The shack was empty and it took no time at all for Bette to explore it. It comprised one single room with a table and a few stools down the centre and a large cupboard against the end wall. The floors were rough wood planks with the ground beneath visible between the cracks. The windows too were cracked, cardboard blocking the worst holes, presumably to stop winter winds from whistling through. The only sop to comfort were a couple of battered rocking chairs set before a wood burning stove, and at the top of a ladder which led up into the loft, she found a mattress. No sign of a bed, but at least the pillows, sheets and blankets looked clean. But then Peggy would have seen to that.
The rest of the cabin too had been cleaned and swept by someone, a pegged rug on the floor and a bible picture on one wall, though with precious little else to cheer it’s starkness.
She discovered that the kitchen was a tiny outhouse built at the back of the cabin, in typically southern style. It looked as if a breath of wind might blow it down and contained nothing more than a sink and a rusty old wood-fired cooker which looked at least fifty years old.
There appeared to be no running water or bathroom in the place, and further exploration revealed a well and a bucket behind the cabin in what the Jacksons would call the yard, but was actually a stretch of garden leading onto woodland.
Still carrying the baby in her arms, not yet having found the courage to put him down anywhere, Bette brought in her things, bit by bit. Then she changed Matthew and lay him down in his crib before sinking thankfully onto a stool, giving the cradle a little push with her toe to make it rock.
Jake had made it for her, for which she was immensely grateful. It was beautifully if plainly carved, though he’d promised to inscribe the baby’s name on the foot, once she’d chosen one. Now, he probably wouldn’t be allowed to do even that.
Bette was resolutely keeping her mind away from the fact that Chad was not here. It didn’t bode well for their future together, but she would think about the implications of that later. When her husband returned from wherever he was, he would certainly need feeding.
When she felt rested and had caught her breath a little, Bette examined the contents of the cupboard which was, quite literally, bare, save for a few bits of crockery and a couple of pans. In the out-kitchen there wasn’t any sign of food either, not even any washing up left in the sink which surprised her. Bette hadn’t realised that Chad could be so tidy.
At least Peggy had packed some food for her, which would do for now. Once Chad got back, he could drive them to the store.
First, she fetched water and gave the shelves a thorough wipe down, just to be on the safe side, then spread out some clean newspapers she’d found stacked in a corner.
They were a few months old, one having a report of the coming invasion. Bogus army and false landings invented by Allied chiefs to confuse the Germans, shouted the headline. Bette sank to her knees, reduced to tears by the rush of memories.
She thought of Fowey and all the excitement of the GIs arriving, the fun of the dances and going to the flicks, the thrill of all that flattering attention, the whispers and secrets surrounding the planned invasion. She thought of Sara and her young niece and nephew, of Cory and Sadie, the explosion of fish that had led to her meeting Chad, and last but not least, of Barney.
Never in her wildest dreams and hopes of coming to America, had she imagined that she would end up living in a wooden shack that Cory wouldn’t even consider good enough to house his boat.
Matthew gave a little hiccup and Bette ran to the crib to check that he was all right. His bright eyes seemed to smile up at her, and she put down her finger for him to grasp with a fierce grip. He was so wonderful. How she adored him.
This was no time for self-pity and nostalgia, things were as they were and she must make the best of it. Like it or not, she somehow had to cope because now she had a child to consider. She must eat properly to make sure she kept producing milk so that he would thrive. She must get the old cooker going, come what may, and cook supper for her husband.
And at least she would no longer have to sit and eat with the Jacksons. She would make a good place for them here, a place of their own as she had dreamed of having.
Bette turned to the boxes, surprised by Peggy’s generosity, and began to unpack them, setting the dry goods in the cupboard, the vegetables in a rack under the sink in the out kitchen, but where to put the fresh food was a problem. There was no big refrigerator here, such as Peggy owned up at the farm. In the end, once she’d filled the large wooden water barrel that stood in the corner of the yard by the back door, she put the cheese, eggs and milk in the water bucket and hung it in the well. There didn’t seem to be any alternative.
Now there was the matter of supper to be addressed. After an hour battling with the rusty old cooker in the out kitchen, she abandoned it in favour of the wood-burning stove in the cabin itself. Even that took a while to get going but finally, after several failed attempts and a fit of coughing when the room filled up with smoke, she got it burning nicely.
Bette opened a tin of soup, adding a few potatoes, peas and other vegetables to make it more substantial, thinking that would surely do for their first night, then set it on top of the stove to warm through. She’d do better tomorrow, when she was less tired, assuming she was still here and Chad hadn’t moved them to a better place.
The first opportunity she got, Bette intended to ask around for a decent house which might be to let, and a job so that she could earn some money. She certainly had no intention of spending her life in this old shack. She felt as if she’d stepped back in time to the last century when the pioneers were settling.
Content that she’d done everything possible to make the cabin feel homely and welcoming and feeling not a little proud of her efforts, with even Matthew fed and changed and put down for the night and the vegetable soup warming nicely, Bette turned her attention to her own appearance.
She washed herself all over so that she was fresh and clean, smelling of soap at least, and not of dust and cobwebs; then combed her hair, letting it fall loose about her shoulders as Chad liked it, and applied a dazzling pink lipstick. All right, it was too soon after the birth of the baby for anything physical between them, but she could at least look pretty for him. If she looked good, he might find it easier to forgive her.
When she was ready, she sat in the rocking chair and waited for her husband to come home.
The wind had risen, making her jump as doors rattled and shutters banged, and there were strange whistles and bumps. The black bear roamed these forests and Bette certainly had no wish for one to come calling. It wasn’t until well after midnight that it dawned upon her that Chad wasn’t coming at all, and it was then that the awful truth hit home. The Jackson family had packed her off to this shack with all her belongings and a few boxes of food, and washed their hands of her.
He didn’t come the next day either, or the one after that. Bette had stepped out into a magnificent arena of colour, although the glory of the trees was not the most important factor on her mind right now.
She’d done a lot of hard thinking as she lay alone on the lumpy mattress, snuggled beneath the blankets in an effort to keep warm, and had worked it all out. She couldn’t simply catch a bus out of here, or even pick up her bags and walk to the farm. They’d driven miles to reach the cabin, and there was no hope of her finding her way back.
Neither could she stay here all alone with a new-born baby. Matthew might need medical attention, so might she for that matter. She was still bleeding badly and there was a constant, dragging ache in her groin. In addition, she felt bone-weary and kept bursting into tears all the time.
Each day she would walk a little further along the lane, just to make sure that there wasn’t a house around the next bend, or the one after that. She’d look rather foolish if she imagined herself stuck here, alone and abandoned, when all the time she had neighbours.
She’d strap a length of cotton cloth around her back like a sling
to hold the baby, papoose fashion, and having satisfied herself that Matthew was safe, contentedly cradled against her breast, she would set off along the road.
Bette refused to believe that Chad would totally desert her. He would come for her eventually, she was sure of it.
She would gaze hopefully along the road, narrowing her eyes against the early morning sun as she willed the pick-up to appear in a whirl of dust and Chad to come for her. But no matter how far she walked, she found no sign of either a dwelling or the truck.
The track twisted and turned round boulders and fallen trees, the view stunning: distant mountains glazed with purple and blue shadows, jagged peaks and the occasional glimpse of a waterfall. And mile upon mile of trees.
Bette had learned some of their names in the months she’d spent in North Carolina, and she amused herself by describing the ones she recognised to her child.
‘See, Matthew, that bright yellow is hickory, oh and just look at the vivid orange of the sassafras tree, the deep red of the dogwoods. And there’s a kestrel, probably with an eye on its breakfast.’
Huckleberries grew in profusion on the banks above the track, prettily bordered with golden rod and late aster. Yet the dirt road itself presumably stretched for miles all along the ridge, to the farm in one direction, and to town in the other.
But how many miles, that was the question?
Too many for her to walk, even without a baby. She knew that the Blue Ridge mountains traversed ridge upon ridge for five hundred miles from Georgia in the south through to Virginia in the north, and Bette didn’t care to think how far of that length she would need to walk before she even found another living creature.
For all it was late October, the day was warm, the sun high in the sky and she couldn’t even be sure how long she’d been walking. Matthew was starting to grizzle, she was exhausted and Bette knew she had no alternative but to turn around, yet again, and go back to the cabin.
Chapter Forty-One
Sara was beginning to seriously consider nursing as a career. Although she wasn’t allowed to change dressings, give injections or anything of that nature, she was finding great satisfaction in helping the nurses with the more basic chores. She didn’t mind washing bedpans or changing beds, had even helped to give blanket baths when the nurses were overstretched, as they certainly were these days.
Now she was beginning to wonder if she was capable of coping with exams and training, once the war was won. Hugh had always drummed into her how stupid she was. But then he’d said and done a great many things that weren’t right, had used her badly, as if it had been in his interest to keep her down. Sara had decided he was wrong. She was beginning to think herself capable of anything, and the prospect of becoming a nurse excited her.
Sister had promised to get details for her, and the necessary papers for her to fill in and apply. She’d quite made up her mind that it would be something really worthwhile to do.
There was a U.S. Hospital Training School in Fowey, but that was for military personnel, simulating battle conditions. She would need to go off to Truro or Plymouth every day to do her training, which would require Hugh’s support. He’d have to get Iris back in the bar, or some other girl to take her place. And what about the children? Arrangements would need to be made for Sadie, or even Hugh himself, to pick them up after school and take care of them until she got home.
Was that possible? Would he agree to do that? Or was she only laying herself open to fresh disappointment by even considering the idea?
‘How I wish you were here, Bette, then I could talk this through with you. But I am at least taking heed of your advice to think for myself.’
They brought in more wounded that afternoon. Each LST had gone out to France carrying eighteen tanks or a couple of dozen vehicles, plus troops. They were returning with hundreds of wounded, an endless stream, day after day.
How the surgeons kept up the number of operations, removing shrapnel, amputating damaged and diseased limbs, dealing with burns, was quite beyond her.
Some operations were actually carried out on board, with others postponed until the patient reached specialist care at Plymouth or Truro. But scores remained to be treated here in Fowey, and Sara was filled with admiration for the medical staff’s stamina and skills.
As she wheeled the tea trolley and newspapers around to those boys who were slowly recovering from their ordeal, she took the time to offer a few comforting words to those still facing theirs. She stopped at each bed in turn to ask their name, how they were feeling, if there was anyone she could contact for them.
‘Would you like tea and biscuits, or can I post any mail for you? Write a letter to your mum perhaps?’ she would say.
A young nurse came over and gently tapped her shoulder. ‘Sara, there’s a young man over there who says he has a letter for you.’
‘Oh, God!’ Sara felt as if the blood had drained from every limb, leaving her limp and useless. Charlie. She knew at once that it must be about Charlie.
The nurse sounded brisk and businesslike, but her eyes were filled with compassion. ‘I hope it isn’t bad news.’
Sara couldn’t speak, could make no reply to this. She half ran over to the young patient, little older than herself, yet who knew what horrors he’d encountered out there to make him old before his time. He was in a bad way, his stomach half ripped open from the shelling, a scattering of shrapnel punctures in a young face racked with pain, yet his expression brightened when he saw her.
‘You have a letter for me?’
‘You’re Sara Marrack?’
Sara had to bend down to hear what he had to say, his voice little more than a hoarse whisper. ‘It’s in my bag, in the locker. I was told to put it into your hands only. Nobody else’s.’
‘Who told you this? Who is the letter from?’ She was searching the locker even as she spoke, then she had it in her hands and relief flooded through her, making her gasp. The handwriting was his, she would have known it anywhere. ‘He’s alive?’
The young sailor was grinning now, even though it made him wince to stretch the muscles of his face. ‘He was the last time he shouted at me for not getting out of the way of that dratted shell. Said I was a lucky son-of-a-bitch, begging your pardon ma’am, to be shipped home, and the only reason he’d let me come back to Fowey was if I brought this letter to you.’
Sara kissed him. ‘I think I love you.’ Then tucked the letter into her pocket and patted it.
‘Aren’t you going to read it?’
‘Later, there’s work to be done.’
The nurse was back at her side, smiling widely at seeing the news wasn’t too bad after all. ‘Lets get you ready for your op, young man. This is your lucky day. We have the best surgeon on duty and he’s going to make you whole again. Come on, Sara, you can start doing a bit more to help, since you’re going to enter the profession.’
It was late in the afternoon before she found a moment alone to read the letter, while she was on her own tea break. It began with an expression of his love for her, his longing to see her again, but as Sara read on, her brow began to crease with worry.
‘They wanted to send me back with young Tim, (my post-boy here) but I refused. There’s limited space available on these home-bound ships and he is a far more deserving case than me. My leg is a bit knocked up but not serious enough to allow me the excuse to take time out, at least I hope not! This darned war has to be finished, once and for all, then I can come home and claim you. I’ve written to Yvonne asking for a divorce. Is it permitted for me to beg you to do the same with Hugh, and marry me? I waited for you, as we agreed. When you didn’t come I thought maybe you’d changed your mind, that you didn’t want me any more. But I’ve had time to think about it since, and I’m wondering if something happened to prevent your getting there. Did he stop you from coming, Sara? If I’m wrong, if you’ve decided that you love him best after all, I’ll have to accept that. I’m hoping that I’m not wrong, that when all this is over, and
if I’m fortunate enough to survive, you’ll come over Stateside with me to a new life. The children too, of course, if Hugh will allow it. Will you think about it at least? Write me at this address when you decide. I love you, Sara, whatever.’
Tears were rolling down her cheeks by the time she’d finished reading the letter. Oh, if only life could be that simple and straightforward. If only she could go to Hugh and tell him that she loved Charlie, that she wanted a divorce and could she please have the children too?
She knew what his answer would be, without even needing to ask. He would never agree, never.
She could walk away, of course, if she so wished; go off to America with Charlie without Hugh’s permission. Except that Hugh could claim that having enjoyed an affair with her lover she was an unfit mother, and since they had spent a weekend together how could she prove her innocence, that nothing at all had happened between them?
Sara might well win her divorce, but lose her children, which didn’t bear thinking about. She folded the letter and put it back in her pocket.
Making the children their tea, giving them their baths, washing their hair and doing all the ordinary, everyday things with them, brought home to her how very important it was for her to keep them safe and a part of her life. Not for a moment would Sara contemplate losing them. They were far too precious.
They sat in their plaid dressing gowns, drinking their cocoa while they played Ludo, then a rowdy game of Snakes and Ladders. Drew cheated a few times, as he loved to do, pretending he’d forgotten that you couldn’t go up snakes and hoping no one would notice.
Jenny kept shouting, ‘he’s done it again, Mummy, tell him!’
Laughing, Sara rumpled his hair. ‘He’s a cheeky monkey but it’s time for bed now, so come on both of you, clean your teeth then I’ll come and read you some more of Rupert Bear.’
For All Our Tomorrows Page 31