My Sweet Valentine

by Annie Groves

  If Dulcie herself wasn’t aware of the huge compliment she had been paid when she was actually offered a cup of tea by Sister herself, then others on the ward certainly were and duly took note.

  Not that Dulcie was anyone’s fool. She wasn’t. She’d seen the looks one of the pretty nurses had been giving David, and she’d seen too the respect with which he was treated by the other men. With or without his legs, having a man like David as one’s admirer could only add to a girl’s status, especially now that Lydia wasn’t going to be on the scene.

  ‘Of course I’m going to the dance,’ Dulcie responded to one young pilot’s question.

  ‘Good, the group captain can go with you,’ Sister informed Dulcie, arriving at David’s bed just in time to hear Dulcie’s announcement, and quickly forestalling David’s attempt to refuse by suggesting, ‘I’m sure that your friend won’t mind pushing your chair, will you, dear? We can get a couple of the other patients to help you if it’s too heavy.’

  ‘You don’t have to go to the dance with me, you know. Lydia certainly wouldn’t have wanted to,’ David told Dulcie once Sister had gone, and he had asked the other men to ‘push off so that I can have Dulcie to myself for a few minutes’.

  ‘Well, I’m not Lydia, am I?’ Dulcie retorted. ‘You don’t want to let her get away with what she’s done, you know, David. Walking out on you and then getting you to give her a divorce when she’s the one that’s done wrong.’

  ‘I can’t blame her, Dulcie. She and I never pretended to be in love with one another, after all, and she’s not like you, you know.’

  ‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ Dulcie demanded.

  ‘It means,’ David told her, ‘that you are the kind of girl that a man just can’t help being tempted to fall in love with.’

  Dulcie gave a contented sigh. The compliments David was paying her were no more than her due. Of course, it was a pity that David had lost his legs and wouldn’t be able to dance with her like he had done at the Hammersmith Palais that night he had joined her there, but the truth was that she had enjoyed herself far more here today, basking in the admiration of a group of young men whom she knew would not make real advances to her because she was David’s friend and they admired and respected him, than she did when she went out with Wilder. David was far more relaxing than Wilder, with his sometimes uncertain temper, his unreliability, his constant attempts to persuade her into a more sexual relationship with him than she wanted. That didn’t mean, though, that she intended to traipse all the way down to East Grinstead regularly. It was nearly thirty miles from London, after all, and in the country, which had no appeal whatsoever for Dulcie. She wasn’t like Sally, who had announced over breakfast this morning that she couldn’t wait for the weather to warm up so that she could go for long walks in the nearby countryside.

  Although Mr MacIndoe allowed open visiting, knowing how difficult it often was for some families to come down and see their loved ones, hospital routine still had to be followed, and it was time for David to have a rest and for the nurses to attend to their patients’ needs.

  Dulcie swept out of the ward as regally as any queen enjoying the adulation of her admirers, feeling very pleased with herself indeed.

  She was still feeling pleased with herself over an hour later as she regaled Sally with how well received her visit had been, over an early tea of sardines on toast in their landlady’s kitchen.

  ‘And Sister specially asked me to push David’s chair to the dance tonight on account of him only agreeing to go because of me. Of course, he was always pretty keen on me.’

  Feeling that Dulcie had enjoyed enough admiration for one day, Sally turned to Persephone, who had returned to the house ahead of them, asking her gently, ‘How are you feeling? I hope you don’t mind, but George was explaining to me about your brother’s condition and how both your parents are too upset by it to be able to come and visit him. You’ve been a wonderful sister to him, Persephone, and it can’t be easy for you. I know from nursing patients who’ve suffered mental damage from the war that they are the very hardest to treat.’

  Persephone jumped and looked flustered. The poor girl obviously wasn’t used to anyone paying her attention or showing her any concern, Sally thought sympathetically.

  ‘Poor Roddy,’ she responded unsteadily. ‘He was to have been a professor, you know. Daddy was very cross with him when he enlisted.’

  ‘Mental damage? Dulcie asked. ‘What’s up with him, then?’

  Sally exhaled silently. Really, Dulcie could be dreadfully thoughtless at times.

  ‘Persephone’s brother was badly burned when he tried to rescue his men. It’s left him mentally scarred, Dulcie. All the men suffer inwardly, as well as outwardly, because of what they’ve been through, but for some men that inward suffering is very bad indeed.’

  ‘It was Dunkirk,’ Persephone told them both simply. ‘They were captured when they were heading for the coast. They tried to escape, and my brother was shot and left for dead. The others were locked in a barn and then it was set on fire.’

  She was sitting bolt upright, the hands she had folded neatly in her lap shaking terribly. Sally reached out and covered them with one of her own.

  ‘Sometimes he thinks he’s still there. He doesn’t understand that he’s safe now here in England. He lost his sight so he can’t see anyone. He … sometimes he can be violent. He thinks he’s protecting his men. Then other times he just screams. I think he’d be better if he could come home and have familiar things around him, but Daddy just can’t bear the thought of it. He was so very clever, you see. Brilliant, everyone said, and now …’

  Tears rolled down her face, causing Sally’s heart to tighten with angry grief.

  There was a good turnout for the dance, with both the nurses and the townspeople there to make sure that the men had as good a time as it was possible for them to have.

  Dulcie might have pushed David’s chair into the room where the dance was being held, but naturally she left it to his friends to secure the table of her choice for their party, right slap bang where everyone could see them.

  The bunting, despite its age, still managed to put on a brave show, Sally thought, rather like the men themselves, who despite their various injuries were all spruced up and clean-shaven.

  Sally, who had lent a hand herself, along with the nurses on duty, to ensure that those men who were not able to help themselves did get a shave, knew how much it meant to these proud young men to feel that they were accepted.

  Some of the nurses were already getting their patients up to dance to the swing music records, and Sally quickly joined in, asking a young man who was undergoing some particularly painful facial reconstruction surgery, and to whom George had introduced her earlier in the day, if he would dance with her.

  Just wait until she told Wilder about this dance, Dulcie thought happily. She’d certainly make sure that he knew that she hadn’t been sitting around on her own all weekend because he hadn’t been able to get leave. She’d tell him about David too, of course, and she might even just drop into the conversation the fact that one day David would be a sir. Wilder liked to think that because he was American and had money, that meant that she was lucky to be going out with him. Dulcie hadn’t said anything before, but now that David was back in her life it wouldn’t do any harm to let Wilder know about him.

  The young owner of the gramophone had a good selection of records, including ‘Whispering Grass’ and ‘A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square’, and Sally, held tightly in George’s arms when they finally managed to snatch a dance together, certainly didn’t mind the fact that the latter was being played for the third time.

  The sight of the stones in her engagement ring catching the light brought a soft smile to her lips and had her moving discreetly closer to George.

  ‘Happy?’ he asked her.

  ‘Very. It was so kind of your mother to write to me as she did, George, welcoming me to your family so warmly.’

&n
bsp; ‘She’d have done that anyway, but I know that having lost her own parents just after she and Dad were married, she’s especially aware of your own loss in that regard.’

  For once Sally was glad that George was slightly clumsy on his feet as she missed a step and he apologised as though it had been his fault.

  She had never intended actually to deceive George when she had told him that she had no family. That was, after all, what she felt and believed – and very passionately, as well. She had denied her father because she had felt that his betrayal meant that he wasn’t her father any more. Her words, though, were now having unintended consequences. George, and now his family, believed that both her parents were dead, and that wasn’t the truth. George’s mother had written the kindest of letters to her in which she had sympathised with her because of that loss. The reality, of course, was that her father was not only very much alive, but that he had remarried after her mother’s death and that she, Sally, had a half-sister who would be one year old in May.

  Sally hated deceit of any kind. It was because of deceit that she had cut herself off from her father. But how could she explain the real situation to George now? She couldn’t. They had initially exchanged family histories as colleagues and virtual strangers. There’d been no need for her to go into detail and she certainly hadn’t wanted to reveal the extent of her own hurt. It had been too raw and she had had no idea then that they would end up loving one another.

  And then there was the issue of how George’s mother might judge her – a young woman she had only heard about from the son who had fallen in love with her, and who she was having to trust would love him as any mother would want their child to be loved – if Sally were to attempt to explain her history now, and her reasons for behaving as she had.

  Logical and reasonable though her thinking was, nothing could make her feel comfortable about the situation, Sally knew. She loved George. She didn’t want there to be any secrets between them. But even now, Sally also knew that she did not want to talk about what had happened, even to George. The reality for her was that though her father was alive, to her he was no longer her father. She still believed that it would be a betrayal of everything she felt for her mother if she were to accept even within herself that she had a father and a half-sister. She was the only person now to keep loyal to her mother.

  One day, she hoped, she would be a mother herself, and when she was … When she was, would she be able to understand and accept a daughter-in-law who had deceived her own son?

  George’s teasing, ‘Are you all right? Only you are looking very fierce’ had her smiling. Surely it was true that she did not have a family any more, even if that was by her own choice? She had cut herself off from her past. Her father belonged to that past.

  SEVEN

  ‘Morning, Mrs Robbins.’

  ‘Morning, Barney,’ Olive responded with a warm smile pushing back the stray lock of hair that was being tousled by the boisterous March wind.

  She’d seen Sergeant Dawson and Barney heading for Article Row as she turned out of it. She was on her way to meet up with Audrey Windle and some of the other members of their WVS group. They were going to help out at one of the refuge centres organised by the Government to provide assistance for people made homeless by the bombing.

  She hadn’t planned to stop. Nancy’s warnings to her about her widowed status, and her own shameful thoughts – and feelings – about Sergeant Dawson had made her feel self-conscious about anyone, including Sergeant Dawson himself, thinking the wrong thing, but since Barney was virtually standing in front of her she had no choice.

  No amount of washing and ironing of his clothes on the part of Mrs Dawson had managed to tidy him up completely, Olive thought ruefully. The collar of his shirt, in contrast with the immaculate neatness of Sergeant Dawson’s shirt, was slightly crooked at one side, one sleeve of his Fair Isle pullover baggy and stretched, whilst his knees, below his grey short trousers, were distinctly grubby.

  ‘I was wondering,’ he said, eyeing her determinedly, ‘if you would mind if I was to go into your garden to see if there’s any shrapnel there?’

  Olive smiled again. Collecting shrapnel had become something of a hobby and a contest between young boys in the aftermath of the bombing.

  ‘Of course not, Barney. In fact, I’m sure that Sally would be very pleased if you were to remove any shrapnel that might be there from our veggie bed.’

  Barney’s answering brisk nod of his head was so very much in the manner of Sergeant Dawson, and so obviously copied from him, that it really touched Olive’s heart.

  ‘You go and tell Mrs Dawson that we’re on our way, will you, Barney?’ the sergeant instructed. ‘I want to have a few words with Mrs Robbins.’

  ‘He’s settled in really well,’ Olive commented when Barney nodded his head again and set off for number 1.

  ‘Yes, he has. It hasn’t all been plain sailing, though. We’ve had Nancy round every week since he came to us, and sometimes more than once a week, with some complaint or another. Her latest is that she found him in her garden. Told me that she thought he was looking to see what he could steal.’ The sergeant’s voice was grim with protective indignation. ‘I told her that he would only have been looking for shrapnel. Of course, he should have asked her first, but he’s a boy who hasn’t had anyone in his life to show him how things should be done until now. The truth is that he pretty much ran wild and did as he pleased. I keep telling Mrs Dawson that we’re going to have to be a bit stricter with him, help him to understand that rules are there for a reason, but the minute my back’s turned she’s ignoring what we’ve agreed.’

  ‘I expect she just wants him to be happy,’ Olive responded. After all, wasn’t that what all parents wanted – for their children to be happy? Happy and safe. It might be nearly a month since Valentine’s Day but things were still not back to normal between her and Tilly. Not really. Tilly hadn’t said anything but there was a distance between them that hurt, and so far Tilly had rebuffed all her attempts to bridge it.

  A sudden gust of March wind caught at Olive’s headscarf, whipping it away before she could grab hold of it. Sergeant Dawson, though, was faster, snatching it up as the wind whirled it around and handing it back to her.

  ‘I couldn’t find my Kirbigrips this morning,’ Olive told him, as she thanked him and took her scarf from him. ‘You can’t buy them any more because of the war.’

  Their hands touched briefly, Olive immediately pulling her own hand back.

  Archie Dawson’s hands were those of a man who worked hard with them: good strong hands. A true man’s hands, Olive recognised. The kind of hands that belonged to a man who would do all those things about the home that a woman couldn’t always do for herself, no matter how practically-minded and determined to be independent she might be. The kind of hands that belonged to a man who would always try to keep those he loved safe. Her Jim’s hands had gone so frail and thin in the last weeks of his life. His sickness had taken all the strength from them so that he hadn’t even been able to hold a cup to his lips. Olive had had to do that for him.

  ‘Why I wanted to have a word with you was to tell you that we’ve got the stirrup pumps at last. The best thing would be for me to bring one round, show you how it works and then leave it with you, seeing as you’re the one who’s going to be in charge of our local fire-watching group,’ he told her.

  ‘Oh, yes …’

  Of course Archie Dawson’s only reason for talking to her was to do with something official. And that was exactly what she herself wanted. What she wanted and the way things must be.

  ‘I could come round tomorrow evening after I come off duty, if that suits?’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Olive agreed.

  ‘It’s very good what you’ve done sorting out a fire-watching group for Article Row, Olive.’

  His unexpected praise pierced her guard. Before she could stop herself she heard herself telling him, ‘Nancy doesn’t think so. In fact, she disapprove
s. She told me that she didn’t think that Jim’s parents would have approved.’

  ‘That’s nonsense. For one thing, knowing how Jim’s ma felt about her house, I can’t see her not welcoming someone making an effort to make sure that Article Row is kept safe.’ He paused and then said, ‘Jim would have been proud of you, Olive.’

  ‘Would he?’ She wasn’t sure. Sometimes now Jim seemed so far away from her that she found it hard to think what he would have felt had he been here now.

  ‘Of course he would. You’ve been a wonderful mother to your Tilly and— What is it?’ he asked when Olive made a small distressed sound and shook her head.

  ‘Nothing,’ she fibbed. ‘I mustn’t keep you any longer. Mrs Dawson will be wondering where you are.’

  ‘I doubt it. She complains that I’ve kept under her feet now that she’s got Barney to look after.’

  ‘Oh dear.’ Her immediate stab of sympathy took Olive’s thought away from her own worries. ‘Is she finding Barney a bit too much?’

  ‘No, she dotes on him. I’m the one who she’s finding a bit too much. She says that I’m too hard on the lad – you know, about having a set bedtime and that kind of thing.’

  ‘All children need rules,’ Olive agreed.

  ‘I think so, but Mrs Dawson doesn’t agree with me. In fact, I’m in the doghouse right now for telling her that being so soft on Barney won’t do him any good in the long run. She’s afraid, you see, that he won’t want to stay, and she’s taken to him that much that she can’t bear the thought of him going.’

  ‘I’m sure things will work out,’ Olive offered.

  The sergeant gave her another rueful look but made no comment other than to say, ‘I’ll see you tomorrow evening. About seven?’

  Holding on to her headscarf, Olive nodded before they went their separate ways.

  EIGHT

  ‘Drew, please let me come with you when you meet up with this man who’s promised to talk to you about this gang of looters he’s involved with,’ Tilly coaxed as she snuggled up next to Drew in the fuggy beer-and-cigarette-scented warmth of their favourite Fleet Street pub, Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese.