The Glassblower’s Daughter
Frances Clarke
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2010 Frances Clarke
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
Thank you for downloading this free ebook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoy this book, please return to
http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/Prances to discover other books by this author. Thank you for your support.
Part 1. Garden Of Paradise – 1955
The
Woman In The Bottle
It
caught her eye the minute they went through the swing door into the
workshop and she pounced on it; a pretty, shining thing like a
snapped off twig made of glass. Between the big machines the floor
was strewn with oddments of balsa wood, flitches of dust and other,
less perfect glass shapes. “Can I have this?”
“Naw, hen, yon’s sherp….....” but she clutched it up against her chest, “a’richt, let’s see if yer daddy can smooth it for ye.” He rasped the broken edge of the glass twig with a file then rubbed it with emery paper.
“I won’t be bored today,” she said, as he tested it on his thumb then handed it back to her. When he smiled she said, “what is that smell?”
And he said: “propinol.” Still smiling he put on his lab coat.
So she said: “Where have Mummy and Deborah gone?”
“A’ve telt ee they’re awa tae the hospital, the special hospital. Keek in, a’ll mak ee yer very ane glass bubble.”
Greta watched her father as he blew. His cheeks reddened. His lips pressed the tube. The tube dangled in a long loop from his mouth. Black hair stood out over the strap of his goggles and his whiskers caught the light. She thought of him standing at the washbasin in his vest, shaving; raking off cream. He was handsome. The mask hid his eyes. Her bubble grew. When it was the size of a tomato he put his flame back in the holder and got the bubble on the end of a metal stick. “Yer very ane,” he passed it to her. On the end of the rod the bubble swayed.
“I’m going to look after it and take it home.” She went to her father’s bench and sat down on her box.
“Weel, if ye dinnae mind stayin’ as still as a wee mouse the hale day.” He began to whistle as he fixed a big glass tube to his machine.
“You can hold it for me if I want to move,” she said.
Her father gave a shout of laughter. “Dinnae you be touching ma condenser, mind now,” he darted his finger at her with such an abrupt shift of his arm that she looked over her shoulder thinking the condenser might have crawled forward to peer over the edge of the bench.
“Listen!” Harold’s voice. His bicycle clips missed his pocket and clattered to the floor and he shook a green and cream thermos flask at her, making a slushy tinkle of noise. She kept her eyes on her bubble. Harold had teeth that tilted forward, hanging out of his mouth. He smelt of something horrible but she didn’t know what the smell was.
“Fall in, quick march, where do you think you’ve been?” called Wilfred, appearing from the grinding room. “You’re late.”
“Listen,” persisted Harold and shook the flask again.
Wilfred winked at Greta.
Greta liked being at her father’s work. Good-natured Wilfred and Harold with their Leicester accents were a change from the familiar Scottish of her father. Mrs Primrose up in the office spoke so posh the men called her ‘the duchess’.
“I dropped my bike on the ramp and it rolled out of my bloody saddlebag,” complained Harold.
“Mind your language,” Wilfred winked at her again, “a little mouse is sitting over there.” Greta liked Wilfred. He called her ‘the faculty mouse’ and though she didn’t know what ‘faculty’ was; the name sounded nice. Wilfred’s face was young, but oldness had caught up with him in patches. The top of his head was bald but hair grew in clumps above his ears. She had wanted to watch the wings go spinning round so he had worked the glass turbine for her.
Her bubble reflected everything. Wilfred got the bench burners roaring and the bubble showed a sea of lavender flame tipped with golden waves. The pale flames that stood up out of the hand burners were like feathers curved in the rounded surface. She could see parts of her face reflected and the sky behind her through the window. She wanted to feel the bubble. Without breathing, she touched it with her fingertips.
And then it was floating down. It landed on her knee, reflecting the navy pleats of her pinafore dress. The metal stick fell out of her hand. Sudden silence descended as her father threw the switch that stopped his rod rotating. Greta curved her fingers to slide them under the bubble, to coax it into her hand. Wilfred came to fetch a clamp from the cupboard, his head crimson from the heat. The bubble sat on her palm. “Look Wilfred.”
“That’s a regular crystal ball,” said Wilfred, “You can see the future in there.”
“Rubbish,” scoffed Harold. His rounded shoulders drooped over his lathe and his neck poked forward out of his overall collar like the neck of a tortoise. Wilfred was different. Greta liked his big, gentle eyes and his shiny head. The things Wilfred said were like stories. Maybe Wilfred could tell her when her mother and Deborah were coming home.
Her father was whistling a song off the wireless. Step we gaily, on we go, heel for heel and toe for toe; step we gaily…The jaunty words danced in her head. Wilfred clashed clamps in the cupboard. The bubble stirred on her palm. It was so light that all she could feel was its warmth. They never lost their heat. “Wilfred.”
“Yes, Pet.”
“Heat is their skin,” she said. Her father’s lathe hissed and the rod began to rotate.
“Go and watch Your Dad putting on the side-arm,” Wilfred closed the cupboard.
The glass on her father’s rod was glowing deep orange. He directed the violet points of his burners at the glass and turned them up to roar out in golden flames. The glass was like syrup. Any minute it would begin to pour. There was a hiss and a thud as the rotation stopped and then the row of burners went back to violet points and he lifted the hand jet. In his other hand was a black cone on a stick and he poked it into the red mound, holding it there while he blew. He was making a hole. The glass he was getting rid of swelled into a bubble. He took the tube out of his mouth and pointed at the bubble. “Noo where does this yin gan?”
“In the flash,” said Greta.
“Aye,” he knocked it off and she watched the pieces float down to join the sparkling layer on the floor. He picked up the side arm and heated the mouth of it. When its rim was red, he heated the rim of the hole in his big tube. When they both glowed red, like two open mouths, he pressed them together. Together they sagged into the softened wall of glass. He pressed them and pulled them and shone the flame on them until he was sure they were joined and then he slammed on the rotating rod and round it all went, the red gone, the gold fading to transparent and the new side arm sticking out like a little waving limb.
Her bubble lifted and she put her hand over it, pressing its wobbliness until it cracked open and became warm, curved pieces to scatter in the flash.
At lunchtime her father lifted her up and she ruffled his hair with both hands to get rid of the indentation in it where his goggle strap had pressed. “There you are, Daddy,” she said.
“Haud the snap;” he passed her the tin. Inside was her jam sandwich, wrapped in greaseproof paper. Her father had cheese and piccalilli. “Ere ye gonnae gies a hawnd making ra tea the nicht,” he said as he shouldered through the swing doors with her. His lab coat smelled of machine oil. He had bought a gas cooker - “Fer yer Mammy gin she comes hame”and every day they were trying out recipes from the little cookery book that had come with it.
As they went down the steps into the darkness she hid her eyes against his neck. Above their heads was an overhead pipe lagged with sacking. Once, he had shone a torch to show her. The humps of sacking frightened her. She felt his hand over her head. The humming of the basement engines was all around them now. Her father turned the corner. “It’s a braw sunny day oot here onyway.” He kicked the door open, spring sunshine flaring round them as he put her down.
“Ask me questions.” It was her favourite game. She had tried with Wilfred and Harold but not any more because they asked what have I got in my sandwiches? How much is a tin of elbow grease?
“De’ve ee ken the kind o glass yer Daddy uses?”
“Bora-silicate,” she said.
“Boro,” he corrected her. “Ony mair?”
“Soda glass.”
“Aye. And fer whit would ah use soda gless?” He stopped in his tracks to light a cigarette, cupping his hands around the match as he carried it to his mouth.
“Windows.”
“Super! Aye. Yer a canny wee lassie.”
“Can I blow that out?”
“Aye.” He held the match down for her. She blew. They crossed the road to the cemetery. Gravestones tilted over as if the ground had heaved up and flung them sideways. Greta sat by her father on a bench and they ate their sandwiches.
“Is it a long way to the special hospital?” She gripped his face with her hands. He didn’t look pleased. She knew it wasn’t the same hospital as the one near their house. “Can we go and see them?” His face twisted away from her hands. Birds sang in the graveyard trees. “Can we?”
“Naw we cannae dae that.”
“But why?”
The pages of his newspaper snapped as he opened it up.
“Why can’t we go?”
He lit a cigarette but didn’t let her blow out the match. She leaned her head against him then slid down to pick the daisies and celandines that grew in the uncut grass around the old graves. When she heard him folding up his newspaper she ran back with her flowers and he lifted her so she could put her cheek next to his face. He scraped her with his whiskers to make her laugh. “That’s ma bonny wee lassie,” he said, “Pit doon yer wee bunch o’ flowers, ye cannae bring they in ma lab.” He hugged her and she let the flowers fall, breathing in the lovely warm smell of him; aftershave, tobacco and some other part that was just him.
During the endless afternoon she sidled into the grinding room up to Wilfred’s elbow: “what’s that, Wilfred?”
Wilfred jumped. The grinding wheel went round.
“What is it?”
“Carborundum powder: two hundred grit.”
“Wilfred…”
“Yes?”
“Do you know where Mummy and Deborah have gone?” Wilfred’s goggles pointed down. The grinding wheel went round.
Greta went back into the glassworking room sniffing in the smell of propinol. With her colouring book on her knee, she sat on the floor by the annealing oven and coloured in a fairy’s dress with a pink wax crayon. Bored with that she put on a Perspex mask and a pair of the big asbestos gloves the men used. On tiptoe at her father’s bench Greta stared at the condenser. It was like a bottle, and inside it was a shape that looked like a lady made of glass. Greta stared hard. It was a glass lady who was trapped inside a bottle; and out of her head… “What’s that curly tube?” asked Greta, but Harold passed by and didn’t answer. The glass tube curled up from the lady’s head, coiling round and round, until it reached the top of the bottle. But there was no opening at the top. The giant gloves fell off her hands and Greta reached out for the condenser.
“Whit are ye daein?” Her father was back.
“Nothing,” she said.
“Jist ye dae yer colourin’.” He picked up the condenser and hurried out. The telephone rang.
“Answer it Harold,” Wilfred’s voice was loud above the roar of his lathe, “don’t stand gawping, you daft ha’porth.”
The phone stopped before Harold got to it. He looked at Greta. “See this?” Harold proffered a round white biscuit. She drew back from his tortoise face and tried not to breathe in his awful smell or look at his teeth. Tell me where Deborah is. Tell me when she is coming home again. Tell me why Mummy took Deborah and not me as well. As she reached out for the biscuit, he snatched it backwards. “No; tell me what it is first;” he said.
“A biscuit?”
“Tisn’t a biscuit! It’s glass.”
“No it isn’t,” she said.
“Yes it is.”
“No it isn’t.”
“Yes it is. It’s sintered glass.”
“I don’t care.”
“How old are you?” Harold asked.
“I’m five.”
“And you don’t know about sintered glass,” he teased.
“Deborah’s gone to the special hospital.”
“So you said.”
“Do you know what she’s got?”
“She comes home in a few weeks. Here…” he gave her the sintered glass.
“How long is a few weeks?”
“Too long, if you ask me. Why don’t you go and help Mrs Primrose up in the office?”
“Harold - Get over here,” shouted Wilfred and Greta ran to her
colouring book as if he had shouted at her.
Fairy Tales
Weeks
and months went by. Summer became autumn and autumn merged into
winter. There was frost on the window panes every morning by the time
they came home. Deborah had a new hairstyle, short; puffing around
her face like a dark chrysanthemum. Maybe that was why her father was
angry but Greta liked it very much. Her mother’s hair was the same
but she smelled as if she had been keeping her clothes next to the
Vim under the sink. She lifted Greta up and held her so tightly that
Greta squeaked. “Do you like the new cooker?” she clamoured,
desperate to have them eat their tea; made to another recipe in the
little cookery book.
“What’s this?” her mother tilted the plate.
“Shamrock Savoury.” Greta glowed with pride. Her father had made fried bread and she had spread the pieces with fish paste and helped arrange three slices of hardboiled egg on each to form a shamrock. Her father had added a dab of chutney in the center of each slice of egg.
“Dad cooked and I helped,” said Greta turning to Deborah.
And Deborah lifted Greta and said: “sit on my knee to eat yours. Pass her plate to me so she can reach. I’m not letting go of her.”
Everything went back to normal
except that now there were the arguments: Deborah and their mother;
Deborah spraying lacquer. “What’s the sense of doing that to your
hair,” their mother demanding, “after that expensive perm?”
Deborah snapping: “It’s my head Mother; I can do what I like with my hair.”
And instead of answering, her mother made a noise as if she had accidentally cut herself with the bread knife.
For Christmas, Greta had a walkie-talkie doll with chestnut plaits whose eyelashes were jutting fringes of real hair. Inside her open mouth a red tongue was about to touch two baby teeth at the top. “Mama,” she said, in a cat’s voice, when Greta laid her down. The voice came from the small of her back where she was drilled with a pattern of holes like the telephone receiver at the glassblowing lab. Greta called her Pearl, which was Deborah’s middle name.
“Look, this is the Devil, Pearl,” Greta held out the picture at the front of the Edgar Allen Poe book, “he’s sitting on the laird’s coffin. What’s a laird, Mummy?”
“That’s a desperate book.” Her mother, knitting Greta’s new jumper in some tan-coloured wool Brother Isidore had brought round, tutted sharply; “put it away.”
“Edgar Allen Poe,” chanted Greta from behind the sofa, as amused as ever because ‘Poe’ meant ‘potty’ as well. She lay on her tummy next to the bookcase. It was her favourite place. As well as Edgar Allen Poe there was an incomplete pack of playing cards, her game of Snap, copies of the Readers’ Digest that Wilfred passed on to her father and a book, from a jumble sale, her mother said, which Greta loved. The pages of the book were fibrous and soft and had black and white pictures; among them a sad postman, an awkward bridge and the one Greta looked at the most which was a big lady lying down with no clothes on. Why was she bare like that? Her flesh looked so pocked and goosepimpled that several times Greta had dug her nails into it, convinced the lady could feel it. The nail marks were retained in the thick padding of the paper. Deborah had read the title of the book to her: The Artist Van Goff.
Pearl fell forward onto the picture of the Devil. Greta sat her up again. “Are you scared, Pearl? I’ll read what it says at the bottom: ‘Twas the foul fiend in his ane shape, sitting on the laird’s coffin…” Greta couldn’t really read it but Deborah had told her the words.
In March, for her birthday, they gave Greta her own book: Hans Andersen’s Fairy Tales and at bedtime, Deborah, with sensational dramatic expression, read her the stories. By June they had reached The Garden of Paradise with the four winds telling tales of polar ice and walruses, of dromedaries and sandstorms. In order to find his heart’s desire, the man had to cross a high white bridge. “Read me that bit again,” Greta said, gripping Deborah’s moving finger as it traced the words.
“Lions and tigers, perfectly tame, sprang like cats over green hedges,” repeated Deborah.
“Can we go there?”
But Deborah went on reading.
Soon Greta clamoured once more: “Read that again!”
“You will come, said the Fairy, to where the tree of knowledge of good and evil stands. I shall sleep among its branches. You will bend over me. But if…” here Deborah paused, then slowly continued “… you touch me,” her voice dropped low, “Paradise will sink beneath the earth and be lost…”
“He won’t do it will he?”
“…The sharp wind of the desert will blow,” said Deborah implacably, “the cold rain will drip from your hair and sorrow and care will be your lot.”
“He won’t do it will he?” Greta was weeping, undone by the image of such dreadful loss.
“Greta, it’s a story, don’t cry;” Deborah said, and her doom-laden tone had vanished and her arm went round Greta, her face laughed down and she used the edge of her skirt to dab the tears. “We’ll stop now. See – nothing.” The book snapped shut. “Sweet dreams,” and Deborah kissed her and was gone. Hot as a boiled potato, Greta kicked her covers off. The summer evening light was rose-pink through her red curtains and she pictured the high white bridge and the tame tigers. If only she could go there. All summer Greta made Deborah read and re-read the mysterious story to her.
It was September by the time they began on The Wild Swans and Greta became acquainted with Princess Elise and her brothers. “Don’t call me Greta,” she said, “I’m Elise”.
“Why?” Her mother was impatient and uncomprehending which made
Greta shy so she shrugged as she had seen Deborah do. She had begun
to read the book to herself; slowly deciphering the words. One bit
said: Elise was too good for magic to have any power over her.
Greta dug her fingernail into the paper so that a crescent marked the
place.
“Can we go to the sea?”
“No, it’s too far.”
“Elise goes to the sea and finds the swans. Elise gets carried by swans.”
“Swans?”
“The swans are her brothers; she’s looking for them; they’re by the sea.”
“Nonsense.” Knives and forks jangled into the drawer. The cat flitted out from under the table, tangling in her mother’s feet. “Damn you, cat,” she cried, suddenly furious, “I’m fed up with Deborah reading you that book. It’s giving you ideas.”
“I want brothers,” stormed Greta. In the doorway stood Deborah, silently pulling hideous faces at their mother’s back.
“Tell her we’re reading Bunty,” she said that night, while she was showing Greta how to play Patience. Her hands layered the cards into place. “She’ll be at work. She won’t know.” Deborah had left school and started a shorthand and typing course. A smell of cigarettes clung to her.
To save her brothers, Elise took a vow of silence and wove shirts out of nettles. Greta cried. Behind the garden shed were plenty of nettles and she let them sting her hands to see if she could bear it. She couldn’t. By November they were nearing the climax. Elise was to be burned as a witch. Her nettle shirts were taken with her to the stake. “Greta!” came a shout, “what are you up to?”
Greta gave a guilty start, caught in the act of trying to bind herself to a garden fork that she had thrust into the centre of her father’s bonfire pile. One minute her mother was rapping on the kitchen window, the next minute she appeared by Greta at the bottom of the garden. “Get off that. What have you done to your poor doll?” Pearl stood with her legs rammed into a pile of soil to keep her from falling over.
“She’s the wicked archbishop, Mummy. Leave her.”
“Is this game something to do with that book?” Her mother straightened up sharply, gripping Pearl. Greta’s hand sneaked into the pocket of her gabardine mackintosh. Folded in there was the nettle shirt she was going to throw over her princely brothers. It was a leaf she had picked from the last marrow plant; its dark palm as rough as the cat’s tongue. It was the same colour as nettles. “What are you playing?” Her mother persisted.
“Guy Fawkes,” said Greta.
“Well don’t. You’ll wreck your Daddy’s bonfire. Pearl’s getting filthy, look at her legs.”
“She’s my doll, Mother; I can do what I like with her legs.”
The secret game continued. Greta sat at her mother’s dressing table
and stared into the mirror as she brushed her hair. Pearl; now the
king; spoke in a deep voice: “is it true Elise? Have you been
gathering nettles among the witches?” To ensure silence Greta
pressed her lips together so tightly that they went into her face,
leaving a line like the scar on Deborah’s stomach and she burst out
laughing
Questions tormented Greta
before she fell asleep at night. To weave nettles was agonising
enough, but to have to keep silent and not explain why, even though
helpful people surrounded her, was terrible. And God; where was he?
Elise prayed to God but he never helped her, only made things worse.
Why did he let the wicked queen turn the brothers into swans? And
couldn’t he have led the hounds away from Elise until she finished
the shirts?
A
Tale of Hidden Treasure
Deborah
went out more and more. “Don’t get in my way,” she warned
Greta, who had come into the bedroom with her drawing book.
Greta sat on Deborah’s bed. “I made up a poem,” she said, holding out the page.
Deborah,who stood brushing her hair; angled her body away from the
mirror to read it out.
“Humpty Dumpty lived in a shed
Humpty
Dumpty fell off the bed
Humpty Dumpty had a sore hed
Humpty
Dumpty was ded,”
she intoned and both of them burst out
laughing. “What a lovely poem, Twig.”
“I’ll make it longer,” said Greta, sucking her pencil. From the radio in the kitchen The Archers music floated up. “What rhymes with dead?”
Deborah pointed at the pictures sellotaped onto her wall which were all of ladies wearing bridal gowns that Deborah had cut out of the papers “Wed?” She rested one foot on the chair as she eased a stocking over her toes and unrolled it up her leg. “Tread?” she suggested, “Fat-head?” Greta laughed. The net flounces of Deborah’s petticoat were frothing round her wrists as she fastened her suspenders. “Can I do one?” asked Greta.
“No, I’m in a hurry.” Deborah dropped her skirt down over her head; a lasso of sky-blue gingham, her elbows like porcelain jug handles behind her as she fastened the zip. She dabbed White Fire scent on her wrists. It was Friday so the rest of the house was full of the smell of grilled herrings. “Pass the nail file,” Deborah said; and after a while, “Reach me that compact.”
Greta gave up on the poem. “Are you going dancing?”
“No;” Deborah drew lipstick along her stretched lips and Greta’s moved in a copy of the shape Deborah’s were making; “the flicks.” Deborah compressed her lips, printing coral bows together.
“Sing me the fountain song,” said Greta.
“Three coins in the fountain…” the lipstick twisted back into its golden case. “Each one seeking happiness…” into the pointed shoes went Deborah’s toes. “Thrown by three hopeful lovers…” stiletto heels raised clear of the rug. “Which one will the fountain bless…” as Deborah's husky voice finished the song she twirled and Greta watched the flaring circle of skirt and the gorgeous peony of petticoat.
“Do it again,” she said. Her pencil fell to the floor and her laughing sister spun. “Can I come with you to the kennels tomorrow?” Deborah had a Saturday job and Greta longed to work there too. “Can I come, Deborah?”
“Maybe,” Deborah buttoned her cardigan; “out you go, you know the rule,” Greta knew the rule. She skipped out onto the landing and leaned over the banister looking down. Deborah followed, closing the door and began to descend the stairs. You are NOT to go in my room when I’m not there! Deborah had made her say I promise. Halfway down the stairs Deborah looked back up at her. “Bye, Twig,” she called.
Greta sat on the stairs and peered between the banister rails to watch her sister swish into the kitchen. Only Deborah called her Twig. She heard the two voices, Deborah and her father. Bumpety-bump she progressed, on her bottom, a stair at a time, all the way down and waited. Deborah, gloves on, came out of the kitchen shrugging on her coat and when she opened the front door, Greta stepped forward to hold it.
“Damn,” said Deborah, “it’s raining.” She grabbed her umbrella from the hallstand and raised it as she stepped out onto the pavement and set off. A gust caught the umbrella and Deborah shrieked and ran a few steps.
“You’re flying,” Greta called and the thought of her sister lifted into the air made her laugh as she slammed the door. The letter box made a friendly clang.
In the sitting room, the chair by the window was Greta’s vantage point for watching the street. She put her head under the lace curtain, pressing her forehead against the glass. At the bus stop Deborah furled her umbrella. The bus came. As it drove past the window towards Wexford Street, Greta saw Deborah inside, reaching up to the silver rail and walking towards the back as if she was trying to come home even though the bus was taking her away.
The glass was cold against Greta’s forehead. Deborah had gone; her mother was at her part-time cleaning job at the off-licence, her father was listening to the radio then he would do the crossword in his Reader’s Digest. She could smell the smoke from his cigarette. Greta crept upstairs into Deborah’s room. Her heart was beating harder and harder making her open her mouth to breathe. It was frightening but she longed to see Deborah’s treasure. The floorboards dug into her knees as she knelt in front of the dressing table. The bottom drawer slid open and she removed the angora sweater and saw the tissue paper. Without making it rustle Greta lifted it out and revealed the bed of cotton wool with shiny cloth on it.
And there they were. The glass animals. Against the purple satin they gleamed as if polished with light. Greta loved them. There was a roe deer, its crystal antlers as tiny as the horns on a snail. Her favourite was the galloping horse. She held it up, marvelling at its radiance. Her fingers traced the outflung mane. The tail was a feather of glass; each hoof a shining nib. She replaced the horse and lifted the peacock, holding it to the light to see the scrolled sequins of its plumage. The spread fan was as delicate as the skin of ice on a puddle when frost first catches it. Greta’s heart thumped. If she pressed with her thumbnail, would the peacock’s tail flake into crystals like salt? Curiosity gave her an urge to do it.
Once she had borrowed Deborah’s shantung ribbon for Pearl. Deborah had discovered her. “You’ve been in my room - damn you to hell, you’re a thief. You’ll rot in hell!” Her dark-brown eyes had looked black. She had snatched up Pearl, torn off the ribbon and dropped the doll back into Greta’s lap. Cheeks red with anger, lashing at Greta with the ribbon she said: “don’t you ever go in my room unless I say so.”
Now, covering the animals up, Greta closed the drawer and looked for
the ribbon. Deborah had taken it off a chocolate box at Mrs Griffin’s
and ironed it. If you held it one way it was deep rose red. If you
tilted it, the colour changed to violet.
Next
day, at Mrs Griffin’s kennels, Greta stared at Terry as he opened
the big five-barred gate for her and Deborah. “Hello Terry,” said
Deborah and reached up and gave him a pat on the head as if he were a
horse. Greta, twisting to watch him over her shoulder as they
crunched across the gravel, saw him rub his cloud of straw-soft hair
and smile after them. He collected things from Deborah and kept them
in the pocket of his dungarees. He had shown them to Greta: a toffee
wrapper, two cigarette cards, a bus ticket: he called them his
‘business’.
They went to get Captain, Mrs Griffin’s golden retriever. “Morning Debbie,” called Mrs Griffin.
“Morning Mrs Griffin.” Deborah strode on, leaving Greta squatting on the kitchen floor patting the sleepy old dog.
“Come to help us today, Greta? Have a biscuit,” Mrs Griffin offered the tin.
“Thank you,” Greta took one, hands cold inside her woollen mittens. The dog sat up and Greta fed him her biscuit.
“Lucky boy, Captain,” said Mrs Griffin.
Mrs Griffin was fat and dipped custard creams into her tea, sitting at the kitchen table adding up lines of numbers. She had a gramophone and listened to Edmundo Ross and Pat Boone and sighed when she got up to change the records as if moving was hard. Terry was her son. Deborah said he was backward. The howling and yipping of the foxhounds broke out. They had heard Deborah coming with their food. Chow time: that’s what Deborah called it.
Greta clipped on Captain’s lead and set off around the paddock, another biscuit in hand, the heavy dog floundering alongside. Ice creaked and snapped on the puddles and muddy water oozed over her Wellingtons. Captain was old and took a long time to get all the way round. When they got back to the kitchen door Greta sat on the step to remove the lead.
“Dry his feet;” Mrs Griffin passed an old towel. Greta watched Deborah talking to a tall man wearing a trilby hat like a film star. Greta knew how big and sparkling her sister’s eyes would be. “That’s Oliver Robinson talking to your sister. He’s the hunt master. He’s taken with your Debbie,” said Mrs Griffin as if she could see what Greta was thinking.
Deborah beckoned, and Terry came into view. Deborah passed him the
bucket she was holding then moved off slowly, her hands in the
pockets of her tightly belted overalls, laughing up at Oliver
Robinson. Greta hugged Captain and the panting dog turned to lick her
face.
When boyfriends came and
collected Deborah, Greta thought that maybe they were not very nice
because it made her father angry. It annoyed her too, because it
meant she couldn’t have her story. “Can your heart really break
because it is so full of gladness?” she asked after The Red
Shoes.
“No,” said Deborah.
“Have you ever seen a night-raven?”
“There’s no such thing.”
“Deborah, let’s be the birds in The Galoshes of Fortune – you be the parrot and I’ll be the canary,” and off she went: “Once I flew about among green palms and flowering almond trees...”
Deborah, angling a look at the page whilst painting her nails, stuck to the book. “You have genius but no… prudence…” she said, pausing to dip her brush in the nail varnish.
Greta improvised. “Shut your beak, parrot - I’m going to squeeze through these bars and fly to Africa, Goodbye!” And she jumped off the bed in her pyjamas and ran about the room waving her arms. “I escape. But you must chase me, Puss, chase me! I’m flying…”
And the cat blinked.
That year
Santa Claus brought Greta a picture book of jungle animals, a new
pack of cards and a compendium of games. As Christmas Day grew dark
she and Deborah played pontoon for matches by the sitting room fire,
cards balanced on their mother’s sewing box and Greta’s legs
mottled from the heat of the coals. Later on, she, Deborah, and their
mother and father too; sat around the table in the kitchen eating
iced Christmas cake playing Snakes and Ladders and Ludo until the
counters were sticky and Greta had hiccups from laughing.
The next day Deborah announced she was leaving college, she hated
shorthand, and she was going to work full time at Mrs Griffin’s
kennels instead. Both her mother and father were furious and no one
ever wanted to play Snakes and Ladders again.
“What’s
it to be, a fried egg?”
“Yes,” beamed Greta, plumping into her chair next to Deborah’s. Her mother obligingly pulled a funny face and imitated the spitty noise of an egg frying which always made Greta laugh herself silly. But the humour didn’t last long.
“Put that paper down, Deborah and finish up your toast.”
“I have finished,” said Deborah, who was cutting out a picture, the part-eaten slice ignored on the plate in front of her.
“Why can’t you be more like Celia Furedi?” Their mother would not get over Deborah giving up her shorthand course. “You’re as bright as her,” she fumed; ripping the top off a packet of tea.
“Oh is that what you think now? When she first went you said: oh, so Leicester’s not good enough for her,” sneered Deborah. “Don’t go on. Just because she’s gone away to college! Celia wants to be a teacher. I don’t. The Kennels pay well enough. I give you my keep.” Deborah frowned with concentration as she turned the scissors to go around the top edge of the picture. It was another bride.
“Keep? Hah! Keep she says. Just listen to her.”
Deborah wobbled her head, mouthing the words: “Keep? Hah! Keep, she says.”
“I’ve dripped egg on my sleeve,” said Greta, trying not to laugh.
“Don’t interrupt,” said her mother, staring at Deborah with hot cheeks. “I suppose I’ll be glad you’re not in one of the garment factories. Now that is a skivvy’s life.” Into the caddy went the tea.
“Celia’s right about one thing,” said Deborah, “she thinks Leicester’s a dump and I agree with her.” The scissors made two snappy bites and the picture was sheared free.
Greta jumped as her mother slammed the tea caddy down yelling: “why would you say that?” Deborah just waved the picture backwards and forwards and Greta craned to see it. “Amn’t I doing enough for you, Deborah?” What their Father called her Irish side always came out when she was angry.
Deborah thrust the picture at Greta. “Hold it for me, Twig. I’m going to stick it on my wall later.” Greta reached out with her free hand as the other conveyed a forkful of egg to her mouth. Her eyes were on the picture and at that moment Deborah gave her a well aimed nudge in the shoulder and the fork went upwards giving Greta an eggy moustache. Both girls screamed with laughter but their mother’s anger increased.
“Why are you so bold? Stop laughing…” Deborah was off. “Come back here Deborah.”
“I’m going to work,” her head came back around the edge of the door, “see ya later Twig.” The front door banged. Clang went the flap of the letterbox.
Grace Kelly’s lifted arm, in its white sleeve, was painted with light. She looked to her left out of the photo as if she was waving goodbye to Deborah. Greta tried to count the pearl buttons on the long cuff. Grace Kelly had been made into a princess, Greta could tell by the half-bonnet of a headdress that held yards and yards of gauzy veil.
Apple
Blossom
The
arguments got worse.
Shouting ricocheted up and down the staircase. At the top was Deborah, buttoning her new red and white print dress. It was a shirtwaist with three quarter length sleeves and a full skirt. “She’s seven Mother, not three,” Deborah was buckling the matching belt; pulling it tight to make her waist as tiny as possible. “She’s old enough to know what to do – it’s only Mass for God’s sake and I’ve told you already; I’m going to Bruciano’s to meet Greg.”
“I’m warning you, Deborah…”
“Well I’m telling you.”
“You can’t defy me and besides it’s barely half an hour and you know I rely on you for this. For the love of God couldn’t you have met him later?”
“Greg said six.” Deborah’s hands gripped the white collar of her dress and stood it up. “I’m going. She’s not a baby, Mother; we’ve done it a thousand times. You shouldn’t take me for granted. I’m not your slave.” Deborah sank into a ballerina curtsey to pick up her clutch bag. The stiff petticoat billowed under her skirt.
“Greg! What kind of a stoaty name is that? And a cardigan isn’t enough, it’s not even the end of May; you’ll be skinned once the sun goes down, the wind is biting. Wear your duster coat.” Deborah slung her white cardigan around her shoulders. “You defy me my girl and …”
“And what? Don’t worry. I’m getting out of here for good. You won’t see me for dust.” Their mother retreated from the white winklepickers, stair by stair. Deborah swept past and opened the front door. Evening sunlight poured into their narrow hallway. “Bye Twig,” she called, “take your animal book. You’ll be right as rain. See ya later alligator…” She was gone and the door banged shut, letterbox echoing, the hall dark again.
Muttering under her breath, their mother put on her camelhair coat and went to the kitchen dresser to rummage in the drawer for her headscarf. Greta darted to her side. “Jesus Mary Joseph you made me jump. Not that one.” Greta’s hands were offering the silky one with the huntsmen in red coats against a turquoise sky. “I want the purple one with the chevrons on it and the paisley border – that’s the one - grand, Love,” her mother was not smiling as she took off her beret and put the scarf over her head and tied it under her chin.
They hurried up the street, crossed Museum Square under the chestnut trees and went down the avenue to the church. “I’m last, oh Jesus Mary Joseph no one’s as late as me,” said her mother as they entered and crossed the wide nave. “Sit there while I’m gone and don’t move.” Her mother hurried towards the heavy oak door that led into the Lady Chapel.
“Look Mummy, Twig’s waving,” Greta held up her glass fragment. Amid the faint odour of candle wax she saw her mother’s pale face glance round; heard the groan of the hinge and the thud of the closing latch. Sunlight filled the church. The windows were huge. I’m not your slave. What did Deborah mean? Greta began looking through her picture book. I’m getting out of here for good. The African elephant. You won’t see me for dust. The giraffe. It’s only mass for God’s sake. The sloth. Greta dug her nail into the ugly sloth then spat on her finger and began rubbing at its offensive shape, until it wore away into a hole. The okapi over the page had Victorian bather’s thighs with alternating stripes of cream and black. Its white socks were girlish. The silken hide of it looked so velvety that Greta imagined her hand imprinting a palm shape in the bronzy shine. It extended ears like a butterfly bow above its devoted kangaroo face. Greta tenderly turned the book sideways to adore the way it nuzzled its okapi calf. To her horror the baby had disappeared. There was a hole. The mother okapi now peered into a ragged mess.
Angels, high up by the ceiling, stood on stone platforms just big enough for their feet. Their outspread golden wings were edged in scarlet. The hateful sloth had spoilt her book. If only an angel would fly down to her. “Come and see where I stand,” it would say and would carry her up. She would hear the air in its wings, like Elise being carried by swans. Her wounded mother would not know where she had gone.
“I’m here,” she would shout and people would look up. The angel would bring her down and her mother would talk to it. She would stand with Greta the way Greta liked; when they both faced the person her mother was talking to, her arms round Greta from behind, her gloved hands clasped a little way below Greta’s chin like the collar the milkman’s horse wore. Greta would stand on her mother’s shoes and be held there while her mother and the angel talked.
From beyond the door Greta heard Brother Isidore and then the sound
of people’s voices all rumbling together. She heard Brother Isidore
again then once more the responses. She began counting. One, two,
three, four, five, six: six angels. The words of Brother Isidore
were fast now and urgent. They went up high and loud. Then silence.
One, two, three, four; four candles burning in the stand. The
magenta cloth on the altar was beautiful. I’m getting out of
here for good. The ceiling looked like an upside-down boat;
narrow planks and every now and then, curved strips of wood, like
sprung bows, to brace them. One, two, three: three statues
draped in purple with only their feet showing. Greta felt hollow. I’m
not your slave! She wanted to go home; wanted to read about being
lost in a dark wood. She was in the middle of The Snow Queen.
It was even more exciting than all the other stories. Little Gerda
was lost in a dark wood, searching for Kai. The robber maiden wore a
scarlet hat and with her long dagger she tickled the reindeer’s
throat so the poor animal struggled and kicked. Greta wished for a
friend with a dagger just like the robber maiden. She wanted to ask
Deborah why did all the people in the story undress Gerda?
“Because
she’s pretty, like a little doll,” Deborah replied, a few nights
later. Greta slipped her bare feet into Deborah’s white high-heeled
shoes and clopped around the room, one hand on her hip. “Oh Twig,
you sweet little thing,” cried Deborah, and lifted her up in a
tight hug.
Time drifted by.
“Stand
still.” It was March the eighteenth, the day after Greta’s
birthday. Greta bobbed and twisted, trying to see the scarlet wool,
to gauge the effect of the white daisy buttons. It was her birthday
present, a shop-bought cardigan, the knitting smooth and soft.
“Let’s get the tangles out of your hair. Keep still.”
Deborah swept into the sitting room. “Hold out your hands Twig,” she said and shook talcum powder onto Greta’s palms. “Rub them together,” she said, “now pat your face,” Greta obeyed, breathing in the ravishing scent. Her head was yanked sideways as her mother did her parting and gathered up a bunch of her hair. “I’ll put the ribbons in, Mother,” Deborah seized the brush. The red satin ribbons were her birthday present to Greta.
“Beautiful,” said their mother. “Do up your cardigan so your old blouse doesn’t show.” For the first time ever, Greta was going next door to play with Bridget Furedi.
“Lift me up to see in the mirror,” Greta stood with her arms raised. Deborah lifted her then pretended she was too heavy and they giggled.
“Mind your p’s and q’s next door,” said her mother but Greta was not attending.
Her father slammed his paper down. “Carmel dinnae fash yersel…” he told Greta’s mother, “…Bridget’s ma jist wants her wee lass to hae a pal.”
“I,” said Deborah, putting Greta down, “am going,” and she swished out as their mother began buttoning Greta’s cardigan.
“Greta,” her father struck a match, “throw yon auld thing awa;” he nodded towards the mantelpiece as he lit his cigarette. “Ye’re no a wee lassie ony mair.” He shook out the match and took her glass twig off the mantelpiece. Greta watched. He flicked the match into the coal-scuttle then tossed and caught her glass twig.
“Daddy…” She held out her hand for it, stretching round her kneeling mother, who was reaching up under Greta’s skirt now, and with hefty tugs, pulling the bottom edge of her blouse down tight.
“See now ah could melt it doon and mak summit o’ it,” said her father.
Greta tore loose and snatched the glass twig off him. Her heart pounded with indignation as she tucked it into the pocket of her skirt.
“Don’t tease, Walter. Go on Greta. They’re bound to let you play again but don’t get above yourself.”
“Michty me wumman calm yersel’!” she heard, as she let herself out of the front door.
Next door, Mrs Furedi answered her knock. Behind her was Bridget with her fingers in her mouth. “What a smart cardigan.” said Mrs Furedi.
“I’m eight now,” said Greta.
“Would you like a pineapple cube? Bridget loves them.” Mrs Furedi gave Greta a paper bag. “Go on, have one.”
The yellow cube was too big for her mouth; the acid taste awful.
Mrs Furedi sat them in the front room. “Don’t touch the dog if he comes in, he bites,” she said and left them to a Snakes and Ladders board set out on the table. Sedately the girls began to play. Bridget didn’t notice when Greta took the dreadful sweet out of her mouth and put it in her pocket alongside her glass twig.
“What’s that of?” asked Greta when Bridget finally won. She pointed at a picture in a silver frame.
“Wedding photo,” Bridget took her fingers out of her mouth at last.
“The dress is nice,” Greta went to examine the picture.
“Wedding dress.” Bridget came to stand by her.
“Who is it?”
“My Ma.”
“It doesn’t look like her,” said Greta.
“Yes it does,” said Bridget and pinched Greta’s arm so hard it was like being burnt. Greta tried to snatch her arm away. Bridget wouldn’t let go.
“It looks like a princess,” said Greta, staring at the picture so Bridget wouldn’t notice that she was nearly crying. “Why don’t you have a sweet?”
Bridget let go of her arm. “Ma said they were for you.”
“Have one,” Greta held out the bag.
“Thank you,” said Bridget primly taking one, “do you want to come upstairs and play on my rocking horse?”
“Will your dog bite me?”
“Kick him if he does.”
“I don’t want the sweets; you can have them,” said Greta.
Bridget smiled. “You can have the wedding photo if you like it,” she said.
But later, when Greta was going home with the photo under one arm, Mrs Furedi said she couldn’t have it at all and she smacked Bridget. Bridget cried very loudly.
“Where is your wedding photo?” asked Greta. Her mother swung round from the sink and stared at her.
“Why ask me that?” she shouted. Greta was too surprised by the shouting to feel upset. She tried to correct her mother’s peculiar mistake.
“It should be on the sideboard in the front room. It is at the Furedi’s. Have you lost yours?”
Her mother turned back to the sink and finished washing the gravy boat she was holding. She put it upside down on the draining board. “I don’t remember. It was just after the war. Things get lost. I don’t know where it is.”
“Did you have a long dress?”
“No. It was just after the war,” she repeated. “Go upstairs and
wash your hands and face ready for bed.”
A
noise of pounding. The shed was ringing with it. Maybe her father was
making her a rocking horse. Greta had always said she wanted one. He
must have come home from work early. Her satchel bumped on her back
as she ran towards the shed. Inside, raising the bolster hammer and
pounding it down over and over, her mother stood at the workbench.
“Mummy,” said Greta.
Her mother leapt; face white and eyes like snowman eyes; two orbs of blurred coal. Her open mouth dragged breath into her. In silence she put the hammer down and walked past Greta out of the shed.Greta stood on her crate. The purple cloth made the workbench look like a messy altar. On the cloth were broken legs and snapped off tails; animals lying smashed, a horrible slurry of powdered glass. The jaws of the vice held the glass horse. The shank of the vice-clamp yielded to her push; gave way, loosening the bite. The iron ball on the end of the shank clanged on the socket-rim as it fell through its hole in the metal. Her hand followed its fall and grasped it from below. Her right hand held the horse and her left hand eased the shank to part the lips of the vice. She laid him on the pile with his broken legs beside him.
By reaching over and gathering the corners of the purple cloth, Greta could lift the whole destroyed collection in an inverted parachute. Tears threatened to overwhelm her. The thought of Deborah finding them made her feel out of breath. Greta’s heart began punching her ribs. The treasure was ruined. Why had her mother been smashing them? She stepped awkwardly down with the heavy parcel dangling from both hands. The oblong of the shed doorway framed a picture of where she lived. There were more bees than usual flying among the Sweet Williams; she saw the lettuces, the beetroot leaves veined with red and the house beyond. The dustbin, its lid crooked, stood level with the scullery door. Just next to it the little window of the outside lavatory was open, glass flashing as the sun slid from behind a cloud. No sign of her mother at the kitchen window. Birds were singing, Furedi’s dog barked. What if Deborah was coming along the street? There was a clang from somewhere further down the terrace. Furedi’s dog again; bark, bark, bark; surely trying to tell everyone about the destruction of the glass animals.
She hurried towards the dustbin, the purple bundle hammering her knees, setting it down while she got the sun-warmed lid off. She heaved the bundle up then into the dustbin it went. Braving the stink she leaned over and rearranged the rubbish so that the treasure disappeared under cinders, tea leaves, orange peel, a Camp coffee bottle, cigarette ends from her father’s ashtray and something slimy that was soaking through the newspaper it was wrapped in.
“Weel. That’s richt ‘e ken.” said a voice as she wiped her hands on her skirt. Her father bent down and picked up the dustbin lid. Without looking at her, he crunched it into place, twisting it slowly, first one way, then the other, as if screwing it tight He kept his eyes down. “We’ll nae speak aboot it. Ah thoucht ye’d be roon at Bridget’s.” There was complete silence. “Weel?” Now he glanced at her. To nod seemed the best thing. “So?”
“I had to come home. Bridget’s got a violin lesson.”
He crouched down and put his arm round her. “It’s a’richt. Yer mammy had a wee bit fight wi yer sister ye ken.”
“Deborah’s at work.”
“She isnae. Yer mammy foun’ Deborah in the hoose wan she brocht hame the shopping frae the market.” He was in his vest but smelled like chicken soup. Greta squirmed from his arm and shed her satchel. He stood up.
On the step of the lavatory her skipping rope lay twined around its wooden handles. “I’m going to skip,” she announced.
“A’richt then.” He took out a cigarette and patted his trouser pockets for matches.
Rushing away through the house helped. Greta held the snake of her
rope and let the handles fly. She swung the rope and the wooden
handles banged against the stair rails as she ran past. It helped a
lot. So did the noise of her shoes on the wooden floor and the slam
of the front door as she pulled it shut much too hard. Chanting
calmed her as she skipped on the pavement at the front:
“Salt…
mustard… vinegar… pepper,
Salt - mustard - vinegar –
pepper,
Saltmustardvinegarpepper…”Faster and faster she
skipped.
Soon the man in the black suit who gave Bridget her violin lessons came out. Greta dropped the rope and was about to knock on Furedi’s door when it opened and Celia Furedi; Bridget’s big sister; dashed out, followed by her mother. “I didn’t expect you to come home looking like a beatnik that’s a fact,” yelled Mrs Furedi. Celia didn’t look round, walking away fast, her circular skirt flaring. It was made of scarlet felt. Her tightly belted cardigan was on backwards. It was black. The light winked off the buttons between her shoulder blades. She wore flat black pumps and a red scarf with white polka dots knotted at her neck in a triangle. Greta liked the scarf. “Black! Black! Who wears black unless it’s a funeral?” screamed Mrs Furedi. Celia was Deborah’s age but had passed her eleven-plus and gone to the grammar school. Now she was at teacher training college. “Tell Bridget Greta’s here,” called Mrs Furedi, leaning backwards into her house. “If only Celia dressed like your Deborah. You wouldn’t catch Deborah Buchanan biting her nails… She doesn’t bite her nails!”
Parts of this were screamed after Celia, parts addressed to Greta and Greta couldn’t think of anything to say. But the drama of the scene blotted out the image of her mother in the shed, so she sat on Furedi’s wall and drank in the swirl of Celia’s red skirt, the tap and clatter of Mrs Furedi’s high-heeled shoes as she stormed in tight circles on the pavement and the music of the charm bracelet zithering on her enraged wrist.
An old woman appeared, holding Bridget by the shoulders. “So is this Bridget’s little friend, Greta?” She demanded. Bridget nodded. “Greta Garbo,” said the old woman and laughed until she doubled over coughing. She had iron-grey hair under a brown hairnet and no teeth. Greta stared at the repellent mauve cavity in her face.
Bridget ran away down the street, fair pigtails flying. “Come on,” she shrieked.
Greta took off, chasing her down towards the prison, heading for the park where there were swings and a slide. “Who’s that old woman?” She asked.
“Nanny Furedi,” said Bridget, “my grandma. She’s staying with us for a fortnight. Celia’s boyfriend has a beard. ” This made them laugh. “She’s got a black boat-neck jumper with batwing sleeves,” continued Bridget: “she smokes now as well.”
“Deborah’s been smoking ages,” said Greta. The slide smelled of metal, inches from her nose. She liked its worn gold. She was lying on her front on the flat part at the bottom. Bridget hung upside down on the climbing frame; her knees hooked over one of the bars.
“Celia won’t have milk in her tea. She says tea’s common and she wants black coffee,” said Bridget. “Me Mum’s gone mad.”
“Where does Celia live?” Greta couldn’t imagine what the teacher training college was like. Me Mum’s gone mad. Maybe her mother had gone mad too and that’s why she had smashed the animals.
“There’s halls at the college where they all live. Celia shares a room with a girl called Penny.”
“Why has she got her cardigan on back to front?” said Greta.
Bridget started laughing so much that she had to come down. “Let’s do it to ours,” she said. They buttoned each other’s cardigans down the back, giggling. “I want to show my Mum,” said Bridget and they ran back up the street.
“I’ve got to go in now,” said Greta as they arrived. Greta didn’t want another confrontation with the toothless old woman. She wanted her mother. She burst into her own house, slamming the front door. In the kitchen her mother was cutting bread. The only odd thing now was that her pinafore wasn’t fastened. Greta crossed over to her. “Shall I do up your pinny?” No reply, just the steady sawing of the bread knife as another slice peeled off the loaf. Greta took up the two long strings and began to do the bow. She tied it carefully, making the loops even. “There, Mummy. All done.”