‘You have to go home, Miss Murphy. It’s your mother . . .’ The boss, a balding self-satisfied man in sharp suits, came straight to her desk. Ruby didn’t reply, she’d known something was wrong, very wrong, all day. Instead, she grabbed her coat and handbag and practically ran from the office. The bus couldn’t move fast enough for her. As she ran from the bus stop to the house she almost knocked Bobby flying.
‘Slow down, Rube,’ Bobby said, though his face looked a mirror of the fear she was feeling too. They entered the house together, neither knowing what they would face.
They opened the door. There was, at first, no sound. Ruby’s pulse was hammering in her brain. Her sense of unease grew by the second. ‘Mum, you there? You all right, Mum? Is little George nappin’?’
Then Ruby stopped. She could just make out a muffled sobbing sound. Without hesitation, she ran up the stairs two at a time, Bobby following on her heels. Was George OK? Was Mum OK?
Ruby burst into her parents’ room. The cot was empty. Next to it, Cathy lay on the bed, moaning and crying. Ruby’s heart stopped. Her mouth was dry. She almost screamed her question. ‘Is it George? Is little George dead? Speak to me, Mum!’
Cathy shook her head and Ruby felt a swooping sense of relief. It was so strong her legs almost buckled and she sat down heavily. ‘What’s wrong, Mum? Please tell us, what’s goin’ on?’
Cathy wiped her eyes, which were red raw. She struggled up, saying over and over, ‘Oh God, it isn’t true.’
Ruby was as still as an animal that knew it was hunted. Bobby sat down next to her. ‘Mum, please tell us what’s wrong.’
‘Oh God, I don’t know how to tell ya. I don’t know how . . .’ Cathy shook her head, her voice a whisper.
‘You must,’ Ruby said, her voice firm.
‘You must, Mum,’ echoed Bobby.
Cathy struggled up and wiped her face, though tears still ran down it in torrents. Finally she spoke. ‘It’s yer dad. Your dad is dead. He’s dead . . .’
The air sucked out of the room, or so it seemed. In that instant, Ruby’s safe family world shattered, shards of it piercing every part of her body and mind.
‘Dad’s dead?’ was all she could say and her mum nodded, unable to speak.
‘What ’appened?’ Ruby wanted to know every detail as if to make herself understand the unthinkable. Bobby placed his head in his hands and sobbed.
Cathy burst into fresh weeping, and Ruby fought hard with herself to contain her emotions and the frustration of not knowing.
‘He . . . he walked under a crane that was shiftin’ a load of machinery parts. Somethin’ went wrong, I don’t understand it as he knew never to walk under those cranes, but today he did. The crane driver didn’t see him and that was that. Louie was buried under six foot of metal.’
The words tore a hole in Ruby’s heart that she realised would never be mended. Her dad, always urging them to be honest, to look after each other, to be safe, did something as reckless as walk under the cranes that were notorious for dropping their loads early. It didn’t make sense. Nothing made sense. Louie was dead and their lives had changed in a heartbeat.
CHAPTER 10
The next day, Ruby, Cathy and Bobby sat at the kitchen table, still in shock, their faces wretched with grief.
Louie had been dead for less than twenty-four hours but it felt like their world had collapsed. When the telephone rang, Ruby got up to answer it.
‘Yes, who is it?’ she said woodenly, her mind still blank with shock, her brain half asleep due to the wakeful night she’d spent.
‘Hello there. Is that Mrs Murphy?’ a voice that sounded rather more posh than she was used to hearing at home said.
‘No, but it’s her daughter. You can speak to me, I’m Ruby Murphy.’
‘This is Mr Anderson from the mortuary. Would you kindly let us know which funeral parlour you need the body of Mr Murphy to be transferred to?’ the voice continued.
Ruby hadn’t a clue how to respond. She knew funeral parlours cost a lot of money.
‘Please hold for a minute,’ she said, putting her hand over the receiver to stop her conversation being overheard.
‘Mum, I’m so sorry but it’s the mortuary. They’re askin’ where we’re sendin’ Dad’s body . . .’
Even the words ‘body’ and ‘mortuary’ sounded so surreal, as if they had no place in their lives. Cathy turned her distraught face up to meet Ruby’s apologetic gaze.
‘It’s all right, darlin’. Tell them I’ll be in touch, as we don’t know about the arrangement yet.’
Ruby relayed her mother’s words, sounding confident but inside feeling suddenly sick. They couldn’t afford to send Louie to an undertaker’s. They had barely enough to live on. Cathy was in no shape to go back to work, and she and Bobby didn’t make much. Where on earth would they find the money for their dad’s funeral?
Ruby swivelled round as she heard the worst sound in the world – that of her mum bursting into tears.
‘How can we pay for a funeral?’ Cathy wailed. Her head was in her hands. ‘Your father worked his whole life yet we never ’ad enough to save for one. He’ll have a pauper’s burial and I can’t bear it.’
Bobby was sitting opposite, his face reflecting Ruby’s sense of helplessness. A pauper’s funeral, was considered a shameful end, especially for a working person. They called it the nine o’clock trot because they’d take the paupers to be cremated at 9 a.m. before the paid-for funerals took place. Everyone would think they didn’t care one wit for Louie. People in the East End saved their whole lives to have a ‘proper’ send-off involving carriages
