Daughters of the Mersey

by Anne Baker

  It was a week later that she received a letter from Ralph’s commanding officer. She stuffed it into her pocket to read later when she was alone, but all afternoon she was torn with curiosity about what it would tell her. She tore it open in the sluice to peep at it.

  Your husband was a valuable member of my team and very popular with his fellow officers.

  When another nurse came in she slid it back into her pocket, it appeared to be no more than a letter of condolence, but that evening in her bedroom she found she was wrong. He told her how Ralph had died.

  It seemed a lone plane had flown over the city and without warning it had strafed the military establishments with machine-gun fire. It had never happened before and had not been thought to be a danger, but in times of war such attacks did happen.

  Lieutenant Ralph Harvey and another officer were unfortunately crossing the open compound that divided the buildings making up battalion headquarters at the time, and had been unable to find cover. Lieutenant Ralph Harvey had been hit by two bullets, one in his leg and another in his head and was killed instantly. He had not suffered.

  June lay back on her bed and thought of Ralph. She was glad to know exactly what had happened but it seemed such a waste of his life. He hadn’t helped to win the war, he’d done nothing heroic. He’d just been unlucky enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was only six weeks since she’d said goodbye to him.

  A few days later she received two more letters, one was from the battalion padre who sent his sincere condolences and said Ralph would be sadly missed. The other was from a fellow officer who described himself as Ralph’s friend, and told her again of the circumstances in which he’d been killed.

  I’m totally gutted. We counted ourselves lucky, we were enjoying ourselves here, doing something useful to help the war effort in what we thought was a safe and pleasant backwater. However, at the back of our minds we all realised that in wartime the worst could happen. We both felt we had to write letters to our loved ones in case it did. I’m so sorry Ralph copped it and I’m enclosing the letter he asked me to send to you.

  It was sealed in its envelope and her name was written in Ralph’s handwriting. With shaking fingers she slit it open and drew out the letter. It was dated six weeks earlier.

  My darling darling June,

  Today, one of the men I came out with was killed and it has driven home that it could just as easily have been me. If it had been, I know you’d be devastated so I’m writing this just in case. But I hope with all my heart that you and I can open it together when this war is over.

  You have given me reason to live. I was making a mess of my life until I met you and you turned it all round for me. It took me a long time to find you and I want you to know I’ve never loved anyone as I have you. You are everything to me and to leave you standing on that railway platform was the most painful thing that’s happened to me.

  We’ve made plans for our future. We want only what other couples want, a home and children of our own, and if we could have those I know we would be happy for the rest of our lives.

  If this is not to be, I want you to try and forget me. You are still very young. I want you to live your life to the full and find happiness elsewhere and enjoy the best the world has to offer. If the worst does happen to me, don’t look back and mourn your loss. Try to think of me watching over you from the next world, wishing you well, loving you and urging you on. If it’s possible I certainly will be.

  Darling June, I wish I could be with you now to comfort you. I would be if I could.

  All my love always,

  Ralph.

  Ralph’s death was a shock to Milo and his parents, too, were deeply upset. June had spent two days at home weeping and her eyes were red and swollen. It upset them all to see her like that.

  ‘Why did we make a scene about them marrying?’ his mother sighed. ‘It must be a comfort to her now that she was his wife.’

  His father was very much on edge. ‘As Ralph has been killed I can’t see it makes any difference to her now,’ he said grumpily, but Milo knew he very much regretted standing out against him. He admitted as much. ‘I was wrong about him,’ he said. ‘I think he would have stood by June.’

  The next time Milo was about to report for fire-watching, Pa set out with him. He was surprised to hear that Pa had joined the Civil Defence Service and had undergone some training so he could be fitted into the team.

  Milo had been given a regular fire-watching position at the top of the church tower which gave a wide view across Merseyside, but the stone steps to get up there were narrow, steep, uneven, and there was no handrail. Many found them difficult but for Pa they were impossible.

  Instead, Pa’s training enabled him to take charge of the telephones in the ARP post and direct the wardens to help where it was most needed. It was his job to summon ambulances and police as required. Milo was impressed and in the days that followed he found the team welcomed Pa.

  Milo was due to return to the hospital in Chester to be assessed and had been doing regular exercises to improve his fitness, knowing he’d be put through his paces in the gym. He expected to be found fit for work. His unit was now fighting in the desert in North Africa and he hoped to be sent to join them.

  He was familiar with the hospital, its routine and staff, and was relaxed when he reported in. He was not alone, there were nine of them recalled for assessment and he’d met most of them on previous visits. To see them again was a pleasure, though he could see some were nervous of the outcome. It didn’t bother him to strip and be examined by the doctors. He enjoyed the session in the gym with the physiotherapists. He hadn’t managed to do all he’d been asked but he thought he’d done reasonably well.

  The next morning when he presented himself to the senior doctors to hear the outcome, he was looking forward to being told he was fit and fully recovered. When it was his turn to enter the room, he saluted and stood to attention. Only when he was told to stand at ease did he notice that the atmosphere was sombre. The proceedings were very formal and Milo was soon filled with foreboding.

  ‘We are sorry,’ he was told. ‘We find you are no longer fit enough to serve.’

  It took him a moment to take in what they meant. ‘But I feel quite well again. I’m over my injuries. I’ve been fire-watching four nights a week.’ The worst he’d been expecting was being told he needed to take another month’s convalescence and return for further assessment.

  ‘You’ve certainly recovered to that point, but the army expects serving soldiers to be super fit. They have to be able to cope with modern warfare. We feel it would not be fair to you to expect more of you than you can give.’

  Milo felt confused. He was being put out of the army! Discharged! He found that hard to believe. He was told to present himself somewhere else to start the process. Somewhere along the way, he was told he’d be given a pension. Pa had been given a pension when this had happened to him. But Pa had lost a leg, while he was perfectly all right.

  Leonie was at the shop treadling hard on a long straight seam when her phone rang. She only had to hear one word to recognise Steve’s voice. ‘They were queuing at the fish shop for cod,’ he told her, ‘but half an hour later when my turn came, it had all gone. I had to use the ration book and get some mince for tonight.’

  ‘Thank you for doing the shopping, at least we’ve got something for Milo to eat when he comes home from the hospital.’

  ‘Tell me what I have to do,’ he said, ‘and I can get the meal started.’

  She was delighted that Steve seemed to have turned over a new leaf. He no longer expected her to wait on him. He was helping with the housework and getting up to help make the breakfast porridge. He’d even enrolled in the Civil Defence Service.

  When she got home from work that evening, Steve was in the kitchen, a pan simmering on the stove.

  ‘Will you taste the stew, Leonie?’ he said. ‘It doesn’t taste like the stews you make. Have I done it right?’ He wa
s washing cabbage at the sink and had the potatoes ready peeled.

  ‘Perhaps a little more salt,’ she suggested. ‘But it’s fine. You’re a marvellous help to me.’

  ‘I saw this queue at the off-licence and joined it. I was able to get a bottle of sherry. Let’s have a glass now.’

  Leonie got out the glasses. ‘You’ve really changed. I do appreciate your help with the chores.’

  He poured a glass of sherry for her and said, ‘There’s a war on. I have to do my bit like everybody else, don’t I?’

  Leone smiled. ‘Being more active seems to be doing you good.’ He was no longer depressed and angry. As soon as he heard the wail of the air-raid siren, he was off out, whether he was supposed to be on duty or not.

  ‘It’s what most of the men do,’ he told Leonie. ‘We’re all volunteers. We want to help all we can. I wish I’d been able to get something more exciting than mince. Milo will want to celebrate if he’s been passed as fully recovered.’

  ‘He’ll have been well fed at the hospital over the last day or so, but . . .’ she broke off. ‘Here he is.’ A blast of cold air followed him into the kitchen.

  Steve knew at first glance that things had not gone as Milo had hoped. He looked thoroughly miserable.

  ‘What’s happened, love?’ Leonie asked.

  Slowly he took off his coat and turned to face them. ‘I’m to be invalided out of the army, pensioned off.’

  Steve was shocked. ‘Discharged on grounds of ill health?’

  Milo pulled a face. ‘They said I had recovered from my injuries but they were afraid I’d never achieve the super fitness required in today’s fighting forces, that it wouldn’t be fair to send me into battle.’

  ‘I was afraid you were being over-optimistic,’ Steve said dourly. ‘The wardens sent you home when you were digging the injured out, didn’t they? Said you were spent, hadn’t the energy left to lift the spade.’ He could see the pain on his son’s face.

  ‘The point is, Pa, what am I going to do now?’

  ‘George will find you a slot in the firm. We’ve been ordered to give our staff their jobs back when the war’s over.’

  ‘No, Pa, that’s not what I want. I shall look for something else, something that interests me more – something to help the war effort.’

  ‘Well there’s plenty of work like that about.’ Steve reflected that his son was coping with the problems his serious injury had caused far better than he’d ever done himself.

  He spent some time reading in bed that night, and when Leonie put out the light she said, ‘Milo’s taken it very well. I was very afraid he’d . . .’

  Steve heard his own voice grate. ‘Expect you to wait on him hand and foot as I did?’

  ‘Well, not exactly, but . . .’

  ‘It was a humbling experience to see him take up his life again exactly where he’d left off. He fully expected nothing to change, but if he’s not fit enough to serve in the army, then obviously his capabilities are different now.’

  ‘He’s doing his best,’ Leonie said softly. ‘He’s not going to let it limit what he does. Not if he can help it.’

  ‘I wish I’d been as strong as him.’ Steve couldn’t hold back a heavy sigh. ‘All these years I’ve been wallowing in self-pity.’

  ‘The doctors were treating you for depression.’

  ‘They were, but why did I always look on the black side of everything? I saw myself as a physical wreck and never even tried. Miles pointed out that I was a selfish shit who thought only of himself and that you all had to fight for anything that wasn’t my idea.’

  ‘I know, but—’

  ‘I took it badly but it was the shake-up I needed. It brought me to my senses, that and the fact that he set me an example by getting back on his feet and going out to live his life. He showed me what I should have done.’

  ‘Well, you’re trying now,’ Leonie said and turned towards him. ‘Suddenly you’re much more like the man I married.’

  Steve was so relieved that he took her in his arms and kissed her in the way he used to when he was young.

  It was weeks since Milo had first written to Duggie Jenkins and he’d posted off some boating magazines and another note since, but he’d heard nothing from him. Floris had told him they often didn’t hear from him for weeks and he knew from hard experience that it wasn’t always possible to write. But when Milo came home from the hospital he found a letter from Duggie propped up on his dressing table. Mum said it had arrived yesterday. He threw himself on the bed to read it and Duggie’s words leapt off the paper. He hadn’t changed a bit, he was still his old cheerful self.

  Later, Milo went round to the Jenkins’ house when he knew they’d be home from work. Floris danced to the door when he rang the bell.

  ‘We each got a letter from him this morning. Dad’s took a month to get here, but mine only a few days. At least we know he’s alive and well.’

  Milo offered them his letter from Duggie to read. ‘There’s quite a lot about his life there.’

  When Floris handed it back, she said, ‘He was obviously delighted to hear from you.’

  ‘How are you?’ her father said. ‘How did you get on at the hospital?’

  ‘They discharged me, but I’ve also been discharged from the army. I’m no longer fit enough to fight.’

  Floris looked shocked. ‘But you always seem so well to us.’

  ‘Yes.’ He admitted it had come as a shock to him and told them how it had happened. ‘It’s left me feeling at a bit of a loss. I can’t make up my mind what to do next.’

  ‘You were working in your family business, weren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, but I didn’t enjoy it. I’ve told Pa I don’t want to go back. With the war, it’s losing ground anyway.’

  ‘Then give yourself a day or two to think about it,’ Henry Jenkins advised. ‘It’s a new career you’re looking for. Think about what you like doing, what you enjoy. There are jobs everywhere. Right now, you can have your pick.’

  ‘I wanted to go to sea, but now . . .’ Milo hesitated. ‘Something to do with ships perhaps.’

  Floris laughed. ‘I work for Beauforte Air Sea Rescue. That’s to do with ships and Dad works for Cammell Laird’s.’

  ‘We’re desperate for more staff,’ Henry said, ‘and I suspect Beauforte’s in the same position. We’re building ships as fast as we can to replace those being sunk in the Atlantic by U-boats.’

  ‘And they all need full safety equipment before they put to sea.’ Floris smiled. ‘Both are considered vital for the war effort.’

  ‘What exactly do you do?’ Milo asked Henry.

  ‘I’m a ship’s architect. There are vacancies in the drawing office if you fancy something like that.’

  ‘I do, I think that would suit me.’

  ‘Think about it first,’ Henry said. ‘Don’t rush into the first thing that sounds halfway suitable. Find out what else there is available to you. Look in the newspapers, go to the library, talk to people. Think about doing the job hour after hour, day after day for years on end. Come back next week and we’ll mull it over. Perhaps I can help.’

  When Floris showed him out, she said, ‘Don’t mind, Dad, Milo. He treats you like he does Duggie. He’s missing him.’

  Milo had found him a helpful support. ‘He talks a lot of sense.’

  While working on the ward, June had little time to dwell on her loss and that went for the time she spent in the classroom too. She needed to keep her mind on what she was doing to survive. It was when she was off duty that she missed Ralph most. She had plenty of company from her fellow nurses and that helped. She knew they all tried to include her in trips to the cinema or to a dance hall. ‘You need to get out and about more,’ they told her, ‘not mope here in your room.’

  June didn’t feel ready to go out dancing yet. She didn’t want to talk to other men. She knew several of her fellow student nurses were older than her and were still seeking boyfriends. But marrying Ralph had changed her, mad
e her grow up in a hurry. She still wore Ralph’s wedding ring on a gold chain round her neck under her uniform.

  Only rarely now did she have a storm of tears. When she needed comfort, she took out Ralph’s letter to read again. It was becoming creased but it eased her mind. For June it was enough to feel she would survive and that she was doing her bit at the hospital to help the war effort.

  As usual, Nick Bailey was expecting Tom and Elaine to come and stay for the weekend. He enjoyed their company; he was envious of their stable marriage and their twins.

  When he’d told them he’d proposed to Heather, Tom had said straight away, ‘She’s a stunning looking girl but she’s too young for you. She’ll not want to stay at home every evening listening to the wireless. Do you have the energy to keep up with her?’

  Nick thought he had and he was tired of being on his own. ‘I’m in a rut. I need to get out and about more.’ He’d felt ready to have another try at marriage. ‘Heather will be good for me.’

  She was equally keen to be married and it seemed pointless to delay it at his age. It took place only two months later in the register office.

  Heather had boundless energy, she enjoyed dancing, racing, rowing on the river, she wanted him to take her to theatres, cinemas and for meals out. Nick couldn’t concentrate in the office; he felt tired and grew less enthusiastic about going out. There was no let-up for him at the weekends. Tom and Elaine bored Heather; they came too often, and as for those twins . . .

  ‘Everything revolves round those tiresome children,’ she complained. ‘They climb all over me and I’m sick of playing Snap, Ludo and Snakes and Ladders.’

  After six months of marriage, Nick was afraid Tom had been right because they were growing tetchy with each other.

  He suggested that being together at work as well as at home was perhaps too much.

  ‘Would you like to look for a different job?’ he’d asked. Women without young children were required to work in wartime and employers were in need of extra staff of every sort. She found a new job the following week.