She rocked John and sang ‘Summertime’ to him – badly, she knew, but John seemed to enjoy it. And suddenly he had fallen asleep, as only babies can do. She placed him in the black perambulator and covered him with his soft blanket, positioning him closer to the fire, but not too close.
She knew that soon she would have to leave Lincolnshire, she would have to abscond with this baby. Aggie’s overheard warnings from the night before filled Dorothy with apprehension. It was time to take action, to stop revelling in the beauty of the moment. She would not be able to take much with her. She made a mental list. And her biggest worry: How on earth was she to get to Lincoln station unseen? Or, failing that, at least arousing no suspicion?
She needed to get the letter to her mother posted, but what should she do with John? She did not want to carry him, in case she was spotted, and pushing him in the perambulator was out of the question for the same reason. He was so very fast asleep, breathing quietly and evenly, sighing occasionally. Quickly, she put on her coat and her gumboots. She could get to the postbox and back in perhaps five minutes. She carefully locked the kitchen door behind her and ran, as best she could, through the crisp, cold air, the frozen snow slippery beneath her feet.
The ice sleeked itself across the path leading to Mrs Sinclair’s kitchen door. Mrs Compton picked her way along it, slowly, slowly. She felt unsteady on ice these days; she wasn’t getting any younger and she had a morbid fear of falling and breaking her hip. It happened to older women. Mrs Compton had cycled out to the cottage; it was only a two-mile trip, but it had taken her over an hour. Once or twice, where the roads were particularly slippery, she had pushed her bicycle. It was a relief to reach Mrs Sinclair’s cottage and leave the bicycle propped against the hedge.
She reached the kitchen door and pushed it gently, just to see. She tried the handle. Locked. That was unusual. Of course, out of politeness, Mrs Compton always knocked when she visited, but she knew that Mrs Sinclair’s door was usually unlocked – or, in the warmer months, ajar. But then Mrs Sinclair was alone all day, with no immediate neighbours. In her position Mrs Compton might have locked her door too.
She knocked again, and waited.
Was nobody home?
She had noticed that the lace curtains were missing from the window in the parlour, so she retraced her steps back round to the front. Gingerly stepping across the frozen grass, she shielded her eyes and peered through the window.
29
A photograph: a little girl in white socks and T-bar shoes, her hair in bunches, wearing with apparent pride a frilly dress whose colour must remain a mystery. A huge smile, with her two front teeth missing. Holding the hand of a woman, but a woman with no face, no head, just legs, a dark skirt, an arm and a hand, holding the little girl’s. Nothing written on the reverse.
(Found inside Hilda Boswell’s Treasury of Nursery Rhymes, very good condition, priced at £15 and placed on the children’s collectables shelf. It sold the same day.)
Philip visited me each day while I regained my strength, staying for many hours, during which he cleaned my floors, cupboards, windows and fridge freezer. I hadn’t been aware that my flat was so grubby. He fed me and encouraged me to shower and dress. On the third day, he finally left, telling me his work was done, and he said I could turn up at the bookshop whenever I felt like it, whenever I was ready. I wasn’t ready for a while. I still felt feeble. I had weight to gain, skin to bring back to life. I was determined to look like myself before I returned to my old job and faced everybody. I took my time.
But now I am ready. Sophie hugs me, Jenna hugs me and Patricia, our new recruit, shakes my hand. Philip emerges from his office, smiling. I offer to make coffee. After I’ve handed round the mugs, Philip sets me to work. Today I am to go through the hardback fiction, remove all books that have been on the shelves for a year or more, and make a bargain shelf of them, all at half price. It’s the sort of job I adore.
Book dust is a comforting smell, but it’s bad for you. And I feel precarious, a little vulnerable. If I look around too much, if I move too much, these walls, these shelves, like living entities, will they turn in on me, will they sneer and jeer, will they see me run home in tears, laughing at how clumsily and slowly I run? Are these books actually alive, whispering about me, hating me?
Get a grip, I tell myself. For God’s sake, Roberta. They’re just books, and you’re better now.
I saw Babunia yesterday. I thought it made sense to go to her before returning to work, before December really gets going. I went along with the intention of telling her about Dad, and took her flowers for the birthday I’d missed in November. She liked the flowers, but hadn’t realised it was her birthday. Was she 108 now? she asked. Or 107? I said, something like that. And she’d had another telegram from the Queen. But she didn’t think the Queen had really signed it.
‘You look peaky,’ she observed, looking at me closely. This I liked. This awareness, always so comforting.
‘I’m fine, Babunia.’
‘Have you been ill?’
‘No! Just a cold. Nothing to worry about.’
‘Even so. You must take care of yourself. You young things don’t wear enough.’
‘Look at me!’ I gave her a twirl.
She eyed my thick polo-neck jumper, cardigan, jeans and boots, and harrumphed.
Aha, defeated!
‘How’s that son of mine?’ she asked.
And I hesitated. What to say? She was so happy and sparkly and bright, like the decorations I was putting up in her room.
‘He’s fine,’ I said eventually. ‘A little busy with work.’
‘I thought he retired,’ she said, pulling a long piece of golden tinsel from the box of decorations, many of which were as old as me, if not older.
I took the tinsel from her and shook it out. ‘Oh, he did, but you know Dad. He likes to keep his eye in.’
‘I’m proud of him. My son.’
‘I know you are. I am too.’ To stop my voice from breaking, my face from crumpling and giving it all away, I wrapped the tinsel gently around her shoulders and kissed her forehead.
She laughed.
So I dust, I am happy, I am home again. And each book I examine becomes warmer in my hands, softer somehow, and I am pleased to be hidden away in this back room, with the French windows firmly shut against the gathering gloom of winter, and Sophie on the till, and Jenna and Patricia decorating the foyer with a Christmas tree and holly and ivy, and only the occasional customer finding me as I sit on the squeaky footstool cleaning books, repricing books, repositioning books.
An envelope falls out of a reprint of a 1949 edition of Elizabeth Bowen’s The Death of the Heart, a novel Philip and I both love. I recall discussing it at length during the early days of my employment here. I pick up the envelope. It looks and smells new; the ivory-coloured paper is thick and watermarked, linen, a high-quality envelope. It is sealed. I turn it over in my hands. It is addressed to ‘Roberta’. And, of course, it takes me a few seconds to digest that this letter is for me.
30
Dorothy, running back to the cottage, stopped in her tracks as she reached her front gate. She let out a small involuntary scream, at which Mrs Compton, standing at the parlour window, turned towards her.
John cried out too, short and sharp and clear as the day’s crisp air, despite the glass separating him from the two aghast women.
Dorothy stared at Mrs Compton. Mrs Compton stared at Dorothy. Neither woman spoke, nor blinked. Whose move it was, neither knew.
Oh God, no, this could not be, not now. So close now, to John. So close to her plans coming to fruition, so close to fulfilling her long-held dream, so close to the happiness she had stopped believing could ever be hers. And this woman, this awful woman, her own living nemesis, staring through the parlour window, the clear window stripped of its smoky-yellow lace early that morning, the curtains drying now on the horse in the kitchen, this odious woman staring at the huge black perambulator in which the b
aby was now awake and screaming, in innocence and without guile.
What could Dorothy do? Did she have the gumption to tell this woman what she truly wanted to tell her? But what was the use? It was too late. She could see. The woman had eyes – oh, how she had eyes – and Dorothy closed the gate behind her, marched to the kitchen door and unlocked it. She sensed Mrs Compton following her, and felt as tethered as a dog on a lead.
She slammed the kitchen door behind her and locked it.
‘Dorothy?’ called Mrs Compton, her voice only slightly muffled by the door. ‘Dorothy? Let me in. Please? I’m not going to … it’s cold out here. I’ve ridden on my bicycle to see you today. I’ve been hearing things. Worrying things. I promise I am here to help. Nothing more and nothing less.’
Dorothy ignored Mrs Compton and stumbled into the parlour. She picked John up, and he calmed quickly. She held him tight. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she cursed her own stupid forgetfulness, her carelessness. She stumbled and shuffled back to the kitchen door, slow, slow, trying to put off the inevitable confrontation. She held baby John even more tightly to her.
‘Cold!’ pronounced Mrs Compton briskly when Dorothy finally opened the door. Dorothy stood back, trembling and clinging to the slumbering baby, pulling his knitted blanket closer to him.
What was cold? Dorothy wondered. The weather? Dorothy’s reception? The house? No, not the house. Fires were glowing in all the grates.
Dorothy laid the baby, now sound asleep again, back in his perambulator, and wheeled it into the kitchen where it loomed large and black in the corner. She made tea, hastily, barely giving it time to steep, and poured a cup for each of them with hands still shaking. Mrs Compton affected not to notice, and sipped. The clock ticked. Small talk was made, more observations on the weather. Enquiries after Nina’s health. Neither mentioned the sleeping baby, his blissful sighs, his sweet-whispered rumours erupting into the room.
When John cried again, Mrs Compton rose from the table, but Dorothy jumped ahead of her and stood in front of the perambulator, barring the other woman’s way.
‘No!’ cried Dorothy.
‘But it’s crying.’
‘I’ll pick him up. You don’t touch.’
She picked John up and rocked him, soothing his cries. She took him to the kitchen window and stared out into the whiteness of the day, and again she cried, soft and low. How strange, she thought, how strange that this baby was no longer a secret. His presence was known about – by the last person Dorothy thought entitled to know about him – and John himself was so unaware of the battles ahead. He wanted comfort, and he didn’t care who knew about it or who comforted him. The awful truth: anybody would do.
Dorothy whirled round from the window to face Mrs Compton, whose face was a picture of confusion and concern.
‘Please leave,’ she said.
‘Whose is this baby?’ replied the older woman.
‘It’s a baby. Just a baby. I asked you to lea— No. I’m telling you to fuck off. I want you to fuck off out of this house and never come back. Do you understand?’ Dorothy could feel her cheeks blazing, both in shame at her language and fury at the thought of losing John.
‘There’s no such thing as just a baby, Dorothy.’
‘He’s mine,’ she blurted.
‘Yours?’
‘Yes.’
Mrs Compton looked utterly baffled. ‘But you’re not … you weren’t pregnant, were you? I saw you before Christmas. You were thinner than ever.’
‘This is my baby,’ insisted Dorothy.
‘Impossible,’ replied Mrs Compton crisply.
If they were stags – or rhinoceroses or even elephants – Dorothy thought they would have locked horns by now, they would have been grappling, fighting to the death. She was breathing hard and fast, and her heart was thumping in her chest like never before, harder even than when Albert had raped her.
Clutching John to her breast, she stroked and kissed his head, and couldn’t prevent her tears landing in his soft dark hair. ‘You are not taking this one!’ she hissed, glaring at the older woman.
‘All right, then,’ said Mrs Compton. She seemed oddly calm, almost friendly.
‘Is that all you have to say?’
‘What else can I say?’
‘Nothing, I suppose.’
‘Please tell me about this little chap. Please. It is a boy?’
‘A little boy. Yes,’ replied Dorothy, warily.
‘And how did you … come by him, Dorothy? Did you …? Oh, God forbid. You didn’t steal him?’
‘Of course not.’
‘I know how hard you took the loss of Sidney. It wouldn’t be the first time a baby was stolen by a grieving mother. And I would understand, if that is the case. Really, I would. But,’ and Dorothy noticed a new authoritarian tone in her voice, ‘this baby would need reuniting with his mother. Have you thought of how she must be feeling?’
‘Don’t presume to talk to me about my Sidney,’ snarled Dorothy.
‘All right. But I do want to talk about this baby.’
‘Have you heard of any babies missing?’
‘No. I admit, I haven’t. But that doesn’t mean—’
‘This baby is not stolen,’ said Dorothy. ‘You have my word.’
‘So whose is he?’
‘He’s mine. I told you already.’
‘We both know that cannot be. Is he a nephew, then? A friend’s baby?’ Mrs Compton’s brow was furrowed with the effort of trying to understand.
‘No.’
‘Dorothy. Please tell me.’
‘He’s Nina’s baby!’ yelled Dorothy. ‘All right? Nina gave birth to him. But she doesn’t want him. Nobody is to know. I look after him. She says I can have him, if I want him.’
‘Oh my!’
‘Indeed.’ Dorothy shushed John, who had woken at her shout and was fretting.
‘Nina’s?’ repeated Mrs Compton.
‘We didn’t know she was expecting. She claims not to have realised herself.’
‘I can scarcely believe it. When was he born?’
‘On Boxing Day. I helped deliver him, up at the North Barn.’
‘Born in a barn? Like the good Lord himself.’
‘If you like,’ she replied, wearily.
‘Well, I must say, you gave me quite a fright. I feared the worst, I really did. I’ll get on to Dr Soames. He’ll know what to do. Has Nina seen him?’
‘No, of course not!’ Dorothy was gripped by a new panic. ‘Nobody is to know. Don’t you understand?’
‘You did say. But is Nina well?’
‘I believe so. She’s still bleeding, but she has no pains. She tore a little, but she tells me it feels like it’s healing. And there’s no fever. She’s not particularly weak, just rather tired.’
‘Why don’t I have a look at her?’ Mrs Compton spoke softly, a tremor in her voice Dorothy had not heard before. ‘I’ve sewn up many a new mother. It’s too late now, really. But I could have a look and make sure all is well?’
‘And then what?’
The clock ticked and John began to mewl for milk. Dorothy waited, her heart thumping and her breath coming in shallow pants.
‘That will be between you and Nina,’ said the other woman, eventually. ‘You have your own arrangements in place, I am sure.’
Dorothy was unsure that she had heard Mrs Compton correctly, but the woman’s face was kindly and placid.
‘She wanted me to send him to the nuns,’ Dorothy told her, stroking John’s hair, gently jigging him up and down against her chest. He was becoming more agitated, the hunger of the newborn baby unbearable, edging him towards the point of no return.
‘God forbid,’ said Mrs Compton with feeling. ‘Why don’t you warm his milk? And I’ll look at him properly. He looks well, I must say, but you never know. Is he drinking goat’s milk by any chance?’
Mrs Compton pronounced the baby to be bonny and in no danger.
The goat’s milk was agreeing with h
im, she could see, and yes, the more she thought about it, the more sense it made to keep all of this quiet. Nina, God bless her, was not the cleverest of girls, not even knowing she was expecting, and she didn’t even want the little chap. She was not maternal enough. Some girls weren’t. How old was she? Nineteen? Well, quite young still. And fond as she was of the good times … and Dorothy, you are, well, you are mature, and capable, and you have had such rotten luck … and any fool can see you love him already, with that love only true mothers have, love for a newborn. The ancient desire to protect. Nina could not be relied upon to have the sense … she might, in time, find a husband willing to accept her illegitimate child, settle down to motherhood, do all right by her son. But the little darling needs that now, as well as in ten years’ time. And Dorothy, you are such an excellent mother. You deserve this stroke of luck, this gift, whatever you want to call it. Just let me know how I can help. I can help.
And the morning gave way to afternoon, and the afternoon wore on, and the fires glowed in the grates and more tea was made; sandwiches were cut. The baby was cuddled, and fed again, and changed. And at three o’clock, Mrs Compton left, to return to the village on her bicycle through the sullen January twilight.
A pact had been made, secrecy assured, an unlikely alliance formed.
Days passed, in which nothing much happened. Each day seemed to remove Nina further from her child, and pull Dorothy closer to him. It was cold, day and night. The winter would last forever, Dorothy felt.
Each day she waited for a letter. They were anxious, long days.
Eventually, the postman came, and a small letter fluttered on to the doormat in the kitchen.
8th January 1941
Dear Dorothy,
I received your letter with surprise and delight. Dearest, of course you and your baby must come home, regardless of all that has passed between us. I find that this war has softened me rather. ‘Life is short’ is a much-used adage but, nevertheless, it is true. I am alone often these days and I must confess the idea of company, and a grandchild, is appealing. I shall expect you in your own time.
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