Through The Storm

by Maureen Lee

  It was almost dark by the time Jessica neared Liverpool. Although Arthur had drawn a map of the route she should take, the road signs had been taken down some time ago when there’d been the threat of invasion, and she got lost several times. Penny was in the back by now, fast asleep on the cot mattress.

  Jessica threw back her head and sang at full throttle: ‘In Dublin’s fair city where the girls are so pretty …’

  The enclosed space seemed to enhance and give even greater depth to her already glorious soprano voice. She’d joined a choir whilst she was away, but choirs seemed dull in the extreme compared to the troop concerts she used to give, at which she’d sung all the latest hits. The audience, men perhaps on the point of going off to fight within a matter of hours, had joined in the chorus if they knew the words, cheering to the echo when the concert finished. The atmosphere had been charged with emotion. Sometimes dear old Jacob Singerman, who accompanied Jess on the piano, had been close to tears at the end.

  When Jessica drove into the dusk of the great city where she was born she felt her heart lift. She found the headlights worse than useless to see by with their metal caps which left merely a narrow slit of illumination. But she didn’t need lights to witness the damage that had been wrought. Parts had been reduced to little more than brickyards and elsewhere bare skeletons of buildings remained, silhouetted black against the grey sky. She drove around, almost aimlessly, for a while, forgetting she was wasting petrol, her horror increasing with each corner she turned. Eileen Costello had told her what had happened in her letters, but nothing could have prepared her for actually seeing the terrible destruction for herself. It was as if the city had been hit by an earthquake.

  Jessica sighed, thought about the petrol, and turned the van in the direction of Bootle.

  Yet more destruction and broken buildings. Some streets seemed to have disappeared completely, wiped with ruthless finality off the face of the earth. She felt a strange sort of resentment that she’d missed all this, though she knew she was being ridiculous and silly. It didn’t seem right that she, a Liverpudlian, had avoided the suffering that everyone else in the city had endured.

  She pressed her foot on the accelerator, anxious to get to Bootle, to Pearl Street, to be home.

  The first thing she did when she entered the house was draw the curtains everywhere and turn the gaslights on. She was pleased to find the place looked quite respectable, and as the agent had said, the furniture was good, if rather ornate and over-large, and had thoughtfully been polished. The heavy embossed wallpaper had taken the distemper well and the rooms were bright and cheerful, and would look even brighter once she got some pretty chintz to cover the ugly blackout material. She’d just have to go without carpets until she earned money of her own, though the quaintly old-fashioned oilcloth looked the sort that was quite likely to come back in vogue.

  ‘What do you think, Penny?’ Jessica asked as she carried her daughter upstairs to show her around. Penny had woken up the very second the van stopped. She seemed enchanted with everything, particularly the gas mantles which she’d never seen before, but then the most insignificant little thing could enchant Penny.

  The mattress on the double bed in the front bedroom had seen better days, but Jessica supposed it would have to do. The rear room contained only a single bed. She’d brought her own bedding and a few other things – dishes, cutlery, a few cooking utensils – though when she went downstairs again, she found the back kitchen fully equipped and supposed it had all belonged to Miss Brazier.

  There was a brass coal scuttle half full of coal on the hearth in the living room, and the fire was partially laid with rolled-up paper topped with kindling. The agent was obviously keen to make a good impression on his employer. Jess lit the paper and gradually began to add the coal, lump by lump. She was dying for a cup of tea. She thought wistfully of the house across the road, number 5, where they’d returned to live. It had been snapped up by the people next door, the Evanses, when Jess and Arthur left. She’d had it modernised throughout in the short time they’d been there; a proper fireplace instead of the ugly black range, a bath fitted in the washhouse, a stove in the back kitchen. And she’d had electricity installed throughout …

  Jessica felt herself grow hot. If it hadn’t been for the electricity, she would never have had Penny!

  ‘Oh, God!’ She felt her stomach turn over at the memory of that night.

  The fire had begun to take hold. Jessica fetched a kettle of water and put it on to boil. It was only then she realised there was no fireguard. ‘I’ll buy one tomorrow,’ she resolved. There was a second-hand shop in Marsh Lane, who’d be sure to have one in stock.

  She gave Penny a bottle of concentrated orange juice and warm water and hooked her reins to the leg of the table. Then she began to unload the van. Everyone in Pearl Street would be dying to know where it came from when they saw it there tomorrow, Aggie Donovan in particular. She’d have to find a garage. That van was going to be a source of income, and she couldn’t risk it being damaged. Her father had started with a horse and cart; Jessica was starting with a van. She was determined not to sponge off Arthur.

  The kettle boiled and the tea was made, when Jessica discovered she’d forgotten to bring milk.

  ‘Damn!’ she muttered. She couldn’t possibly wait until tomorrow for a cuppa, she’d just have to borrow some. Eileen Costello, who she would automatically have gone to, was now living in Melling, and Jacob Singerman, the dear old soul, was dead. Still, Eileen’s sister, Sheila, wouldn’t mind lending her some.

  Jessica undid Penny’s reins, picked her up and tripped along in her high-heeled suede sandals to number 16 to borrow a cup of milk. She would have sooner died of thirst than borrow milk when she lived in Calderstones, but something seemed to have happened to her when the business went bust and she’d returned to her roots in Bootle. Things that had mattered then didn’t seem important any more. She no longer cared if she made a good impression. In fact, she didn’t give a toss what people thought. She knocked on Sheila’s door and waited.

  Sheila Reilly stared in disbelief at the glamorous figure in the clinging blue dress and fluffy white mohair cardigan who was standing on her doorstep, a cherubic baby in her arms.

  ‘Strewth, if it isn’t Jess Fleming! What on earth are you doing here?’

  ‘I’m here to borrow a cup of milk. I’ve moved into number ten.’

  ‘Come in,’ Sheila cried, delighted. ‘The kids are in bed and I was just listening to the wireless on me own. Does our Eileen know you’re back? I bet she’s thrilled to bits if she does.’

  ‘No. No-one knows – except you.’

  ‘Is Arthur with you? Surely he hasn’t given up that nice job in the museum?’

  ‘Arthur might come later,’ Jessica said briefly.

  Sheila turned her gaze on the baby. ‘Is this Penelope? Oh, let me hold her. Isn’t she beautiful? Come to your Auntie Sheila, there’s a good girl. Sit down, Jess. Make yourself at home.’

  This is what I’ve missed, Jessica thought warmly; the feeling that people care, the togetherness, as if everyone in the street belonged to the same family. It was something she’d never been aware of when she’d lived there as a child.

  ‘It seems dead funny, seeing women with children younger than me own,’ Sheila said, chucking Penny under her fat chin. ‘I had six in seven years, which meant I always had a baby, but our Cal refuses to have any more till the war’s over. He says six kids and a wife are already enough to worry about whilst he’s away at sea.’

  ‘Well, you can’t blame him,’ Jess said reasonably. ‘How is Calum?’

  ‘He was fine when I last saw him in July. He’s on the Atlantic convoys. I never know when to expect him home.’ She looked at Jessica with scared eyes. ‘It’s terrible dangerous, Jess. Most nights I can’t sleep for thinking about Cal, stuck on a little boat somewhere in the middle of the ocean and all those U-boats about. I’ve lost track of the number of his mates who’ve been killed.�
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  Jessica was unsure how to reply. What on earth were you supposed to say to someone in Sheila’s position? The loss of life at sea, the tonnage of ships sunk, was horrendous, and had been so since the very first day war started and the Athenia had been torpedoed on its way to Canada.

  ‘Never mind,’ Sheila sighed. ‘If I say enough prayers, God won’t dare let anything happen to Cal.’ She stared at Penny curiously. ‘Y’know, it’s awful funny, Jess, but she’s got a definite look of our Siobhan – y’know, me oldest girl. Isn’t that peculiar?’

  ‘Very peculiar,’ Jess agreed.

  ‘Anyroad, now’s you’re here, you may as well have a cup of tea with us. I was just about to make one, me dad’ll be along in a minute on his way home from the pub, though you can put the kettle on yourself.’ She hugged Penny, who looked quite content in a strange woman’s arms. ‘There’s no way I’m going to give up this lovely little bundle.’

  ‘I’ve already made tea,’ Jessica said. ‘I’ll go and fetch it. It would be a shame to waste a whole pot.’

  She fetched a dozen eggs at the same time – she’d brought a whole tray with her which she’d intended keeping for herself, but Sheila’s open-hearted welcome had touched her. She remembered the way people usually shared things, particularly good fortune if it came their way.

  Sheila was overwhelmed when Jess returned. ‘Eggs! A whole dozen! I’ll give some of them to Brenda.’

  ‘You can buy eggs from the farms,’ Jess explained. She went into the back kitchen and poured the tea.

  ‘Our Eileen’s started keeping hens out in Melling, though none of them have laid yet, they’re only little.’

  ‘I must go and see her.’

  ‘Perhaps we could all go together one weekend?’

  ‘That’d be nice.’ Jess could hear laughter in the street, men’s voices. The King’s Arms was letting out. She held her breath, feeling on edge as she waited for the key to be drawn through the letterbox, for the door to open. She wondered if she’d purposely forgotten the milk, so she would have an excuse to call on Sheila Reilly the minute she arrived.

  A few minutes later came the sound which she’d been so anxiously expecting. The front door was opened. ‘It’s only me, luv,’ a man’s voice called.

  ‘Come on in, Dad,’ Sheila called back.

  And the giant figure of Jack Doyle appeared, almost entirely filling the doorway of the living room.

  Chapter 3

  Jack Doyle stood immobile in the doorway, his face totally expressionless. He was better dressed than usual, in a cheap navy-blue suit and a collar and tie.

  ‘Jess’s home,’ sang Sheila. ‘She’s moved into number ten, Miss Brazier’s old house. And this is Penelope. Isn’t she lovely? And it’s ever so strange, Dad, but from certain angles, she’s the image of our Siobhan.’

  Jack blinked and came shuffling awkwardly into the room. ‘Where’s Arthur?’ he growled, directing his question at Sheila, as if the red-headed figure in the blue dress were invisible.

  ‘Arthur might come later,’ Sheila explained.

  ‘What happened to the Grahams?’

  ‘Dai Evans said the rent collector told him they were bad payers – they both had the same landlord. They were chucked out. I already told you that, Dad.’

  ‘That’s not fair,’ Jack exploded. ‘There were five kids in that family and Alfie Graham hasn’t worked in years.’

  ‘Only because he didn’t want to,’ Sheila argued. ‘There’s plenty of work for everyone since the war began.’ She regarded him with a certain amount of disapproval. ‘You’re dead rude, Dad. You haven’t said hello to Jess.’

  ‘Hello,’ he said grudgingly.

  ‘Hello, Jack,’ said Jessica. Her face was as expressionless as his, disguising entirely the thrill of excitement that coursed through her.

  She’d loved Jack Doyle since she was twelve, when he had come to the yard to complain bitterly because her father had given only coppers to some old lady for a family treasure which was worth far more. He was eight years older than she was, already courting, and barely aware of Jessie Hennessy’s existence. Anyroad, he wouldn’t be interested in someone like her, the daughter of a capitalist, a man who made his living like a leech on the backs of the poor – or so she’d heard him yell at her father on more than one occasion.

  After they left Pearl Street, she still had hankerings after the young firebrand who’d been the bane of her father’s life for so many years, though gradually, as time passed, the memory faded and if she thought about him at all, she regarded him as part of a working-class past long out-grown. She married Arthur. She was happy living in Calderstones, surrounded by every luxury money could buy. Her wardrobe was stuffed with the latest fashions, they owned the latest car, the kitchen was fitted with the most modern appliances. Jessica Fleming wanted for nothing.

  At least she told herself she was happy. There was always a sense of sadness that she’d never had children. At times, she felt she would have given everything, the clothes, the car, all the equipment in the kitchen, if only she could conceive a child of her own. Of course, it was her own fault. There was something wrong with her. Jessica Fleming might well be the epitome of womanhood, with her broad hips just made for childbirth, and full breasts waiting to be filled with milk, but inside she was barren …

  ‘Jess!’

  Jessica came to. Sheila was standing over her, a cup and saucer in her hand.

  ‘You were miles away,’ she laughed. ‘I’ve poured you another cup of tea.’

  ‘Thanks. You’re right, I was miles away.’

  ‘With Arthur?’

  ‘I’m not quite sure where I was.’

  Penny had been transferred to Jack Doyle’s knee while Jess was in her daydream. She was standing, exploring his face with her hands, whilst he stared at her, a curious, almost mystified expression on his craggy features. When Penny pulled his ears, he couldn’t resist it, he smiled.

  The smile transformed his rather sombre face. He was still a good-looking man, Jack Doyle, thought Jessica, perhaps better looking now than when he was young, with a rugged, almost exaggerated handsomeness and eyes that were a vivid blue. Both his daughters had inherited the same colour eyes. He wore the cheap suit with a sort of rough elegance that better-dressed men might have envied. He was so very different from Arthur, who was delicately boned, much thinner, with small, almost feminine, hands. Jack’s hands were like spades, workman’s hands, rough and worn at the knuckles from the hard manual work he did every day on the docks.

  Jessica shivered, remembering the way those hands had touched every part of her the night she conceived Penny. She wondered if he was having the same sort of thoughts. There’d only been the once, and neither of them had referred to it again. They’d acted as if the night had never happened, as if he’d never come into the house to get on with the electricity, thinking the place was empty. Instead, he found Jessica, naked in the bath in front of the fire.

  He lifted Penny high above his head, his hands almost meeting around her small body, and she squealed in delight. ‘She’s lovely,’ he said, for the first time addressing Jessica directly. ‘But Penelope’s a daft name to give her. What made you think of that?’

  ‘We call her Penny.’

  ‘That’s better.’

  ‘What was the lecture like, Dad?’ Sheila turned to Jessica. ‘He went to a lecture earlier on with his girlfriend.’

  Jack flushed a ruddy red. ‘She’s not me girlfriend, don’t be so bloody stupid.’

  ‘Your womanfriend, then,’ Sheila giggled. ‘Did you ever meet Kate Thomas, Jess? She was the overseer in our Eileen’s factory.’

  When Jessica shook her head, Sheila continued, ‘Her and Dad get on like a house on fire – don’t you, Dad? Me and our Eileen really fancy having Kate Thomas for a stepmother.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, girl, shut up your nonsense. There’s nothing like that between me and Kate.’ He grew even redder and Penny patted his cheeks curiously. />
  ‘More’s the pity.’ Sheila sighed and winked at Jessica. ‘You’ve been a widower for a long time, Dad. It seems a shame, a man like you going to waste. I bet there’s loads of women dying to get their hands on you – and Kate Thomas is probably first in line.’

  ‘What was the lecture about?’ asked Jessica, who was finding the conversation irritating.

  Jack looked relieved that the subject had been changed. ‘Anglo–Soviet Co-operation,’ he replied. Then his big face twisted contemptuously. ‘It makes you sick, the way the official line on our Russian comrades has changed out of all proportion since June. No-one had a good word to say about them until then. Now, Communism’s respectable, Russia’s our “Great Ally”, and Stalin can’t do a thing wrong. It’s “Uncle Joe” this, and “Uncle Joe” that, and everyone’s falling over themselves to send help, from “Tanks for Russia” week to knitting blankets. They even sent an entire wing of the RAF over there. In fact,’ he said proudly, ‘that’s where Nick is, our Eileen’s husband, Russia.’

  ‘I know,’ said Jessica.

  ‘Brenda Mahon’s making gloves and socks for the Russians,’ Sheila put in.

  Jack nodded approvingly. ‘They’ll need them, what with the winter coming on.’

  The Germans had thought the conquest would be easy – Hitler himself had said Russia would fall like a leaf – but the Russians, although they were retreating, were fighting like demons for every single inch of soil. Not only that, they adopted a scorched-earth policy which meant the enemy might capture a town, but there was nothing left to capture; the people had left, the buildings had been razed to the ground.

  ‘Did you listen to the news tonight, luv?’ Jack asked his daughter.

  ‘Yes, Dad,’ Sheila said obediently, ‘but there’s not much happening anywhere, at least not much worth reporting. Everything’s in the doldrums at the moment, except for Russia.’