The Liverpool Basque Page 12

  Rosita sat by him at the table, a cup of tea in front of her, and suckled Francesca. Her magnificent red hair had not been combed and, in the light of the kitchen fire, it shone like a halo. Her expression was such that Manuel had a scared feeling that the last thing she was thinking about was a jittery small boy.

  When he was ready to leave, however, she handed him two biscuits for his elevenses, wrapped in a piece of paper saved from a cereal box. Then she squatted down in front of him, kissed him and told him he was being a very good, helpful boy.

  He felt better and grinned shyly at her. She patted his bottom, and sent him on his way. She did not want him at home when the undertaker, alerted by Vicente Saitua, came to measure her father’s body for a coffin later that morning.

  On the previous day, the doctor had come immediately in response to Father Felipe’s request. The accident was explained to him and the broken ladder shown to him. He wrote an appropriate certificate, and told Rosita gently, ‘I have to inform the Coroner’s Office, and they will probably send someone to look at your father. If the coffin arrives before they do, please do not put Mr Barinèta into it until they have made their examination; they will want to see the body – and the ladder.’

  At this intimation of an invasion of their privacy, Rosita had looked so defeated that the doctor had to reassure her that the official would probably be both compassionate and brief. ‘And you should lie down for a little while,’ he advised. ‘Mrs Saitua said you were expecting – and you don’t want to lose the child.’

  She merely shrugged; there would be other pregnancies.

  ‘Would you like to ask Mr Biggs to look after the body for you?’

  ‘You mean now? Give Father to the undertaker?’

  ‘Yes. You might feel a little better to be relieved of it.’

  ‘Good Heavens! No! Mother’s broken-hearted enough already.’

  Watched by Maria, Micaela, Rosita and young Peggy O’Brien had tenderly washed and shaved Juan and laid him out as soon as the doctor and Father Felipe had departed. They had wrapped him in a clean sheet and bound his jaw closed with a strip torn from another one. Two copper pennies were laid over his closed eyelids to keep them shut.

  To keep him flat and straight, before rigor mortis set in, Domingo and Vicente had opened up the folding flaps of the parlour table and had laid him flat on his back on it. The women did not attempt to straighten his neck, in case the Coroner demanded further medical examination.

  ‘When they hear about a man being suddenly dead, they always think he’s been in a fight – especially when it’s down in the docks,’ Peggy remarked sagely. ‘That’s why they want to take a look – ’cos then it would be murder. Lucky we are, nobody called the police, or we’d have had them on our backs as well.’ She had been practical and calm, and, before she hurried home to her out-of-work husband and her babies to give them their tea, Rosita had hugged her and thanked her.

  ‘You’re so young to face all this,’ she told her. ‘But I couldn’t ask Bridget, because she’s minding Manuel.’

  ‘It’s not so bad for me. Me mam was like Bridget, and she taught me. As a young girl, I often helped her bring a kid or lay somebody out.’ She wrapped her shawl round herself, and added, ‘When I’ve got the kids to bed, I’ll come back and sit with you for a spell.’

  After Peggy had departed, Rosita felt suddenly very alone. There was much to do. She must first persuade her mother and Maria to eat something – and she had better have a bite to eat herself – what with Francesca not yet weaned and the demands of the child inside her. The nappies hadn’t been washed, the fire needed remaking – it was nearly out; and she must do Juan’s job of bringing some buckets of coal up the cellar step, not something she wanted to do while pregnant. And Manuel would be back soon, she supposed. She hoped Bridget had given him some tea.

  In the event, it was Peggy who carried up the coal. She returned more quickly than Rosita had hoped. And it was she who took Manuel’s boots and socks off before Pat slipped him into his bed still sound asleep. She stayed until early the next morning when she had to go to attend to her own children.

  Not only Peggy and the other women had proved their worth on that awful day. Father Felipe remained for a while with Micaela. Though Spanish, he knew enough Basque to speak comfortingly to the distraught woman in her own language. Firmly, gently, he helped her to regain control of herself. He had remained with the family until after the doctor’s call and the removal of the body from the sofa to the table, where it was temporarily covered with a sheet. Rosita brought them both wine, and the priest and the broken old woman sipped it together. It was he who suggested to Rosita that, to give themselves strength, they should eat before formally laying poor Juan out.

  Micaela smiled dimly at this, but as soon as Father Felipe left, she insisted that the laying out be done right away. Wearily, Rosita agreed, but said she must feed a screaming Francesca first.

  Working neatly and carefully, as she always did, Micaela had seemed better as she gave the last service she could to a well-loved husband of forty years. Within, she was beating herself because she had asked him to do a job, at his age, which involved climbing a ladder; it did not help her to remind herself that he had spent his youth climbing the rigging of sailing ships and had always had excellent balance.

  Afterwards, she had eaten a little, as did a tear-sodden Maria. Then she had gone into the parlour, rosary in hand. Maria had determinedly blown her nose and had followed her in, to sit with her until Peggy returned to join them. Dry-eyed and drained, Rosita had settled Francesca for the night and washed a couple of nappies, ready for the morning. She was thankful when, later, Manuel was brought in sound asleep.

  She was worried about the strain on Maria, already so weak and frail, and, as soon as she could, she had gone to take her place in the parlour. ‘Bed, Maria,’ she had ordered briefly, as she took out her rosary. ‘You must keep your strength up.’ So, protesting feebly, Maria had gone upstairs to the bedroom she shared with Manuel and had wept very quietly so that she did not wake the child.

  Only a few minutes after Manuel had been sent to school the following morning, Ould Biggs, the undertaker, presented himself. He was brief, obsequious and politely sympathetic. He delicately inquired if they had Burial Insurance.

  As Rosita led him into the parlour, she assured him that they had and that it was paid up to date. He nodded his head in acknowledgement of this welcome news, as he approached Micaela and took her hand and silently held it for a moment.

  Then he briskly whipped out his tape measure and measured Juan. He was respectful of a man who had given him a lot of work for his horse buses when dispatching Basque emigrants and he did not touch the body.

  He then turned back to Micaela and, taking her hand again, he asked her very kindly if she would like to step round in the afternoon to choose the kind of coffin she wanted. ‘You and your daughters, like. And a memorial stone – I’ve got a nice line in them – and I’ve several beautiful coffins in stock.’

  The candle on the table at the head of the corpse flickered from the weight of the sigh that Micaela let go, before she whispered her agreement to the visit. Tears rolled slowly down her cheeks to drop on her black apron. Maria, seated on the horsehair sofa, put her head down on her knees and wept, her silver and ebony rosary dripping from her fingers in the candlelight, as if its tiny glitter were tears and that it wept for her as well. The doctor had left a sedative for her to take, but she had not swallowed it. It lay forgotten on the mantelpiece.

  Rosita had hardly ushered him out of the front door, when a grand gentleman caused a stir in the street by arriving in a motor car, a contraption rarely seen by the local inhabitants. He announced that he was from the Coroner’s Office, and Micaela, wearied from mourning and lack of sleep, managed to rouse herself sufficiently to give him a fairly coherent description of the accident. He inspected the offending ladder and the broken drainpipe, while rain poured down on his bald head; he had, of co
urse, removed his bowler hat on entering the house. He assured Micaela that she had nothing to worry about and that she could go ahead with arrangements for the funeral. The Coroner’s Office would see that Mr Biggs was informed that all was in order for him to proceed.

  Just before Manuel was due back from school for his midday meal, Madeleine Saitua dropped by to deliver a piping hot rabbit pie, which she put into the kitchen oven to keep warm. Rosita seized the opportunity to ask her if her boys would help her to rearrange the parlour furniture, after Juan had been coffined, so that the coffin could be supported by a chair at either end, and the neighbours could move round it when they came to pay their respects.

  Madeleine gazed compassionately at the white-faced younger woman, and said, ‘Of course, luv. Just send Mannie up with a message when you’re ready. And you try to get some rest, luv.’

  Rosita agreed that she would and saw her out with an expression of thanks for the pie. She was still watching her plod up the street, when Peggy came by on her way to the corner grocery. She asked if Ould Biggs had been yet, and when Rosita said he had, Peggy remarked, ‘Manuel’ll be able to see his granddad when he’s all peaceful in his coffin – with flowers round him. Frannie’ll be too young to remember him, more’s the pity.’

  Rosita had not yet had time to weep herself and, at this remark, she felt suddenly choked with grief. She managed, however, to answer her kindly, blundering neighbour, by saying cautiously, ‘If the boy would like to.’

  After doing his best to describe the loss of his grandfather to Lorilyn, Old Manuel leaned back in his chair and gazed abstractedly out of his study window at the distant mountains of the United States on the other side of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. He could only guess at the sorrow and despair of his grandmother, his mother and his delicate aunt; they had done their best to swallow their own grief and reassure their frightened little boy.

  Chapter Sixteen

  This was the second year during which Manuel had attended St Peter’s Catholic School, and he was accustomed to its highly disciplined system. He knew that when he was bigger and more able to travel safely by himself, he would be sent to St Francis Xavier’s, a Catholic Grammar School, and, there, his real education would begin.

  On the morning after his grandfather’s death, when he pushed open the wrought-iron gate and entered the asphalted school yard, the atmosphere of the school seemed, unexpectedly, very peculiar; the children were too quiet. Instead of rushing about to make the most of their last moments of play before they were sent indoors, they were hanging about uneasily.

  Andrew Pilar, usually belligerent, came with a crony to stare at him; Manuel tried not to cringe, as he prepared to slap away hands which often pinched him cruelly in his private parts.

  To his surprise, Andrew simply snorted and turned away, followed closely by his slouching friend. Then Miss Carr, usually so brisk and acid-tongued, took him by the hand and put him quietly in the line being formed by the youngsters in his class, preparatory to being marched into their classroom. As if he did not know that he was supposed to line up, he thought bewilderedly. Behind him, Andrew in the next higher class, was given short shrift and pushed into his proper place. No child spoke to Manuel, though many stared at him.

  Miss Carr stood in front of the ragged lines. In response to a sharp command, the children shuffled to align themselves by stretching out their left arm to put their hand on the right shoulder of the person next to them.

  Four lines behind him, there was a small sob and a girl began to cry. Miss Carr blinked behind her pince-nez. She said kindly, ‘Rosemary, come and stand by me, child.’

  Manuel did not dare to turn his head, as the children behind him made way for Rosemary, who was one of the big girls, aged ten. This morning, her straggling flaxen hair was even more untidy than usual, and her white pinafore, worn over a navy-blue serge dress, was crumpled from being used to mop up floods of tears.

  ‘Come to me, dear,’ Miss Carr said softly, her own mouth quivering. She put a protective arm round the girl’s shoulders and held her close to her, as she quickly glanced up ferociously at her other charges. ‘Stop shuffling,’ she ordered. Then Manuel was aware of her worried frown, as her gaze rested on him for a moment.

  She gave a deep sigh, and ordered, ‘Standard One! Attention!’

  She successfully marshalled her charges into the hall of the school for the morning Assembly. On a small platform stood the Headmaster, flanked by some of his teachers. Behind them hung portraits of George V and Queen Mary.

  In addition to the usual hymn, announcements, prayers and short homily, the pupils were ordered to pray for the soul of Rosemary’s father and for all The Fallen; Manuel was far from sure who or what The Fallen were. Could you lose your soul without being dead, perhaps? If, however, praying for Rosemary’s father would cheer her up a bit, he was willing to do it.

  He felt that if one was supposed to pray for The Fallen, it was very disappointing that the Headmaster did not order prayers for Grandpa. With a sigh, he assumed that it was because he had only fallen off a ladder and that that did not count.

  On their way home for their midday meal, he discussed this a little anxiously with Joey and Brian Wing, and they agreed that since Grandpa did, indeed, fall, he must be one of The Fallen. Manuel began to cry helplessly, and Joey and Brian became scared, because they barely understood what had happened to his grandfather; they were relieved when they reached the Echaniz doorstep and could leave him.

  When he entered the kitchen-living-room it was so quiet that he could hear Pudding energetically washing her face. His mother sat at the table, writing a letter. Two addressed envelopes were propped against the milk jug. Though the fire had been lit before he left for school, there was none of the usual smell of dinner cooking.

  At his entry, Rosita looked up. ‘Hello, darling,’ she greeted him absently, and then continued to write. He heaved off his Wellingtons and flung them into the boot cupboard by the fireplace, where Pudding usually gave birth to her kittens. He took off his macintosh and hung it on the back door – he had to stand on tiptoe to reach the wooden peg.

  ‘Where’s Granny?’ he asked. ‘And Auntie?’

  His mother signed her name at the foot of her letter, and folded it carefully. As she slipped it into an envelope, she replied, ‘Grandma’s resting on her bed for a bit, and Auntie Maria is sitting in the parlour by Grandpa – Madeleine Saitua’s there, too.’

  As she licked the envelope to seal it, Manuel watched her, trying not to grizzle; he was disconcerted at the lack of the usual bustle surrounding the production of the midday dinner.

  ‘Hasn’t his angel come yet?’ he inquired cautiously.

  Taken aback by the question, Rosita paused in her sealing of the letter. She looked down at her son, and saw the traces of tears. He had put his hand on her lap, as if to concentrate her attention on him. When she did not answer him immediately, he explained, ‘Auntie Maria told me that Grandpa’s Guardian Angel would come to take care of him.’

  Rosita put down her letter, and lifted the child on to her knee. She felt guilty that she had paid little attention to him since her father’s accident; Francesca had, of a necessity, to be fed and her napkins changed, or she would have screamed steadily; but her quiet elder child had been fobbed off on to Bridget next door.

  As he curled up thankfully in her lap, she struggled to keep her voice normal, as she replied, ‘The angel bore his soul away when he fell, dear. We’ve only to take care of his body. Grandma’s having a beautiful box made for him to rest in, and we’ll put lots of flowers round him, and Father Felipe will help us to say prayers for him. Then he will be laid in the cemetery under the trees, where it’s quiet and peaceful. We think he’ll like that.’

  With his head against his mother’s shoulder, Manuel considered this explanation, and then looked round the kitchen-living-room. ‘I’m awfully hungry,’ he said heavily.

  Rosita gave a broken laugh. ‘I haven’t forgotten your dinner, lu
v. I’ve a nice piece of rabbit pie waiting for you in the oven. Mrs Saitua brought it just now – wasn’t it kind of her?’ Manuel slipped off her lap, as she rose, and she went on, ‘Grandma says she’s going to cook something hot for us for tea.’

  It was suddenly infinitely comforting to hear that Grandma would be undertaking some of her usual tasks. He ate his rabbit pie, and went back to school feeling better.

  His mother, who had not shared the meal with him, walked part of the way with him; she had to post the letters she had written to Pedro, to Great-Uncle in Bilbao and to Leo. She had addressed the latter to Nevada, in the hope that it would be redirected to Leo wherever he might be. She sighed, when she thought about her brother; he was barely twenty, completely alone in an area of the States noted for its lawlessness. He was hardly literate, but she wondered if he realized how thankful his mother would be to have even a couple of lines from him regardless of whether the news was good or bad.

  She promised herself that that evening she would tackle letters to her elder brother, Agustin, and to the Echaniz family on their farm in the Pyrenees.

  Leo never received his letter, and Pedro was given his only when his boat docked at Liverpool two months later.

  That same day following his grandfather’s death, Bridget invited Manuel over to play with Mary and Joey after tea. ‘It will keep the kid occupied – keep his mind off things,’ she told Rosita.

  The two little boys were swopping cigarette cards on the mat in front of the Connollys’ blazing fire, when Manuel’s mystification about The Fallen was clarified a little.

  Bridget was washing the dishes and Pat was reading the back page of the newspaper, where the sporting news was usually featured. ‘Proper awful about Frank Abbott,’ she shouted.

  ‘Eh?’