by Beezy Marsh
It was all too confusing. She loved her job and she liked Mr Philpott. In fact, if she were being honest with herself, she was very fond of him indeed. He was clever and handsome, in his way. Was she in love with him? She wasn’t sure of that but perhaps she could come to love him. A lot of people did that in marriages. She’d overheard Mum talking to the Misses Dalton about women who’d ‘made the best of it’ and then found they’d fallen head over heels in love once they’d set up home and had children.
But if she married, he’d be bound to ask more about her family and then the truth about her father might come out. That fear hung over her like a black cloud. It had just been the three of them – Mum, Harry and Kitty – for so long and only they understood how it felt to be part of their family, the shame they carried. Sharing that secret with someone who said he loved her just didn’t seem possible because once he knew the truth, he would surely change his mind.
And in any case, if she got married, she would have to give up work, which she enjoyed so much. Mum relied on her wage too. It wouldn’t be fair for her to go and get married and start having children to care for. Who would look after her mother?
‘Kitty, love?’ Mum’s voice carried up the hallway. ‘What on earth are you doing up there all alone? It’s Christmas Day! Come and lay the table, the Misses Dalton will be calling around later and I need to get things ready for them.’
With Harry safe, Mum wanted to have a proper celebration and she’d been steaming a beautiful pudding all morning to accompany the goose she’d managed to buy at the butcher’s. But Kitty seemed to have lost her appetite entirely.
‘I’ll be there in just a moment,’ she shouted.
She sighed to herself and put the sparkling emerald back in its box and shut the drawer.
On New Year’s Day, Mum and Kitty travelled to Armstrong College, which had been requisitioned to house the 1st Northern General Hospital, to be reunited with Harry. Nurses in starched white uniforms and caps, with black and red capelets around their shoulders, were coming and going from the red-brick building as they approached.
Mum clasped Kitty’s arm for support.
‘Do you think we will recognize him?’ she said.
‘Of course we will,’ said Kitty. ‘He’s our Harry.’
They entered a big hall which was filled with beds as far as the eye could see, so there must have been more than forty wounded soldiers recuperating in there. A couple of men with their legs missing below the knee sat at a felt-covered table in the middle of the room, playing cards. There were bandaged arms and patched eyes, and the nurses seemed to glide along, tucking in a bedsheet here and there, telling some to rest and others to try to get up and walk about.
Kitty spotted him first, propped up on a pillow at the end of one of the rows, nearest to the fireplace. Mum rushed along the highly polished floor, which reeked of disinfectant, letting out a squeal of delight – much to the annoyance of the nurses, who tutted their disapproval. Harry was thinner than they’d ever seen him, but when he smiled, his whole face lit up.
‘Two visitors at a time only, please,’ said a nurse, who appeared to have rolled silently to the bedside, as if she were on castors. ‘And please be mindful that there are some very sick men in here who need quiet and rest.’
Mum ignored her and bent down to kiss Harry’s cheek, running her hand across his forehead. Her son had come back from the dead and she wasn’t going to stand on ceremony for Florence Nightingale or anyone else for that matter.
Kitty sat on a wooden stool at his side and clasped his hand. ‘It’s so good to see you. How are you feeling?’
Harry laughed, and he was the same Harry that she’d always known and loved. ‘Well, it’s better than being in the trenches, I can tell you.’ He shifted uncomfortably and put his hand to his belly. ‘I’m still in a lot of pain. Doctors say the scar isn’t healing too well yet, so I’ll be in here for a while before I’m allowed home. But I’m doing better than some, so we must be grateful for that.’
Another soldier, who looked little more than a boy himself, was sitting on a bed clutching his knees, rocking back and forth. ‘He’s been like that for hours,’ said Harry, lowering his voice. ‘Nurses tell him to stop, but he can’t. I’ve seen it before – the war does terrible things to a man’s mind.’
Kitty felt her brother’s fingers start to tremble. ‘The dead have it easy, Kitty, the dead have it easy.’
Mum recoiled in shock. ‘Don’t upset yourself, now, Harry, what’s done is done.’ She used to say that to both of them when Dad left, to help them get through the long and lonely nights.
He looked up at his mother, anguish etched on his features.
‘I want to come home with you, because every night, when the lights go out, we’re all back there at the front, every last one of us in here,’ he said, gripping Kitty’s fingers. ‘There’s no escape.’ Fat, salty tears rolled down his face and soaked his nightshirt. ‘Please let me come home!’
The nurse reappeared and freed Kitty’s hand from her brother’s grasp. ‘Come along, Harry, I think you need to let your mam and your sister be getting on now. They can come again tomorrow, when you’re feeling better, but the doctors will need to see you soon.’ She leaned down and put his arms under the covers, tucking them in tightly as if he were a child.
Mum was struck dumb and looked over to Kitty.
‘Well, let’s do what the nurse says, Harry, because we want you to get better and then you can come home,’ Kitty said, kissing him on the cheek.
His grey eyes searched her face and she smiled at him reassuringly. ‘Don’t worry. We will certainly be back tomorrow. And the day after that, and the one after that too. We will come every day until you are well enough to come home. We won’t leave you. Ever.’
Her words seemed to make him relax and he closed his eyes. Kitty took Mum by the arm to escort her back out of the ward. The ward sister was waiting for them by the doorway and she walked with them down the long corridor. ‘It will take time, but you must understand that his wounds are mental as well as physical. It’s best not to talk about the past, but to concentrate on the future, on happy and familiar things. Do you understand?’
Mum nodded. Kitty understood perfectly. She knew what she had to do.
Kitty carefully placed the ring, still in its box, on top of a pile of papers at the front of Mr Philpott’s desk. A look of hurt flickered across his face and he leaned back in his chair.
‘Do you have something you want to say to me, Kitty?’
‘I wanted to thank you for your very kind offer, but I can’t accept it because I have my family to think about. My brother needs me now, more than ever.’
His voice fell to a whisper. ‘I can provide for all of you, if you’ll let me. Your mother and brother would be welcome to move in with us, in Jesmond. We have room—’
‘You’re very kind,’ said Kitty, ‘but we are quite set in our ways.’
‘I could wait, Kitty. If you think you could grow fond of me . . .’
Outside on the Tyne, a ship was sliding down the slipway into the murky waters below. Nothing could stop it now. It had been set free from its moorings and there was only one way forward.
‘I am fond of you, Mr Philpott,’ she said. ‘Very fond.’ She ignored the awful sinking feeling in her chest as she spoke the words. ‘But I also need this job and I’m not about to give it up for you, or any man for that matter.’
She leaned forward and pushed the ring box towards him. It sat there, in the no man’s land between the edge of his desk and his blotting pad.
‘I will always be grateful to you, especially for the kindness you have shown me, but I have to put my family first,’ she said.
‘Kitty—’ he began.
‘And do please call me Catherine. I like that at work.’
He picked up the ring box and put it in his drawer, watching her as she turned and walked out of his office.
Kitty settled herself down at her typewriter, inser
ted a fresh sheet of paper into the mechanism, and began to tap away, writing up the tonnage, freight and specifications of the ships in this month’s edition.
With every keystroke, she determined that things would go back to the way they had been before the war. Harry would get better, she would see to it, and then it would be just the three of them.
Kitty, Harry and Mum.
12
Annie
Acton, October 1942
‘And what in God’s name are you wearing, my girl?’
As Bill’s voice carried up the hallway at Grove Road, Mum and Annie peered around the scullery door to see what all the fuss was about.
Elsie was standing by the front door, ready to go out to work at the munitions factory, dressed in a pair of blue dungarees, with a headscarf knotted around her head.
‘You can’t go out looking like that!’ cried Bill. ‘People’ll think you are a blooming communist!’
‘Dad,’ said Elsie, with her hands on her hips. ‘Dungarees are utility workwear. All the girls are wearing them these days. They are practical, comfortable and stylish. The War Office says so.’ She turned on her heel and slammed the front door shut.
‘Well,’ said Bill, muttering to himself as he made his way into the scullery for a reviving cup of tea. ‘I haven’t seen anything like it in all my born days . . .’
‘Oh, don’t be so hard on her,’ said Mum, popping little Anita into a high chair for some porridge while Annie cradled her youngest, John, who was coming up to three months old now. ‘She’s working hard down that factory and I think she looks lovely.’ What’s more, Elsie was bringing in two pounds and five shillings a week and although she kept some for herself, she was generous with it, putting more than half into the old tea caddy which served as a household kitty.
‘Looks like a bleeding fella in those overalls, if you ask me,’ said Bill, chewing on a crust of toast. Mum tutted at him.
‘I don’t think there’s any mistaking Elsie for a bloke,’ Annie laughed. Her youngest sister had blossomed into an extraordinarily good-looking young woman and you only had to walk up Churchfield Road beside her to see heads turning.
The government had passed an order which meant all single women aged nineteen to thirty had to register for war work. A lot of married women were helping out in the factories too, even if it was just in the canteens, and Annie had started to get itchy feet staying at home all day. She just felt she should be helping the war effort, especially since George was now over in North Africa fighting.
He’d taken part in the successful attack on the German-held fortress of Tobruk with the Eighth Army, but luckily was already in Egypt when it was taken back by the German commander Rommel earlier in the summer. That defeat was a crushing blow to morale, with so many soldiers taken prisoner. George sent postcards for Anita, just as he promised he would, and letters for Mum which didn’t say very much other than that it was blooming hot and the flies were purgatory. He was proud to be one of Field Marshall Montgomery’s Desert Rats and said that they should not give up hope of winning the war.
Annie confided in Mum about her plans, who rolled her eyes at the very thought of Annie leaving the children and going out to work. ‘Oh, you’re worse than your friend Esther! I saw her down on the High Street doing a flag day to raise money for War Weapons Week. It’s all well and good but who’s looking after her kids? They’ll be getting up to no good without their mother to keep an eye on them, you mark my words.’
It was true, Esther was always out volunteering but her children seemed perfectly well mannered and her eldest, Leonard, was out of London at the weekends with the Scouts and he was always helping out down at the Women’s Voluntary Service, lugging bags of clothing donations about or setting out chairs for meetings in the church hall. Annie couldn’t help thinking Mum was still a bit cross about Elsie commandeering half her cooking pots to give to Esther for scrap metal drives; she’d taken to hiding her best stockpot in the pantry every time Esther set foot in the house.
‘I don’t know,’ said Annie, wiping the baby’s mouth with the edge of a tea towel. ‘I just feel I could do a bit more, if you could help out with the kids a bit? Or I could always put them in a nursery. There’s a new one opening down on the High Street so that mothers can go out to work.’
‘Oh, over my dead body will my grandchildren go into a nursery!’ Mum cried, snatching John from Annie’s arms. ‘How could you even suggest it? Look at his little face! As long as there’s breath in my body, I will help out, of course I will. But it just seems daft to volunteer when you’ve got so much on, Annie. What will Harry say?’
‘Oh, he’ll be fine about it, I’m sure,’ said Annie, going over towards the sink to wash up. She turned away so that Mum wouldn’t see the sadness in her eyes. Harry didn’t seem to say much to her these days. He was exhausted by the factory shifts and his ARP duties, but his nightmares had been getting worse and Annie found he preferred sleeping in a rocking chair in the kitchen whenever they were at home. He’d tell her that he hadn’t wanted to disturb her by coming to bed, but it had put a distance between them and with every day that passed, the gap was growing wider. She could feel it.
‘Well, Ivy’s got a little one and she doesn’t feel the need to go out working,’ said Mum matter-of-factly. That was true but even having Charlie on a different continent fighting with the army wouldn’t stop her being under his thumb. If the truth be told, they were all a bit wary about what exactly was going on behind closed doors. Mum and Annie talked about it a lot, in hushed tones, when they were making do and mending in the scullery. Ivy hadn’t said anything about it and they didn’t want to pry, but she was slimmer now than before she’d had her baby and Mum couldn’t persuade her to eat so much as a fairy cake, even as a special treat, because ‘Charlie wouldn’t like it.’
Now Mum was giving Annie one of her concerned looks, the type she normally reserved for Ivy.
‘Love, is everything all right indoors?’ Mum said, laying a hand gently on Annie’s shoulder.
‘Of course it is! Why wouldn’t it be?’ she said airily. Annie didn’t want to tell her mum about it. It wasn’t as if they were having problems, it was just that Harry seemed quite affected by everything he’d seen in the Blitz, that’s all. ‘I just want to do my bit for the country, like everybody else.’
‘Well, if it means that much to you, Annie, of course I can take the babies for you during the day, but you need to think carefully about it before you start offering too much work-wise. You’ve only got one pair of hands.’
Annie nodded and gave Mum a little smile.
She understood what her mum was getting at, but at least if she had some war work to keep her occupied, it might help Harry see that they were both in this together. She’d hoped that having another baby would bring them closer but they were both so tired and worried about the way the war was going, it hadn’t turned out that way. He was more distant than ever and she didn’t want to grumble about that because it wasn’t her way, but she wanted him to talk to her about things more. Some nights, she’d lie there on her own and wonder if this was what the rest of her life was going to be like. It was like living with a stranger. If she could get a job, perhaps then he might see her differently. That might encourage him to share whatever was on his mind.
‘Why don’t you invite your sister, Kitty, down here for a visit?’ said Annie brightly the next morning, as she mixed up some powdered eggs for Harry’s breakfast.
Harry kept his head buried in last night’s Evening News. ‘Annie, pet, there’s a war on and she’s looking after my mother, who’s not been in the best of health. She can’t just leave her, you know. Newcastle is a long way away.’
‘Well, I know that,’ said Annie, whisking some milk in to try to make the mixture look as appetizing as possible – which was no mean feat with powdered egg. ‘I just thought it might be nice for her to see the children and perhaps it might lift your mood a bit.’
Harry flicked the n
ewspaper closed and glared at her.
‘What’s wrong with my mood? Not to your liking, is it?’
‘Don’t be like that, Harry,’ said Annie, laying some toast in front of him. The floorboards above creaked as their neighbours came into their kitchen upstairs. She lowered her voice because she didn’t want the embarrassment of people overhearing their private conversations. ‘It’s just that you haven’t been yourself lately, with all the air raids, and I thought maybe it might help to talk to Kitty. From what you say she’s a—’
‘She’s a very forceful woman, our Kitty,’ Harry cut in. ‘Opinionated. You might not get on with her.’
‘But she’s family!’ said Annie, throwing up her hands in exasperation. ‘I have had your kids and I haven’t even met her.’
‘Well, we’ve got Herr Hitler to thank for that, haven’t we?’ said Harry, picking up his newspaper again. He spoke to the pages in front of him, rather than looking her in the eye. ‘Kitty would start meddling in our affairs. She’d want the bairns out of London and living up there in Newcastle with her, you mark my words.’
‘What?’ said Annie. ‘She couldn’t come down here and take my children; I was only suggesting that she could come and visit.’
‘Oh, you just watch her. She’s a force of nature. She’d persuade you to it, Annie. Trust me, she’s my sister and I have known her all my life. She’s got a man’s brain in her head and she won’t take no for an answer. You know she’s cleverer than I am. She can outwit anyone, our Kitty can.’
‘But—’
‘Just leave it, will you?’ he said, getting up and grabbing his coat and flat cap. ‘She’s not coming down here and we are not going up there and that’s the end of the matter. Now, I’m going out.’
Annie turned around just in time to see the eggs burning in the pan on the stove. As she scraped them into the bin, something inside her snapped.
She didn’t need his permission and she wasn’t going to ask it, not after the way he spoke to her this morning.