by Lizzie Lane
‘Stan. Stan.’
She was breathless and her cheeks were pink. He might have thought she was having a heart attack or something, but for the fact that she was so animated. With the help of her walking stick, she closed on him fast. It was then that he saw her expression; she was crying. Still sobbing his name too. All the same, he couldn’t quite bring himself to acknowledge her.
‘Stan.’ In her free hand she held a flimsy white piece of paper, not a handkerchief at all. ‘I can’t believe this! I can’t believe it! Dead! Dead!’
His blood froze in his veins. Mike! It had to be Mike.
‘Such a tragedy! Such a terrible tragedy!’ Her shoulders heaved with sobs, tears squeezing from the corners of her eyes.
‘No! No.’ He shook his head forlornly as if that alone would make the statement untrue. It had to be Mike.
‘But there’s more, Stan. There’s more …’
‘Let’s get you back into the house.’
Troubled as he was, afraid of hearing the details of the death of her nephew – Mary’s fiancé – he had to be strong for her. He knew – or thought he knew – how she was feeling.
He took hold of her arm, but even she tottered a bit, her unsuitable shoes slipping in the soft earth, mud gathering around her heels. She leaned on him heavily, her shoulders quaking all the way back up the garden path to the back door.
‘Better take them shoes off before you go inside,’ Stan said. ‘I’ll make the tea. You need it strong and sweet.’
‘Never mind that. A little dirt never hurt anybody. What does a bit of dirt matter when such things like these can happen, terrible things …’
Stan felt an overwhelming desire to be doing any small thing in an effort to hold off the moment when she would tell him the full details. ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’
‘No. Don’t bother. I need something stronger than tea.’ She eased herself into a chair, the letter still clutched in her hand. Her tears appeared to be drying. ‘I’m amazed, Stan. Truly amazed.’
Stan frowned and briefly wondered whether she’d read things right. She’d gone from devastated to something else in a matter of minutes.
He looked at her, remembering the girl she’d once been before she’d married Alf Hicks and gone away. In a way she hadn’t changed that much, just older – like all of us, he thought wryly. But today …?
Sadness clouded her eyes.
‘Do you want me to call the doctor?’
She shook her head, sniffed then lifted her chin defiantly. ‘Gilda! It’s Gilda!’
‘What happened?’
She handed him the letter. ‘An air raid. Gilda’s been killed in an air raid. I told her not to go back to London!’
Her shoulders began to quake anew. She sucked in her lips and hung her head.
Stan headed for the kitchen dresser where Bettina kept her store of sherry, port and spirits and put the letter down. ‘Let’s have that drink first.’
He thought about the children. Please God, not them too! He didn’t want to ask. His courage failed him.
Steadying his hand, he reached for two glasses. ‘Brandy?’
‘Yes.’
He poured a glass for each of them, turned round and handed her a glass. ‘Drink it,’ he said.
‘You too.’
He did as ordered while all the while his stomach tightened and churned at the prospect of hearing further details of yet more bad news. She still hadn’t said anything about the children. That was why he hadn’t read the letter yet, why it was there on the dresser wedged between a blue-striped butter dish and a sugar basin.
He swigged the drink down in one gulp. Bettina did the same.
She handed him her glass. ‘Another. I need another.’
He poured again.
‘Read it. You must read it, Stan.’
Stan took a deep breath. ‘I take it the children were with her?’
‘Not quite. That’s why I want you to read it. There’s something in it that concerns you.’
Stan frowned as he walked back to the dresser. What did she mean?
The paper was thin and crisp between his fingers. He raised his eyes to meet hers before dropping his gaze back to the flimsy sheet of paper. First he read the heading. The address was that of an adoption society in London.
He looked at Bettina, wanting to ask what an adoption society could possibly want with him, and secondly why the letter had been sent to Bettina.
Bettina read his expression. ‘Read on, Stan. You need to read on. This letter is really for you, not me. It’s for you Stan!’
He didn’t fail to notice that she’d stressed the fact twice. Still he questioned it in his mind. The letter was for him? He turned his eyes to the page.
Dear Mrs Hicks,
Your name has been passed to us by a Mr and Mrs Jacobsen whose daughter-in-law, Mrs Gilda Jacobsen, recently died in an air raid.
Fortunately, her two eldest children were staying with their grandparents so were unhurt.
However, we have been told by Mr and Mrs Jacobsen that the third child, a boy of about nine months, was with his mother.
It appears from eyewitnesses that the mother protected the baby with her body …
Not knowing anyone in London, Gilda had stayed with Bettina when she’d first arrived in England but had gone back to London when Charlie had been killed. She had thought that her dead husband’s parents had also died, but they’d managed to escape from Europe, finding their way over the Baltic Sea to Sweden and from there to England. Gilda, it seemed, had ended up staying with them, but only until they’d found out about her pregnancy.
Stan looked up from the letter. ‘A third child?’
Bettina nodded. ‘Read on.’
… We have been informed by Mr and Mrs Jacobsen that they are unwilling to take the child in as he was not fathered by their son, who, I understand, died at the hands of the Nazis. As he is not their son’s child, nor of their religion, they feel they cannot accept him into the family. However, they wish him no ill and have instructed us to trace whatever other family he might have.
In this regard, they were given to understand by Gilda Jacobsen that the baby is the son of one Charles Sweet.
The Jacobsens have asked us to contact you, Mrs Hicks, as a dear friend of their daughter-in-law and her parents, who we believe are also dead, to act on their behalf in arranging that Mr Charles Sweet is told of his responsibility and makes arrangements to collect the child, whose name is also Charles, from the orphanage in which he presently resides …
By the time he’d finished reading, Stan Sweet felt as though every bone in his body had been ground to dust.
‘Dear God!’
With his elbows resting on the table, he covered his face with his hands.
‘I had known Gilda as a child before her parents moved to the Netherlands. I don’t know where they are now. Her husband’s family managed to escape to London. They contacted me because Charlie and Gilda used this address when they wrote to each other. They thought you didn’t approve that they were lovers,’ she said in response to his questioning look. ‘And they were lovers. There’s no question about that.’
‘I shouldn’t think there was any doubt!’ said Stan brusquely. ‘There’s a baby!’
Once again he hid his eyes behind his hands as a whole regiment of thoughts marched around his brain, so much so that his head ached with the pressure of them. One after another they tumbled over as he tried – and failed – to analyse his feelings.
‘You know, Betty, I’ve walked in darkness ever since our Charlie died. Nothing, not even the prospect of our Mary’s wedding, helped soothe the hurt. Terrible to admit, but even going to the churchyard and telling my Sarah about it didn’t help. It used to, but of late …’
‘I know,’ Bettina said quietly, reaching across and patting his hand. ‘You didn’t bother to come to see me either. I did miss you. Friends get fewer the older you get. And I appreciated our little chats. You must know that, St
an Sweet.’
He came out from behind his hand to see her smiling through her tears.
‘Anyway,’ she added briskly. ‘Did Sarah say anything back to you?’
He eyed her thoughtfully. ‘I’m not sure. It might just ’ave bin my imagination, but … I could hear what she might have said, or thought I did.’
He looked down at what remained of the brandy, pushing the base of the glass round with his index finger so that the liquid quivered in the glass.
‘Gave me a right telling off, I don’t mind saying. But it was no use. I couldn’t snap out of it, but …’
‘But now you have to.’
Bettina waited for him to tell her what he thought Sarah was saying to him, but when nothing seemed forthcoming she filled in the gap herself.
‘One life ends, another begins. Your son Charlie presented you with a grandson. “Look after him, Stan,” she would have said to you. “Look after our grandson just as you did his father and the girls. Frances too.”’
‘A baby! I can’t believe it!’ His hand fell away to hang limply between his knees.
‘A grandson, Stan. He’s your grandson.’
When he looked at her, she was smiling. For the first time in ages, he smiled too. It felt as if the weight of the world had been lifted off his shoulders.
He studied the high cheekbones, the coif of cotton wool hair, the way her eyes were studying him, searching for his reaction to what she’d said.
Bettina smiled. ‘And his name’s Charles. Charlie.’
‘Charlie!’ He said it with wonder, his eyes moist.
Bettina covered his hand with hers. She smiled into his face. ‘You’re not just his grandfather, Stan. The adoption society are asking about Charlie, but it’s you who is now his legal guardian. They’re asking Charlie to have him, but it’s you who is next in line for the legal responsibility. Are you willing to have the baby live with you?’ She paused.
Stan stared at her as he digested what she was saying. Suddenly he was no longer looking backwards, wishing things had been different. It was like when Sarah had died and he’d taken on the reins of raising his family on his own. This is what he would do again.
‘Can you write back to them?’
Bettina leaned forward slightly. Her tears had dried up though her eyes were still puffy.
‘What do you want me to say, Stan?’
Stan Sweet’s features had drooped for far too long. He was fifty-two years old and about to take on raising his baby grandson. But he didn’t feel as though he were over fifty. He felt reborn, ready again to take on the world. For the first time in months the ghost of a smile spread over his lips and brightened his eyes.
‘Tell them that my son is dead but I’m coming for young Charlie. I’m coming for my grandson.’
This time her tears were of happiness and she was smiling through them. ‘If that’s what you want.’
He nodded profusely. ‘I do. I most certainly do!’
‘I’ll reply right away.’
Stan clasped his hands in front of him as Bettina got up from the table and went to the writing bureau sitting in an alcove to one side of the fireplace. Suddenly he felt terribly guilty at the way he’d behaved over the last few months since Charlie’s death.
‘Bet,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’
She turned round and looked at him, her reading glasses perched halfway down her nose. ‘Sorry about what?’
He looked down at his hands, one thumb rubbing against the other. ‘Sorry I’ve been so offhand of late, but …’
‘There’s nothing to apologise for, Stan. You’ve lost your son. But now you’ve got to pull your socks up. You’ve got a grandson to think about. Your Charlie would want you to. So would Sarah.’
‘You’re right. Of course you’re right.’
There was only one thing left to worry about. Bettina noticed his sudden frown.
‘I know what you’re thinking.’
He looked up sharply.
Bettina continued. ‘You’re wondering what Mary and Ruby will think of all this.’
He nodded. ‘I am. It’s going to be quite a shock.’
She couldn’t stop smiling. In fact, she felt she could burst with joy.
‘You’re not as young as you were when they were babies, so they’ll have to step in on occasion. It’s just a case of a bit of give and take.’
‘Yes.’ He nodded resolutely. He thought he could see things very clearly.
What Bettina said next pulled him up short. ‘You’ve neglected them too since Charlie died. You can’t preserve the past, Stan. Keep his memory in your heart, not pinned on your shoulder. Your Sarah would have told you that – if she’d thought you’d been listening.’
CHAPTER NINE
SITTING AT THE kitchen table, Mary contemplated her list for the wedding, a pencil clutched between finger and thumb.
Booking the village hall already had a big tick beside it.
Next her pencil hovered over the list of food wished for, acquired and promised.
Tins of salmon and ham were already sitting in the larder. A pound or two of Cheddar cheese had been promised by Mrs Martin whose brother had a dairy farm between Cheddar and Yeovil in Somerset.
Ruby had made sure they had enough dried fruit and sugar for the cake. Miriam Powell had donated a packet of icing sugar.
‘It’s the last one.’ She’d told Mary this proudly before whispering that they also had some tinned pineapple arriving shortly.
‘At least bread won’t be a problem,’ Mary murmured to herself.
She was just ticking off the last items on her list when a blur of blue passed the kitchen window accompanied by a lot of childish tittering and laughter. Then came Frances’s bragging. ‘This is the dress I’m going to be wearing when I’m a bridesmaid. Isn’t it pretty?’
Mary let both her list and the pencil fall, dashing outside to rescue the bridesmaid’s dress. ‘Frances!’
Half a dozen surprised faces turned to face her. Frances, the little minx, was wearing her blue bridesmaid’s dress, showing it off to her friends.
‘Frances! Who said you could try that dress on?’
Frances looked totally shocked. She’d thought everyone was in the shop. ‘I just thought—’ she began.
‘Do you realise how much effort Ruby put into that dress? It is not for wearing in the garden. Now get into that house and take it off this minute!’
Getting this angry was alien to Mary, but during the past couple of weeks it seemed as though Ruby’s feet had been welded to the cast-iron plate of the treadle sewing machine and she didn’t want her sister’s efforts to be ruined.
‘I was very careful. And it hasn’t even been ironed yet,’ Frances protested. She was standing with her arms outstretched, her hands clutching the fine material to either side of her.
‘You heard what I said. Get indoors and take it off now!’ Mary pointed a finger at the back door. It wasn’t like her to lose her temper, but everyone had been working and saving so hard to make this wedding special. Frances could be so thoughtless at times.
Defiant to the last, Frances gave one more twirl, the fragile skirt wafting out from her legs, the hem catching on the rose bush.
Frances gasped. ‘Whoops!’
Seeing what she’d done, the village kids hot-footed it out of the back gate, one or two pausing to make faces at the woman who’d spoiled their fun.
‘You’ll get “whoops” indeed!’ Mary scolded as she crouched down to untangle the hem from the rose bush. ‘Stay still.’
Frances covered her mouth, her eyes round above her hand. She’d been enjoying showing off in front of her village friends. She’d also enjoyed regaling them with tales of her stay in the Forest of Dean, embroidering some of the details in order to make them sound even more impressive.
‘I was telling them about the Italian and thought I’d dance too,’ Frances explained to her cousin.
Actually she’d embroidered the truth to the extent
that the hungry man she’d met in the forest had been an Italian spy – which was only half a truth. He had been Italian, but she’d no idea whether he was a spy or not.
Mary slapped her arm. ‘Stop telling stories and keep still!’
Her fingers seemed turned to thumbs and even toes as she attempted to disconnect the hem of the dress from the thorny stem.
Frances wasn’t good at keeping still and even though Mary was careful, the material was old and thus rather delicate. There was a sudden ripping sound.
‘Oh no!’
Mary eyed the tear, which was about four inches in length.
‘Now look what you’ve done!’
Frances pouted. ‘I just wanted to show them how pretty it was. I like blue. They like blue too – except for Christine. She likes pink.’
The moment Frances was out of the dress Mary shouted for Ruby. There was no response.
After putting her old clothes back on, Frances slumped at the kitchen table holding her head in her hands. She might have deserved the telling off, but that wasn’t quite the way she saw it.
‘I didn’t mean to tear it. I didn’t do it on purpose.’ She wished her cousins would stop treating her like a child. She was beginning to get curves and bumps in the same places that they had them. At least Ruby had noticed and given her a cast-off brassiere. It was a little big yet, but Ruby had assured her she’d grow into it and Frances was pleased at the prospect.
‘I can’t wait for them to grow,’ she’d said to Ruby. ‘I want big ones. Do you think I might have big ones?’
Ruby had laughed and told her that anything was possible. Mary, Frances decided, was just being mean. Perhaps she didn’t really want her to be a bridesmaid.
Mary ignored the hangdog expression and puppy-dog eyes. As far as she was concerned, Frances was still a child, though not a very obedient one.
‘The fact is you put the dress on without telling anyone, then went outside wearing it. It’s a bridesmaid’s dress, Frances. You’re supposed to wear it when you follow me up the aisle. You do not wear it out in the garden to show your friends! And that’s it. And before you ask me again, no, you cannot go off with those children today. You are not going out to play!’