‘There is great comfort in the thought that the years of darkness and danger in which the children of our country had grown up are over and, please God, forever.’
The rest of the King’s words were lost to Esther; she sat in a dark turmoil of her own. Right and wrong – it really was as simple as that. It wasn’t which side you’d fought on in this terrible, bloodthirsty war. It was all to do with your own heart and soul, the bit of you that made you you. There were probably ordinary German people, housewives and mothers, fathers and brothers, who had been against Hitler and his Nazis and had paid the ultimate price because of it. And on the other side – the side that supposedly stood for freedom and equality of man – there were men like Monty, who had fought and risked their lives, and yet were capable of turning their back on their own child because she didn’t fit into what they perceived as socially acceptable. How could that be? How on earth could that be?
‘Esther?’ She came back to her surroundings as Prudence took her arm. ‘Are you all right, lass?’
Amazingly, she was. ‘I’m fine.’ She forced a smile. ‘Absolutely fine.’ She could put her head on the pillow at night and sleep with a clear conscience. She had done nothing wrong, and suddenly that was of vital importance. As the GIs would say: she was one of the good guys.
It was a moment of epiphany and she recognized it as such.
A short time later, with Caleb at her side and a sleepy Joy cradled in his arms, she walked with the others to the site of the bonfire, where the chief fire-watcher was already standing, ready to light the fire at the stroke of ten o’clock. The neighbourhood children were beside themselves with excitement, and when one of the older boys who’d been designated with the honour handed the chief fire-watcher a long pole, at the end of which was a rag soaked in paraffin, a sudden quiet descended. Immediately the fire was lit, a long and sustained cheer went up.
The children danced around the bonfire yelling at the top of their voices; flares were let off and fireworks shot up into the sky, and occasionally into the crowd too, causing brief panic. The dressmaker’s piano was at the ready at a suitable distance from the flames, and soon the lady in question had begun to play a selection of popular songs: ‘Roll Out the Barrel’, ‘Tipperary’, ‘Daisy, Daisy’, ‘The Lambeth Walk’, ‘Knees Up Mother Brown’ and other rousing tunes to stir the people’s patriotism, which was tangible.
Grown-ups, young people and children joined hands and danced and sang, their voices ringing out, while other folk stood quietly enjoying the scene, and thanking God they were alive. Once the fire died down, potatoes were cooked in the ashes; and more beer, saved for the end of the day, was brought out and handed around.
‘Glad you came?’ Caleb smiled down at her, with Joy fast asleep in his arms, and Esther smiled back, nodding. Priscilla and Kenny were wrapped in each other’s arms at the edge of the flickering light, but she couldn’t pick out Eliza or Prudence or any of the others. It was gone midnight, but no one seemed to want to go home, although some mothers of small children were beginning to try and round up their offspring. Everyone seemed to feel it was a never-to-be-forgotten experience – one that so easily might not have happened, if Hitler had got his way.
‘It’s been a wonderful day,’ she said softly, ‘but I can’t help thinking that . . . ’
‘What?’ he said as she hesitated.
‘That now the future is in front of us, and everything is going to be so different from the last few years.’
‘And that’s a bad thing?’
‘No, no, of course not, but things that have been put on the back burner because of the war will have to be dealt with.’
Since that first night at the village hop, when they had talked in the moonlight and she had told him her story, Caleb had never brought up the subject of her husband. He had thought about him often enough, accepting wryly that he was intensely jealous of a man he had never met. Esther had loved him – perhaps did love him still – and her husband had let her down in the worst way possible, abandoning her and her baby. But women were forgiving creatures, and she had said herself that her husband had been her first and only love. Perhaps he hadn’t brought the subject up because he didn’t want to risk finding out how she really felt? he asked himself now. And she was right: while the war had been going on and everything had been up in the air, it had been easier to put off the inevitable. He wasn’t proud of the fact, but he had often prayed that this Monty would meet his end, courtesy of one of Hitler’s bombs.
Now, cautiously feeling his way, he said, ‘Was that a general observation, or something more personal?’
‘Both, I suppose.’
Caleb was a northern man to the tips of his toes and, in spite of not wanting to frighten her off, nothing on earth could have prevented his next words. It was speak or burst. ‘You’re thinking of him – your husband – aren’t you?’
Again she nodded.
His stomach churning, he said gruffly, ‘Have you heard from him? Is that it?’
‘No, I haven’t heard a thing, so I suppose that means he is still alive, or someone would have to let me know. And if he is alive, if I’m not a widow’ – she flashed him a quick glance, but he kept his face expressionless – ‘then divorce proceedings will have to be faced.’
‘Perhaps he doesn’t want a divorce. He might have changed his mind.’ Caleb’s lips had become dry and he ran his tongue over them before he could say, ‘Have you considered that possibility?’
She didn’t reply directly to this. What she did say, and in a tone that brooked no argument, was, ‘I want a divorce, Caleb.’
‘You do?’ Such emotion flooded through him that he felt faint.
‘I don’t love Monty any more. In truth, I wonder if I ever knew the real Monty, or whether I fell in love with what I imagined he was. Does that make sense?’
He didn’t know, but he wanted to hear the rest of it and so he nodded, his eyes never leaving her sad face.
‘I thought it was a forever love, and that nothing but death could part us. That he loved me for exactly who I was: warts and pimples and all.’ She gave a weak smile. ‘But . . . ’ She shrugged. ‘He didn’t. I’ve asked myself: if the position was reversed, and when Joy was born it had turned out that Monty was adopted or something and had a black parent, would I have felt differently about him? And I can say from the bottom of my heart that I wouldn’t. But perhaps that’s just me and I asked too much of him – of anyone in that position.’
‘No, you didn’t.’ His heart was in his voice.
She made a little inarticulate sound, her eyes holding his, and for a moment the scene in front of them faded away and the night was hushed.
But for the sleeping child in his arms, Caleb would have drawn Esther to him, then and there, and declared that she was the most amazing, beautiful, exquisite creature in all the world, and that nothing in heaven or hell could have stopped him from being at her side, if he’d been Monty. As it was, his voice shaking slightly, he said again, ‘You didn’t, Esther. The fault is his. Only his.’
The expectant hush continued for a moment more, before Esther could bring herself to murmur, ‘Thank you.’ She felt as though she was on the brink of a chasm; a chasm that had opened so suddenly it had taken her breath away. Why couldn’t Monty have been made of the same stuff as Caleb? Caleb would never have walked away and left his wife and child to fend for themselves, whatever the circumstances. There wasn’t a shadow of turning in Caleb’s big, strong frame. How was it some women ended up with men like Caleb, whereas she . . . ?
Something in her mind checked the mistake of continuing down that path – a path that could only bring further heartache. Caleb was a kind, good man, and she knew he cared about her as a friend, but he had never said one word indicating that he wished their relationship was something more. She must remember that. And why would he? When Caleb got romantically involved, it would doubtless be with a girl untainted by the past, some eager, bright young thing with no skeletons
in the cupboard, who could offer him all of herself, with no reservations. And he deserved that, he really did.
Suddenly Esther felt as old as the hills and weary of life, and the corners of her mouth drooped.
Caleb saw her expression and he could have kicked himself. He had obviously done the one thing he hadn’t wanted to do and unnerved her. Had she guessed how he felt and been embarrassed? Thank goodness he was holding Joy and hadn’t been able to follow through on the desire to take Esther in his arms and hold her. She would have probably called an end to their tenuous friendship, right then and there. Damn it, he had to be more careful or he would lose her altogether.
He was as relieved as Esther when Priscilla and Kenny came up behind them in the next moment, Kenny slapping Caleb on the back as he said, ‘I think it’s time we started to make a move for home.’ And Priscilla took Esther’s arm as she breathed, ‘Hasn’t it been a truly wonderful day, darling? I’m so happy I could burst.’
‘Wonderful,’ Esther agreed quietly.
Eventually they found the others in the crowd and said their goodbyes, but only Caleb accompanied them to the truck parked at the end of the back lane, still carrying the sleeping Joy in his arms.
In contrast to Priscilla’s exuberant leave-taking of Caleb, when she flung her arms round his neck and deposited a smacking kiss on his cheek, Esther merely smiled and nodded. Caleb’s goodbye was equally subdued, and once they were all packed in the truck and it trundled noisily off, leaving Caleb standing looking after them, Esther began to have niggling regrets about mentioning Monty to him. And the more she thought about what she had said, the more she began to panic. Would Caleb think she had told him she didn’t love Monty, and wanted a divorce, because she had hoped he would declare that he had feelings for her?
She felt hot all over in spite of the chilly night.
By the time the truck reached the farm after depositing Kenny at the home, she felt like a wet rag. Joy hadn’t stirred during the journey, and as Priscilla turned off the ignition and they climbed out of the vehicle, Esther thought longingly of her bed. She needed to sleep. Perhaps she’d feel differently in the morning and see things more clearly, because at the moment it felt like the end of the world. She didn’t want to lose Caleb as a friend, or for him to think badly of her. She needed him in her life.
The night was pitch-black, a cloudy sky obscuring the moon and stars, but a light was still burning in the cottage, causing Esther to murmur ruefully, ‘Oh dear, it looks like Rose has waited up for us, and I told her not to. She needs her sleep.’
The two farm collies, Gyp and Badger, that slept in one of the hay barns came sniffing at their ankles to make sure all was well, but as Esther and Priscilla walked towards their cottage, the two dogs slunk away into the darkness.
They hadn’t reached the cottage when the door opened. Obviously the truck’s noisy old engine had alerted Rose to their arrival. But then Esther stopped dead, shocked to the core. She often marvelled afterwards that she hadn’t dropped Joy, because all feeling seemed to drain from her limbs as she stared into Monty’s handsome face.
He stood there in the doorway, still very much the gentleman and dressed as immaculately as always, and his voice was the same when he said, ‘Hello, Esther. I’m sorry to arrive unannounced like this, but I wanted to see you . . . ’
Chapter Sixteen
It was fifteen minutes later.
Joy was tucked up in her cot and fast asleep, and Rose had insisted on taking Esther’s bed for the night, so that Esther and Monty could have the front room of the tiny cottage to themselves to talk in privacy.
When Esther came down the stairs after settling Joy, she found Monty sitting bolt upright in his chair, his gaze riveted on her face. The first words he spoke to her were about Joy, and nothing he said could have hit her on the raw so completely, which was strange in view of their content.
But it wasn’t what he said exactly, more the note of wonderment – and, yes, relief – in his tone when he said softly, ‘She is beautiful. Our daughter, she really is quite lovely.’
Esther stared at him. Joy had awoken for a few moments when she’d been carried into the cottage, almost as though the child had sensed her mother’s turmoil and distress, and Esther had noticed the widening of Monty’s eyes as he’d gazed down into the exquisite face. For a moment she had seen her daughter as Monty was seeing her: the warm, coffee-coloured skin that was such an amazing backdrop for her huge, jade-green eyes with their thick lashes, her delicate features and her golden-brown curls. She had felt both resentment and alarm when she had seen Monty’s expression, and now this feeling was increased a hundredfold. Stiffly she walked across the tiny space and sat down opposite him in the old armchair in front of the fire, and the stiffness was reflected in her voice when she said, ‘My daughter, Monty. You made it perfectly clear two years ago how you felt about her. And me.’
Monty stared at his wife. When he had arrived at the farm just after lunch he hadn’t known if Esther was living there, but he had hoped the farmer might be able to give him an idea of where she had gone, if not.
The first person he had seen as he had climbed out of his car was Rose. She had been coming out of a barn a short distance from the farmhouse, and she had stopped dead, gazing at him with an open mouth and blinking eyes, as though she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
So Esther was at the farm, he’d thought, his heart leaping in his chest, before the feeling of apprehension and dread that always accompanied thoughts of the child came into play. But the desire to see Esther had been eating him up for a long time, even before Theobald had begun to insist that he trace her whereabouts; and so he had used his charm on Rose and the farmer’s wife and had spent the afternoon in the farmhouse. Admittedly his charm hadn’t worked on Beryl, Vera and Lydia when they had come back from an hour or two at the village celebrations, but he hadn’t risen to any of their barbed comments and had kept his temper. Eventually, when the three girls had retired for the night, he walked across to the cottage with Rose and sat and waited for Esther there.
He had been very careful to say and do all the right things with Rose; he knew he needed Esther’s old nanny on his side, whether or not he decided to take Esther back, as Theobald was insisting. From what Rose had confided, it seemed Esther was devoted to the child, which he saw as the major problem, but he decided to see Esther first before he considered anything further.
And then she had come back; he had seen her face and had known he loved her more than ever, although she was not the young girl he’d left two years ago. She was very much a woman now, and he wanted the woman even more than he’d wanted the girl.
Gathering his thoughts, he said gently, ‘I know you’re angry with me, and you have every right to be, but looking back, I don’t think I was in my right mind when Joy was born. The war, everything I was going through, it takes a toll. And then, just after that, I was shot down’ – he held out his hands for her to see them clearly – ‘and for months on end I didn’t know much.’
There was no way she could find out the truth, he reassured himself silently, either about the fact that the incident had occurred a good time after the child’s arrival, or about the women he had had after he had left her.
‘Then came all the operations on these.’ He nodded at his bent and crippled fingers. ‘But at least they got them to a point where I can function relatively normally, drive and look after myself, and so on.’ He smiled bravely.
Esther said nothing, keeping her face blank with enormous effort, but behind the calm facade her mind was racing and her heart was thumping so hard it actually hurt.
‘I want us to go back to the way it was, Esther. And your father is prepared to meet you—’
‘My father is not known to you.’
‘I mean Theobald. He—’
‘I want nothing to do with him.’ She felt she was on solid ground here, at least. When Monty had been talking about his hands, she had imagined what he must ha
ve gone through and it was weakening her. She knew, from some of the things that Kenny had said, that Monty would have suffered the torments of the damned. She could see in his face that pain had aged him. ‘Let me make one thing absolutely clear, Monty. Theobald Wynford is no relation of mine, and I am thankful for it,’ she continued flatly. ‘I want no claim on him, and he has none on me.’
Reproachfully he said, ‘You don’t feel that is a little hard? He was the deceived, Esther. Not the deceiver.’
She didn’t deign to answer that. ‘Why are you here, Monty?’
‘I told you. I want us to be together again.’
‘That is impossible.’
‘Why? We are still man and wife, and there is the child to consider. Do you want her to grow up without a father?’
‘Better that than knowing that her father is ashamed of her. We both know how you feel. You made it abundantly clear two years ago.’
‘I’ve explained about that.’ In truth he had had the biggest shock of his life when he had seen the little girl today. She was the most exquisite child he had ever seen, and nothing like the little scrap he remembered on the day of her birth. True, she was still clearly not white, but with his mother gone, that didn’t matter so much. People would assume Esther had misbehaved and he had been magnanimous and forgiven her, and as long as he made sure there were no more children, who would ever know any different? But he could deal with that problem in the future. For now he had to convince Esther to come back to him. ‘I regretted it immediately and, but for the fact that I was shot down, I would have found you and made things right. You have to believe me, darling.’
The Colours of Love Page 21