Faithless Wife
An old man with corrugated brow stood gazing sadly at the little red brick Victorian terrace. Six back to back houses in a row, each with its own coal house and lav. at the bottom of the yard. Here he had brought his bride; here his children had been born.
1930, it was, when they moved in. They were lucky to find a home of their own after living with her Mam for a twelve month. She was all right, a good sort really but the old man, cripes he was something else. The household revolved around him. Take food, for instance, if he didn't like anything that was it. Didn't matter what you wanted.
When he and Maggie moved into this place he put his foot down. Maggie was used to brown tripe stew; he put an end to that. 'From now on,' he told her, 'we have tripe done proper in milk. And no putting prunes in with rabbit. It ain't normal, prunes are made to serve with custard.'
Once she understood who was boss, they were all right, rubbed along comfortable. He'd been good to her; left her a bag of toffees every Friday when he went to the pub and never spent a penny of her housekeeping. Nor had he neglected the kids. She only had to ask, if they needed shoes or vests, he tipped up though he had told her she should keep a tin for savings. She wasn't a very good manager, never put anything by.
It was a good thing he hadn't gone on strike like a lot of his mates. Look after number one was his motto and it paid off in the end. Although he'd been flabbergasted, after the strike was over, to be given the sack because the men refused to work with him. He'd got taken on by 'Skinflints.' They preferred non union labour.
Then Poll, her sister moved in next door. A right flibberty gibbet that one. Bill, her husband, tipped up all his wages. She gave him baccy and beer money, now what way was that to go on?
It wasn't long before Maggie bleated on about it. Well he'd told her, he was master in his own house and his wage packet was his business. Did her Mam know what her Dad earned? Well of course not. As long as a wife had money for the table what more could she ask?
It wasn't as if she needed money for clothes he always bought her a vest or jumper for Christmas and birthday or even a skirt when she said hers was worn out, even though he couldn't see anything wrong with it.
That sister of hers was forever flaunting herself, crepe de chine dresses or some such and going to the Palais tea dances. They'd had a real todo then. Maggie wanted to go with her. He soon knocked that on the head. Gave her another kid. He'd been smart there. Told Bill he should follow suit, but he wouldn't listen. You can't help some people.
With six nippers to care for Maggie settled down, stopped moaning about money and clothes. If she was short she could always do a bit of lace work like her Mam. She wanted to join her sister in a factory canteen but there was no way he was going to have his wife going out to work. It was all right though. She looked after Poll's two along with their six and Poll gave her a pound a week and twenty players, so he hadn't gone without a fag even when he lost his job.
They were hard times though until the war came. He'd been too old to fight so he'd gone into munitions. Only just in time, if he'd left it any longer he might have found himself back down the mine.
Bill, her sister's husband, went to war. He'd been in the territorials, for the money of course. With a wife like Poll he needed every penny. He came through it all right and then they moved to one of them fancy Council houses.
Maggie wanted to go too but he wasn't having that. They'd got the chance of a life time, the right to buy as a sitting tenant. £400, they'd have been mad to refuse especially when he'd got the money doing nothing in his building society account.
You'd have thought she would be over the moon but no. Said she wanted a garden- a garden I ask you. It wasn't as if they'd got babies, the youngest would be at work in a couple of years and he wasn't about to start gardening just when he was free to go to the pub every night instead of twice a week. Besides, he had reminded her. She wouldn't be able to go to pictures of a Saturday if they moved.
So they stayed and he felt the pride of ownership. He bought a brass door knocker and put a lock on the lavatory door. They had it to themselves now. He had tried to make Maggie happy, had even made her a window box and bought her a big tub of cardinal red. Made the kitchen floor tiles gleam real bonny. You hardly noticed the uneven bits unless you caught your toe.
Those had been happy days until the council slapped a compulsory purchase order on the terrace. They said it were slum property. Would you believe it? They'd been as snug as bugs in a rug. No bath but public baths was only half an hour's walk away.
Maggie went to live with her sister.
It goes to show man's ingratitude has got nothing on women. You're good to a woman for near on a life time and what thanks do you get? He had given her everything a woman could want, a washing machine, a vacuum and a telly, and she walked out.
You'd think they'd make her move into the Home with him but the social worker said, "Fraid that's life old fellow. We'll see she gets half the compensation. Matron will administer your share. Don't worry you'll get pocket money."
Life's a bastard, ain't it?
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