‘I’ve eyes in the back of my head,’ she would tell us. ‘Don’t think you can get away with anything with me.’ But today I had done it. My tummy was happy. My ears and eyes were pricked for any reactions, but this time none came. It was my buttery secret, and I had got away with it. Phew.
My trips to the larder became a way of life, of staying alive. I got very good at being stealthy, quiet and scavenging without leaving a trace. Sometimes there was a new loaf of bread – a wonderful sight and smell – and I developed a way of digging in my fingers, lifting up the crust, pulling out some dough, like a soft white ball of heaven, and stuffing it in my mouth. As I was chewing and savouring I would fold the crust back down and press it carefully to cover my tracks. From the outside it looked completely untouched while I would slink out of the larder swallowing a mouthful of wonderful, melt-in-your-mouth soft bread. Sometimes there was a carton of St. Ivel Five Pints powdered milk, and if it had already been opened I would flip the corner, take a huge slug, swallow and swallow as fast as possible, fold it back and get out of the larder as soon as I could, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand to remove all traces.
I took increasing risks at the age of four and five, and got bolder as I went, but I wasn’t always successful. I found a way of sneaking some food from the larder into my knickers, into a pocket or hidden in my cuff, and then take it up to my room. I pulled a little hole in the mattress material underneath where I slept, and popped in there whatever I could scavenge. Sometimes it was a crust, or a biscuit or
a bit of cheese. I would fold the material part over it, so it wasn’t visible from the outside. I felt I had my own little larder, my own private stash, which I could sneak out later and eat quickly when I was really desperate.
I got bolder and once or twice took small tins of baked beans and sweetcorn out of the larder and hid them in a children’s red cardboard suitcase that was in my room. One day Ian came in for a rare visit and he saw the tins out on the carpet.
‘Mummy will be cross,’ he said, looking pale and terrified himself. ‘Take them downstairs now, quickly, and she’ll never know. Quick!’ Without a word, I scrambled off the floor and slunk like a weasel down the stairs, into the larder and out again, having placed them back on the shelves exactly where I’d found them. My heart was pounding like a sledgehammer and my mouth was dry. That was close.
Then one day I became aware that Barbara was having a woman in the village round for coffee. This was very rare, as we seldom had people to the house. Peeking into the larder, I saw, gleaming on the middle shelf, a big packet of biscuits. Shiny purple paper, snazzy design: a packet of five – FIVE – Club biscuits. I couldn’t help myself: I took one out, slipped it up my sleeve and crept upstairs to my room. I hid it under the carpet beneath the bed, right at the corner. I held my breath. I imagined eating it later, sinking my teeth into what I knew was thick dark chocolate and biscuit. Mmmm, the very thought.
Then I heard her coming. Oh no! She’d found out. I could hear her taking the stairs two at a time, thumping the banisters as she went, and I was frozen to the floor. I watched her fling the door open and fly towards me like a demented monster. She bounded up to my face and bent over me, so close I could smell her sour breath, shouting, ‘You little thief, give me my biscuits NOW!’ I was terrified. She was almost drooling over me. I started crying uncontrollably. I pointed to the corner of the carpet. She lifted up the corner and picked up the biscuit, still wrapped in its shiny purple paper.
Barbara turned and slapped me with the full force of her right arm across the face, and I fell to the floor and hit my head. I lay there sobbing. She walked over to me and kicked my foot, then kicked my side, hissing, ‘Thieving little bitch,’ then stormed out of the room, biscuit in hand. I cried for some time. It felt like the end of the world. I wiped the back of my hand across my face, and then saw blood on my hand. It had a salty, dark, bitter taste. I looked at the ceiling and counted: one, two, three, four; one, two, three, four; one, two, three, four. Perhaps my luck had begun to run out, or maybe I’d got sloppy. I’d have to be more careful.
On Sundays, Barbara did cook Sunday lunch, which usually turned out to be a difficult event. She didn’t like cooking and would complain loudly about it. She would bang and crash about in the kitchen. She said she was too hot, and would throw open the doors and windows and swear a lot. Barbara was angry about having to cook, angry with the oven, angry with the food and angry with us. ‘Get out from under my feet, you bastards,’ she’d shout, and we’d scuttle away.
Her anger included Ian, who was always turfed out of the kitchen. He usually spent Sunday morning cleaning out his work van, which sat on the drive. It was obvious he was staying out of her way. We all did. Ian kept a small Tupperware box in his van, which occasionally had biscuits in it: Garibaldi and Rich Tea. He often had the two front doors wide open, like widespread wings, while he cleaned it out. I would watch from the sidelines and, when he went to get something, I would dart to the Tupperware box and prise it open. If there were two or three biscuits in there, I would sneak one and quickly slip it in my pocket, then close the lid and slide the box back into its place. All before Ian came back, totally unaware.
The biscuit would burn a hole in my pocket. I would put my hand in and then bring my fingers up to my nose and smell that warm, biscuity smell. I relished when I would be able to crumble a bit off and slip it in my mouth, even just the crumbs were marvellous things to melt on the tongue. When dinner was ready, Barbara would shout at us to get Ian: ‘Tell Daddy dinner’s ready.’
We would run to the drive and tell him, and he would say, ‘Oh, ready? Now?’ He didn’t look that keen. We would look panicked, William and I, as we knew he had to come instantly to appease Barbara. We would give each other a look. I would go back and very quickly get some cutlery and plates out and put them on the big kitchen table – big plates for them; side plates for us on the little kiddie table. We would have tiny bits of roast, like a doll’s meal, while they had a whole plateful and seconds. Kevin would look very smug as he ate to his heart’s content. He’d taunt us whenever he could.
Then one day I was in the garden, down by the big brown shed with the birdseed, which was now locked more often than not. The day we first got the birdseed (and subsequent days) had been unusual, since then a huge new shiny padlock had now appeared. Maybe Barbara had found traces of the seed; we didn’t know. We didn’t talk about it. It was all done in silence with looks, nods and gestures.
This day I noticed the padlock was open and I was starving. It was afternoon time and ages till we would get our meagre tea. Barbara would make jam and mincemeat in the autumn and put it in labelled jars on high shelves. I got on an old wooden chair and found a jar of mincemeat, which had already been opened. I got my dipper out and plunged it into the sweet, strong-smelling goo. Once covered, I shoved it in my mouth and – Oh heaven – the fruity, tangy taste was utterly wonderful. I was just swallowing when I became aware of a change in the light and a grating noise. I swung round, terrified: Barbara was standing behind me, her face red with fury.
In two strides she was across the floor. She grabbed my arm, pulled the jar from my other hand and put it back on a high shelf.
‘You nasty little thief,’ she was spitting, incandescent, as she dragged me hard and fast off the chair and into the garden, pushing me down the end of the footpath. She dragged me along on my knees and by my arm, yanking it overhead. I fell forwards into the flowerbed, full of roses and dahlias, and she kicked me in the side with her brown lace-up shoe.
‘You little bitch,’ she snarled, and with that she pushed my head face down into the earth. ‘Eat dirt, go on, you little thief.’ I was shaking uncontrollably now and crying, but she stood astride me, with me hunched on my knees in the flowerbed, face down. ‘Eat dirt!’ she screamed. So I put my hand in the earth, scraped some out and raised it to my mouth. ‘Go on, then. Eat if you’re that hungry.’
I licked a bit of dirt from my hand; it was gritty and disgusting. She pushed her foot into my side again and kicked. Suddenly she pulled my hair and yanked my head backwards. She bent her red face over mine and spat: ‘Louise, I said EAT, you little bitch. That’ll teach you never to steal again, you horrible little girl.’
She made me dig my hand in the dirt and eat a whole load, and as I ate I cried and cried and it dribbled out of my mouth and down my chin and onto my blue gingham summer dress, making everything a dirty mess. It was then that I saw I was also eating cat poo, little sausages of white stuff mixed in the dirt. I fell on my face and sicked it all up, all the dirt, the poo, the mincemeat. Barbara stalked away shouting, ‘One day you’ll learn that you can’t do as you please.’ I sat, sobbing, my hands on my knees, a total mess.
‘Louise,’ she barked from down the garden, now by the chicken run. We had about six chickens in a coop behind chicken wire alongside the back of the house. ‘Come and help, you lazy little bitch.’
I got to my feet, stunned, and stumbled up the garden. My side really hurt and I was covered in sick, dirt and dribble. I was still sobbing quietly, but I knew better than to show any more feelings, so I tried to stop myself. I started counting as I walked. Counting, counting, counting. Barbara pointed to big sacks that the hen straw had to go in once they had used it, and I had to hold them open while she forked mess and straw into them. She said not a word to me the whole while, and I just tried to calm myself down, thinking I really had to be more careful in future or I wouldn’t survive.
3
Caravan Saviours
The back garden was big, with a chicken run on the left with a long wire fence and, next to that, right at the bottom, an orchard with old apple, pear and plum trees. At the end of the orchard was a piece of land that served as a small traveller site, with a few cream and blue caravans on it, occupied by a mixture of Polish and Irish people. William and I often wandered through the garden, past the shed with the birdseed and mincemeat, past the greenhouse, and then into the orchard beyond. We would stand by a leafy apple tree and watch the travellers: the women had colourful headscarves and aprons, full skirts and crinkled white shirts and looked very old. We crept through the orchard hedge up to the long, cream caravans and were fascinated by their dinky net curtains and plastic flowers. Everything looked very neat and tidy inside.
In one caravan lived an old, thin couple we called ‘the robot’ and ‘the witch’ – it made us both giggle. There was another, smaller, pale-blue caravan, set to one side, which belonged to an older Irish man. We watched him come out of his caravan dressed in big brown trousers with braces, an old stripy shirt with no collar, with rolled-up sleeves and a flat cap. He had a crinkly kind face and white hair. He would come out and sit on the step of his caravan and roll up a cigarette and smoke. We would watch him sitting with his cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He’d wave to the Polish people and nod, or just watch the birds. William and I would watch him, half-hiding behind the apple trees. Then we would wander about, picking up fallen fruit and eating the sour flesh, avoiding the worms.
One day we were wandering around the caravans, looking for apples, and we got nearer to the Irishman’s blue caravan. We both crept along by the window, which was propped open, and were trying to peek inside when suddenly a hairy arm shot out. We jumped and froze. We were used to being scared and being shouted at, and we supposed we were about to get a beating. William and I were both shaking and wondering how to creep away but were staring at the disembodied arm
hanging out the window. We realised there was a nice piece of crusty bread clasped in the strong fingers.
‘Take it!’ the Irishman whispered hoarsely out the window. William and I looked around, making sure the coast was clear. We didn’t want Barbara to find us; there’d be hell to pay. We looked at each other, then back at the hand, and then the crust. ‘C’mere wontcha. Take it,’ the voice repeated softly. We crept up to the hand like cats, and sniffed. Was it a trick? It smelt like bread. Real bread. Snatch! William grabbed it and broke it roughly in two and we dived into it. Oh, the taste! Yeasty, sweet, soft, divine. No bread had ever tasted anything like this. It was manna from heaven. The hand disappeared and reappeared with another slice, and that too we gobbled down as fast as we could. William and I stood riveted to the ground, amazed at our fortune, as the caravan door opened and out came the familiar figure of the Irishman. He went down a couple of steps and sat down. ‘Sean Brannon,’ he said warmly.
We just stood and looked at him, licking our lips, feeling our tummies filling – a warm, wonderful, comforting feeling. Sean smiled at us and sucked on his cigarette. We just stared at him and didn’t know what to say. Suddenly, afraid of being found out, we turned and ran away. I was scared there would be a terrible price to pay. What if he told Barbara? What if she saw any crumbs or noticed that we were happy? This was too good to be true. But in my heart I knew we would be back again, just as soon as the coast was clear.