‘He’s so tactless and clings to Terry like a leech,’ she said. ‘Anyone but Terry would be driven mad but he doesn’t seem to notice. Just says there’s plenty of room in Canada, if we say anything.’
Joe saw Terry alone when he came home, and he told Sarah that they had had a good talk and now his brother knew exactly how things had happened. ‘I thought he might want to punch me,’ Joe said, ‘but it all went great. We’re still good pals.’
Sarah took a week’s leave and they spent every possible moment together. Joe was still in uniform and everyone smiled on them as they walked along in a golden dream with their arms around each other or sat entwined on a park seat.
Other people seemed remote to Sarah. Only Joe was real, and the love which they had tried to hide now seemed almost tangible as they moved through the days in a blissful dream.
To Sally they were like herself and Lawrie in their courting days. He was often in her thoughts as she smiled tenderly to see Sarah and Joe, lost to the world as they gazed into each other’s eyes.
All too soon the week sped by, but before Joe went back they chose a neat three-stone engagement ring. Everyone admired it, then Kate announced: ‘I’ve got news too. Gene and I have fixed the wedding for the first week in October.’
Cathy was vexed that she had chosen to announce the wedding at what should have been Sarah’s moment, but Sally told her not to worry.
‘I’d like to see anything that’d worry those two this minute.’
Terry went to Canada in September and Mick was demobilized and came home, but not for long. He told them that he had considered going to Cambridge but had decided to go into industry instead, with a friend from his squadron.
‘We’re going to make plastics,’ he said.
‘Plastics? What are they?’ Cathy asked.
‘It’s a new idea,’ he said. ‘We’ll be able to make things like buckets and bowls, even something that looks like leather or glass but isn’t.’
‘Ersatz, you mean, like the Germans?’ Cathy said doubtfully.
‘No, they were substitutes and not good ones. These will be just like the real thing, but much cheaper. We could make a glass slipper that wouldn’t break.’
‘And what will you use for money?’ Sally asked.
‘We’ve both got good gratuities and we’ve been saving,’ said Mick.
‘I suppose you know what you’re doing, Mick, but it seems chancy,’ his mother said doubtfully.
‘If it fails we’ll do something else,’ he said cheerfully. ‘I’m afraid I’ll be moving away though. We’ve taken a small factory in the Midlands.’
‘So Greg was right,’ Cathy said to her mother. ‘The house is emptying out. What do you think about moving, Mam?’
‘Are you sure you want me to come?’ Sally said. ‘You and Greg could be like Darby and Joan.’
She smiled but Cathy knew that she was serious and said quickly, ‘I’ll tell you what, Mam. I’d rather go to live in Norris Street again with you, than have a dream house without you. I’d be lost.’
‘In that case, I think it’s a good idea. It breaks my heart to look round Everton now, with all the empty spaces where people I knew used to live. There’s nothing to keep me here.’ She glanced up at the mantelpiece where the handleless teapot and Lawrie’s pipe stood in the place of honour. ‘I’ll take those and I’ll be settled anywhere.’
‘Anne and John have been promised a prefab,’ Cathy said, ‘so Sarah and Joe can have their rooms until they get a house. Of course Joe won’t be back in England until after Christmas, and he’ll still have a few months in London before he’s demobbed, Sarah says.’
‘Do you ever hear about Miss Andrews that took your house in Norris Street?’ Sally said. ‘I remember Peggy telling me that her brother was an Air Raid Warden and nearly drove everyone mad, but I’ve never heard any more.’
‘Neither have I,’ said Cathy. ‘Freda used to tell me about the street but now she’s gone to Scotland I don’t hear anything. I know Mrs Parker is in Belmont Hospital. She went senile and none of them would look after her, and poor Grace Woods died before her husband so she didn’t get her wish.’
The atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August the sixth and on Nagasaki three days later, but the full horror of it was not realized by people at home. Five days later Japan surrendered and Peggy came running round to see Sally.
‘At last,’ she said. ‘It’s all finished, and our Michael will be home. I’ve got his room all ready.’
Peggy had lived with Meg and Willie for a while after her own house was bombed but had been unable to resist interfering and spoiling Willie’s careful efforts to make Meg self-sufficient. Fortunately a house became empty nearby and Peggy moved there, ostensibly to make a home for Michael’s return.
When she was finally notified that he had been traced and brought to hospital in London, she travelled to see him with her eldest son Robbie. Sally went to see Peggy when she returned and found many of her family with her, all very distressed.
‘Sally, he’s just a skeleton,’ Peggy wept. ‘What he must have gone through!’
Even burly Robbie was in tears as he walked up and down the room, clenching his fists. ‘If I could just get my hands on them those yellow devils,’ he kept repeating, ‘I’d kill them, so help me God! I’d kill them.’
‘Never mind, Peg,’ Sally tried to comfort her. ‘At least he’s alive and they’ll give him every care.’
‘The doctor said they’d build him up but it’ll take months,’ Peggy said. ‘But he’ll never be the same again, Sally. My poor lad.’
It was a relief to Sally to come back to her own family and their happy house. ‘There’s not many as lucky as us, love,’ she told Cathy.
‘I know, Mam. We’ve all got safely through the war, and now three of them have got good partners. I wouldn’t wish for a nicer girl than Anne, and Joe’s perfect for Sarah, and a lad I’m very fond of. Gene’s a nice boy, too, although I don’t suppose we’ll see much of him or Kate either when they go to America.’
‘I wonder who Mick will bring home?’
‘I don’t know. I’m prepared for anyone from a hottentot to a dowager,’ Cathy said. ‘If he does as well as the others in marriage, I’ll be happy.’
She had intended to hold Kate’s wedding reception at home, but Kate had other plans. She told her parents that Gene would like to be married in the little chapel at the camp as he often acted as altar server in the Mass there, and the priest would like to marry them and say their Nuptial Mass.
The family were invited to the Officers’ Mess a few days before the wedding and were overwhelmed by the hospitality they received. ‘And that wasn’t even the wedding reception,’ Cathy said as they drove home.
‘Kate will take to that life like a duck to water,’ Sally said. She had been reluctant to go but Greg had pointed out that she would have to go there for the wedding so she might as well get to know the place beforehand. In the end she had enjoyed the evening.
Joe was not able to come home for the wedding but Sarah wrote him such a detailed description he said he felt as though he had.
With a baby in the family again, Christmas 1945 was a quiet but happy one for the Redmond family, but early in the New Year Cathy was saddened by the death of Eleanor Rathbone, MP. Cathy had admired Miss Rathbone all her life and campaigned for her in her youth, but a few days after the death was announced she was cheered by the news that Joe was coming home on disembarkation leave.
He had suggested getting married on this leave but Sarah said she would rather wait until he was demobbed in May.
“I don’t want to be parted again after we’re married,” she wrote, but several times during Joe’s leave regretted that they had not married when he suggested.
The months soon passed, with frequent weekend leaves, the excitement of Kate’s departure to America, and viewing the new house which Cathy, Sally and Greg were to move into after the wedding. It had been built pre-war and was
a modern, well-planned house with a bathroom and hot water and a garden front and rear. It was not far from the allotments which the Burns family now worked so Peggy could often come to see Sally, and Sally could take the tram to see her.
Joe came home in May and with Sarah made the arrangements for their simple wedding. The wedding reception would be the last festivity in the Egremont Street house.
Only the immediate family were at the wedding of Sarah and Joe, with Peggy as Sally’s guest, and it was a simple but moving ceremony. Even the priest who married them was visibly affected by their shining happiness and obvious love for each other. He said that he would not preach a sermon, only say that he wished every couple he married were as sure of happiness as Sarah and Joe. He walked to where they knelt at the altar and placed his hands on their heads. ‘Go with God, my children,’ he said and they felt truly blessed.
They spent their honeymoon in Anglesey, and came to see Sarah’s parents and grandmother when they returned. Anne and John came too with the baby, and they all sat round discussing the war and what it had meant.
‘Was it worth while?’ Anne said.
Joe replied immediately, ‘I think so. If you’d seen those people when we liberated Brussels – it was an evil regime. And the concentration camps! I don’t believe in war and I hope we never see another but Hitler had to be stopped.’
‘Yes, but—’ John was beginning.
Sarah interrupted, ‘Don’t let’s talk about war. Can’t we talk of happier things?’
John picked up the baby from the rug where he was playing and sat him on his knee.
Cathy leaned forward and stroked his head. ‘What about Gerry?’ she said. ‘What sort of a world will he grow up in?’
‘A much better one, Mum,’ said John. ‘All the things that Grandad worked for will come true soon with the Welfare State. “Security from the cradle to the grave.” It took a war to do it but it’s come at last. I wish he had lived to see it.’
‘He didn’t think it would come in his time, lad, but he hoped it would come in yours, and thank God it has,’ said Sally. ‘I’ve been thinking about him a lot lately, I suppose because Sarah and Joe put me in mind of us when we were wed.’ She laid her hand on Sarah’s. ‘I hope you won’t have the hardships we had to face when Lawrie fell out of work.’
‘They won’t, Grandma,’ John said eagerly. ‘There’ll be unemployment pay, proper pensions for widows and old people, and medical care for everybody, milk for babies and schoolchildren.’ He glanced at his mother. ‘And even family allowances at last.’
‘I helped Miss Rathbone to campaign for them when I was young,’ Cathy explained to Anne. ‘Miss Rathbone – there’s someone else who died before she got what she’d always fought for.’
‘But she knew it was coming,’ John said.
‘And you campaigned?’ Anne said admiringly to Cathy. ‘We didn’t do anything but enjoy ourselves, did we, Sar?’
‘No. My only ambition was to be happy,’ Sarah said. She smiled up at Joe. ‘I’ve realized that anyway.’
‘And what about this little fellow?’ Greg said, taking the baby from John. ‘I suppose you’ve got all sorts of ambitions for him?’
‘No. Only for him to be happy. I think that’s the best we can wish for our children. I hope he has more sense than I had, but he’ll make his own mistakes,’ said John.
‘If he’s happy and healthy, I’ll be satisfied,’ Anne said. ‘I think Sarah’s ambition is the right one.’
‘I wonder if he’ll realize how hard the fight was for what he’ll probably take for granted,’ said John.
‘I don’t doubt you’ll tell him,’ Sally said drily.
‘No, I won’t, Grandma. I’ll let him find things out for himself.’
‘He’ll grow up in a different world anyway,’ said Joe. ‘And so will all our children. People hoped for a better world after the Great War but it didn’t come off. This time I think it will.’
‘I hope you’re right, lad,’ said Sally. ‘Forty years ago Lawrie thought good times were just around the corner, but maybe this time it really will be a better world.’
‘It will, Grandma,’ John said eagerly. ‘A better world for everyone.’
‘And especially for Gerald John Redmond and his generation,’ Cathy said, laughing and cuddling the baby.
He looked round their smiling faces and clapped his hands, crowing with delight.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Mr Roger Hull, Reference Librarian, and the staff of Crosby Central Library, the staff of the Local History Department, Picton Library, Liverpool, and of the Museum of Labour History, Liverpool, my brother George Savage (ex. R.A.F.), my sisters Agnes Morgan and Theresa Kelly for memories they shared with me, members of Crosby Writers’ Club and other friends and relations, and last but not least my husband Ted and all our family for all their help and encouragement for which I am deeply grateful.
When Day is Done
When sisters Kate and Rose Drew are orphaned, they are heartbroken to discover they are to be separated. Kate must go to Aunt Mildred, a hard woman who runs a Liverpool boarding house, who puts the young girl to work at once. But Rose gets the wealthy widow Aunt Beattie, who lavishes her with gifts and attention.
As one sister experiences hardship alongside friendship, and the other is spoilt and isolated, which will find happiness? For, at the end of the day, it is not what Kate and Rose have in life that counts, it is what they choose to make of it…
The Liverpool Sagas
‘A family saga you won’t be able to put down’ Prima
Land is Bright
To Give and To Take
There is a Season
First published in the United Kingdom in 1991 by Headline Book Publishing
This edition published in the United Kingdom in 2018 by
Canelo Digital Publishing Limited
57 Shepherds Lane
Beaconsfield, Bucks HP9 2DU
United Kingdom
Copyright © Elizabeth Murphy, 1991
The moral right of Elizabeth Murphy to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781788631105
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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There is a Season Page 54