A Little Learning. Anne Bennett
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fell on Janet.
One day the doctor called not long after Janet had got in from school. She’d cooked tea for Duncan, the twins and herself, prepared a tray that she was going to take up to her mother and was getting her father’s dinner ready to cook while she tried to stop the twins killing one another. The doctor watched her for a few minutes, then remarked, ‘You’re a splendid girl, Janet, and I know you’re a grand help, but don’t work yourself too hard. Get Duncan to help you.’
‘Duncan, Doctor?’ Janet said in amazement. ‘He’s a boy.’
‘I’m aware of that,’ Dr Black said with a smile.
‘Well, boys don’t do anything, do they?’
‘What about your father?’
Janet stared at the doctor for a minute, but didn’t speak. He gave a grim smile and asked, ‘Aren’t you going to point out that he’s a man?’ Without waiting for a reply, he said, ‘Tell your father I’ll be round to see him this evening after surgery. I think we need to have a chat.’
When Janet reported to Auntie Breda what the doctor had told her, she said, ‘About time someone spoke to him. You two better come to me for your tea. I’ll ask Mammy to see to Betty and your dad and get Conner and Noel to bed, but you two had better be right out of the road. Bloody good job it’s Friday and I haven’t got a job to go to.’
After their tea at Auntie Breda’s, Duncan and Janet were sent into the living room to look after Linda while Breda talked to Peter in the kitchen. Duncan was disgusted.
‘Boys don’t look after babies,’ he said. ‘Can’t I go out to play with my mates?’
‘No, you can’t,’ Auntie Breda told him. ‘I’m not having you hanging around your house. As for boys not looking after babies, you’ll probably have your own one day.’
‘Yeah,’ Duncan said, ‘but that will be my wife’s job, won’t it?’
‘You have a lot to learn, young Duncan,’ Breda said. ‘The modern woman and what she wants will be like a slap in the face to you and those like you. In this house, you’ll start by doing what you’re bloody well told.’
Still sulking, Duncan allowed himself to be propelled into the living room, where he kicked disconsolately at the skirting board and said to Janet:
‘I don’t know why they’ve sent us round here. It isn’t as if we don’t know what Dr Black wants to see Dad about, is it?’
‘Isn’t it?’ said Janet. She’d picked up that the doctor wasn’t pleased with her dad, but she didn’t know what it was all about.
‘You really are stupid sometimes, our Janet,’ Duncan snapped. ‘He’s going to tell our dad to stop doing it … you know …’ He looked at Janet’s puzzled face and burst out, ‘Well, they don’t want more babies, do they?’
At that moment, Breda’s voice came clearly from the kitchen.
‘Well, someone had to speak to him, Peter, and he’d never listen to me. Someone had to tell Bert Travers to keep his bleeding hands off our Betty and put them in the washing-up bowl more often.’
Peter murmured a reply but neither of the children heard it. They picked up Auntie Breda’s voice more easily, high-pitched as it was with indignation.
‘Well, I don’t trust him. He might do what the doc says now, but as soon as that baby’s born, he’ll be back to groping.’
‘See,’ Duncan said with satisfaction.
‘Ssh,’ Janet cautioned, for Breda was still talking.
‘He’s a man like all the rest, only after one thing. I’m getting her down that clinic, get her sorted out, as soon as that kid’s born.’
‘What does she mean?’ whispered Janet.
‘Oh, it’s just women’s talk,’ Duncan said airily. He wasn’t going to admit to not knowing.
But Janet knew Duncan didn’t understand. She didn’t either, but she pieced together what she did know. According to Auntie Breda, Dr Black was going to tell her dad he couldn’t touch her mother any more. That would mean he couldn’t kiss her, because he couldn’t do that without touching. Not that her parents went in for that sort of thing much, but she supposed they did in bed. There were lots of things people did in bed that she wasn’t sure of. Groping sounded pretty awful, and Janet wondered what it was. Her father obviously used to do it to her mother, because Auntie Breda said he’d be back to it. That was probably it. This groping was the thing they did that brought the babies, and Dr Black was going to tell her dad there was to be no more of it.
Bert Travers was very subdued when the children went back after Sarah had sent word that the doctor had left. He’d been soundly told off for allowing his daughter to become a drudge.
‘Considering how sick your wife is, I’m surprised you’re not giving more of a hand,’ the doctor had continued. ‘After all, Janet’s not old enough to be doing everything, is she?’
Bert hadn’t even really been aware of it. He never thought about what Betty did. He knew that everything got done, but she’d never complained. He’d never considered it hard work. After all, he did the hard day’s work in the factory and he wasn’t keen on starting again when he came home.
‘Your wife is fretting upstairs,’ Dr Black said. ‘She says Janet looks pasty and run-down. Worry is the last thing she needs. No wonder I can’t get her blood pressure down. Go on in the selfish way you have been and you’ll have a sick daughter as well as a sick wife, and then where will you be?’
Bert felt suitably chastened. He hadn’t realised, he said. He’d do more, and draft in young Duncan to give a hand.
But the doctor hadn’t finished. ‘While we are on the subject of selfishness, you do understand that this child must be the last?’
Bert gulped. ‘We hadn’t intended this one, Doc, not after the twins, you know.’
‘Intending is one thing, making sure is quite another,’ Dr Black said grimly. ‘You must ensure, if you wish to continue marital relations with your wife, that you take precautions.’
Bert stared at the doctor until he snapped irritably, ‘You know what I’m talking about, man, they’re on sale in all the barber’s shops.’
‘I’m not using them things. What do you bleeding well take me for?’ Bert gasped.
‘Well, I hope you’re just a fool and not a cruel idiot into the bargain,’ Dr Black said sternly. ‘I’m telling you straight, Betty has had a hard pregnancy and she has the classic signs of a hard birth. She’ll not go through another one totally unscathed and I would be worried for her very survival. Take precautions or curb your natural desires, the choice is yours.’
‘Some bloody choice,’ Bert said gloomily.
‘Well, I’ll leave you to decide,’ the doctor said, walking to the door. There he turned and said, ‘About young Conner and Noel …’
‘What about them?’
‘They seem to have boundless energy and Janet is hardly able to control them. Your wife will have her hands full in the summer with a new baby as well, and she’ll need to rest at times. They could start at the Gunter Road nursery in September. There is a waiting list, but I do have some influence and I could put in a word.’
‘I don’t know whether Betty would like them to go to a nursery,’ Bert said doubtfully.
‘Talk to her,’ the doctor said. ‘Point out the advantages. No need to make a decision yet. I’ll say good evening to you, Mr Travers, and I’ll be along on Monday to see your wife.’
Bloody doctor! Bert said to himself as he watched the doctor’s retreating back. Bloody interfering sod!
‘Bert!