‘No chance of that, Beat,’ grinned Jack as he went off to perform his own duties. ‘You’re too well thought of.’
* * *
It was no empty compliment. Major and Mrs Herron did seem greatly to appreciate her endeavours and she was very well treated. Instead of just the afternoon off that she had enjoyed as a maid, in her position of cook she was now given a whole day, which was especially useful when her friend eventually arrived from Scotland. It was marvellous to see Lucy and her family again, who seemed to have brought the weather with them for after a cold and unsettled midsummer the temperature suddenly soared to eighty and clear blue skies were to enhance their sojourn. It was exceptionally pleasant for Beata to see two more of her godchildren, even if they did spend their time fighting with Jack’s offspring over who was going to sit next to her in the car when he took them all out for a picnic.
Motoring all the way into the West Riding, after lunch Jack proposed a visit to Cragthorpe Hall. Its owners, just as much affected as anyone else by the financial disasters of the last decade, had been forced to open their home to public viewing. The mothers said they could hardly take their children into such a grand residence, dressed as they were in bathing costumes against the intense heat. Beata at once grasped this chance of temporary motherhood, replying that she would stay outside to look after them, totally unaware that she was missing the opportunity of visiting the magnificent house where Aunt Kit had once been housemaid.
Too soon for Beata, Lucy was on her way home again but the glorious weather was to remain, Yorkshire enjoying its driest July for eighty-four years and the drought continuing into August.
It was September before Mrs Temple was finally well enough to return to her post, very grateful to keep it after such a long absence. With mixed feelings Beata prepared to leave, though she was to stay on for a few more days until Mrs Temple got back into the swing of things. At the end of her tenure, Major Herron summoned her to the drawing room to give thanks for all her help and to hope he could call upon her again in such an emergency.
Beata voiced the genuine reply that she had enjoyed being here, then addressed Fräulein Froitzhein, who had gathered with the family in the drawing room. ‘Goodbye, miss. I hope it’ll soon be safe for you to go home.’
The young woman looked rather taken aback, but did not respond to this except for a sad little nod and to wish Beata luck.
Dispensing with etiquette, Jack carried his former sweetheart’s bag to the car. ‘I don’t think she’ll be going back yet, Beat. She certainly won’t be marrying her young man that’s for sure. The Nazis’ve totally forbidden it.’
Beata clicked her tongue. ‘Makes you glad you live in England, doesn’t it?’
‘It does indeed!’ he said cheerily, handing her to the care of the young chauffeur who had been instructed to drive her back to York. ‘It’s been grand to work with you again, Beat. Keep in touch, won’t you?’
Beata said she would. Indeed, she had remained on good terms with most of those with whom she had worked over the years and was regularly in contact. Next month would see her attending Sadie’s wedding.
It was difficult, though, changing jobs all the time and life became a little flat after working with her old pals again. While she could not complain of being idle, the posts she was offered were not of such high calibre and, jumping from one menial job to the next, it was really a case of marking time until something better came along. At least it gave her the chance to save for Christmas.
It looked like it was going to be a white one for, come mid-December, there was an overnight fall of snow and citizens woke to find a fourteen-inch drift blocking their doorways. Seizing on this chance of work, however transitory, ranks of unemployed lined up outside the Corporation offices to be given snow-clearing implements. Whilst two of Mick’s sons shivered in the queue, he himself did not, objecting that his back would not cope with such punishment and using this same excuse when the Post Office needed four hundred extra men to meet the Christmas rush.
Braving the harsh conditions to deliver gifts, fighting to keep her feet like the cart horses that skittered over the treacherous granite setts, Beata found him warm and comfortable in his fireside chair whilst his wife underwent the gargantuan task of preparing festivities for her extended family.
‘The bag was too heavy for him, Beat,’ his loving wife explained why Mick was not out delivering letters. ‘The Post Office ask an awful lot of those chaps, you know. I’d hate for him to injure himself permanently.’
‘Not much danger of that,’ growled Maddie when Beata related the episode. ‘I’m beginning to think he must be glued to that bloody chair.’
Beata agreed. ‘But our Gus won’t have a word said against him.’
The scene was much the same the following week when Beata called to thank her sister for the Christmas gloves, Mick sitting in his usual warm place by the fire reading the newspaper, hardly bothering to acknowledge his sister-in-law as she came in from the cold but holding out his empty tea cup to his wife as a request for a refill.
Having a propensity for doing several tasks at once, Augusta was checking on a cake in the oven, whilst with her free hand stirring the pan that held a stew for dinner, and was obviously in the middle of ironing too, for there was a stack of clothes two foot high on the table. Notwithstanding her sister’s talents, seeing her now about to rush to fulfil Mick’s request, Beata sought to spare her and grabbed the cup off him. ‘I’ll mash a pot.’
Whilst she did this, Gussie went back to her ironing, Mick’s only contribution being to read extracts of news to the women.
‘God rot them, the Italians have used poison gas in Abyssinia.’
Remembering the poor broken men who had been gassed in the war, Gussie paused, iron in hand, to show indignation. ‘That’s against the Geneva Convention.’
‘Not everyone follows the rules, Gus – Pass me that baccy from the mantel, will ye, deary?’
Beata held her tongue as Gussie pandered to his desire.
‘Why is the League of Nations not enforcing them then?’ She picked up her iron again and dashed it at the linen.
In the act of lighting his pipe, Mick shrugged, then leaned back in his chair to puff contentedly. ‘Ye know what they say about rules, they’re meant to be broken. Anyway, the League of Nations is a joke, there’ll soon be nobody left in it.’ Japan and Germany had both resigned their memberships, others were threatening to emulate.
Beata cast her mind back to what Fräulein Froitzhein had said and related this to the listeners. ‘The major thinks there’ll be another European war. What’s your opinion on it, Mick?’ Lazy or not he had had much experience of the world.
‘’Tisn’t impossible.’ There was a rasping sound while Mick scratched his white stubbled chin. ‘The Corporation isn’t preparing air-raid precautions for nothing. If there is another war that’s where it’ll come from, de air.’
‘My God, if it isn’t bad enough the miners are threatening another strike over pay we’re going to get bombed an’ all,’ sighed Beata. ‘What else could befall us?’
* * *
The New Year was blasted in on a ferocious gale, the streets littered with broken slates and twigs. It was as if this was an indication of what kind of year it was going to be, for that same month it was announced that the King was gravely ill and within three days he was dead, the nation plunged into mourning.
Forty-eight hours later, on her afternoon off, Beata stopped to watch a procession of robed aldermen, soldiers, police and magistrates make their way to the steps of the Mansion House where proclamation was made of a new king, Edward VIII.
She happened to be passing through town again on the day that the old king was laid to rest. A single stroke of Great Peter boomed out over the city to command a two-minute silence, dutifully observed by all despite the heavy rain, busy shoppers suddenly frozen in respect, a few of them even sobbing.
Beata could have wept too but for another reason. She had rec
eived a letter from Aunt Meredith asking if she would once again go and look after Wyn and Teddy. Wyn certainly knew how to manipulate. She could have written directly but, obviously alert that Beata would think she was malingering, she had used her more popular sister as an ambassador, knowing Beata would not refuse. Whether Wyn was genuinely ill this time, or just wanted a servant, she had yet to find out. But whatever the reason she was compelled to respond. There was nobody else who could go; they all had their own lives to follow. Free of responsibility, Beata had no excuse. Hence, she had been forced to give notice and now stood here with suitcase in hand, waiting for the two minutes to pass.
People came to life again. Continuing through the rain, she made for Gussie’s house to inform her sister of her movements.
Encountering a group of nuns on their way out, she showed no surprise, for Gussie’s house was as their mother’s had been, regularly visited by supplicants of the Church, agents who purveyed a host of religious icons, not to mention neighbours on the cadge. Nodding respectfully to the wimpled brigade, she went indoors to discover that Maddie had chosen the same time to make a visit.
‘Oh, I’m glad you’re here too. I can kill two birds with one stone.’ Beata explained that she had been summoned to Aunt Wyn’s.
Puffing on a cigarette, Maddie eyed the little suitcase, a cynical twist to her smile. ‘Just as well I was here. It’s saved you having to trudge all the way to tell me, I don’t think.’
Beata gave a guilty chuckle and offered to make a pot of tea so as not to disturb Gussie in her delicate task of icing a cake. Instead of rotten apples this house had a permanent aroma of baking and vanilla. Putting her talents to good use, as if she did not already have enough to do, Gussie had started to bake and ice wedding cakes for profit.
Always glad to chat with her sisters, today she had something extra to confide. ‘I’m having another.’ She bit her lip, half excited half afraid. ‘Cross your fingers for me.’
‘Oh, we will, Gus.’ Beata gripped the other’s arm, trying to inject confidence.
Maddie donated little more than a grunt. ‘Where’s the culprit? I see he’s managed to extricate himself from his chair today.’
‘He’s just gone to put a bet on. It’s his only bit of enjoyment, you know.’
Beata dared not look at Maddie but sipped her tea, focusing instead on the youngest stepdaughter, who had been kept off school with a cough. Watching Gussie hand the little girl her baking bowl and spoon to lick, smiling upon Elinor with tenderness as she did so, Beata thought how lucky the Melodys were to have her. Her mind inevitably drifted to another stepmother. How could Eliza have been so cruel to little ones when she had had three of her own? For a sane person, it was impossible to imagine that woman’s reasoning.
‘What are you thinking?’ Busy as she was, Gussie had noted her sister’s frown of concentration.
Roused, Beata smiled. ‘Oh, nowt much, trying to put myself in your shoes. I dreamed I had a baby last night.’
‘Ooh, don’t say that.’ Gussie shivered and crossed herself. ‘If you dream of a birth there’ll be a death.’
‘I suppose it’s too much to hope that it’ll be Aunt Wyn’s,’ muttered Beata to Maddie under her breath as their sister went to answer a knock at the door.
The visitor did not disturb them long, having only come to pay for her wedding cake. After she had gone Gussie dropped the money into a tin with a satisfied air. ‘Another bit towards the lasses’ college fees.’
Maddie huffed in disapproval. ‘Shouldn’t that be their father’s responsibility?’
‘Oh, poor Mick – his army pension won’t stretch to it. And they’re ever so bright. It would be a crime if they weren’t given the chance to improve theirselves.’
Silently agreeing with Maddie, Beata gave a sigh and announced, ‘Well, it’s no good me dawdling here I’ll have to go some time.’ Reluctantly she rose to put on her hat and coat. ‘Look after yourself, Gus, and write and tell me how you’re all going on.’
Gussie promised she would.
‘Bye, Maddie.’
The reply was delivered on a puff of cigarette smoke. ‘Abyssinia.’
* * *
Beata did find Aunt Wyn genuinely ill this time and, on viewing the poor frail old patient, immediately felt guilty that she had slandered her.
However, this was not to last long. Once recovered and back in her usual position at her husband’s bedside, Wyn thanked her niece in her inimitable stingy manner. Eyeing Beata’s tattered footwear, she announced, ‘You need new slippers. If you pay a shilling towards them I’ll supply the other elevenpence.’
Where would I get a shilling? thought Beata, whose only recompense for looking after her aunt and uncle was to be fed, though out of respect for an elder she did not voice this retort, saying instead, ‘That’s very kind of you, Aunt, but I can only just scrape together the train fare back to York.’ She saw her aunt’s dismay. ‘Of course I won’t go till both you and Uncle are better.’
Instead of her imperious style, Wyn looked pathetic. ‘I was hoping you’d stay for good.’
Beata hoped her face did not portray the horror she felt.
‘Uncle Teddy seems to be getting worse, tripping over and such—’ He might stay upright if he didn’t drink so much, thought Beata, struggling for an excuse not to stay here.
‘—and I’m not getting any younger. If he goes down I can’t pick him up without help. And I mean if I were to fall too we could be lying there for weeks and nobody would know.’
‘But Margaret comes in every few days.’
‘It’s not enough. We need somebody here permanently.’
‘You could hire a nurse.’
‘We could if we had the money!’ Wyn looked hurt. ‘Anyway, we’re not invalids, I’m just asking for a bit of family loyalty.’
‘Aunt, I’d gladly oblige if I could but I need to earn a living and—’
‘Why? You’ve no children to support, we feed you well, don’t we?’
That was debatable, thought Beata. ‘Yes, but there are others who need me too, Aunt. Our Gussie’s expecting another baby soon. I’d like to be there after she’s had such a difficult time of it, and there’ll doubtless be somebody else wants me for something once I’m in York.’
‘But only on a temporary basis,’ pointed out Wyn, ‘when one or another of them is giving birth or whatnot. They don’t need you like I do. It’s not through selfishness I ask, naturally you may go to them if they write, but once you’ve dealt with whatever it is there’s nothing to stop you from coming back here, is there?’
Beata frowned, but could summon no answer. ‘All right, I’ll stay, but on the understanding that if anyone else should need me—’
‘I shall release you of course,’ beamed Wyn, suddenly not quite so frail.
* * *
With her aunt as stingy as ever and Beata’s own funds gradually exhausted over the months that she was here, there was no means of getting up to York – or even away from the house for any length of time, for Wyn and Teddy were always calling for her. Nor was there any entertainment to be had in conversation; if Margaret so much as paused in her dusting Aunt Wyn was on her like a vulture, saying they did not pay her to stand and gossip. The only other people who came here were her aunt and uncle’s acquaintances, and Beata was not included in their dialogue, though this did not stop her listening in as she served them tea.
Today’s discussion between the local clergy concerned the German Chancellor, whose name seemed to be cropping up more and more in the newspapers.
‘When I visited Germany,’ the Reverend Mr Love took his cup of tea from Beata without acknowledgement, ‘everyone seemed to adore Mr Hitler. He’s quite an impressive personality and he’s certainly united their nation. It’s only the politically motivated ones that bring trouble upon themselves.’
‘It’s a fact.’ Mr Jowett, the minister, agreed. ‘It’s all very well the League of Nations rattling on about him introducing conscri
ption but he’s solved his unemployment problem, hasn’t he? And the trade unions. We could do with someone like him here.’
‘You wouldn’t think we were the ones who won the war,’ grumbled Father O’Kelly.
‘No indeed.’ Teddy leaned towards his guests with a whisky bottle, tipping a dram in each teacup. ‘Thank the Lord Mr Baldwin’s in charge again. He’ll put the country back on its feet. Besides, I don’t know why everyone keeps on about the Germans. It’s the Russians we should be wary of.’
‘True, true,’ came an ecclesiastical chorus.
Quietly departing with her tray, Beata was not quite so trustful of these old men’s judgement. Confined to the house on an evening she had much time to read the newspapers or listen to the wireless and was acquainted with the great unrest that was going on in Germany, but what worried her more were the reports that the Nazis had started to interfere in the war that was going on in Spain. So too had the Italians, who had a similarly bombastic leader. She had seen both men on the newsreel at the cinema and their military power had frightened her. There was something evil afoot. The politics of it all was beyond her, but, quick to recognize any injustice, she understood all too well that people were being persecuted for their religion, men put out of business simply because they were Jews. She knew how it felt to be discriminated against because of her religion.
She was discussing this some days later with the cleaner, telling her about poor Fräulein Froitzhein, when a bad-tempered Aunt Wyn came upon them.
‘Gossiping again! This really won’t do, Margaret. I shall have to dock your pay.’
‘It was my fault, Aunt,’ explained Beata as a grim-faced Margaret plodded away. ‘I just think it’s disgusting what’s being done to the poor Jews, don’t you?’
Her attitude having changed somewhat since the news that Herr Hitler and his Nazis had marched in to reoccupy the demilitarized zone of the Rhineland, Wyn was inclined to take more notice of what was happening. ‘Well, yes, it is. Uncle Horace would be having a difficult time of it if he was in Germany – if he wasn’t already dead, that is. He was once a Jew, you know.’
A Different Kind of Love Page 68