Daisychain Summer

  He had wanted to leave; wanted not to leave. Inside him, just where his heart should be, sadness lay like a cold, heavy stone; yet his stomach churned with excitement. This was the first day of the great adventure, yet it was the first day without Daisy.

  Things passed quickly, then. Mam hearing him lighting the fire because she, too, had been awake; Mam coming downstairs. He and Mam eating bread and jam and drinking tea and checking that his passport was in his coat pocket and checking the mantel clock with his wristwatch because the minutes were ticking off much, much too quickly.

  Then the cars coming and Mam, white-faced, holding him tightly, taking his face in gentle hands, saying, ‘God bless you, son. Look after yourself …’

  And he, trying not to look back because Mam said he mustn’t, even though he knew she was still there, watching him out of sight; then peering through the trees towards Keeper’s Cottage, wondering if Daisy were awake, knowing she was not because there was no light in her room.

  And now, at Holdenby station, the five of them surrounded by luggage and the porter waiting importantly with a trolley, asking them to stand back if they pleased, as the signal fell with a clunk.

  ‘It’s coming,’ Kitty sighed. ‘Oh goodbye, dear old Holdenby and goodbye everybody.’ She had looked dramatically at her father, her glance telling him he was real mean not wanting to come over at Christmas as they had always done. ‘Can you hear it yet?’

  ‘No.’ Keth whispered, wanting her not to talk to him because Daisy would surely be sending him her love and he wanted to hear her voice in his mind, his heart.

  ‘Say, Keth,’ Bas smiled. ‘Got a message for you. Tell me – which side of the compartment will Brattocks Wood be?’

  ‘The side farthest from the door – why?’

  ‘Then guess you’d better sit there. Daisy said you were to look out. She said you’d know where.’

  ‘But of course!’ The train ran alongside Brattocks Wood for a little way, about half a mile out of the station. The far end of the wood, it was, not far from the elm trees in a little clearing. ‘What did she say, Bas? When did she tell you?’

  ‘Yesterday, when the Clan was at Rowangarth, saying goodbye. Said I wasn’t to forget.’

  Daisy. He would see her again. Last night they had been sad and he’d walked away from her in despair. But Daisy understood, loved him. Now it would all come right.

  The little local train clanked and hissed importantly, then came to a squealing stop at the platform. Keth and Bas supervised the loading of the large luggage into the guard’s van; Albert helped his wife and daughter into the compartment. Then Kitty said, ‘Here y’are, Keth. This end. Now all of us – get ready to wave!’

  The stationmaster blew his whistle, waved his green flag. The train jerked, juddered, took up a slow, slipping rhythm, then pulled and strained, gained speed slowly.

  Holdenby behind them and ahead of them, trees. Brattocks Wood where Daisy would be, at the very end of Rowangarth lane.

  And there she was; Daisy, with the labradors, smiling, waving a handkerchief.

  Keth leaned out calling, ‘Love you, Daisy!’ He knew she hadn’t heard him over the noise of the train, but he’d said it and she had seen him say it and his going-away memory would be of Daisy, there when he had so needed her to be; Daisy, smiling. All over in a few seconds, but she had been there!

  ‘Gee,’ Bas smiled, ‘that was real nice.’

  ‘Romantic …’ Kitty sighed.

  Mr and Mrs Sutton were smiling; the whole world was smiling. Keth Purvis was going to America and when he came home in the summer of ’forty, Daisy would be waiting for him and loving him and wanting him, still.

  ‘Nice,’ Keth grinned, then leaned back in his seat, eyes closed, remembering Daisy. And life was all at once good.

  40

  ‘Come in, do.’ Alice returned Julia’s kiss. ‘Where on earth have you been? Seen neither hide nor hair of you all week.’ She pushed the kettle further into the coals, reaching for the teapot. ‘You’ll surely have time to stay for a cup?’

  ‘I’ve been busy planning a party – mother’s seventy-eighth, by the way; I’ve just been to Nathan’s and yes please, I’d love a cuppa.’

  ‘Nathan’s?’ She was spending quite a bit of time at the vicarage, these days. Lucky they were cousins so the village couldn’t read too much into her comings and goings. ‘Again?’

  ‘Nathan’s. Again,’ Julia smiled mysteriously. ‘You’ll be coming to mother’s do? I’d thought to have a tea party, this year. Don’t want anything that’s going to go on too long. She gets a bit tired, these days.’

  ‘She’s all right?’ Alice looked up sharply.

  ‘Course she is. Just a little slower, that’s all. How’s your lot?’

  ‘Tom’s fine.’ Julia wasn’t going to volunteer anything, then, about Nathan. ‘He’s at the rearing field, checking up. It’s a busy time for him, with all the young chicks.’

  ‘And Daisy?’

  ‘Missing Keth – but then, she would be. Keth’s always been there, ever since she can remember. She’s taking her shorthand and typing exams, soon, but you’ll know that. Sorry she isn’t in; took it into her head to call on Reuben.

  ‘And Keth’s fine. Letters coming regularly. Don’t mind the kitchen, do you? I haven’t lit the parlour fire, yet.’

  ‘The kitchen’s fine.’ Julia pulled out a chair, leaning her elbows on the table. She looked so much more relaxed these days, Alice considered. Better by far since she’d been to Andrew’s grave and started to face facts a bit.

  ‘By the way, I’ve got a bit of news from you, hot from the vicarage.’ Julia poured milk into the cups, spooning in sugar. ‘Thought you should be the first to know – after mother, of course. Nathan’s –’

  ‘Mam!’ The kitchen door burst open and Daisy stood there, gasping for breath as if she had run all the way from the almshouses. ‘Did you hear it on the wireless? It’s Hitler! He’s marched into Austria!’

  ‘Oh, my Lord!’

  ‘You’re sure?’ Julia’s voice was sharp.

  ‘Of course I’m sure. I wouldn’t make up a thing like that. Turn the wireless on, Mam?’

  ‘Too late.’ Alice glanced at the mantel clock. ‘News’ll be over, now. So tell me – what exactly did it say?’

  ‘Said the German armies had marched into Austria and that half the population had turned out to greet them. Said the Viennese were jubilant.’

  ‘Well, they would be. There’s a strong German element, there. Austria was on the Kaiser’s side, in the war,’ Julia nodded, lips pursed.

  ‘So is there going to be trouble?’ Alice whispered.

  ‘I doubt it. Hitler’s been going on lately about more living space for Germany. Maybe now he’ll be satisfied.’

  ‘So you don’t think it’s serious, Aunt Julia?’ Daisy’s eyes were wide with concern.

  ‘No, dear. I don’t think it’s so much an invasion as an annexing, really.’

  ‘And we’ll not interfere? We’ll let them get on with it?’

  ‘No reason why not, Daisy. They weren’t firing shots or anything, were they?’

  ‘N-no. Seemed by what I heard that Hitler wasn’t exactly unwelcome.’

  ‘There you are, then. Now just settle down, lovey, and get your homework finished,’ Alice soothed. ‘When your Dada gets back, we’ll ask him about it. Like your Aunt Julia says, it mightn’t be all that serious. Off you go upstairs. I’ve lit the oil stove in your bedroom.’ Alice closed the staircase door. ‘What do you think, Julia? Really think, I mean,’ she asked when they were alone.

  ‘I don’t know. Didn’t want to upset the child, but it looks as if Anthony Eden was right – Churchill, too.’

  ‘Mr Eden resigning from the government, you mean, because he thinks we’re letting Hitler get away with too much? You think taking over Austria is too much, then?’

  ‘As long as he stops there and doesn’t get any more ideas, I suppose we can learn to live with it. What do
you want us to do, Alice – tell him to stop it, or else?’

  ‘You know I don’t!’

  ‘Sorry, love. And can you blame us for getting a bit jittery when Germany really is throwing its weight about a bit?’

  ‘Wouldn’t you, if you were Hitler and you’d got all those tanks and planes and soldiers?’

  ‘And what about the Duke of Windsor and his woman?’ Julia flung. ‘Remember, they went to Germany in October, to Berchtesgaden. If that isn’t kow-towing, I don’t know what is! Remember that picture in the papers and Mrs Simpson smiling all over her face, shaking Hitler’s hand?’

  ‘She’s the Duchess of Windsor now …’

  ‘I don’t care if she’s the Queen of Hearts, neither of them should have gone! He doesn’t represent Britain, now. He should keep his nose out of things and especially out of Germany!’

  ‘All right – they shouldn’t have gone, but it’s all water under the bridge, now. Tom reckons if Hitler really intends making trouble, he’ll go for Russia.’

  ‘Then I hope Tom is right. Just as long as this country keeps out of it, that’s all. Last time, we went in because Belgium wanted to stay neutral. If it happens again, surely we’ll have learned our lesson? And anyway, the French are building those defences. The Germans won’t be able to march into France, like they did last time. The Maginot Line, isn’t it called? They say it’s really strong – guns, tank traps. You name it …’

  ‘Hitler has built one an’ all.’ The Siegfried Line, they were calling it. No need for trenches, if it happened again, Alice sighed. French and German fortifications each facing the other and a ready-made No Man’s Land between them. ‘This tea has gone cold. Better make another pot. Tom’ll be in, soon, and he’ll want a sup. And Julia – you were going to tell me something when Daisy came in – something about Nathan?’

  ‘Oh, yes! Don’t say anything just yet, but it’ll be common knowledge, soon. Not before time, mother said when I told her, but she’s very pleased, for all that. Nathan has got a curate, at last.’

  ‘A curate!’ A curate, and she had thought – she’d been sure – that Nathan had proposed to Julia. ‘I’ll put the kettle on …’ There really wasn’t anything else to say.

  ‘That’s enough!’ Cook glared at the wireless. ‘Turn it off, Tilda. Life’s depressing enough without having Hitler morning, noon and night. That man is worse’n the Kaiser!’ At least the Kaiser had been a gentleman.

  ‘All right, Mrs Shaw. Don’t get yourself upset. There’s nothing you and me can do about it if the Germans want to take over Austria. We should mind our own business, not get entangled with that lot in Europe. Look where it landed us, in 1914!’ Mary sniffed.

  ‘Mind our own business, eh? And who says so?’

  ‘Will says so. There’s no need to stick our nose in, he said. What happens over there needn’t concern us. We’ve got the Channel between us and them and we should be glad of it!’

  ‘That Will Stubbs of yours ought to be in Parliament, he’s got so much to say!’

  ‘Will is a well-read man,’ Mary countered, nose in the air. ‘There’s things going on in Germany if folk but knew it, he said, that would make your hair curl! You’ve only got to read the newspapers.’

  ‘Newspapers!’ Cook still harboured a sneaking mistrust of Fleet Street.

  ‘Yes, Mrs Shaw. Will was only talking about them the other night – the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, I mean. Said if the newspapers hadn’t got hold of it, none of us would’ve been any the wiser about him and her hobnobbing with Hitler.’

  ‘He has a perfect right,’ Tilda said mutinously, ‘to go where he pleases.’ Tilda Tewk still loved her Prince of Wales, was ready to clasp him to her bosom the minute his skinny wife divorced him.

  ‘Not to Germany. Not when they were our enemies. Will was there, in the trenches. He knows what the Kaiser’s lot got up to. And serving king and country entitles him to an opinion if you’ll pardon me, Mrs Shaw!’

  ‘I see.’ Cook’s cheeks flushed deep crimson. ‘Then might we have the benefit of that opinion, Miss?’

  ‘Oh, you might! Will says the Duke of Windsor only went to see Hitler so he could stake his claim, like. Will reckons that if there’s another war and Hitler wins it, the Duke hopes he’ll make him King of England again, and her the Queen!’

  ‘Another war!’ Cook’s fingers strayed to her apron corners, a sign Mary should have noted. ‘The next war you’re on about, and some of us still not over the last one yet!’

  ‘Will says –’

  ‘Will, Will, Will!’ Not only Hitler to torment her but Will Stubbs, an’ all! ‘All right – so your man’s entitled to his opinion – it’s a free country, I’ll grant you. But I don’t want his opinions in my kitchen, is that understood, Mary Strong?’

  ‘Ha! Sorry I spoke, I’m sure. But there are others here who did their bit for king and country and went very yellow doing it. And they have the right to an opinion, too!’ Last word flung, Mary opened the kitchen door with a flourish, stormed up the back stairs and out, in search of Will.

  Will would know what it all meant – those Germans marching into Austria without so much as a by-your-leave. Will Stubbs was nobody’s fool and she should know! He’d managed to remain a bachelor all these years, and that took some doing!

  ‘There now, Mrs Shaw, don’t get yourself upset,’ Tilda hushed, filling the kettle, placing it to boil. ‘And if those Austrians want to cheer Hitler, then let them! None of our business.’

  ‘No, but are we going to make it our business? See where our interference landed us in ’fourteen and all because somebody shot an Archduke in Sarajevo. Us hadn’t even heard of Sarajevo, ’til then.’ She still plucked at her apron corners, ready to lift it, bury her face in it, and weep. It was either that, or the tea. ‘Make us a good strong cup, Tilda lass,’ she sighed.

  And happen Tilda was right. Austria had nowt to do with us.

  There were times, Julia thought as she strolled the walled vicarage garden at Nathan’s side, when she almost knew contentment. She breathed in deeply of the scents around her; of second-flowering honeysuckle and lilac and, edging the path, beds of old-fashioned pinks to add their sweetness to her pleasure.

  ‘I like your garden,’ she said softly, tucking an arm in his. ‘Not too big, and sheltered, too.’

  ‘My sentiments, exactly. I like the house, as well. What was it, before Rowangarth let the parish have it?’

  ‘The Dower House. Mother should be living here now, all things being equal. But they aren’t equal, are they, though I might tell the Bishop that Rowangarth wants it back, once Drew is married,’ she teased.

  ‘You’d live here, then?’

  ‘If I had to – quite happily. I suppose, though, that when Drew marries, I’ll stay at Rowangarth. The south wing could be made into a nice little apartment. I’ve often thought it.’

  ‘So you wouldn’t move in here – if I left, I mean?’

  ‘No.’ Her reply was without compromise.

  ‘Good. That’s one problem solved. It’s the new curate, you see. I was so relieved to get him I practically guaranteed him somewhere to live. And he’ll need a decent place because he’s got two sets of twins and a widowed mother to house. Would you object to him having the vicarage, Julia?’

  ‘Not at all. But if you left here, where would you go?’

  ‘Father’s getting old, and he’s lonely in that great place. I could go to Pendenys.’

  ‘But would uncle like being involved in parish affairs – people calling, and all that sort of thing? And people dying.’ People, Nathan once said, always sent for the priest in the small hours of the morning. It was a strange fact that that was when most people died. ‘Pendenys is a bit out of the way, isn’t it, for parishioners?’

  ‘I suppose it is, but parish business could still be taken care of at the vicarage by the curate and it’s as father says – who is going to take over Pendenys Place, when he goes? Kentucky won’t want it. Albert never liked it a
nd Bas hates to think he might inherit it. Only that madcap Kitty has a good word to say for it.’

  ‘Then leave it to Kitty. And somehow, it isn’t so – so theatrical-looking since Uncle Edward had the tower demolished. It was that tower made it look so odd.’

  ‘Of course, it might be more bearable to live in if I were married, Julia – had children.’

  ‘True. But there were three of you there, once. As children, did you like it?’

  ‘I didn’t. I always thought it was like living in a Town Hall.’

  ‘Then why wish it on your children? And should you even be thinking about a family – now, I mean, when everybody’s got the jitters about Germany and Italy?’ All at once, her near contentment vanished.

  ‘Czechoslovakia, you mean?’ Hitler, now that he had expanded his living space into Austria, was making scarcely-veiled hints that parts of Czechoslovakia rightly belonged to the Third Reich, too. ‘Is he going to march in there, as well? And if he does, will that be the end of it? The man’s a lunatic – power mad.’

  ‘So it isn’t just me getting goose pimples whenever I think of him – see him on the newsreels? You worry about him, too, Nathan?’

  ‘Yes, though I think I’d be a bit too old to go to war again. But that’s a selfish attitude when there’s the young generation to think about. It’s them we should worry over.’ He stopped, biting on his words, knowing he had said entirely the wrong thing. ‘Sorry, Julia.’

  ‘Then don’t be. You’re right, anyway. But I love the young Suttons so much, you see. My Clan. I’ve watched them grow up. I don’t want them to have to face what we faced, Nathan.’

  All at once, the beauty of the soft July evening was as nothing because she had voiced the fears that until now she had managed to push behind her. Because no one, she had thought, not even arrogant, goose-stepping Germany, could want another war.

  ‘It’s the newspapers. They blow things up out of all proportion.’

  ‘No!’ Julia shook her head. ‘They’re only trying to wake people up to the truth.’