Farewell To The East End
Dedicated to Cynthia
for a lifetime of friendship
Farewell to the East End
JENNIFER WORTH
Table of Contents
Cover
Dedication
Title Page
Acknowledgements
‘YOUTH’S A STUFF WILL NOT ENDURE’
THREE MEN WENT INTO A RESTAURANT . . .
TRUST A SAILOR
CYNTHIA
LOST BABIES
SOOT
NANCY
MEGAN’MAVE
MEG THE GYPSY
MAVE THE MOTHER
MADONNA OF THE PAVEMENT
THE FIGHT
THE MASTER’S ARMS
TUBERCULOSIS
THE MASTER
THE MISTRESS
THE ANGELS
TOO MANY CHILDREN
THE ABORTIONIST
BACK-STREET ABORTIONS
STRANGER THAN FICTION
THE CAPTAIN’S DAUGHTER
ON THE SHELF
THE WEDDING
TAXI!
ADIEU
FAREWELL TO THE EAST END
GLOSSARY
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Author biography
Also by Jennifer Worth
Copyright
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
My thanks and gratitude to:
Terri Coates, the midwife who inspired me to write these books, Dr Michael Boyes, Douglas May, Jenny Whitefield, Joan Hands, Helen Whitehorn, Philip and Suzannah, Ena Robinson, Mary Riches, Janet Salter, Maureen Dring, Peggy Sayer, Mike Birch, Sally Neville, the Marie Stopes Society.
Special thanks to Patricia Schooling of Merton Books for first bringing my writing to an audience.
All names have been changed. ‘The Sisters of St Raymund Nonnatus’ is a pseudonym.
In 1855 Queen Victoria wrote to her daughter Vicky, the Crown Princess of Prussia, who was expecting a baby:
What you say about the pride of giving life to an immortal soul is very fine, but I own I cannot enter into all that. I think very much more of our being like a cow or a dog at such moments, when our poor nature becomes so very animal and unecstatic.
‘YOUTH’S A STUFF WILL NOT ENDURE’
Someone once said that youth is wasted on the young.1 Not a bit of it. Only the young have the impulsive energy to tackle the impossible and enjoy it; the courage to follow their instincts and brave the new; the stamina to work all day, all night and all the next day without tiring. For the young everything is possible. None of us, twenty years later, could do the things we did in our youth. Though the vision burns still bright, the energy has gone.
In the heady days of my early twenties I went to work in the East End of bomb-damaged London as a district midwife. I did it out of a yearning for adventure, not from a sense of vocation. I wanted to experience something different from my middle-class background, something tough and challenging that would stretch me. I wanted a new slant on life. I went to a place called Nonnatus House,2 which I thought was a small private hospital, but which turned out to be a convent run by the Sisters of St Raymund Nonnatus. When I discovered my mistake I nearly ran away without unpacking my bags. Nuns were not my style. I couldn’t be doing with that sort of thing, I thought. I wanted adventure, not religion. I did not know it at the time, but my soul was yearning for both.
The nuns generated adventure. They plunged headlong into anything, fearlessly: unlit streets and courtyards, dark, sinister stairways, the docks, brothels; they would tackle rogue landlords, abusive parents – nothing was outside their scope. Sparky, saintly Sister Julienne with her wisdom and humour inspired us all to dare the impossible. Calm Novice Ruth and clever Sister Bernadette inspired respect, even awe, with their vast knowledge and experience of midwifery. Gruff and grumpy Sister Evangelina shocked and amused us with her vulgarity. And naughty Sister Monica Joan! What can be said of this wilful old lady of fey and fascinating charm who was once prosecuted for shop-lifting (but found not guilty!)? ‘Just a small oversight,’ she said. ‘Best forgotten.’
We took our lead from the Sisters, and feared nothing, not even getting our bikes out in the middle of the night and cycling alone through some of the toughest areas of London, which even the police patrolled in pairs. Through unlit streets and alleyways, past bomb sites where the meths drinkers hung out, past the docks where all was silent at night but for the creaks and moans as the ships stirred in their moorings, past the great river, dark and silent, past the brothels of Cable Street and the sinister pimps who controlled the area. Past – no, not past – into a small house or flat that was warm, bright and expectant, awaiting the birth of a new baby.
My colleagues and I loved every minute of it. Cynthia, who had a voice like music, and a slow, sweet smile that could calm any situation, however fraught. Trixie, with her sharp mind and waspish tongue. Chummy, a misfit in her colonial family because she was too big, too awkward, to fit into society, and who totally lacked self-confidence until she started nursing and proved herself a hero.
Youth, wasted on the young? Certainly not for us. Let those who waste their youth regret the passing of the years. We had experience, risk, and adventure enough to fill a lifetime. And to remember in old age is sweet; remember the shaft of sunlight piercing the black tenements, or the gleaming funnels of a ship as it left the docks; remember the warmth and fun of the Cockney people, or the grim reality of too little sleep and yet another call out into the night; remember the bicycle puncture and a policeman fixing it, or jumping barges with Sister Evangelina when the road was closed; remember the London smog, yellow-grey and choking thick, when Conchita’s premature baby was born, or Christmas day, when a breech baby, undiagnosed, was delivered; remember the brothels of Cable Street, into which the child Mary was lured, and where old Mrs Jenkins lived, haunted by hallucinations of life in the workhouse.
I remember the days of my youth when everything was new and bright; when the mind was always questing, searching, absorbing; when the pain of love was so acute it could suffocate. And the days when joy was delirious.
THREE MEN WENT INTO A RESTAURANT . . .
Carters used to say that a working horse knew the way back to his stable and would pick up his feet and pull his cart with a lively step at the close of day, knowing that soft hay, food and water were at the end of the journey. That was how we midwives felt as we headed home after evening visits.
A cold but kindly west wind blew me all the way down Commercial Road and the East India Dock Road towards the welcome of Nonnatus House, the warmth of the big kitchen and – most important of all – food. I was young, healthy and hungry, and the day had been long. As I pedalled along, Mrs B’s home-made bread was foremost in my mind. She had a magic touch with bread, that woman, and I knew she had been baking that morning. Also in my mind was the puzzle Fred had presented us with at breakfast. I couldn’t work it out – three nines are twenty-seven, plus two makes twenty-nine – so where was the other shilling? It was nonsense, didn’t make sense, it must be somewhere. A shilling can’t vanish into thin air! I wondered what the girls had made of it. Had they got any closer to solving the riddle? Perhaps Trixie had worked out the answer; Trixie was pretty sharp.
With the wind behind me the ride was easy, and I arrived at the convent glowing. But Trixie had come from the east, had cycled two miles into a strong head wind, and was consequently a bit ratty. We put our bikes away and carried our bags to the clinical room. The rule was that equipment must be cleaned, sterilised, checked and the bag repacked for immediate use in the middle of the night, should it be needed. Chummy – or Camilla Fortescue-Cholmeley-Browne – was ahead of us.
‘What-ho, you jolly swags,’ she called out cheerily.
Chummy was all solicitude.
‘Sorry, old bean, didn’t mean to sound a wrong note, what? Here, I’ve just finished folding these swabs. You have them; I can quickly do some more. And the autoclave is at 180 degrees; I put it on twenty minutes ago when I came in. We’ll get these bally bags done in a jiff. Did you see Mrs B making bread this morning?’
We had. Mrs B not only made the best bread north of the Thames, she made jams and chutneys, cheesy scones and cakes to die for.
Our bags packed, we emerged from the clinical room and headed towards the kitchen, hungry for supper, which was a casual meal that we prepared ourselves. Lunch was the main meal of the day, when we all gathered around the big dining table, usually about twelve or fifteen people including visitors. Sister Julienne presided, and in the presence of the nuns and, frequently, visiting clergy, it was a more formal affair, and we girls were always on our best behaviour. Supper was different; we all came in at different times, including the Sisters, so we took what we wanted and ate in the kitchen. Standards were relaxed and so was conversation.
The kitchen was large, probably Victorian, and had been modernised in Edwardian days, with bits and pieces added on later. Two large stone sinks stood against the wall beneath windows that were set so high no one could see out of them, not even Chummy, who was well over six feet tall. The taps were large and stiff, fed by lead pipes that ran all the way round the kitchen and were attached to the wall with metal fixtures. Whenever you turned a tap on, the pipes gurgled and shook as the water made its way along its course, sometimes coming out in a trickle, sometimes in vicious spurts – you had to stand well back to avoid a soaking. Wooden plate racks were fixed above each sink which was flanked on either side by a marble-topped surface. This was where Mrs B did all her mixing and kneading of dough, covering the mixture with a cloth for it to rise, and all the other magic rituals necessary for making bread.
Against the second outside wall stood a double-sized gas stove, and the coke stove, which had an oven attached and a flue which ran up the wall and disappeared somewhere near the ceiling about fifteen feet above. The hot water for the whole convent was dependent upon this boiler, and so Fred, the boiler-and odd-job man, was a very important person indeed, a fact even Mrs B was obliged to concede. Fred and Mrs B were both Cockneys, and a guarded but fragile truce existed between them, which now and then erupted into a slanging match, usually when Fred had made a mess of Mrs B’s nice clean kitchen, and she would go for him hammer and tongs. She was a large lady of formidable frontage, and Fred was undersized even by Cockney standards, but he stood his ground and fought his corner manfully. The exchanges between them were rich, but Mrs B knew that the Sisters couldn’t do without him, so reluctantly they settled down to another period of truce.
Mrs B certainly had a point. Fred certainly was messy. The main problem was his squint, the most spectacular you have ever seen. One eye pointed north-east, the other south-west, so he could see in both directions at once, but not in the middle. Not infrequently, when he was shovelling his ash, or tipping his coke, it would go in the wrong direction, but he would sweep it up willy-nilly, and often whatever he was sweeping, particularly the ash, would go the wrong way also. Ash could be flying all over the place, at which point Mrs B ... well, I need not go on!
We settled down to our bread with cheese and chutney, and dates and apples, with a few pots of lemon curd, jam or marmalade. We really appreciated our food because we had all been war-time children, brought up amid strict rationing. None of us had seen a banana or chocolate until we were in our mid to late teens, and had been brought up on one egg and a tiny bit of cheese that was to last a whole week. Bread, along with everything else, had been strictly rationed, so Mrs B’s delectable provender brought murmurs of delight.
‘Bagsie the crust.’
‘Not fair, you had it last time.’
‘Well, we’ll split it, then.’
‘How about cutting the crust off the other end, as well?’
‘No, it would go stale in the middle.’
‘Let’s toss for it.’
I can’t remember who won the toss, but we settled down.
‘What do you make of Fred’s puzzle?’ I asked.
‘Don’t know,’ said Chummy, her mouth full. She sighed with contentment.
‘It’s a load of rubbish if you ask me,’ said Trixie.
‘It can’t be rubbish, it’s a question of arithmetic,’ I replied, cutting another wedge of cheese.
‘Well, you can think of arithmetic, old sport, I’ve got better things to think about. Pass the chutney.’ Chummy had a large frame to fill.
‘Leave some for Cynthia,’ I said. ‘She’ll be coming in any minute, and that’s her favourite.’
‘Whoops, sorry,’ said Chummy, spooning half back into the jar. ‘Greedy of me. Where is she, by the way? She should have been back an hour ago.’
‘Must have been held up somewhere,’ said Trixie. ‘No, it’s not arithmetic. I passed my School Certificate with merit, and I can assure you it’s not arithmetic.’
‘It is. Three nines are twenty-seven – that’s what they taught me at school – plus two makes twenty-nine.’
‘Correct. So what?’
‘So where’s the other shilling?’
Trixie looked dubious. She didn’t have a quick answer, and she was a girl who liked quick-fire repartee. Eventually she said, ‘It’s a trick, that’s what it is. One of Fred’s low-down, wide-boy Cockney tricks.’
‘Nah ven, nah ven, oo’s callin’ me a low-down Cockney wide-boy, I wants to know?’
Fred entered the kitchen, coke-hod in one hand, ash bucket in the other. His voice was friendly, and his toothless grin cheerful (well, not quite toothless, because he had one tooth, a huge yellow fang right in the centre). From his lower lip hung the remains of a soggy Woodbine.
Trixie didn’t look abashed at having insulted the good fellow; she looked indignant.
‘Well, it is a trick. It must be. You and your “three men went into a restaurant” yarn.’
Fred looked at her with his north-east eye and rubbed the side of his nose. He rolled the Woodbine from one side of his mouth to the other and sucked his tooth, then gave a sly wink.
‘Oh yeah? You reckons as ’ow it’s a trick. Well you work i’ ou’ Miss Trick – see? You jest work it out.’
Fred slowly kneeled down at the stove and opened the flue. Trixie was furious, but Chummy came to the rescue.
‘I say, old sport, go and look in the big tin, see if there’s any of that cake left. She’s a gem, that woman Mrs B, a jewel. I wasted two years at the Cordon Bleu School of Cookery, fiddling about stuffing prunes with bacon and filling figs with fish, soppy things like that. But no one there could come up with a fruit cake like Mrs B’s.’
Trixie calmed down as we tackled the cake.
‘Leave some for Cynthia,’ said Chummy. ‘She’ll be here in a minute.’
‘Aint she come back yet? Ve quiet one? She should be ’ere by now.’
Fred, as well as being a tease, frequently showed a protective instinct towards us girls. He rattled the rake in the flue.
I still wasn’t satisfied that Trixie was right about Fred’s story being a trick. I had been puzzling about it on and off all day, and now that Fred was here I wanted to get to the bottom of it.
‘Look here, Fred. Let’s get this straight. Three men went into a restaurant. Right?’
‘Right.’
‘And they bought a meal costing thirty shillings?’
‘Straight up.’
‘So they paid ten shillings each. Correct?’
‘You’re a smart one, you are.’
I ignored the sarcasm.
‘And the waiter took the thirty shillings t
o the cashier – yes?’
‘Yes.’
‘... who said the men had been overcharged. The bill should have been twenty-five shillings. Have I got it?’
‘You ’ave. Wha’ ’appened next?’
‘The cashier gave five shillings change to the waiter.’
‘No flies on you, eh? Musta been top of ve class a’ school.’
‘Oh, give over. The waiter thought, “The customers won’t know,” so he trousered two shillings and gave the men three shillings.’
‘Naugh’y naugh’y. We all done it, we ’as.’
‘Speak for yourself.’
‘Ooh, ’ark at ’er. Miss ’oity-toity.’
Trixie intervened.
‘That’s where I don’t get it. Each man took a shilling change, so that means each one had paid nine shillings instead of ten.’
We all chorused, ‘And three nines are twenty-seven plus two in the waiter’s pocket makes twenty-nine. So what happened to the other shilling?’
We all looked at each other blankly. Fred carried on raking and shovelling and whistling his tuneless whistle.
‘Well, what happened to it, Fred?’ shouted Trixie.
‘Search me,’ said Fred, ‘I ain’t got it, copper.’
‘Don’t be silly’ – Trixie was getting irritated again – ‘You’ve got to tell us.’
‘You work i’ ou’,’ said Fred provocatively as he gathered up his ash bucket. ‘I’m goin’ to empty vis, and you three smart girls’ll ’ave an answer ’afore I gets back.’
Novice Ruth and Sister Bernadette entered at that moment.
‘An answer to what, Fred?’
‘Vem girls’ll tell yer. They’re workin’ it ou’.’
While the Sisters attended to their supper, we told them the conundrum. Novice Ruth was a thoughtful girl, and she paused, knife in hand. ‘But that’s crazy,’ she said, ‘it doesn’t work. Where’s Cynthia, by the way?’