The Leaving Of Liverpool (3 page)

Olive smirked. ‘I’m going to change me name to Rosalind Raines. It sounds better than Olive. Eh, what about your sister? I take it she’s getting up today?’

‘I’ll leave her to wake up of her own accord. We had no sleep the night before last and she was sick on the ferry from Ireland. She’s probably worn out.’

‘And you’re not, I suppose! Well, I’ll love you and leave you, Mollie. It’s so stuffy in here, I can hardly breathe. Tata.’ She left with a cheerful wave, slamming the cabin door and waking Annemarie, who groaned, sat up, and began to retch so hard that Mollie was worried she’d crack a rib. She grabbed a towel and held it over her sister’s face, but it was so long since either of them had eaten that there was no food left to bring up.

‘There, there, darlin’,’ she said softly, and began to wonder if going to New York was turning out to be a great big mistake. In her present state, Annemarie wasn’t up to the long voyage cross the Atlantic. They might be better off in Liverpool until she felt better, but the Doctor might suspect they’d come this far when he could find no trace of them in Ireland. He knew people in the city, other doctors, with whom he corresponded.

She bit her lip. Perhaps the best thing was to stay on the boat. Annemarie might improve once she got used to it and the sooner they got to New York - and dear Aunt Maggie - the better.

Her sister was asleep again, her head falling forward until it almost touched her knees. Mollie gently laid her down. It was hard to imagine this was the same, vivacious girl with whom she’d shared her life since she was born. Even Mammy’s death hadn’t dampened Annemarie’s high spirits for long. She’d used to pretend their mother was still there; had brought her home wild flowers from the fields to put on the kitchen window-sill; had drawn pictures, sung for her, convinced that, wherever she was, Mammy could see and hear. Her sister had lit up the Doctor’s house with her bright eyes and infectious laughter. But now she lay on the bed like a corpse.

All of a sudden, Mollie felt quite overwhelmed by their situation. She was sixteen, used to coping, particularly since Mammy died, but now everything was getting beyond her. The last few weeks, since the ‘thing’ had happened, had been nightmarish. But she wouldn’t cry. She rubbed her cheeks with her knuckles, willing away the tears that threatened to fall.

‘I’ll have some breakfast, a hot drink,’ she said aloud. ‘It’ll do me the world of good.’ She felt guilty for leaving her sister on her own, but if she didn’t have something to eat soon, she’d become ill herself and that would never do.

 

It was cold on deck, but the wind had died down, the sun was out, and it was a tonic to breathe in the fresh, salty air. She swallowed great gulps of it as she took in the still busy quayside and the majestic buildings opposite. There was a clock on one: half past nine, she noted, later than she’d thought. Liverpool appeared to be a splendid city. If it hadn’t been for Annemarie, she wouldn’t have minded having a look around. The ship didn’t sail until some time this afternoon.

There were quite a few people out for a stroll around the deck, most of the women smartly, if not richly dressed, their skirts shockingly short, ending just below their knees. It was a style that hadn’t yet reached Duneathly where ankle-length skirts were still in vogue.

She made her way to the third-class dining room. It was much grander than she’d expected: wood-panelled with glass-shaded wall lights and a striped carpet on the floor. A steward took her name and cabin number and led her to a round table big enough for eight. The other six must have already eaten, as only two places were set.

‘I have a Miss Annemarie Kenny on my list,’ the steward remarked. ‘If she doesn’t come soon, we’ll stop serving.’

‘My sister isn’t well: she won’t be having breakfast this morning.’

‘I hope she’s better soon,’ the man said sympathetically. He would have been remarkably handsome had he not had such a fearful squint. ‘If it’s the seasickness, you can get something for it from the ship’s doctor.’

‘Thank you, I’ll remember that.’

A few minutes later, she was tucking into bacon, eggs, and sausages, accompanied by an entire pot of tea to herself as well as a basket of crusty rolls, jam, and butter. The jam was raspberry, her favourite.

The world seemed a much-improved place after she’d finished eating and her stomach was full - she’d almost drowned herself in tea. She returned to the cabin. Annemarie was the only one there, still asleep, breathing evenly, looking quite peaceful. Mollie decided to go back on deck for a while. It smelled nicer and she’d like to have a last look at Liverpool: she’d almost certainly never see the place again.

She was leaning on the rail, admiring the clear blue sky and a sun that was more cream than yellow, when a girl of about her own age leaned beside her. Her fair hair was a mass of ringlets and she wore a bright-red coat with a fur-lined hood. Mollie’s sensible navy-blue one looked desperately old-fashioned beside it.

It turned out the girl was American. Her name was Rowena and she’d boarded the
Queen Maia
in Hamburg where dozens - it might have been hundreds - of immigrants had been herded into the steerage compartment below where it was absolutely horrid. The stench was indescribable, she’d heard, and it was apparently so crowded that there was hardly room to move.

‘You should have seen them, poor things,’ Rowena said in a voice thick with emotion. ‘Their clothes were little more than rags and they looked so wretched. A lot of the women had babies in their arms, and the older children and the men carried all their worldly possessions in bundles on their backs. It was so sad I wanted to cry.’

‘
They
probably don’t feet sad and wretched,’ Mollie said. ‘They’re setting off for a new life in a new world. They might be a bit scared, that’s all.’

Rowena conceded this could well be the case. ‘My grandparents were immigrants,’ she said proudly. ‘That’s why I know so much about it. They came to America forty years ago without a cent: Papa was only two. But they started their own bakery and did really well for themselves. Papa has just taken us, my brother and me, to Hamburg, to see the place where he was born and look up some of his cousins.’

It was all extremely interesting but, after a while, Mollie felt bound to excuse herself. The big clock across the way showed half past eleven: Annemarie had been on her own for ages. ‘My sister’s sick, I’d better go and see if she’s all right.’

‘If she’s OK,’ Rowena said eagerly, ‘perhaps we could all have a game of cards in the lounge this afternoon? That’d be neat, wouldn’t it?’

Mollie agreed that it would indeed be ‘neat’, and they exchanged cabin numbers in case they missed each other at lunchtime.

 

She knew something was badly wrong when she reached the cabin and heard the screams coming from inside. She almost fell through the door and found an hysterical Annemarie sitting up in the bunk yelling, ‘Mollie, Mollie, Mollie,’ over and over again. A small, tubby woman with iron-grey hair was holding her by the arms, saying soothingly, ‘All right, little girl, Mollie come soon.’

‘I’m here, darlin’,’ Mollie cried. ‘I’m here.’ She tried to reach her sister, but before she could get near, the woman slapped Annemarie’s petrified face. Annemarie stopped screaming and began to cry instead.

‘You shouldn’t have done that!’ Mollie gasped, appalled.

‘It all right, I am nurse. Your sister having nervous fit, now she better. Now she just cry, much better to just cry.’ The woman, who looked in her sixties, proceeded to gently stroke the back of the sobbing girl. ‘What wrong, child?’ She turned to Mollie and asked in her guttural voice, ‘What wrong with your sister?’

Mollie sank, trembling, on to one of the lower bunks. On reflection, a sharp slap was the best way to treat a person with hysterics. This must be Gertrude Strauss; she was being very kind. Last night, she’d got a completely different impression of the woman. ‘Annemarie had a very bad shock a few weeks ago and she hasn’t recovered since. Normally, she’s full of the joys of spring.’ At this, Miss Strauss looked bemused. ‘What I meant,’ Mollie explained, ‘is that normally she’s an exceptionally happy person, if rather highly strung.’ She’d never leave her sister alone again. Until Annemarie was back on her feet, she’d eat all her meals in the cabin.

‘Her heart beat very fast, like engine. It not . . . what word I want?’ Miss Strauss’s round face screwed up in a frown. ‘
Regular
! Her heart not beat regular.’

‘Oh, my God!’ Mollie could feel the colour drain from her face. ‘Last night, I forgot her digitalis, she has five drops on her tongue.’ Until recently, Annemarie had administered the drops herself and Mollie hadn’t got into the habit of remembering.

‘You better get it now. Is important.’

‘It’s in the washbag.’ Mollie leapt to her feet, her head meeting the frame of the bunk above with such force that, for a few seconds, the world went black.

‘
Mein Gott
!’ gasped Miss Strauss.

‘I’m all right.’ She reeled across the cabin to the locker where she’d put the things they’d need on the voyage. The washbag was right in front: she’d used it only that morning. She rooted through the toothbrushes, the tooth powder, soap and face flannels, but couldn’t find the little brown bottles with rubber droppers that she distinctly remembered putting there before they’d left the doctor’s house.

But they
must
be there. Desperate now, she emptied everything on to the bed, but there was no sign. Perhaps she’d put them somewhere else. But where? She wouldn’t have left them loose in the suitcase or her handbag where the tops might become loose. Just in case, she searched both: no digitalis. Knowing it was hopeless, Mollie reached for the fat, brown envelope in which she kept the money, their passports and other papers. The bottles weren’t there either.

She sat back on her heels, closed her eyes, and relived the last hour spent in the Doctor’s house, packing their clothes, trying not to make a noise, Annemarie lying fully dressed on Mollie’s bed, watching with her big, violet eyes. Mollie had already taken an extra bottle of digitalis from the medicine cabinet in the surgery to add to the one that was almost full. She’d put both bottles on the bedside cabinet, crept into the bathroom to collect the other items for the washbag, returned to the bedroom, picked up the digitalis . . .

No, she hadn’t
. When she’d looked, Annemarie had fallen asleep and she’d had to wake her, tell her they were leaving any minute, that they had a long walk ahead of them. Then she’d put the washbag in the suitcase and snapped it shut . . . leaving the digitalis on the bedside cabinet.

‘I’ll have to buy some,’ she muttered. She searched through the mess on the floor for a ticket to see when the boat sailed. ‘Thirteen hundred hours.’ Three o’clock. It was a strange way to put it. ‘I’ve plenty of time.’

‘Where you go?’ Miss Strauss asked.

‘To find a chemist’s and buy some digitalis.’ She shoved her purse into her pocket. ‘Do you mind looking after Annemarie while I’m gone? I won’t be long.’

‘Of course I look after your sister, but—’

Mollie didn’t wait for the woman to finish. She was already outside, racing along the corridor, and Miss Strauss’s final words - ‘Ship doctor will have digitalis’ - were addressed to the empty air.

 

She’d forgotten her hat, and the spot where she’d banged her head felt as if someone were banging it with a hammer. There wasn’t a shop of any description in the area outside the dock, let alone a chemist’s, just the majestic buildings she’d seen from the boat and streams of traffic, including dozens of tramcars whizzing by, sparks exploding from the lines overhead. It was a sight that, normally, would have made Mollie stop and stare, entranced, had she not had more important things on her mind. She grabbed the arm of the first man she saw and asked if he knew the whereabouts of the nearest chemist.

‘Let’s see now.’ He chewed his lips with maddening slowness. ‘The nearest chemist’s. Well, you won’t find one around here, luv. You’ll have to go into town to find a chemist’s. If you cross the road and go up Chapel Street . . . no, no, Water Street, it’s more direct, and turn right at Crosshall Street, you’re bound to find one there. A tram would take you quicker. They start from over there, but I’m afraid I don’t know what number.’

‘Is it far to walk?’

‘Not too far for a healthy young lady like you,’ he said with a wink and a smile.

‘Then I’ll walk.’ That way she was in control of the situation. Her legs wouldn’t let her down.

Except today they did. She was half walking, half running along Water Street, when her head began to swim, the pavement began to rock, and the tall buildings looked about to topple down on her. Her legs positively refused to move in the right direction. This must be what it was like to be drunk, unable to put one foot in front of the other. People were giving her some very odd looks: a woman stopped and asked if she was all right. ‘I’m fine,’ Mollie insisted, although her breath was coming in little hoarse gasps. She held on to a wall and gritted her teeth so hard that her jaw hurt: the Doctor had said Annemarie’s heart condition was nothing to worry about, ‘
As long as she uses the drops every night before she goes to bed
.’ She
had
to get the digitalis for her sister or die in the attempt.

Her breathing was easier now, so she resumed her search, hanging on to railings, supporting herself along walls, more people stopped to ask if she was all right, until she arrived at Crosshall Street and saw a chemist’s directly across the road. Without thinking, she stepped off the pavement and was nearly mown down by a van. It stopped, just in time, with a screech of brakes. ‘D’you want to get yerself killed, you stupid bitch,’ the driver yelled.

Mollie hardly heard. A bell sounded loudly when she entered the shop, hurting her ears. ‘Digitalis,’ she gasped. ‘Two bottles, please.’