The September Girls by Maureen Lee Read Free Book Online Page A

how terribly alone you felt. In his club, he had many friends, all male, who would crease up in embarrassment at the mere mention of such a thing as loneliness.
    He turned on his heel and went back to work. He wasn’t exactly neglecting the factory, but it no longer occupied his mind day and night. Nowadays, too much of his time was taken up with thinking about Brenna Caffrey.
     
    ‘I was wondering,’ Nancy said to Brenna a few days later when she came to Upper Clifton Street bearing two pork chops, half an apple pie and the usual supply of milk, ‘if you’d like to bring the lads around to my place on Sunday?’
    ‘But you always go to see your friends!’ Nancy belonged to the Women’s Social and Political Union formed by someone called Emmeline Pankhurst. They held meetings every Sunday afternoon. It was all to do with women having the vote - a vote for what, Brenna had no idea.
    ‘This week I’m not.’
    ‘Mr Allardyce might complain.’ Brenna had never met Mr Allardyce and imagined him to be about seven feet tall and desperately fierce.
    ‘Sunday’s me day off and Parliament Terrace is me home. I can invite whosoever I like: it’s got nothing to do with Mr A.’
    ‘Are you sure?’
    ‘Would I ask if I weren’t?’
    ‘No.’ Yet Brenna had the strongest feeling that Nancy was deliberately missing her meeting just so the Caffreys would have somewhere to take Fergus and Tyrone. It wasn’t always fine on Sundays when they went for walks, mainly around Princes Park, usually so pretty but downright miserable in the rain. Only once had they been taken to the room in Upper Clifton Street where their mammy and daddy and Cara lived, and the look of horror on their faces had upset Brenna to the core. Fergus had cried the whole time and said the room reminded him of hell.
    ‘I’ll make a nice tea,’ Nancy offered. ‘What time shall I expect you?’
    ‘Just after two o’clock: the lads have to be back by four.’
     
    A clock somewhere was striking two when the door of the convent opened and the Caffrey boys came out accompanied by Sister Kentigern, an elderly nun who worked in a draughty office just inside. ‘I shall expect them to be back at the usual time,’ she said curtly.
    With three regular meals a day, the lads had put on weight. They had never looked so well - or so desperately unhappy. Fergus made straight for his mammy’s arms and Tyrone for his dad’s.
    ‘Mind your little sister, me darlin’ boy,’ Brenna said when it seemed Fergus was intent on hugging them both to death.
    Fergus started to cry. ‘I wish I was Cara,’ he sobbed. ‘I wish me and Tyrone could live with you all the time like her, even if it is in hell. I wish we were back in Ireland. I hate Liverpool, Mammy, and I hate Uncle Paddy for not coming to meet us.’ The lads didn’t know their uncle was dead.
    ‘He couldn’t help it, Fergus. He’d have come if he could.’ She wondered if that were true. Would Paddy have turned up, despite having lost all their money in a game of cards?
    ‘There’s a treat for you today,’ Colm was saying. ‘We’re going to tea with Nancy Gates.’
    Tyrone’s dull eyes, usually so bright, lit up at the news. Fergus said he wasn’t hungry, yet looked pleased. ‘Will it be in the room with the yellow bird and the ginger cat?’ he asked.
    ‘Indeed it will,’ Brenna told him.
    The bird began to sing when they went into the warm sitting room, and the cat rubbed itself against everyone’s legs. The bird was a canary called Eric, Nancy said, and the cat’s name was Laurence. ‘They’re named after me two little brothers who died when they were only babies, poor little mites.’
    ‘Our Cara won’t die, will she?’ Fergus asked worriedly.
    ‘A big healthy girl like her? Not likely,’ Nancy assured him. ‘Now, I’ve only made ham sarnies with jelly and custard for afters as I expect you’ve not long had your dinner. It’s more a snack than a proper meal. Come on now, tuck in,