Anne Bennett - Forget-Me-Not Child

‘You leave Matilda to me,’ George said. ‘From now on you will eat dinner with us. Agreed?’

‘If you say so, Mr Maitland,’ Angela said with an impish grin. ‘You’re the boss.’

‘Glad you realize that at least,’ said George, but he had a smile on his face as he turned the sign to OPEN and unlocked the door.

Mary cried when she unpacked the two shopping bags George had filled with groceries for them all. There were three loaves of bread that George said would only go stale if they stayed in the shop, a block of lard, and another of butter and a chunk of cheese. There was the ham and corned beef that had been left at the end of the day and a side of bacon left on the bacon slicer and a dozen eggs, and then he had added a jar of jam and a packet of biscuits. Mary could see the makings of many meals with the food George Maitland had given them and when Angela told her about the raise and the new arrangement Mary felt the nagging worry slide from her shoulders that they wouldn’t have enough to eat, heat the house and pay the rent.

‘You must take a little more for yourselves,’ she said to Angela.

Angela shook her head. ‘I don’t want anything.’

‘Listen to me,’ Mary said. ‘You think you know all there is to know about Barry, but you know him as a brother. You need to get to know him as the man you will spend the rest of your life with and, please God, as the father of any children you may be blessed with and for that you two need to get out more on your own.’

‘We haven’t the money for that sort of thing.’

‘With your increased wages and Barry’s money we have enough,’ Mary insisted, ‘especially if you are guaranteed a hot dinner every day and George sends home groceries every week. Anyway you don’t have to spend a lot. Now and again you could maybe go to the cinema, or the Music Hall, or if money was tight you could just go for a walk, or go down the Bull Ring on a Saturday evening where there is great entertainment to be had I’ve been told.

‘And another thing,’ Mary went on before Angela had time to form any sort of reply, ‘tell everyone about your impending marriage so the two of you can openly go down the street hand in hand, for you are doing nothing wrong.’

‘I know that,’ Angela said. ‘I wasn’t sure about it myself at first, you know, with Barry nearly a brother to me, but he convinced me that it was all above board to feel as we do.’

‘Hmph, and he might have to do some more convincing before he is much older.’

‘What d’you mean?’

‘Why did you think it might be wrong?’

‘Well I suppose because we had been brought up so closely,’ Angela said. ‘I knew Barry loved me. He said that when I arrived at your house first, though, he couldn’t understand much of it, but he felt sorry for me because he said I looked so sad and he was determined to be the best big brother he could be. And he was and I always loved him. I loved you all of course but there was always a special place in my heart for Barry, my big brother, so when those feelings changed I thought they must be sinful, so sinful I nearly told it in confession.’

‘But you didn’t,’ said Mary with a smile.

‘No I didn’t because to give voice to it would make it more real,’ Angela said. ‘At the time I was trying to convince myself that I was imagining things. And I suppose I was sort of ashamed.’

‘Well all I’m saying is that others may feel as you did at first,’ Mary said. ‘In fact some around the doors think you are brother and sister. We came here as a complete family and I thought of you as my daughter by then, and you were a wee sister to all the boys, and so many will think these feelings you have for each other very wrong indeed. And so I don’t want you to hide away as if you were guilty of some crime. Hold your heads up high.’

How wise Mary was, Angela often thought in the weeks that followed that little chat, for there was open condemnation from neighbours. George Maitland had been slightly alarmed when she told him as well as being surprised, though he knew they were unrelated because Angela had told him when she first came to work in the shop how it had transpired that she was living with the McCluskys. But he knew what people were like and many he knew would take a dim view of this state of affairs, and the customers in the shop were shocked at first and it didn’t entirely stop when Angela told them she wasn’t Barry’s sister, for some still considered it bordered on an incestuous relationship.

Added to that was what they saw as a lack of respect shown to their two boys drowned in the Atlantic Ocean. ‘There was no decent period of mourning at all,’ women muttered among themselves around the doors.

‘And that cock-and-bull story of her not being related to the McCluskys at all doesn’t ring true to me.’

‘Yes they’re all the same family as far as I’m concerned,’ another agreed. ‘I’m surprised Mary doesn’t put a stop to it.’

‘Wait till Father Brannigan gets to hear. He’ll roast the pair of them alive.’

Some women showed their displeasure initially by refusing to be served by her. Angela found the animosity hard to take for she had never encountered it before; she’d always thought she was well liked.

Mary told her to take no notice, that their news would be a seven-day wonder, that was all, and then it would be someone else they turned their attentions upon. Angela knew that that was probably true, but meanwhile she found it hard to approach a group of chattering women, who fell silent as she grew near and ignored any tentative greeting she offered, and she felt their eyes boring into her back as she walked away. ‘Miss hoity toity,’ someone called after her as she passed. ‘Marrying her brother with no respect for the dead.’

Barry seemed not to notice, or at least not to care. ‘Why worry?’ he asked Angela one Saturday night as they made their way to the cinema. ‘While they’re pulling us to pieces they’re leaving some other poor devil alone.’

But it was almost a fortnight since the news that Angela intended to marry Barry McClusky became public, and just that morning a woman had refused to be served by Angela. She dreaded the day when George Maitland would ask her to leave and although the money she earned as well as the groceries given ensured their survival, she would still be glad not to face the bevy of scornful, judgemental women day after day. She turned to Barry now and said, ‘Don’t you care what they are thinking about us and what some are even saying?’

Barry gave a little laugh as he shook his head. ‘Slides off me like water off a duck’s back,’ he said. ‘It would matter only if it were true, but it isn’t. You and I are doing nothing wrong and you must really believe that, or it will taint the time we have together.’

Angela knew Barry was right and cuddling up tight against him as they walked, she felt safe and secure and it was easy to tell that she cared not a jot for the opinion of the neighbours.

After a while the animosity calmed down a little when George eventually took his customers in hand and assured them Angela was no blood relation to the McCluskys and far from showing lack of respect to the two boys that drowned, they decided to marry early to give Mary some reason to go on, to give her something to look forward to, for she was in danger of falling into depression.

Most customers accepted that. Many of George’s customers were Catholics and went to St Catherine’s and knew the McCluskys to be a respectable family, and no wonder Mary was so very desolate, losing two sons like she had. Giving her a reason to go on would seem to be a good idea. However, over three weeks later another customer, one Edith Cottrell, known for her caustic tongue, still refused to let Angela serve her.