The Londoners

by Margaret Pemberton

  ‘A real banana,’ Leon said solemnly. He stretched his hand out to hers. ‘Come on, let’s have a cup of tea at Mrs Collins’ and then you can help me unpack my kit-bag.’

  Daisy put her hand willingly into his. Her Auntie Kate had told her she would like Leon and, as usual, her Auntie Kate had been right. No-one else she knew would be having bananas for Christmas. And no-one else she knew had a friend who looked so wonderfully different from everyone else.

  ‘I missed you,’ Kate said fervently as, her hand clasped in his, they followed the Collinses and Lomaxes and Mr Nibbs into the Square.

  His hand tightened on hers. ‘And I love you,’ he said, his eyes, meeting hers as Daisy skipped at her side and Hector bounded ahead of them.

  Kate’s heart somersaulted. It was as if there were only the two of them in the whole wide world; as if the little throng of neighbours only a few yards ahead of them didn’t exist.

  ‘I love you,’ she said softly. ‘Every time I wrote to you I wanted to tell you. I’m glad now that I didn’t, that I’m telling you now, face to face.’

  ‘So am I.’ He wanted to kiss her so badly he hurt. ‘And I’m glad you’re telling me today, in this exact spot.’

  Her eyes widened uncomprehendingly and a wide, easy grin split his face. ‘We’re just about to walk past the Jennings’. Don’t you remember what happened here, a year ago almost to the hour?’

  Joyous laughter bubbled up in her throat. She certainly did remember. And she owed Miriam Jennings a huge favour. If Miriam had taken him in as a lodger, instead of being rude to him and slamming the door in his face, then he would never have approached a complete stranger to ask if she knew of anyone who took in lodgers. And she owed Hettie a favour, too. For if Hettie hadn’t also refused to take him as a lodger, the stranger in question would never have impulsively walked down to The Swan and told him that, if he wanted it, she had a room she could let him have.

  ‘It’s our anniversary,’ she said, hugging his arm. ‘What could be more perfect?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Leon’s heart was full to overflowing. Never again would he feel a loner or an outsider or a misfit. He had a family again. When the war was over, Kate and Matthew and Daisy and Hector would be waiting for him. Years and years of being together and loving each other lay ahead of them, or they did if his ship survived being blasted to eternity by a German U-boat or battleship. As they turned in at Hettie’s gate his jaw tightened. He’d survive the war. He wasn’t going to let anyone, not the entire German Navy or Air Force, rob him of the happiness he knew lay ahead of him with Kate as his wife.

  That he and Kate were now far more to each other than lodger and landlady seemed to be accepted by their neighbours without question.

  ‘You look after that fella of yours,’ Hettie said to Kate a little while later as she pressed a mug of tea with condensed milk, into her hand. ‘He’s a real hero.’

  And Mr Nibbs said, ‘It’s very fortunate your young man is no longer hampered by an injured leg. If he had been he’d never have been able to make such a magnificent jump.’

  ‘I’ve scored a hat trick,’ Kate thought to herself as Ted made Billy apologize to Leon for all the trouble he had caused and Hettie sat down at her piano and began playing Knees Up Mother Brown and Mavis began to lead the singing. ‘First Miriam speaks to me and then Christina Frank and now Mr Nibbs, all in one day!’

  Later, leaving Daisy happily thumping out tunes on Hettie’s piano, she walked up her own front path, Leon’s arm around her shoulders. ‘I think I know how Miss Helliwell feels when she predicts the future,’ she said joyously. ‘I know the tide has turned as far as the war is concerned. I know you’re going to come home safe.’

  They had climbed the short flight of steps to her doorstep and he turned her round to face him. ‘And I know I’m going to love you for as long as I live,’ he said, and very firmly he drew her into his arms and lowered his mouth to hers.

  As her mouth opened lovingly, her tongue slipping willingly past his, she knew with utter certainty that the heartache Miss Helliwell had spoken of so many years ago wasn’t Jack Robson’s death, but Toby’s. She knew also that when Miss Helliwell had predicted she would know long-lasting happiness and deep love, she had been speaking not of Toby, but of Leon.

  This time, when they entered the house, she had no need to lead the way up the stairs and to show him which room was his. With his kit-bag hoisted easily on his shoulder and with his limp no longer discernible he led the way up the stairs and at the top, where the doors of the four bedrooms and bathroom led off, he opened the door not of the room with the plump blue eiderdown on the bed and the bedside lamp with a sunflower-yellow shade, but of her room, holding it open so that she could walk past him into it.

  Flushing rosily, glowing with happiness, she did so. From now on the room would be their room. From now on, whenever they were together, wherever they were, she would always share a room with him, as she would share everything with him, lifelong.

  Chapter Twenty

  They had thirty-six hours together before he returned to sea. Thirty-six hours of unadulterated happiness; of laughing and loving and feeling completely right together. They went to a midnight carol service at the church; they took Daisy and Hector for a walk in Greenwich Park and a walk across the Heath; they visited the Misses Helliwells and used their Morrison shelter as a table tennis table as Mavis and Jack had once done.

  When the time for parting came, Kate drew comfort from remembering the words Miss Helliwell had spoken to her, so many years ago.

  ‘She told me that after heartache I would know a great and lasting love,’ she said, her head resting against the comforting broadness of his chest as he held her close, his kit-bag ready and waiting near the door. ‘That means we’re going to be in love with each other for years and years and years, Leon. It means you’re going to come home safe. It means nothing terrible is ever going to happen to us.’

  His arms tightened around her. Fond as he was of Miss Helliwell, he didn’t share Kate’s implicit trust in her psychic powers. The war was far from being over and thousands of tons of Allied shipping had already been torpedoed into oblivion on the winter convoy routes to Murmansk and Archangel.

  Keeping his dark thoughts to himself, he said huskily, ‘I love you. I’ll always love you. Never forget it, Kate. Promise?’

  She turned her head, looking up into his dear, kind, compassionate face. ‘I’ll never forget, Leon,’ she said, tears glittering on her eyelashes at the knowledge that it would be months, years even, before she saw him again. ‘Whenever you think of me, I’ll be thinking of you.’

  He lowered his head to hers one last time, kissing her with a passion and a need that almost unstrung her and then he was gone, his footsteps running lightly down the steps outside the front door.

  She couldn’t bear to go to the door and watch him as he walked away; she was too frightened she would lose self-control and that his last sight of her would be with tears streaming down her face.

  Daisy’s hand slid into hers. ‘It isn’t nice people going away, is it?’ she said, her voice wobbly. ‘You won’t go away, will you, Auntie Kate?’

  ‘No, darling.’ Kate hugged her tightly. ‘And people come home again,’ she said, reassuring herself as well as Daisy. ‘Matthew will be home soon. And one day, Leon will be home again as well.’

  ‘I thought you were going for Matthew this weekend?’ Carrie said, dumping her bus conductress’s ticket-machine and leather money-bag down on the nearest chair and staring down at Kate, a frown of concern creasing her forehead.

  Kate lay on the settee, propped up by cushions and covered by a blanket. ‘I’ve got ’flu,’ she said thickly, reaching for one of the many handkerchiefs that were stuffed beneath the cushions. ‘Don’t come too near me or you’ll get it as well.’

  ‘If you’re so bad, I’d better take Daisy down to my mother,’ Carrie said practically. ‘Before I do, shall I make you a hot drink? Have you any rose-hip syr
up? A spoonful of that in hot water might make you feel better.’

  Two weeks later, Kate still felt foul. She no longer had a temperature and she was no longer alternately shivering and sweating, but she still didn’t want to eat and still felt nauseous.

  ‘Perhaps you should pop along and see Doctor Roberts,’ Carrie suggested. ‘You might have picked up another bug, besides ’flu.’

  Doctor Roberts put his stethoscope away and told her to put her blouse back on. Walking to his desk and sitting down at it, he eyed her strangely. ‘You’re certainly run-down,’ he said as she sat opposite him, fastening her blouse buttons, ‘but that’s to be expected after a bad bout of influenza.’

  ‘I’ve had influenza before and I’ve never felt sick with it,’ Kate said, wanting to be utterly sure she wasn’t carrying anything contagious before going to Somerset to collect Matthew.

  Doctor Robert chewed the corner of his lip for a moment and then, deciding that nothing was to be gained by beating about the bush, said bluntly, ‘You were sick, however, when pregnant, weren’t you?’

  Kate stared at him.

  Doctor Roberts sighed. He wouldn’t have thought it possible that a girl as well brought-up as Kate Voigt could fall pregnant a second time while still unmarried, but from the dawning comprehension on her face it obviously was possible.

  ‘When did you last menstruate?’ he asked, wondering what the world was coming to and blaming everything on the war.

  ‘I’m not sure . . . it’s not something I ever think about . . .’ Kate’s mind raced. It had been before Christmas . . . before she and Leon had become lovers . . . five or six weeks ago, possibly seven.

  ‘I suggest you come back and see me in a month’s time,’ Doctor Roberts said heavily. ‘By then a physical examination might confirm whether or not you are pregnant again.’ He clasped his hands on the top of his desk. ‘It’s not part of my duties to give out contraceptive advice, unasked, to unmarried women, Kate. However, I do sincerely wish you had felt able to come to me and . . .’

  ‘It wasn’t necessary, Doctor Roberts.’ Happiness was spiralling through her so fiercely she could hardly contain it. ‘If I am pregnant, I want this baby just as much as I wanted Matthew. My boyfriend is a sailor. He’s going to be over the moon when I write to him with the news.’

  Doctor Roberts shuddered. A sailor. The father of her last child had been an airman. No doubt in a year’s time she would be back again, pregnant with a child fathered by a soldier.

  ‘I’ll see you again in four weeks,’ he said, wondering what on earth his wife would say when Kate’s condition became obvious and the neighbourhood began talking; wondering what Carl Voigt would say when he heard he was to be grandfather to a second illegitimate child.

  ‘How I’m going to tell my father, I don’t know,’ Kate said wryly to Carrie. ‘It wasn’t too bad before. He did at least know Toby and like him and when I finally plucked up the nerve to write to him with the news that I was pregnant he was amazingly understanding.’

  ‘He’ll like Leon, too, when he meets him,’ Carrie said, rather entertained at the idea of Kate, who everyone had always regarded as being very prim and proper in comparison to herself, having a second love child. ‘What about Miss Godfrey? What is she going to say?’

  Miss Godfrey didn’t say anything because Kate didn’t tell her. There was no need as yet and she had other things on her mind. Joss Harvey had written to her saying that Matthew had a heavy cold and that he thought it inadvisable for him to be moved to London until he had fully recovered.

  Kate had brooded over the short and to-the-point letter for quite a while. Was Matthew unwell or was Joss Harvey simply stalling for time? And if Matthew was unwell, shouldn’t she be with him? She thought of the hideous influenza she had just recovered from and was uncertain for how long influenza germs hung around. She certainly didn’t want to take any germs down to Somerset with her, perhaps making Matthew’s condition even worse.

  ‘We’re just going to have to be patient,’ she said to a disappointed Daisy. ‘We’re just going to have to wait until Matthew is better before we go and collect him and bring him home.’

  On Saint Valentine’s Day they had a visitor. ‘I can’t stay for long,’ Lance said, a box of chocolates in his hand. ‘I just wanted to wish you a happy Valentine’s Day.’

  Kate eyed the beribboned box in disbelief, feeling nauseous no longer. ‘Where on earth did that come from, Lance? An American airman or the black market?’

  A rare smile touched his mouth. ‘Ask no questions and get told no lies.’

  Kate smiled sunnily. ‘Wherever they came from, they look gorgeous. Daisy won’t be able to believe her eyes when she sees them. She’s down at the Jennings’ at the moment, playing with Rose.’

  Lance followed her into the kitchen. It was the heart of her home and he had become accustomed to sitting in it as if it were a drawing-room.

  ‘There’s something we have to talk about,’ he said, grateful that Daisy wasn’t there and that they had a little privacy for once. ‘I know how deeply you’ve grieved for Toby and it’s the reason I haven’t pushed things. I’ve wanted to give you time to get used to the idea of a new relationship.’

  She turned to face him. This conversation was one they had had before and was one she had hoped wouldn’t be raised again.

  ‘Please don’t say any more, Lance,’ she said gently, ‘there’s something you don’t know, something I have to tell you . . .’

  ‘No,’ he said forcefully, taking hold of her by the shoulders. ‘I let you avoid the issue once before but I’m not going to do so again. It’s been eighteen months since Toby died and you can’t grieve for ever. Nor can you continue bringing up a young child single-handedly.’

  She opened her mouth to protest and he said, ‘Joss Harvey won’t allow it, Kate. I know him. I know what he intends. Now will you please listen to me?’

  The words she had been about to speak died on her lips. Joss Harvey. What did Lance know about Joss Harvey’s intentions where Matthew was concerned? Had she been right in suspecting that Matthew didn’t have a cold? Was the lie all part of some terrible plan to separate her from her son for ever?

  ‘I’ve known Joss Harvey since I was thirteen or fourteen and Toby and I used to spend time together during school vacations,’ Lance said, his hands still firm on her shoulders. ‘And one thing I know about him is that he always gets what he wants. And what he wants now is something I want also.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, a small frown puckering her forehead. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  He was standing so close to her that the buttons on his RAF jacket were brushing her blouse.

  ‘Joss Harvey wants us to marry, Kate,’ he said, his eyes hot as they held hers. ‘If we marry, you’ll be an unmarried mother no longer and he will no longer feel ashamed of his great-grandson’s illegitimacy. Even more to the point, if we marry, he knows he will be ensured future contact with Matthew, something that might not happen if you were to marry anyone else.’

  Kate’s eyes flashed with remembered indignation. ‘Joss Harvey has already informed me of his plans for me and when he did so I told him that my future was none of his concern!’

  ‘And you were quite right to tell him so,’ Lance said, keeping his voice steady with difficulty. Dear God in heaven, what if she turned him down? What if he lost her for ever? ‘But can’t you see how fortuitous it is that he feels the way he does?’

  His voice throbbed with the intensity of his feelings. ‘I love you, Kate. I fell in love with you long before I met you, when Toby first talked to me about you and showed me your photograph. That Joss Harvey feels as he does will simply make life easier for us. I was a junior architect when I joined the RAF. Joss has already said that when we marry and when I’m demobbed, there will be a position for me on the board at Harvey’s.’

  Kate sucked in a deep, unsteady breath. No wonder Joss Harvey had been so certain he could manipulate Lance Merton in
to marrying her. She wondered what other bait had been proffered. Had Joss Harvey also promised that when he died, and until Matthew reached adulthood, Lance would have total control of Harvey’s? Had Joss begun to view Lance as a substitute for the grandson he had lost?

  And was it so surprising if he had? Lance had been educated at the same exclusive public school as Toby and they had been school friends. Toby had been tall and blond and loose-limbed and though Lance didn’t possess the easy-going nonchalance that Toby had possessed, he was just as tall and just as Nordically fair. Unbidden, another thought came winging into her mind. He was also just as eligible, or so most people would judge.

  She looked up into his tense, narrow, high cheek-boned face. The wife of Group Captain Lance Merton wouldn’t receive slights or snubs from anyone, she would be socially and financially secure, her lifestyle very similar to that which it would have been if she had married Toby. Even more importantly, her relationship with Joss Harvey would be amicable. Matthew wouldn’t grow up enduring the misery of knowing he was the cause of battles between them. They would be, to all outward purposes at least, a united family.

  It was a tempting prospect. A handsome husband. Social status. Financial security. She put her hands against his chest and said quietly, ‘I can’t marry you, Lance. I’m not in love with you.’

  His jaw tightened. ‘You might find out differently if only you stopped grieving . . .’

  ‘I have stopped grieving,’ she said starkly, ‘or at least I’ve stopped grieving in the way that you mean.’

  ‘Then why . . .’ he began, impatience edging his voice.

  ‘I’m in love with someone else.’

  For a second his eyes remained blank and then shock flared through them, followed swiftly by disbelief.

  ‘And I’m having a baby,’ she said, wanting him to be in no doubt at all as to her full commitment to another man.

  There was no mistaking her sincerity and the disbelief in his eyes vanished.

  ‘You’re pregnant?’ He dropped his hands from her shoulders as if he had been burned. ‘Pregnant?’