The Hills and the Valley

by Janet Tanner

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Eddie said grandly.

  ‘He will. He always calls us liars.’

  ‘We did something bad today,’ Marie said in a small voice.

  ‘Oh, what was that?’ Eddie asked, bending lower to hear her.

  ‘We took some money from the house next door.’

  ‘But only because we was hungry!’ Elaine put in swiftly. ‘We wanted to buy some food.’

  ‘Are you hungry now?’ Eddie asked. ‘I expect you are. Well, I’m taking you home with me. I’ll see you all right.’ He picked up his bicycle and sat Marie on the crossbar. ‘We shall have to walk, I’m afraid,’ he said to Elaine. ‘I can’t ride with both of you.’

  As they set out along the road there were expressions of triumph on both his face and Elaine’s. Only Marie looked unhappy. She did not like the things Elaine had said. Of course, Elaine was her big sister and she was usually right. Marie always stuck by her through thick and thin. But this time she did not think Elaine was right.

  Marie clung to the crossbar of the bicycle feeling confused, hungry and frightened.

  ‘It’s ridiculous!’ said Margaret. ‘The most ridiculous thing I ever heard!’

  ‘Not only ridiculous but a pack of lies!’ said Harry.

  ‘Nevertheless, accusations have been made.’ Sergeant Button shifted uncomfortably, taking refuge under his voluminous cape. He did not like this one little bit. He had enormous respect for both Harry and Margaret Hall, but he still had a job to do. ‘You don’t deny taking the children out of school today, Mr Hall, and making them miss their dinner.’

  ‘No, I don’t deny that. But I took them out for a very good reason. A purse had been stolen, Sergeant, and I found it in their room. I wanted to get to the bottom of it all.’

  ‘The girls say they took the money because they were hungry. They wanted to buy something to eat.’

  ‘Do you honestly believe that?’ Margaret demanded.

  The sergeant shifted again. ‘There are people who take in vackies for the money they get for their keep and don’t spend what they should on them.’

  ‘And you’re saying we are like that?’

  ‘Not necessarily. But it does happen …’

  ‘Not in this house, it doesn’t!’ Margaret marched to the larder, took out the pie and banged it down on the table in front of the policeman. ‘Here is their tea, uneaten. The fact that they didn’t have it is entirely their own fault. But I assure you that until today they have never gone hungry in their lives. Well – not since they have been with us at any rate.’

  Sergeant Button’s majesty wilted beneath her furious attack.

  ‘They are a cartload of little monkeys, it’s true,’ he admitted. ‘I’ve had more trouble with the vackies and the things they get up to than all the local youngsters put together. Being away from home I suppose they think they can get away with anything.’ He paused, remembering it was not just the children who had caused him trouble. There had been one of the young women, soliciting openly outside the Miners Arms, and several cases of theft and shoplifting. ‘Well, at least you won’t be troubled with them any more,’ he said.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Margaret asked sharply.

  ‘They’re with Mr Eddie Roberts. He has offered for them to stay with him for the time being and I reckon that would be best all round.’

  ‘But they live here!’ Margaret was distressed. ‘All their things are here!’

  ‘As far as I’m concerned I’m quite happy to bundle the lot of it in the car and drive it up to Eddie Roberts’house,’ Harry said. ‘He’s got them, he can keep them, and good luck to him.’

  ‘No!’ Margaret protested. ‘I’m not happy about that Sergeant. I’m sure I could get through to them if I had the chance and find out why they said those terrible things.’

  ‘You’ve had plenty of chance to get through to them – and it hasn’t worked,’ Harry said bluntly. ‘Let them stay where they are, I say. Well, what about the accusations against us, Sergeant? Will you be preferring charges?’

  ‘I doubt it, Mr Hall. I shall have to make a few enquiries, of course, but I feel sure it will end there.’

  ‘I wish you would take us to court,’ Harry said.

  Margaret’s eyes went round with horror. ‘Harry!’

  ‘I do. At least then we could refute the allegations. As it is mud will stick. And Eddie Roberts will do his best to see that it does, no doubt. Can’t you just imagine how he’ll love to go round muttering “There’s no smoke without fire”? I can!’

  ‘It’s unfortunate. Very unfortunate,’ Sergeant Button said uncomfortably. ‘But I still think it’s best to leave them where they are for tonight. Perhaps you’ll be able to sort something out tomorrow, Mrs Hall.’

  ‘They are not coming back here if I can help it!’ Harry stated.

  Elaine and Marie arrived on the doorstep two days later.

  ‘What are you two doing here?’ Margaret asked coldly.

  They looked at her sheepishly.

  ‘Can we come back and stay with you?’

  ‘I don’t know about that,’ Margaret said. ‘I thought we ill treated you.’

  ‘It’s better than at Mr Roberts’house. You can’t move there. His mother keeps telling us not to touch things,’ Elaine said in disgust.

  Margaret hid a smile. She had heard Amy talk of her former mother-in-law’s fetish for tidiness.

  ‘Well, I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Mr Hall is very upset about the things you have said and done.’

  ‘Oh, please!’ Marie cried. She hurled herself at Margaret, clutching her skirts. Margaret was lost.

  ‘All right, you had better come in,’ she said.

  ‘Things are going to be different from now on,’ Harry said sternly. ‘I’m telling you straight that if I had my way you would certainly not have come back. And if I ever have another moment’s trouble from either of you, you won’t get another chance.’

  They returned his gaze submissively. What was it about these urchins, he wondered. They could do the unforgiveable and still worm their way back into your heart.

  Of course, if he was honest, his motives were not entirely altruistic. Already, Eddie Roberts had begun to spread the rumours, a word here, a word there. ‘Of course, nothing could be proved but …’, always with the look that said maybe Harry Hall was not all that he seemed. With the children back under his roof his case looked a little stronger. If he had really ill-treated them they would never have been so eager to return.

  As prospective Labour candidate Harry felt he could not afford even a whisper about his character – and given the opportunity Eddie Roberts would do plenty of whispering.

  ‘Very well, for the moment we will forget about it,’ he said to the children.

  But he knew there were plenty of political opponents now and in the future who would not be so ready to forget.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Throughout the spring of 1941 while the war gained in ferocity and momentum Marcus Spindler continued to court Barbara Roberts.

  Britain was on the offensive now. Huw was night-flying as part of the fighter force which escorted the bombers to their targets in France – small groups of Lancasters and Halifaxes which flew down from their bases in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire and made their rendezvous with a close-support wing of thirty-six Hurricanes or Spitfires over the fighter base to create the formation known as the ‘beehive’. Sometimes, Huw was a part of this, more often he flew with the target-support wings, timed to arrive in the target area at precisely the same time as the ‘beehive’. As he watched the dark waters of the Channel pass beneath the wings of his Spitfire and the coast of France loom ahead Marcus was wining and dining Barbara; by the time the bombers had off-loaded their cargoes of destruction onto some French factory which was working for the Germans and turned for home, Marcus was kissing her goodnight in the deep shadows under the trees where he parked his two-seater Bentley.

  She thought of him sometimes as Marcus held h
er, whispering in her ear the sort of sweet nothings which Huw never had. They rolled easily off his tongue and started a strange dark excitement inside her. It was pleasant to be told she was the most beautiful girl he had ever met, possible to believe it almost when good food and wine and the tantalising touch of his lips had filled her with excitement. It made her feel desirable and feeling that she responded accordingly, learning to kiss as he kissed, with tongue and teeth as well as lips, murmuring those intoxicating words of love against her skin. In spite of this she sometimes thought of Huw and it was like a sweet sad yearning which somehow only heightened the response she offered Marcus.

  Forget Huw. Forget him. He doesn’t want you. Marcus does. He holds you and whispers nice things to you. He spends a great deal of money on you and wants to be with you often. Forget Huw. Forget him!

  Gradually the self-hypnosis began to work and she began to believe that Marcus could replace Huw in her heart.

  At the beginning of April news reached Hillsbridge that Alec was with the British Invasion Force in Greece but it was one subject Barbara did not raise with Marcus, being slightly ashamed of her cousin’s lowly status as Private when Marcus had been a Captain.

  Then, on 18th April, the very same day that the Mercury reported seventy people dead from a bomb which had demolished a block of flats in Berlin, Marcus had news of his own.

  ‘We’re having a few changes in family business,’ he told her as they drove around the lanes to their favourite restaurant. ‘My brother has decided to volunteer for army service.’

  ‘Really?’ Barbara was surprised. Henry Spindler was his father’s right arm. While Sir Richard ruled the colliery companies, Henry was responsible for administering the estates, the farms, cottages and other holdings which went to make up the Spindler empire. It was for this reason, she imagined, that he had so far escaped being called upon to serve his country, for the successful administration of Britain’s assets could be considered in many ways essential war work, though when other young men from Hillsbridge had failed to put a case to satisfy the Exemption Board there had been occasional murmurings of unfair treatment. ‘It’s one thing if your name is Spindler, quite another if you’re plain Smith or Jones’ was one comment that had been made in the Working Men’s Club on more than one occasion.

  Marcus manipulated the Bentley around a bend with a burst of acceleration which made Barbara wonder just how much petrol he was burning – and where he managed to get it.

  ‘The point is there should be a Spindler doing his bit,’ he said. ‘Unfortunately it can’t be me now – this leg has put paid to that. So Henry is going to join my old regiment and I am going to take over his job.’

  ‘But you don’t know anything about it,’ Barbara objected.

  He laughed. ‘Not as much as Henry does, maybe, but I’m learning. What do you think I’ve been doing all these months – sitting around and twiddling my thumbs? Of course not! I’ve been working with Henry, learning to do what he does. Which compared to being an army officer, with men’s lives in your hands, is child’s play.’

  ‘Is it?’ Barbara said doubtfully. The course she was engaged on was teaching her that there was a great deal more to business than she had at first suspected and she had already decided that although she would be having her eighteenth birthday the following week, she would see the course through to the end of the year at least before volunteering herself for one of the women’s services.

  ‘Do you wish you could be the one to go back into action?’ she asked. ‘Or are you glad your war is over now?’

  He glanced at her, his well-shaped mouth curving.

  ‘With a lovely lady like you by my side is there any doubt about where I’d prefer to be?’

  She experienced the familiar flush of pleasure but refused to allow it to show. ‘Seriously.’

  ‘Seriously, it is not very nice to feel one is no longer of any use.’

  ‘Oh, but that’s rubbish!’ she said hotly.

  ‘Unfortunately, it is not rubbish.’ He paused, seemingly on the point of saying something.

  ‘At least you have the satisfaction of knowing you were invalided out a hero,’ Barbara said into the small silence.

  Marcus pressed his foot down hard on the throttle. The car shot forward.

  ‘Yes,’ he said and there was an undertone in his voice she did not understand. ‘Yes. I suppose at least I have that.’

  Henry Spindler left to begin his training as an Army Officer the following week in almost as much of a blaze of glory as Marcus had come home to.

  The night before he left the Spindlers held their own private farewell party and for the first time Barbara was invited to their home.

  The prospect of meeting his family did not intimidate her, but as they passed between the lodge gates and into the tree lined drive leading to Hillsbridge House she felt the first twinge of nervousness.

  The house was so enormous! Even now, shrouded in blackout, she could imagine the way it must have looked when dinner parties or balls were held in peacetime with lights shining out of every one of the dozens of windows and illuminating the broad forecourt and the willows which overhung the lawns.

  Marcus parked with an unceremonious screech of brakes, helped her out of the car and led the way up the flight of steps, guarded by magnificent stone lions, to the main door. Once inside, the brilliance encompassed her. The hall, larger than their own drawing-room, was illuminated by a crystal waterfall chandelier; a broad stairway swept upwards beneath a cupola, now hung with blackout. Barbara glanced furtively around, glad she had saved enough clothing coupons for the blue shantung which Amy’s dressmaker had been able to turn into something more suitable for such an occasion than the ‘utility clothes’which were all that could be purchased in the shops these days.

  A door to the right of the hall was ajar, and voices were floating out, genteel voices with no hint of Somerset accents. As Marcus led her in she glimpsed pale gold velvet and brocade, fresh flowers and valuable antiques. His arm was around her shoulders as he made the introductions.

  ‘My dear, how lovely to meet you at last. We’ve heard so much about you!’ Lady Spindler was tall and slim, dressed in silver-grey silk. Her hair, too, was silver-grey, a shining cap; her features slightly faded yet still pretty, her long neck showed to perfect effect a double choker of pearls caught at the base of the throat by a small and perfect cameo. She reminded Barbara of a swan. Over her shoulder Sir Richard beamed at Barbara.

  ‘Capital. I must say you know how to choose’em, Marcus my boy!’ He stopped short of actually clapping Marcus on the back but Barbara felt that he would have liked to do so. ‘Now, my dear, what would you like to drink? Sherry? Or don’t you indulge?’ He laughed a little too heartily.

  ‘Oh yes, she indulges, don’t you, Barbara?’ Marcus said, smiling at her. ‘And so will I.’

  ‘I knew you would,’ Sir Richard said jovially. ‘Drinks too much since his wartime experiences, you know. But I dare say it won’t do him any harm.’

  ‘As long as it doesn’t make me garrulous, Father,’ Marcus said and Barbara cringed. But Sir Richard, seemingly unaware of the sarcasm in his tone, rumbled on.

  ‘They say the army marches on its stomach. Myself, I’m not so sure. Marches on the bottle if you ask me. Where would we have been in the Great War in the trenches without a rum ration?’

  ‘Don’t forget Barbara’s sherry, dear,’ Erica Spindler said gently.

  ‘No, of course not. Marcus, introduce Barbara to your brother, will you? He’s been talking to that blasted Clara Oldthorpe for the last half hour. And if he’s off to war he may as well take the image of a pretty face with him as a plain one, don’t you agree?’ He winked at Barbara and she felt that as far as Marcus’s father was concerned at least she had passed the test.

  By the time they went in to dinner Barbara was enjoying herself. Henry Spindler, quieter and altogether more serious than Marcus, had been very sweet to her and if his companion Clara Oldthorpe, a
doctor’s daughter from Bath, had shot her the occasional less-than-friendly look Barbara counted that as yet another mark of triumph. When a girl was as plain as Clara Oldthorpe it must be very difficult to refrain from jealousy, Barbara thought, trying to be kind but unable to avoid the conclusion that the obviously expensive gown she was wearing did nothing whatever for her flat chest, thick waist and decidedly bandy legs.

  Dinner was served by a maid in a black dress, cap and apron. Barbara recognised her as a Hillsbridge girl, one of a family who lived in the same rank as her Aunt Dolly, and fervently hoped she would not show any sign of recognition herself. She did not. She was far too well trained for that.

  They were in the middle of dessert – wafer-thin crêpes in flamed brandy – when the air raid siren began to wail. Although Hillsbridge House was a good two miles outside the town the sound carried clearly across the valley and Barbara paused, spoon halfway to her mouth, waiting to follow the lead of the others. They did nothing, but noticing her alertness, Lady Spindler smiled.

  ‘We ignore it, Barbara,’ she said serenely. ‘It’s probably a false alarm, but in any case there is nothing I deplore so much as a spoiled meal.’

  ‘Waste of good food – nothing short of criminal in these days of shortages,’ Sir Richard agreed.

  ‘Oh yes!’ Barbara said and popped the spoonful of crêpe into her mouth. But it no longer tasted quite so good. The bomb which had demolished the Chapel and killed poor Ron Hodges had made her nervous – since then she had never been able to summon up the same nonchalance about a raid – and looking across the table she realised Marcus was feeling much as she did. His handsome face was drawn suddenly, his eyes wary and she knew that like her he was listening for the drone of the bombers. That was experience for you, she supposed. A little went a very long way.

  On this occasion, however, Lady Spindler’s optimism was justified. After a few minutes they heard the siren again, this time the reassuring ‘all clear’ and Barbara heaved a sigh of relief. There would be no raid tonight – at least not on Hillsbridge.