A Mother’s Gift: Two Classic Novels

‘Do we still have a few minutes?’

She nodded her head again.

Taking her by the hand, he asked light-heartedly, ‘Would you care to join me?’ Leading her to the bench, he sat her down. ‘Welcome to Paradise.’

For a little while they sat and talked and laughed, and when she gave a long, trembling shiver, he dared to put his arm round her shoulders, and like Ben, she was afraid, of her feelings, and of the future.

Suddenly their private idyll was shattered, when a homely figure came rushing round the corner, calling out: ‘Supper’s ready. Your mammy says you’re to come in out of the cold.’ Elsie chuckled merrily. ‘I’m to tell you, she doesn’t mind you canoodling out here, but she doesn’t want you catching pneumonia, and if I can’t persuade you back into the house, she’ll be out here and she’ll chase you both inside with her walking stick. What’s more, I’ve made a big jug of creamy custard, and I’d like Mr Morris to enjoy my apple-pie while it’s hot. It’s a deep-dish pie, stuffed with best cooking apples and covered in pastry that’ll melt in your mouth. It’s only reheated, mind, but I made it fresh yesterday.’

Ben’s stomach rumbled. ‘Sounds wonderful.’

‘I’m not one for singing my own praises,’ Elsie declared self-righteously, ‘but I do make the best apple-pie in the whole of Bedfordshire, and woe betide them as says any different.’

The evening was a great success.

The pork chops were succulent, and the vegetables done to a turn, and just as she’d promised, Elsie’s apple-pie was the best Ben had ever tasted. Lucy had produced a bottle of wine and drank more than the others put together. She also did most of the talking. She told Ben about her hometown of Liverpool and got carried away with the memories – though there was one particular memory she did not divulge.

‘What did you love most about Liverpool?’ Ben asked, intrigued by her stories.

‘Oh, the docks, and the Mersey of course!’ Taking another sip of her red wine, Lucy savoured it for a moment, rolling it round her tongue and smacking her lips, like a dog after a bone.

Ben was ashamed to admit it, but he’d never seen the Mersey.

‘Maybe you’d think she was nothing out of the ordinary – just another river flowing away to the sea,’ Lucy speculated, ‘but to the ones who’ve lived and worked alongside her for most of their lives, she’s very special. She changes, y’see – from day to day she’s never the same. She has moods just like us … dark moods, quiet moods … and after a while you get to know her, and you can’t help but be affected, in a kind of magical way.’

She gave a long, nostalgic sigh. ‘If you’ve never seen the early morning Mersey when she’s covered in mist, or stood beside her when the moonlight dances on the water and brings it alive, then your life is sadly lacking.’

‘I can see I’ll have to take myself up there at the first opportunity,’ he said obediently.

‘Quite right!’ Lucy applauded. ‘Make sure you do!’

While Lucy and Ben chatted, Mary thought it amazing how well they got on together. But then, right from the start, she had felt comfortable with him. Maybe it was because he was older than her? Ben was so easy and natural, it would be hard not to feel at home in his company.

‘Do you mind if I ask you something?’ With her engaging manner and interesting tales, Lucy had commandeered him, though he hoped that he and Mary would make up for lost time together later.

‘Go ahead, young man. Ask away.’

‘Well, I was just thinking … if you were so happy in Liverpool, why would you ever want to leave?’

Suddenly the air was thick with silence, and Ben immediately wished he had never asked. But then his hostess answered and her manner was curiously sombre. ‘Life sometimes gives us problems that we aren’t equipped to deal with. So we run away … like the cowards we are.’

Ben was mortified. ‘Oh look, I’m sorry. I seem to have opened up old wounds.’ She had that same look about her that he had seen in the churchyard; a look of resignation, a sadness that was almost tangible.

Lucy, too, was mortified, for she had let them both see through her armour, and now she was afraid. ‘It’s all right,’ she assured him hurriedly. ‘I did love Liverpool. I still do, but I can’t go back.’ Her voice stiffened. ‘I could never go back.’

Mary had never heard her mother talk in that way, and it worried her. From a child, she had known there was something in her mother’s past that played strongly on her mind. Her own memories were unreliable; her early childhood often seemed tantalisingly out of reach. With Ben having opened a door to which she herself had never had access, secrets might come out and at last she would know what it was that haunted her mother so.

Turning to Ben she confessed, ‘You’re not the only one never to have seen the Mersey. I was born in Liverpool yet I can’t recall anything about it.’ She glanced at Lucy. ‘Time and again, I’ve offered to go back with Mother, but we never have, and now I’m beginning to think we never will.’

Lucy smiled. ‘Oh, you’ll see Liverpool,’ she promised. ‘Maybe not with me, but you’ll go down the Mersey and know the wonder that I knew as a young woman. Curiosity will get the better of you and one day, you will go back, I’m sure of it.’

Mary asked her outright. ‘And if I really wanted you to come with me, would you?’

Lucy shook her head. ‘No.’

‘Why not?’ In spite of her mother’s emphatic answer, Mary felt she might yet uncover the truth; until her hopes were dashed with Lucy’s firm reply.

‘Because I’m too old now. Travelling tires me, as you well know.’ She laughed as she told Ben, ‘We went to London on the train. Dear me! What a trial. All that climbing in and out, up and down. You wouldn’t believe the traffic in the streets there, and folks rushing about as though it was the end of the world … It was all too much for me.’ Sighing, she finished, ‘No, my travelling days are well and truly at an end.’

With dinner over, they retired to the cosy sitting room. Here, although the hour was growing late, they chatted on; among other things they talked of the introduction in America of the first colour television. ‘The mind boggles!’ Lucy declared. ‘Colour television, indeed! Whatever next?’ She herself thought the wireless was sufficient – why would you need one of those big, ugly television sets?

Mostly they talked about the grave illness of King George. ‘He has been a good King,’ Ben said. ‘He’ll be sadly missed.’

Mary had her say and it was this. ‘You’re right. He will be missed, but his daughter Elizabeth will make a wonderful Queen.’ And without hesitation, the other two readily agreed.

‘Right!’ After tapping on the door, Elsie showed her face. ‘I’ll be off now. I’ve washed the dinner things and cleared them away. I’ll see you in the morning.’

‘Thank you, Elsie.’ Lucy was fond of that dear woman. ‘Off you go and put your feet up.’

Elsie chuckled. ‘Hmh! Chance would be a fine thing.’

Mary excused herself and saw Elsie out. When she returned to the sitting room, she saw how tired her mother seemed. ‘I think it’s time you went to bed,’ she said affectionately.

‘Nonsense!’ Lucy was bone-tired, though she would never admit it. ‘I’m getting to know our new friend,’ she said. ‘The more I learn about him, the more I like him.’

Ben laughed. ‘I’m flattered,’ he told her, ‘but I have to agree with your daughter, and then there’s that business of you falling and hurting yourself in the churchyard. It’s been a long, heavy day and no one would blame you if you wanted to rest now.’

He had noticed how every now and then she would close her eyes and relax into the chair, and occasionally she would fitfully rub her hands together, as though fighting some inner demon.

‘I see!’ Looking from one to the other, Lucy smiled wickedly. ‘Trying to get rid of the old biddy so the two of you can be alone – is that it?’ Mary smiled, but in fact, she had been concerned about her mother these past months. She seemed to have grown frail, and less mobile, though she would not hear of seeing a specialist.

Changing the subject completely, Lucy told Mary, ‘I think I’m ready for a nice cup of tea. What about you, Ben?’

‘Sounds good to me, thank you,’ he said, swallowing a yawn. It was high time he was in bed, too. The animals would be waiting to be fed at dawn.

‘Go on, then! Get the kettle on, Mary, before we all die of thirst, and don’t bring the teapot, there’s a good girl … too much fuss and ceremony. Just pour three cups, that’ll do.’

Frustrated at her mother’s insistence on referring to her as ‘child’ or ‘girl’, Mary groaned. ‘All right, Mother, I’m on my way.’ Turning to Ben she confirmed, ‘One sugar and a little milk, isn’t it?’ She had remembered when Elsie brought him tea earlier.

‘That’s it, yes. Thank you.’ He was surprised and pleased that she’d remembered.

‘There you are!’ Lucy chipped in. ‘Already she knows how you like your tea. That’s the sign of a good wife, wouldn’t you say, Ben?’

‘I’d say your daughter has a good memory,’ he answered, and that was as far as he would go.

No sooner had Mary departed for the kitchen than Lucy was quizzing him again. ‘You do like her, don’t you?’

He had got used to her directness and thought it refreshing, but now and then she would ask a question that took him off guard. ‘I do like her, yes.’ What else could he say, when he had been drawn to Mary as to no other woman since his divorce.