Free Family of Women by Annie Murray

that it was hot and dusty, and there were kangaroos! And it was so far away. The thought was frightening. All she wanted now was safety and what was familiar.

Chapter Fifteen
    ‘I don’t know why you didn’t marry your mother!’
    Violet shrieked at Harry’s back as he left the house once again.
    There was no reply, but he slammed the door so hard that it sprang open again. Violet sighed sharply and banged it shut again.
    I’m turning into a proper fishwife , she thought. She didn’t like shouting like that. They seemed to be rowing so much of the time these days. And it was usually over the same thing. But he’s never here!
    ‘You might as well bloody live with her still! Why can’t one of the others go?’
    As soon as he knew about the baby, Harry seemed to shn
    Even when he was at home, Harry never understood how she felt, that she needed comfort and reassurance. Violet turned to Jo Snell and her family. Her friendship with Jo had come to be one of the most important things in her life. She could pour her heart out to Jo, and often did.
    ‘I expect he’ll come round when the baby’s born,’ Jo told her. ‘And if he doesn’t, more fool him. You can always come and see us.’
    It was marvellous to have a friend like that. But even Jo didn’t know how it felt to have a baby. The one person who seemed to understand, for the first time ever, was her mother. More and more often after work she found herself slipping along Summer Lane and into Bessie’s yard. Home. That’s how she thought of it still, and it felt reassuringly familiar, although she lived with Harry and that was supposed to be her new home.
    Suddenly though, Bessie was treating her with a new respect. Almost, though not quite, as an equal. Violet existed for her in a way she never had before and when she went round there her mother was welcoming in her aggressive way. Yesterday when she’d gone there, feeling lonely, Bessie greeted her with, ‘Oh – so you’ve come running back again, have you? You’d better come in then. How’s the babby?’
    To Violet’s relief, no one else was in.
    ‘Rosy out with her pals, is she?’
    Bessie scowled, banging the kettle down on the fire. ‘When’s she ever in, little minx. She’s felt my hand a few times lately, I can tell you. There’s some factory Jack hanging round her already – at her age! I’ve told her she’ll come to a bad end. The lip she’s got on her! I said to her this morning, you’ll have mustard on your tongue if you carry on like that but it’s like talking to the wall . . .’
    Violet was surprised how little authority Bessie had over Rosina. The rest of them had always kowtowed and tiptoed round her. Rosy had always been different – now she was even more so. She was just fourteen and had started work at a button factory and according to Bessie spent as little time at home as she possibly could. Violet felt sorry for her though, left at home with Clarence and Marigold.
    Bessie brewed up the tea and set it on the table. As usual, the room was as clean as a pin, plates gleaming on the shelves, the rag rug shaken out and laid back by the range. Bessie was obsessed with cleaning.
    ‘Here – have one.’ On the table were boiled sweets in a little pale blue bowl. ‘Barley sugar – that’ll make you feel better.’
    Violet obeyed.
    ‘You should be drinking raspberry leaf tea . . .’ Bessie sat down with a grunt in the big chair by the range, smoothing her capacious apron over her lap. ‘Helps with the pains . . .’ She peigrding QShe peigroured from the old brown teapot and spooned plenty of sugar into her cup.
    Violet didn’t need to say a word. Bessie sat back, holding her cup up close to her chin, her dress riding up to show inches of coloured bloomers, shoes off to ease her corns. She reminisced about her own childbearing days.
    ‘Ooh now, you don’t know what’s coming to you, wench. I’ll never forget Charlie and Marigold – sick as a dog I was! Just be