At Home by the Sea

by Pam Weaver

  Her mother nodded. ‘I told him I didn’t want to be his wife anymore and then I said something I wished I’d kept to myself. After that I just had to get away.’

  ‘And that was the winter of ’47, the coldest on record,’ Izzie said sagely.

  Doris nodded. ‘They said I would have died if Walter Patterson hadn’t found me.’

  ‘Oh Mum,’ Izzie said again.

  ‘I don’t remember a lot about it but they tell me I was in hospital for three weeks and then because of what your father told them, they sent me to Graylingwell,’ said Doris.

  Izzie frowned. ‘The mental hospital?’

  Her mother nodded again. ‘That’s why you and Linda went to stay with your Gran. It broke my heart.’

  Izzie slipped her arm around her mother’s shoulders. ‘Oh Mum, I’m so sorry.’ She kissed her cheek. ‘Why didn’t you talk to the police?’

  Her mother snorted bitterly. ‘What would be the point?’ she said. ‘It was a domestic. Nobody gets involved where a husband and wife are concerned.’

  ‘If only I had known,’ said Izzie brokenly.

  ‘You couldn’t have done anything my dear,’ said Doris. ‘Like I said, you were a little girl. I only wished you’d stayed with your Gran until you were all grown up.’

  ‘I wanted to but Dad came to take us back home,’ said Izzie. ‘Grandad was ill. Dad said he missed us but I wasn’t convinced. I reckon he only wanted us because I could go out to work and he needed someone to look after him.’

  ‘He finds it hard to show affection,’ said Doris. Her mother grasped Izzie’s arm. ‘Promise me you won’t stay at home and let him waste the whole of your life,’ she said earnestly. ‘You’re still very young and there’s a whole world out there waiting for you.’

  ‘But what about you Mum?’ said Izzie.

  Her mother smiled coyly. ‘I think you already know I’ve already met somebody very special.’

  ‘Mr Frobisher,’ said Izzie.

  Her mother nodded.

  ‘So did you and Dad get a divorce?’

  Doris chuckled. ‘No. Your dad refuses to divorce me. I think he wanted to punish me for rejecting him. Well, I may be what they call “living in sin”, but I’m happy.’

  The elephants and their trainer were leaving the beach now. Someone handed Doris a flyer for the circus and she glanced down. ‘Now that I’ve told you everything,’ she said quietly, ‘will you still consider bringing Linda one day?’

  ‘It would be easier if you came to Worthing.’

  Doris shook her head sadly. ‘I’m not allowed to, Izzie. After they put me away, I was only allowed out if I promised not to go back to Worthing. They said I was too unstable. Your dad made me sign a paper and if I do go back there, the authorities will make me go back to Graylingwell.’

  Izzie gasped. ‘Can they really do that?’

  ‘Your father sent me a solicitor’s letter telling me so.’

  Izzie sucked in her lips. ‘Then I will try and persuade Linda to come, Mum,’ she said gently. ‘Give it time, eh?’

  Doris nodded sadly. ‘Give it time,’ she repeated with a wan smile.

  Izzie looked thoughtful. ‘Mum, next time I come, can I meet your Mr Frobisher?’

  ‘Oh, that would make me so happy, dear.’ Doris grasped her hand and squeezed it. ‘He’s a wonderful man,’ she said, her eyes lighting up. ‘He’s no oil painting but I love him to bits.’

  ‘That doesn’t matter, does it?’ Izzie declared. ‘And if he makes you happy, I’d like to meet him.’

  Doris smiled wistfully. ‘All right, I’ll ask him.’

  Twenty-Three

  As the train pulled into Worthing station, Izzie leaned out of the window and waved frantically. ‘Esther, yoo-hoo.’

  She had arranged to meet her friend on her return from Brighton. Esther ran towards Izzie’s carriage and as she alighted onto the platform the two girls embraced warmly. ‘It’s so good to see you,’ Izzie cried.

  ‘You too,’ said Esther, slipping her arm through Izzie’s. ‘How was your mum?’

  ‘Fine,’ said Izzie. ‘Oh Esther, I have so much to tell you.’

  The two girls walked from the platform and showed their tickets to the collector; Izzie, her return ticket from Brighton, and Esther, her platform ticket. Then, stepping through the doors and into the Worthing sunshine, they turned right to walk towards the railway gates and eventually Esther’s home.

  ‘Well,’ said Izzie. ‘How do you like being a policewoman?’

  ‘It’s not quite what I expected,’ Esther said in a flat tone of voice. Her face was set.

  Izzie blinked in surprise. ‘Oh. I am disappointed for you. You were so excited about it. Is it truly awful?’

  ‘It’s not that,’ Esther admitted. ‘It’s the men. Sometimes they’re so annoying.’ They paused at the crossing gates while the London bound train pulled into the station. ‘Do you know,’ Esther continued, ‘the first day I got my posting, some big-headed sergeant at the desk asked me if I was a dyke or a bike and when I said neither everybody fell about laughing.’

  Izzie wasn’t sure why that was so funny but she didn’t like to say. Instead, she frowned and shook her head. ‘Can’t you do something about it?’

  ‘Absolutely nothing, so it would seem,’ Esther continued. ‘One girl on my course packed up and went home.’

  Izzie gasped. ‘Why?’

  ‘When she was standing in the queue in the canteen, one of the older men shoved his truncheon up her skirt,’ said Esther. ‘She went to the station sergeant to complain but he said if she was upset about a silly thing like that, she shouldn’t be a policewoman. He said she would get far worse from members of the public, so she left.’

  ‘But that’s awful,’ Izzie cried indignantly. ‘Why should they be allowed to behave like that? It’s disgusting.’

  They had reached Esther’s front gate. ‘Not a word to my mum,’ she whispered, ‘or she’ll be wanting me to come back home.’

  ‘You’re not going to let it stop you then?’

  ‘Absolutely not!’ cried Esther. ‘No jumped up little twerp is going to stop me doing what I want.’

  Izzie giggled.

  Esther’s mother was pleased to see Izzie again but apologised that she and her husband had to go out. ‘I’ve left half a crown on the kitchen table,’ she told her daughter. ‘Get yourselves some fish and chips from round the corner and make yourselves at home.’

  Twenty minutes later, they were tucking into two plates of cod and one portion of chips, which meant they’d managed to get a bottle of Coca-Cola to share as well. It was so good, Izzie was sure she was in food heaven.

  ‘So tell me about your new job,’ said Esther.

  Izzie told her about the Café Bellissimo and a little more about the girls she worked with. ‘Lucy is about the same age as me. She’s got two brothers, both called up and doing National Service. They’ve been sent over to Germany and they’re a bit homesick so she asked us all to be pen friends. Helen and Carol are writing to her brothers but they found me another chap.’

  ‘Ooh,’ said Esther, ‘what’s he like?’

  Izzie reached over and got his photo from her handbag. When she saw it, Esther nodded approvingly. ‘Not bad looking.’

  ‘I know it sounds awful to say it but I don’t think he’s very bright,’ Izzie went on. ‘He told me he comes from “Litter Hamton”, and he said he lived with his mum on a “bawt”.’

  ‘Oh dear, not good at spelling then,’ said Esther with a chuckle. ‘What about the other waitresses?’ she said. She was screwing up the newspaper their meal had been wrapped in and putting it in the bin. ‘What are they like?’

  ‘Helen and Carol? They’re nice girls. We go to the pictures together sometimes although I’ve told them I can’t do it very often.’

  ‘Because of your dad?’ said Esther, filling the kettle to make them some tea.

  ‘No,’ said Izzie with a grin, ‘because I’m doing a correspondence course.�
��

  ‘Izzie that’s great!’ cried Esther. ‘What are you studying?’

  ‘Journalism,’ said Izzie. ‘It costs an awful lot of money but they are letting me pay for it in monthly instalments.’

  Esther filled the tea pot. ‘How long will it take you?’

  ‘There are ten parts,’ said Izzie. ‘I wanted to do it quickly but I have to wait for my tutor to return my last assignment before I can send the next.’

  ‘I’m sure you’ll be fantastic,’ said Esther. ‘Are you enjoying it?’

  ‘Loving it.’ Izzie cupped her hands around the cup of tea her friend had given her. ‘My only problem now is getting a typewriter. They’re letting me do the lessons in long hand for the moment but I really have to find one soon.’

  Esther pulled a face. ‘Second hand shop? Rag and bone man?’

  ‘I’ve already tried,’ said Izzie. ‘I think I went to just about every second hand shop on the planet but no joy.’

  ‘How odd,’ said Esther. ‘You’d think they’d be ten a penny.’

  ‘There’s something else,’ Izzie began again. ‘Remember that newspaper cutting I wrote to you about?’

  ‘You asked your mother?’

  Izzie nodded. ‘But first I went to the offices of the Worthing Herald. Did you know, they have an archive of all of their newspapers?’

  ‘No I didn’t, but go on.’

  ‘It took me no time at all to look through the books and I found it. Then I had to go forward to see what happened next.’

  ‘Isobelle Baxter,’ Esther said with a giggle. ‘I may be a policewoman but you are definitely the detective.’ Izzie blushed and smiled shyly. ‘So go on, don’t keep me in suspense, what was it all about?’

  Once again Izzie opened her handbag. This time she drew out several different cuttings. ‘I’d be as excited as you,’ she said, ‘if it weren’t about my own father.’ Izzie spread the scraps of paper out. ‘The Herald have plenty of old copies,’ she continued, ‘and the woman at the desk managed to find this one for me.’

  Under the headline Tragic Death there was a picture of two boys, one holding a jam jar containing a small minnow. ‘Just hours after this picture was taken,’ Esther read, ‘Gary Sayers, aged five, was dead and his cousin, Raymond Perryman, was seriously ill. Last night, market trader William Baxter was arrested for an offence against the Ministry of Food regulations. It is believed that he knowingly sold Manufacturing meat as Ration meat. The meat had been condemned as contaminated. Baxter was remanded in prison until his trial.’

  The second cutting under the first read, Market trader sentenced to five years in prison with hard labour. Esther glanced up with a look of surprise.

  ‘So your father was in prison?’

  Izzie nodded. ‘My mother always said he was in prison,’ she said bitterly, ‘but she led me and Linda to believe that he was a prisoner-of-war.’

  ‘And Mrs Sayers is Gary’s mother?’

  Izzie nodded.

  ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘There’s nothing I can do, is there,’ Izzie said with another shrug. ‘As shocking as it is, it’s ancient history now.’

  ‘And your mother?’

  ‘I told her what I’d found out,’ said Izzie, ‘and she cried. Esther, my dad had her locked up in a mental home. There’s a court order forbidding her from coming to Worthing.’

  ‘Crumbs,’ said Esther.

  ‘At least now I understand why she doesn’t want to come back to him.’

  ‘It was wrong, yes,’ Esther began again, ‘but surely it was just a ghastly mistake.’

  ‘Apparently not,’ said Izzie, shaking her head. ‘My mother told me that my father knew the risk and that he took a chance. That’s why she’s still angry with him.’

  Esther laid her hand on Izzie’s. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she said. ‘It must be awful for you.’

  Izzie nodded. ‘But far worse for poor Mrs Sayers.’ The atmosphere had become sombre. ‘Sorry,’ Izzie said suddenly, ‘let’s talk about something else; something a bit happier.’

  Esther nodded.

  ‘I didn’t tell you, did I?’ Izzie began again, this time a little brighter, ‘Mrs Shilling came into Café Bellissimo.’

  ‘Never,’ Esther said with a gasp. ‘So did she apologise for what she put you through?’

  Izzie laughed sardonically. ‘You must be joking.’ She told her friend what happened and Esther laughed.

  ‘What’s your boss like?’

  ‘Mr Semadini?’ said Izzie looking away. ‘He’s a lovely man.’

  ‘Half a mo,’ Esther teased. ‘I can see something in your eyes. You’re a bit in love with him, aren’t you?’

  ‘Don’t be daft,’ said Izzie scornfully. ‘He’s years older than me. He’s at least twenty-eight. I don’t suppose he’s even noticed me.’

  Her friend smiled knowingly as Izzie felt her cheeks heating up.

  *

  Back home in Chandos Road, Izzie was alone in the house. She had no idea where her father was and even less idea where her sister was. Linda came through the front door just as Izzie was finishing her wash in the bathroom.

  ‘Hello.’ Her sister’s call seemed animated and happy.

  Izzie put her towel onto the rail. Now seemed as good a time as any to tell her about Mum. ‘Nice time?’ Izzie called out in reply as Linda came into the kitchen.

  ‘The best,’ said Linda. ‘I went to that new coffee bar at the back of the Old Town Hall again.’

  ‘The Cave?’ said Izzie. She was about to add, be careful, as she’d heard the girls in the café saying it didn’t have a good reputation, but she bit the words back just in time. ‘Did you go with John?’

  Linda nodded dreamily. ‘They’ve got a skiffle group and they serve really cool coffee in special glass cups. It’s very expensive.’

  ‘Sounds fun,’ said Izzie, putting the toothbrush into her mouth. ‘And how are you liking your new job?’

  Linda shrugged. ‘I left.’

  This was Linda’s fourth job since leaving school. She had worked in a small dress shop but all at once her employer didn’t require her services anymore. Izzie guessed she’d been up to her old tricks again but luckily her employer didn’t press charges. From there, she’d gone to work in a shoe shop where her manager was a bit of a dragon. Then she was an usherette in the cinema for a while and now she’d left her job behind the counter of a shoe repair shop.

  Izzie must have looked a little surprised because Linda said, ‘I’ll soon get something else. And anyway, I won’t need a job for long. I shall probably get married before I’m twenty.’

  Izzie turned her head away to spit out the toothpaste. What an absolute waste! Didn’t Linda want to do anything with her life? Their father had let her stay on at school so that she could go to college but she’d bunked off too many times and the headmistress had asked her to leave just before Christmas 1951. Izzie would have jumped at just such a chance but Linda didn’t seem to care that here it was, the middle of May, and she’d just quit yet another job. How did she get away with it? And as for getting married, once the wedding was over, Izzie was willing to bet real money that her sister wouldn’t even like being married. She hated housework and when the babies came along … Izzie rinsed out her mouth and patted it dry with the towel.

  ‘Linda, there’s something I’ve got to tell you. When you’ve had your wash, come to my bedroom.’

  ‘What is it? Something horrible?’

  Izzie shook her head. ‘I’ll tell you when you’re ready for bed.’

  Linda knocked softly on Izzie’s bedroom door about fifteen minutes later. She was in her nightdress and Izzie was sitting up in bed. ‘Okay,’ said Linda, ‘what is it?’

  ‘I hope you won’t be too upset,’ Izzie began, ‘but for several months now, I’ve been seeing Mum.’

  Linda lowered herself onto the edge of her sister’s bed. ‘I know.’

  Izzie’s eyes widened. ‘You know! But how?’ Then the realisatio
n dawned. ‘Oh, don’t tell me. You were snooping about in my room again and you found something.’

  ‘One of her letters,’ said Linda, completely unabashed.

  Izzie sighed. ‘I do wish you would stop doing that. What gives you the right to go through my things?’

  Linda shrugged. ‘I was looking for a handkerchief.’

  Izzie didn’t believe her for one minute but she wasn’t about to get into some sort of distracting argument. ‘Mum wants to meet you.’

  Linda said nothing.

  ‘I know you’re angry with her for going off like that,’ Izzie went on, ‘but you should hear her side of the story. Mum didn’t have a choice.’

  Linda looked up sharply and Izzie could tell she wasn’t convinced. ‘I was just as sceptical as you are right now,’ said Izzie, ‘but now that I’ve met her I believe what she says. She really does love you Linda and she wants us to be friends again.’

  ‘What about Dad?’

  ‘She’s not interested in Dad, but she wants to see us.’ Linda remained silent so Izzie ploughed on. ‘If it’s any consolation, I don’t think Dad wants to be with her again anyway. He’s got someone else.’

  ‘I know,’ said Linda. ‘He’s had several girlfriends already.’

  Izzie blinked in surprise. ‘What?’

  ‘I’ve seen them,’ said Linda. ‘He spends a lot of time with them in that back room in his shop. I caught him at it once,’ she added with a smirk. ‘I popped in on my way home from school and he had his trousers around his ankles. He tried to make out she was the district nurse and she’d come to look at a boil on the top of his leg. Didn’t fool me though and I got a quid out of him to keep quiet.’

  The two girls stared at each other for a second before bursting out laughing. They heard the front door open and slam shut.

  ‘I’d better go,’ whispered Linda.

  ‘So can I tell Mum you’ll meet her?’ Izzie said softly.

  Linda hesitated by the door but only for a second. ‘I’ll think about it.’

  Twenty-Four

  True to his word, Giacomo had made the Café Bellissimo the most popular eating house in Worthing. Every day was busy. People were willing to queue for a table and he often had customers waiting in the street to come in. It had taken a while but he’d finally got permission to have a few tables and chairs outside, so long as he didn’t block the thoroughfare, and of course that led to even more customers. By June he had taken on another two waitresses and Umberto and Benito were working flat out in the kitchen.