by Pam Weaver
‘She’s in good health,’ said Auntie Doreen, ‘but she’s not a happy bunny.’
When was she ever? Shirley thought acidly. ‘Oh?’
‘She doesn’t like me in uniform,’ said Doreen.
‘Well, I think you look fantastic,’ Shirley cried.
‘So do I!’ Popeye agreed enthusiastically.
Auntie Doreen glanced shyly at her friend. ‘Why, thank you, Ernest.’
There was the sound of planes overhead, so they rushed outside to watch another dog fight. This time, the German got away, but the RAF boys chased him back towards the sea. As they stood watching, Hazel stuffed some straw down Shirley’s back and she chased her to do the same. After a few minutes, everyone had joined in, whooping, screaming and laughing. It was good to be silly for a while. When they’d had enough, they went inside to eat.
When most of the food was gone, Janet produced a huge birthday cake. They’d even managed to get enough candles. Granny Roberts had made the cake, which despite her arthritis, was as light as a feather. When the cake was almost gone, Seth put a shove-halfpenny board onto the table, and Vince hung a dartboard on Hitler’s underpants and everybody couldn’t wait to aim and fire. The two men insisted on doing the milking by themselves, and by the time they came back, Gwen and Bobbi had already left. Of those remaining, Auntie Doreen and Popeye went first, with everyone waving after them and calling out their goodbyes, even Tom. A little later on, the others said they were keen to be back in the village before the blackout. It was only later that Shirley realized she hadn’t asked Miss Smith to tell her more of her friendship with Elizabeth.
Alone in the kitchen, Shirley suddenly felt that she had never been happier. What a terrific day. She piled the plates next to the sink while she waited for the kettle to boil. As she stood there with the dishcloth, Shirley felt a mixture of emotions. She liked it here. It had taken a while to get used to it, but she was happy being part of village life. Now that she’d officially left school, though, she guessed she would be expected to go back home and take over the running of the shop. She sighed. It was the last thing she wanted to do. Tom wouldn’t want to go either. She emptied the teapot and made up her mind that as soon as she got her mother’s new address, she’d ask her if she could stay a little longer – at least until Mr Oliver came out of prison and Janet left the farm.
* * *
France had fallen. Florrie had been looking for a letter from Len for more than two weeks now, but she was disappointed. In her head, she kept going over old ground. If only things had been different. If only Mum hadn’t . . . But what was the use? It didn’t alter anything. What was done was done. Her mind drifted back to Ruth. She had agreed to see her when she got to the new convalescent home. She didn’t know why, but somehow she felt it would be better to meet her in her new surroundings. The place sounded lovely. Countryside, big house, lovely grounds. Florrie shivered. Her bag was packed. She’d written to Betty, Doreen and of course to Shirley and Tom to tell them of her new address. Betty, dear Betty was still looking after the shop, and wasn’t Doreen visiting her mother in Coventry? Florrie hoped that she didn’t stay too long. She knew Doreen would visit her in the new convalescent home whenever she could. Doreen was all too easily manipulated by her mother. It worried Florrie when Doreen hinted in her last letter that she had some unexpected news to tell her when she came to visit.
Now that they were both sixteen, the twins had officially left school and there was every possibility that they’d want to go back home. She wouldn’t stop them. Why should she? Shirley could help Betty in the shop, and Tom would be in familiar surroundings. Florrie couldn’t wait for them all to be together again. She’d missed them both so much.
The journey was very pleasant. Florrie enjoyed looking out of the car window as the leafy Sussex countryside, miles and miles of rolling hills, sheep and blue skies, sped by. If only the war and the horrors she’d heard about on the radio in Dunkirk were a thing of the past too . . . She wondered again what Len was doing. She wished her answer all those years ago could have been different. Just recently, she’d kicked herself for caring more about what people thought than how much she’d cared about him. After what had happened to Mum, she’d moved away. She’d been in service for a while and there she met Sid. It didn’t take long before they’d courted and married. He’d been all right to start with and they’d been happy, but when the twins were born, and it became apparent that Tom wasn’t quite right, she’d blurted out everything about the past. Of course, the minute she’d done it, she’d wished she hadn’t, but she was upset and wasn’t thinking straight. She’d always blamed herself for Tom. God must have been punishing her because of Ruth. As soon as she saw the expression on Sid’s face, she knew everything had changed, but she couldn’t take it back.
‘My God,’ he’d gasped. ‘Wasn’t that in all the papers?’
Florrie had nodded miserably. He gave her a look so filled with anger and disgust she almost felt like he’d stabbed her in the heart. ‘But it doesn’t change anything, love,’ she said. She’d reached out her arms to him, but he’d butted her away.
‘Don’t you touch me,’ he’d snarled. ‘Don’t you ever touch me again.’
She’d been devastated. She’d pleaded with him, but he’d grabbed his coat and left the house. He was drunk when he came back home and he didn’t come to bed. He’d slept downstairs on the sofa, and when she’d got up in the morning, he’d already gone to work. The next few days were very difficult. They shared the same house, but Sid refused to speak to her. She tried to talk to him, but he acted as if she was completely invisible. Florrie had done her best to keep the horrible atmosphere from the twins, and a week later, she’d come back from the shops to find all his things gone as well. It was only then that she’d discovered their father had moved in with the publican’s wife from the Cross Keys.
Florrie felt embarrassed now about the way she’d handled the situation, but back then she really didn’t think she could survive without Sid. She’d gone round to see him, even falling on her knees and holding on to his legs, but to no avail. She’d begged and pleaded for him to come back, but instead he’d literally thrown her out onto the street. She’d honestly thought she’d fall apart without him. How wrong she was. As far as she knew, he never told anyone her terrible secret. She’d guessed it was a mixture of fear of the unknown and fear of exposure, but certainly the local gossips never found out the real reason why he’d gone. Within a month, Sid and his mistress had gone to Bristol, some said; Wales, according to others. Wherever he’d gone, she’d never heard a word from him from that day until this. Her luck had changed when she’d inherited the shop. It was even better that it was in a different part of London where nobody knew her maiden name. Len had been a brick right from the word go. He’d wanted to marry her, but of course she couldn’t. She’d explained that there was no possibility of divorce and that she wouldn’t live with him without being married. She’d given Ruth away and then she’d had Tom. Poor Tom. She’d couldn’t bear it if anything bad happened to Len.
‘God is punishing me,’ she’d told him.
‘Now you’re talking complete tommyrot,’ he told her, but he didn’t know the whole truth, and back then Florrie couldn’t bring herself to take the risk. And now that Ruth was back in her life, she wished . . . Florrie sighed. What did she wish?
‘Here we are, love.’ The driver of the car had pulled from a winding lane onto a long driveway. At the end, she could see what looked like a country house. Built possibly as early as the eighteenth century, it was a pretty place made of white brick over two storeys. There was an attractive cornice and a parapet on the roof. At the front, she saw a large veranda and lacy ironwork in front of the curved windows. The property of Sussex County Council since the 1920s, the house’s surrounding grounds were cultivated not with flowers but were kept as a smallholding. She could see fruit trees and rows and rows of neat vegetables. Florrie smiled. Not bad for four guineas a week. She was goin
g to like it here.
Shirley loved being in Elizabeth’s room. It was perfect. So perfect she could hardly believe that Janet preferred Mr Oliver’s room over this. Of course, Janet’s room was a lot bigger, but wasn’t a patch on this pretty place. When she got ready for bed that night, Shirley found herself just sitting on the edge and looking around. It was odd that Elizabeth, like Janet, hadn’t shared the same room as her husband. Shirley knew little about the facts of life, but she knew enough to understand that husbands and wives usually shared the same bed. It was also odd that Elizabeth had such a feminine room. She had obviously been allowed free rein when it came to making choices in here. Pretty floral curtains, fat pink cushions and pillowcases edged with white lace. It was only on closer inspection that Shirley realized that these added touches were entirely home-made. Elizabeth was a home-maker. Given a chance, she could have made a real difference to the cold, functional farmhouse, but perhaps miserable old Mr Oliver didn’t want that.
When she came to put her own things in the drawers, she could see that although there wasn’t a lot inside, the contents had been disturbed by somebody else. She couldn’t believe that Elizabeth would leave them in such a higgledy-piggledy state. Someone had been looking for something. Even though the first Mrs Oliver was never coming back, Shirley decided out of respect to put her things in one place. She found a suitcase at the bottom of the wardrobe, but it was already full of stuff. That was funny. Someone had gone through the case as well. Neatly folded clothes had been tossed around before the lid was closed. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but something wasn’t quite right.
Shirley took everything out and repacked the case. She opened the half-empty drawers and carried on filling the case until it was difficult to close the lid. That was when she noticed another strange thing. Elizabeth had gone in winter and slipped into the icy water of Patching Pond and yet the stuff in the case was for summer. Could it be that Elizabeth had simply packed her summer clothes away for the winter? That was entirely possible, she supposed, but why pack a washbag and toothbrush into the same case? They said she’d gone to the pond to pick greenery for Christmas wreaths, yet she was all packed and ready to go. It didn’t make sense.
Dog-tired after another hectic day on the farm, Shirley could hardly keep her eyes open. She’d added two more money-making schemes to her already overfilled day. Having picked and sold a basket of primroses from the hedgerows, she’d gone round the village with a basket of fresh eggs as well. Both proved to be very popular, so she’d decided to build on the idea. When the primroses were over, it would be bluebell season. Of course, selling stuff door to door only brought in pennies, but every one counted and already the communal pot was growing. After all that work, and two rounds of the village with the baskets, her legs were so tired she had a bit of a wobble. When she grabbed the iron bedstead to steady herself, the knob came off in her hand. It was only as she tried to screw it back on that she realized there was something inside the hollow tube.
It was difficult to get out because her clumsy fingers kept accidentally pushing it further down. In the end, she took a pin from Elizabeth’s workbox and used that to pull it up. It was only a piece of paper, but when she unrolled it, she was surprised to find a picture of a ship, the Dunnottar Castle from the Union-Castle Line. Shirley gazed in wonder at the swimming pool, the library and the sports facilities on offer for passengers going from Southampton to Cape Town.
She looked down the tube again, but there was nothing else. How odd. Why hide your holiday poster inside the bedstead? But by the time her head hit the pillow, Shirley had convinced herself that any unease she felt was only because of her overworked imagination.
CHAPTER 23
Florrie sat in the big winged chair facing the door. She wanted to see her visitor from the moment she came in. She had taken a great deal of trouble with her appearance. Barbara had helped her with her hair, and she was wearing her best dress. It wasn’t so attractive as it had once been, because she had lost so much weight, but it was the best she could do. Mavis, two beds down the ward, had loaned her a brooch, and Florrie had bought a small potted plant from the shop on the smallholding the day before to give to Ruth as a present.
When the door swung open, the first person to come in was Dick, Barbara’s gentleman friend. He was closely followed by a string of other people who had relatives or friends in the home. The air was soon filled with noisy and excited conversation. The clock said twenty past three. The doors closed and Florrie waited. Her heart sank. After all this, Ruth wasn’t coming. A few minutes later, her heart leapt as the doors swung open again, but it was only one of the nurses. Florrie bit back the tears and got up. She went and sat on the veranda. It was a little more private. No one else was here and she could dab her eyes without anyone noticing and making a fuss. Sitting by the window, she stared miserably out onto the gardens.
She had settled quickly into her new surroundings. There was a fairly strict routine, but she was allowed to move around at will. After breakfast, she had a choice of activities, all of which were designed to help strengthen her body and increase her muscle power. She could do keep-fit in the library, in which patients did exercises on a mat to music played on a wind-up gramophone, or she could join the others on a walk around the grounds. It was only when she realized how physically tired she was after such activity that Florrie understood how weak her body had become after months of lying in bed. She didn’t suffer from bouts of coughing any more, but for the first week she needed to lie down before lunch, and sometimes she slept. The meals were plain, but there was plenty of food. Good old-fashioned things like mutton stew, liver and bacon, bacon and onion suet pudding were followed by rice pudding, apple pie or steamed jam roly-poly and custard, all designed to build her up. And they did. Slowly but surely her energy levels grew and she began to feel stronger. After lunch, everyone had an afternoon nap, and then they read, played cards or chatted until teatime.
The people living there were a mixed bunch. Some were quite well off, but others, like herself, were working people with limited funds. Florrie made a special friend of a woman called Barbara who had worked in a large department store in Portsmouth before she was taken ill.
‘I belong to a friendly society,’ she confided in Florrie. ‘A lot of my treatment has been paid for by them.’
Barbara was about the same age as Florrie. She wasn’t married, but she had what she called ‘a gentleman friend’. Visiting hours were from five until six on Saturday evening and three till six on Sunday, and Barbara’s gentleman friend was always the first to come through the doors. It seemed that everyone had someone, all except Florrie. She had written to tell Shirley and Tom of her new address and the twins were coming next week. Florrie could hardly wait. It had been nine months since she’d seen her children, and oh, how she had missed them.
Florrie closed her eyes. She couldn’t blame the girl for not turning up. It was a long way to come. Perhaps she’d been put off when she’d learned that Florrie had been ill with TB. There were still some people who believed you could catch it just by a handshake.
‘Florrie?’ said a soft voice beside her. ‘Florrie Jenkins?’
Florrie opened her eyes to find herself looking into the face of a young girl with pale hazel eyes and light brown hair. ‘I’m Hannah,’ she said, ‘but you remember me as Ruth.’
Florrie leaned forward to get up, but the girl said, ‘No, no, don’t get up, please. Sit still and I’ll fetch a chair.’
Florrie sank back and watched her heading towards a wooden chair on the other side of the room. She was beautiful, slim with an easy sway to her body. She turned to come back. Under a plain cotton jacket, she was wearing a pretty button-through dress in a striped material. Florrie spotted a small pocket with an imitation handkerchief on her left breast, and the knee-length skirt was tight over her hips but burst into neat pleats from the hip down. Round her waist, she wore a plain blue belt. Her hat, the same colour as her jacket, sported a pr
etty spray of summer flowers on the brim. She carried a cream clutch bag and cream gloves.
‘How was your journey?’ Florrie asked as she sat down.
‘Fine,’ said Ruth. ‘I got a friend to bring me.’
‘That’s good,’ said Florrie. ‘At least you haven’t been hanging around bus stops all day. They say that the government might stop civilian cars having petrol altogether soon. That would be a disaster, wouldn’t it? I mean, you would have to rely on the bus or the train for everything, wouldn’t you? And if you were a soldier on leave, it might not be possible to get home to the family and back to barracks in time. People won’t be very happy about that, will they?’ She stopped, suddenly embarrassed that she was gabbling on and on about nothing. It was only because she was flustered and nervous. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘It’s all right,’ said Ruth, ‘and you’re right.’ They looked at each other and then Ruth fiddled with her gloves, while Florrie stared at her own hands, resting in her lap. She felt awkward. What should she say? What should she ask?
‘Before I forget,’ said Ruth, handing her a slip of paper, ‘here’s my new address. I’m working in an orphanage now, so I’ve decided to live in. The army requisitioned Mother’s house anyway.’
‘Oh,’ said Florrie. ‘You’re a nurse?’
‘A nursery nurse.’
Ruth smiled shyly. It was so unnerving looking at her. The girl was a younger version of her mother – the same tilt of her head, and her lips moved in the same way as she formed words like ‘friend’ and ‘requisitioned’. Florrie was suddenly filled with a gnawing sense of loss.