Lily of Love Lane

by Carol Rivers

  Taking the paper into the parlour, she sat down. If only she was wealthy, like that aristocratic girl Hattie had told her about, who had been put in the family way. Her relatives had managed to get her married and then sent her abroad. She had had her baby discreetly and no one had known any difference. But could an ordinary person do that? Would it be possible to find Charles if she really searched? He had said he had offices in Westminster. Could she find them?

  The newspaper slowly slipped to the couch as her thoughts went round and round in her head. Westminster was a big place. How many offices were there? Would Ben drive her up to the city?

  Lily’s eyes fell on the newspaper. It had fallen open on a page with a circle drawn around a headline. ‘British Fascist Sympathizer Charles Grey Flees to Rome’.

  She picked up the paper, unable to believe what she was reading.

  This news comes as no surprise to those of us who believe the rumours that have scotched Mr Grey’s attempts to enter British politics. This wealthy supporter of fascism and his new Spanish-born wife Signóra Maria Covas, were met by representatives of the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini on their arrival in the great Latin city. Our sources inform us that Mr Grey’s interest in fascism began when serving with the British Navy. Disillusioned by his wartime experiences, his political path in Britain recently took a turn for the worse when he and many idealists from all over the world made their way to Madrid to take sides in the civil war. When Grey and his compatriots fell foul of General Franco’s Carlist forces, he and Covas sought refuge under the Italian dictator’s wing. They are said to have sold their estates in England, making their home in the sunnier climes of north-east Italy.

  Lily’s heart felt as though it was about to burst out of her chest. This couldn’t be her Charles – her baby’s father! She drew her hand over her eyes to clear her sight. She read the article again and again.

  Finally, she let the paper fall. All the strength seemed to seep out of her body as she stared blindly into the fire.

  The bright lights of the West End were behind him as Ben dropped off his last fare. He was whistling and feeling pleasantly at peace with himself and the world.

  The pocketful of heavy coins and notes, some of which were tips that his customers had given him, had provided a plump bird to cook on Sunday along with all the trimmings. Sausages, bacon, stuffing – the goods were all tucked safely away in the boot and sitting behind the wheel, he listened to the slow, rhythmic beat of the engine as he followed the traffic and allowed himself a sigh of satisfaction. He was going home to Lily. Now, wasn’t he a lucky man? All right, so she thought no more of him than a friend, but a man could live in hope. He opened the window of the cab and rested his elbow on the ledge. He’d made a good return this week, thanks to them ladies outside Fortnum and Masons, all elbowing each other for a ride. And truth was, he’d had a bit of a laugh with some of them as they’d sat in the back with their posh hair-dos and expensive purchases. A bit of the old verbal and a wink or two – it was all in the line of duty. But now he was looking forward to getting home and looking into Lily’s lovely blue eyes, the only ones that mattered to him.

  He couldn’t wait to see the expression on her face when she saw what he had for Sunday’s dinner. Not a bad day’s work when the country was down in the dumps and this talk of war going on. With the Spanish unrest, many said it would only be a matter of time before conflict returned to England’s shores. If there was another war, would he put his hand up to fight it?

  Ben’s thoughts were disturbed as he turned into Aldgate and a fine mist crept down like a ghost. At first it didn’t look bad as it only obscured the tops of the smoke-blackened buildings. But then it slid down their exteriors and crawled off the pavements and into the streets.

  ‘Sod it,’ he cursed. ‘Now I’m going to be late home.’

  Sighing resignedly he brought the car to a halt. There he was, bumper to bumper with the Saturday traffic. Still, nothing he could do about that.

  Ben sat back and thought of Lily and his little house.

  In spite of the weather conditions, he couldn’t help smiling.

  It was gone eight when he arrived home. The mist was thicker in Stepney but it didn’t matter, he’d soon be inside and having a hot cuppa and he’d be telling Lil all about them fares in the city, giving her a good laugh. It brought back the sparkle to her eyes when she laughed. And if it was only humour he could give her, then it was something.

  Ben let himself in and whistled. She always came down the hall, her trim little figure just showing the babe. Sometimes she disguised the fullness with an apron, blushing as he gazed at her. If only he could tell her that he loved to see her like that. In his opinion she’d never looked so beautiful as she was now.

  Ben peered down the dark hall. His stomach lurched. It was too quiet. He shot in the parlour, glanced round the kitchen, scullery and yard and then flew upstairs. But he knew even before he hammered on Lil’s door that she was gone.

  Lily had lost her way. She thought she knew where she was, but her bag was heavy and the fog was so dense that she’d even stepped in the road, missing the passing vehicles by inches, drawing loud toots and cries of annoyance. Although she had caught a bus on the Commercial Road, the cold and damp soon seeped into her as she left its cosy interior. If she found the Queen’s, she’d be safe as Dewar Street was only a few turns away. She’d walked it often enough, but now she was confused, having turned off into a lane that looked like Dewar Street. Taking another few steps, she began to cough. For a moment, she felt the baby move. It was the first time. Her hands went to her stomach as she leaned, panting, against the railings. Coughing again, she let her bag drop. She was frightened and alone. Had Charles really married Mrs Covas and moved to Italy? She couldn’t understand much of what the newspaper had said. Was it true that Charles was a fascist? It was an ugly word, but what did it mean? Charles had told her he had enemies. Was that why he had left the country?

  The thought of her baby spurred her on. Her steps were slower now, as a pain went across her stomach. She felt sick and stumbled weakly along.

  Ben sat in the parlour reading the newspaper article. Mr Next Door had circled it in pencil.

  ‘Oh, Lil,’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘Why did you have to find out like this?’

  He cast the paper aside and pushed his hands over his face. Where could she have gone? In this fog an’ all. What had got into her head to go out in weather like this? Would she have gone to her mum’s? Ben shook his head impatiently. No, that was the last place she’d go; she’d move mountains to keep her secret from Josie. Hattie and Reube’s, then? No, she wouldn’t want to be seen in Love Lane.

  Ben racked his brains, trying to think of an answer. He paced up and down, going over in his mind all the possibilities. But there were none he could believe – and then he froze. There was one place!

  Jumping back in the cab, he resisted the urge to accelerate. ‘Steady,’ he ordered himself as he peered through the sheets of greeny grey mist sliding over the bonnet. When he got to Poplar, he found a brief clearing. Beyond the Queen’s, he turned into the narrow roads behind. Edging the car round into Dewar Street, he stopped outside number four. The house gave off a faint glow.

  Who was there? Was it the new people? Or was it Charles Grey back from Italy?

  His heart beat fast as he leapt from the car and ran up the steps. He banged angrily on the knocker. Would it be Grey, turning up like the proverbial bad penny, who answered? If it was, what would he do?

  The door opened. His gaze fell on the figure of a plump, homely looking woman. The pleasant smell of cooking oozed out of the house.

  ‘Yes?’

  Ben found himself mute for a moment. As the baby in her arms whimpered, he took off his cap. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you. I’m looking for a friend, a Miss Lily Bright. She used to work here.’

  He was surprised when she said, ‘You’d better step in, young man.’

  Ben wiped his boots on the ma
t.

  ‘We’re new to the house,’ she told him, closing the door. ‘But we had another visitor a short while ago.’

  ‘You mean you’ve seen Lil – Miss Bright?’

  ‘She didn’t give her name. She just wanted to know if a Charles was here.’

  ‘That’s who she worked for,’ Ben nodded urgently.

  A boy and a girl came running down the stairs, yelling and shouting.

  ‘Quiet, you two, we’ve got another caller.’

  The three of them looked up at him.

  ‘What happened then?’ Ben asked.

  ‘I told her I didn’t know who lived here before, as my husband had dealt with the purchase of the house.’

  ‘Did she look all right?’

  ‘No, as a matter of fact, she didn’t. I asked her to come in and take shelter from the fog but she refused.’ The baby began to cry and the woman held it over her shoulder, patting its back. ‘Then she just seemed to drift away.’

  Ben felt the panic rise in him. What had Lily been thinking when she’d come to Dewar Street? She must have thought like him, there was a chance Grey had returned. How had she felt when she found the new family here?

  ‘Thanks,’ he nodded and rushed out. He drove the length of Dewar Street once more, up to the laundry and back, his eyes alert for any movement. Suddenly he saw something on the ground. It was Lily’s bag!

  Stopping the car, he picked it up. It must have been too heavy for her to carry. He looked around him. ‘Lil, Lil, it’s me, Ben,’ he cried, but only an echo returned.

  After a while he drove on again. In Poplar High Street he looked this way and that. Should he get out to search? She couldn’t have gone far. Was it likely she had returned to the island? By the time he drove into Westferry Road, he had broken out in a sweat. The docks were treacherous in these conditions; one false move and you were in the drink. With the fog obscuring the wharves, their slippery edges and sharp declines, a person could be lost, never to be found again.

  Ben pounded the wheel in frustration! Where was she? He passed Cuba Street and Manilla Street and was at the beginning of Tiller Road when he jammed his foot on the brake. A figure appeared. It seemed to hesitate in his path, not knowing whether to advance or retreat.

  ‘Christ almighty!’ His heart almost jumped out of his chest.

  Had he hit it?

  He leapt out and caught the shivering bundle in his arms. It was Lily who clung tightly to him.

  Lily looked into Dr Tapper’s face. He was sitting on the chair beside her bed in Ben’s house and his kindly eyes under his bushy grey eyebrows were regarding her steadily.

  ‘You gave us all a scare,’ he told her sternly. ‘In particular the young man waiting downstairs in the parlour. He thought he might have run you over.’

  ‘I couldn’t see in the fog.’

  ‘Lily, do you realize that you have put yourself and your baby at risk?’

  She sat up. ‘Is it all right?’

  ‘The stress and shock you’ve been through caused you to lose some blood. But I think we’ve avoided by a whisker the miscarriage you would have had, had you not been found in time.’ The elderly man put away his things in his Gladstone bag and stood up. ‘Now, I have left instructions that you are on no account to exert yourself over the next few days.’

  Lily nodded silently.

  ‘I’ll come to see you again soon. Then we’ll decide on whether or not you can move around a little.’

  ‘Doctor Tapper?’

  ‘Yes?’ He paused at the door.

  ‘Does me mum know?’

  ‘Have you told her?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘Then if you haven’t, she is obviously unaware.’ He smiled. ‘Now, goodbye and make sure you do as I say.’

  Lily heard him go down the stairs. A tear slipped slowly down her cheek. Why had she gone off like that? The pain in her stomach had been the baby in distress. She couldn’t bear to think of what might have happened if she’d lost it. She knew she wanted this little life more than anything now. More than Charles even.

  Suddenly there was a tap on the door and Ben came in. ‘Now then, cheer up.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Everything.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry that you felt the need to run away.’

  ‘I read that newspaper article that Mr Next Door sent in. It was about Charles and Mrs Covas. I couldn’t believe it at first, and I thought he might still be there, at Dewar Street.’

  ‘So you went off in a pea-souper, when you was only just getting stronger after the hospital? Well, Lily Bright, this can’t keep happening, you know. I enjoy you falling into me arms, but I want you fit and well when you do it.’

  Lily looked down at her hands on the sheet. ‘Is it true what the newspaper says, about him and her?’

  He nodded. ‘I’m sorry you had to find out that way.’

  ‘You knew all the time, didn’t you?’ She searched his gaze.

  ‘I had me suspicions all along there was something amiss, but I kept telling meself it was just a bit of the green-eye over you. Then just before your uncle popped his clogs, he asked me to find out about these rumours . . . your gent’s name had been bandied about by the old blokes down the Mission Hall. It was said he’d been over to Germany a few times, Italy and Spain too, to hobnob with the likes of Hitler and Mussolini.’

  ‘I thought he was going to buy furniture.’

  ‘Yes, but you wasn’t to know the truth.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have cared what he did or was, anyway. I was always imagining meself as lady of the house, that it was me who would make him forget Delia and that I’d help in his career.’ Her voice trembled. ‘He always talked so passionately about it, but I should have known it wasn’t right when he asked me to lie.’

  Ben gave her a long look. ‘Lil, no one knew for sure what he was up to.’

  ‘I thought he loved me.’

  ‘Well, who’s to say he didn’t?’

  Lily swallowed on the hard lump in her throat. ‘If he did he wouldn’t have married someone else, it would be me in that house now, not a new family.’ She brushed away another tear. ‘I saw her standing there with a baby in her arms and I thought, that should be me.’

  ‘We can’t always have the things we think we want.’

  ‘Charles used to talk as if we’d be together. I believed him, but I was just useful for appearances’ sake. Like Annie.’ She sobbed. ‘I suppose even that was a lie, that she didn’t pinch anything and he made her think he loved her too?’

  ‘Lil, you won’t ever know.’ He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. ‘Look, he was just another charmer. A man who got himself in a muddle and couldn’t get out of it. There’s been dozens of them in history and will be a few more. He fooled a lot of people – people in high places – not just you. It took the civil war in Spain to make him show his true colours.’

  She nodded. ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘The one lesson we should all learn from this is that every moment of peace counts. To live our lives and be happy together.’

  Lily looked into his earnest grey eyes. ‘I thought I was going to be happy.’

  ‘You can be,’ Ben smiled. ‘Happiness is just a thought away.’

  ‘But what about me baby?’

  He took her hand. ‘You’ve always been me girl, Lil. I want to look after that little life inside you. Count him as me own.’

  Lily shook her head. ‘But it’s Charles’ child.’

  ‘Listen, Lil, as far as I’m concerned, when that kid opens its eyes, he’s gonna see me. And like the proverbial duck, he’s gonna waddle after the first ugly mug he sees and I’d like that mug to be mine.’ He wiped a tear on her cheek with his thumb. ‘So what’s the answer?’

  ‘You mean you’d marry me, knowing that I—’

  ‘I’ll marry you, Lil,’ he whispered. ‘Just say the word.’

  Lily gazed into his loving grey eyes and remembered
Charles’ dark ones. Would she ever forget them? Was it right for her to take everything Ben offered when she had so little to give back?

  Could she learn to love again?

  The baby moved inside her as if in answer. As Ben leaned forward to kiss her, she closed her eyes. His touch was soft and familiar and though it wasn’t the grand passion she had dreamed of, it was something deeper and wiser.

  She knew then that happiness really was only a thought away.

  Noteworthy Extracts from the Mission Hall Quarterly 1937

  28th September

  The fascist conqueror Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler staged a massive floodlit demonstration of solidarity in Berlin tonight. The German leader once again referred to the text of his book Mein Kampf; ‘Without colonies, Germany’s space is too small to guarantee our people can be fed safely and continuously . . .’

  10th October

  Sir Oswald Mosley was hit on the head today and rendered unconscious as he prepared to address a crowd of 8,000 in Liverpool. It was only four days ago that he led his Blackshirts through South London but was stopped by Costers’ barrows, barbed wire and overturned vehicles.

  16th November

  The British government have drawn up plans for the evacuation of London, if necessary, in the event of war, though MP’s voted today for thousands of air raid shelters to be erected throughout the country’s towns and cities . . .

  24th December

  A postscript from the editor of the Mission Hall Quarterly, Charlie Brent, retired coal merchant.

  On a lighter note to end the year, I would like to make a short report of the delightful occasion to which the Mission Hall members were invited. Bonny four-month-old Josephine Heather Bright was baptized this afternoon at three o’clock at St Peter’s! I’m happy to record that the church was full to the gunnels, hours before the midnight service! The christening was held on this date to commemorate the memory of the baby’s great uncle, Noah Kelly, who passed away one year ago to the day. His niece, Lily James and husband Ben, the proudest of parents, put on a wonderful knees-up for us all afterwards at Noah’s old abode, number thirty-four Love Lane. The house is still occupied by his sister Josie after whom the child was named and her husband Bob. A happy Christmas was wished to one and all, as we thoroughly wetted the baby’s head, making the very most of the peace that still reigns – if not in Europe, then in every East Enders heart.