In the Bleak Midwinter Read online

  IN THE

  BLEAK

  MIDWINTER

  Carol Rivers, whose family comes from the Isle of Dogs, East London, now lives in Dorset. Visit her website at www.carolrivers.com

  Also by Carol Rivers

  Lizzie of Langley Street

  Rose of Ruby Street

  Connie of Kettle Street

  Bella of Bow Street

  Lily of Love Lane

  Eve of the Isle

  East End Angel

  First published in Great Britain by Simon & Schuster, 2011

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster UK

  A CBS company

  Copyright © Carol Rivers, 2011

  This book is copyright under the Berne Convention.

  No reproduction without permission.

  ® and © 1997 Simon & Schuster Inc. All rights reserved.

  The right of Carol Rivers to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  Simon & Schuster UK Ltd

  1st Floor

  222 Gray’s Inn Road

  London WC1X 8HB

  www.simonandschuster.co.uk

  Simon & Schuster Australia

  Sydney

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  Hardback ISBN: 978-1-84737-689-3

  Paperback ISBN: 978-1-84739-841-3

  eBook ISBN 978-1-84983-411-7

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Typeset in Bembo by Hewer Text UK Ltd

  Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Cox & Wyman Ltd, Reading Berkshire

  This is for you, Stan, and the Buffs

  Acknowledgements

  Go to Adrian Bramley, Haras Ullah and Teresa Cann for their help, hard work and enthusiasm in providing a valiant and comprehensive Home Library Service, without which some of us would never enjoy the life-giving world of books. To Connie Rothman and all the staff at Southbourne library – this year celebrating 85 stoic years of opening its door to the public – thank you for your support and encouragement! To Rachel, Barry, Ethan and Samuel, a big hug for always being there.

  Thanks to Big C, whose adventurous love of all things digital, I completely rely on. And as always, I am deeply grateful to readers who take the time to write or email me, visit my website, review on Amazon or to post to Facebook and Twitter. You are the tops!

  Once again, to Maxine, Emma, and the team of amazing guys at Simon & Schuster and to my great agent Dorothy Lumley, thank you for a wonderful year!

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Epilogue

  Chapter 1

  November 1918

  Birdie Connor gazed critically into the rust-speckled mirror nailed to her sewing room wall. Had she arranged her deep brown finger-waves a little too frivolously? Did the cheeky bow on her pale green dress seem a trifle overdone? She’d have to wear a coat, of course, as it was cold, with a cutting wind blowing over the roofs of the East End’s dilapidated houses.

  There was little about the island on which she lived – a shambles of docks and wharfs, which curved into a horseshoe of land, sticking out into the great River Thames – to cause a girl much excitement over a stroll. For on a Sunday, even the river was still, the boats and barges and tall goose-necked cranes idle. Only the taverns cheered the men’s spirits, but gave little encouragement to their families. A man’s wage could be drunk in the space of an hour and, stumbling home, he’d probably not remember his starving children until he fell in the door and gazed into their hungry faces.

  But, Birdie was quick to reflect, luckily this was not the case with the Connor family of March Street. Their lives depended not on the docks or the factories huddled around them, but on her skill to sew, and the few extra pennies she earned as a landlady. Nor could the bleak midwinter weather dim her excitement in the least. For today, she and Donald Thorne, the man she hoped soon to marry, planned to spend an entire day together. A perfect miracle, in Birdie’s estimation.

  Pinching her cheeks to bring out their pinkness, Birdie reflected that a touch of rouge wouldn’t go amiss. And it was all the rage to have curved, thin eyebrows to accentuate a powdered face, just like Mary Pickford, the film star. But Don had never approved of make-up, though she had to admit that once or twice she’d given in to temptation and used the lipstick that Lady Hailing, her very best customer, had given her.

  ‘Birdie?’ Fourteen-year-old Patrick Connor, her younger brother, cautiously poked his head round the door. ‘I’m off to meet Willie.’

  ‘Willie, is it?’ Birdie teased as he entered, giving him a curious glance. ‘Now would you be telling your sister the truth? Why would you not be walking out some pretty young lady, I wonder? For just look at the height of you – growing taller by the day. And with good, clean looks to set you apart from the average, too.’

  ‘You won’t catch me courting!’ Pat exclaimed disdainfully. ‘Girls don’t interest me one bit.’

  ‘That’s not what you’ll be saying in a few years’ time. Just wait till you fancy your first girl. Believe me, she’ll take up all your thinking time, as well as what’s in your pocket.’

  Pat shook his head fiercely, causing a lock of auburn-coloured hair to flop over his eyes. ‘Females ain’t for me, Birdie. I’m going to travel the world and make me fortune first.’

  ‘The world, is it now? A messenger boy since September and he thinks he’s Christopher Columbus.’

  ‘I might join the navy, even.’

  ‘And so you might,’ Birdie agreed, folding away her rolls of fabric before Pat could lay a grubby hand on them.

  ‘Or sail up the Nile on a barge,’ he mused as he sat down on her sewing chair. ‘And see them pyramids.’

  ‘Now that’s an idea.’

  ‘Or work a passage to Australia. Shoot a few dingoes.’

  ‘And all you’d need to take with you is a solid pair of boots,’ Birdie nodded as she rescued a length of cotton gingham from the table nearby. ‘I hear Australia don’t call for many warm clothes. Just decent footwear to stop the snakes and spiders from biting.’

  ‘I ain’t afraid of spiders and snakes.’ This was said with defiance, but Birdie heard a trace of doubt too. ‘I’m not afraid of anything. Long as it’s not wearing a skirt.’

&nb
sp; Birdie laughed. With Patrick’s shock of auburn-brown hair – a trait of the Irish Kennedys, their mother’s side of the family – and his athletic figure and twinkling brown eyes, he was already beginning to fill out to handsome proportions.

  But she didn’t tease him today as her mind was on other, more important things. Was this dress really suitable for a brisk walk to Poplar and a tram ride to Aldgate? And what sort of restaurant would they be dining in? Although the shops were closed, Don had said they might stop for a bite to eat under the shadow of St Paul’s. And in Birdie’s book that meant gloves and a hat, a look to make her tiny five-foot-three-inch figure just a fraction taller. But now she was having her doubts about the dress. Should she have cut the material on the bias? Or created an even lower, more subtle dropped waist? But then, if she didn’t wear this one, what would she wear? Navy-blue skirts and white blouses, her neat uniform for seeing her dressmaking and mending clients, simply wouldn’t pass muster.

  At last, after several turns and twirls, Birdie decided the dress was satisfactory, if not quite perfect. It would have helped, of course, if she’d had decent shoes, not this old pair with a buttoned-strap, and newspaper stuck inside. But, beggars couldn’t be choosers. Although, Birdie reminded herself sternly, she wasn’t on the steps of the workhouse yet!

  ‘Birdie, are you listening?’

  She nodded distractedly.

  ‘You aren’t, I know you aren’t.’

  ‘I am indeed,’ she insisted, her mind still on the doubtful footwear.

  ‘I just saw Don. I was riding me bicycle up East India Dock Road and he was off to church with the two Mrs Ts and little Jamie. Called out that I was to tell you it’d be this afternoon, after his dinner, before he was round.’

  ‘This afternoon?’ Birdie gasped. ‘But he said he was to call this morning.’

  ‘Seems like he changed his mind.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘As sure as my name’s Pat Connor.’

  Birdie shook her head in confusion. Ever since Don’s father had died last year from the flu, their plans had been set to one side. Not that she didn’t understand Don’s predicament. It was only right, she’d told herself a hundred times over, that with the loss of his brother, Stephen, at Passchendaele, and his father a year later, he should attend to his own affairs first. Aggie, his mother, and Lydia, his sister-in-law, both ending up as widows in the space of eighteen months – well, it was a tragedy, to be sure. But life had to go on. And Birdie couldn’t help feeling left out.

  Why, wasn’t it only a few weeks ago – and only through Don’s urging – that the two women had put away their widow’s weeds? Even Birdie had to admit that Lydia could be a very presentable young woman when she tried, and had every chance of marrying again; an event that Birdie was praying would take place very soon, and relieve Don of the burden of Lydia and little James’s care.

  ‘So he was with Mrs Thorne and Lydia, was he?’ Birdie pondered again. ‘And what would they be wearing? Sunday-best church clothes, was it?’

  ‘And big hats with feathers, all dolled up to the nines,’ remarked Pat with a smirk.

  Birdie rolled her eyes. ‘You know what I mean, you cheeky devil.’

  But Pat only shrugged. ‘Mrs T was on one arm and the young missus on the other.’

  ‘Oh,’ murmured Birdie disappointedly. Not that she minded Lydia being on his arm, not at all. In fact she was glad he’d given the poor girl his company whilst she’d been grieving. But she was missing Don’s arm herself now and had expected to be leaning on it today.

  Still, she was lucky indeed to have even half a day with Don. Many a man – certainly a hard-working shopkeeper like Don, who put in all the hours God sent, as well as caring for his family – would be taking full advantage of a rest on a Sunday. And she didn’t begrudge him his church-going, no, not at all. But Aggie’s Sunday dinners were proper performances. They could last an eternity! Not a mutton stew or cold meat and a finger of cheese, like Birdie made, but a real joint, running freely with fat and juices, and vegetables of at least three varieties crammed on the plate, with thick brown gravy to drown the golden potatoes. Birdie knew all this because she had been invited to dinner once or twice when Aggie had been of a mind to entertain. Birdie sighed softly as she considered Aggie and the family she was soon to be part of. She was grateful for Aggie’s occasional invitations; the busy routine of the store did not allow for many social events and Birdie felt honoured to be welcomed into the fold.

  ‘Never mind,’ Pat said cheerfully, ‘a man’s got to do the right thing by his own. Them Thornes have got knees hard as pokers from all the praying they do. Can even beat us Catholics, I reckon.’

  Birdie smiled. ‘S’pose I can’t expect miracles.’

  ‘Speaking of miracles, why don’t you go over to Flo’s? Take those noisy kids of hers to Mass. I’ll stay with Dad.’

  Birdie shook her head. ‘They’ll have left for Mass already.’

  Flo Sparks was her best friend and lived just round the corner in Ayle Street. Sometimes they went to the early Mass together, but Birdie had already told her that she was spending today with Don.

  ‘I’ve plenty to do here,’ she shrugged, unwinding a long, red, fox fur from a box. ‘There’s this poor dead beast to stitch to Lady Hailing’s coat and two hems yet to be altered. I had it in mind to finish them this evening, but now the morning is all me own.’

  ‘Fancy wearing that!’

  ‘All the country ladies favour these.’

  ‘Why are them ladies so rich,’ Pat demanded, ‘and us so poor?’

  ‘It’s just a fact of life, love.’

  ‘It’s not fair, that’s what I think.’

  ‘Pat Connor!’ Birdie warned gently. ‘We’re lucky to have breath in our bodies after the war the world has just been through. Haven’t you just landed yourself a grand job? And ain’t we got a nice lodger to help out with the rent? And don’t I get a few nice cast-offs from the ladies?’

  ‘I know that, Birdie, and I ain’t ungrateful. All the same, I don’t expect it matters to the ladies of Hailing House that you’re always sewing, even on a Sunday, until your eyes nearly pop out your head. Bet they don’t even know how to sew a button on.’

  ‘I should hope they don’t or else I should have no work. And I’m always mindful that it was at the sewing classes at Hailing House that I learned my skill as a child. And that skill is still serving me well.’ Birdie smiled into his big brown Connor eyes, the same shade as her own, though the shine in them was definitely their mother’s. Time, however, was beginning to dim even Birdie’s memory, for at eleven she had been no more than a child herself when Bernadette Connor had died giving birth to Pat. A kindly neighbour had helped with the baby until Birdie had left school at thirteen and was able to take over his care. But now, more than ever, Birdie wished with all her heart that Bernadette was here to answer Pat’s many questions.

  ‘Still don’t think it’s fair,’ he grumbled again. ‘Just like putting our Frank behind bars isn’t fair.’

  At this Birdie was silent, for she agreed wholeheartedly. She couldn’t bear to think of their older brother in prison. The army had called him a deserter, but Birdie refused to accept that was so.

  ‘Do you believe our Frank done what they said he did?’ persisted Pat, the pink flush of boyhood still on his cheeks.

  ‘No, I don’t,’ Birdie admitted. ‘Frank is no coward.’

  ‘Dad says he let the King down.’

  ‘Dad is a proud man,’ Birdie responded carefully, loyal to both her father and brother. ‘If things had been different he would have volunteered for the front line, even at his age. And now he is ailing worse, his pride is taking a knock, for all his life he’s toiled to keep home and family together. But this is a very grown-up thing to understand, Pat, although the matter may seem clear-cut to you.’

  ‘I’ll never believe our Frank ran away,’ said Pat stoutly. ‘And I ain’t far off from being grown up.’


  ‘And proud of you, so I am, Pat.’ Birdie’s heart clenched with love for her little brother, now almost a head and shoulders taller than she.

  ‘Down the docks, the men say all deserters should be shot.’

  ‘Nonsense!’ Birdie exclaimed. ‘That’s ignorance talking. I reckon our Frank should’ve got a medal, not a court martial.’

  ‘Even old Charlie Makepiece down the road shouted out a rude name when I cycled by.’

  ‘That’s because he’s half barmy with drink,’ Birdie said, thinking that she’d have something to say herself to Charlie about his cussing and bawling loud enough to wake the dead on his way home from the pub.

  Pat drew his cuff across his nose and sniffed. ‘So it’s not true that our mum turned in her grave for what Frank did?’

  ‘Course not!’ exclaimed Birdie furiously. ‘Did the buggers say that, an’ all?’ Pat looked away guiltily, but Birdie caught his arm. ‘Now listen to me, Patrick Connor, this is God’s truth I’m telling you. For a start, Mum ain’t in her grave. She left it a long time ago to watch over us. And you can be sure of this: our mum would have been the first to stand up for our Frank.’

  ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘Indeed I do.’

  Pat scratched his head. ‘But our dad says he’s never speaking to Frank again.’

  ‘Time is a great healer,’ answered Birdie, although privately she was a little fed up herself of waiting for their father to relent. ‘Meanwhile, as there’s nothing we can say just yet to change Dad’s mind, you must remember that it was Mum who said to be proud of our family, and the Kennedy pride is what I’m passing on to you this very moment.’

  Birdie reached out to comfort him; it wasn’t often that Pat spoke as he had today. He had always been a happy child, despite being motherless.

  ‘I’ve got to oil me bicycle and polish me boots for tomorrow’s rounds,’ he muttered, pulling away and banging the door after him so that even the walls seemed to shudder.

  Birdie sat quietly, lost in thought. Both Pat and Don were of equal importance in her heart, though selfishly, it was Don’s reluctance to name the day that concerned her the most. And how would she, Birdie, fit in with the Thornes when they were married? She was a cradle-born Catholic and Don a regular-as-clockwork churchgoer. And although Don had not contested a Roman wedding, Birdie knew of Aggie’s disapproval.