Anne Bennett - Walking Back to Happiness

Hannah had been simultaneously horrified and angry and she’d hurled the offending letter into the fire, lest Josie catch sight of it. She thought the child had enough to put up with. She’d been wrenched from her home, with her parents dead and her sisters and brothers spread about the globe. She had only Hannah and she’d have to make Arthur see that. She wouldn’t allow Josie to feel the rejection she’d always felt herself.

Josie would never forget her first view of Birmingham as they emerged from New Street Station. She’d recovered quickly once she’d left the rolling boat and had quite enjoyed the train, though she’d been very hungry and glad of the reviving tea and sandwiches Hannah had bought at the platform buffet at a place called Crewe, where they’d had to change trains.

She seen little of Dublin as they passed it on the way to the Port of Dún Laoghaire, but the noise and bustle seemed all around her as she surveyed Birmingham, her new home. Hannah had been right that day in the barn, Josie thought, for she had never seen so many lorries, or cars or people – hundreds of people thronging the shops, or alighting from large rumbling buses or swaying trams that rattled alarmingly along the rails set into the road.

Not that she had time to stand and stare, for she had trouble keeping up with Hannah’s easy strides, especially hampered as she was by a case and a bundle. And all the time Hannah talked, pointing out this shop and that, and telling her she’d take her to something called the Bull Ring soon.

At last, they stood at the bus stop opposite the police station in a road aptly named ‘Steelhouse Lane’ outside a large building which Hannah told her was a general hospital. ‘Used to be the workhouse, I’m told,’ she said. ‘Gloria Emmerson said the older people still don’t like going in when they’re sick or anything.’

Josie studied the grim building and honestly didn’t blame them, but before she was able to reply, the bus screeched to a halt beside them. Josie was glad Hannah had chosen a bus. It was unnerving enough and nothing like the cosy single-deckers she was used to where you knew everyone on board, but the trams frightened her to death.

They sat upstairs, so that Josie could see more of the city she’d come to live in, while Hannah pointed out landmarks to her, like the large green clock at Aston Cross, and Salford Bridge that spanned the canal, unaware how horrified Josie was by everything.

She’d been as surprised and shocked by the back-to-back houses as Hannah had been when she’d first arrived and depressed by the grim greyness of the whole place. She looked with horror at the huge factory chimneys belching smoke into the spring air and became aware of the pungent stink that tickled her nose and lodged at the back of her throat. She thought the canal, that Hannah pointed out with such pride as she explained that Birmingham was ringed with such waterways, was horrible. She’d never seen such brown, oil-slicked, stagnant water and it made a sharp contrast to the rippling stream near her old home that had glinted in the sun as it babbled over its stony bed.

As the bus rumbled its way towards Erdington, Josie felt depression settle on top of her. She thought everywhere drab and without a blade of grass anywhere. Homesickness swept over her, so strong she felt tears prickling her eyes. She wondered how Hannah could stand living in such a place. She was frightened of arriving at her destination, frightened of Mrs Emmerson and her guesthouse where Hannah worked and wished with all her heart she was back in her home in Wicklow.

But Hannah had not exaggerated about Grange Road. It was lovely. The pavements were as wide as the road and had trees planted every few yards and that alone went some way to making Josie feel better.

Gloria Emmerson wasn’t frightening either. She was plump and motherly. Even her face was round, but it was kindly-looking with a smallish mouth and a squashed-up nose and really bright sparkly eyes. Josie smiled at Gloria as she swept them into the house and through to her personal rooms at the back. She had a casserole cooking in the oven and the smell of it revived Josie’s spirits somewhat as she realised that, despite the sandwiches and tea at Crewe, she was still very hungry.

Gloria watched them surreptitiously as they ate. Josie, she thought looked very pale, though she supposed that was from the upset of her mother dying and the tiring journey they’d had. She thought her a plain little thing with her large brown eyes standing out in her head and her brown, nondescript hair.

Not a patch on her aunt, she thought. Not that it had done her much good in the long run, she reminded herself with a sigh. She didn’t know whether she was doing her a favour or not pushing her into marriage. But then, Arthur Bradley was nothing if not respectable and after all, it was the best she could expect in the circumstances.

Arthur was waiting for Hannah in the house he’d inherited in Harrison Road, just off Erdington High Street. It was a fine terraced house with three stone steps up to the front door, while an entry ran around to the back door and strip of garden.

Initially, it had given Hannah a thrill of pleasure to realise that, after her marriage, she would be mistress of such a house. The front door opened onto a marble-tiled hall with the door to the front room with a bay window to the right-hand side, which Hannah decided would be the parlour, and carpeted stairs to the left. Behind the front room was another slightly smaller room and at the end of the hall was the door to the breakfast room, leading through to the kitchen and scullery, while a large cellar ran from front to back beneath the whole ground floor.

It had originally had three large bedrooms upstairs, but at some time Arthur’s relative had cut one of the double rooms in two to make a much smaller bedroom and an indoor bathroom and lavatory. It was an unheard of luxury, though Arthur said in the daytime, he would prefer the lavatory outside to be used so as not to spend time traipsing up and down the stairs and thereby wearing out the stair carpet.

Still, not to have to go out in the middle of the night was a bonus, and there was running water into the bath, provided you remembered to light the geyser. They had proper bathrooms at the hotel of course, one between four rooms, and Gloria had one in her living quarters which she allowed Hannah the use of once a week. Other times, Hannah had to make do with a bowl of water in her bedroom. What luxury to be able to have a bath when she liked.

In fact, the whole house would be a joy to care for. It was even adequately furnished. It wasn’t her choice, but, in those austere post-war days with shortages and utility being the watchwords, she thought herself and Arthur fortunate to have the problem of furnishing a house solved for them. ‘In time, when things are easier, we might replace some of the furniture,’ she told Arthur on her first visit.

‘Hmph, yes, my dear,’ Arthur had said. ‘But you know money might not be so plentiful. I shouldn’t want to go into debt for anything. This hire-purchase scheme is not one I should like to get involved in.’

Hannah, who’d never owed a penny in her life, agreed with Arthur’s sentiments. Gloria, when she told her, said it just showed what a sensible man he was, and wasn’t it just as well they hadn’t to buy even the basics before they could start married life, though she advised Hannah to buy if not a new bed, then certainly a new mattress.

But that day, Hannah had more on her mind than a new mattress. She hoped Arthur would come to see that she had no alternative but to bring Josie home with her, without getting cross about it.

He wasn’t the sort to rant and rave, but he could go very cold if he was displeased. And she knew this news would greatly displease him. He’d made his views adamantly clear in his last letter and would have presumed that Hannah would have carried them out.