by Maureen Lee
‘I would have thought that news was a cause for rejoicing, not sighs. What did you want her for, anyway?’
‘Nothing,’ said Kitty.
‘In that case, why did you say “oh, dear”?’ smiled Harriet. ‘Did you have a big expensive present for her?’
Kitty started to help with the beds. ‘Not likely,’ she said. She flung a sheet over a thin, rather lumpy palliasse, and tucked it firmly underneath. She shrugged two pillows into their cases, plumped them up and placed them at the head, flung on another sheet …
‘What’s the matter, Kitty?’ Harriet asked gently.
‘Nothing,’ Kitty said again as she grabbed two blankets.
‘You know, I have a strong desire to hit you with this pillow.’
Kitty wrinkled her nose disparagingly. ‘It’s just that I discovered me dad’s going out for the day tomorrow, that’s all, and I thought I’d swop duty with Clara.’
‘I see,’ said Harriet, and Kitty could tell from the tone of her voice that Harriet saw everything.
On Christmas morning, Jimmy Quigley spent an hour getting ready. He cleaned his teeth both before and after breakfast and spent an age having a shave and doing his hair in the living-room mirror, humming carols under his breath. He wore the maroon and yellow Paisley tie Kitty had given him that morning, and requested that she iron his best shirt again as she hadn’t got all the wrinkles out of the cuffs.
‘Where’s the clothes brush?’ he demanded, straightening his collar as he took a last pleased glance at his reflection.
‘In the same place as it was last time you asked,’ replied Kitty. She’d been watching the proceedings, doing her best not to look as miserable as she felt, which was difficult because her headache was worse today than yesterday. Not only that, her limbs throbbed painfully and felt too heavy to move. She was determined not to enquire again the identity of the ‘friend’ who’d invited him to dinner, though she was dying to know who it was. ‘If he wanted me to know, he’d tell me,’ she reasoned.
‘I’d’ve thought you’d have the chicken on by now,’ Jimmy said.
‘I might have dinner later.’ If the truth be known, Kitty didn’t feel the least bit like eating. Even the thought of the smell of roasting chicken made her feel slightly nauseous.
‘Does this mac look all right, luv?’ her dad asked when he was ready to go. ‘I haven’t worn it in years.’
She resisted the urge to say he looked a bit like the gasman in the navy-blue belted raincoat, and it definitely didn’t go with a brown felt hat. Instead she said, ‘It looks fine.’
‘I might take a look in Burtons after the holidays and buy meself an overcoat, one of those loose tweed ones. After all, now you’re working, we’re not short of a few bob, are we?’ He readjusted his hat. ‘Have you got a bag, luv?’
‘A bag? What sort of bag?’
‘A shopping bag, a big paper bag. Anything’ll do.’
‘You don’t get paper bags from the shops since the war. There’s a string bag hanging behind the door in the kitchen.’
‘Ta.’
He went upstairs and returned with the string bag bulging. Before Kitty could see what it contained, he was gone.
She made herself a pot of tea, recklessly strong in view of the fact there wasn’t much left. As soon as she’d finished the pot, she made another, took three aspirins for her headache and turned the wireless on. Later, she’d pop over and see Nan Wright. Nan was going funny lately and kept calling her ‘Ruby’, the name of the daughter who’d died long before Kitty was born. Still, she’d make sure Nan had something proper to eat, though Aggie Donovan or someone else had probably done so already.
The key was drawn through the letterbox and Kitty prayed it would be Eileen or Brenda, even though she hadn’t wanted them to know she was by herself, but it was Vera Dodds, the postwoman, who came in, looking majestic in a black coat with an astrakhan collar, her hair set in rigid waves especially for Christmas. She looked slightly disappointed when she saw only Kitty was there.
‘Your dad hasn’t turned up at the ale house,’ she said brightly. ‘I just wondered if he was all right, like?’
‘He had to go out for a while, something to do with football,’ Kitty lied.
‘Will he be along later?’
‘We’ll be having our dinner as soon as he gets back. I reckon it won’t be till tonight.’
Vera looked unaccountably shy. She put a little box beneath the tree on the sideboard. ‘I’ve brought him a little prezzie. It’s only a pair of cuff links.’
‘I’m sure he’ll be dead pleased.’ She’s after him, thought Kitty in astonishment.
‘Well, I’ll be getting back. Are you all right, Kitty? You don’t half look pale.’
‘I’m just tired. We were terrible busy yesterday at the hospital.’
‘I’ll love you and leave you, then. Merry Christmas, luv.’
‘Merry Christmas, Vera.’
Vera hadn’t been gone long, and Kitty was still feeling stunned at the idea of a woman chasing her dad, when she began to shiver uncontrollably; despite the blazing fire, her entire body felt as if it were encased in ice. She went upstairs and fetched an eiderdown, legs almost too stiff to move. Halfway down again, she felt the urge to vomit, and reached the kitchen just in time to throw up her breakfast in the sink.
‘Oh, God!’ she groaned, as she wrapped herself in the eiderdown and curled up in the chair. ‘If only me dad was here.’
The objects in the room turned hazy and began to float away. Then they became very clear again, but seemed unnaturally large. They turned hazy, grew large, turned …
Kitty began a bizarre journey. She swooped crazily through the hospital wards where the patients were all lying face down beneath their beds. Huge grinning faces kept looming in front of her and she punched them out of the way. The faces looked vaguely familiar, and she realised they were people she knew; Harriet, Lucy, Clara, Nurse Bellamy.
She came to every now and then, still shivering though by now she was covered in perspiration and boiling hot.
‘I should be in bed,’ she told herself during one of her lucid moments. She managed to struggle as far as the stairs, but her legs and her mind gave way, and she sank to her knees at the bottom where she was carried away in another nightmare. This time she was in the hospital entirely alone. There were no patients, no nurses, no doctors, just Kitty wandering through the empty building which seemed to be ticking like a bomb about to explode. Then the trees began to tap against the window as if they wanted to come in. Tap tap, tap tap …
Kitty woke up again, heart racing. The hallway was pitch dark and someone was knocking on the door, which meant it wasn’t anyone from the street, else they would have let themselves in.
‘The key,’ she called weakly. ‘Use the key.’
The knocking continued and eventually the letterbox flap was lifted and someone peered inside. ‘The key’s behind the door,’ Kitty sobbed.
A few seconds later, the door opened and a dark figure stepped inside. Kitty had no idea who it was until the figure stood on her foot, uttered a yelp of alarm and shone a torch in her face.
‘Kitty! Oh, what a good job I came,’ cried Harriet Mansell.
Harriet helped her upstairs, tucked her into bed and placed a wet flannel on her forehead. She made a hot water bottle and a cup of tea and doled out three more aspirins. As soon as Kitty was half sitting, half lying against her own pillows and the two off Jimmy’s bed, Harriet emptied her handbag on the counterpane, rummaged through the mess, found a thermometer, shook it, and stuck it in Kitty’s mouth.
‘I think I’m going to die,’ groaned Kitty after a while.
Harriet removed the thermometer. ‘High, but not dangerously so,’ she said briskly. ‘I think you’ll live. You’ve got three-day ’flu. You’ll be as fit as a fiddle by Saturday. Scores of nurses have come down with the same thing, including poor Clara Watkins. She still came in, the brave soul, despite feeling as ill as you do, thou
gh she was despatched home pretty damn quick in case the patients caught it.’
‘You mean you had to manage on your own?’
‘We were under-staffed all round, but everyone mucked in cheerfully and some of the walking wounded gave a hand. In fact, we all enjoyed ourselves tremendously.’
‘How did you know I was ill?’ Kitty asked. She was beginning to feel slightly better, not solely due to Harriet’s tender ministrations, but for knowing that someone cared about her.
‘I didn’t. I remembered you’d be alone. I’m here to invite you to a party.’
‘I’m afraid you’ll have to go by yourself.’
Harriet looked shocked. ‘As if I’d leave you like this! I’ll stay and keep you company.’
‘But …’ began Kitty.
‘There’s no buts about it,’ Harriet said firmly. ‘Do you want to sleep or talk? I’ll go downstairs and listen to the wireless if you prefer, and you can call out if you need anything.’
‘I’d sooner talk, but I might well fall asleep in front of your eyes. I feel a bit dozy.’
‘I shan’t be offended if you do. What time will your father be home?’
‘I’ve no idea.’ Kitty felt strangely embarrassed and ashamed of having been let down so badly.
‘I suppose you feel deeply hurt,’ Harriet said intuitively.
‘Not just hurt,’ Kitty replied. ‘All of a sudden, I knew I could never rely on me dad again. I was on me own from now on. It was a dead horrible feeling.’
Harriet nodded understandingly. ‘I felt the same when Hugh was killed. My parents were dead by then, my brother worked in the Foreign Office and I scarcely ever saw him. It was a scary sensation, realising I was totally alone.’
‘What did you do?’ whispered Kitty.
‘What else was there to do except get on with my life? I threw myself into my work, made friends, nearly got married on two occasions.’
‘What stopped you?’
Harriet shrugged and pulled a face. ‘They were good, decent men, both of them, but I would have been marrying for companionship, not love.’
‘You mean you turned them down because you preferred being by yourself?’ said Kitty in astonishment.
‘I did,’ smiled Harriet. ‘I wasn’t prepared to be stuck for ever with someone I didn’t sincerely care for. I’ve enjoyed my life, Kitty. It’s not a tragedy to live alone – most of the time I’ve been quite happy. It’s other people such as Clara Watkins who poke fun and make snide remarks and tell me I’m pathetic. I could have had a husband and children if I’d wanted, but I decided I didn’t, not if the husband couldn’t be Hugh.’
‘It’s not fair,’ Kitty burst out. ‘Everyone feels sorry for spinsters, yet never for bachelors.’
‘That’s because they assume spinsters haven’t been able to catch a man, and bachelors were clever enough to escape a woman’s clutches,’ Harriet laughed. ‘They can’t visualise a woman living contentedly alone without a man’s support. Spinsters are automatically deemed second-rate citizens – what an ugly word spinster is, and “old maid” is even worse.’ She patted Kitty’s hand. ‘Whatever you do, Kitty, don’t marry the first man who proposes just so you can have “Mrs” in front of your name.’
Kitty shook her head tiredly. ‘I won’t.’
Harriet removed the flannel from her forehead and said, ‘Lie down and sleep for a while. I’ll go downstairs and make myself something to drink. Is there any more tea? I used the last of the packet.’
‘You’ll have to borrow some from number sixteen.’ Kitty slid underneath the clothes.
‘I might well do that. I’m aching for a cuppa.’
‘Have some Christmas cake,’ Kitty muttered just before her eyes closed.
‘I’ll do that, too,’ said Harriet.
It was past midnight by the time Jimmy Quigley arrived home, whistling ‘God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen’ and feeling extraordinarily pleased with life, to find a strange woman sitting in the living room and no sign of his daughter.
‘Where’s our Kitty?’ he demanded. The woman was as thin as a rake and as plain as a pikestaff and he disliked her instantly.
‘Kitty’s very ill,’ the woman said crisply. ‘Very, very ill.’
‘Where is she?’ Jimmy, alarmed, realised he hadn’t given a thought to Kitty all day.
‘In bed. It was fortunate I dropped by, else the poor girl would have still been lying in the hallway.’
‘In the hallway! Jaysus! I’d best go and see to her.’
As Jimmy made to go upstairs, the woman said in a voice like ice, ‘It’s rather late for that. Anyway, there’s no need. She’s fast asleep and you’ll only disturb her.’
‘Did you fetch a doctor?’ Jimmy wondered who the woman was. She had an air of authority which made him feel rather small as well as guilty for having been out enjoying himself all day. From the way she spoke, he sensed she disliked him as much as he did her.
‘No.’ She smiled sardonically. ‘There’s nothing a doctor could have done for her that I couldn’t do myself. She’s got a severe dose of ’flu and will need to spend the next two days in bed.’ She picked up her coat. ‘I’d better be getting home. I expect it will be difficult to find a taxi at this time of night.’
‘There’s never taxis round here, luv.’ Jimmy bit his lip. The woman didn’t look the sort to be called ‘luv’.
‘In that case, I suppose I’ll just have to walk.’
‘Have you got far to go?’
‘Ince Blundell.’
Jimmy gasped. ‘But that’s miles away!’
The woman frowned. ‘Yes, and now that I think about it, I’ll have to take Kitty’s place tomorrow, which means I’d scarcely be home before it would be time to leave.’
‘You work at the hospital?’
‘I’m Harriet Mansell, one of Kitty’s colleagues.’
Jimmy recognised the name. She was only another bloody auxiliary like Kitty. He felt slightly less small and slightly less guilty. ‘Y’can sleep in the chair, if you like?’ he said magnanimously.
Harriet Mansell curled her lip. ‘In the chair!’
She might be only a bloody auxiliary, but the curled lip made Jimmy Quigley squirm. ‘I’d offer you me bed,’ he said quickly, ‘’cept I don’t know where Kitty keeps the clean sheets.’
‘That’s all right,’ Harriet said just as quickly. ‘I’ll sleep on top of the covers.’
Jessica and Arthur Fleming lay side by side in bed, not touching.
‘I’m glad I came,’ said Arthur. ‘It’s been a lovely day.’
‘I’m glad you enjoyed it,’ said Jessica. They’d gone to Melling for their Christmas dinner, along with all the Reillys and Jack Doyle.
‘Remember all those pre-dinner and after-dinner drinks parties we used to be invited to at Christmas?’ Arthur mused. ‘I never enjoyed a single one. It was all business, never friendship. We went to the ones we thought it wisest to be seen at.’
‘I think I enjoyed them at the time,’ Jessica conceded, ‘but not in retrospect.’ She’d enjoyed showing off her latest outfit, her newest fur, telling everyone what presents Arthur had given her – which she’d usually chosen and paid for herself.
‘It was entirely different today at Eileen’s,’ Arthur said contentedly. ‘We wanted to be there and they genuinely wanted us. You could sense the goodwill and affection. Penny almost seemed like part of the family.’
As if she’d heard her name being mentioned, Penny uttered a huge sigh and turned over in her cot beside the bed.
‘I’ve missed Penny.’ Arthur turned on his side and laid his hand on Jessica’s stomach. ‘And I’ve missed you too, Jess. I’ve missed you terribly.’
Jessica froze. She’d been hoping all along he’d change his mind and not come, but he’d turned up early that morning, having travelled all night, and seemed so pleased to see her that it was difficult not to be nice. Even though she’d prepared the bed in the other room, she hadn’t the heart to tell him when
he’d automatically assumed they would be sleeping together. As far as he was concerned, they were still man and wife. He couldn’t read her mind and know that she considered the marriage was over.
‘Have you, dear?’ she said with as much sincerity as she could muster.
He began to stroke her breasts. Jessica caught his hand in both of hers and held it still. She knew she wasn’t perfect, that she had many faults, but the idea of letting Arthur make love to her whilst she was having an affair with Jack Doyle seemed dishonourable in a crazy sort of way.
‘You know, Jess,’ he said quietly, ‘I’m beginning to realise what a useless life I lead, messing about with fossils and old bits of tile in that museum. I’m cut off from the real world up there.’
Jessica held his hand and said nothing. She’d used virtually the same words herself when she’d explained why she wanted to leave. She prayed Arthur wasn’t intent on making the same decision.
‘Today,’ he went on, ‘the cottage seemed so charged with emotion that you could almost touch it. Sheila and Calum couldn’t take their eyes off each other and the sad expression on Eileen’s face made me want to weep. Even Jack Doyle seemed different, more subdued. I felt like a gatecrasher, not in person, but in spirit, as if they, and you, Jess, all belonged to a club I’m not a member of. My life, my job, both are entirely unaffected by the war.’
‘But it’s a job in a million, Arthur,’ Jessica said inadequately. ‘It’s what you always wanted to do.’
‘You sound as if you’re worried I might give it up and want to live with you.’ His voice was a mixture of amusement and resentment. He removed his hand. ‘You can’t even bear for me to touch you, can you?’
Jessica sighed. ‘I don’t know, Arthur,’ she said. She couldn’t bring herself to tell him bluntly, ‘No.’
‘Does that mean we’re finished?’
‘I suppose it does.’
They lay, not speaking, not touching, for a long time. Eventually Arthur asked conversationally, ‘Have you taken up with him again, Penny’s father?’
‘I’m not prepared to discuss it,’ Jessica said flatly. She loathed hurting him. He was a good man who loved her and although he was weak, he’d never intentionally harmed anyone in his entire life.