Room for a Stranger

by Ann Turnbull

  She felt for the path. Brambles caught her legs, and once she tripped on a tree root and nearly fell. She stopped then, and shouted, but there was no answer. She became almost convinced that she was wrong, that Rhoda wasn’t there at all, but at Aunty Elsie’s, telling everything, and being given cocoa and a bed for the night…

  She reached the roof. The ground felt different, harder, underfoot, and led up in a slight curve. Now she had to be careful. She squatted and felt wet brickwork beneath her hand.

  She called again.

  Still no answer. But did she hear something – a rustling – or was it some animal? The hiss of rain blurred other sounds.

  Something moved below, she was sure.

  “Rhoda! It’s Doreen!”

  She inched forward on hands and knees. There was a tree, a rowan, growing between the bricks near the drop. She reached out and found it, held on, and felt for the edge of the broken roof with her free hand.

  “Rhoda!”

  That movement again, and then she saw it: the pale oval of a face.

  “Go away,” said Rhoda.

  A great wave of relief washed over Doreen.

  “I can’t,” she said. “You’ve got to come home. Mum will be so worried.” She found that her teeth were chattering. “Please, Rhoda. I’m sorry I said those things. They weren’t true.” She leaned forward, trying to see some response in the upturned face. “I never meant to—”

  And suddenly the bricks moved under her hand; she lurched, seized at the tree to save herself and swung out over the drop as the roof gave way and bricks and earth showered down. She heard screaming – her own and Rhoda’s mixed – and then the branch snapped and she fell, landing hard on the rubble. She hid her face from the rush of earth and stones. The battering on her back continued, slowed, and at last stopped.

  For a while she lay stunned. Then, cautiously, she raised herself onto her knees. She hurt all over and she could feel blood trickling into one eye.

  “Rhoda?” she whispered. “Are you all right?”

  But there was no answer.

  Rhoda was somewhere beneath her, buried under the rubble.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Doreen moved fast. She sprang off the mound of rubble, and began to pull away bricks and stones, heaving them to one side. She sobbed as she worked, “It’s all right, Rhoda. Don’t worry. It’ll be all right.”

  There was no response. She began to panic as she scraped and scrabbled and brushed away earth. She touched cloth – Rhoda’s raincoat; her shoulder; her hair. If only she could see! Rhoda was so still and silent. Doreen found her face and brushed earth from her nose and mouth.

  “Rhoda!” she begged. “Wake up! Please wake up! Don’t die!”

  There was no movement.

  A picture came into her mind – not something she’d seen but something she’d been told – of women gathered at a pit head, and a miner brought out, dead, with scarcely a mark on him, suffocated by the fall of earth and stone when the roof collapsed.

  Suffocated. Rhoda was suffocated.

  She sprang up in terror and ran outside.

  She had to get help.

  Despite her panic, a part of her brain was thinking fast. There must be a telephone at the station, but it would take ten minutes to get there, probably more in the dark. Much nearer was the Revells’; their smallholding was just up the lane.

  But first she had to find her way out of the hollow.

  She found the place where the path led up, and began to climb, scrambling up the muddy slope on hands and knees, grabbing at tussocks and brambles, not caring about the pain.

  She reached the top, picked her way across the dangerous area of ruined walls, and then began to run. The path was just visible between darker masses of trees, and she ran, uncaring of where she put her feet. Her fear of the dark was gone too; all that mattered now was to see houses and people – most of all, people.

  There was a short cut to the Revells’ that Joyce always took: a smaller path leading off to the left. It brought you out almost opposite the smallholding. Somehow Doreen found it. She raced along, feeling nettles whip her legs, thinking only that Rhoda was dead, that she must tell someone, she must get help.

  She came out on the road, crossed it, found the drive that led to the smallholding. She saw the dark shape of buildings against the sky. “Help!” she shouted. “Help, please!”

  A dog began to bark, then another; and far away, towards Station Road, a third dog added its voice. She heard people, and saw light – light at last, and such a bright one! A hurricane lamp was bobbing towards her, and a woman’s voice, with a nervous edge to it, called, “Who’s that?”

  “Doreen! Doreen Dyer! I need help!”

  She reached the woman. It was Molly, Joyce’s sister. The hurricane lamp made a great blaze of light between them. Doreen stretched a hand towards it. “The blackout…” she whispered.

  “Bugger the blackout,” said Molly. “What’s up?”

  “She’s dead,” said Doreen. “I killed her.”

  Her teeth chattered as she spoke. She hadn’t stopped shaking since Mrs Revell brought her home.

  Lennie tried to reassure her. “She might not be. She might just have been unconscious.”

  “Lennie, you didn’t see what happened. All the earth… It all fell on her. And the bricks. And me on top. She couldn’t breathe.”

  “But you got all the stuff off her. You were quick. They get roof falls all the time in mines, and people survive.”

  “Do they?”

  “Of course. Here, drink your tea.” He handed her the cup. If Doreen hadn’t been in such a state she would have laughed: Lennie making her tea! But Mum had told him to, before she went off with Mrs Revell.

  Doreen sat in Dad’s chair now, wearing her nightie and socks, with a blanket wrapped around her. While she sipped her tea, Lennie told her stories of men who’d been rescued in mining accidents. Slowly her shaking subsided.

  At half past ten Lennie said, “I’d best make the fire up. Mum’ll be cold when she gets back.”

  The hospital was at Wraybury. “How long does it take to get there?” Doreen asked.

  “Not long in an ambulance. Twenty minutes?”

  “They’ve been gone hours. Lennie, how will Mum get home?”

  “I don’t know. Perhaps someone will bring her.”

  “If only she could get a message to us!” She began to cry. “It was all my fault.”

  “Don’t be daft,” said Lennie. “That roof could have gone at any time. The rain we’ve been having – that would have weakened it, like. That and the kids climbing on it.”

  “I didn’t mean the roof. I meant Rhoda going off there. Because of the things I said.”

  “What things?”

  “I can’t tell you. Horrible things.”

  “They can’t have been that bad.”

  “They made her want to go home.” Doreen was choking on her tears.

  Lennie rearranged the blanket and hugged her awkwardly. “Look, Mum said you’re not to get upset.” He went to pick up the kettle. “I’ll make some more tea.”

  All night they listened to the slow tick of the clock. Eleven o’clock came; twelve; twelve thirty. Still no message, and no way of finding out what was happening.

  “You’d better go to bed,” said Lennie.

  He made her a hot-water bottle.

  “I’m not cold, it’s nerves,” said Doreen. But it was nice, all the same, to feel cared for.

  She lay awake for a long time, reliving the events of the evening all jumbled up: the rush of earth, the screams, the awful stillness of Rhoda’s body were mixed with the bumpy, rattling trip home in the Revells’ cart and seeing the rain falling in the circle of light from the hurricane lamp.

  She must have slept at last. The next thing she was aware of was the room full of daylight and Mum silhouetted against the window as she lifted down the blackout screen.

  “Mum…?” The events of the night rushed back to he
r, and she sat up, becoming aware of pulled muscles and bruises that she hadn’t noticed before.

  Mum turned round. “She’s alive.”

  Doreen felt as if a weight as heavy as the brick roof had been lifted off her. She began to cry in relief. “I thought she was dead.”

  Mum hugged her – cautiously because of the bruises. “She might have been if you hadn’t dug her out so quickly. She came round in the ambulance. She’s got a broken collar bone, badly bruised ribs, a lot of cuts and bruises.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Still at the hospital. They kept her in overnight. Miss Wingfield will fetch her this afternoon.”

  “Good.” She sank back on the pillows. But other anxieties began to surface. Her heart beat fast. “Did Rhoda talk… much? Did she say why she went to the Dungeon?”

  “She tried to explain, but I said we’d sort all that out later.” She looked suspiciously at Doreen. “She was running away, wasn’t she, because you’d quarrelled?”

  Doreen fiddled with a loose thread on her eiderdown. “I didn’t mean the things I said.” She looked up, anxious. “She will stay, won’t she? She won’t have to be moved?”

  “Do you want her to stay?”

  Doreen looked around the room: at the empty chair where Rhoda’s clothes had hung, the dressing-table swept clear of her possessions. It would seem odd, now, without Rhoda. But did she want her to stay? Or did she just want not to have made her go?

  “Rhoda says it’s all her fault,” said Mum. “She says she should never have agreed to be in the concert without you.”

  Doreen thought about this. “The thing is, I think I would have done the same, if I’d had the chance.”

  “That’s what I told her,” said Mum.

  “I’m sorry,” Doreen said.

  It was easier to say than she had expected. Rhoda looked such a victim: her right arm in a sling, and a great purple bruise on one cheekbone.

  Not that Doreen had escaped unhurt. She had cuts to her face, but the worst thing was the bruised ribs. Mum had even thought of taking her to the doctor, but the expense put her off. “We’ll see how you go,” she said. “There’s one thing: neither of you will be fit to sing in that concert now.”

  While Mum and Miss Wingfield were there, talking, Doreen and Rhoda had exclaimed at each other’s appearance and compared injuries, pushing up sleeves and rolling down socks, and anticipating how much they would enjoy being celebrities around the town.

  But now Miss Wingfield had left and Mum had gone upstairs, leaving them alone.

  “I’m sorry, too,” said Rhoda.

  Doreen glanced at Rhoda’s brown paper carrier bag, soggy and disintegrating in the corner where Miss Wingfield had dumped it.

  Nothing had been unpacked.

  “Will you stay here now?”

  “Do you want me to?”

  But before Doreen could answer, the back door opened and Lennie burst in.

  “Rhoda! Your mother’s here!”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “They’re in a car,” said Lennie. “Her and a soldier. I told them to come in.”

  He went to the foot of the stairs and called, “Mum!”

  And then they heard voices, and the click of high-heeled shoes, and Anne-Marie came into the room.

  Red-gold hair, blue eyes that flicked around. She was like Rhoda, Doreen thought; like her own photograph, too, and yet different – harder. She wore a tight-fitting dark blue costume and held a lighted cigarette in her hand.

  “Mam!” Tears ran down Rhoda’s face. She rose awkwardly to her feet and tried to hug her mother.

  Anne-Marie fended her off. “Easy, love, you’ll get ash on my skirt.” She waved the cigarette distractedly, looking for an ashtray. Doreen found her a saucer and she stubbed it out. “Thanks.”

  As Mum came downstairs and into the room, Anne-Marie was holding Rhoda at arms’ length and exclaiming, “You look awful! What have you been doing to yourself?”

  Mum took in the situation and began to explain, but Anne-Marie interrupted. “Oh, I know. Some woman phoned me – Miss Winford? Said there’d been an accident and I ought to come straightaway. You can imagine the shock – I was due back on stage in fifteen minutes. I told her, ‘I can’t just drop everything like that; I’ve got my public to consider.’ But she laid it on about Rhoda needing me –” she glanced at her daughter as if expecting her to deny this – “and then after the show Harry said, ‘You’d better go; I’ll take you tomorrow.’”

  She introduced the soldier, who was standing by the door holding a bouquet of flowers and a brown paper carrier bag. “This is Sergeant Wilson; supposed to be on leave, poor man –” she smiled and squeezed his arm – “but he’s driven me all the way from Bootle.” She turned to Rhoda again. “Those bruises look terrible; I’ve got some foundation that might hide them.”

  “I expect you’d like a cup of tea,” said Mum. She smiled at the sergeant and indicated Dad’s chair. “Do sit down.”

  “We’d love one!” exclaimed Anne-Marie. “Parched, aren’t we, Harry? We’ve been on the road for hours, Mrs…”

  “Dyer,” said Mum. “I wrote to you.”

  “Oh, yes, you did. Ta. I’d been meaning to get in touch.”

  She took the flowers from Sergeant Wilson. “These are for you, Mrs Dyer. And some chocolates in the carrier.”

  The three children swooped on the carrier bag while Mum took the flowers.

  Anne-Marie perched on one of the kitchen chairs, twitching her narrow skirt down over her knees. “Now, tell me, love,” she said to Rhoda, “are you really all right?” And then, before Rhoda could answer, she turned back to Mum. “The woman who rang said not to worry, but you can’t help it, can you? Not that I couldn’t have done with a lie-in today; I’m dead tired.”

  She lit a cigarette and offered the packet to Mum, who shook her head. She inhaled, and leaned back, gazing critically at Rhoda as she blew out smoke. “What have you done to your hair? It looks a mess.”

  “She got earth in it,” Doreen said coldly. “When the roof fell in.” She put her arm around Rhoda.

  “Needs cutting,” said Anne-Marie. “I can see the split ends from here.”

  Doreen noticed Mum’s lips tightening. She doesn’t like her, she thought; and neither do I.

  Anne-Marie was rummaging in her handbag. “Before I forget, there’s a letter for you, Rhoda.” She tossed her an envelope. “From Bernadette. I promised I’d send it and I’ve been carrying it round for weeks.”

  Rhoda grabbed the letter eagerly and put it in her cardigan pocket unopened.

  “I don’t know what the woman finds to write about,” laughed Anne-Marie. “She never goes anywhere. My dressmaker,” she explained to Mum. “Keeps an eye on Rhoda sometimes.”

  Doreen thought the letter looked fat and interesting.

  Mum got up and poured the tea. Doreen noticed how her eyes kept straying to the flowers. They were beautiful: bronze and crimson and gold chrysanthemums mixed with some big white daisies, and greenery spread around at the back.

  “Could you put them in water, Doreen? There’s your nan’s vase in the front room. We could all sit in the front room,” she added, opening the door, but nobody moved. The sergeant was comfortable in Dad’s chair, and Anne-Marie said, “Oh, don’t bother, Mrs Dyer. We can’t stay. We just popped in to make sure the kid’s still in one piece.”

  Rhoda helped Doreen with the flowers. She showed her how to cut the stems diagonally and take off the lower leaves and arrange everything in the vase.

  “Mum’s never had flowers before – not shop ones,” said Doreen.

  “Me mam gets given them all the time.”

  And Doreen realized, then, that the bouquet must be one that Anne-Marie had been given last night, after the performance.

  Lennie was talking to the sergeant, and Mum was trying to explain to Anne-Marie how Rhoda came to be injured. Doreen listened, hoping Mum wouldn’t say they’d quarrelled. But Mum was tactful
and spoke of “some game they got up to – although I’ve told Doreen often enough not to go there.”

  “These things happen,” said Anne-Marie. Her laugh rang out. “You send your kid away from the bombing and she still gets buried under a pile of bricks.”

  Mum had already brought out some biscuits. She offered sandwiches.

  “No, no. We ate on the way here,” the sergeant assured her.

  “We could open the chocolates,” suggested Doreen.

  So they drank tea and ate chocolates, and the pile of lipstick-stained cigarette stubs grew in the saucer, and Anne-Marie talked about the shows she’d been in and the bombing they’d had, and Lennie took the sergeant out to the loft to look at the pigeons, and Mum remembered to get Anne-Marie to write down her address.

  “Although I’ll be moving again soon.” She turned to Rhoda. “I’ll send you a card, love. I’m going to Aberystwyth for a month or so.”

  Rhoda’s face brightened. “There wouldn’t be any bombing in Aberystwyth. I could visit you.”

  “Oh, love, it’s not worth it. My lodgings are tiny – you’ve no idea, Mrs Dyer, how much easier it is to get lodgings when you haven’t got a kid with you. You’d be bored to death, Rhoda. And besides, I’ll be back in Merseyside before Christmas. You’re better off staying put. She’s no trouble, is she, Mrs Dyer? People always tell me she’s no trouble.”

  “Of course not,” said Mum with feeling. “She’s a lovely girl. You should be proud of her.”

  Lennie and Sergeant Wilson came in. The sergeant glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. “Well, Annie?”

  Anne-Marie got up. “Yes, we must be on our way.” She glanced in the mirror and touched her hair.

  “Coming for a little drive” the sergeant asked Rhoda, “before you say goodbye?”

  “Oh, yes!” Rhoda followed them out. Doreen would have gone too, but Mum held her back. “Let Rhoda be with her mother.”

  The kitchen looked as if they’d had a party, littered with tea cups and chocolate wrappers and cigarette stubs. Draped over a chair was a black velvet jacket that Anne-Marie had brought for Rhoda.