A Gathering Storm

by Rachel Hore

  Three weeks after Angelina’s wedding, Beatrice found what she’d been looking for. She overheard a fellow FANY driver complaining that her lodger was leaving.

  ‘I need somewhere,’ Beatrice told her. The other woman, Dinah, who had a way of looking down her nose that made Beatrice feel uncomfortable, studied her with surprise as though she hadn’t really noticed her before, then seemed to come to a conclusion.

  ‘Good show. It’s not much of a room, I’m afraid, but the last girl didn’t seem to mind. You can come and see the flat for yourself.’

  The bedroom was indeed ‘not much’, being a long narrow room right next to the bathroom. This meant that the noises of the whole house’s plumbing system often woke her early, but Beatrice came to find the clanking of pipes and rushing of water comforting, and she liked the view from the window onto other people’s back gardens; a busy mosaic of vegetable beds and airraid shelters criss-crossed with fencing. The flat took up half the first floor of a converted Victorian house in Primrose Hill, and looked out towards Regent’s Park. On a still night, strange bird cries and the roars of big cats could be heard, which gave Beatrice the delicious fancy of being somewhere more exotic than exhausted old London. The drawing room and kitchen were light and airy, even in the summer heat, and a flat roof at the back, accessible by the nimble from the kitchen window, was, Dinah assured her, just the place for sunbathing, though Beatrice didn’t think she would be crawling out there any time soon. Next door, a fox terrier, who made Bea think of dear old Jinx, barked rhythmically at the sky for an hour each evening after the air-raid warning, doing its bit to ward off the bombers. One of the best things about the flat was that Dinah was only there half the time. Another FANY driver was quick to inform Beatrice that Dinah was having an affair with a senior officer, who lived in Knightsbridge while his wife, in blissful ignorance probably, kept the home fires burning in Suffolk. Beatrice found the burden of this knowledge uncomfortable and never discussed it with Dinah. At the same time, she was aware that her own predicament meant she was hardly in a position to judge others. She liked Dinah all right. Five or six years older than Bea, tall and blonde, she was straightforward and, despite her cool manner, at heart unsnobbish and often kind. Although the two women had little in common, it worked for them to share digs together because each was fairly considerate of the other whilst not taking an unhealthy interest in what was plainly private business. That said, Beatrice took the precaution of telling Dinah about the baby immediately. After all, she would notice very quickly anyway. All Dinah said in her understated way, was, ‘Poor you. Well, at least you get better rations.’

  One morning, when she’d been in her new home for five or six weeks, Beatrice was shocked to catch sight of herself in the long hall mirror as she was getting ready to go out. Five months pregnant and it was as though her belly had grown overnight. She’d already had to let out the waistband of her skirt, but now the hem rode up in front and the buttons of her jacket looked fit to burst. In short, her condition was starting to become obvious. Arrangements of some sort would have to be made.

  Still she hesitated to say anything to her Commanding Officer, fearing her reaction. In the end it was Sandra Williams herself who called Beatrice into the tiny windowless back room that she called her office, and asked if she was all right.

  ‘Yes,’ she said automatically. ‘Why?’

  Williams bit her lip and frowned. She was a plain but hearty woman, whose forehead shouldn’t be so furrowed in her early thirties. The girls were responsive to her down-to-earth manner and caring disposition. Beatrice had long ago gauged that coming to work was a welcome relief from living with an ailing widowed mother in Surrey.

  ‘Well, you don’t look your usual self.’ Sandra waited and, struck to the heart by her kind look, Beatrice promptly burst into tears.

  When she recovered sufficiently to speak, she explained everything. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ she finished up. ‘I haven’t heard from my fiancé at all. He’d have written if he’d got my letters, I’m sure he would.’

  ‘What about your parents, can they help?’

  ‘I haven’t told them about the baby yet. They still haven’t even met Guy. I daren’t break it to them, they’d be so upset.’

  ‘I expect they’d help you, though. You ought to try.’

  After that, things moved quickly. Williams, being her Commanding Officer and hence in charge of her welfare, promised to get Beatrice put onto lighter duties – office work, most probably. After all, you won’t be able to fit behind a driving wheel soon!’

  Beatrice wrote to her mother and was touched by the response she received a few days later.

  I cannot hide the fact that your news has come as a terrible shock to us, particularly your poor father, though we are doing our best to remember that situations are different in war-time and that in normal circumstances you would be happily married to your Guy Hurlingham. I pray with all my heart for his safe return. In the meantime we will help you all we can in this difficulty, though I think that it will be very hard for your father to have a young baby in the house. These days he does require absolute quiet for his writing and is easily upset. We will, of course, inform our neighbours that you are married. I think it would be the best thing as there are some who have small minds. We have very little spare money, but I enclose a cheque from your father to help you buy a few things for the baby. Please write and tell us when you plan to come.

  She was moved by her mother’s kindness, but also by her honesty. It would be a terrible pressure on her parents if she went home with a baby, even one born safely in wedlock. She remembered the episode with the evacuee and how it had poisoned the atmosphere of the household for weeks. And yet how could she do anything except go home, given that she had no money? She pinched open the cheque her mother had sent and her eyes widened. From what she knew about her parents’ finances it was a generous amount. She dreaded to think what they would have to do without. Still, it was only a tiny proportion of what she had calculated she would require in the months she wasn’t earning.

  Her next decision was one she’d put off making for a long time: to write to Guy’s parents. In the end, she decided it would be most tactful to write two letters, the first asking if they’d had any information about his whereabouts.

  The reply to this, from his mother, was friendly enough, if cautious. Guy had mentioned Beatrice to them, but Mrs Hurlingham didn’t seem to know that they’d become engaged. Beatrice tried to see it from their point of view. After all, they’d never met her and who knows what kind of person might have taken up with their son and what stories Beatrice might be spinning? However, they’d heard nothing from Guy or about him for as long as she had and, like her, were desperately anxious. They hoped that she was well and looked forward to meeting her one day with Guy when he was safely home.

  Beatrice caught his mother’s uncertainty, and she wrestled with herself long and hard before writing the letter she knew she had to write, that Guy would want her to write. It was knowing that he’d be upset if she didn’t ask them that in the end made her overcome her scruples.

  I find that I’m having his baby. It’s due in November. I felt you ought to know.

  There, she’d written the words. She sealed the envelope and stamped it, but didn’t have the courage to send it. She wasn’t quite desperate yet. She’d write to Guy one more time, in case her other letters had gone astray.

  A few days after this, she was loitering in the sunshine outside an office in Whitehall, waiting to see if Michael Wincanton or anyone else needed driving, when one of his aides emerged. He was in the company of a man she’d seen once before, the middle-aged Colonel of compact build to whom Michael had spoken about Peter. The Colonel’s voice, when he greeted her, had that lovely Scottish burr, and she liked the straightforward way he looked at her.

  ‘I want you to get me to Baker Street by twelve,’ he said, as she opened the door for him to get in.

  When they turned off t
he Marylebone Road into Baker Street he directed her to an unmarked building of no obvious significance, where he got out, with a nod of thanks.

  She was about to get back into the car when a man’s voice said, ‘Beatrice!’ and she turned in surprise to see a dark thin man in khaki smiling at her. It was Peter Wincanton.

  She hadn’t set eyes on him for a year and a half, for he hadn’t been able to make Angie’s wedding, and she was struck immediately by the change in him. He looked much older, though he must still be only twenty-one. It was the uniform, partly, but something else too. His bearing was more confident, and although he still wore his habitual expression of watchfulness, his eyes met hers as he shook hands, instead of sliding away.

  ‘What are you doing up this way?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, a meeting,’ he replied vaguely, and she knew not to ask any more. ‘What about you? Still driving my father about? I hardly see the old man these days. Or any of my family, in fact.’ His expression hardened. ‘How’s my sister, do you know? I was sorry I couldn’t attend her nuptials, but I simply couldn’t get away.’

  ‘I think Angie’s enjoying life, though not seeing Gerald much, of course.’

  ‘Still, she has better luck than some. I say, if you’re going back into Town is there any chance of a lift? I’ve an hour or two to fill and there’s a concert at the National Gallery. Do you ever get to them?’

  ‘No, but I’ve heard they’re wonderful. Can one just turn up?’

  She was free herself, as it happened, so she dropped the car off as pre-arranged with another driver and went with him. She knew little about music, but the great waves of Beethoven piano chords vibrated through her thrillingly. Beside her, Peter sat rapt and still. She followed his example, closing her eyes, allowing her spirit to soar.

  Afterwards he took her to a Lyons Corner House café, where he bought them tea and lumpen scones and told her he’d been bombed out of his friend’s place and was living in officer’s quarters in North London and hating it.

  ‘I keep to myself most of the time. I’m on the look-out for somewhere. Met a chap in Albany who might have a room coming up. How about you?’

  She explained about Dinah’s flat and then, warily, about her engagement to Guy, looking to see how he’d react. She’d never been sure what Peter thought about her. There was a link between them, some recognition of each other’s loneliness, perhaps, but she couldn’t be sure of the nature of it, indeed found it difficult to relax in his company. He could be called attractive, no doubt about it, with that glossy, near-black hair, the shadow of beard beneath the pale skin. In fact, she realized with a shock, he reminded her of Guy – but there was something about the air of unhappiness and anxiety he wore that warned her away.

  ‘I heard there was someone,’ was his reply. She thought there was a new tautness about his mouth but he said, ‘Congratulations,’ easily enough, and asked her about Guy, his regiment, the part of the country he came from, and nodded at her answers.

  ‘Bit of a bitch, my sister Angie,’ he said, and she stiffened. ‘Your poor friend Ashton. I warned you what she was like. No news of him, I don’t suppose?’

  ‘No,’ she said, angry now. All this time, she had persuaded herself that no one but Angie had known about her hopes of Rafe, had thought she’d buried them deep and stifled them, and here was Peter, stripping away the winding sheet to reveal her secret with a ghastly casualness. She looked away. ‘No one’s heard anything of him for over a year now. Even if he’s still alive.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you,’ Peter said quietly. ‘But this chap Guy – I hope he’s everything you want.’ He eyed her thoughtfully, but if he recognized her condition, he didn’t say anything about it.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘He is.’ Peter had always had that knack of making her feel awkward, unhappy, as though he saw right through her. She didn’t want to know what he saw. She pulled on her gloves and forced herself to put out her hand to shake his. After all, she thought he meant to be kind. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘The concert was most enjoyable.’

  ‘Perhaps you’ll come again sometime,’ he said, a bit desperately, seeing he’d hurt her, and she left him turning an unlit cigarette in his fingers, all the misery of the world in his face.

  Outside in Trafalgar Square, clouds raced across the sky and a cold wind blew. An old man with a crooked back swept the pavement with slow, awkward movements, the wind whipping up eddies of dust, so her eyes began to smart. No one showed any surprise these days at a woman weeping in the street.

  ‘Cheer up, love,’ said a skinny old woman in a ragged black dress and headscarf, who was sitting on the steps feeding the pigeons. ‘There’s them with troubles worse than ours.’

  A few days after this, the very end of July, she woke feeling sluggish, but forced herself to get up. She felt better after she’d breakfasted on dry toast and went to work as usual. This was to be her last week of driving and she could hardly wait to be shot of it. Lately, she hadn’t seen Michael much anyway, and when she told him she’d been seconded for desk work and would welcome the change, he looked surprised, but thanked her warmly enough and told her to be sure to call in to see them whenever she could. Oenone would love to see her, he said. Beatrice honestly didn’t think he guessed a thing about her condition. Someone would tell him soon enough, she imagined. He was a man who got to know things.

  When she arrived home that evening, tired and with an aching back, there was a packet waiting in the hallway, addressed to her in unfamiliar handwriting. She opened it in the kitchen and was horrified to see half a dozen envelopes slide out onto the counter. They were all letters she’d addressed to Guy, returned unopened. She stood looking at them, the truth gradually changing her. Even before she picked up the folded sheet of Army-issue writing paper she knew that Guy was dead.

  He’d been lost in the withdrawal from Crete ten weeks before, but for some reason only recently had this fact been established. This Lieutenant-Colonel Burton, who wrote, had been alerted to the fact that Guy had a fiancée and now returned all the letters that had never reached him. She turned them over and saw that they were all there, all unopened, her return address written neatly on each one. So Guy had never learned that he would have a child, never had the joy of that knowledge, and, very pertinently, had never had the chance to put in place any arrangements for support of mother and child. Worst of all, she had to face the terrible fact that Guy was never coming home.

  For several days she was struck down by grief, hardly able to leave the flat. It was Dinah who helped her, making sure that she ate, telling her she must go on because of the baby.

  As soon as she felt able, she wrote to her parents with the awful news. There would be no marriage. The baby would have no legitimate father. She tore up the letter she’d originally written to Guy’s mother and wrote a new one to say that she’d heard the news and how devastated she was. Still, she lacked the courage to mention the baby. After weeks went by without there being a reply, she gave it up as a bad job. She’d write again after the birth, offer to bring the baby to see them if they wanted. She wasn’t sure what she feared: cold rejection by them, shock, the assumption that she was trying to get money out of them. Perhaps she wasn’t being fair. If Mrs Hurlingham had been warmer, more welcoming, it might have been different. Or if she herself had been less proud . . .

  In August, nearly six months pregnant, Beatrice had been found a place at the FANY HQ in Knightsbridge, answering the telephone and dealing with general administration. She felt much relieved. One Tuesday soon after she’d started, she left work early to shop for food, and was looking forward to a quiet evening in. She felt so tired these days, tired and uncomfortable and worn down by grief.

  ‘Still no butter,’ she said, arriving home and dumping her shopping bag on the table.

  ‘I’ll make tea. You look done in.’ Dinah, in housecoat and slippers, her face glistening with homemade face cream, was scraping baked beans from a saucepan onto
a plate arranged with four plain triangles of greyish bread. Her look of disgust at her supper was comical. ‘No cheese either, I don’t suppose. What did they have?’

  A few carrots and potatoes, none of them up to much.’ Beatrice started pulling items out of the bag with a magician’s flourish. The last two eggs in the shop, a tin of herring roe, milk powder, of course, and, voilà, some brawn! That’s your lot until Thursday, madam.’

  ‘You’re welcome to the brawn.’ Dinah poured boiling water onto dried-out old tea leaves in the pot, laid out two cups and saucers and sat down before her meagre supper. ‘I’m out for dinner tomorrow anyway. I say, do you mind if I get on and eat or I’ll be late for the theatre? I’ll bag my egg, though, if there’s time.’

  ‘I’ll cook them when I’ve got my breath back.’

  ‘Mmm,’ Dinah said, swallowing a mouthful. ‘Oh, by the way – someone was waiting for you outside when I got home. A young chap, fair hair, rather a dish. I told him you were out and he said he’d call again.’

  ‘Oh? Who was it?’ Beatrice said, an irrational part of her hoping it might be Guy.

  Dinah shrugged. ‘He wouldn’t give his name. Said he wanted it to be a surprise.’

  Later, Dinah shouted goodbye, slamming the door as was her habit, leaving behind a cloud of Lily-of-the-Valley. Beatrice washed some clothes and was sewing a button on a jacket when she heard the doorbell buzz downstairs. She pushed herself up from the settee, but on hearing the well-bred tones of Mrs Elphinstone, the widow who lived beneath, drifting up from the hallway, she sat down again. A moment later came a soft knock on the door of the apartment.

  At first, when she opened it, she thought there was nobody there, then a man separated himself from the shadows. As the light from the doorway fell on his face and she recognized him, she could only stare in shock.

  ‘Bea,’ he said, his voice low and urgent.

  She cried out, ‘No!’ then, ‘Rafe? Rafe?’ She gave a laugh, light, hysterical.