The Liverpool Basque. Helen Forrester
with mock anxiety. He pulled out an old sweater, and then another one. But the second sweater was wrapped around something.
Very carefully, Pedro loosened the bundle and lifted out a model yacht, its mast and sails folded flat. He handed it to his son. ‘Guaranteed to sail – and not to sink,’ he told his son.
Manuel took it gingerly from him. Nobody amongst his school friends had anything to equal it – he was sure of that. ‘Will it really sail?’ he asked, as he twisted it round to have a better look at it.
‘Given a decent breeze it will – like a real one. Tomorrow, we’ll go up to the park and try it on the pond. You’ll soon get the hang of it.’
The pond? That was where grown-up men took their model yachts, yachts carefully pushed through the town in old perambulators, because they were too big to carry.
The child’s face was beatific. He determined that he would never let Andrew get even a glimpse of the little boat; he was not going to chance its being taken from him.
Grandpa leaned forward. ‘Let me see it, Mannie.’
Manuel used both hands to pass it to his grandfather, and the old man took a closer look at it: the brass rails, the finely polished wood, and the correct rigging. ‘Nice piece of work,’ he said. ‘Must’ve taken a while to do that.’
‘Aye, it did. It’s to scale.’
Juan handed the boat back to his grandson. ‘You don’t take that up to the park by yourself,’ he instructed. ‘When your dad’s away, I’ll come with you.’ He, too, was aware of the predatory children, some of them homeless, who ran wild in the streets.
Manuel promised.
Rosita bent over them, to admire the little vessel, and Pedro slyly pinched her bottom.
She shot a shocked glance of reproof at him. ‘Not in public!’ she hissed, trying to look suitably outraged.
A further diversion, which relieved Pedro’s feeling of strangeness in his own home, was created by the sound of hob-nailed boots in the hall, as Jean Baptiste Saitua and two of his sons stepped tentatively through the open front door; it did not take long for the Basque community to learn through the grapevine any bit of news, like a return from sea, and these old friends of the entire family felt free to step in and inquire how Pedro was.
Grandpa leaned back in his chair to look down the hall. ‘Come in,’ he shouted. ‘How are you, Jean – Domingo – Vicente?’
They tramped in and shook Pedro’s hand and slapped him on the back, while Rosita quietly slid over to the fireplace, to remove the chicken casserole from the oven and place it on the warming shelf above the fire; she winked at Aunt Maria, sitting quietly watching the scene. ‘Heaven only knows when we’ll get our tea,’ she muttered to her sister. ‘Would you like another glass of wine?’
Maria smiled gently and nodded. ‘Yes.’
Grandma, equally resigned to a long session of male reminiscences, was already getting more glasses and another bottle of wine. Jean Baptiste was a bosun with a small Basque shipping company sailing out of Liverpool; he had a couple of nights’ leave. Domingo was a ferryman, and Vicente was in his last year at school. After much joking, Vicente was allowed a glass of wine, though Jean Baptiste said his mother would probably be after him, if she smelled it on his breath.
The cakes intended for dessert were brought out and handed round, and the party became quite merry. Pedro abandoned hope of a bath that evening, and Rosita was beginning to wonder if she could stretch her chicken casserole to feed three extra men, when Maria began to cough violently. The hilarity ceased immediately, and Grandma said, ‘Don’t worry. I’ll take her upstairs – it’s just the smoke.’
Fat, jolly Jean Baptiste quickly rose from the table, however, his heavy jowls suddenly drooping. ‘Ah! I forgot!’ He looked round the room, thick with blue tobacco smoke. ‘I’m sorry, Maria.’ He turned to Grandpa, and said, ‘We can meet in the Baltic later on; some of the other lads’ll be sure to be there.’
With grave dignity, he eased himself and his sons out of the crowded room, calling his thanks to Grandma for the wine and cake.
His sons clattered down the steps to the pavement, while he paused at the top, to speak to Juan and Pedro. ‘The wife told me Maria was back home. I thought she must be well again. How is she?’
Grandpa’s shoulders went up in a hopeless shrug. ‘They can’t do anything for her – but you mustn’t worry about the tobacco smoke; she loves to be part of what’s going on. If we put her upstairs all the time, she’d die of loneliness.’
‘Of course, poor girl. It must be a terrible worry to you.’
He turned to Pedro. ‘See you later, lad.’
And Pedro, who simply wanted to go to bed with his wife, nodded agreement.
While Micaela unbolted the back door to open it, to let out the tobacco smoke, Rosita quickly filled a glass of water and handed it to Manuel. ‘Give this to Auntie; it’ll help her stop coughing.’
The little boy obediently took the glass over to his struggling aunt. Rosita leaned over the sink to heave up the sash window; it had been partially open during the Saituas’ visit; now she struggled to push it up further, but after a couple of inches, it stuck in its rotting wooden frame. ‘Blast,’ she muttered, ‘I’ll have to tell the rent collector when he comes.’
Micaela pushed her slightly aside, so that she could damp a towel under the tap. As she turned and wiggled her way between the scattered kitchen chairs to get to Maria, she said grimly, ‘You can tell him – but don’t expect him to do anything. Better to get your father to have a look at it.’
Maria had been coughing so violently that she had not been able to take the glass of water from Manuel; he was standing by her, wide-eyed, not knowing what to do.
The sick woman held a big man’s handkerchief over her mouth to catch the blood-streaked phlegm which she was coughing up.
‘It’s all right, Mannie, dear. Put the glass on the little table, and go and help your mam.’ Micaela gently wiped her daughter’s face with the damp cloth, and, as fresh air entered the room, the coughing lessened enough for Maria to be eased on to the oil-cloth-covered sofa and be propped up with a myriad of patchwork cushions. Her mother covered her with a knitted shawl, and persuaded her to take a sip or two of water.
After chatting for a minute or two with Jean Baptiste Saitua, Juan and Pedro sat down on the front doorstep to continue their smoke. They remained there, in companionable silence, until Rosita called them in to eat.
While Rosita took a bellowing Francesca out of her cradle and put her to the breast under the cover of her shawl, Micaela served the family. She put a plate of food in front of Rosita, so that she, too, could eat, while nursing the baby.
Before sitting down, Pedro looked across at his sister-in-law, lying limply on the sofa. ‘Sorry the smoke made you cough, Maria. Cigarette smoke’s the worst. I’ll smoke outside in future.’
The kindly meant words spoken softly in Basque brought tears of weakness to Maria’s eye. She made a small gesture with her hand, as if to say it did not matter.
Micaela took a little bowl, put a spoonful of rice in it, and covered it with a ladle of gravy from the casserole. Very slowly, teaspoonful by teaspoonful, she got the food into the invalid. Only then did she sit down to eat herself.
Pedro had been praising the dinner to Rosita, and she smiled happily, while she shifted the baby to the other breast. She remembered suddenly what had happened when she had bought the hens in the market, and she told him the story of the third hen, retrieved from the bank windowsill.
Juan was silent