Polly's War

by Freda Lightfoot

  ‘Didn’t I tell you Mam would be home soon?’ Sean said, not understanding.

  Sarah Jane seemed more aware of what was really happening. She half glanced over her shoulder, then grasping her mother’s arm thrust her towards the back door. ‘Let’s go to Aunty Minnie’s. Quick, before ...’

  ‘Before what, Sarah Jane? You weren’t thinking of going anywhere without me, were you?’ The voice from the door stopped them all in their tracks. Lucy spun about to face Tom and gasped when she saw him. In his hand was a gun, the German Luger she’d once caught a glimpse of in his drawer and dismissed as a product of her vivid imagination. Now here she was, looking down the barrel of it. Time seemed to slow, to stretch endlessly as a sense of utter disbelief swamped her. This surely couldn’t be happening.

  ‘Tom? What are you doing? Her voice sounded calmer than she felt. ‘Why don’t you put that thing down. You wouldn’t want to hurt Sean or Sarah Jane, now would you?’

  ‘I’m aiming it at you, Lucy, not the children. Can’t you tell?’

  She moved her lips, stiff with fear, into what must be a parody of a smile. ‘Yes, of course I do. I’m aware that I’ve hurt you, Tom.’

  ‘You have indeed hurt me. You’re the guilty party. Not these innocent children. Isn’t that right?’ When she didn’t immediately answer, he repeated the question, only louder. ‘Isn’t that right?’ It made them all jump and Sean to realise that all was not well, and start to cry.

  ‘Hush, sweetheart. It’s all right. Yes, if you say so, Tom. But let me send the children out, so we can talk this thing th...’ She got no further as he suddenly yelled at her to be quiet.

  ‘Don’t tell me what to do! I’m in charge here. I’m the one with the blasted weapon. Can’t you see it?’ He was shaking the gun now, waving it about in front of her face. Sean stared at it wide-eyed with horror.

  ‘Don’t you hurt my mam,’ the little boy bravely shouted, and Lucy hushed him again, anxious he didn’t irritate Tom into some reckless act. This was the last thing she’d expected. Yet Lucy realised that she should have been alert to the possibility. She’d underestimated Tom for too long. She should have protected her children better.

  ‘Let Sean go. He’s just a baby. Let him go. Sarah Jane too.’

  ‘And have them fetch help? Do you think I’m stupid? Once you have the children back, you’ll run off with that fancy man of yours. I know what you’re up to Lucy. I’ve seen all the toing and froing. I’ve been watching you all for some time. And I’ve seen him hanging about by the wharf.’

  ‘Who? Michael?’ Hope leapt in her but he only laughed.

  ‘That got you going, eh?’ It quickly died again as Lucy tried desperately to make her brain work, to think, to plan, to decide what she ought to do. Should she tell him about the MPs waiting outside for her signal? If she shouted could they break in before he fired the gun? Or should she keep on talking and smiling and hoping for the best. While she was still striving to make up her mind, Tom stretched out his hand and flicking a finger said, ‘Come here son. Come and stand by me.’ Before she could make a move to stop him, Sean had done as he was told, apparently mesmerised by the chill command in his father’s voice. Tom grasped the boy and held him close to his side, oblivious to his noisy crying. Dear lord, why didn’t someone help her? Could they hear his cries outside?

  Tom was beckoning to Sarah Jane, ordering her to come to him too, before he lost his temper good and proper.

  Swallowing her fear Lucy grasped hold of Sarah Jane and pushed her behind her own back. ‘No, you’re not having her.’ Lifting her chin she braved the furious anger that twisted Tom’s face into something utterly unrecognisable. ‘Listen to me, Tom. I’m not going anywhere.’

  ‘Oh, but you will. Everyone leaves me. Francesca left me for her old lover, just as you’re doing.’

  Lucy froze. So that was her name. This didn’t seem the moment to accuse him of bigamy. ‘It’s not true, Tom. I haven’t seen Michael in - oh, I don’t know - ages. Not since before the fire in fact.’

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ he snapped. ‘You lie, lie, lie all the time, just to serve your own evil purpose.’

  This seemed rich, coming from the smoothest liar of all, but Lucy had the good sense not to say so. ‘Don’t shout, Tom, please. You’re frightening the children. Anyroad, it’ll do no good,’ she gently urged him, using her most cajoling tones. She let go of Sarah Jane’s hand. Pushed her further away. Took a step closer to Tom. ‘It’s all over. Give me the gun before you hurt our lovely kids. You know you’d be heartbroken if you did anything to harm them.’

  ‘It’s you I mean to harm.’

  ‘No, I don’t think so, Tom. You’ve had a bad war, I accept that. Now it’s all over. They’ve come for you. The MPs, I mean. It’ll be much easier if you give yourself up. Don’t make it any worse for yourself.’ She held her breath, wondering if she’d done the right thing to warn him as he stared at her in silence. Lucy could have sworn there were tears as well as panic in his eyes, and a curl of hope rose in her breast, swiftly quenched by his next words.

  ‘The fighting at Salerno was a mess,’ he told her, his voice scathing, filled with a brash arrogance as if entirely unconcerned by the fact that the truth of his inauspicious war career had at last been revealed. ‘A combination of mud and military bungling. I wasn’t hanging around just to get shot or die of disease. I escaped through Greece, across North Africa and have been living all nice and cosy in Spain ever since. Then Francesca left me, stupid bitch. Went back to Diego. Not that I really cared, you understand. I was getting bored with her in any case.’ He spoke with his famous bravado. ‘I decided to come home to you, Lucy, that you were worth the risk of returning.’

  ‘You mean you couldn’t think of anywhere else to go,’ Lucy responded, the first hint of bitterness in her tone. Tom was quick to respond.

  ‘No, it’s true. I did miss you. But I only intended hanging around long enough to persuade you to come somewhere fresh, to a new life. America or Australia. Except you were hooked up with this Hopkins chap.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Lucy said, though she wasn’t at all.

  ‘Now I suppose bloody Benny’s grassed on me.’

  ‘Benny? What does he know about any of this?’

  ‘Only that he guessed I’d deserted. But he promised to keep his bleedin’ mouth shut.’

  Lucy decided to pursue this matter later with her brother, and again held out her hand. ‘Please, Tom. It’s over now. Give me the gun.’ It was almost there, almost within her grasp when there was a loud crack. Then every door seemed to burst open at once and the room was suddenly filled with people, Benny and Michael coming from one direction at the back and the MPs from the front. It was several moments of utter pandemonium before she realised that the gun had been fired.

  A pair of handcuffs were being slipped on to her unprotesting husband’s wrists. Words were spoken, informing him of his rights and where he would be taken. Tom was shouting at Benny. ‘I’ll get you for this, for shooting your bleedin’ mouth off.’

  ‘You’re wrong,’ the MP calmly informed him. ‘It wasn’t your brother-in-law. It was someone else. They told us you’d set fire to a warehouse, thereby adding arson to the charges. We’ll be investigating the matter fully, of course.’ The two MPs were obviously enjoying themselves.

  Tom paled and, switching his attack, said, ‘Bloody Hubert Clarke. After all I’ve done for him. I’ll kill him.’

  ‘I don’t think so, Private. You’ll be tucked away somewhere very safe for quite a long while.’

  It was only when Tom was safely shackled that an ashen-faced Benny asked if anyone was going to spare a thought for him. The bullet had nicked his shoulder. One of the MPs gave it little more than a cursory glance but assured him he’d live. When Benny groaned in pain, the military policeman laughed and began to strap it up with a scarf, packing it with a tea towel Lucy brought, and promised to drop him off at the local hospital on their way back to base.

 
; ‘So if it wasn’t Benny, who was it?’ Tom yelled, glaring at Lucy.

  ‘Actually I was the one who shopped you,’ Michael said and smiled with satisfaction as Tom made a lurch towards him, quickly stifled by the two MPs. ‘Benny and I met up some weeks ago and he told me about your lies. Then when he confirmed that Ron was innocent of arson, we guessed you were responsible for that too. I thought it about time you settled the debt you owe to society, and to Lucy. As soon as I was sure Hubert Clarke was in the bag, I brought in the military.’

  Lucy was glaring at her brother. ‘You knew Tom lied?’

  ‘Don’t be angry Lucy. He did talk about Spain once but I felt I shouldn’t get involved, because of you and Michael. But then after the fire I saw things a bit different. I’m really sorry, truly I am. You were right all along. Tom Shackleton is bad news and I shouldn’t have made any promises to him. That’s why I had to come dashing to your rescue, Luce, like the bleedin’ cavalry.’

  Lucy’s eyes filled with a rush of tears. ‘You great daft lump. I could batter your brains in, if you had any.’ And putting her arms about Benny’s broad shoulders she hugged him, causing him to yowl in protest as she accidentally pressed against his injured shoulder.

  ‘I went all through the war without being wounded and here I am having pot-shots taken at me in Civvy Street. Don’t that take the biscuit?’

  After the MPs had gone, marching Tom before them, with Benny trailing behind in their wake, Lucy found that she had to sit down for her legs had given way. She’d wasted all those years waiting for Tom to come home, all that loyalty and sympathy, all that agonising and believing herself still beholden to him. And when he’d unexpectedly returned, against all the odds, she’d been endlessly patient, not wishing to deprive him of his children, striving to do her duty as his wife. She’d thought she was the guilty one for loving another man, had believed what he’d told her despite her reservations.

  ‘When all the time he was a deserter. Not only that, but a bigamist as well, marrying some other woman while still married to me. What a fool I’ve been.’ Lucy put her head in her hands and began to cry. ‘Oh, Michael, you were right, I should have left him ages ago. I love you so much, and Tom has told me nothing but lies from the start.’ She at once launched into a flurry of apologies and explanations.

  Michael interrupted her. ‘Say that again.’

  ‘Hubert has ...’

  ‘No, the other bit, about your loving me?’

  Lucy looked up and smiled at him, a smile so radiant it lit up her entire face. ‘I love you. I love you. I love you! There, is that enough?’ She could hear the children giggling, Sean with his hand clapped over his mouth in a picture of glee, and Sarah Jane grinning from ear to ear.

  ‘No, it isn’t,’ Michael said. ‘I want you to say it every day for the rest of our lives together.’

  She beamed at him, then kissed him softly on each cheek and after that full on the lips. ‘We are going to be together then - for the rest of our lives?’

  ‘I reckon so, just as soon as that military court has finished with Tom Shackleton, we’ll take him to another for that divorce. Right?’

  ‘It’ll be a pleasure. Then I’ll say it every day to you, and this little one too, shall I?’

  ‘Little one?’

  He gave a puzzled frown as Lucy smilingly laid a hand upon the curve of her belly. ‘Our child.’

  ‘Oh, my love!’ Michael’s arms came about her and Sarah Jane was wriggling between them, Sean jumping and scrambling into Michael’s arms, determined not to be left out of the loving.

  ‘We’ll have to take the new baby to see the fireworks at Belle Vue,’ Sean yelled.

  Sarah Jane was shouting too in her excitement. ‘You promised us, Michael. You did, remember?’

  ‘I remember. Well, as I always keep my promises, it’s a date.’ Then they were all laughing and hugging, Michael with his arms full of love, for they were a family at last. Nothing and no one would ever separate them again.

  Read on for an extract of For All Our Tomorrows

  Chapter One

  The oranges rolled across the narrow street, bouncing on the cobbles and bumping seductively against the feet of the two young women. Children were running helter-skelter in the Cornish sunshine, giggling with excitement, eager to catch one of these glorious golden orbs as they were tossed and rolled with such reckless generosity.

  Gasping in amazement, the younger of the two women snatched one up, to sink her pretty white teeth into the flesh.

  ‘This is wonderful!’

  Juice spurted, running down her chin to leave little orange blobs on the bodice of her print frock as she greedily stuffed segments of fruit into her mouth. Not that she appeared to care one bit, nor that her expertly coiled, soft auburn hair had shaken loose from its pins as she’d run down the steep hill of Lostwithiel Street. All she wanted was to keep pace with the trucks, jeeps, gun carriers and goodness knows what else which were parading through Fowey town, and catch another of these glorious fruits.

  She lifted her face to the grinning man high above her in his vehicle, and laughed.

  Her sister too was laughing as she chased one orange, clearly heading for the town quay, while tossing a second to the child running excitedly beside her.

  Other women were doing exactly the same. After four years of war, many of the children had never seen such a thing in their lives before and their mothers had almost forgotten the delicious, bitter-sweet taste.

  Nor had they ever seen men like these.

  These men didn’t carry the weariness of war on their shoulders, nor were they dressed in utilitarian battle dress that didn’t quite fit. Even their vehicles were blazoned with stars and nicknames such as ‘Just Jane’, ‘Lucky Lucy’ and ‘Cannonball’. These men were fresh and smart and young, bristling with sexual energy which not a girl or woman in the crowd didn’t recognise as such.

  Bette Tredinnick certainly did. Her hazel eyes were teasingly provocative as she tore the skin off the fruit with her teeth. ‘More please. Give me more!’

  ‘What’s it worth, honey?’ the marine mischievously asked her.

  ‘Name your price,’ Bette shouted back.

  ‘Hon, the captain would kill me with his own bare hands if he heard me make such a suggestion in a public place.’

  Bette made a show of innocence as she shielded her eyes against the sun and gazed back along Fore street in the direction of the jeep that was leading the parade. ‘Take a chance. He isn’t listening and I’m open to all reasonable offers.’

  ‘See you later then, sweetheart, down by the quay.’

  ‘I’ll be there,’ she called, just as his vehicle swept away to be swamped by the crowd.

  Sara Marrack, having made sure that both her children were each provided with the delicious treat, began to delicately peel her own orange, for once making no comment about her younger sister’s bold flirtatiousness but laughing with her, enjoying this unexpected holiday along with the rest of the flag-waving townsfolk.

  Bette should be in their mother’s hairdresser’s shop, cutting and styling, and herself doing chores at the Ship Inn. But women in curlers were openly joining in the fun and the pub was fortunately closed till lunch time, so here they were, along with everyone else, stealing time off work to witness the arrival of these American marines.

  They’d come by train only days ago, arriving at Fowey station in the pouring rain on a gloomy autumn day. Now the sun was shining and everyone had turned out to give them a hearty welcome.

  There had been times when no one had quite believed that this moment would ever come, in spite of the preparations made in recent months by the Construction Battalion, the Sea Bees as they were called, whose task it was to prepare quarters for the expected friendly invasion. They’d erected rows and rows of Nissen huts up at Windmill, a field high above town, cleared one or two beaches of mines and coils of barbed wire so that training for some operation or other could safely take place.

 
; No one quite knew what that might be, but it had something to do with all this talk of the Second Front.

  Sara didn’t care that there were jobs she should be doing, floors to scrub, beer pumps to flush out, or that when Hugh returned from his regular weekly trip to the brewery he would take her to task for neglecting them. What did it matter if she got a bit behind for once? This was an historic day for the town. Even the teachers recognised it as such, and had honoured it by closing the school and allowing their pupils to run down the hill to meet these new arrivals who had come to help win the war.

  None of the other businesses in town were doing much trade either. The women who, moments before, had been queuing with their empty shopping baskets outside the greengrocers, hoping for half a cabbage or a turnip or two for the stock pot, were now revelling in the acquisition of much choicer fruit. Children no longer had their noses pressed against Herbie Skinner’s ice-cream shop window.

  Even an elderly man in the process of being fitted for a new suit at Williams the tailors, stood grinning on the pavement, uncaring of the pins holding it in place.

  The townsfolk of Fowey had long since grown accustomed to disruption, to anti-aircraft guns, to the boom across the mouth of the River Fowey which had to be negotiated to allow for the passage of friendly shipping. They no longer paid any heed to Pillboxes and searchlights, and took for granted the activities of the river patrol on constant look-out for spies and saboteurs. They accepted the need for muster points and fire wardens, the ARP and all manner of other defence measures deemed necessary in case the posters plastered all over town warning of the threat of invasion, proved to be correct.