Free Trinidad Street by Patricia Burns Page A

catch up with the others.
    Away to the west, lightning flickered, followed by the first warning rumble of the coming storm.
    The women were sitting out on the doorsteps. The little houses were too stuffy to stay indoors, and tempers frayed if large families were on top of each other all the time. The men went up to the pub, to drink or meet for some club; the Rabbit Club, the Pigeon Society – any excuse would do. Sometimes the women went too, but more often they stayed on the doorsteps, mending, keeping an eye on the children, gossiping. Ellen heard them as she squatted on the kerb with Florrie Turner, playing fivestones or arranging the paper dolls they cut out and made into families.
    ‘You seen how that Maisie Johnson dresses that baby o’ hers? It’ll catch its death o’ cold. Hardly a stitch on it, poor little mite.’
    ‘Poor little mite, my eye! Great bonny boy he is, doing lovely. Go down with heatstroke, he would, if she dressed him up like you said.’
    ‘His mum’d do a bit more lovely if her old man was home more often.’
    ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
    ‘Go on, don’t come that one with me. Never home, he ain’t.’
    ‘No more ain’t your old man, come to that.’
    ‘At least I know where mine is.’
    ‘If you’re saying what I think you are, it’s a flaming lie. Will Johnson’s gone over the Harp of Erin with the rest of the boys.’
    ‘Yes, and to see who, might I ask? That flighty little Irish madam, that’s who. And when he isn’t listening to her sing he’s out with her down the East Ferry Road.’
    ‘That’s another flaming lie an’ all. Clodagh O’Donaghue wouldn’tlet no girl o’ hers down the East Ferry Road with no one, and ’specially not with a bloke what’s married. Only fast girls go down there. Just ’cos she jilted your Jimmy, you got your knife into her.’
    ‘Huh. She did no such thing. He didn’t want a girl like her. And I tell you another thing, too. It don’t surprise me one little bit, the way that Will’s behaving. Always was on the wild side. I was never happy when he was walking out with my Dot. If it hadn’t been that Siobhan it’d be someone else. He only married Maisie because she was in the family way. You can say what you like, but I know what I know.’
    Ellen’s ears burned. She bent over the game, avoiding Florrie’s eyes, pretending she had not heard. Her long curtain of brown hair hid her face. But as she tried to toss the pebble and pick up the next one, her hand shook and she dropped both.
    ‘My go,’ Florrie said.
    Ellen’s attention wandered. She looked up the street to the Billinghams’ house. There was nobody outside their door. Alma was out somewhere with her latest man, while Will, Gerry and Charlie, if her overhearings were to be believed, were over in Poplar at the Harp of Erin. Maisie was inside.
    ‘Coming to see Tommy, Aunty Florrie?’
    Florrie said nothing. Her thin hand was steady six inches above the pavement, two pebbles balanced on the back. Nimbly she tossed them up, grabbed a third from the ground and caught all three.
    ‘I won. Yeah, all right, Aunty Ellen.’
    The novelty of the new relationship had not yet worn off. They adored Maisie’s baby, vying to be allowed to hold him, play with him or take him for walks in the rickety old pram passed down through the Johnson family since Will was a baby. He was a happy little soul, now that he had got over the collicky stage, always ready with a smile for his serious young aunts.
    ‘Maisie?’ Florrie stopped outside the door of number forty and rapped on it with her knuckles. ‘Maisie? Can we come in?’
    There was no answer. The girls looked at each other. Two doors along, a canary in a cage on the bottom windowsill was singing its heart out. Down the other end of the street there was a yell of ‘Out!’ from the boys playing rounders.
    ‘She must be in,’ Ellen said. She was conscious of eyes upon her back watching to see what happened.
    ‘Come on,’