Alice threw back her head, laughed briefly, and then, smiling, apologised. She herself had been raised by a mother whose monarch had been Queen Victoria, and the values of family and fidelity had been firmly instilled into her. But her own experiences over the past two years, together with those she had witnessed amongst the girls in her care, had widened her values and softened her judgement.
‘Of course you’re old enough, Georgie, and quite possibly wise enough, too.’ She looked into the solemn face and the level, grey eyes which, in fact revealed very little beyond Georgina’s obvious health and intelligence. ‘But I’d hate you to be unhappy. I’m not old enough to be your mother but if I was I’m pretty sure I’d trust you not to get hurt – or to hurt anyone else for that matter.’
‘But Christopher… Is he hurt, d’you think?’
‘How long is it since you’ve seen him?’
‘Ages. Six months at least. Lionel and I rode up to the woodsman’s hut at Christmas. Christopher looked incredibly well and he was very sweet. But I could tell he still wants things on his terms. He doesn’t approve of my flying. He can’t understand how I can bear to have anything to do with the war. He seems to be saying, “You know how I feel and you know where I am if you want me.”’
‘But you don’t want him,’ Alice said. ‘Not now, at any rate.’ Georgina stared at the floor. There was a pause before she met the warden’s eyes.
‘No,’ she said, adding, almost apologetically, ‘I want Fitzy now.’ Before Alice could comment she continued. ‘The idea is that we go to the cottage.’
‘What cottage?’
Georgina described to Alice the small cottage the Webster family owned on the North Devon coast.
‘Li and I used to be taken there for summer holidays when we were kids. We adored it. It’s totally isolated on a wild, pebbly beach. Oil lamps and driftwood fires and everything. I thought I’d take Fitzy there… He doesn’t know yet. Perhaps the idea won’t appeal to him.’ Alice resisted the temptation to say that she thought it most unlikely that the idea of a weekend with Georgina in such idyllic surroundings would not appeal to him and confined herself to making Georgina promise never to do anything she did not want to do.
‘Of course I won’t!’ Georgina responded in surprise.
‘No,’ Alice agreed, smiling, ‘of course you won’t! And when is all this going to happen?’
‘Heaven knows! We’ve both put in for leave. Whether we’ll get it and whether the dates will coincide is in the lap of the gods!’
An urgent tap on the closed door to Alice’s room interrupted them.
‘Gwennan’s put the prong of an ’ay fork clean through ’er foot,’ Rose announced. ‘Mr Jack’s brung her back in the truck and she’s to go to Ledburton straight off so the doctor can give ’er an injection for the lockjaw. One of us is to go with ’er, Mr Bayliss says. Shall I go or will you?’
It was on 9th July, the day that Caen was finally captured by the Allies, who began at once to make better headway into France, that Reuben was found and Hester’s macabre conviction proved to be accurate.
His body was discovered in shallow water some miles along the coast from the place on Omaha Beach where his unit had disembarked. This, together with evidence provided by the wound that killed him, indicated that he had been struck by shrapnel as he waded ashore and had barely set foot on French soil.
This news – that part of it that was considered suitable for her to hear – had little effect on Hester, who, they all now realised, had been grieving for Reuben since D-Day. She continued to move through the routine of her life, her face blank and her body still showing no sign of her four-month pregnancy.
A letter came from Reuben’s parents assuring her that despite their loss she would be warmly welcomed into their family and that her baby would be raised alongside its cousins. A United States army widow’s pension began to arrive and Hester was visited by the chaplain, who had married her to Reuben six months previously. He told her that as her case was now prioritised, she should prepare for her imminent departure for Bismarck, North Dakota.
Reuben’s mother, whose name was Bette, wrote to her daughter-in-law, enclosing half a dozen snapshots of the Westerfelt family, ‘so you can get to know us, dear.’ Hester spread the photographs on her bedspread and stared at the unfamiliar faces. A woman who had been Reuben’s mother. A man who had been his father. Two young men, one of whom looked eerily like a younger version of Reuben, but was not Reuben.
Hester’s parents had been informed of their son-in-law’s death but had failed to contact their daughter. The land girls were outraged by this.
‘Call themselves Christians!’ Marion had fumed over cocoa, one night.
‘But they aren’t Christians, see?’ Gwennan snapped. ‘They’re these Pentecostal things! Not proper Christians at all!’ Alice warned them to keep their voices down in case Hester overheard them.
‘She knows, though, Mrs Todd,’ Gwennan continued, more quietly. ‘She knows what they think of her. Cast off, that’s what she’s been, poor kid!’
‘I don’t think Hes wants to go to America,’ Mabel said hesitantly, and Winnie and Marion turned on her in astonishment.
‘What? Not want to go and live in America with Reuben’s folk! ’Course she does!’
‘Anyhow, what would you know, Mabel?’ Gwennan snarled. Mabel blushed and stammered, unable to articulate her opinion in the face of such scorn.
‘Why d’you say that, Mabel?’ Alice asked more gently.
‘’Cos of how she looks when she thinks about it,’ Mabel mumbled.
‘And how do you know when she’s thinking about it?’
‘You can tell,’ Mabel said, ‘by ’er face.’
‘Daft as a brush, you are, Mabel Hodges!’ Gwennan said dismissively.
‘Well, I reckon she’s got no choice,’ Rose announced firmly, her hard Devonian voice cutting through the murmured comments of the girls, most of whom seemed unconvinced by Mabel’s theory. ‘She’s got nowhere else to go and, fond as I am of the poor child, I haven’t the room in my cottage, not when my Dave comes home, I haven’t.’ Rose was well aware of possible complications if Dave, still at least half in love with Hester, was to return from France to find a young widow, available, yes, but pregnant with another man’s child. Next thing Dave’d be saddled with bringing up Reuben’s baby! Not that Rose had anything against Reuben, of course. But it was not what she had in mind for Dave. Not what she had in mind at all. ‘And the sooner she goes the better, if you ask me. So she’s nicely settled in America by the time the baby comes.’ Rose’s tone suggested that the subject was now closed.
When, one afternoon, a cart arrived at the farmhouse gate and a gaunt man descended, dressed in black and wearing on his head something that resembled the stove-pipe hats of the 1890s, Alice guessed at once that he was Hester’s father.
‘I be ’ere to see my daughter,’ he announced when Alice approached the porch to meet him. It was a hot day and the doors at each end of the cross-passage were standing open, allowing what breeze there was to move through the building.
Jonas Tucker was a tall, emaciated man, whose crumpled clothes hung on him, giving him the appearance of a scarecrow. Baleful eyes were burning in a face that was lined and furrowed into a mask of disapproval. His skin had a curious greyish tinge to it and was darkened by several days’ growth of beard. He had removed his hat and as he stood with it clutched in his huge, bony hands, he seemed to quake with a barely controlled anger.
Alice knew of Hester’s background and her strict upbringing at the hands of her father, a minister in a small religious sect based in Cornwall and known as the Pentecostal Brotherhood. She had once briefly encountered Ezekial, Hester’s young brother, when, visiting his sister, he had caught her wearing a borrowed frock and reported to her father that she had loosened her hair and was being led into temptation by the land girls.
Alice was immediately shocked by the appearance and bearing of this man and her
initial instinct was to protect Hester from him. But she knew she could not deny him access to his daughter and led him into the empty recreation room, told him she would fetch Hester and warned him that he would find her in a fragile state because of her pregnancy and her grief over her husband’s death.
‘Her wretchedness is deserved,’ he said suddenly and so harshly that Alice gasped in surprise. ‘She has disobeyed the laws of her Church,’ he continued, his face contorted with anger, ‘and betrayed her family. She has sinned against Almighty God and must bear his wrath. This is the word of the Lord. Now, fetch my daughter to me.’
Had Alice not already implied that Hester was somewhere close at hand she could have lied, telling the man that he was too late and that his daughter was already on her way to America. With little time to consider what to do, she decided to pretend to go to fetch Hester but instead of delivering her to her father, to ask Rose to conceal her somewhere and tell him his daughter could not be found. But Hester had seen the arrival of the cart from the window of Rose’s cottage and knew who was waiting for her in the farmhouse. She had crossed the yard and at that moment appeared silently in the doorway of the recreation room. Sensing that she was there, Jonas Tucker turned slowly to face her.
‘Leave us,’ he said to Alice. But Alice stood her ground, placing herself between the man and his daughter and was relieved to catch a glimpse of Rose behind Hester, in the gloom of the cross-passage.
‘So this is how it is,’ Jonas Tucker said, aware of the presence of the two women. ‘Well, daughter. I reckon you ’eard what I just said but I will repeat it for you!’ He raised his voice, adopting the strident tone he used when addressing the small, cowering congregation in the dank chapel where he preached. ‘I told ’ee that you’m cursed! And because you’m cursed your ’usband was cursed and the child ye be carryin’ be cursed along with all those who do consort with ’ee! Thou art in cohorts with Lucifer himself and shall be consigned to the everlasting fires of Hell!’ The quiet air shuddered and both Rose and Alice were momentarily stunned by his outburst. Then, as if at a given signal, both women moved. Rose, reaching round the open door, caught Hester by the wrist and dragged her out into the cross-passage. Like a rag doll, pulled almost off her feet, her free arm flailing, her eyes still locked onto her father’s, Hester was drawn from the room while Alice took a step closer to Jonas and jabbed a forefinger into his chest.
Afterwards, she recalled feeling the hard bone of his sternum against her hand and hearing Rose slam and lock the door to the kitchen.
‘If you are not out of this building in one minute I’ll have you thrown out!’ she heard herself say. ‘Mrs Crocker is fetching the farmhands! Now, do as I say!’ There were no farmhands at Lower Post Stone Farm that day and, even had there been, the maimed Ferdie and the aging Jack would not have had much effect on Jonas had he resisted them. In her own ears, Alice’s voice sounded thin, but for his own reasons, Jonas, having succeeded in causing the damage he had intended, chose to obey her.
‘Aye!’ he shouted. ‘The likes of you aluss ’as lackeys to defend you! But the good Lord knows where virtue lies and it bain’t under this roof, that’s for certain sure!’
‘Jack!’ Alice shouted, bluffing. ‘Mr Vallance! In here, please! Quickly!’ Jonas turned, appeared to lose his balance, collided with the door jamb and, muttering curses, stumbled through the cross-passage and out into the blinding daylight. Here he appeared to trip, and Alice was surprised to see him sprawl, headlong, onto the cobbled path. He scrambled to his feet, turned to face the farmhouse and hurled a final curse, spittle and blood from a cut lip running down his quivering chin.
Hester sat on her bed in Rose’s cottage and, despite the ministrations of both women, didn’t speak for several hours. They brought her first strong tea and then beef broth but she would not drink. Eventually she spoke.
‘I’m all right,’ she said, becoming aware of their concern for her. ‘I know all that, see. He didn’t need to come here to say it to me. ’Cos I know it. ’Bout being cursed an’ all.’
‘You bain’t cursed, Hester!’ Rose protested. ‘What would you be cursed for? You’m a good girl what’s never done no harm to no one! You was a good wife to your Reuben and you’ll make a good mother to his child.’ But Hester shook her head.
‘’Tis too late for us, Rose. Reuben’s already paid the price. Next it will be me and then the little one.’ She looked from one uncomprehending face to the other and then she said, ‘I think I’ll go to sleep now.’ Alice and Rose watched as she took off her clothes, pulled her nightshirt on over her head and got into her bed.
‘But ’tis on’y five o’clock, Hester,’ Rose protested, knowing that Hester was barely hearing her, ‘and you ‘bain’t ’ad no supper, my lover!’ But the girl had turned onto her side and closed her eyes.
‘She’m not like the rest of us, that one,’ Rose said, as she and Alice crossed the yard and went into the farmhouse. ‘She knows things, that girl. And it bain’t healthy.’
Chapter Seven
While morale at Lower Post Stone Farm had been sobered by Reuben’s death, another situation, caused by the Allies invasion of France, had threatened to suppress the girls’ spirits. Marion and Winnie in particular were dismayed when the thousands of young servicemen who had been training for the invasion and had, during that time, paid constant and welcome attention to them, were suddenly gone, shipped or flown across the channel to do what they had been prepared for. There was, however, a surprising amount of coming and going between the South of England and the North of France, and this proved to be enough to keep up the flow of nylons, chewing gum and chocolate with which, by selling it on to other girls, Marion and Winnie subsidised their incomes, so that the savings in their Post Office book continued, albeit at a slower rate, to grow.
Encouraging news of the war was arriving every day. Roger Bayliss and Alice raised their glasses to each other when the Russian army broke through the Mannerheim Line and captured Minsk, and Margery Brewster arrived a couple of weeks later with a bottle of gin and an unshakeable determination to celebrate the news that the Americans had taken Guam from the Japanese. The hostel rang with cheers when, in mid-July – when the Post Stone girls were busy with the second cutting of hay – it was announced that an attempt had been made on Hitler’s life.
‘’Ow come they never finished ’im off, though?’ Mabel wailed. ‘Whatever was they thinkin’ of?’
On the following Friday evening, Edward John, home from his weekly boarding school, brought with him a note from his headmaster.
‘Whatever possessed you?’ his mother demanded, the headmaster’s letter shaking in her hand. Edward John had used his penknife to inscribe the name HITLER into the gleaming surface of the Bechstein piano which dominated the school’s music room. Now, faced with his mother’s anger, he was initially surprised by it.
‘Because I hate Hitler, of course,’ he explained. ‘Don’t you hate him?’
‘Yes, I do! But what has that to do with the school piano?’
‘It’s a Bechstein!’ he said, as though the answer to her question was obvious. ‘It’s a German piano!’
‘Oh, Edward John…’ Alice sighed. She could see the logic of his action and understood that it had been a misguided protest rather than the act of vandalism it had initially appeared to be. ‘So would you like to see all the musical instruments and all the books and all the paintings and the sculptures – many of which are scattered all over the world to places where they are valued and loved – destroyed, just because they happen to come from Germany? And what about the plays and the operas and the music? Beethoven was a German, for heaven’s sake!’ For a moment she thought he was going to defend himself, so she pressed on. ‘I’m ashamed of you, Edward John! Whatever you think of the Germans you have absolutely no right to damage other people’s property. You will write a letter of apology to your headmaster and when we know the cost of repairing the piano you shall pay for it out of your pocket money.
’
It was Edward John’s Uncle Richard who met the bill. In his letter to Alice, in which he enclosed a cheque for five pounds, he seemed more inclined to sympathise with his nephew than to admonish him. These last few years, he wrote, have possibly had more effect on him than you think. He’s a sensitive lad, Alice, and, if I may say so without incurring your wrath, I think you should go easy on him. Alice had bristled slightly but after some thought decided that Richard, for all his lack of experience with young children, was probably right.
‘You wouldn’t think,’ Rose said a few days later, with the cup of strong, sweet tea that Alice had made for her, between her shaking hands, ‘that a lad in the Catering Corps would get wounded, would you? And here’s me thinking he was safe, peelin’ spuds in some army kitchen or other and there’s he with a lump of shrapnel in ’is leg!’
In fact, Rose’s Dave, driving supplies to a field canteen in Normandy, had been, and not for the first time, closer to enemy action than many of the battalions of foot soldiers it was his job to feed.
The lorry he was driving along an isolated country road had been strafed by a Messerschmitt and his passenger, a young conscript who had arrived only that morning from a training camp in Hampshire, had died instantly.
Dave, in shock and bleeding heavily, had continued for several miles before arriving, with the dead boy slumped beside him, at a US army checkpoint.
‘’E was took to a field hospital first off,’ his mother told Alice, having been given all the facts by Roger Bayliss, who had telephoned a spokesman for Dave’s unit. ‘And then they brung him home ’cos he has to have an operation, see, for to get out the shrapnel.’ She showed Alice the piece of paper with the address of an army hospital near Portsmouth. ‘I’ve got a cousin lives down that way so I shall go stay with her and visit Dave. You’ll be all right with Hester to help you. Jack’s fetching me to the station first thing in the morning. I’m going to do some cooking now, so I can take Dave plenty of nourishin’ food on account of I don’t reckon they’ll be feedin’ him proper in that hospital.’
The Girl at the Farmhouse Gate Page 14