She looked round the room, but there was nothing of hers left. She had taken everything with her in her flight to London. For flight it had been, she knew that now, as she sat in the haven of what had been her home. She had run from her misery.
Too late to come back, she thought. My life is in London now, working at Livingston Road. She thought about Harry and wondered yet again where he was. Since she had found Aunt Naomi and Uncle Dan again Harry had retreated to the back of her mind. But he was still there, reappearing occasionally when she least expected him, dropping in and out of her thoughts as he’d dropped in and out of her life. Charlotte swung from being angry with him to worrying about him and then back to anger again. He could at least have said he wasn’t coming, rung the home or sent a message or something, so that she didn’t look a fool in front of Miss Morrison and the others; all dressed up and nowhere to go. Maybe he’d put in another appearance when she got back to London. If he did, she wondered, how would she feel about it? Would she be pleased to see him? She didn’t know. She would only know for sure if and when it happened.
With a sigh she pushed him to the back of her mind, got to her feet and crossed the landing into Miss Edie’s room. It, too, had been left untouched, as if Miss Edie might return at any moment. Charlotte went over to the bedside table and picked up the photograph of Herbert. She looked down at his smiling face and found herself smiling back at him.
‘I’ll take you with me,’ she said aloud. ‘I won’t leave you here to be thrown away.’ She opened the bedside drawer and saw, beside a bottle of aspirin, lying on top of the hankies, the dog-eared telegram and a letter with an army postmark, addressed to Miss Edie. She picked them both up and put them and the photograph into her pocket. She would never read the letter or the telegram, she would burn those as soon as she had the opportunity, but the photo she would keep.
At last she came to the spare room, the room with the doorway into the attic.
‘You may want to have a look at everything that’s been stored in the loft,’ Mr Thompson had said, ‘before we have it cleared away. There may be things there that you’d like kept, but much of what’s there will probably be Everard family possessions which’ll mean nothing to you. I’ll go through any papers in case they’re important.’
The door had always been kept locked. Charlotte found the key on the bunch she’d been given, unlocked the door and went in. It was as it had always been. Neat bed, chest of drawers, wardrobe, and in the corner, the triangular door into the attic. Charlotte looked across at the wardrobe, which Miss Edie’d kept locked. She’d never mentioned why it was locked or what it contained, but Charlotte decided that she should be the one to open it now Miss Edie had gone. She looked at the various keys in her hand and selected one that looked hopeful. It fitted and, though stiff, she was able to turn it and open the wardrobe door. Inside hung a single garment. A white lace wedding dress. Charlotte stared at it, tears springing to her eyes. Miss Edie had already made her wedding dress before she heard that Herbert had been killed. She had kept it safe, locked away with her hopes and dreams, just in case the telegram had been wrong. Just in case Herbert came home.
Hearing a sound downstairs, Charlotte quickly closed and locked the wardrobe door.
‘Who’s there?’ she called as she went to the top of the stairs.
‘It’s me,’ called Billy. ‘Mrs Swanson said you were here.’
Charlotte came back down the stairs. ‘I was just looking round the house again,’ she said. ‘I’ve finished now.’
It had been suggested to her that it would be better to tell no one about Miss Edie’s will. ‘It’s nobody’s business but yours,’ the vicar had said. ‘Better if you’re not to be the topic of village gossip.’
‘It’ll get out eventually,’ he said to Avril later, ‘but there’s no need to subject the child to more comment.’
Charlotte had agreed to say nothing. She would be going back to London in a couple of days, anyway. Caroline already knew; there was no need to tell anyone else.
‘I’ve brought the dogs with me,’ Billy said as they went back into the garden and Charlotte locked up.
‘Miss Edie’d be pleased with the garden,’ she said, looking round at the tidy vegetable patch. ‘Who’s been looking after it, I wonder?’
Billy didn’t answer and she looked across at him sharply. ‘Was it you, Billy?’
‘I helped,’ he said casually. ‘Thought we might go across towards the gorge, what do you think?’
It was a bright October day; the sun struck flashes of brilliance on the autumn trees. They walked along the track that led out of the village and up through the copse on to the open hillside beyond. As they walked past the observation post from where Billy and his father had watched the German plane crash, Charlotte said, ‘Do you still come out here to watch for enemy planes?’
‘Only if there’s a warning,’ Billy replied. ‘We still get them even though the threat of invasion seems to have lessened now that Hitler’s bogged down with the Russians. He’ll have his work cut out there, but at least it means his attention’s elsewhere.’
Billy was right. The threat of a German invasion had indeed decreased. Billy was still part of the auxiliaries; they still had everything in place in case the threat returned, but they all thought that the danger, once so imminent, had now diminished. For Billy the relief was more than the general lessening of tension felt by everyone else. It was an intense, personal relief. The Germans weren’t coming and, if they weren’t, the danger he’d feared for Charlotte, both as a refugee German and as the girlfriend of an auxiliary, was no longer a threat. He knew that he still couldn’t explain his sudden coolness towards her after the midsummer dance, but he was determined to try and repair the damage it had caused between them. Getting their friendship back on its old, easy footing was the first step.
They let the dogs run as they came out on to the hilltop. The freshening breeze brought colour to Charlotte’s cheeks and her spirits lifted as they walked the familiar pathway.
‘I have missed all this,’ she said, waving her arm to encompass the view. ‘London is very shut in. The buildings all crowd round you and you can only see in straight lines.’
‘Tell me about London,’ Billy said. ‘What was it like going back there after living here in the country for so long?’
‘Difficult at first,’ admitted Charlotte, ‘but you get used to it. The noise, the bustle, the crowds of people. But it’s a sad place with all the bomb damage. Empty spaces where houses once stood, ruined buildings waiting to be cleared.’
As they walked Charlotte told Billy about her visit to Kemble Street and the ruins she found there. She told him, with tears in her eyes, about Hilda. ‘She and her family were so kind to me when I first came to London, and now she’s dead. She was killed in the raid that injured me.’ She told him about finding Aunt Naomi and Uncle Dan at last. ‘They’d searched everywhere for me, but they thought I’d been with Hilda and that I was dead, too. They moved away from London when the house was destroyed.’ As she talked it was as if a great burden was slipping from her shoulders. She’d had no one in whom she could confide her thoughts and fears since Miss Edie’s death. Everyone had been very kind, but she had held on to her innermost feelings and shared them with no one. Somehow with Billy it was different and, almost without realising, she slipped back into their earlier, easy amity, and told him all about her life in London and her work in the children’s home. The only person she didn’t mention was Harry. Billy was not the person with whom to discuss Harry.
They sat down on a fallen tree trunk and Billy listened as she poured out what had happened to her since she’d left Wynsdown. ‘When are you going back?’ he asked. ‘I assume you are.’
‘In a couple of days,’ Charlotte replied, ‘three at the most. Miss Morrison has given me time off for a few days, but she needs me back up there. You have to remember it’s my job now. I’m not just helping her, I’m earning my living.’
�
�You could come back here and earn your living,’ suggested Billy. He took her hand. ‘I miss you, you know.’
Charlotte let her hand rest in his, but smiling at him, shook her head. ‘I miss you, too, Billy. But my place is in London now. The children in the home where I work need looking after. They’ve all lost their homes and lots of them their families too. That’s all happened to me, so I know what that’s like. Sometimes I can help them get through it.’
A breeze blew up and Charlotte shivered. ‘We should be getting back,’ she said, getting to her feet. ‘I said I’d be back at the vicarage for early supper with the children.’
Billy whistled the dogs, which had been happily exploring a rabbit warren under a nearby hedge, and they turned their steps back towards the village, Charlotte with her hand tucked comfortably through Billy’s arm. When they finally reached the village green, the sun had disappeared and the air was decidedly chilly.
‘Will you come over to the farm tomorrow?’ Billy asked her, looking up at her as he bent to clip leads to the dogs’ collars. ‘Have your dinner with us?’
Charlotte nodded. ‘Yes, I’d love to. When shall I come?’
A smile spread over Billy’s face and he said, ‘Just come when you’re ready. Ma’ll be expecting you.’
The last couple of days went very quickly and suddenly Charlotte was on her way back to London. It was Billy who went with her on the bus to Cheddar to see her off at the station.
‘How will you get back to the village?’ she asked as they boarded the bus.
‘Walk, of course,’ Billy replied with a grin. ‘’Tisn’t that far.’
As they waited on the platform, her case at her feet, Charlotte could feel tears pricking her eyes. She knew she had to return to London, but she was sorry to be leaving Wynsdown and all the people there who’d done their best to make her feel it was her home. As the train chugged round the corner, Billy put his arms round her and held her close.
‘Look after yourself in London,’ he said into her hair. ‘Don’t go getting lost again.’
Charlotte returned his hug and then broke free as the train snorted to a halt beside her.
Billy opened the door for her to get in and heaved her suitcase up into the rack. ‘Take care,’ he said as he jumped back down on to the platform. ‘And you never know, I might just come up the Smoke to visit you.’
The guard blew his whistle and the train began to move. Billy jogged along the platform beside the open window and to his delight as the train drew away, Charlotte leaned out to wave and called back, ‘Yes, Billy, do.’
As the train rounded the curve she pulled the window up and sat down on her seat. Blinking away the tears that had threatened to overflow, she thought about the day she’d spent at the farm. It had been a lovely day and she had spent the morning, as she had so often before, helping Billy’s mother in the farmyard and in the kitchen till the men came in for their midday meal. As they were preparing the vegetables, Margaret Shepherd had said, ‘It’s lovely to have you back, Charlotte, if only for a few days. We’ve all missed you, Billy in particular, of course.’
‘Has he?’ Charlotte couldn’t help letting a little bitterness creep into her voice as she remembered how her happiness of the midsummer dance had evaporated in the face of Billy’s coolness towards her after the German plane had crashed. She had spoken in German, words of comfort to the injured pilot, words of comfort to an enemy.
‘Of course he has,’ Margaret chided her gently. ‘You know how fond of you he is. I know he wasn’t... well, quite himself for a while, but he was involved in sommat secret that was preying on his mind.’
‘Secret?’ echoed Charlotte. ‘What sort of secret?’
Margaret shrugged. ‘I don’t know, my lover, he ain’t said nothing to his dad nor me, but we know him and he were worriting about sommat for sure. Sommat to do with them trainings he went off to do.’ She gave Charlotte a reassuring smile. ‘But seems like it’s over now. Our Billy’s our Billy again.’
That afternoon they went round the farm with the dogs and she watched Billy training the two of them with a few sheep. The dogs were learning to work in tandem and, as she’d watched, Charlotte knew she could never take Bessie back to London with her. Her place was here in Wynsdown, even if her own wasn’t.
They’d been back in time to help John Shepherd with the afternoon milking and then Billy had walked her back to the vicarage.
Avril had been pleased to see that their friendship had been rekindled. Billy Shepherd was a good solid man, no stranger to hard work, with a generous heart. She’d heard Caroline’s misgivings about the young German refugee, Harry, who seemed to have some sort of hold on Charlotte.
‘I don’t think he’s holding something over her,’ Caroline had said, ‘but there is a very special connection between them, they came on the same train from Germany. The thing is, I don’t really trust him. I certainly didn’t tell Charlotte about Miss Edie’s will till I was pretty sure he wasn’t coming back, but a letter has come for her. It’s postmarked HMP Brixton.’
‘You mean the prison?’ exclaimed Avril.
‘Yes. I think he’s probably inside. He was arrested some months ago as an enemy alien, so perhaps he’s been arrested again. The thing is, do I give her the letter, or do I simply forget about it?’
‘Oh, Caro, I don’t know,’ Avril said. ‘What do you think?’
‘One minute I think I won’t tell her about it and if he turns up again they’ll just think it was another casualty of the wartime post, and then the next I think that’s morally wrong. I shouldn’t try and play God and decide what’s best for her. I’d be furious if someone did that to me, wouldn’t you?’
‘Even if it was for your own good?’
‘Who’s to decide what’s for her good? It’s not up to me.’ She sighed as the pips went. ‘Time’s up,’ she said. ‘I think I’ll—’ but before Avril could hear her decision, the line went dead and she didn’t know what Caroline was intending to do.
Perhaps, she thought as she saw Billy help Charlotte on to the Cheddar bus the next day, with a bit of luck she’ll forget the disappearing Harry and remember Billy, waiting for her here in Wynsdown.
*
Caroline was waiting up for Charlotte when she got back to Livingston Road.
‘My dear girl, you must be so tired,’ she cried as she hurried her into the warmth of the home’s big kitchen and set some soup to heat on the stove. ‘How did you get on? How was my sister? It must have been lovely to get out of London, even if only for a few days.’
She poured the hot soup into a bowl and, cutting the crust off a loaf and a wedge of cheese, she set the food down in front of Charlotte.
Charlotte was indeed feeling tired. Several times during the journey the train had been shunted into a siding to allow a more important train to pass by on the main line and it had finally arrived in London nearly three hours behind schedule. She was grateful for the food and as she ate the bread and drank the soup, she told Miss Morrison about her time in Wynsdown.
‘Did you get everything sorted out with the solicitor?’
Charlotte explained the arrangements, both financial and about Blackdown House.
‘Mr Thompson is going to look after the maintenance of the house,’ she said. ‘He thinks we should let it, furnished, for the time being. I’ve taken a few small things that I want and packed them into a trunk. Mrs Swanson’s going to keep them for me until I have somewhere else to store them.’ She thought again of the wedding dress she’d folded so carefully into the trunk, the veil which had hung with it. No one had seen them but her. Laid with them were Herbert’s photo and both the letter and the telegram Miss Edie had kept all those years. Charlotte had planned to burn those, but at the last minute had slipped them in the trunk instead.
The only thing she had brought back to London with her was the piano music she’d been practising for her exam, before Miss Edie died. She had missed playing the piano more than she’d have thought pos
sible. There was an old piano in the home at Livingston Road, but she’d had little time to do more than play simple tunes for the children to sing to.
If I really have a little money of my own now, she thought, I might try and find someone to teach me again.
So, she’d packed the music in her case and brought it back to London.
Apart from that she took nothing. She’d had no wish to go into the attic and search through the boxes and cases that were stored there. She simply told Avril Swanson that she could go through everything and take anything that would be of use to anyone in the parish.
‘Of course, if I find anything of value,’ Avril had said, ‘I’ll set it aside for you to look at. There may be things there that would fetch a fair price in an auction room.’
As Caroline listened, she was still struggling with her decision. Should she pass on the letter that she was sure had come from Harry, or not? She had been very tempted to open it, just to be sure it was from him; but who else could it be from? Who else would Charlotte know in Brixton prison? She had decided to hang on to the letter for a few days and see how Charlotte settled back into the Livingston Road routine. Then, if all was well, she would find a suitable time to give it to her.
‘Have you told anyone about your legacy?’ she asked now.
Charlotte shook her head. ‘No, not yet. The vicar said it would be better if it wasn’t generally known yet. It’d be round the village in no time.’
‘Will you tell the Federmans?’
‘I probably will,’ Charlotte replied. ‘I don’t want them to think that they have to provide for me any more. They know I’ve got a job with you, but Uncle Dan was saying something about giving me a little extra so that I could go up and see them from time to time. With the allowance Mr Thompson is giving me, he certainly won’t have to pay my fares when I visit them.’
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