Patrick and I exchanged a glance and he gave me a slight nod.
‘No,’ I said. ‘Not Jackson. Cora changed her name to Devonshire. It was just a name she chose at random. She pretended to be a widow, you see, because …’
I took a breath.
‘… she was pregnant. She was pregnant with Donnie’s baby.’
Charlie was silent, this time for even longer.
‘She had a baby?’
‘She did,’ I said. ‘A girl. Ginny. And Ginny has a daughter, too – Natasha. And Natasha’s got loads of kids. Three, I think.’
‘Four,’ said Patrick.
‘Four,’ I said.
‘Well, I’ll be damned,’ said Charlie. ‘Cousins.’
‘Cousins,’ I said.
‘And Cora?’ Charlie said. ‘What about Cora? Is she still with us?’
Patrick and I laughed, both amazed that we’d not told him about the most important person in all of this.
‘She’s alive and kicking,’ I said. ‘She’s almost ninety but she’s fabulous. Suffers a bit with her arthritis but she’s incredible.’
‘I’d like to meet her,’ Charlie said. ‘And my kids would, too, I bet. My daughter even studied in England for a while – she could have walked right by one of her cousins and not known.’
‘We’ve not told her,’ I blurted out. ‘Cora doesn’t know what we’ve found out. She doesn’t know Donnie died before the wedding and she doesn’t know Patrick’s tracked you guys down.’
‘Ah,’ said Charlie. ‘You going to tell her?’
I glanced at Patrick again and he gave me a firm nod.
‘Absolutely,’ I said. ‘Right now if we can. She’ll be so sad about Donnie, but knowing that Ginny and Natasha have a whole new family will help, I’m sure. I bet she’d love to chat with your dad, too, and share memories of Donnie.’
‘Dad would love that,’ said Charlie with a chuckle. ‘We’ve all heard his stories a thousand times – Cora would be a new audience for him!’
He paused.
‘Listen,’ he said. ‘I know my dad has a box of stuff from the war. Lots of memorabilia from when Donnie died – letters, photos, medals. My Aunt Lois kept it but, when she passed away, Dad took it. We thought someone should have it.’
‘I’m pleased you did,’ said Patrick.
‘I used to look through it when I was a kid,’ said Charlie. ‘I’ve not so much as lifted the lid in years but I know where it is. How about I scooch over to my dad’s now and dig it out. See if there’s anything that might help you tell Cora. This is pretty big news for anyone to take in, especially a lady in her eighties.’
‘You’re right,’ I said, touched by his compassion for someone he’d never even met. ‘It’s going to be a shock for her.’
‘Let’s see if we can soften the blow,’ Charlie said. ‘I’ll go over to Dad’s now, and email you whatever I can. Give me a couple of hours, yeah?’
We said our goodbyes and Patrick ended the call. Then we both stared at one another in astonishment.
‘Have we done the right thing?’ I said, as the enormity of our discovery began to sink in. ‘Or have we just opened an enormous can of worms?’
Patrick looked exhausted.
‘I have no idea,’ he admitted. ‘It’s good, I think. Better that she knows, right? Donnie didn’t jilt her and we can prove it. That’s got to be an improvement on what she thought before.’
I nodded slowly.
‘You’re right,’ I said. ‘It’s just she was talking about missed opportunities and letting life pass you by the other day.’
I caught Patrick’s eye and felt myself blush as I realised it was pretty obvious why that subject had come up. I looked away and carried on.
‘I just hope she doesn’t start thinking of her whole life as one huge missed opportunity.’
‘She’s done good things, Amy,’ Patrick said. ‘She’s loved, she’s successful – she may have let some chances slip by but she definitely made the most of others.’
‘You’re right,’ I said, feeling slightly more positive. ‘I just want to tell her now and get it over with.’
I felt fizzy inside with nerves and excitement and very restless.
‘How’s your toe?’ asked Patrick.
I’d actually forgotten all about it. Now I flexed it to see if it still hurt. It didn’t.
‘It’s fine,’ I said. ‘Bit cold.’
‘Great,’ said Patrick. ‘Because I know one sure-fire way to distract us while we’re waiting for Charlie to email all that stuff.’
He did? Was he suggesting what I thought he was suggesting? Even though we’d only just agreed to keep our relationship firmly in the friends zone? I looked at him with a combination of surprise and desire.
‘Really?’ I said, lowering my gaze and looking up at him from under my eyelashes. ‘And what would that be?’
Patrick held out his hand to me.
‘Foxtrot,’ he said.
Chapter Forty-Seven
Cora
2015
I was enjoying a late-afternoon snooze in front of Cash in the Attic when Patrick and Amy arrived. I heard them knock on the back door, chatting in what they thought were quiet voices, and then Amy called out to see if I was home.
‘In the lounge, darling,’ I said. ‘Bring tea.’
I didn’t really want tea, but I definitely didn’t want them to see me hunched in my chair, blanket over my knees. I was an old woman, yes, but I was a vain one and I liked to be looking elegant when I received guests.
I stood up, groaning a bit. That’s a sign of being old, I thought, if you can’t stand up without groaning or sit down without sighing in relief. I’d noticed Ginny doing that now, too. That was a real shock, when I realised my daughter was old now. Her seventieth birthday was approaching and, though she also liked to look after herself, I could see she was beginning to slow down a bit.
I tidied my hair in the mirror, reapplied my lipstick, and draped my blanket over the back of the sofa. Then I settled myself in the chair again and turned off the TV just as Patrick and Amy shuffled in.
Amy put the tray of tea on the low table in front of me, and they both stood – looking nervous and awkward.
‘Sit down,’ I said, wondering what was going on. ‘You both look like you’ve come to see your headmistress.’
They sat simultaneously and Amy chewed her lip. I studied her. She was astonishingly pretty. Even more so now she’d tamed her mop of hair. I’d never tell her so – she was pleased enough with herself – but I’d watched lots of clips of her show on Natasha’s iPad and I thought she was a wonderful actress. She had a great future in front of her, I was sure. But now she looked like she was going to burst into tears.
‘Do you want me to do it?’ Patrick asked her.
Amy shook her head.
‘It should come from me,’ she said.
I felt the first stirrings of alarm. What was she going to say?
‘Is everything all right?’ I said.
Amy leaned forward.
‘Cora,’ she said. ‘Do you remember you asked us to find Donnie?’
His name made my heart thump, just as it always had, and the shock of hearing Amy say it made me snappy.
‘Of course I remember,’ I said. ‘I’m old, not insane.’
Amy frowned at me.
‘Cora,’ she said. ‘It’s not good news, I’m afraid.’
I looked down at my hands. They were shaking but when I spoke my voice was steady.
‘Married?’ I said. ‘Or dead?’
Amy took a breath.
‘He’s dead, Cora,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’
I raised my chin.
‘I’d expected as much,’ I said. ‘He’d have been ninety-one now – lots of my friends are gone. Poor Audrey didn’t make it to seventy-five.’
I smiled as I thought of darling Audrey, cigarette in hand, telling me what to do.
‘When did he go, Donnie?’ I carried on.
‘Did he keel over on the golf course? Or pass away surrounded by his loving family?’
Amy and Patrick looked grim-faced. Amy got up and came to me. She knelt on the floor at my feet and took both my hands in hers.
‘Cora, he died in 1945,’ she said carefully. ‘He was killed in a bomb that fell in London on 25 March. He didn’t jilt you – he was already dead.’
I felt like the whole room had tilted and I was sliding off. I put my hand to my head trying to steady myself.
‘I don’t understand,’ I said.
‘It was a V2 attack,’ Patrick said. ‘There were quite a few, right at the end of the war.’
‘I remember,’ I said. Now my voice was shaky. ‘There were lots down in Camberwell and round here. But none where Donnie was stationed.’
Amy looked at Patrick for help and he continued.
‘It hit Tottenham Court Road,’ he said. ‘Killed ten people. Donnie was one of them. But it took them days to clear the site and I guess by the time they’d worked out he was one of the victims, you’d moved on.’
I shook my head.
‘I saw Donnie that day,’ I said. I remembered meeting in Hyde Park in the spring sunshine and him dashing off to do something. ‘I don’t know where he went afterwards. Why would he go to Tottenham Court Road? What was he doing?’Amy was talking but she sounded like she was very far away.
‘Cora,’ she said. ‘Do you want to lie down?’
I did. She helped me over to the sofa and put the blanket over me.
I closed my eyes, wondering if this was all a dream, but all I could see was Donnie up ahead of me on the path, shouting that we were getting married. The scene replayed itself over and over on my eyelids.
‘Do you want me to phone Natasha?’ Cora said. ‘Or the doctor?’
‘No,’ I croaked. ‘No. Just give me a minute to take this in.’
‘I know it’s a shock,’ she said. She stroked my hair gently. ‘But Cora, that’s not all.’
I opened my eyes and stared at her. She was leaning over me, her pretty face etched with concern and her wide brown eyes worried.
‘We’ve found Donnie’s family,’ she said. ‘We spoke to his nephew, Charlie. He’s the son of Donnie’s brother, Walter.’
I nodded. I remembered Donnie’s tales of Wally and the scrapes he got into.
‘And Charlie’s found some things,’ Amy said. ‘Photos, letters, other memories. He’s emailed some of them.’
I struggled to sit up.
‘Do you have them?’ I said. I was shaking violently now. ‘Can I see?’
Patrick helped me sit up properly – apparently nothing made one feel every moment of one’s eighty-nine years more than finding out one’s fiancé had died seventy years ago – and then he sat on one side of me and Amy on the other. To all intents and purposes they were all that was keeping me upright.
Patrick opened his computer and clicked a few buttons. Suddenly the screen was filled with a photograph of me in uniform.
‘Ohhhhh,’ I said. Grief hit me like a physical pain and for a moment I thought I was having a heart attack.
‘Cora,’ Amy said. ‘Oh, God, Patrick, put it away.’
Patrick moved the computer but with a superhuman effort I gulped some air and managed to speak.
‘No,’ I said. ‘I want to see.’
‘Oh, Cora, are you sure?’ Amy sounded close to tears – as I was myself – but I knew I had to find out more.
I pointed at the screen with my lumpy, shaky knuckle.
‘That’s me,’ I said. ‘Obviously. I gave Donnie that photograph. I wrote a message on the back.’
Patrick clicked again and this time the screen showed the back of the photo.
‘Darling Donnie,’ I’d written all those years before. ‘Forever yours, Cora.’
I looked up at the ceiling, trying not to cry. Just like on my wedding day, I feared that if I started I’d never stop.
‘Is there anything else?’ I asked. Patrick nodded.
He showed me a photograph of Donnie in uniform, and some of his division – there were familiar faces among them but I didn’t linger. There was the telegram announcing his death, and a letter from his commanding officer telling Donnie’s mother what a good soldier he was.
And then Patrick paused.
‘Charlie said there are lots of letters,’ he told me. ‘Donnie’s mother kept them all. He’s not sent them all but he’s sent the one that matters. The one about you.’
I closed my eyes again, and again I saw Donnie up ahead, turning round, smiling at me over his shoulder.
‘Can you read it to me?’ I asked Amy. ‘Will you do that for me?’
‘Are you sure?’
I gripped her hand tightly.
‘Please,’ I said. ‘Please.’
Chapter Forty-Eight
Amy began to read, her voice clear and steady. I closed my eyes and listened – hearing Donnie’s voice in every line.
‘London. March 25, 1945,’ Amy began.
‘Dear Mom and Dad. I have no way of telling if my letters are arriving in the right order, or if they are even arriving at all, so I feel I must start over telling my stories each time I write. This letter is more important than most because I am writing it on the eve of my wedding. Yes, you read that right. I’m getting married. I’ve told you about Cora. She is just wonderful and she and I have decided to tie the knot right here in London – tomorrow. As you know – I hope, if my letters have arrived – we are being sent to France once more and so Cora and I didn’t want to wait a second longer than we had to. We have booked the ceremony for tomorrow afternoon and we are so excited to become Mr and Mrs Jackson’
Amy looked up at me.
‘Do you want me to carry on?’ she said. I couldn’t speak but I managed to nod and so she continued.
‘Let me tell you a little about Cora,’ she said. ‘She is beautiful, of course. I enclose a photograph that I tore from a newsletter. She has blonde hair, and clear, bright-blue eyes. She is a dancer and, as I told you before, I met her when her company – the Entertainment National Service Association – performed for we rowdy GIs last year. When you see her on stage, as I’m sure you will one day, you’ll understand why she caught my eye. When she dances, you can’t take your eyes off her. She wants to be in movies like Ginger Rogers and I know she’ll be a big star someday. She’s so funny – she makes me laugh like a drain most of the time – and she’s really smart. She’s a great singer, and a comedienne. She likes dogs, and she hates getting her face wet, and she makes me the happiest man alive’
Amy looked at me again. I was crying now, fat tears slipping down my cheeks, but I didn’t care.
‘Please keep going,’ I whispered.
‘Cora doesn’t have any brothers or sisters so she’s eager to meet Wally and Lois, though I have warned her that Lois never shuts up and that Wally will probably get her to play cowboys with him as soon as she arrives. Because that’s our plan, Mom and Dad. We want to build a life together in America and as soon as the war is over we want to head to LA and Hollywood and see if we can’t just get Cora discovered by some big-time movie producer. But if that doesn’t happen, that’s okay, too. We’ll make a life in Connecticut instead. Cora’s going to write you after the wedding as I’d really like her to make her way to the States as soon as possibly. London’s not the safest of places and I want my bride to be out of harm’s way
‘Mom, Dad, I’m sorry you won’t be at the wedding. That’s how it goes in wartime I guess. Maybe we can have a party to celebrate when all this is over? Invite all the family so they can meet Cora. Perhaps she’ll dance for us all. I know Lois would love that. Cora loves putting on a show. In fact, I’ve got a surprise for her after the wedding. We’ll have a few hours before I go to France, so I’ve arranged a room in a pub nearby – you know what a pub is, right? – where Cora and her friends can sing and dance to their heart’s content and celebrate our marriage. I’m there now, in fact. I’ve just said goodb
ye to Cora in Hyde Park and come to the pub – it’s called the Whitefield Tavern – isn’t that just the most English name? I’m sitting here, chatting to the landlord – that’s what they call bartenders here – and drinking beer and arranging the party for tomorrow. When I’ve finished my drink, I’ll mail this letter and then head back to meet the rest of my division
‘There’s always a strange atmosphere with the men the night before we go someplace, but I like the way we all pull together at these times. I’m scared of going back to Europe, but knowing Cora’s waiting for me will make me even more determined to come home
‘Tell Lois I miss her, and tell Wally to stay out of my room. And I miss him, too. I’ll see you all soon.
‘Your loving son, Donald’
Amy took a deep, juddering breath and looked at me.
‘He really loved you, Cora,’ she said. ‘He didn’t run out on you. He loved you and he wanted to marry you.’
I pulled my hanky out of my sleeve and wiped my eyes.
‘I loved him, too,’ I said. ‘I loved him so much. We could have had a wonderful life together.’
Amy squeezed my hand gently.
‘I know,’ she said. ‘I know.’
She put her arm round me and I cried and cried. She cried too. And Patrick made more tea and put his arms round us both and said soothing things as the room grew dark.
Eventually, when I had no more tears to cry, I started to think about the implications of all this.
‘Ginny,’ I said. ‘Oh, my word. I have to tell Ginny.’
‘Does she know who her dad was?’ Amy said.
I shook my head.
‘Bits and pieces,’ I admitted. ‘I once had a friend who told me that the best lies are full of truths. When Donnie left …’ I caught myself. ‘When Donnie died, I called myself Cora Devonshire, as you know. I told everyone – including my mother, and Ginny – that I’d married a GI who’d been killed in action.’
Amy was looking shocked.
‘It wasn’t easy being a single mother in those days,’ I said. ‘War or no war. It was much better to be a widow.’
She nodded.
‘Did Ginny never ask?’
I shrugged.
A Step In Time Page 22