Polly's War

by Freda Lightfoot

  ‘Still some Irish blood whirling in those veins eh, little chap?’

  And he was a survivor. Benny thought that one day he would have to tell his son how he’d been born in a back street on a pile of mucky snow and in the pouring rain, without any assistance save that of his own brave mother. The rhythm of the baby’s sucking was steady now, punctuated with contented little gasps. Benny found it immensely soothing, almost therapeutic to be sitting here with his son in the quiet of the night, as if there were just the two of them in all the world. Course, it wasn’t the little chap’s fault that his mam was dead. How could he even think such a thing? Neither of them had been given a choice in the matter. And he’d do well enough, that much was plain, even if he did have to make do with an amateur for a da.

  ‘She would’ve loved you,’ Benny said, unaware of the tears sliding down his cheeks. He’d tell him about Belinda too when the boy was old enough to understand, how lovely she was, how spirited and determined.

  He chuckled softly at the memory. ‘We hadn’t two pennies to rub together and there were times when we fought like cat and dog but by heck, lad, we were in love. I worshipped the ground she walked on, and she never lost her faith in me, despite my fanciful notions at times. That’s your ma, a survivor, like you.’

  The baby’s eyes opened for a brief moment, round and blue, gazing intently up at Benny as if memorising his father’s face, as if he’d been taking in every word and agreed with it, before allowing the lids to droop closed again. And not once did he pause in his sucking.

  Benny tucked him closer to his chest, protectively, as if shielding the baby from a harsh world. He saw, in that moment of intense emotion, how he could best pay tribute to Belinda’s memory, by being the man she’d always believed him to be. All he had to do was work hard and be a success.

  He thought of his own father, Matthew Pride, bravely fighting for his country then coming home and being the best dad any boy could’ve wished for. Benny had worshipped him.

  The baby was drowsy now, sated with milk, a small bubble forming on his pursed lips as Benny withdrew the teat. He lifted his son and lay him gently against his shoulder, just as Polly had shown him. ‘Come on now, Matthew love, give yer old dad a good burp.’

  In the stairs, Polly slipped quietly back to bed, tears in her eyes and a soft smile on her face.

  Chapter Twenty

  So far as Lucy was concerned everything changed when Belinda died. Losing her dear friend felt like the end of everything of value in her life. And she was haunted by the conversations they'd had about love.

  ‘Why make two people miserable when you can make one happy.’ Belinda had said.

  Life suddenly seemed very fragile, as if every day must be enjoyed to the full for you never knew when it might end. Wasting it with a man she no longer cared for, who gave no indication of truly caring for her, didn’t seem the best way to spend it at all. Lucy felt as if she were living a life of pretence. Pretending she loved Tom, pretending she was happy. Yet what she truly felt was a desperate urgency to spend every possible moment with Michael. She was young still, and in love. There surely wasn’t a moment to be lost. Yet how to gain her freedom, that was the problem.

  She lay beside Tom night after night, longing for Michael’s touch, for the excitement only he could instil in her, regretting ever having given him up simply for the sake of duty. Each morning she went about her daily routine like some sort of clockwork toy, cooking and cleaning, doing what was necessary without thought or reason, without even the chance of escape to the Gaumont with her lovely friend. Inside, her heart lay heavy and sick, robbing her of the last of her appetite.

  Following their agreed parting she’d caught no more than a glimpse of Michael in the distance. Lucy convinced herself that he’d forgotten all about her, filled his life with other things, whereas she couldn’t get him out of her mind. One evening she was so wrapped up in these thoughts that she put salad cream on the table instead of custard.

  ‘I don’t think this goes with rhubarb tart, Mam,’ Sarah Jane giggled and Lucy dashed about, trying to remember what she’d done with the custard jug.

  ‘How could you cope with Benny’s baby, when you can’t even manage a simple meal?’ Tom said, his voice thick with sarcasm, as so often these days. ‘Get off to bed soon tonight, then you’ll be more awake tomorrow.’

  ‘I’m not tired. I’m fine.’

  ‘Do as I say. The children can see to themselves for once, and you can do the washing and clearing up tomorrow. Go to bed.’ And she did, for it seemed easier to obey.

  It was Whit Sunday and Polly had invited the entire family to lunch. Lucy and Tom began it with their usual morning toast and mug of tea taken largely in silence, which even so somehow led to an argument. It all started innocently enough. Tom complained about there not being enough butter on his toast and Lucy laughed, saying it was actually margarine and she couldn’t remember the last time she’d even seen any butter let alone had the money to buy it. That inflamed him and he accused her of mocking him for not earning enough money to keep them.

  She felt cowed by his dominance of her, by his constant carping and criticisms. Yet something of the old Lucy still remained, buried deep beneath the damaged self esteem. Now she experienced an unexpected surge of rebellion at being repeatedly bullied, even by a husband scarred by war. Benny had been bullied as a boy but he’d won through in the end. Maybe she would too, if she held her nerve. She waited until the children were upstairs getting dressed and she was tying his best tie for him. ‘I was thinking of getting a job,’ she announced, without giving herself time to think. ‘Maybe that would help.’

  ‘Don’t talk daft.’

  ‘I mean it. I’m bored out of my mind stuck here at home. It’s not as if there’s enough to do, what with our Sean now at school. I’ve worked for years. I like working and having a bit of money in my pocket. Besides, we could surely do with a bit extra. We could happen afford butter then, eh?’ And she smiled, trying to keep what she saying light.

  ‘There you go, accusing me of keeping you short.’ Tom bridled at the implied criticism.

  Lucy hastened to assure him. ‘That’s not what I meant at all. I like having a bit of pocket money of my own, or to spend on the kids, that’s all. And as I say, I like working.’ Yet as so often before Tom absolutely refused to listen to her point of view or even to discuss the matter. ‘You’ll stop at home, where you belong. You’re not even managing the housework very well. How could you possibly cope with a job as well.’

  ‘I’ve told you, it’s because I’m bored. Why can’t I work? I could easily get my old job back with Minnie Hopkins.’

  ‘So that’s it. You’re still pining after lover-boy.’

  Lucy sighed but was determined not to rise to the bait. ‘All right then, maybe Mam could find me a job at the warehouse. Everyone else is working for the family business, why not me?’

  ‘Because you have childer and a husband to look after.’

  It was no good, she could feel the pointlessness of the argument in her bones and afterwards would wonder what had possessed her to battle on. She smoothed his tie into place, handed him his hat and raincoat. ‘I overheard you telling Lily Gantry at the funeral, that you spent years in that prisoner-of-war camp in Germany, yet you told Michael and me that you’d crossed over the Alps into Italy after you escaped, and then made your way through France. Where, exactly, were you held then?’ The thought had come out of nowhere, but she couldn’t doubt that her words had hit home by the way he flinched.

  He rubbed a hand over his face and started prowling about the kitchen, back and forth, like a lion in a cage. ‘Michael and me.’ He cruelly mimicked her voice and before she could guess what was about to happen, he’d brought the flat of his hand down across her face. The blow knocked her off balance, sent her reeling across the kitchen so that she stumbled and fell, catching the side of her head on the edge of the steel fender.

  He was instantly contrite. Full of
apologies he hurried to fetch iodine and warm water; assuring her that he hadn’t meant to lash out. It was the war that caused his temper to be so short, he explained, and jealousy of her feelings for Michael. ‘All you have to do is agree to give our marriage a chance. You really shouldn’t have provoked me. It’s your own fault.’ Lucy rather thought that it must be, for otherwise why would he have hit her?

  Polly met them at the front door and, in honour of the occasion, wasn’t wearing the much knitted cardigan which she’d rarely seemed to have off in six long years of war but a smart frock in navy blue with a crisp white collar. It made her look young again. She hugged and kissed her daughter, saying how pretty she looked. Lucy was wearing a lemon seersucker dress, cut on the bias and it was quite apparent to Polly that she’d lost weight since Belinda’s death. Polly intended to get something inside her today. As Charlie led the way into the house, limping slightly on the stick he now used, Polly also noticed a small bruise on her daughter’s face and mildly enquired how she’d come by it.

  ‘Oh, I bumped my head on the cellar door,’ Lucy said. ‘Shall I set the table?’

  ‘Now isn’t that something? A pair of willing hands for once.’ Aw, and wasn’t she proud of the lot of them. It made her heart sing for all there was the sadness of an empty place at the table. ‘And where are my two treasures?’

  The children, having not long since filled their stomachs with their usual breakfast of bread and jam, were soon sprawled on the floor, flat on their stomachs playing with toy soldiers, oblivious to the appetising aroma of roast beef and Yorkshire pudding that was making all the adults salivate with hunger.

  Polly watched her only son with pride as he carefully spooned cereal into baby Matt’s mouth which fluttered open like a young bird for more every time the spoon was taken away. At three months, wasn’t he the finest baby in the street if not the whole of Manchester? She tickled him under the chin and, thinking it was the spoon, the small mouth fastened itself upon her finger with a startling fierceness. Polly burst out laughing. ‘Look at the precious soul. Isn’t he the one? Won’t he grow as big as his da one day and just as greedy.’

  Benny grinned, taking this as a compliment.

  Seated opposite Benny was Tom, looking fitter than ever. What a fine, good looking young man he was, to be sure. He’d surprised Polly by proving to be quite diligent at his work in the warehouse, for all it was little more than labouring. She’d agreed to let him drive the van occasionally as he was proving to be a useful member of the team.

  She glanced across at her daughter, as if searching for clues as to her state of mind but Lucy was busily setting out knives and forks. Polly watched as Tom slid an arm about her waist, popped a kiss upon his wife’s neck as she bent over and then merrily tweaked the soft brown curls on her brow. So everything must be fine and dandy between them, she thought. Lucy didn’t return the gesture or even smile a response. Mebbe she’d best have another talk with the girl, just to make sure.

  Serving out the meat and vegetables on every plate took an age, but nobody minded as by then they’d all consumed a fluffy slice of Yorkshire pudding topped off with onion gravy. As Polly handed out the brimming platefuls, she recalled a time when her family would think that humble dish alone would constitute a dinner fit for a king, certainly it had gone down well one Christmas back in Ancoats when there’d been no meat to follow.

  ‘That’s too much for me, Lucy demurred, unloading half of the food on to her brother’s plate.

  ‘Nay, is that all you’re having, lass? It wouldn’t keep a sparrow alive,’ Charlie said.

  ‘I’m not very hungry.’

  Polly gave Lucy a keen look and wondered if she’d been crying. But then losing her sister-in-law had been a blow to them all, and the pair had been as close as two slices of bread stuck together with jam. Which reminded Polly for some reason of her grandchildren. She finally managed to drag them away from their toys and placed a small plate of dinner before each of them, all the while advising Lucy as if she was a girl still and Polly’s responsibility as a mother were as strong as ever, to take better care of herself.

  ‘Ye definitely look a bit peaky. Starvin’ yourself will do no good at all. Belinda would hate to see you make yerself ill, wouldn’t she so?’

  Benny, returning from putting Matt down in his crib asked what it was Belinda would hate and Lucy irritably told him that it was only Mam nagging.

  Tom chipped in, ‘I’m at her all the time to rest more but will she listen? Stubborn to a fault she is. All she has to do is settle back and enjoy her children, instead of which she’s again fussing about going back to work.’

  Perhaps these words rekindled her rebellion, or maybe it was being in the heart of her family with a mother who had always worked outside of the home, which gave Lucy the courage to make one more stand. ‘And why not? I don’t have to spend my entire life wiping children’s mucky faces, or cleaning other folk’s doorsteps. There might very well be something more interesting and demanding I could do.’

  ‘Well said,’ Polly laughed, applauding vigorously. ‘Couldn’t we use all the help we can get at the warehouse, if you’d a mind.’

  Tom scowled at this apparent show of feminine solidarity. ‘Leave her be, Polly. Don’t encourage her day dreams. A wife’s place is in the home.’

  Polly might have protested against this damning indictment of womanhood but Lucy, her dander up now, returned to the subject which had been exercising her mind more and more these days, wagging her fork at him across the table. ‘Tell me, when you were wounded at Salerno, there was presumably a roll call.’

  Tom looked startled by this abrupt change of subject, as did the rest of the family while Polly clicked her tongue in annoyance. ‘Sunday dinner is not the place to discuss the war, m’cushla. Besides, haven’t we put all of that behind us?’

  ‘I’d like to know.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ Tom said with a patient smile, as if he were used to humouring his wife. ‘Aye, there always is a roll call after a battle. That’s very shrewd of you to guess.’

  She hadn’t guessed of course. Michael had mentioned it once and somehow the question had stuck in her mind. ‘And later, when they’d collected in all the wounded, they’d check again, wouldn’t they? Scour the site for bodies, for instance.’

  A nerve by the corner of Tom’s eye twitched, and though he appeared to be searching for an answer, or even a way out of the conversation, could apparently find none. ‘Your mam’s right. This isn’t a fit subject for dinner. Can we get on with it in peace?’ Then bent his head to the task without bothering to answer the question at all.

  Lucy set down her knife and fork and leaned across the table towards him. ‘But how come they didn’t find you? Why did they rescue all the other wounded, and not you? Why were you left behind to be captured and nobody else?’

  ‘How should I know? I was unconscious. That was a bad winter. The mud was dreadful. By the time I was well enough to walk about or ask questions, my battalion had moved on.’

  ‘So where did you spend that first winter? And who found you? When were you taken to that POW camp? How?’

  No one else at the table spoke a word, or even moved; every eye was upon Tom, every ear listening to the exchange, waiting for the reply which came eventually in a soft monotone.

  ‘It - wasn’t quite then I was captured. It was later. An Italian family found me. They were very kind. Can we forget the war, please? This beef is delicious,’ he added, turning deliberately to Polly who smiled sympathetically at him, not quite understanding what was going on but clearly troubled by it.

  Lucy pushed her plate aside, despite protests from her mother. She’d always been able to tell when he lied, and she knew he was lying now, without question.

  When the family had gone, Polly toed off her shoes and sank into an easy chair to rub her aching feet with a sigh of relief. ‘What a mystery they all are to me these days,’ she groaned. ‘I thought they were hard enough work as children,
but there’s still never a moment but what I’m worrying about one or other of them. There’s our Benny upstairs, widowed and alone, poor soul, thankfully turning into a devoted father.’

  ‘You should be pleased about the latter, at least,’ Charlie smiled.

  ‘Oh I am. Though I’m none too chuffed to be tied up so tight with that father-in-law of his. He’s a cold fish is Councillor Hubert Clarke.’

  ‘ But substantial. A self-made man.’

  ‘Aw, he’s substantial all right. Too many beef dinners there, for sure.’ Polly’s chuckle soon changed into a frown. ‘It’s odd but whenever we reorder anything for the shop, he’s nearly always out of stock. And when I ring and ask him to send the van to collect unsold stock as we agreed, the van’s always occupied somewhere else and I have to keep reminding him. I’ve been waiting for over a week now to be rid of a consignment of bookcases. Like cardboard they are. I’ll never sell them.’

  ‘Ring him again,’ Charlie said, only half listening with his eyes closed.

  But Polly’s thoughts had moved on. ‘Our Lucy is another worry. Is she happy d’you think?’

  Charlie met her gaze with the frankness she’d come to expect from him over the years. ‘No, I don’t think she is in the least bit happy. I’d say, if I didn’t know better, that someone put pressure on her to stay in that marriage against her will. I hope, Polly my girl, that it wasn’t you.’

  Polly’s eyes rounded with false innocence as she felt a nudge of guilt. ‘Now would I do such a thing?’

  ‘You just might, by your own twisted sense of loyalty.’

  ‘Twisted is it, to want me family to thrive?’

  ‘Yes, it is, if you interfere too much. A person must make their own way in the world, not follow a path set by someone else. The only way a marriage can thrive is with love, and no one can order that to be present, not even a loving mother. I reckon you should have a word with your Lucy, and tell her that whatever she decides to do about it, we’ll give her our full support. There’s not much wrong with Michael Hopkins, and if he makes her happy, isn’t that what you want too?’