by Maggie Holt
And of course they talked about Maud.
‘I don’t think we need worry too much about her, y’know, she’s lookin’ much happier, sort o’ contented, like. She says she’ll probably tell Alex next time he turns up, and then who knows? You an’ me might find ourselves at a weddin’, Norah!’
But Sister McLoughlin’s blue eyes were sombre. ‘There’s nothin’ sure in the world, Mabel, not any more. I thank God that Maud’s got yerself to look after her an’ love her, the poor darlin’.’
Mabel stared. This did not sound like Norah with her simple faith and hopeful outlook.
‘We can only wait an’ hope an’ do the best we can for her,’ she replied. ‘Any news o’ that brother o’ mine?’
‘Not lately, but I’m hopin’ he might turn up at Christmas or round about, ye know the way he suddenly jumps up from nowhere.’ Norah smiled, though Mabel doubted that he would. The blockading of German ports was having a terrible effect upon the morale of the starving civilian population, and in some quarters it was said to be more likely to shorten the course of the war than the continued carnage on the Western and Eastern Fronts.
Then came a letter from Violet Stoke-Marriner, full of news of the East London and saying how much Nurse Court was missed by everybody. ‘And by the way, Mabel,’ she wrote at the very bottom of the page, ‘Dr Knowles came and brought the baby to show us last week, such a dear little thing. He came into the dining-room at lunchtime, and held her up in his arms. He looked so proud of her. I thought you would be pleased to know this, Mabel.’
And of course Mabel was pleased – for Stephen’s sake, for his wife Phyllis and most of all for their little daughter who now had a loving daddy. It was happy news, and how thankful she was that she had done the right thing . . .
But that night her treacherous subconscious mind caused her to dream that she was again in his arms, reliving that one and only moment, that single kiss. In a transport of joy Mabel awoke suddenly and found only the vaporous fragments of a dream.
The curtains moved softly, as if love had flown out of the window, and Mabel despised herself for her weakness.
October gave way to dark November and fogs that hung around all day. Londoners looked shabby and careworn, and more and more women wore the black of mourning. Theatres still did good business offering escape to a world of colour and romance, and Chu Chin Chow was being rivalled by The Maid of the Mountains at Daly’s Theatre and Peg o’ My Heart at the Globe. On the silent cinema screens Mary Pickford was bringing in the crowds.
Maud Ling woke at ten o’clock, yawned, stretched and got out of bed to put the kettle on. The morning sickness had passed, and she felt fit and well in her fourth month. She patted the little swell at the bottom of her abdomen and whispered, ‘Our baby, Alex, darlin’. I’ll ’ave to tell yer soon, won’t I?’
She took her breakfast of tea and bread and marmalade back to bed with her. She felt that she ought to go out and take a sniff at the moist air, maybe stop for pie and mash at Wilcox’s Dining Rooms. She might even look in discreetly at the Daily Chronicle and see if young Ted was around – ask him out for a bite in his dinner hour. She dressed quickly in the cold room, put on her winter coat and jaunty green hat, and went downstairs.
‘Mornin’, Mrs Hiscock!’ she called to the landlady whose ground-floor door stood open.
‘Mornin’, miss!’ came the reply, almost drowned out by a crashing of pots, pans and cutlery. The woman did not show herself and Maud wondered if there had been just the slightest emphasis on the miss. She gave a little grimace; sooner or later the old girl would have to be told, and then would she, Maud, be able to stay? She’d never been behind with the rent, like some, and Teddy was a very useful messenger and errand boy when occasion rose.
And how much longer could she stay in Chu Chin Chow?
Out in the street she ran into Madge, a pert blonde of twenty, who was in the chorus of the show.
‘Ye’re lookin’ pretty good these days, Maud,’ she said. ‘’Ow’s that young airman o’ yours? Officer, i’n’t ‘e?’
Maud nodded. ‘Yeah, Royal Flyin’ Corps. ’E’s a wing commander.’
Madge raised her thin eyebrows. ‘Coo! Was ’e the one ’oo was waitin’ outside the featre that time when ’e dragged yer away soon’s yer showed yer face at the stage door?’
‘Yeah, that was my Alex.’
Madge’s light-blue eyes travelled over Maud’s figure. ‘’Scuse me askin’, but are yer engaged to ’im?’
‘Er – yeah, unofficial, like.’ Maud glanced down at her ringless fingers.
‘Got a date for a weddin’?’
Oh, my Gawd, she’s guessed, thought Maud. Well, everybody’s got to know sooner or later.
‘I reckon I’d better be gettin’ along, Madge – get back in the warm an’ put me feet up before goin’ on tonight.’
‘Yeah, ye’d better make sure yer get yer afternoon rest, Maud,’ said the girl, and Maud thought she saw a meaningful look in her eye, cheeky little cow.
The front door of the lodging house was open, in spite of the all-pervading fog, and Mrs Hiscock stood in the hall, looking curiously flustered. Something had happened.
‘What’s up?’ asked Maud sharply.
‘Yer got a visitor, Miss Ling. An officer.’
‘Alex!’ shrieked Maud, looking wildly around her. ‘Where is ’e?’
‘I let ’im into my sittin’-room – ’ere, ’alf a minute, miss, wait! ’E ain’t that Redfern bloke – ’ere!’
But Maud had dashed through into Mrs Hiscock’s ground-floor flat and was calling out to the man she loved. ‘Alex! Alex!’
And then she saw the unfamiliar officer standing in the middle of the room. He had removed his peaked cap and held it in his hand. ‘Miss Ling?’ he asked without smiling.
By refusing to acknowledge him, by not listening to him, Maud tried to make him disappear.
‘Alex – ye’re not – yer ’aven’t – where is ’e?’ she babbled, her words a senseless jumble.
‘Squadron Leader Dobson,’ he said, introducing himself. ‘I’m a – I was a friend of Wing Commander Redfern – Alex – and I’ve come to inform – to tell you that – I’m sorry, Miss Ling.’
There was no getting rid of this messenger. He refused to disappear. The colour drained from Maud’s face and her eyes seemed to grow larger; her mouth dropped open and she put up her hands as if warding off a blow.
Mrs Hiscock came to her side. It seemed that she and Dobson had already spoken.
‘Miss Ling, I very much regret to say that Alex’s de Havilland 4 was shot down over enemy lines two days ago, Tuesday, November the thirteenth. His relatives have been informed by telegram from the Air Ministry. I knew Alex, he told me about you, and I promised him that I would let you know if – if this happened. I’m very sorry, Miss Ling, but Alex Redfern is dead.’
The howl that broke from Maud’s throat was like that of an animal in pain. And then she spoke. ‘But there’s the baby,’ she whispered. ‘I ain’t told ’im. ’E don’t know about the baby yet.’
She swayed on her feet and Dobson put out a hand to steady her. He caught her in his arms as she fell.
‘There’s a woman askin’ for yer downstairs, nurse,’ said the patient’s mother. ‘Salvation Army uniform. I told her you were attending to my daughter.’
Mabel was immediately alert. ‘Oh, heavens, it’ll be my landlady and friend. Just stay with yer daughter while I see what she wants, will yer?’
When she heard Ruby’s message she clung to the newel post of the banister.
‘Oh, my God. Alex. Oh, no, no, no, no, it can’t be. And I’m stuck here, Ruby. I can’t leave.’
‘I told her brother you were out on a case, Mabel, but I said I’d let yer know. He said she was in a bad way. Has she got any other friends or family?’
‘No, only him, he’s a good lad but only sixteen. Oh, Ruby, whatever can I do?’
‘Let me go to her, Mabel. When she sees me unif
orm, she’ll know I’m yer friend and her friend. I’ll stay with her till yer can come.’
Upstairs the bedroom door opened and the patient’s mother called down urgently, ‘Nurse, she’s pushin’ down – come back up at once, d’ye hear?’
‘All right, I’m comin’, don’t worry!’ Mabel called back. The demands of a woman in labour overrode all other considerations for a midwife and she had to make a decision at once.
‘Thanks, Ruby – an’ if yer can get in touch with Sister McLoughlin at the Midway Babies’ Home an’ tell her – tell Maud I’ll be there soon’s I can. Bless yer, Ruby. All right, all right, I’m comin’!’
It was seven o’clock that evening when Mabel was finally able to leave her patient and the seven-pound baby boy she had delivered, and without stopping to eat she set out again on her bicycle for South Lambeth Road and Maud’s room on the second floor of the lodging house. She found Norah sitting beside a wax-pale Maud, trying to get her to drink tea and eat a boiled egg with toast, ‘for the baby’s sake’. Young Teddy Ling had gone up to his own room, a fugitive from women’s talk and tears.
‘He’s comin’ down to stay wid her tonight, after we leave,’ explained Norah in a low voice.
‘Maudie, dear – I’m so sorry I couldn’t come before,’ Mabel whispered, embracing the friend of her childhood.
‘It don’t matter, there’s nuffin’ left for me now, gal,’ came the dull reply.
Both her friends protested that she had the baby to think about and live for: Alex’s baby that only today she had felt kicking inside her for the first time.
‘Did Mrs Swayne tell yer, Norah?’ asked Mabel in a low tone.
Norah hesitated. ‘No, I was already here, y’see. When I was gettin’ the children ready for their dinner, didn’t I see Maudie’s face in front o’ me, clear as I’m seein’ it now,’ she said quietly. ‘An’ I knew it wasn’t good, ’cause me heart went cold inside me an’ I knew I had to go to her straightway. Mrs Lovell was frightened when she saw me face, she said ‘twas white as death, like seein’ a ghost.’
Mabel shivered.
Maud moaned and sat up in the bed. ‘I’ll ’ave anuvver cup o’ tea if ye’re makin’ one,’ she muttered.
‘Good girl!’ said her friends in unison and Mabel rose to put the kettle on.
‘Ye’ve got to look after yerself, Maudie dear, for the baby’s sake,’ she said.
For the baby’s sake. It was to be an oft-repeated rallying cry in the cold, dark, desolate months ahead.
Chapter Twenty-one
IT WAS ONLY after the news of Alex’s death that Maud Ling noticeably began to ‘show’. Until then she had concealed her condition by wearing loose jackets and coats, but from mid-November she seemed suddenly to become obviously pregnant and made no attempt to hide it – except when she went on stage, for to her friends’ amazement she returned to Chu Chin Chow on the following Monday.
‘Need all the cash I can lay me ‘ands on, gal,’ she told Mabel grimly. ‘Ever so good to me, they are at ‘Is Majesty’s, lettin’ me wear them baggy trousers an’ a couple more veils floatin’ arahnd. Reckon I can keep goin’ till the New Year, an’ then I’ll look aht for anuvver job where me shape don’t matter.’
She gave her bulge a tenderly possessive pat. Her baby.
Mrs Hiscock turned out to be unexpectedly sympathetic and Maud was suitably grateful for this, though knew she would have to tread carefully with the landlady.
‘She could turn rahnd an’ say I was givin’ ’er boardin’ – ’ouse a bad name – an’ I reckon she would, too, if I gave any ovver cause for ’er to complain. But I pay me rent in full on time, don’t make no noise, no followers – she used to turn a blind eye to Alex ’cause ’e tipped ’er well – an’ she knows if she frew me aht, Teddy’d go too, an’ she finds ’im useful, bringin’ in the coal, goin’ dahn to the ‘Orns for ’er pint o’ porter, fetchin’ the newspaper – so I reckon we can stay. It’s ’ome, near enough.’
Mabel nodded, thinking of the memories the dingy little room held for them both, and made a point of speaking to the landlady on her visits, for which she now had an official reason. But when she tentatively mentioned the Redferns, now in mourning and uncomforted by the knowledge of an expected grandchild, Maud’s mouth hardened.
‘No, Mabel, they don’t care, not them. She fought I was expectin’ when I called on ’em that time – “in some sort o’ trouble”, that’s what she said, an’ freatened to ’ave me frown out. They ain’t goin’ to get a second chance. No fear!’
Sadly, in these times of men’s lives lost, Maud Ling was not the only unmarried girl on Mabel’s books. Many of these unfortunates went into rescue homes of one kind or another, but some stayed with their parents and faced the neighbours and local busybodies.
‘This has been a great sorrow to us, Nurse Court,’ said Mrs Clegg, a stalwart of the Kennington Methodist Chapel where her husband was treasurer. ‘But Catherine would have been married if her father and I hadn’t told them to wait until after the war. That was before we knew that she – and now his ship’s gone down and she’s having his child, so the least we can do is stand by her.’
‘Of course, Mrs Clegg, she’s yer daughter,’ said Mabel gently, though she could see that both mother and daughter were full of regret about the situation.
‘I mean, take that girl down the street, that Beasley girl, well, Mrs Sands she is now, only seventeen and married in a hurry before the man went away. She’ll be confined about the same time as Catherine, and if she’s widowed she’ll get a pension, even though –’
‘All right, that’s enough, let it rest now,’ broke in Mr Clegg irritably. ‘No need to parade all our business in front of strangers.’
‘Nurse Court isn’t a stranger, Frank.’
‘Maybe not, but it’s bad enough having to walk down Kennington Park Road with everybody gawping and talking behind their windows. Our daughter’s shamed her family.’
There was a brief, awkward silence. Mabel smiled at Catherine, a listless, ungainly figure at eight months.
‘Let’s go up to yer room, Catherine,’ she said, and the girl silently led the way upstairs. Mabel told her to lie down on the bed so that her tummy could be felt and the baby’s heart heard through the ’ear-trumpet’, as Mabel called the foetal stethoscope.
‘It’s very sad, losin’ yer young man, Catherine, but o’ course ye’re not alone,’ she said kindly. ‘The war’s changed so many lives. But the important thing now is the new life on its way. How’re yer feelin’ in yerself? Are yer sleepin’ all right? Is the baby kickin’ a lot?’
The pale, dispirited girl who had not so far uttered a word, now looked up with heavy eyes. ‘Nothing will ever be the same as it was before, nurse.’
Mabel took hold of her hand and searched for some words of comfort. ‘Yer baby’ll bring a lot o’ love with it, dear, an’ yer mother an’ father’ll cheer up when they find ’emselves grandparents, just yer wait an’ see. The important thing now is the new life inside yer. That’s what yer got to hold on to, Catherine.’
‘Mother’s asked us all to spend Christmas Day at Falcon Terrace,’ said Ruby. ‘Dad’s got an open-air meeting in the morning and we could join him there with the boys while mother cooks the dinner. I don’t know whether Harry’ll be able to come out in his chair. What about you, Mabel? Will yer be able to come?’
‘It depends what calls come in, an’ Christmas could be busy,’ Mabel answered. ‘An’ I’ll be lookin’ in on Maud an’ Teddy at some time.’ She sighed. There seemed to be so many things to worry about, or be sorry for, or both. Things that should have made her happy, like the cards, gifts and letters that arrived from Belhampton, only brought more bad news. Aunt Nell sounded worried about Uncle Thomas’s continued shortness of breath and swollen legs; the doctor said it was to do with his heart and had prescribed the traditional extract of foxglove. Aunt Kate’s letter was short, and told of the tragic suicide of a legless man who had managed to t
ip himself from an upstairs window at Pinehurst. Daisy wrote that Lucy Drummond’s brother Cedric was reported as being badly wounded and likely to lose a leg, so there was no Christmas joy at the Rectory. By separate post came a plain Christmas card with the message, ‘From Gerald, Alice and Geoffrey Westhouse.’
Mabel felt guilty about her sister Daisy, now nearly fourteen; they had missed so much of each other’s lives in the past three years. She promised herself a visit to Belhampton in the spring, then immediately thought that she could not leave Maud until after the delivery, expected in April.
There was a scrawled, creased postcard from Albert, dated the sixth of December, which contained no real news, only that he missed his two sweethearts and sent regards to Harry.
Of George there was no word, and Mabel feared that all contact was lost with the brother who had been so swiftly despatched to a strange land. It was time for his eighteenth birthday, and Mabel never thought the day would come when she would be thankful that George was safely out of the way. Out of the war . . .
As it turned out, Mabel did not see either Maud or Norah on Christmas Day. A summons at three in the morning called her to a woman in labour with a third child and progress was rapid. By ten to six she was pushing and, to Mabel’s horror, the fleshy protuberance that she had thought was a head was in fact a bottom, embellished with testicles and penis. An undiagnosed breech! She felt herself gasp in alarm, for breeches could be difficult to deliver and if the head was stuck in the vagina for too long after the body was born – or if it was delivered too quickly – brain damage could be the tragic consequence. What should she do? It was too late to send for a doctor.