Josephine Cox 3-Book Collection 2: The Loner, Born Bad, Three Letters

Beth smiled at him. ‘All right, that’s what we’ll do then, eh? The three of us … talking and drinking, and helping each other. Yes! That’s what we’ll do.’ Greatly relieved, she could see he was coming back to her, but he was still in shock, and in her brightest voice she teased, ‘D’you know what, Joseph? I don’t know about you, but if you’ve got any old brandy hidden away, I wouldn’t mind just the teeniest drop in my cup of tea.’

She gave a deliberate sigh. ‘Oh, but I don’t suppose you’ve got any such thing, eh? So we’ll just have to go without, won’t we?’ Beth knew full well that Joseph always kept a bottle of brandy in the cupboard. ‘It would have been nice, though, don’t you think? A drop of the good stuff to warm our cockles?’

Slowly but surely, a glimmer of understanding crept over Joseph’s sorry features. ‘You artful devil, Beth Makepeace,’ he said in a croaky voice. ‘You know exactly where it is.’

He rallied round. ‘You can fetch it, if you like.’

The brandy did the trick. By the time Joseph had drunk three cups of tea with the ‘teeniest’ drop in it to give it a kick, he was beginning to talk freely, though the sadness was all too evident. ‘I’ve got you to thank for looking after her,’ he told Tom. ‘God only knows what might have happened if you hadn’t heard Davie calling from the woods. Oh, and where is the lad?’ He grabbed hold of Beth’s hand. ‘Where’s my Davie? Did you know, I threw him out … lost my temper. I couldn’t see owt but what she’d done, and he was willing to go with her and leave me on my own.’

His voice trembled. ‘I turned against him – lost my head. He’ll never forgive me, will he, eh? Surely he knew I’d change my mind the minute he was out the door, and I did! I went after him, but he were gone. They were both gone, and it was too late. Too late.’ His voice broke, and for a moment he was quiet, then when he was composed, he looked at Tom. ‘Why doesn’t he come home, Tom? He needs me … we need each other. Where in God’s name is he? What’s going to become of him?’

‘I don’t know,’ Tom answered truthfully. ‘Happen he’ll think things over, and when he’s come to terms with what happened out there in the woods, he’ll turn his mind to you, and he’ll know you didn’t mean it when you spoke harshly to him.’

Unconvinced, Joseph’s next question was directed at Judy. ‘I reckon you know him better than any of us, lass. Will he come home, d’you think? When he’s cried himself out, will he make his way back to his old grandad? What d’you reckon, pet?’

The girl said cautiously, ‘Maybe.’ Davie loved his grandad, she knew that for sure. But what she didn’t know was how deeply he had been affected by what had happened to his mammy. And for his grandad to turn against him was unthinkable. Davie would be taking it hard, she knew that well enough, but she revealed nothing of her thoughts. What would be the point? She’d only upset the old chap further.

‘It’s a lot for the lad to deal with.’ Joseph was thinking aloud now. ‘First his mammy comes home drunker than I’ve ever seen her, then there’s this terrible fight and his daddy walks out, and as for me …’ He took another swig of his tea. ‘I threw him and his mammy out onto the streets. And that was after I had damn near pushed her down the stairs. She must have hurt herself badly but she didn’t say owt, you see? Oh, my Rita. My stubborn little girl!’ He sobbed anew. ‘What kind of monster am I?’ He took another swig. ‘The lad saw his mammy die out there in the woods. God Almighty! I wouldn’t blame him if he never wanted to set eyes on me again.’

For a split second there was an uncomfortable silence, before Judy flung her arms round the old man’s neck, saying passionately, ‘He loves you! Davie would never think bad of you – never!’

Startled by her sudden show of affection, the old man looked up to see her crying. ‘Oh, lass,’ he said huskily. ‘It’s no wonder our Davie took you for a friend. You’re a caring, kind young thing, and if you say he’ll forgive me, then I’ll take your word for it.’ If only he could turn back time. If only … ‘I’m hoping our Davie won’t forsake me, any more than I could forsake him,’ he wept, ‘and I hope you’re right, bonnie lass, when you say he’ll come home. But I was harsh on him … on both of ’em. I turned my back on the lad when he needed me most. Happen he’ll never forget that. Happen he’ll never forgive me for it neither.’

Taking another swig of his tea, and for the first time, Joseph told them about his late wife, Marie. ‘My wife was a real beauty, just like Rita,’ he said fondly. ‘Unfortunately, she started the boozing soon after having Rita. An’ then our second child – baby Matty, we called him – died in his sleep one night, and there was no consolin’ her. Poor little Matty – an’ now Rita, too. Both me childer dead an’ gone.’ He gave a long, shuddering sigh. ‘At first I thought I could help my Marie to be rid of the booze and the men, and live a decent life with me and with our beautiful daughter Rita. But for all my efforts, it didn’t happen. Lord knows how hard I tried to change her. Many a man would have walked out on her, but I couldn’t do it. I loved her, y’see, and when she was sober she had a mischievous and lovable nature, just like Rita.’

As the Makepeace family listened respectfully, Joseph paused. The bad memories had, by now, brought a scowl to his face. ‘Oh, but when she’d been at the booze, by God, Marie was the devil incarnate.’

He explained how Rita seemed, in time, to have naturally followed in her mother’s footsteps. ‘I can’t blame the lass for what she became,’ he said regretfully. ‘She grew up adoring her mammy, living in her shadow, seeing her kind and loving one minute, and in the next how violent and cruel she was.’

He took a moment to remember. ‘I should have left her then,’ he said gruffly, ‘but I loved her too much. I kept on hoping she’d come to her senses for the child’s sake, but she never did. And when the TB took her off when she was still in her prime, it seemed like my Rita took on her mother’s character … up and happy one minute, then down and shameless the next.’

He spoke of his son-in-law. ‘She were just a kid when she met Don, and oh, I was that pleased for her. I thought, here’s a good man, hardworking and decent. They will be happy together, not like Marie and me. Aye, he loved her as much as any man can love a woman, but when she went wrong, he couldn’t change her, any more than I could change her mammy.’

He hunched his shoulders. ‘I don’t blame him for walking out, and nor should anyone else. If I’d walked out, all them years back, I might have saved Rita from copying her mammy’s ways. In truth, Rita became worse than my Marie ever was. She went with men openly. She even did her dirty work with blokes who worked alongside Don at the factory.’ Growing emotional, he took a moment to compose himself. ‘There were snide remarks and cruel taunts, and my son-in-law would retaliate, like any other normal man would. But then there’d be fights, and he’d lose his job again and there would be no money coming in.

‘They say you shouldn’t speak ill of the …’ Unable to say the word, he closed his eyes, then quickly opened them again, and now his voice was stronger. ‘It pains me to say it, especially now she’s gone … but my daughter was a slut of the worst kind. There was such badness in her – almost as though her mammy had passed it on with a vengeance. And good man that he was, Don stuck with her, till his patience was tried too far. I knew it had to happen, and somehow I reckon I also knew that one day it would end in tragedy. She was like a runaway train, my Rita, heading straight towards a cliff-edge.’

‘Have you any idea where Don was headed?’ Tom wondered if the man had been informed of the situation – his wife dead, and his son missing.

‘No idea at all.’ Joseph had been thinking along the same lines. ‘When he left here, it was on the spur of the minute. He was in such a state, I don’t reckon he knew where he was headed himself. Although, he did give a slip of paper to young Davie, with someone’s name on it. The boy must have gone off with it.’

‘Well, Don will have to be told, won’t he?’ Tom queried. ‘He’ll need to know what’s happened. His wife is beyond his help now, but the boy needs his father.’

‘Yes, you’re right.’ Sad at heart and not knowing which way to turn, Joseph revealed, ‘I told the police the whole story, from beginning to end, and they promised to do what they could to find him.’

‘But they’re not really duty bound to do so, are they?’ Beth intervened.

Joseph agreed. ‘Happen they’ve done their duty in telling me about the accident, and mebbe it’s up to me to do the rest.’

‘But what about Davie?’ Judy persisted. ‘The police will have to find him, won’t they?’

‘I hope so, lass. After all, he’s only just coming up to fourteen. I told them how much he thought of his mammy and how badly this whole business would have affected him. Let’s hope they find him, eh? Aye, let’s hope they do. As for him going after his dad, he doesn’t have a penny piece on him, and the mood our Don was in when he left, it wouldn’t surprise me if he hasn’t already left the country – jumped on a ship at the docks mebbe, and gone to sea. They can always use a good carpenter on board ship.’

Tom was interested. ‘Was that what he hankered after?’ he asked. ‘Making for foreign parts?’

‘Yes. Right from when he went abroad with the Army he had an appetite to see the world. Said as how he’d like to join that scheme to emigrate to Australia … with all those wide open spaces where a man could breathe. Then again, he might have gone back to Ireland. I understand he has an old aunt there, although, as I recall, he hasn’t seen her in years.’

He yawned, and said sleepily, ‘Aye, happen that’s where he’ll be headed … Australia, or Ireland. One or the other, I’ll be bound.’

All talked out and exhausted from grief and the effects of the brandy, he began to nod off, and when he closed his eyes, Judy whispered to her mammy, ‘Can we go and look for Davie now?’

Carefully, without waking him, Tom helped the old man onto the sofa, where he promptly fell into a deep sleep. Judy ran to get a blanket and Beth laid it gently over him, and when they were certain he would be safe, they left the place, securing the door behind them.

Beth tapped at the house next door to let them know that Joseph was sleeping soundly. ‘Will you keep an ear out for any disturbance, Patsy?’ Beth asked the young woman who opened the door. She knew her vaguely from her visits here to collect Judy or pick up Davie.

‘I’ll be glad to.’ With her lank hair tied back with a grubby ribbon, the woman appeared to have her hands full with a multitude of children clamouring round her ankles. ‘It’s no bother at all,’ she assured them.

Thanking her, Beth explained, ‘He should be fine now, but I thought it best to let you know he’s on his own.’

Patsy agreed to look in on him within the hour. ‘Don gave me a spare key last winter, when the old man went down with pneumonia. There were times when Rita wasn’t … well, you know what I mean.’ A look of repulsion flickered across her features. ‘The boy needed looking after when his dad was at work. I just popped in from time to time to make sure everything was all right. Don’t worry, I’ll keep an eye on old Joseph,’ she promised.

Beth was relieved. ‘Thank you so much.’

As she turned to walk away, she saw what she took to be the woman’s son, standing further back in the passageway. Tall and well-built, with dark eyes and longish dark hair, he was a good-looking boy. ‘This is my son, Lenny.’ To his embarrassment, the woman pushed him forwards. ‘He’s a handy sort.’

Thinking that was an odd thing to say, Beth smiled and nodded, and he nodded back, and as she went away Beth heard his mother reprimanding him for not keeping the children out of her road while she dealt with the visitor at the door. However, satisfied that Patsy and her husband Ron would take care of Davie’s grandfather, Beth returned to the car. ‘Apparently Don gave them a key when Joseph was ill last winter,’ she said, getting in beside Tom.

‘Very wise too,’ Tom declared, starting the engine. ‘What with Rita boozed out of her mind half the time and trawling the streets for men the other half, I expect he was concerned that someone should keep an ear out for the boy and his grandad.’

Feeling guilty, he addressed himself to Judy. ‘We’ll be on our way now, lass.’ Waiting for Beth to settle herself in the seat, he then pulled away from the kerb. ‘I know we could have gone back to search for Davie first, but I was worried about Joseph. I knew it would come as a shock when the police arrived to see him, and I just needed to make sure he was all right. And there was always the chance that Davie might be there.’

Judy understood. ‘It’s what Davie would have wanted,’ she said. ‘He must be worried about his grandad too.’

‘Well, at least old Joe is resting now.’ Tom gave his wife a sideways wink. ‘After the brandy your mammy plied down him, I dare say he’ll sleep till the cows come home. Matter of fact, if the Almighty Himself came knocking at the door, I don’t reckon Joseph would hear a thing.’

Some short time later they arrived at the spot where Davie had run out onto the lane. ‘This is it.’ Pulling over to the verge, Tom got out of the car to collect a torch from the boot.

‘You’ll need to stay close,’ he warned, ‘but like I say, I don’t think we’ll find him. I went round and round these woods, calling out his name and looking into every nook and cranny, to no avail. So don’t go expecting miracles.’

Judy was the first out of the car and away. ‘Come back here, child!’ Startled, Beth brought her to heel. ‘I know you’re keen to find him – we all are – but I don’t want you wandering off into them woods by yourself. You’re to stay close at all times.’ Though anxious for Davie, the fear for her own flesh and blood was instinctively stronger.

They spent almost two hours searching. Tom led them to the spot where he’d found Rita, and from there they covered a wider circle, calling out Davie’s name and leaving no stone unturned. But at the end of it, they were disappointed.

On the way back to the lane, Tom had his arm round his daughter’s shoulders. ‘You’re not to be too disheartened, lass,’ he said kindly. ‘He’ll turn up when he’s ready.’ Though he gave Beth a look that said different, because after what young Davie had been through, he doubted whether the boy would ever again be seen round these parts.

Judy was quiet all the way home. From when they left the spot where Tom had first seen Davie, her troubled gaze was strained to catch a glimpse of him, through the lamplit streets, along the darkened lanes, down by the river and alongside the canal, and now as they drew ever closer to home, her heart sank like a lead weight inside her. The thought of never seeing Davie again was unbearable.

Tom drew up at the battered five-bar gate with its handpainted sign reading Three Mills Farm. He got out, opened up, drove the old Morris Minor through, then got out and closed the gate again. He patted the bonnet approvingly, then went to change into his wellies and old coat to check on the animals.