by Amy Myers
Miss Felicia looked nice in her old blue; it had always suited her, and now it was shorter it was almost unrecognisable, especially since she’d had her hair cut. Margaret didn’t approve of all this modern styling, and Miss Felicia’s lovely long hair was a real loss. Still, she understood it was necessary, what with her work on the front – no time for rosemary shampoos there. It was nice to see everyone dressed properly for dinner tonight. Mostly the family ate at separate times now and didn’t bother to dress. She’d almost forgotten what a handsome figure the Rector cut in his dinner suit, and Mrs Lilley had gone to some trouble with her red velvet. Even Lady Buckford had put her tiara on and pearl choker. After all, Miss Felicia was a somebody, and Mrs Isabel had persuaded her to put on her Order of Prince Leopold, which she and Miss Tilly had been awarded by King Albert of Belgium. Mr Daniel was looking handsome too, bless him, and when she carried in the roast he was joking away with Miss Felicia in a way she hadn’t seen for many a year. Lady Hunney and Lady Buckford were engaged in telling stories of the Rector and Daniel as children, and the Rector and his brother were deep in conversation. When she returned to clear the dishes and take in the pudding, Mrs Isabel was animatedly telling Master George about the success of the cine-motor campaign, and his cartoon film in particular.
‘Half a million people have seen them now,’ Isabel was crowing.
‘I wish I had a penny from each of them,’ George grumbled. ‘Not one did I get.’
‘Scrooge,’ declared his sister, and quite right too, in Margaret’s view. ‘Don’t you love your country?’
‘Not half as much as Mrs Dibble’s puddings.’ George attacked the jelly eagerly.
‘That’s Miss Felicia’s,’ Margaret said, shocked, before she remembered her place.
‘Let Scrooge have it,’ Felicia said.
‘Now I can tell a tale or two about Rector and jelly,’ Nanny Oates chipped in.
Margaret gave a mental sniff and retired from the room. She had better things to do than listen to Nanny rabbiting on for hours.
‘All going well in there?’ Percy looked up from his evening paper when she reached the kitchen.
Margaret sighed, suddenly she felt very weary. ‘Yes. It’s not going to be the same, is it, without Miss Felicia? Having Master George home makes you realise how much you miss him.’ She yawned. ‘You know, Percy, for once I’m going to let Agnes and Myrtle do the washing-up, and go to bed after I’ve taken in the coffee.’
Myrtle could manage the dishes, even if Agnes was tucked up in bed. She only had a month or so to go now, before the little one was due, otherwise Margaret wouldn’t be called upon to do so much of the waiting. The time was getting on anyway. It was gone ten-thirty, and past her usual bedtime. Tomorrow might be a bank holiday, but food still had to be thought of.
‘Good idea, Margaret. You mind yourself. You’re not as young as you were.’
Margaret saw red. ‘Oh yes, I am, Percy Dibble,’ she snapped right back. She pursed her lips. She’d donated her final bottle of last year’s plums for that jelly, and no one was going to bear out the remains but her. She forgot about bed, and half an hour later she was still up. After all, there was only one more job to do.
‘Just in time, Mrs Dibble,’ Isabel called, as she took in the coffee – if you could call it that now. ‘You can join in the loyal toast.’
Everyone looked flushed and happy, and Margaret didn’t want to spoil the fun. ‘I don’t mind giving King George V a toast, Mrs Isabel. Nothing alcoholic, mind.’
‘Of course not.’ The Rector sounded shocked, but she could see he was grinning. All right, so he thought her temperance was funny, but say what you like, it was God who made water, sugar, and the grape, and only man who worked out how to make alcohol from them.
‘It isn’t the King, Mrs Dibble.’
‘Who then?’
Mrs Isabel stood up. ‘On this lovely evening,’ she said, ‘there can be only one toast: absent hearts!’ She looked round the table. ‘Robert in Germany, Caroline and Phoebe in London, and dear ones no longer with us: Fred Dibble and Reggie Hunney.’
Margaret through a sort of blur could see Mrs Lilley trying to hold back tears and failing. The Rector rose to the occasion though. ‘Absent hearts,’ he repeated quietly, ‘but always present in ours.’
Margaret carefully did up her hair in its rags, for all her tiredness. After all, one had to face one’s Maker in a proper way on Monday morning no matter what a mess you felt the night before. She smeared on her hand cream (her mother’s recipe of lemon, glycerine and eau de cologne), said her prayers, asked after Fred, who’d been right about it being a lovely party, sought forgiveness for tonight’s nasty thoughts about Nanny Oates, and climbed gratefully into bed. There was no point waiting for Percy since he had to lock up after everyone had gone.
Margaret fell asleep, still planning tomorrow’s apple pudding from her bottled apples, and the bit of suet she’d forced out of that miserly Wally Bertram. Suddenly the pudding exploded all round her, the ground was rocking, and she seemed trapped in bits of apple and crust. She realised she must be awake again. Or was she? Everything was spinning round her, it was cold with a wind blowing, and her hand was red with blood. No, it couldn’t be blood, surely. There was broken glass on the bed though, and a stifling acrid smell. This must be a nightmare, for there was a dead silence like the end of the world had come; it lasted forever, it lasted no time at all, and then came the screams.
The whole of ‘out there’ seemed to be screaming. She licked the blood off her hand, and found it was real, and therefore the screams were too.
Margaret’s brain cleared and she went straight into action. There was no sign of Percy, no light in their quarters, and she couldn’t stop to find him. The screams were outside, no, inside; even from here she could hear pounding feet in the Rectory as she rushed through, not even stopping for a dressing gown, just her slippers, into the kitchen. There was broken crockery all over the floor, but one lamp was still lit. In its dull glow she could see Myrtle crouched down, her arms round her head, moaning. Where was Percy? Fear hammered at her in this alien place. And then she saw him, in the doorway, just lying there groaning.
‘Get up, Percy,’ she croaked, as she ran into the Rectory hall.
The front door was wide open, the wind and dirt blowing in, and through it she could hear the screaming. Outside, in the garden, was it? Or further, on Bankside? She could see Miss Felicia running down the drive and the Rector after her. Mrs Lilley, rushing downstairs in her dressing gown, fell into Margaret’s arms at the bottom. ‘Isabel, George,’ she was babbling. ‘They took Nanny home.’
Margaret tried to make sense of this. Something had happened. She’d no proper shoes on, she’d no torch. If she was to do any good out there – whatever it was – she needed both. She ran back to the kitchen to find her old snowshoes, and found a dazed Percy was clambering to his feet.
‘The barometer,’ he said jerkily. It was lying in the hall, she’d noticed, and must have fallen on his head. Percy would be no use. It was up to her. Margaret threw one of the Rector’s coats over her dressing gown and ran after the Rector. There was no sign of Mrs Lilley.
Once outside, she saw the whole of Bankside seemed to be aglow, but it was a different shape somehow, and figures were silhouetted against the reddish light. Still, the screams. She could hear Joe Ifield’s voice yelling to make way for the ambulance. Ambulance? What had happened? Someone caught in the fire? She could now see that half of Bankside seemed to have disappeared, but then she stopped thinking at all, as she plunged through the crowd to add her authority to Joe’s and the Rector’s, wherever he was. Order was needed here, and there she could help, as stretchers were lifted into the ambulance, and the crashing of wood gave place to moans. The ambulance was moving off, and out of the blackness the Rector was running in her direction, following the vehicle. His face streamed with blood, covered with dust, he staggered into her, so hard she had to put her arms round him to suppor
t them both.
‘Isabel,’ he moaned.
‘Hurt?’ Margaret asked sharply. Miss Felicia could help, wherever she was, and maybe she could give a hand too.
The Rector’s reply was a howl of grief, but the words were quite distinct.
‘She’s dead.’
Chapter Eight
Not tonight of all nights. It was Whitsun and tomorrow was a holiday – or was it already today? Whatever time was it? The telephone bell was ringing and ringing insistently.
‘If that’s C,’ Caroline hissed to Yves, ‘tell him the operator has the wrong number.’ A call in the middle of the night could only mean a top-level call from the SSB; she supposed she had no right to grumble because it was only due to the need for Yves and Luke to be reached at all times from all places that the stingy secret service had provided them with a telephone at all at Queen Anne’s Gate. Caroline glanced sleepily at the clock; half past one, and they had not long been in bed, thanks to the air raid.
‘I’ll go.’ Yves was already up and disappearing through the door. Caroline comforted herself that the call could not be for her, for C would hardly be calling the office clerk. Unless – sudden fear made her sit bolt upright in bed, for the night brought nightmares to the semi-wakeful as well as the sleeping – it was bad news for one of them. George, it could be about George. She battled to remember whether Mother had really told her George was on leave, and sent up a fervent prayer to wish him safe at Ashden. She could hear her heart thumping, as she sat up in bed waiting for Yves to return. If she lay down, the nightmares would intensify.
At last she heard the murmur of voices, so Ellen or Luke must have jumped up too. She realised she was shivering, although the May night was warm. Surely Yves wasn’t being recalled to Belgium so soon? Perhaps it was a call from King Albert, or from GHQ to say that Ludendorff’s expected new offensive had begun.
‘Come back, Yves,’ she muttered, thumping the pillow, ‘come back.’ It was too much, after the noise and disruption of the air raid. It had been an attack in force from the sound of it, and so bright was the waxing moon last evening, she supposed they should have expected it. There had been no raids on London for some time now, however, and everyone had relaxed, believing that the Germans were reserving their bomb power for the Western Front. Then just before eleven-thirty, while they were preparing for bed, came the familiar dimming of the lights, and the sound of the maroons. Instead of the luxury of her first full night of reunion with Yves, they had been in the basement sheltering while the searchlights flashed over their limited view of the sky. Although the aircraft approached silently now, once overhead the noise was formidable. They stayed there for an hour and a half before they deemed it safe to return to bed. And now this.
Perhaps it was bad news from Simon’s house. Tilly? Penelope? Caroline’s imagination ran riot until at last she heard Yves open their door. She lit the oil lamp at her side, rather than turn on the electric light, and in its eerie glow it seemed to her his face looked very pale. He sat down by her on the edge of the bed, rather than returning to her side under the bedclothes, and she waited with apprehension.
‘What is it?’ she whispered. It was not just the effect of the oil lamp, Yves’ face was pale with shock. ‘Do you have to leave again?’
‘No. Cara, it is terrible news from Ashden.’
‘George! It’s George, isn’t it? He wasn’t on leave. He’s been shot down, he’s dead? I must go.’ She pushed the bedclothes aside to move, until he gently restrained her.
‘No, my love, it is not George. He was on leave, and was injured, but he is alive. It is Isabel’ – his voice broke – ‘who has died.’
‘Isabel?’ Caroline stared at him. His words didn’t make sense. ‘The baby, you mean? She’s had a miscarriage?’
There were tears in his eyes. ‘No, the baby too. Both dead. A Gotha must have lost his direction home in the battle with our aircraft, and probably had a hung-up bomb. It fell on Ashden.’
Caroline began to shiver violently. This was all part of her nightmare, wasn’t it? It couldn’t be true! Air raids didn’t affect villages like Ashden. She doubted if the village had ever seen a Gotha, it was rare enough to see our own aircraft. Isabel dead, Isabel dead, she forced her brain to repeat over and over again, but it still wasn’t real. Isabel bouncing into her bedroom, crying, ‘Caroline, can I borrow Granny Overton’s jet? Darling, I simply must have the jet,’ Isabel marrying Robert, Isabel so proudly at the cinema, Isabel’s ‘I’ll never be unhappy again.’ Those were real. Bright images of life raced through her mind. The word dead, and remembering Robert in his POW camp, not knowing he had lost both wife and baby – those were for later.
‘Felicia?’ she asked jerkily. ‘Mother? Father? Everyone else in the Rectory?’
‘No one else in the Rectory was seriously hurt, and the Rectory suffered only broken glass and damage to the front door when it was blown in. The bomb fell on Bankside. Your sister was not the only victim.’
It still didn’t make sense. What could Isabel have been doing out at that time of night? It didn’t matter. What mattered was that she was needed at the Rectory.
‘I must go immediately.’ She swung her legs to the floor, but Yves restrained her.
‘We’ll both go by the first train. I have checked and there is none till seven o’clock. Luke will remain in the office, and I will return in the evening, so that he may come down if Felicia wishes.’
Details flowed on through her head without registering, taking on a soothing quality, a stick to grasp in a drowning nightmare. Only one was important. ‘There is one task for you, beloved,’ Yves said. ‘Felicia asked if you could tell Phoebe. Felicia was telephoning from Ashden Hospital, and is needed there. Then you must rest to gather your strength.’
Rest? The night would be an endless vigil until they walked to Victoria to return home to the Rectory.
What terrible places railway termini were. Yves had briefly deserted her to buy tickets, and all around were reunions and partings, tears and laughter, servicemen returning from Whitsun leave, preparing to go back to the front, and brothers, sisters, wives, parents, sweethearts dispersing after having said goodbye to their loved ones. In the middle of it all stood Caroline Lilley with a lump like lead in her stomach. It felt so heavy it was as if she had only to give it the slightest push and off it would roll, so that she would realise it wasn’t true after all.
The train crawled interminably to East Grinstead, and then even more slowly through Hartfield towards Ashden. As they stepped down from the train, the lump of lead inside her dissolved and spread all over her, numbing her. Even at the station, the pall of disaster was heavy in the air, reflected in the pallor and silence of those around them. Through the open door of the booking office Caroline could see Station Road, stretching out into the distance. Once it was a joyful path to tread, but not today.
How could the birds still sing? How could the hedgerows still flower in their spring glory, when such tragedy had hit the village? Not everything looked the same in Station Road, however. There was more motor traffic going in and out of The Towers than she had ever seen before. Lorries, wagons, staff cars, all fully laden. As Caroline and Yves reached The Towers, they stopped to allow one lorry through the gates. Poking over the side was a grandfather clock, one she recognised.
‘Nanny Oates too?’ Caroline asked Yves, stunned into fresh horror.
‘Yes, cara.’
‘What are they doing with her clock?’ she choked.
‘Possessions have to be removed to prevent looting and to clear debris from the buildings.’
Looting happened in Belgium, France and other far-off places. But here in Ashden? Caroline tried to brace herself for what she realised she must see shortly, but sickness and dread welled up inside her as they drew near, and she held on to Yves’ hand so tightly she could feel her nails digging into it. It was ten o’clock. Normally on a bank holiday the village would already be bustling with everyone preparing to enjoy
the day in his or her own way. This morning it looked deserted, save for Bankside.
The first thing she noticed was that the oak tree on the corner of Station Road seemed to have turned black, its leaves and branches scorched by fire. It too was in mourning for the jagged scar opposite. Between the Norrington Arms and the cinema had been four cottages. Now there was none, and on the green slope down to the pond before them was a large crater. Part of the pub wall had vanished, and Isabel’s beloved cinema now had a gaping hole, exposing its innards like a doll’s house. The smell of smoke and dust of the debris hung everywhere, as soldiers and village folk cleared rubble and possessions together. Standing apart from them, like a Greek chorus observing the tragedy, was a large and silent group of villagers. Everyone dealt with it in a different way; some hid their eyes, some had theirs glued on the evidence of reality.
The sight of the Rectory, with its glorious muddle of architectural red-brick styles, made Caroline weep anew, so reassuring was it. Perhaps there had been some horrible mistake? Isabel couldn’t really be dead, for if the Rectory had so little damage, Isabel could not have been killed within its walls, and she could have had no reason to be out so late last night.
‘I will stay here, Caroline, until you come for me,’ Yves said gently, letting her hand drop with a kiss.
Surely his banishment didn’t matter now in this family tragedy? Then, she realised, at least to Yves, it still did, and for the first time she thought of how he had felt at her father’s rejection. Only she saw Yves as a member of the family, not he, nor her parents.