‘Are you seeing Phil this weekend?’
‘No. Well, we haven’t arranged anything.’
He’d asked me out for Saturday night and I’d turned him down vaguely. I regretted it now. Without Peggy, the house was already feeling empty.
‘Blooming heck! It’s raining and I haven’t got a brolly!’
Standing in the doorway of the café, Carol tugged a scarf from her coat pocket and tied it over her hair. Then, with her head down, she dashed out into the crowds.
‘Tara Rosie. Maybe see you in the week!’
I pulled my coat around me and splashed through the puddles, headed for home.
There was no smell of cooking, not even the lingering smell of something drying up in the oven. Instead Mrs Brown was looking busy and harassed.
‘You can have bacon and eggs and a bit of mash for your supper. I’m making a start on Peggy’s room.’
‘Making a start on what?’
‘Well we’re going to be moving soon. That first phase is just about finished up at The Meadows. Frank heard from his mate Les that the decorators are starting on Monday and that’s the last thing to be done. They’ll be allocating them soon. I don’t suppose we’ll get first phase, but we’ll probably get second if they want us out of the way to start on their precious new road. And there’s a lot to be done.’
I realised she had been struggling with an old suitcase, on which the zip had broken as it was tied together with a dressing-gown cord.
‘All these are clothes ready for the jumble sale. I’ll leave it in the scullery and if anyone comes around – I think the Guides are due one day soon – just give them that will you, love. Now where’s Frank? He’s late this evening. Just as well as I’m not ready for him.’ And she struggled with the case through the kitchen and into the scullery.
With that, Mr Brown came in, stamping the rain off his shoes.
‘You’re late, Frank,’ said his wife.
‘Yes and for a very good reason.’
There was a silence.
‘Well aren’t you going to ask me what that reason is?’
‘Oh go on then,’ said Mrs Brown, not looking at him, but tipping potatoes into the sink and turning the tap on. ‘Why are you late?’
‘I’ve bought a car.’
There was a very satisfying clatter as the potato knife dropped into the stone sink too. ‘You’ve done what?’
‘I’ve bought a little car, a Morris Minor.’ Mr Brown looked very pleased with himself.
‘A car! Us?’
‘Why not? I’ve been thinking about it ever since it took us all day to get to that christening and all night to get back from it. If we had a little car, we could have done it in an hour.’
‘Can we afford it?’
‘I had a bit of money put by for our Peg’s wedding and well, in the end it didn’t cost as much as I thought, so let’s spend it on something we can enjoy.’
‘What do you know about cars? Do you know how to drive one?’
‘Course I do. Learnt in the army, didn’t I?’
She bombarded him with questions over kind, colour, cost.
‘And have you got it here now?’ Mrs Brown darted out to the front, to see if it was in the street.
‘No, no. It will take a few days to get the paperwork arranged and everything done.’
‘Well, well,’ said Mrs Brown, finally absorbing the idea. ‘Fancy that. A new house, a new baby, and a new car, all at the same time. We are going up in the world, aren’t we?’
‘If you want to put it like that,’ said Mr Brown, looking pleased with himself. ‘Right then, where’s my supper?’
Mrs Brown scuttled back into the scullery and started speedily peeling potatoes.
As we sat down to bacon and egg, with the egg yolk mopped up by the mash to fill any gaps, Mrs Brown was still dreaming of the difference a car would make.
‘We’ll be able to go to the seaside. And for drives out in the country. Oh, Frank, we could go on a holiday, a touring holiday. You see it in the papers, don’t you, in the wedding reports. “The couple will spend their honeymoon on a touring holiday of the West Country.” We could do that -a touring holiday along the open road.’
She cleared our plates and brought out some fruit cake for pudding. ‘Cornwall, now I’ve always wanted to go to Cornwall, they say it’s very quaint. Can we go to Cornwall, Frank?’
‘Why not?’ Mr Brown was beaming like an indulgent uncle.
Janice came in later to finish the fruit cake and her English homework (‘Describe Shakespeare’s use of the imagery of blood in Macbeth’), and was very impressed to hear about the new car.
‘After all, Mr Brown,’ she said solemnly, ‘we are the New Elizabethans, and we have to explore our world.’
Mr Brown laughed, ‘Well pet, I think I explored more than enough of it in the desert with Monty, but yes, we’ll explore a bit more now.’
Chapter Twenty-One
It had rained all day and all night. From the moment Carol and I had come out of Silvino’s on Saturday afternoon, and all through Sunday, it hadn’t stopped. It had blown George and Peggy in through the door on Sunday evening, their cheeks glowing, their eyes dancing with excitement. Was it the weather or the honeymoon? I wondered.
‘Can’t stop long, Mum,’ said Peggy, ‘George’s mum will be waiting for us. But I’ll come over tomorrow afternoon, when you’re back from work and tell you all about it. But we’ve had a lovely time. We’ve seen Buckingham Palace and the changing of the guard, and we saw the Houses of Parliament – it’s just like on the sauce bottle!’
Over a quick cup of tea and a slice of the sponge cake Mrs Brown had baked that morning, Peggy handed over a little plate with a picture of Buckingham Palace. ‘Present back, Mum.’
Mrs Brown smiled and put it on the dresser, slap bang in the middle of the shelf. ‘I’ll put it there so people can’t miss it,’ she said proudly, ‘and I can say my daughter and son-in-law brought it back from their honeymoon in London.’
I could see again how the story of the wedding was still being re-written.
After a quick hug for Peggy from her parents, she and George had dodged back into the rain. George with one hand carrying their small case and the other protectively holding Peggy’s arm.
‘I don’t know, it doesn’t seem right her not being here,’ said Mrs Brown, peering out of the sitting-room window trying to watch them going down the street.
‘She’s a married woman, now. Her place is with her husband,’ said Mr Brown.
Mrs Brown fussed around clearing away the cups and plates and taking them out to the kitchen. I could have offered to help but thought that really she would prefer to be on her own.
All night it rained. The wind whipped along the streets and blew the blossom off the trees. The blossom bobbed on the ripples whipped up on the puddles. As I sat eating my breakfast porridge, glad of its stodgy comfort, the rain slashed angrily against the kitchen window, making the old frame rattle and turning the outside world into a cold wet blur.
‘More like blooming winter than nearly summer. I hope Peggy wraps up well when she comes around,’ said Mrs Brown, tugging on a pair of rubber boots and tying a scarf firmly around her head. ‘No point in taking a brolly today. It’ll be blown inside out before I’m across the doorstep.’
‘When you get your new car you’ll be able to have a lift to work, or drive yourself,’ I said.
Mrs Brown stopped, her hands in midair where she’d been tugging at her scarf. ‘Ooh, I couldn’t do that. We couldn’t use the car for that. Though Frank might. No, I’ll be back to Shanks’s blooming pony. Anyway, I’m off now. Make sure the door’s shut really tight when you go out, won’t you? Otherwise we’ll come back and find the wind’s whipped it right off.’
I finished my breakfast, washed the dishes and did my make-up in the kitchen mirror – powder, lipstick and a quick spit on the mascara. Then, wrapped up nearly as securely as Mrs Brown, I tugged open the front door a
nd launched myself into the storm.
Ouch! The rain slapped me in the face, blew my skirts up and tugged through my hair. It was a battle to get over the doorstep, never mind down the street. How I missed my car, my nice, warm, safe, dry little car … I would have caught a bus, but there was no direct route between the house and The News. I would have caught a cab if I could have found such a thing. Come to that, if I’d spotted the milkman and his horse I’d have hitched a lift on that. As it was, I had to walk, hands in pockets, head bent against the wind and the rain that was stinging my face.
By the time I got to work I was soaked. My feet squelched in my sensible shoes, I had mud splashes all up the back of my legs and the rain had even started to come through the shoulders of my sensible mac.
‘Lovely weather for ducks,’ said the receptionist cheerfully as I squelched into The News, water dripping off the end of my scarf.
The office smelt of wet clothes and wet shoes, horribly reminiscent of wet dog. It mingled with the smell of musty newspapers and all the cigarette smoke. It made me long to get out again, but one look at the smeary, rain-spattered windows, the panes rattling in their frames, made me equally desperate to stay inside, smell of wet dog or not.
Despite the damp and the smell, I went up the stairs with that small sense of excitement, that fluttering in your insides that comes from fancying someone you work with. Only this was much more than simply fancying. I squelched up the stairs with a spring in my soggy step.
‘Bit damp are you there, kid?’ asked Billy as I dripped past him, my face bright red with the rain and the wind. I grinned – if he’d called me ‘kid’ back at home in our own real time, I would probably have hated it, but here it was great, a sign of comradeliness, affection almost … I shook my head so the drops flew off and spattered all over the newsdesk diary, and then ran quickly as he shook his fist in mock horror.
‘Just for that,’ he said sternly, ‘I think I will send you on a nice little door-stepping exercise …’
My face must have fallen because he laughed.
‘No, you’re OK, I wouldn’t send a dog out today, though,’ with a grin over his shoulder, ‘I’m going to send Alan. No, Marje is off today, so could you do the women’s page please, Rosie? Oh yes, and we need Kiddies’ Corner too.’
I groaned. But at least it kept me out of the rain, which got no better as the morning went on. At lunch time I was still bashing away at my typewriter when Alan came back in. Rain was dripping off the rim of his hat and he looked soaked to the skin.
‘The river’s very high,’ he said, peeling off his sodden raincoat and draping it over the back of a chair. ‘Sergeant Foster was down there, looking worried. Apparently the Civil Defence are on standby. They’re filling sandbags. It looks as though they’ll be needed. It’s getting serious out there.’
He looked at Billy. ‘I don’t know if you want to go and check on your house …’
But Billy was already pulling on his raincoat.
‘Alan, can you run the desk for a while? I must check on Carol and the kids. If the river’s running high, it could be well up towards the house.’
‘Glad to,’ said Alan. But Billy was already gone. I could hear him dashing down the stairs two at a time to get to Carol. So much for that small show of affection for me. So much for my anticipation, the fluttering insides, my eager-ness to get into the office to see him. He was well and truly spoken for, and by someone who could get him leaping downstairs two at a time, a wife and family he had to look after and protect.
‘Are you making the tea then, Rosie?’ asked Alan as he shook his hair dry and looked at the work left on Billy’s desk. I turned, deflated, to get the kettle. I knew my place.
The rain didn’t let up. I ate my sandwiches at my desk and was finishing the women’s page (‘Meals in a hurry for busy mothers’), and Kiddies’ Corner (this week’s competition is how many words can you make from ‘Thunder and Lightning’?) when the electricity went off. It was so dark that we’d had the lights on even though it was early afternoon.
Alan cursed, lit a cigarette and then went groping around in the back of a cupboard from which he produced a paraffin lamp. He cleared a space for it in the middle of all the clutter and lit it. After a few failed and smoky efforts it finally got going and cast a cosy glow over the office, though God knew what would happen if anyone knocked it over in all those heaps of paper …
By now phones were ringing from reporters in other offices and members of the public wanting to know what was happening. Alan was already talking on two phones at once when the third rang and I answered it. It was Billy.
‘Is your house OK?’ I asked.
‘Probably not for much longer. But we’ve moved all we can upstairs and Carol and Libby have gone to her mother’s. There’s nothing more we can do.’
That little house already smelt of damp. How much more so now?
‘Look Rosie, can you get Alan? We need to be out and about. The river’s burst its banks and people are going to have to be rescued. There are great stories. I’ve seen George and Charlie, but we need another reporter out.’
‘I’ll come!’ I said.
There was a crackly silence on the other end and hope in my heart. ‘Alan has only just dried out, and he can run the desk better than I can,’ I said. I let the thought hang in the air.
At the end of the phone line I could hear the wind and rain – and almost hear Billy thinking. It took a second for him to make the decision.
‘OK. I’m down by the old quay, so get yourself to Watergate and see what’s happening there. But for goodness’ sake be careful! Now put me on to Alan.’
I interrupted Alan’s two phone calls, handed him the receiver and fled.
Floods! A real story! Worth getting wet for! And Billy had told me to be careful. Maybe he did care about me after all. Adrenalin and happiness were surging around my system.
Now I know journalists are always said to like bad news, but the truth is that they are the dramatic stories. It’s when you feel part of the action. You spend so much time doing routine stuff – those worthwhile things about concerts and councils – that you long for something different. It’s exciting, an adventure, and also you feel useful and part of the community at the same time. So it wins on all fronts – and you know that lots of people will buy the paper the next day.
As long as The News’ generator worked of course …
The receptionist on the front desk looked horrified as I clattered down the stairs. ‘You’re not going out in this are you?’ she said, and when she saw that obviously I was, she said, ‘Well at least get yourself something sensible for your feet. Haven’t you got any wellies?’
‘No. Where’s the nearest place to get some?’
‘Woolies, of course.’
It was only across the road. I dashed in and found some wellies, the last pair in my size said the assistant, and some woolly socks. I went back to The News to change and left my soggy shoes in reception. Certainly, as I strode down to Watergate my feet felt warm and dry, about the only bit that did. I slipped my bag across me, like old ladies do, and marched out into the storm.
Down at Watergate it was chaos. The river was already over its banks and the road was disappearing. A stream ran down into the river under a low old bridge. The water was already up to the arch of the bridge and was roaring through in a torrent, bringing branches and debris down with it. It looked as though it would start backing up soon.
I splashed along on what had been a pavement but was now about a foot deep in water. It was already lapping near the top of my wellies and rising fast. I moved away, up higher towards the Market Place and the water seemed to follow me.
A policeman in fisherman’s waders was standing in the middle of the road directing traffic, up to his knees in water. A tractor and trailer were ploughing through the water sending up huge waves, but people were wading across to get into the trailer, bringing babies and possessions. A little short fat man came waddling out
nearly bent double under the weight of a huge cardboard box full of papers. I was sure the rain would make the box collapse and the wind whip all the papers away before he got to the trailer, but he made it. Just. Then he dumped the box and went waddling back to his office for more.
You could see the water rising as you looked. A lorry load of volunteers arrived with sandbags and a fireman sent them elsewhere. He was shouting into the wind and rain, but his voice was whipped away.
Normally on occasions like this I dart in and out talking to people, grabbing a chance and a quote where I can. But it’s tricky to dart when you’re wading in water in wellies. It was hard going. Police and firemen were too busy to talk, but generous enough to throw remarks out into the wind and rain. I guess they were pretty excited by it all too. Someone was waving out of a bedroom window. A fire engine arrived and the firemen put a ladder up to the window. It looked very puny in such weather.
But a fireman – in a huge and heavy uniform, made even heavier by the weight of the rain – climbed up and took a bundle from the woman at the window. The bundle shrieked. It was a baby. The fireman in his yellow helmet took the baby down the ladder and it was handed from arm to arm to the safety of a lorry parked in the shallower water. Then there was a slightly larger bundle, a little girl of about two.
At that point, hooray! George arrived. He got some good pictures and I paddled through the water to the trailer and got the names of the mother and children.
I tried to write them down in my notebook but it was hopeless. I struggled into a covered alleyway that led around the back of some derelict-looking houses. Quickly I scribbled down the names of the people I’d talked to, ripped the already wet pages out of my notebook and stuck them deep down in the pocket of my bag where there was a chance they might not get any wetter.
The alleyway was damp, but at least the rain wasn’t as heavy there. It was quiet too. I hadn’t realised how noisy it was outside. I leant against the wall and took a breather. There was a strange whispery noise …
The Accidental Time Traveller Page 24