London Pride

by Beryl Kingston

  ‘Yes, all right, I promise,’ Peggy said.

  ‘Good,’ her mother said. ‘I shall go to sleep now. You can go home if you like.’

  But Peggy sat out the hour and afterwards she was glad she had. For when she presented herself at the ward at eight o’clock the next evening the bed was empty.

  CHAPTER 31

  There were things that had to be done. She knew it, but she couldn’t think what they were or where she was supposed to do them. She was overwhelmed by fatigue, as if she were walking about at the bottom of the sea, dragging an enormous anchor behind her, wading with ponderous slowness through an obscurity of heavy waters, where faces ebbed away in mid sentence and voices went echoing in long distorted reverberations like tangled weed.

  The doctor was talking to her, occasional words wriggling into her ears like minnows, in – slick slick and out again without leaving a trace of their meaning behind. ‘Septicaemia,’ he said, ‘very serious injuries’ ‘so very sorry’, and she could hear her own voice agreeing with him, ‘Yes – Yes,’ as she wondered why the light was so green.

  Afterwards she supposed she must have done all the things that had to be done, for her mother’s body was returned to the house and an undertaker arrived who seemed to know what he was doing, and there was a pile of letters ready for the post and addressed in her handwriting. But she passed the days in a stupor, numb with exhaustion and grief, accepting Baby’s howling incomprehension and Joan’s frozen-faced sorrow with equal calm. Even the air raids were distanced. She could hear them going on overhead as she lay wakeful in her bed in the kitchen, but they meant very little to her, and nor, even more oddly, did the knowledge that she ought to have been on duty at the wardens’ post. Mr Goodall had told her not to come in until the end of the week and she’d obeyed without question or thought, as though it didn’t matter.

  It wasn’t until the day before the funeral that her senses returned to her in a flood of grief so severe that she had to put her face in her hands to prevent herself from crying aloud. She was standing in Leslie and Ernest’s florist shop waiting to see the wreaths, breathing in the woody scent of the chrysanthemums and thinking how pretty flowers were when they were massed in vases one above the other, and it suddenly struck her that her mother would never see flowers like that ever again. The tears were rolling from her eyes before she could control them.

  ‘Oh!’ she wept, as Leslie leapt towards her. ‘Oh dear. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Now don’t you worry, my dear,’ the old man said, leading her gently to a chair. ‘The most natural thing in the world.’

  ‘I promised Dad I’d look after her,’ she sobbed. ‘I gave him my solemn word. And now she’s dead. I couldn’t stop her going to the pictures, you see. If I’d known I’d have stopped her. I would. I would. If I’d known. And all them others. That poor man with half his face gone and the woman with her chest smashed in and the boy with no legs. So many, all covered up. Full of life one minute, blown to bits the next. Oh it’s awful. Why can’t we stop it? We ought to stop it.’ Grief was making her incoherent, the words tumbling into one another. ‘So many good people dead. I can’t bear it.’

  Ernest’s round face loomed into focus, more wrinkled than ever in his anxiety, that long white hair of his falling towards her. ‘You must come home with us at once,’ he said. ‘She must, mustn’t she, Leslie? You need looking after my dear, that’s what it is. You’ve carried too many burdens for far too long. We’ll shut the shop. I’ll put the notice up.’

  They dried her tears and waited until the first rush of her grief was over and then they led her home, one on either side, holding her tenderly by the elbows as though she might fall if they weren’t there to prevent it. Which in her present state might well have been the case.

  Once they were in Paradise Row they took her into their house, wrapped her in a blanket like a swaddled baby and sat her in a chair with a glass of brandy to sip while they busied themselves, lighting the stove, arranging flowers, setting the table. It was soothing in the kitchen, everything was so neat and so richly coloured. They’d got green flock wallpaper on the walls so it was really more like a dining room than the all-purpose workshop she lived in next door. The table was oak and there were four upholstered chairs to match and a really rather splendid oak dresser crammed with brightly coloured china, and flowers everywhere she looked, printed on the curtains, embroidered on cushions piled on an oak settle, linked petal to petal in a border strip underneath the picture rail, and standing alive and sweet-smelling in vases and jardinières all over the room.

  ‘Now you come and sit up to the table,’ Ernest said. ‘You can keep that blanket round your legs. It won’t hurt. Would you care for some more brandy?’

  ‘Oh no thank you,’ she said, covering the top of the glass in case it was given despite her. ‘You’ll make me tipsy.’

  ‘And a jolly good job too,’ Leslie said. ‘Does you good to be tipsy now and then. We always take a little nip when we’re feeling low, don’t we, Ernest? Best thing in the world, brandy. You drink it up.’

  Ernest was removing a stewpot from the stove and dividing the contents between three soup plates. It smelled and looked delicious.

  ‘Not for me,’ Peggy said quickly. ‘Thanks all the same, but that’s your rations. I can’t eat your rations.’

  Ernest clicked his teeth. ‘There’s plenty,’ he said. ‘We’ve eked it out nicely. We’ve all got a nice big chunk of bread to go with it. You just eat it up, my dear, and stop fretting.’

  She looked from one kind eager face to the other, beaming at her, willing her to accept. ‘Well if you’re sure,’ she said. And was whisked into her place at the table immediately.

  It was an excellent meal and she felt better by the mouthful. And there was a second course too, a steamed pudding with raspberry jam, which Leslie said was his speciality. ‘You must eat every last scrap or I shall take offence,’ he said, dividing it neatly into three.

  So she ate every last scrap.

  ‘We ought to have some more brandy, don’t you think?’ Leslie suggested when their plates were clean. ‘Finish with a flourish.’

  But the flourish at the end of this meal was even better than brandy. There was a knock at the door and when Ernest went to open it he came back into the room with Jim Boxall.

  At the sight of him, Peggy wept again, but now there was a familiar chest to cry against and longed-for arms to hold her and comfort her. ‘Oh Jim,’ she said, ‘I am so glad to see you. How did you get here?’

  ‘Thirty-six hours compassionate.’

  They sat on the settle together while he cuddled her with one arm and dried her tears with his handkerchief, and the two old men hovered about them, murmuring and approving, and telling Jim about the landmine and her bravery in little snatches and snippets of conversation. ‘Terrible tragedy – twelve killed, you know – no lights at the hospital – nor windows either – no lights no windows, imagine – they had to operate by candlelight – this dear girl’s been so brave – too brave – looking after everybody the way she does.’

  ‘That’s my Peggy,’ he told them. ‘She’d carry the world on her shoulders every minute of the day an’ night if I didn’t peel it off now an’ then.’

  ‘You ought to get married,’ Ernest said. ‘I can’t think why you don’t.’

  ‘I got to look after Mum,’ Peggy tried to explain. ‘I mean, I had to look after her,’ feeling bleak because she was speaking in the past. ‘And there’s the ARP.’

  ‘Never mind the ARP,’ Jim said practically, warning the two old men with a quick glance over the top of Peggy’s head that this wasn’t the time to be talking of weddings. ‘You got everything arranged for the funeral? Do you know who’s coming?’

  ‘I got a list somewhere,’ she said, trying to remember where she’d put it.

  ‘Leave it to me,’ he said. ‘You just come home and show me where it is.’

  ‘What a blessing you’re back,’ Ernest said. ‘I don’t
know how she’d have managed all on her own. I really don’t.’

  By now Peggy’s sobs had subsided. Jim wiped her face with his handkerchief as the two old men looked on tenderly. ‘OK to go next door?’ he asked, and when she nodded, ‘That’s my girl.’

  She kissed her two rescuers goodbye. ‘Thanks for everything,’ she said. ‘It was ever so good of you.’

  ‘Yes,’ Jim said. ‘Thanks for looking after her.’ He’d never thought much of these two peculiar men if the truth were told but now he was reassessing his opinion.

  ‘What are friends for?’ Leslie said, flushing with pleasure.

  ‘If there’s anything else you need,’ Ernest added, ‘you just give us a call.’

  But there was nothing else Peggy needed now that Jim was home. His arrival made everything possible again. She remembered all the things she had to do the moment she stepped inside her own front door. She told him about the wreaths she’d ordered, she knew the time of the ceremony, she felt that she could sustain it all now, the nightmare had begun to recede.

  And the next morning when people began to arrive she was steady and composed, standing beside Jim to welcome her subdued guests, Uncle Gideon and Ethel looking ill at ease in black, Aunt Maud and Josh looking old and bent and as grey as dust, Mrs Roderick weeping, the Allnutts pale and patient, John Cooper blowing his nose, Mr MacFarlane protective, Joan stern and her children baffled, Baby sniffing behind a spotted veil.

  The service was mercifully brief. Too many bomb victims were being buried that day and there was no time for a long oration at the graveside, which was just as well because it was bleak and cold out there among the headstones. And when it was over and the mourning party had nibbled Peggy’s sandwiches and drunk tea from her assorted cups, Jim began to suggest them towards the door. Maud and Josh had a train to catch, Mrs Roderick was escorted home by the Allnutts and Mr Cooper, Gideon and Ethel seemed only too glad to be gone. Soon only Mrs Geary, Mr MacFarlane, Jim, the two children and the three sisters were left in the kitchen.

  ‘I’ll away now,’ Mr MacFarlane said, taking his tin hat from the hook in the hall. ‘God bless you, my dear.’

  ‘Tell Mr Goodall I’ll be down to see him tonight,’ Peggy said.

  ‘No, no,’ Mr MacFarlane said. ‘There’s no rush.’ And he kissed her before he left. ‘You just bide here a wee while longer.’

  ‘I’ll give you a hand with those plates and cups,’ Joan offered when he’d gone. ‘Then we’ll make tracks.’ She was busy and practical and seemed quite herself again, getting on with her life as she got on with the housework, putting death and funerals behind her.

  Peggy didn’t have the energy to get out of her chair. That awful numbing fatigue was engulfing her again. Seeing Joan recover so quickly had made it worse. She watched as the kitchen was set to rights and Yvonne and Norman were bundled into their coats and Balaclava helmets.

  That’s it then,’ Joan said, ‘we’ll be off. Come on, kids.’

  ‘We’ll walk you to the station,’ Jim said, looking at Peggy. ‘Breath a’ fresh air’ud do us good.’

  Despite her lack of energy, or perhaps because of it, Peggy obeyed him like a child. They all walked down to the station, huddled against the cold and not talking. The hoardings were covered with posters giving advice and instructions, ‘Be wise – keep mum’, ‘Make do and mend’, ‘Careless talk costs lives’, ‘Dig for victory’, ‘We want your kitchen waste’, ‘Beat fire bomb Fritz’.

  ‘Funny that,’ Peggy said.

  ‘What?’ Joan asked.

  ‘The hoardings. I must have seen them every day for years but I’ve never noticed them before.’ She was in a most peculiar state, noticing things that weren’t important and paying no attention to the things that mattered. It was almost as if she’d become somebody else.

  ‘Forever telling us what to do,’ Joan said, dismissing the hoardings with a glance. ‘Gets on my wick. As if we ain’t got enough to contend with. Tatta, Jim. Tatta, Peg. See you Sunday. Give your Aunty Peggy a kiss, kids.’

  Jim and Peggy stood on the platform and watched their train rattle away, its crisscrossed windows patterning its progress like some overgrown caterpillar, its roof dark grey with dust.

  Peggy sighed. ‘Everything’s so shabby,’ she said. She was noticing that too.

  ‘Time for a quick one,’ Jim decided. ‘You don’t have to go back yet awhile.’ And he walked her across to the Station Arms and ordered a couple of pints.

  It was warm and crowded in the pub and the smell of spilled beer, sweat and tobacco smoke was reassuring even if it didn’t comfort her.

  ‘Your neighbours were right, you know,’ Jim said, wiping the froth from his mouth on the back of his hand.

  ‘Which ones?’ Peggy asked without much interest. ‘About what?’

  ‘The two old fellers where we used to live. About us getting married.’

  ‘Oh them.’ She couldn’t drum up any interest in them or the subject. He was talking about marriage and yet here she was sitting in a heap too tired to be interested. Oh dear.

  ‘Them,’ he said, watching her.

  She drank her beer wearily, saying nothing. There was no vitality in her at all and the sight of her forlorn face roused him to a determined protectiveness. ‘I’ll tell you what we’re going to do,’ he said. ‘First we’ll finish our beer, and then we’ll go down the registry office and we’ll call the banns and get married.’

  ‘What? Now?’ What was he saying? How could they get married?

  ‘No,’ he said, unperturbed. ‘Not today. In four weeks’ time. I’ve got ten days’ leave at the end a’ the month, remember? One to get married on, eight days honeymoon, day to get back. Piece a’ cake! I shall probably be a corporal come the summer. We could live on a corporal’s pay as easy as pie. So that’s what we’ll do. You’ve been looking after people quite long enough. Now I’m going to look after you.’

  Surprise and pleasure tempted her out of her lethargy at last. ‘Well it would be lovely,’ she said, smiling at him, such a slow gentle smile that it made him ache to put his arms round her and start protecting her there and then. To be looked after, she thought, to leave the blitz behind and drop all her responsibilities and just go off somewhere quiet and peaceful all on her own with him. Oh, it would be lovely. ‘I don’t know though.’

  ‘What don’t you know?’

  ‘It’s just …’ she said, her brow puckered with the effort to find the right way to tell him all this. ‘Oh I don’t know … If it wasn’t for the war and us not having any money, I’d’ve married you long ago. But you know that anyway. It’s just … Well I can’t walk away from it all now. Not with the raids still going on and everything. It wouldn’t be right, would it?’

  The publican was roaring with laughter behind the bar, and the sound annoyed Jim, making him brusque.

  ‘Yes,’ he said firmly. ‘It would be right. Absolutely right. You need looking after. I need to look after you. So that’s what we’ll do.’ It was a statement, a decision, there was no doubt left in him at all.

  She began to worry. ‘But where would we live?’ she said. ‘How would we manage? There’s invitations to send. Weddings take ever such a lot a’ work. Oh dear! It’s too soon after…’

  ‘We’ll marry first,’ he said, wearing his most stubborn expression, ‘and sort all that out afterwards.’

  ‘But what about Baby? How will she manage the rent if she’s all on her own? I promised Mum …’

  ‘Baby earns a darn sight more than you do,’ he said. ‘You don’t have to worry about Baby. Do her good to look after herself. She’s a lot tougher than you think.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ she worried again. ‘I don’t see how we can.’

  ‘I do,’ he said. ‘Just leave it to me.’

  She was too tired, too stunned and, beneath her fatigue, too pleased to argue any further. If that was what was going to happen, she thought, it would happen. Perhaps it was meant to.

  So they went to the regi
stry office, and she watched while he applied for a licence, filled in forms and booked their wedding. In half an hour the whole thing was signed and settled.

  ‘Now,’ he said, ‘we’ll go shopping and get the ring, and then I shall have to be getting back. You got three weeks to buy yourself a dress and that’s all you’ve got to worry about. An’ a hat from old Madame Aimee’s perhaps. Joan’ll see to everything else.’

  The next three weeks spun past in a confusion of activity. As he’d predicted, Joan and Mrs Geary threw themselves into wedding preparations, delighted to have a reason for celebration, organizing a sing-song, ordering booze, even baking a sponge cake with two precious eggs and tremendous enthusiasm. Mr Allnutt set up trestle tables which actually remained upright if a trifle precarious, Mrs Roderick recovered from her grief and re-trimmed her best hat, Uncle Gideon arrived with a canteen of cutlery as a wedding present, and Tom slunk away to the empty bedroom upstairs where he curled himself up on top of the chest of drawers, scowling with displeasure.

  And then it was their wedding day and they were standing side by side in a registry office so full of people that there wasn’t room to turn around, repeating their promises after the registrar while their guests sneezed and coughed and blew their noses and burst into a bedlam of congratulation the minute the little ceremony was over.

  ‘Just what we all needed,’ Mrs Geary said, handing round refreshments at the ding-dong afterwards. ‘We’ve all had a darn sight too much grief just lately, what with one thing an’ another. Ain’t that right, Gideon?’

  ‘Flossie would’ve approved a’ this,’ he agreed, taking the proffered sandwich. ‘I can tell you that. They’re a lovely couple. Me an’ Ethel was just saying so.’

  ‘Best thing all round,’ Ethel agreed. ‘She’d only ha’ moped, poor girl, if she’d stayed at home by herself. This’ll take her mind off it.’

  It had actually taken her mind off everything, and so effectively that it wasn’t until she was at Victoria station later that afternoon and struggling through the usual crowds of kit-bagged servicemen, that Peggy realized that she was married.