The River Folk Read Online Free PDF

her.’
    Bert knew there was no sense in arguing, so he reached up to kiss his wife’s cheek and then pattered back up the stairs to his cold bed. He hated sleeping without his Bess beside him. Her presence was warm and comforting. His sons, too, yawning now that the excitement of the night was over, went back to their beds.
    The child was soon drifting off and Bessie watched over her, tenderly stroking her hair and carefully removing her thumb from her mouth. When Mary Ann was asleep, Bessie tiptoed back into the warm kitchen to sit in her armchair by the glowing coals. She left the door between the two rooms open so that she could hear the child if she stirred. Bessie leant her head back and closed her eyes. She sighed heavily. She knew Bert didn’t agree with her interfering, but she could not stand by and see a child at risk. Nor that poor woman if it came to that, although where she was concerned Bessie felt a trace of irritation. Why did Elsie put up with such treatment? Why didn’t she up and leave him and take her child with her?
    Bessie’s innate honesty answered her. You’ve never been in that situation, Bessie Ruddick, nor are you ever likely to be, so don’t judge others till you know how you’d be yourself. ‘I know one thing, though,’ she murmured aloud. ‘I wouldn’t put up with it.’
    The following morning, when the menfolk had gone to work, including Sid Clark, Bessie wrapped the child in a shawl and took her next door.
    ‘You there, Mrs Clark?’ When no answer came, Bessie opened the door and walked into the house.
    Smashed crockery littered the floor of the scullery. As Mary Ann still had no footwear, Bessie lifted her over the sharp slivers of pottery and moved towards the living room. There she glanced around her and then shook her head in disbelief. The contrast between this house and her own home was stark.
    Bessie kept her house lovingly polished and although it lacked natural lighting, like all the houses in the yards, which were hemmed in by other buildings, Bessie’s home was never gloomy. In some houses, the front door led straight into the main room of the house. In the early days of their marriage, however, Bert had built Bessie a scullery, so that entry into the Ruddicks’ house was through this and then into the kitchen. Here, her family had their meals at the table in the centre of the room and sat around the warm fire in comfortable easy chairs in the evening. Beyond the kitchen was Bessie’s front parlour, used only at Christmas and on special occasions. In this room were Bessie’s family heirlooms. A glass-fronted china cabinet holding her treasures. A grandfather clock in a mahogany case with a brass face and a pendulum that swung with a comfortingly dependable rhythm. On the sideboard was Bessie’s most prized possession; a model of a keel with its one large, square sail and smaller topsail, patiently made by Bessie’s own father.
    But in this house, where Bessie was standing, looking about her with growing unease, there were no such comforts, no family possessions of any kind. The grate in the range was cold and the few bits of furniture scattered about the room looked as if they had come straight from the scrap heap.
    ‘Mebbe they have,’ Bessie murmured, shrewdly.
    She set the child gently on the one sagging armchair and straightened up. Then she glanced at the door she guessed led to the stairs. Was the woman still in bed? Bessie bit her lip, wondering if she should venture upstairs. She glanced down at the child, but Mary Ann had curled up and fallen asleep again.
    Bessie opened the inner door and peered up the stairwell. ‘You there, missis?’ Silence. Bessie frowned. ‘Mrs Clark?’ Still no answer, but as she put her foot on the first step and took hold of the banister, she heard a movement above and glanced up to see Elsie Clark approaching the top of the stairs. Relief at seeing the woman alive and on her feet flooded through Bessie. ‘I’ve brought