The Runaway Girl

Book 0: Sixteen Streets Trilogy

by Elsie Mason

Genres: Romance

Synopsis

1918. Fleeing from her past, Cathy Carmichael is new to the Sixteen Streets. She has nothing to her name, no plan and nowhere to go. Cathy thinks she's struck gold when she runs into Mrs Sturrocks, an elderly lady who offers her a room at her boarding house. Her son, Noel, might be strange and sulky, but he gives her a job at the Robin Hood pub and before long, Cathy is thriving as the new barmaid. The Sixteen Streets was only meant to be a temporary stop for Cathy...but could it become home instead?

Publisher: Orion

Print pages: 368

Sample

In later years, if you were to ask what Cathy Sturrock was like, just about everyone would give you similar answers. ‘Why, she’s always the life and soul of the party! She’s strong. She’s in charge. She’s been here forever! She’s the Queen of the Sixteen Streets, is Cathy!’

Such was the esteem that the denizens of that area by the docks in South Shields held her. There was no nonsense with Cathy. She was strong because she had always had to be strong. And she was glamorous, too. By! You should have seen her when she was a young’un, with her flaming red hair and those catlike green eyes. She still had her looks as an older woman, sitting in splendour by the bar in her beloved Robin Hood pub. For more years than anyone could recall she had reigned here, at the top of steep Frederick Street, at the heart of the community, overlooking the Tyne.

‘But is that what she’s really like?’ the stranger might ask, watching this woman as she sipped milk stout and chattered with her usual gaggle of friends. ‘Surely she couldn’t always have been queen here? So secure in her place in the world? How did she even come to be here in the first place?’

Most of the locals would frown at this, as they would at anyone asking too many questions about a person’s past. It was something that just wasn’t done in the Sixteen Streets. People had to bide together so closely in these rows of two-ups, two-downs, and for the sake of a quiet life, it didn’t do to enquire too much into the pasts of those who dwelled nearby. There was lots of speculation and lots of gossip behind people’s backs, mind, but no one liked a nosy parker, asking questions outright about folks’ secret lives.

Some people did speculate about Cathy Sturrock’s origins. While most assumed that she had always been here, living by the dirty docks of South Shields, there were others who dimly recalled hearing that she had blown into this place, alone and starving and very young, back at the end of the Great War, all those years ago. With nowt to her name and desperate, she had shown up here in the Sixteen Streets, almost at random, back when all the men and boys were away fighting and there was a bereft and horrible feeling about the place. That’s when Cathy fetched up in town. She was fleeing something or someone and looking for a place to settle in. That’s what some of the old matrons said when the subject of Cathy’s past came up. But they claimed that they didn’t like to speculate or remember much more. Cathy had been good to all of them round here and the past was the past. If she wanted to forget it, then it was no one’s business but her own.

Cathy sat by the bar and sipped her drink, feeling that familiar warm buzz from both the alcohol and the talkative hullabaloo of her bar. She was so at home here and so familiar with everyone that she could give a good guess at what every small huddle of drinkers was discussing. These people really were like her beloved subjects and there was nothing that Cathy didn’t know about them. And she knew that sometimes even her oldest and most loyal friends would mutter amongst themselves about her past. She was a very familiar sight to all of them, in her velvet gowns that always seemed too grand for a sawdust-floored place like this. And yet there was still a mystery about her. One that she was still keen to guard, even all these years later.

How many years, exactly? Twenty or more she had been landlady here, ruling supreme. Twenty years since her great struggle to make the Robin Hood hers alone, and to free herself of the shackles of a loveless marriage. More than twenty years since she staggered into this place for the first time, with nothing to her name. Just the clothes on her back. Hardly a picking on her. Despair in her heart. Desperate to find a new place to hide away in and to simply forget everything that had already happened in her young and wasted life …

Sometimes she couldn’t help herself from going back and dwelling on the days that had seen her first pitch up here in the Sixteen Streets. It was always mixed feelings she experienced then. Sadness and loss, but also great elation and joy. She had faced up to so much and triumphed, though there was always such great shame that she kept hidden deep inside.

It was the Biscuit Man who had brought her here, and it was he who she had to thank for finding her the right place in the world. It was all random though, and he’d had no idea the favour he was doing her, that day he’d offered the girl a ride in his cab back to the factory.

Why, she couldn’t even remember that driver’s name now. She remembered the horses that pulled his wagon better than she could remember him. He’d just been another gurning ne’er-do-well, looking at a bonny, helpless lass and figuring he’d have some fun with her. He let her clamber up into his cab to sit beside him not out of the goodness of his heart. Oh no, it wasn’t for the sake of helping her out that he gave her a lift.

Even at the age of nineteen, Cathy had realised that. Cathy Carmichael as she had been known then. No, that fella with the wagon had just been after a bit of a feel. He’d fancied getting his leg over, somewhere between Morwick-on-Sea, where their fateful journey had started and his destination, South Shields, in the next county down.

‘Aye, bonny lass, you just come and sit up here with me, then,’ he’d laughed, and hoisted her up onto the seat beside him. ‘Are you running away?’

She had nodded grimly and wouldn’t be drawn any further. Her mouth settled into a thin line, as it often did when she was cross and determined. Somehow her stubborn quiet only attracted the Biscuit Man even more and he kept gazing at her appreciatively as he drove his wagon out of the small seaside town onto the main rutted road going south.

‘It’s biscuits I’ve been carrying,’ he told her, almost proudly.

‘Yes, I saw the writing on the side of the van,’ she said. ‘Shouldn’t you be away fightin’?’ she asked him cheekily.

‘Dicky heart,’ he told her. ‘And I’m doing my bit by keeping these deliveries goin’, if it’s even any business of yours, young lady.’ He growled at her, clearly put out by her questioning.

Cathy didn’t care. She sat up straight on the shiny leather seat, looking as respectable as she could in her thin cotton frock. The only frock she owned. She’d had to leave her other few belongings behind in her lodgings this morning, as she’d fled without paying the past month’s rent. All she had was a battered carpet bag on her lap, but there was bugger all in it. If robbers set upon her now they’d find themselves empty-handed, she reflected, and this thought made her feel braver. I’ve got nothing to lose, she thought. Not now.

She took a swift grip of herself. She had almost crumbled just then. She had almost submitted to the tears that were threatening to overwhelm her. They were always there, right behind her eyes. Her feelings lay in wait for her, patiently biding their time for her to drop her tough façade. Then they could get to her and remind her of everything she was leaving behind.

But no. She mustn’t dwell upon things she could do nothing about. She had to follow her present course and make a future for herself.

‘Wights Biscuit Factory,’ the whiskery driver was telling her. ‘That’s who I work for. I take deliveries to all the big, fancy shops in all these towns. I go all over Northumberland, supplying the big shops with fancy tins.’

‘Do you, now?’ Cathy said, humouring him, watching the rows of townhouses rolling by. The streets were mostly empty this time on a Monday. There was no one around to see her leaving the town she had made her own for this past year. No one cared that she was absconding, penniless and no better off than she’d been when she arrived. There was no one to notice anything she ever did. Usually this thought made her feel desolate, but today she felt a surge of wonderment, almost excitement. I’m free, she thought. I’m free to make up the rest of my own life …

But for now she was stuck with this boring man, telling her all about biscuits and the history of the Wights Factory in South Shields. He was burbling on about custard creams and ginger snaps. Couldn’t he even hear how dull he was being? She knew only too well that he was filling up the air with nonsense chatter, to cover the fact that he was excited and nervous at having her sitting there beside him. As he yammered about biscuits, his mind was spinning on dirty thoughts. She recognised the signs, of course, and knew that she’d have to fight off the mucky bugger before long.

‘Aye, a lass like you, looking for work an’ all that, you could do worse than knocking at the gates of Wights Biscuit Factory,’ the driver told her. ‘They’re always after lasses to work in the baking house and on the production line. And with all the young fellas away at war still, they’ve been needing even more, or so I’ve heard.’

‘Oh, really?’ she asked. Actually, maybe he was giving her a good tip here. Maybe factory work was exactly what she was looking for. Not that Cathy Carmichael had ever seen a factory in her life, or even knew what factory work might consist of. She’d come from the country and had never seen a town bigger than Morwick in her life. She didn’t let any of that ignorance show, however. She turned to look at her driver with interest and he leered at her, mistaking her querying glance for interest in him.

‘I can drop you at the factory gates,’ he told her. ‘I’ll be taking the van back to the depot and I’ll have stuff to sign and my gaffer to see. But if you play your cards right I could introduce you and show you around. Make an introduction or two. It’s hard and hot work, they say, but the living’s good. Most of the folk in the Sixteen Streets work at the biscuit factory, they say. If it’s good enough for all of them, well then, I imagine it’s good enough for you too, lass.’

She blinked at him and asked, ‘The Sixteen Streets?’

‘Oh,’ he grinned. ‘That’s the whole area on the hill above the factory and overlooking all the docks. That’s what they’ve called it for years, all the folk who live there. It’s like a rabbit warren, it is. It used to be a right bloody slum, back in the olden days. They were all crammed twenty to a house. And they’re tiny little houses, too! In the bad old days it was a smoky and mucky old place. You’d choke on the fumes from the chimneys and if you walked up the wrong way someone’d slit your throat and chuck you in the dirty water. But it’s better now, or so they say. It’s almost respectable, is what I’ve heard.’

The Sixteen Streets, Cathy thought to herself, and liked the way the words sounded. Perhaps she was a little superstitious. Perhaps that was a bit of the Irish in her, that came down to her from both her ma and her da’s sides, or so she’d been told … but there was a little shiver inside of her when she heard the name of that place they were headed to. It was like she could foretell something of the future and some special part of her knew that the place was going to be important to her.

More than important to her. The Sixteen Streets was going to become her whole life.

The driver had noticed her shivering. ‘Are you chilly, lass?’

It was true, the breeze was whistling in through the sides of the van. ‘I’m all right,’ she said tersely, not wanting to let him know she was having curious thoughts about the future. For the first time in God knew how long, she was even letting herself feel hopeful …

‘Listen, maybe we could see about getting you warmed up somehow?’ the driver said. ‘That frock you’ve got on is like a wisp of nothing.’

She glanced out of the corner of her eye at him. ‘Aye, we’ll see about that,’ she said, as the road opened out ahead of them. They were on their way to South Shields and not even this horrible man could spoil her mood now.

She managed to escape from the Biscuit Man mostly unscathed. When they arrived by the coastal stretch north of the Tyne he pulled up to the roadside and tried to give her a bit of a kiss and a cuddle. She found him to be a puny thing though and she thought, if this one oversteps the mark too much, I could break his neck, I reckon. She shuddered as he covered her face in slobbery kisses. I’ll give him a dicky heart all right, she thought.

‘That’s enough now,’ she told him firmly.

‘Oh, is it?’ he chuckled, moving even closer.

‘Yes,’ she said, and with that she reached out and took hold of the quivering hard flesh inside his mucky trousers and gave it a sudden, sharp yank. The Biscuit Man howled and leapt away from her.

‘Yer little divil!’ he screamed as soon as he could get his breath back.

‘There’s more of that if you keep on at me,’ she warned him.

‘Where did you learn to hurt a man like that?’ he gasped.

‘I grew up on a farm,’ she shrugged. ‘For years I watched my Aunt Linda pulling the balls off pigs and sheep. I always knew it’d come in handy.’

The Biscuit Man stared at her like she was a monster, his breath still coming in jagged bursts. ‘I was only trying to be nice to you,’ he muttered.

‘It wasn’t what I’d call nice,’ Cathy said. ‘Now look, can we get moving again? You’ve had your fun.’

‘Fun!’ he said, in a strangled voice, and moments later their journey resumed.

The next hour was spent wordlessly and the girl was glad because it allowed her to concentrate on their new surroundings. North and South Shields were dense, smoky conurbations gathered round either side of a wide harbour. The whole place stood on tall cliffs overlooking the endless, shining expanse of the North Sea. There were massive ships and cranes in the harbour, and everywhere she looked there was a profusion of rooftops and chimneys, everything crammed in closely and sending up plumes of dove grey smoke into the early evening air. There was hooting of factory horns and ships’ whistles and the cries of gulls. There was noise and stuff going on everywhere she looked as the wagon’s horses clip-clopped through the cobbled streets.

Cathy could feel a rising excitement in her heart. All the sadness inside her had swelled into an enormous, unbearable burden in recent weeks but now, at the sight of this town she had never been to before, that tension had cracked clean across. It had vanished in the stiff salty breeze from the sea. Here was a challenge. This was a fresh start. Now she felt like she could put her anguish behind her for a while, as she faced up to the possibility of beginning a new life.

They trundled through the darker, dingier slum streets of town, where the gutters ran with filth, and women and kids sat on doorsteps or glared out of windows at newcomers. It was like entering dark ravines where shady, unknown creatures were dwelling. Lights came on as the twilight deepened and the streets took on a more cosy, welcoming aspect, lifting the girl’s heart even further.

Soon they were outside the tall iron gates belonging to Wight’s Biscuit Factory. Cathy stared in wonder at the hordes of women in aprons and hats that came flooding through the gates at the end of their shift. They looked exhausted and they were covered in glittering sugar. Behind them the tall chimneys were pumping out violet smoke into the burnt orange of the sky. Cathy filled her lungs with the most wonderful, ambrosial smell. The first time she caught a whiff of the sweet buttery smells of the biscuit factory was something she would never forget.

The whiskery Biscuit Man glared at her. ‘Well, this is the end of the line for you, my dear. I’ve got to go and get these horses stabled and whatnot. You can get out now and good luck to you.’

She gave him a surprised look. ‘I thought you were going to introduce me to the bosses? Help me find a job at the factory?’

His wayward eyebrows went up. ‘Are you kidding, hinny? I said I’d help you if you played your cards right. But you didn’t, did you?’ He glowered darkly. ‘In fact, you hurt me. I think you might have done me some permanent damage there, you horrible minx.’

‘Ha!’ Cathy burst out. ‘I’m glad! You deserve it!’ She clutched up her battered carpet bag that contained absolutely everything she owned in the world. ‘I don’t need your help,’ she told him. ‘I’ll make my own way. I’ve always had to before, and I’ll manage perfectly fine on me own! So, bugger you, you scruffy old git!’ And with that she jumped out of the cab and onto the cobbles at the foot of Frederick Street.

She strode away from the Biscuit Man’s van and didn’t look back at him once.

‘You made a monkey out of me, lass!’ he bellowed after her. ‘You … you used me! You should be ashamed of yourself!’

This made her laugh. ‘Aye, maybe I should be ashamed about lots of things,’ she thought to herself. ‘But I bloody well refuse to be!’

Her instincts told her to head up the hill. The street she was on was one of many in serried ranks overlooking the docks. Her idea was to march up this road and get to the top and from there maybe get a good high-up view of her new town. And from there? Well, then she would see what she could see and she would decide what to do with herself next. One thing at a time.

Cathy swung her carpet bag and climbed up the hill, paying close attention to all the bay windows with their sparkling white net curtains and the whitewashed doorsteps and polished front doors. Maybe these were poor folk, but they were proud, keeping the outsides of their homes immaculate.

Kids were still out playing on the street in little gaggles and they stared at her as she breezed past. There were no men to be seen, of course. Well, that was just as well. Men only caused bother for girls like Cathy.

Perhaps strangers were a rarity round here, she mused. It was the kind of place where everyone knew everyone else and a new face stood out a mile. Part of Cathy longed to live in a place like this and belong to people like that. The kind of people who looked out for you.

She was so used to the quiet of the countryside and living with just a few all too familiar faces around her. Living up on the windy hilltop, looking down onto the moorland. Hearing nothing but her aunt’s mithering tones. A bit of noisy confusion and crowds would be like balm to her soul. Even hearing these rowdy kids at their games did her good. She was only a few years older than them, really. She felt like she’d missed out on that childhood bliss of having loads of pals her own age and playing out like this lot. All that time had been robbed from her.

But there was no use letting the past get her all rankled and upset. She shook her head and felt her stomach rumble. It did more than rumble. It was growling. All she’d had all day was a broken custard cream offered to her by that mucky devil in his wagon. The lovely aroma from the biscuit factory made her hunger pangs even worse. Why, she could still smell it! But there was something else, too – a fried oil smell. A chip shop smell, golden and crispy.

Ahead of her there was a short queue standing outside bright windows. ‘Betty’s’, the sign above the shop read, and some wag had supplemented it with the scrawled epithet, ‘Swetty’. Cathy laughed to herself and realised that she hardly cared how sweaty Betty might in fact be, because she was starved and a packet of chips would fill all her immediate needs splendidly.

Feeling around in her carpet bag for the purse she’d had since she was a child, she joined the queue of those waiting for an early supper. Some of them acknowledged her with a shy smile, with the same cautious curiosity that the kids had done. So they weren’t unfriendly to strangers here, then. They were intrigued and polite and slightly distant. That suited Cathy fine, she thought, as she poked around in her purse, finding only dark, ancient coins. One of them was an old Queen Victoria coin, smooth to the touch.

Others were getting glistening slabs of fish in golden batter. She watched them emerging from the steamy shop with their parcels. Men and women linking arms and eating the chips straight from the paper. Cathy knew she wouldn’t have enough for fish. Maybe the chips would fill her up enough, and maybe if Swetty Betty was a generous soul, she could ask her for some scraps of batter …

‘Eeeh, hinny,’ said the woman in front of her in the queue. ‘You look like you’re drooling! Your tongue’s hanging out!’

Cathy looked down to see a tiny old woman staring up at her. She was so diminutive Cathy hadn’t even noticed her there. The woman had a smile that split her weathered face in two, it was that broad. Her eyes were dark and almost hidden inside the wrinkled folds of her face. A shapeless, ancient hat was pinned to her head by a glistening hat pin and she was bundled into a monstrous fur coat that looked like it was hopping with fleas. ‘Oh!’ gasped the girl at the sight of her. ‘I never saw you there.’

‘Ha!’ the old woman chuckled. ‘Well, you’d do well to keep your eyes peeled round here, lass. There’s all sorts round here, and they’re not all as friendly as me.’

Cathy felt herself warming to this strange old soul. She found she couldn’t help herself. Her voice was booming, and she was only about … what, four feet tall? In her ratty fur coat, she looked like she could be a hedgerow creature out of the wild. ‘I’m Cathy,’ Cathy said. ‘I’m new round here.’

The old woman looked her up and down. ‘Aye, you are, aren’t you? You look like you’ve wandered here from another world. Are you after chips?’

‘I’m absolutely starving,’ Cathy admitted.

The woman stared at Cathy’s skinny frame through her thin dress and tutted. ‘You look like you’ve not been eating properly for weeks. You’ve not been looking after yourself, lass.’

That was true enough. Her existence in recent times had been hand-to-mouth, ever since she had lost her job at the department store and her meagre savings had run out. ‘I think I’ve got enough for chips.’

‘Betty’s prices are reasonable,’ said the old woman. ‘My name’s Mrs Sturrock, by the way. I’m well known round here – I run a boarding house in Frederick Street. Number twenty-one. It’s nothing grand, but I’ve a room free, if you’re looking for summat.’

Cathy smiled at her. ‘I do need somewhere, actually. I’ve pitched up here with nothing, no plan, and nowhere to go. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.’

Mrs Sturrock looked scandalised. ‘Whit? You’re here with no family nor friends nor nowt? You’ve no people to go to, hinny?’

Cathy shook her head. The queue inched forward and they came closer to the warm, inviting interior of the tiled shop. Now she felt rather foolish, admitting that she was essentially homeless here in South Shields.

‘Eeeh, lass,’ the old woman said. ‘You know, the folk here are welcoming, good people. They might be a bit rough and ready in their ways but we’re all right really. So you’re lucky in that way. You’ve fetched up in a world that’s mostly friendly. But that’s not to say that there aren’t bad buggers here as well. We’ve got bad’uns here, who’ll kick you when you’re down. Ones who’ll nab your last crust off of you. We’ve got evil-minded souls here, just the same as anywhere.’ Her voice had taken on a rich, dark timbre that made Cathy shiver involuntarily as she bent closer to listen. But then the old lady grinned once more, revealing her scanty brown teeth and letting out a blasting reek of bathtub gin. ‘Ah, but mostly they’re the kindest souls you’ll ever meet, round here. Believe me, you’ve come to the best place in the whole world. I’ve lived here all my life, hinny, and look what it’s made of me!’

Cathy smiled at her in bemusement, and then she found they’d reached the head of the queue in Swetty Betty’s fried fish emporium. Mrs Sturrock patted her hand. ‘You know what? This’ll be my treat, hinny. I’ll buy your supper for you tonight.’

Mrs Sturrock told her that the best place to eat your fish and chips on an evening like this was right at the top of the hill. There was a bench by the railings round the graveyard and from there you could see right over the whole town and all the docks spread out around you. Cathy found herself following and tagging along after the tiny old woman and felt quite content to perch beside her on the bench, amused by the way the old lady’s feet didn’t even reach the ground.

‘Isn’t it grand?’ she asked the new arrival and Cathy had to admit that the view was terrific. The ships in the harbour were vast, rising above the warrens of sloping roofs like tailor’s dummies stuck with pins and veils of fabric. The cranes waded through the water and stood stock-still like gigantic fishing birds biding patiently for their prey.

The air was soft and cool, with just a tang of the approaching autumn in it. Cathy loved the reek of the sea in her nostrils. She found it made her nostalgic for her childhood, when she and her ma had lived closer to the shore, before she moved to live on the farm estate at Morwick. She shook her head to clear it of nostalgic thoughts. She simply had to concentrate on her present circumstances. Dwelling on the past would only send her into gloom and despair. She blew on a hot fatty chip and crunched it hard.

‘You were right. These are the best I’ve ever had!’

Mrs Sturrock cackled. ‘Swetty Betty has a secret recipe, but round here we all say her secret is that she never ever changes the fat or cleans out her fryer. That’s why everything fries so dark and delicious.’

Cathy pulled a face but found she didn’t care. The fish was fresh and melting in her mouth. Her insides groaned at the taste of it. She hadn’t had a proper meal in several days. ‘Thanks so much for this, Mrs Strurrock,’ she said, through a huge mouthful. ‘You’re a lifesaver.’

The old woman was studying her keenly. ‘You know, I’ve not got a gift. Not like my old friend Winnie does. Now, she has a real and genuine gift for presentiment.’

‘What’s that?’

‘Hm? Oh, it’s what Winnie also calls prognostication. But that’s just putting long words to things in order to sound grand. What she’s gifted at is getting glimpses of the future. For getting a feel of how things will turn out.’

Cathy smiled. ‘Well, I could do with some of that. I haven’t got a clue what I’ll do next.’

‘Well, like I say, I don’t have our Winnie’s gifts,’ said Mrs Sturrock modestly. ‘But I do have some few talents in that direction.’

‘Oh?’ Cathy was only half listening, really, relishing her chips and the sharpness of the vinegar she’d lavished on them.

‘And do you know what I can see?’ Mrs Sturrock’s eyes crinkled up as she focused her thoughts, with a chunk of cod halfway up to her mouth. ‘I can see you living here for a very long time. Yes, I can see you getting to be a woman who lives right here on this hillside … why, most of her life, just like I have done. I think you’ve found your true place in the world, Cathy. That’s what I see when I open my psychical eye. I see a future for you here in the Sixteen Streets.’

Cathy’s own eyes went wide. ‘Well! Thank you … I mean, that’s nice to hear. I’m not sure though – this is only the first place I’ve fetched up. I thought about maybe going in for work at that biscuit factory down the hill …’

Mrs Sturrock closed her eyes again and tried to concentrate as she chewed and smacked her lips. ‘Hmm, I don’t see you working in the factory, no. I see … something different. Something more … glamorous! I see people looking at you, and you all dressed up.’

‘Dressed up!’ Cathy laughed, thinking of the ragged dress she was wearing. ‘Am I going on the stage?’

Mrs Sturrock pursed her greasy lips. ‘It doesn’t do to mock the talents of those gifted,’ she warned, and Cathy felt reprimanded. ‘You’d do well to heed my words. You belong in this place, Cathy. You must give your heart and soul to the people here. Do you understand?’

Cathy shrugged. ‘I don’t really, no. But it’s nice of you to try to read my future. Do you do tea leaves, as well? The cook in the big house where I used to … work, she did tea leaves but she was always wrong, every time …’

Mrs Sturrock glanced at her like she thought tea leaves were a very low-class kind of thing. She carried on chewing and the two of them sat like that in companionable silence, watching the skies above the docks changing colours. Then all of a sudden Mrs Sturrock was crumpling up her greasy newspaper and jumping up from the park bench. ‘Righty-oh. I’ve made. . .