet of the argument that had raged on, she could only guess at the rest.

‘I ought to go and see if everything’s all right.’

‘You keep your nose out of it and don’t interfere. They’ve rowed before, and no doubt they’ll row again. She thrives on trouble, you should know that by now.’

Sylvia, however, found herself talking to thin air as her husband followed the shouts and abuse that came from the Denton house. ‘Oh, my!’ At the door, he saw Ruth lying there, still loudly complaining. She appeared half dazed and there was a trickle of blood running down her face. When she madly struggled to get up off the floor, the ornaments fell off the side table one after the other.

‘Whatever’s happened? Here … let me help you …’

As William began to make his way into the house, Ruth gave him a barrage of abuse. ‘Bugger off out of it!’ Snatching a small ornament, she sent it flying through the air, to land at his feet. ‘You’d best clear off before I get up … or you’ll rue the day!’

When he came running back indoors, his wife was in fits of laughter. ‘You silly old fool! I told you not to go, but you never listen, do you?’

‘Hmm!’ Without another word, he skulked into the parlour, lit up his pipe, and sat there, contemplating life and thanking his lucky stars he had married a sensible, understanding wife.

Away from Henry Street, Tom was growing frantic. Casey was nowhere to be seen. He was not in the street, nor was he at the bus stop, and each time he called out, Tom was greeted with silence.

After widening his search beyond Penny Street, he wended his way back to Henry Street. At the back of his mind Tom worried that the boy might have overheard the row. If so, it would have been a devastating shock, flooding Casey’s young mind with all manner of imaginings. Tom hoped with all his heart that the one thing Casey had not heard was his mother’s shocking confession.

Suddenly Tom recalled the place where Casey would go whenever he wanted to be alone or quiet; mostly after school and before his daddy was home. That was the time when Ruth might send him out – so she could entertain her men friends, Tom now knew.

He remembered how much Casey loved the peace and quiet of the Blakewater, a long, winding brook that ran behind Henry Street and on through the lowlands of Blackburn. He quickened his steps towards the place.

Once there, he paused to look over the little stone bridge, and was greatly relieved to see Casey below. A small bundle of humanity scrunched in a heap on the wet cobbles, he was sobbing bitterly, his arms wrapped round the guitar and his head bent low.

Saddened at the sight of that small, innocent child hunched up in the cold and so deeply distressed, Tom thought of where the blame lay. He suspected the worst: that Casey must have heard his mother’s damning confession; that the man he had always known and loved as his father was not his father at all.

Tom felt helpless. While he himself was trying to come to terms with her wicked claim, he could not even imagine the trauma Casey was going through. His heart went out to him.

‘Casey!’ Tom called out.

When there was no answer, he took off at a run, over the bridge and down the slope, where he slithered and slipped on the shifting cobbles. ‘Casey. You had me worried, son. I’ve been searching everywhere for you!’

Casey appeared not to have heard or, as Tom suspected, he chose not to respond.

A few minutes later, Tom was seated cross-legged alongside the child.

‘I’m sorry about earlier, about the shouting and the things that were said, but none of it was your fault, son. Don’t ever think that.’ Deciding it might be wiser not to elevate the situation, Tom slid a comforting arm about Casey’s shoulders. ‘I’m just glad you’re safe. When I couldn’t find you, I got really concerned.’

Tom waited for him to speak. The boy, though, remained silent, afraid to open a conversation that might prove his fears were all too real.

Tom understood. In some inexplicable way he, too, felt immensely safe in those familiar surroundings, and, again like Casey, he was momentarily lost in the peace of that place.

This dark, dank area beneath the Blakewater bridge could never be described as beautiful. Beneath life’s traffic, and surrounded by brick buildings and stone walls, a visitor might be forgiven for thinking he was deep in the bowels of the earth. The air was thick with a pervading stench of rotting food and other perishables routinely thrown into the water from the bridge, yet, for all that, there was something magical about this place. Here an unquiet soul felt safe and uniquely comforted. Unlike people, this ancient bridge would not desert or hurt you.

Now quieter of heart, Tom glanced about him at the tall, ancient walls that had stood for an age, thick and solid, and strong enough to support the houses that had rested on those reliable stone shoulders for many an age.

At certain times, after heavy rains, the shifting stream of Blakewater would rise to cover the walls and flood the passageways into the back yards. Carried by the high water, rats would swim through into the house cellars. Many scampering rodents lost their lives when the frightened residents beat them with spades and threw their corpses back into the swirling, stinking waters.