Kate was about to say something in Emma’s defence but Diana shook her head almost imperceptibly and frowned, mouthing, “No”. She held her finger to her lips to silence her until she heard the sound of the front door slamming and was sure that Matthew had left. Emma took the opportunity to repeat her request for the bathroom.
“Yes, of course. Cecily show her will you?” Cecily nodded but as she left the study her sickly fixed smile slipped from her face. She was the housekeeper not some nippy hired to show a lowlife where the facilities were. She shot an unpleasant look at Kate before she left the room with Emma following behind. When Emma returned to the study she looked upset. Kate asked her if she was feeling better.
“I’m all right,” she said, frowning at Kate to shut her up.
“We have to sort this out,” Diana said. “I'm sorry Mr. Barton was rude to you but you have to understand how we feel.” Cecily tapped on the door and came into the room, her condescending smile back on her face. “I’m sorry to interrupt you, Madam. I wondered if there was anything you needed, a snack perhaps. It is 11 o'clock.”
“No, Cecily, thank you. And I don’t need you for the rest of today.” Cecily turned to leave the room. “Oh, and Cecily.” She turned back again, the patronising smile appearing once more. “I would appreciate your keeping anything that's been said here today to yourself. There's no need for anyone else to know. I hope I can rely on your silence on the matter.”
“Of course, Mrs. Barton. As always.” She went into the hall, shooting a hateful look at the girls. She left the study door slightly ajar so she could hear everything that passed between the three. She made sure she couldn’t be seen as she eaves-dropped on Diana’s conversation with Kate and Emma.
Cecily Little knew everything that went on in the Barton household and a prime piece of juicy gossip had just fallen into her lap. Her friends down at the Diamanté Bingo Hall would have a job topping this one.
“I’ll have to speak to Stephen and you should see a doctor, Emma, to make sure. If it's a false alarm we won't say anymore about it. You understand I must talk to Stephen. It’s not that I think you’re lying but I need to hear it from him. I'd like you to phone me and let me know what the doctor says. If my husband answers put the receiver down. If it's Cecily or me then it's OK. Will you do this, Emma?” Emma nodded, looking miserable.
“And Kate, if the pregnancy test is positive you must get Emma to tell your parents. They have a right to know and I’m sure it would worry them if they thought you were keeping something like this to yourselves.” Both girls were silent so Diana took this to be their agreement. “I’ll take you home now.” Kate and Emma gasped in unison.
“It's fine.” Kate cried. “We walked here, we can walk back.”
“'Nonsense,” Diana insisted. “Where do you live?”
“On The Smithy,” Kate answered quietly. Diana frowned. “But that’s on the other side of town. You can't walk back, especially Emma.”
She led them out of the study and into the hall. Emma looked up at the domed ceiling and marvelled at the imposing crystal chandelier. Diamond-cut prisms threw out shafts of sparkling light in all directions. She nudged Kate and pointed upwards.
“'Wait here a moment,” said Diana. “I need to find my car keys.”
As Diana left them the door to the room opposite opened and Cecily stepped into the hall. She’d had to move quickly when she realised they were about to leave so she’d hidden in an opposite room. She looked at the girls with scorn. So they lived on The Smithy, did they? Bet it’s the Sunningdale Terrace end, she thought, yet Her Ladyship was treating them like family. She’d never once treated her like that in the five years Cecily had worked for her.
She scuttled off to the kitchen to get her hat and coat. She certainly had a story to tell her friends and this thought warmed her. This would take her to the top of the pecking order, knocking old Ethel Heathcote off the top of the tree. The old bat always seemed to steal a march on her with her tales of intrigue. She won’t like that one bit, Cecily thought joyously.
“What did the housekeeper say to you, y’know, when you went to the toilet,” Kate asked Emma. Emma shook her head. “I can’t remember.” Kate frowned. “You can’t remember? Don’t be daft, Em’, of course you can remember. It was only twenty minutes ago if that. What did she say?” Before Emma answered, Diana returned. The girls followed her through the hall and out into the chilly air. Diana shivered. “Autumn’s here already. It’s getting cold now.” She shivered again, her short Chanel jacket inadequate for the change of temperature.
“Wait here. The car’s in the garage.”
Diana left the girls waiting by a large wisteria clinging to the house, covering most of the front and reaching high up to the first-floor windows. It had already lost its magnificent colour by the time the first crisp mornings of September had arrived. The lilac and pale-violet deeply scented petals had dropped to the ground from the woody stem. Gradually, velvety pods that held the seeds of a new plant replaced the abundant flowers. On the other side of the front fascia grew a yellow bell-flowered clematis that joined the clinging tendrils of wisteria over the front door’s beautifully sculpted arch. Its pendulous clusters of buds were slowly giving in to autumn leaving fluffy seed heads on the stems.
Kate and Emma stood where Diana had left them. They were spellbound by the magnificent gardens burgeoning with shrubs and bushes, and the paddock, home to the wild flowers of the meadow. They said nothing. Not a word passed between them but they both understood how incongruous they looked at Meadow's End and its surroundings. The realisation of how Stephen had used them hit them like a thunder-bolt. Tears ran down Emma’s face when she realised she would never live in a place as beautiful as this. Knowing that somewhere like this haven of beauty existed yet in the order of life was never meant for her flooded her senses with a tidal wave of sadness.
For the first time in her life Kate began to realise life was tinted in different and confusing shades of grey and not in black and white. She had often heard Joe say, “what goes around comes around” and she thought it sounded a fair way for life to be. The fact that Stephen would surely inherit the beautiful surroundings in which they now stood didn't fit the pattern. Kate felt lonelier than she’d ever felt in her life.
Diana pulled the car up in front of them and looked across to the girls. Tears pricked under her eyelids when she saw how lost they seemed. She observed Kate’s ashen face and felt troubled regarding her fate. Emma carried the child but it was Kate who carried the burden. She leant across the front passenger seat to help open the door. “Get in, girls.” Emma climbed into the back seat and as Kate was about to follow her, Diana suggested she sat in the front. “Sit here, Kate,” she said. “Emma can stretch out on the back seat.”
She glanced momentarily at Kate, wondering if she dared to ask a few questions about her and Emma. She didn’t want to push them, but she felt she had a right to know more about them. Starting the car, she pulled out slowly from the frontage, driving down the drive to the main road. “Why hasn’t Emma told your mother?” she asked Kate as gently as she could. She thought this was the most benign of questions she could ask and the best way to open the conversation. Unknown to Diana it was the most difficult question for Kate to answer.
“Mum isn't well at the moment. That’s why Emma came to me for help and not her. She was worried it would set Mum back.” Kate felt relieved that she had given a believable answer. To her ears it sounded plausible enough. Diana nodded. “She will tell her now though, before she starts to show?” Kate shrugged.
“But who'll be responsible for Emma until then? Surely not you, Kate?”
Kate began to bristle. Diana was getting too close. She was beginning to delve into things that Kate thought were of no concern to her. There wasn’t a choice. This woman with her fancy clothes, posh car and money to burn couldn't possibly understand the life she and Emma had. She could never understand, she thought. How could she? “I think you shoul
d let me worry about that. I’ll be seventeen soon. Some girls have their own babies and a husband to look after by then so it’s not so impossible. And we're not looking for handouts from you, no matter what your husband thinks. We hoped Stephen might stand by Emma but from what I've seen so far that's not going to happen, is it?” She looked pointedly at Diana.
Diana smiled inwardly. Kate impressed her. She seemed to have no doubt in her ability to provide the protection Emma and her baby needed. It was this quiet, poised air that had convinced Diana Kate was telling the truth about Stephen. In her eyes she’d seen fire, the smouldering strength of someone who had complete confidence in their own ability. Those eyes were steadily looking at her now. “I understand that, but if Emma is pregnant, she's carrying my grandchild.”
Kate sat petrified in her seat. The pulse-point in her temple started to throb and a cold wave swept over her chilling her to her heart. She just hadn't thought of it. That Diana and Matthew Barton would want to have anything to do with Emma’s baby was something that hadn't occurred to her. The conversation came to a standstill.
The scenery changed. The leafy grandeur of a middle-class suburb gave way to the more familiar scene of terraced houses on The Smithy; at first well-kept and loved, then giving way to the dingy fronts of the houses around Kate’s street. In the past she would have been ashamed to admit that this was her home but today it wasn’t important. Today she’d realised that the person who had tried to rape her would be linked with her forever with the arrival of a child.
“Are we near home, Kate?” Diana asked her, startling Kate out of her thoughts. “Yeah, yes, Sunningdale Terrace is second on the right. We live at number fifty-three.” Diana turned into their street and pulled up outside the house. The jolting of the car as it drew to a halt woke Emma who’d slept through the journey. Diana turned to Kate. “You will tell your mum and dad, won't you? They have a right to know. I'll tell Stephen I've seen you. I'm not trying to bully you and I know you're both scared but I'm worried too.” The girls remained silent. “Perhaps you could speak to your dad first, before you break the news to your mum.”
“Dad's not at home,” Emma said flatly. “Ever.” Diana sighed. She reached into the glove compartment and pressed a small card into Kate’s hand. “My telephone number is on there. Don’t forget to telephone me when you can.”
“We don’t have a telephone, Mrs. Barton.”
“Well, perhaps a telephone box, then? Would that be all right?” Kate nodded and the girls got out of the car. They stood on the pavement outside the house not wanting to go inside until Diana had driven off in case Angie decided to put in an appearance. Their polite smiles disappeared when Diana was out of sight.
“Oh, my God,” groaned Kate. “That was terrible, just terrible.”
“What are we going to do now?” asked Emma. “I thought they’d just give us some money to help with the baby. I didn’t know Stephen was going to university. He always said he wouldn't go. P’raps I should get rid of it like his dad said. It would solve everything. I don’t think I want a baby now.”
“Maybe you should have thought of that before.” Emma's eyes filled with tears. “I'm sorry, Katie. I made a mistake. A really bad one. I’ve got you, haven’t I? If I haven't got you I don't know what I'll do.”
“You've got me,” Kate answered, struggling to keep her lip from trembling, “but it’s not going to be easy.” Emma's eyes clouded over. “We don’t have to tell Mum, do we? I mean... not yet?”
“Not yet. We need time to decide what to do. If we don’t contact the Bartons again, hopefully they’ll let it rest. It’s not as if we’ve asked them for anything. We’ll just have to do what we can without their help. Come on let’s go inside. I’m freezing.”
They opened the front door and waited with bated breath for Angie to pounce on them, but there was no sign of her. She was in her usual place on the sofa, lost in her personal escape-route; her feet surrounded by empty bottles and cigarette packets. It was mid-day.
Chapter 18
“Do you want me to come with you, Jack?”
“No, Mum. Why would I want you to come with me?
“Just in case, son.”
“Just in case of what?”
“Just in case.”
Jack Daly limped into the surgery. The pain in his thigh was so excruciating it almost took his breath away. He’d hoped the pain was coming from his brooding so much. He’d watched a television programme about people suffering psychosomatic pain and he’d thought it could be the answer, but he wasn’t sure.
The crutches the hospital had lent him were in his room propped up against the wall. He’d never used them and didn’t intend to. “I don’t need them,” he’d said to Ivy and Ray when they’d suggested crutches would make life easier for him. “If I start using them now I’ll rely on them too much. I’m going to make do without them.”
A knowing look had passed between his parents but they’d remained quiet. They knew their son. He was strong-willed and determined and it wasn’t worth an argument. Jack winced as he sat in the surgery chair.
“How’s it going, Jack? Any improvement?”
“Yes,” he lied. “A slight improvement, Doc’. It seems to be getting easier.”
“Really,” said the doctor frowning. “I saw your mother the other day. She said you weren’t bothering with your crutches. Is there a reason for that?”
“I don’t need them, Doctor,” he said. “I can manage all right without them.”
The doctor walked slowly round his desk and leant against it directly in front of Jack. He didn’t believe Jack when he said his leg was improving. He knew there was a hidden agenda. Jack wanted to get back to his regiment and would lie if he thought it would make a difference. He understood him. Jack was used to being fit and active and was finding it hard to adjust.
Jack looked into the doctor’s face, his eyes full of hope. “Well, Doc’?” What’s the verdict? When are you going to let me go back to my mates?”
“It’s not good, Jack. Your leg has certainly healed to a degree but the break was so bad it’s weakened the bone. You also have a lot of soft tissue damage that hasn't healed very well. I can see you’re in a lot of pain so let’s put our cards on the table. You won’t be going back to your regiment, at least not in the near future. When I write my report I’m going to have to recommend you stay on sick-leave. Your regimental medical unit will want to see you to get their own perspective on things but for you to go back now...it’s a no-no I’m afraid.”
Jack was sick at heart. This was the news he’d been dreading. He loved the army life, the work; the camaraderie; the fun, everything he’d experienced since joining up when he was eighteen. He couldn’t imagine life without it. He smiled nervously. “But it’s not permanent, eh, Doc’? It will mend properly won’t it, eventually?”
“I can’t say right now, son,” the doctor replied. “I just can’t say.”
Chapter 19
“D’you think he’ll be all right? At the factory I mean?
“Why wouldn’t he be?”
“It’s not what he wanted, Ray.”
“That’s life, Ivy. We don’t always get what we want, darlin’.”
Ivy Daly bustled about in her kitchen making sandwiches and flasks of hot soup for Ray and Jack’s lunch. She carefully cut the ham from the bone, making sure they each got an equal amount of the sticky white fat and brown rind surrounding the lean meat. Sandwiching it between four thick slices of bread she smiled to herself. Feeding people made her happy. There was nothing that could give her greater pleasure than placing a hot, steaming bowl in front of them, filled to the brim with neck-of-lamb stew accompanied by huge fluffy dumplings. She looked up still smiling when Jack came into the kitchen.
“Morning, Jack. Ready for your first day?”
“I'm a bit nervous. I don’t know how I’ll fit in with this new life of mine, Mum.” Ivy lowered herself down onto the chair next to him. “You’ll be all right, lad. Y
our dad’ll see to that. You were very lucky to get a job at Butterfields. It was only a few months ago they were planning lay-offs. Then they got that big order from abroad and well, it saved the company. Your dad says they’re a progressive company, whatever that means. I don’t hold any truck with these new fangled terms. Don’t understand ‘em. After all the worry about it going under it looks as if they’re finally going places. Mind you it’ll never be the same as when the old man had it, you know, James Butterfield. He was a good ‘un, but you know what they say about new brooms sweeping clean, don’t you? Sometimes they sweep something out that should‘ve stayed in, and when that new lot got in they changed everything and it went down-hill from there. Seems like they’ve come to their senses at last. Seen the light so to speak. It probably won’t change much for your dad but it could mean a proper career for you if you play your cards right and keep your nose clean.” Jack laughed. “And me fingers crossed with one hand tied behind me back, and as long as I don’t put my new shoes on the table and make sure that I pull all the hair-pins out of me hair when it thunders and lightnings...” he took a deep breath, grinning. She got up laughing and shoved his shoulder playfully. “Oh, you. You're always taking the rise out of me...just like you did before you left your mum and went into the army,” she said wistfully. “Your dad and me missed all that while you were away, Jack. The house seemed so quiet without you. Even our Lisa said the house had lost its laughter and it was true. And I lost my laughter and so did your dad and I know you won’t like me saying it because I know how hurt you’ve been but... I’m glad you’re home, son. I really am.
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