Liverpool Miss Read Online Free Page B

round I was in an easy chair beside a fire, in the living quarters behind his little shop. His wife was forcing brandy down my throat. She must have succeeded in getting me to swallow quite a lot, because the pain did dull slightly and I felt exhilarated and yet sleepy. Edward had been propped in a matching chair on the other side of the fireplace. White rivulets down either grubby cheek marked the passage of tears. He had, however, a cheering ring of red jam round his mouth and in one hand was holding the crumbling remains of a tart.
    The tiny, stuffy room was packed with furniture, and the blaze in the hearth glanced off a gilded china shepherdess on a shining sideboard opposite to me. It danced off the glass dome covering a pair of stuffed birds and made the glasses of my hostess flash.
    The butcher’s wife was a tiny woman dressed in the greyish, washed-out skirt, blouse and cardigan which seemed to be the uniform of women in Liverpool. Wisps of hair had escaped from her bun and draggled round a careworn face.
    ‘Are ye feeling better?’ she asked.
    ‘Yes, thank you,’ I said. I blinked at her rather hazy face through spectacles that had slipped down my nose. ‘In fact, I feel fine.’
    ‘Aye, that’s good brandy, that is. You gave me husband a real fright when you keeled over.’
    ‘I am sorry. I get a pain each month,’ I faltered shyly.
    She smiled. ‘Oh, that was it, was it? Oh, aye. Brandy was the best thing to give you then. Does a lot for a woman at such times.’
    ‘It seems to,’ I said blithely.
    Then I remembered the children’s lunch, yet to be made. ‘I must go home,’ I said hastily. ‘My brothers and sisters will be coming from school.’
    ‘Think you’ll be all right? You only live down the road, don’t you?’
    ‘Yes.’
    I got to my feet. They did not feel very certain as to where the floor was, but I managed to stagger over to Edward and to pick him up. He put his arms round my neck, and sent a shower of pastry crumbs over the threadbare carpet.
    Reeling slightly, I again thanked the butcher’s wife.
    She laughed.
    ‘It’s nothing. Aye, brandy’s gone to your head, hasn’t it?’
    ‘It has,’ I giggled. ‘But the pain is less.’ I wanted to kiss her, but decided I could not aim straight. So I said effusively, ‘Thank you very, very much,’ andstaggered, still giggling, through the lace-draped door to the shop, which she held open for me. She smiled broadly at me, as I passed.
    Though sometimes the pain would rise above the effects of the brandy, and I had to stop walking and grip the handle of the old pram until the wave passed over, I hummed most of the way home. I was merrily drunk for the first time.
    I rolled round the icy living room and the kitchen as I boiled and thickened the minced meat I had bought; it was as well that it was ground, otherwise it would have been unchewable. I peeled the potatoes and boiled them to a mush, before the penny in the gas meter ran out and the gas stove refused to deliver any more heat. I spread clean newspaper on the table, and laid it. Seated on a wooden chair, I waited, at first happily, for the children to come in. But as the effects of the brandy began to seep out, the chill of the dirty, comfortless room began to invade – and the pain was once more paramount.
    Edward, too, was chilled and hungry and began to whimper. I took him up on my knee and wrapped us both in the old coat I used to cover him in the pram. It smelled of urine and long use. We warmed each other a little. He sucked his thumb and dozed, while I wept silently on to his scurfy little head.
    I wished I had some more brandy or anythingelse which would stop the grinding misery within me. As I waited, I saw suddenly the expression of pain which frequently lay on my father’s face – and in a burst of warm understanding I realised why he needed to drink sometimes. The burden of bereavement from the loss of most of his friends, in a war which, though it seemed a long