A Wartime Friend

by Lizzie Lane

  As he munched on his sandwich and drank tea flavoured with condensed milk, he mused over Mrs Crow and the dismayed look on Meg’s face. He grinned salaciously, thinking himself quite the man, the hero of the hour who would avenge any slight from Mrs Crow. If he had happened to look in the mirror, he would have seen that his reflection was hardly the stuff dreamboats are made of. But it wasn’t what she wanted that concerned him, it was what he wanted, and what he wanted he always set out to get.

  ‘Meg, my girl. I’m here for you.’

  As for Mrs Crow, she ought to be taught a lesson. And you, my son, are the one to teach her, he thought as he chewed. He considered how best to upset the old bitch. What was her passion, the thing she loved above all others?

  Dahlias! There you are, he thought to himself. You do the same as you did in the past, me old china! It was a pound to a penny that she probably still did grow dahlias, as keen to win the cup she’d won every year since time immemorial. He’d trample them into the ground just as he had before. Imagine her face! He chuckled at the thought of it.

  He spent the afternoon sleeping and stealthily walking from one room to another, down the stairs, up the stairs, a cigarette hanging from his mouth. Each cigarette stub was saved and broken apart to remake a fresh one. It wasn’t ideal but it was all he had until he got back to London.

  As darkness fell, he took the remains of the corned beef, some more bread and a cup upstairs. The one thing he was careful about was hiding his tracks, just in case some nosy bugger peered through the window. Nothing had changed since his mother’s death, everything was in its proper place.

  Slowly the darkness invaded every corner of the attic room until the moon came out from behind a bank of clouds and silvered the blackout with its chill white light. Good enough for me, Bert thought to himself. His plans were made.

  It was close to midnight when he made his way down the stairs into the kitchen. Standing by the back door, he breathed heavily like a greyhound at the White City, panting to be chasing the hare. He waited until the time was right. The clock in the church tower struck at the same time as the moon retreated behind a cloud. Keeping close to walls, bushes and trees, he moved swiftly out through the back gate, along the little-used path that ran between Malago Brook and the rear walls of a whole terrace of cottage gardens.

  Mrs Crow’s cottage was detached and stood in its own generous gardens. It was said in the village that you could smell her garden before setting eyes on it. She grew all kinds of flowers, most of them heavily scented, the dahlias being an exception, though like everyone else in the village, nowadays she grew more vegetables than flowers. But she still grew flowers. He was sure of it.

  A shaft of moonlight struck the back wall of the garden he sought. He recalled there being a trelliswork arch over the back gate thickly covered with some kind of climbing plant. Keeping low behind a ramshackle shed with hoes and garden rakes hanging from its sides, he narrowed his eyes. The moon served him well. The trelliswork arch was right in front of him, picked out by moonlight and throwing a shadow on the back wall.

  Darkness fell like a blanket as he inched forward, carefully holding the hinges of the gate to stop them from squeaking. If he remembered rightly, Mrs Crow’s beloved flowers were on the right-hand side of the uneven garden path. This was it, he thought joyfully as his feet sank into the earth. This is where she grows her pride and joy. Silently and quickly he began to trample the unseen plants into the earth, kicking and jumping on each and every leaf that brushed his legs. Given the chance, he might willingly have gone all over the garden until every single plant was laid low. As it was he had no wish to be discovered. Mrs Crow wouldn’t know who’d destroyed her plants and in consequence, she would be beside herself and the village would be up in arms.

  Back home he took off his boots at the back gate and scraped the mud off into the water butt, the mud falling beneath the fly-speckled water. Nobody would be any the wiser as to who had paid a nocturnal visit to Mrs Crow’s garden. He had covered his tracks well. Up in the attic he lit a cigarette, smiling at the thought of what he had done and imagining how that old cow would react. The village too. Smug vicar. Officious policeman. Pompous Mr Puller, the air-raid warden. He bore grudges towards all of them and taking revenge brought delicious thoughts to mind. They all deserved some of the same treatment, acts of revenge by person or persons unseen. In the absence of anyone else, they’d turn upon each other.

  Bert swelled with pride. Yes. That’s what he would do. It was the best ruse he’d ever had and what’s more, he would enjoy doing it. Just for a few weeks until he judged it safe to return to London. But first, he wanted a close encounter with the lovely Meg, though to do that he had to get rid of the dog. He had to get her alone.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Meg sniffed the air and closed her eyes. The smell of the two plum cakes she’d just taken from the oven was quite delicious. Normally she would only make one for consumption by herself and Lily. Today she had baked two and for very good reason. Although identical, Meg knew there were more plums in one than the other. The one with the most plums in was for Mrs Crow by way of a peace offering.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she’d said to her when they’d met head on in the street yesterday. ‘I really hadn’t noticed that Lily picked your flowers. And anyway, they were growing on the verge outside your garden wall. I didn’t know they were yours …’

  The way Mrs Crow pursed her lips was akin to sucking on a lemon. Her words were sharp as needles. ‘That’s the trouble with people like you from the city. You know nothing about folk like us and the way things are done round ’ere.’

  ‘I really am sorry, Mrs Crow. I didn’t notice her picking them. She always used to like making daisy chains in our garden in London.’

  ‘They are marguerites, not daisies. And they weren’t growing in your garden in London. They were growing in mine.’ Mrs Crow jerked her chin disapprovingly at the chain of flowers Meg had thought were wild moon daisies hanging around Rudy’s neck.

  ‘I didn’t realise the flowers growing outside your garden wall were yours. I’m sorry,’ Meg repeated. ‘I promise she won’t do it again.’

  Lily had looked from her mother to the po-faced woman berating her about the lovely necklace she’d made for her dog.

  Mrs Crow heaved her awesome breast, her nostrils flaring like a mettlesome horse. ‘Most people in the village have dug up their flowers, gone over to growing vegetables to eke out their rations. I am one of the few people in the village still growing enough flowers for the bereaved to place on the graves of their loved ones and to decorate the church to the glory of God. I’m sure you can see my point given your own recent tragedy.’

  Meg had felt her face burning. She really hadn’t noticed what Lily was doing, absorbed as she often was nowadays with wondering if Ray really was dead and, if so, was he at the bottom of the sea or blown to bits? ‘I’m sorry,’ she’d said again.

  A curt nod and the confrontation was over. Mrs Crow moved on.

  She couldn’t help wondering about her husband, just in case he was found alive and well. It was a forlorn hope, but all she had. Every day she watched the postman making his way around the postboxes of the cottages bordering the village green, hoping and praying that he would stop at Bluebell Cottage and hand her a letter saying that a mistake had been made; that Ray was alive and a prisoner of war. Waiting for years for him to come home would be preferable to the prospect of living a life without him by her side.

  ‘You must not pick Mrs Crow’s flowers again,’ Meg said to Lily. ‘Do you understand?’

  The girl nodded solemnly.

  ‘Promise?’

  ‘I promise,’ she said.

  Meg was thankful that she’d replied in English. While Lily doted on the dog and rarely drew houses with flames coming out of their roofs – a fact Meg was extremely grateful for – as she began to emerge from her shell, she sometimes reverted to German, as though her English had got a little lost along the way.
Deep down, Meg feared her speaking in German. She worried that if she remembered more German, she might also remember something of her family. If she did so, then they could be traced and Lily would be lost to her. It was a selfish notion but she couldn’t help it.

  Following the altercation, Meg had felt obliged to make amends for Lily picking her flowers. She felt guilty, given Mrs Crow’s reason for still growing them when everyone else had turned their gardens over to the growing of vegetables.

  As it was Saturday, there was no school. ‘Come on,’ she said to Lily. ‘Let’s take this lovely cake to Mrs Crow, shall we?’ After wrapping the cake in a clean tea towel, she placed it in a basket. ‘Rudy can stay here,’ she said, as Lily picked up his leash.

  Two sets of soulful eyes looked up at her accusingly, one pair brown, the other blue. Meg sighed. ‘We’re taking a cake to an old lady. It would be better if we leave Rudy here.’

  Lily’s bottom lip quivered; Rudy whimpered. The two pairs of eyes continued to gaze at her imploringly.

  Meg knew when she was beaten. She sighed but said firmly. ‘All right. You win. But no picking flowers. Understood? As for you,’ she said, turning to Rudy. ‘You will stay at the garden gate until I’ve done what I have to do. Is that clear?’

  Rudy wagged his tail. Lily smiled.

  It wasn’t unusual to see PC Carter’s bicycle outside Mrs Crow’s cottage, so Meg thought nothing of it but sauntered up to the door, the basket containing the plum cake banging against her hip. People dropped in on each other all the time. Lily and Rudy followed behind her, the dog’s leash wound tightly around Lily’s fragile hand.

  Meg turned at the front door and pointed at the dog. ‘Sit!’ Rudy sat down, his ears up, eyes alert. ‘Lily. Put the lead down and come with me.’

  Lily glanced over her shoulder.

  Meg noticed her pensive look. ‘Rudy will still be there when we get back. Now come on,’ she insisted.

  Lily patted the dog on the head and gave him a hug. ‘We’ll be back soon. Be a good boy.’

  Meg felt something shift inside. More words, though she had to admit that Lily spoke more to the dog than she did to humans. But that didn’t matter. Lily was coming out of herself and the world felt a more beautiful place. Rudy wagged his tail.

  The front door to Japonica Cottage was open. Not quite used yet to the ways of the village, Meg paused at the door, reluctant to enter until properly invited. ‘Hello? Is anyone there?’ She pushed the door open gently. The smell of beeswax and the sweetness of late-flowering roses wafted outwards from the interior.

  ‘Come in, whoever you are!’ The voice was brusque. Definitely Mrs Crow.

  A wave of warmth came from the cast-iron range sitting in the old inglenook fireplace. A series of sepia-tinted photographs sat above it on the solid oak mantelpiece. Meg presumed them to be family photographs: young men in uniform, women in leg-of-mutton sleeves and high tight collars. Two cats lay on separate cushions on a window seat, their tails lashing, their eyes staring at the strangers as though hostile at having their privacy invaded.

  Mrs Crow was slumped in a chair, her hand over her eyes. She was sobbing silently. PC Carter was standing over her, a reassuring hand on her shoulder. ‘There, there,’ he soothed.

  Mrs Crow’s head jerked upwards, her face creased with dismay. ‘Never mind “there, there”. All my plants ruined. And done deliberately!’ A finger as gnarled as an old twig pointed towards the open back door. ‘Trampled. The whole lot’s been trampled.’

  ‘We don’t know that for sure … It might have been cows or sheep.’

  ‘It weren’t no cows or sheep!’ Mrs Crow cried. ‘Did you see any hoofmarks? No, you did not!’

  Mrs Crow’s splinter-bright eyes spotted Meg standing at the door and one side of Lily peering out behind from behind her hip. ‘If you’ve come to sympathise, don’t bother, and if you want flowers there aren’t any. Not many vegetables either.’ Her tone was less than welcoming.

  Meg was taken aback. ‘Has something happened?’ She looked at the policeman for explanation.

  Carter took off his helmet and wiped his brow. ‘Mrs Crow’s prize dahlias have been trampled into the ground.’

  ‘Not just my dahlias. Everything! Delphiniums, lupins … Everything, even my vegetables.’

  ‘That’s terrible,’ said Meg. ‘Who would do such a thing?’

  ‘Who indeed!’ Mrs Crow’s eyes blazed with indignation, so much so that for a moment Meg felt that she was suspected of the dastardly crime.

  Swiftly realising that wasn’t the case, she gathered her thoughts in order to say the right thing. ‘It seems very odd that someone would trample the vegetables. A thief would have taken vegetables, surely, unless he wasn’t hungry or had no one he could sell them to.’

  Carter frowned as he nodded. ‘My thinking exactly.’

  ‘Jealousy,’ snarled Mrs Crow, her eyes glittering. ‘That’s what it is. Do you know how many years Fred Grimes has been pushed into second place with his dahlias? Twenty years. Twenty years! He couldn’t beat me so he’s finally lost his mind and decided to destroy me!’

  ‘Now, now,’ said PC Carter, his tone as long suffering as his expression. ‘You can’t say that for sure, Mrs Crow. There’s no evidence. Besides, old Fred’s pins are a bit dodgy. I can’t see him doing anything like that.’

  Mrs Crow was like a dog with a bone. ‘It was him. It has to be him!’ She’d decided Fred Grimes was the culprit, and until somebody proved otherwise, that was the way it would stay.

  PC Carter sighed. He had been village policeman long enough to know that the peaceful idyll was not always what it should be. There were rivalries over matters city folk would consider too trivial to pursue. Winning prizes at the annual horticultural show was small fry to them but red meat to the likes of Mrs Crow and Fred Grimes.

  He was determined to wrap this up as quickly as possible. His feet ached in the new boots he was presently breaking in, and he was desperate for a cup of tea and a visit to the bathroom. With that at the top of his agenda, he straightened his helmet and got ready to leave. Normally he’d get a cup of tea for his trouble, but Mrs Crow was in no mood for making anyone tea. He wasn’t likely to get another cup at Japonica Cottage until the whole case of the downtrodden dahlias was put to bed.

  His attention shifted to Meg, who was nice to look at and more amenable to deal with. He would have liked to thank her again for the rabbit stew the other night, but didn’t dare do that in front of Mrs Crow or the news would fly around the village. ‘Was it me you came to see, Mrs Malin?’ He eyed her hopefully.

  Meg shook her head. ‘No. I came to see Mrs Crow.’ She attempted a smile as she raised her basket. ‘I’ve brought a peace offering,’ she said to the old lady.

  Mrs Crow eyed her quizzically, a deep frown wrinkling her tanned forehead. PC Carter lingered, keen to know what this was all about. Mrs Crow noticed and instantly gave him a piercing look. ‘I expect you’ve got things to do.’

  Carter recognised he was being dismissed, and Mrs Crow wasn’t the sort you got into arguments with. Clearing his throat, he got to his feet, his knees cricking as he did so. ‘I’ll be off then.’

  ‘Yes,’ snapped Mrs Crow. ‘You be off then. We’ve already agreed on that.’

  The policeman eased himself past Meg and her daughter, smiling at Meg and patting Lily on the head. ‘No doubt I’ll be seeing you around, Mrs Malin. Anything you want, I’m always around.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Meg returned the smile, noting that he’d called her Mrs Malin in Mrs Crow’s presence whereas over dinner she’d been Meg.

  Whistling nonchalantly, he strode off down the garden path and into the high street. After a few yards he remembered he’d left his bicycle, came back and collected it.

  Meg summoned up all her courage and turned round to face Mrs Crow. ‘I’ve brought you a plum cake. It’s freshly baked.’ She tried not to sound nervous.

  A pair of deep-set eyes narrowed to glass chips and looked
at her sharply. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because of Lily picking the flowers … To say we’re sorry …’

  The moment the words were out of her mouth, Meg realised they could be easily misunderstood and instantly regretted them. ‘I mean, the other day. Not this. Certainly not this. It wasn’t her that trampled your flowers. I mean, she only picked the ones outside on the verge. She wouldn’t go into your garden without being invited and certainly not overnight. Honestly she wouldn’t.’

  Mrs Crow made a huffing noise that sounded as though it could be disbelief, then shook her head. ‘I am not stupid, Mrs Malin. Somebody wearing big boots destroyed my flowers, not some dainty little thing like her.’ She waved her hand dismissively at Lily, then suddenly jerked her head forward and addressed the little girl directly. ‘You like flowers, child. You wouldn’t step on them, would you.’ It was a statement, not a question.

  Lily’s eyes widened as she shook her head.

  ‘No, she wouldn’t,’ Meg added emphatically. ‘But she did pick your flowers without asking permission. That’s why I baked you this cake.’ She placed her basket on the kitchen table, pulled back the tea towel and took out the plum cake.

  Mrs Crow sat back in her chair, produced a lace-edged handkerchief from her pocket and blew her nose. ‘Push the kettle back on to the hob. I could do with a cup of tea and a piece of cake. The cups and saucers are over there on the dresser. Let’s see how good a cake maker you are.’

  Meg crossed the flagstoned floor to where an oak dresser took up almost the whole wall. A range of mismatched china of every description hung from hooks or stood upright, propped against the wooden slats at the back. The teapot was hidden beneath a knitted cosy. The cups were blue-striped Cornish, thick and serviceable.

  Meg made the tea and placed the pot, a cup and saucer, sugar and milk on to a tray along with a slice of cake on a matching plate. She wouldn’t dare pour a cup for herself or slice a piece of the cake, and anyway she didn’t particularly want to. She’d made amends and that would do.