She spat out a soggy piece of wood. ‘They would be if we could reach them.’ When Charlie said he could reach them, the chewed end of the pencil was levelled at him. ‘You dare!’
He adopted nonchalance. ‘All right, suit yourself. If you don’t want them…’
The girls swapped disbelieving expressions. ‘You mean you’d get them for us?’
‘Well, what time do I have to start a collection with you lot to look after? Come on, while it’s still light.’
No sooner had the offer been made than Charlie was being dragged across Knavesmire. Fifteen minutes later they stood looking up at the tree. Charlie squinted. ‘Can’t see it.’
‘You see that branch that’s shaped like a letter F?’ said Beany.
‘Oh, I see it now!’ Charlie rolled his sleeves up and hauled himself onto the first large branch, dragging his body higher and higher up the tree.
‘It’s like the Indian rope trick,’ giggled Beany as Charlie vanished among the branches. There was a golden edge forming around each leaf. Some fluttered down as he rustled his way through them. Twenty feet up, encased in a welter of twigs, Charlie searched for another foothold, found one and strode onto a large branch where he paused to look for the nest. Just a bit further.
How bloody stupid, was his thought as he reached the nest and inserted his fingers to clutch at emptiness. How stupid to take their word that there’d be eggs in at this time of year. He shouted down, ‘It’s empty!’ and muttered to himself, ‘Closet-brains.’
Wails of disappointment filtered up through the leaves. ‘Are you certain?’
‘Come up and check if you like!’ the acid reply descended. He started to come down. ‘Wasting my blasted time…’
Unfortunately, he came down a little faster than he had planned. The breath was knocked out of him with a noisy grunt as his body hit the ground. Before he blacked out he felt an excruciating pain in his arm…
* * *
‘You can consider yourself very lucky!’ Rachel glared down at the pathetic figure in the hospital bed, with his bandaged head and arm, his face grazed and cut by the branches. ‘If Robina or her sister had been standing directly beneath you I dread to think what would have happened. What sort of trick was that to be teaching them? Stupid boy!’
‘I’m so—’ At her intensified glare he bit off the word. ‘They wanted to start an egg collection like… Mr Hazelwood.’ He used the title ‘Father’ sparingly now, knowing how it irritated from his lips. ‘They told me about this nest…’
‘Oh, so it’s their fault, is it?’ she replied loudly, then compressed her mouth as the other patients in the ward and their visitors all turned to look at her. If Charlie’s action had served any purpose it was to bring her out of her trance – even if it were just to pour more anger upon him.
‘No, of course it isn’t. It was no one’s fault. I just slipped.’
‘But what an idiotic thing to attempt the same day as you had your plaster off!’ Then Rachel remembered with a twinge that she had been responsible for the plaster in the first instance and said huffily, ‘Anyway, there are dozens of eggs cluttering the attic that they could have had…’
‘Would you like to sit down?’ With stiff movement, Charlie indicated a hard chair. Apart from breaking his arm again he had dislocated his shoulder and it was doubly painful. Apparently, a woman who lived nearby had sent for the ambulance. Rachel must have arrived while he was having his arm set in plaster.
‘I’m not stopping that long. I only came because I knew there’d be forms to fill in… oh, very well then. But just for a second.’ She scraped the chair to the bedside. Apprehension had almost prevented her from coming here. Would the doctors be suspicious about Charlie’s repeated injuries? But no, they had just seemed to think it was the result of usual boyish behaviour.
An uncomfortable silence followed.
‘Is there anything you need apart from flannel and pyjamas?’ Her query was not made from affection, she was merely showing him the courtesy she would have shown anyone in his predicament.
But Charlie misinterpreted it. ‘That’s very kind. I wouldn’t mind something to read if I’m to be here long – do you know how long, by the way?’
She gave a negative flick of her head that wiped out any misunderstanding; she hadn’t even bothered to ask the doctor. ‘Rowena will bring your library books.’
‘Oh, they’re due back tomorrow!’ He covered his mouth. Rachel said in that case her daughter would return them. ‘I dare say she can bring you some more.’
‘Thanks… I’ll be pleased to see her. Tell her to bring her school books and I’ll go over the sums with her.’ He studied her face at length before deciding whether to go further. ‘Mrs Hazelwood… I think you ought to talk to Wena.’ She beheld him sharply. ‘About her stealing…’
Rachel looked round to see if anyone had heard this, then whispered, ‘That is none of your business!’
‘I know, it’s yours… but you don’t seem as if…’
‘How dare you…’
‘She’s so unhappy!’ He could see she wasn’t going to permit him to speak unless he blurted it out all at once. ‘It’s because you don’t talk to her, I mean really talk! She’s done ever so much since you’ve been ill…’
‘Ill, ill? What’re you talking about, ill?’
‘…and you never say thank you, even. Never bothered to ask her why she was stealing. It’s because of Bertie…’
She pushed her chair back and shot upwards. ‘You despicable wretch! Trying to lay the blame on my son…’
‘I’m not!’ He leaned forward in the bed. ‘Honestly! I’m just trying to explain why Wena was taking things, it’s because she wanted to make you talk to her – about Bertie…’
‘Shut up!’ Her face contorted with her detestation of him. Then Rachel turned her back and tore from the ward.
* * *
All the way home from the hospital, her mind seethed. How dare he? The impudence! Implying that she was responsible for her daughter’s dishonesty. Through her mind rebounded all the vile words she could think of, which only served to keep her anger at boiling point. Even the brisk march down the road to her home could not reduce it. Rowena’s innocent offer of tea on her arrival home was met by a stream of accusations.
‘Why did you see fit to tell that boy the reasons for your thievery and not your mother?’
Rowena was so knocked off balance by the outburst that all she could do was to stand with her mouth open. Her sisters, who were drinking their supper-time cocoa, looked alarmed too. ‘Well! Are you just going to stand there gaping like a fish? You accused me of not talking to you! Well, now I’m here, come on, out with it! You miserable girl, how could you do such a wicked thing?’
Rowena found her voice, though it was weak and threatened tears. ‘Mother, what have I done?’
‘You’ve laid the blame for your own wickedness on your poor dead brother!’
‘Oh, no…’ Rowena began to shake her head.
‘That black fiend told me so!’
‘But I never blamed Bertie! I only wanted to talk about him!’
‘Yes! Malicious, spiteful talk!’
‘No, I loved him!’ Rowena burst into tears.
Rachel stood like a cat about to strike, glaring at the pitiful figure for another ten seconds… then her own face crumpled and she gathered the distressed child in her arms and wept with her.
‘Oh, Mother, I didn’t mean to!’ Rowena shivered and wept as the two of them sank onto the kitchen sofa, blind to their audience. ‘I just wanted to talk about him, but…’
‘But I wasn’t here.’ Rachel clasped her, rocked her to and fro. ‘I know, I know.’ One arm still wrapped tightly around her daughter, she mopped her eyes and sniffled. ‘It’s me who should be sorry, love.’ She disengaged herself in order to clear her nose of mucus, then cuddled up again. ‘I didn’t realize what you were going through. It was selfish of me even to think that others couldn’t feel his loss too. It’s just th
at… I couldn’t talk about him. I suppose I must have thought that if I didn’t talk about it, it wasn’t true. But it is true… Robert’s dead!’
They both fell to sobbing again. Robina and Becky joined the miserable group and a long time was given to shedding tears. When it was over, Rowena said tentatively, ‘Mother… D’you think he felt any pain? I worry about it so much that I can’t get to sleep.’
Rachel felt the ice-cold water seep into her mouth, her throat, her lungs, expanding them until they burst. ‘No… I shouldn’t think so.’
There was a long period of silence. Rowena snuggled close to her mother, revelling in the show of affection. Though there had never been any lack of it before, it had been given as if to a possession, a prize dog or cat, not as one person to another. Rachel felt a difference too. She had never really seen her children as separate individuals, as people who hurt and grieved as she did, just as little bodies to be kept neat and clean and brought out to display whenever there was company. But where were those neat little bodies now? For the first time in weeks Rachel looked properly at her daughters – saw how neglected they had become.
‘Charlie’s been so good, hasn’t he? So helpful.’
Rachel stiffened. How could you? How could you voice his name in the same breath as your brother’s?
‘He’s been organizing everybody and getting them off to school, did my housework, the cooking.’ For Becky’s sake Rowena didn’t mention the wet sheets.
Resentment forced Rachel from her seat, breaking the bond between them. ‘Well, he won’t be here to do it tomorrow, will he? So it looks like I’ll have to do it.’ Her anger was experienced twofold: as if it wasn’t enough to praise him, her daughter was making out that she had been shirking her duties as a mother.
Rowena sensed that she had said something wrong and tried to make amends. ‘We’ll do it together.’
For a second there was still that detached coldness… then Rachel assumed a forgiving smile and nodded. ‘You’d all better get ready for bed now, it’s late. Come here, Rosalyn, and let me brush your hair.’
It took several minutes to do this. Rowena watched her sisters kiss their mother and make for the stairs, while she herself held back.
‘Mother?’ There were still dozens of questions to be asked. ‘Do you… d’you think you’ll ever forgive Father?’
Rachel, taken unawares, said, ‘You’re too young to understand what he did to me, Rowena.’
‘No I’m not. I know… at least I think I know he committed a sin by being Charlie’s father.’
Her mother inhaled deeply, tasting salty mucus. ‘Oh, you don’t know the half of it, love.’
‘I’ll try to understand if you tell me.’
‘I can’t.’ Rachel gripped her arms about herself. ‘I can’t even bear to think of it, let alone speak… God trust that you’ll never have first-hand experience, never know how it feels to be betrayed, see everything you’ve worked for destroyed.’ And your son killed, she thought but didn’t say it aloud.
Rowena plaited her hair. ‘What about when the war’s over? Will Father be coming back?’
Rachel examined the worried face. ‘I expect so.’
‘I’m positive he never loved Charlie’s mother as much as he loves you. I can’t bear the thought of you being unhappy.’ Emotion made her nose run. ‘Can’t you try to forgive him?’
Rachel appeared to revert to her trance. ‘Once… when I was a little girl, my mother bought me a lovely coat. I was so proud of it that I refused to keep it for best – kicked up such a fuss that Mother had to allow me to wear it for school. One day, I went to the cloakroom and found another girl trying it on. She was the dirtiest girl in the school… I never felt the same about that coat again…’
For some reason this parable conveyed much more to Rowena than any rational explanation. She never raised the subject again… though she clung to the desperate hope that one day Mother would change her mind.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Charlie was only detained in hospital for a couple of nights. An ambulance brought him home on Saturday, though Rachel was instructed to keep the boy in bed for another few days due to him having taken a nasty bump on the head. This did not suit her and she made strident objection at the thought of having to run up and down stairs with his meals. Charlie assured her there was no need to do this; he would come down.
‘Oh yes! And have everyone blame me if you fall down the stairs because you got up too quickly!’ she replied caustically as she settled him into the attic room. ‘You’ll stay where you’re put.’
‘Has there been any news from Father Guillaume while I’ve been away?’ he asked.
‘Huh! I gave up on him long ago. I suppose you want something to eat now, then?’ She left him and went downstairs.
Rowena was his first visitor, bringing with her a pile of library books. ‘I hope you haven’t read them. I didn’t know what to get.’ She placed them on his blanketed lap. ‘I did ask Mother if you could borrow some of Bertie’s books, but she wouldn’t hear of it, I’m afraid.’
This wasn’t the only thing to be refused. Rowena’s suggestion that perhaps Charlie might be more comfortable in Bertie’s room had been met by a look that bespoke treachery. However, Mother had condescended to let Charlie have Biddy’s bed in the nursery, where it was warmer. Before Rowena could tell him this, the other girls arrived, encircling his bed. Becky welcomed him home, telling him how glad she was that he hadn’t been killed.
She handed him the comic which she had bought with her pocket money. ‘I just had a little peep at it first, but I knew you wouldn’t mind.’ At his thanks she turned to her other sisters, saying tightly, ‘Beany and Lyn have got something to say to you.’
‘Sorry about your desolated arm, Charlie,’ mumbled Beany. ‘It wasn’t a trick, you know. We really did think there were eggs in that nest.’
‘We wouldn’t want you to think we sent you up on purpose so you’d fall,’ added Lyn.
This nasty thought had never occurred to him and he said as much. ‘When I get this pot off I’ll try and find a nest that does have some old eggs in – only we’ll pick one that’s a bit lower this time!’
Then Lyn pulled a grubby bundle from the pocket of her pinafore and handed it to him. Her face was to the floor, where her unlaced boots scraped the wood. ‘Sorry, it’s all clagged together,’ she muttered as he took charge of the bag of toffee. ‘But it’s been in me pocket since yesterday.’ It had been murder, knowing it was there but saving it for him. It wasn’t often they were able to afford toffee these days.
He was touched. ‘That’s all right, the paper will come off after I’ve sucked it a while. Tell you what, we’ll share it out now.’
Lyn, who had been hoping he would say this, brightened considerably and edged closer in order to have first pick. Everyone got a piece of the paper-clad toffee and, as they sat on his bed, chattering away about the Zeppelin raid that had taken place while he was in hospital, little balls of damp paper were picked from their tongues and lined up on a nearby trunk.
They stayed with him until they heard their mother’s voice summoning them to eat. At their departure, Charlie caught Rowena’s arm to remark on how well she was looking now. She smiled and perched on his bed a moment longer. ‘It’s thanks to you. Mother and me had a long chat about… oh, Bertie and everything. I feel heaps better.’
‘I’m glad.’ He gripped her hand. ‘And before you go back to school we’ll have you doing that maths standing on your head.’
The tone of her answer implied that she wasn’t looking forward to going back. But she showed gratitude for his help and on impulse kissed his face – just as her mother opened the door. Rowena felt her face redden with guilt and shot from the bed. ‘Sorry, Mother, I was just coming… see you later, Charlie!’ She rushed out.
Charlie, too overtaken with pleasure at Rowena’s loving gesture to notice Rachel’s shock, smiled his au revoir and settled back to accept the meal she had
brought.
A stony-faced Rachel came forward and put the tray on his lap. ‘My daughter had the idea that you’d be rather uncomfortable in this room so you’re to have the bed in the nursery when it’s been made up. I suppose she told you.’
‘No, she didn’t.’ He smiled. ‘But thank you. Rowena looks a lot better, doesn’t she? Thank you for that too.’
‘Why thank me?’ she asked coolly.
‘Well, you know… I realize I upset you the other day, saying you should talk to her more. But you do see that it was the right thing, don’t you?’
Rachel arched her back. ‘If I choose to speak to my daughter then I shall do so, I don’t need anyone to instruct me – least of all you!’
Charlie’s smile evaporated as she slammed the door on him.
* * *
The war rolled on. Perhaps it would be over by this Christmas, for the press reports which Rowena read out to the others were very favourable – though she did not read out every item; the lists of casualties had become alarmingly long. However heroic the deaths might be, she felt that the younger ones should be spared this as they would only worry about their father… as she was constantly doing. Privately, she always paid great study to the photographs of the dead soldiers to make certain that her father was not among them. But to the others she would read out the less personal articles: ‘Listen here! There’s three people got bubonic plague in Bristol – they say it’s the work of an enemy agent who’s been releasing infected rats.’ And no mention was made of the trains full of stretcher cases brought to York’s military hospitals.
It was as well that she did read the newspaper so closely, for in doing so she was able to prevent the fiasco that had taken place earlier in the year when her mother had forgotten to alter the clocks. This time all arrived at school at the correct hour – though Rowena secretly longed for some excuse to bring another suspension from the dreaded place. Oh, with Charlie’s help the maths was no longer a problem – he was a much better teacher than Miss Greenwood – but the whispers and pointing fingers were. People just wouldn’t let her forget, would make great play of taking their belongings with them when they left the room and more than one person had openly called her a thief. She had no friends there, but she must suffer it for her mother’s sake. Mother had enough to bear and at least Rowena had a friend at home in Charlie. She wondered if this Christmas would be any less austere than the last two, but then that was hardly to be expected. More importance was given to creating a Christmas atmosphere for the men on the Western Front. Rowena felt that this was as it should be, and she herself had been knitting a balaclava from odd bits of wool she had collected; it was very brightly coloured. Father would like it.
My Father, My Son Page 47