Read Online Saturday's Child by Ruth Hamilton - Free Book Online Page A

you.’
    ‘It isn’t.’
    ‘I mean . . . I mean you didn’t ask to be born looking like a film star.’
    It was Magsy’s turn to laugh. ‘Hardly a film star, although I do get more than my fair share of attention. But I am so sorry if I have offended you.’
    He perked up. ‘Then you will come out with me?’
    They turned into Prudence Street. ‘Thank you,’ she said, ‘but no.’
    Magsy retrieved Beth from a tangle of Higginses who were playing cowboys and Indians, though all the cowboys were girls and poor Thomas was the sole Indian, his face caked in gravy browning, a
few paper feathers in the blond curls. In the middle of total chaos, Sal sat on one of the beds knitting at a rate of knots. Magsy surveyed the scene before dragging a reluctant Beth out of the
Higgins house and into their own.
    The silence was a blessing. While Beth drank a cup of milk and chewed on a shive of bread and jam, while she found her rosary and missal, Magsy took off her work clothes and put them in soak.
She sent her daughter to church, dressed herself in skirt, blouse and apron, made a fire, brewed tea and threw together a meal of eggs and bacon. When Beth had returned and the food had
disappeared, when crockery and cutlery sat and waited for another kettleful of water, the pair got to work.
    This was Magsy’s other job and she took it very seriously. From the age of three, Beth had been reading and writing. Now nine, she played her part at school, never appearing too
knowledgeable, though her private studies had now taken her far beyond her own mother’s abilities. The child opened a book, grinned broadly. ‘You got it, Mam.’
    ‘Yes, I did indeed. I must take it back, though, because it’s a valuable book.’
    Beth opened the cover carefully, peeled back a layer of tissue. ‘This is the nervous system,’ she explained to Magsy, ‘all the blue lines are the major nerves in our bodies. We
have hundreds of miles of these. They allow us to feel heat, cold, pain and physical pleasure. We use them to distinguish textures, too. Otherwise, if blindfolded, we would not know the difference
between a brick and a block of wood. Each sense adds to the others – sight, hearing, touch, smell and taste are all complementary to each other. The human body is amazing,’ Beth
concluded.
    Magsy swallowed, wondered how on earth this child’s emotional self was going to keep pace with her intellect. A stranger coming in would wonder what was going on. A nine-year-old lecturing
an adult on the subject of physical pleasures? ‘Like when we stroke a cat – that kind of pleasure?’ asked Magsy.
    Beth, already lost among diagrams, simply nodded. She had reached the part that explained physical movement, which also depended on nerves.
    This was how it had become. Magsy still sat in on the studies, but roles had been reversed slowly, steadily, until she was now the student. But this system had its compensations, because, in
explaining the intricacies of anatomy to her mother, Beth compounded her own learning by translating it and passing it on. She was going to be a doctor. ‘If we lose our sight,’ Beth
explained, ‘other senses become more acute to make up for the loss.’
    Magsy nodded – she had heard about that.
    ‘But the loss of nerves can be dangerous. We need to feel pain, Mammy. Pain is the first warning that something is wrong. It is a message to the brain asking for help.’
    ‘Miss Hulme can see for miles,’ commented Magsy, ‘or so they say. It seems the deafness has made the eyes work harder.’
    ‘Smelly Nellie,’ murmured Beth.
    There, thought a relieved Magsy, that was the child speaking. Inside the miniature adult, there remained a junior school girl who played cowboys and Indians, skipping rope, hopscotch and
marbles. There was a huge collection of the latter in a jar on the sideboard. When it came to marbles, Beth O’Gara was legendary. Many boys in the area came begging for swaps, since
Beth’s