‘I’ve changed, Leonore. I ain’t the same little gel what let ’erself get shoved around an’ lied to. I’ve grown up a lot in the last few years; I’ve ’ad to.’
‘I know, Jess, but…’
‘No, I’m sorry, Leonore, I’m gonna ’ave to stay. Yer tell me if yer can what’s to stop yer son findin’ out about us, an’ stickin’ me an’ Sylvia back in that ‘ole? Yer said yerself, people love runnin’ and tellin’ stories. I’d only ‘ave to go near that village an’ it’d be all round like wildfire. Everyone knew about ’is carryin’ on. Someone’d be sure to tell on me. I’m sure yer precious Robert’d pay well for the information. Anythin’ rather than ‘avin’ me cause ’im any embarrassment. An’ I ain’t gonna let ‘em put me away again. I ain’t. Yer came in there to see me, an’ I’ll always be grateful for that, but yer don’t know what it was really like in there. No one ’oo ain’t been locked up can know. I’d rather be dead than let ’em take me an’ Sylvia back in that place. I mean it.’
‘I’m sure you do, Jess, but please don’t say things like that. You know how hard I tried to understand what it was like for you. And I would never let anyone take you back there. Ever. You must believe that.’ Leonore rubbed her throbbing temples with her fingertips. ‘Jess, I want you to know something of great importance. It is no longer possible for Robert to do that to you. Not now. It couldn’t happen.’
A sudden feeling of sick panic swept over Jess. She closed her eyes. ‘Yer don’t mean ’e’s copped it?’
‘No, Jess, he’s fine. Well, he has been injured again, but he’ll recover. After he has had surgery, he’s being sent back to England to recuperate.’
‘So ’ow does that ’elp me an’ Sylvia? Sounds worse to me. ’E’ll be closer than ’e is now.’ Jess frowned and looked round at her small, golden-haired child playing contentedly on the rug, chatting happily to the rag dolly Mrs Garnett had sewn for her.
‘Jess, I can’t explain it all to you. Not easily. But, like you, Robert has changed. He too has grown up. Being in Flanders has changed him. Seeing all the horror and pain. If he knew you have his child, he’d never do anything to harm you. Either of you. I know he wouldn’t. In fact just the opposite, if you would allow him the opportunity.’
Jess bent down and picked her daughter up again. Sylvia wriggled, eager to get on with her game, but Jess wouldn’t let her go, hugging her close. ‘I’m sorry, Leonore, but that don’t sound very likely to me. I don’t mean to be ’urtful after all yer’ve done for us, but ’e’s too much like ’is ol’ man for me to be able to trust ’im.’
Leonore went to speak, but Jess carried on. She was determined to have her say.
‘Sorry. I meant, like ’is old man used to be, when ’e stuck me away.’ Jess looked from Leonore to Sylvia. ‘No. There’s no hope of me takin’ no chances like that. For Sylvia’s sake.’
‘I’ve not explained myself properly, Jess. If only you’d listen.’
‘I’m sorry, but if yer don’t mind I’ve got to get on. Sylvia wants ’er breakfast an’ I’ve got a lot to do before Mrs Garnett gets back.’
Leonore bit her lip anxiously. ‘Don’t be angry with me, Jess. I’ve said the wrong thing, I know that. But there’s no harm done. I haven’t told Robert about you and Sylvia. I promise he doesn’t even know he has a child. You do believe me, don’t you?’
‘Yer’ve confused me, Leonore, I know that. I thought yer wanted to protect us. Now I dunno what to think. An’ it’s no good yer gettin’ yerself all worked up about it, cos I won’t ever trust ’im. No matter what yer say.’
‘Jess, we haven’t gone through all this together to stop being friends, have we? Please, forget it. Forget I ever mentioned it.’
‘I’ve forgot it already.’
Jessie’s words convinced neither of them.
* * *
Ten days after Christmas, Leonore travelled to Shropshire to see her son. The journey to the military hospital was long and difficult, but Leonore would gladly have made the trip many times over. She was so full of optimism for the future. It would take time, but Jess would be convinced that Robert had changed. She could not fail to be once she had seen him. Nothing would go wrong. Leonore hadn’t realised it, but she had been planning for that very thing to happen in the future since the day she received Robert’s first letter from the front. And now the future had almost arrived.
Leonore told the cabman to leave her at the entrance gates. The convalescent hospital had been set up in Myntton Park, a large Queen Anne house not unlike Worlington. As she walked along the imposing tree-lined drive, she was pleased with the thought that Robert must feel quite at home in such a setting. She passed men in wheelchairs, clad in dressing gowns and pyjamas, their legs covered with tartan rugs. Nurses who looked hardly strong enough to manoeuvre the big, high-backed wheelchairs pushed the patients deftly around the gardens, taking advantage of the unseasonably warm afternoon.
At first Leonore failed to recognise her son. The thin, slightly greying man had to wave and call to her several times before she realised he was addressing her. She dropped her parcels on the drive and ran across the lawn to greet her only remaining child.
‘Careful, Mother,’ he said, flinching from her embrace. ‘I’m still a bit tender, you know.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry, darling, did I hurt you?’
‘You will do if you don’t stop that snivelling. I told the chaps I had the best-looking mother in the place. Don’t let your nose get all red and spoil it.’
‘Oh, Robert.’ Leonore buried her head in his shoulder, struggling to hold back her tears of joy and relief.
* * *
Leonore and Robert talked away the whole afternoon, Leonore pushing his chair around the grounds and meeting his fellow patients. She felt guilty about doing so, but still she offered up silent prayers of thanks when she saw so many of them with injuries far worse than Robert’s. Mother and son laughed together and cried together, remembering some things and choosing to forget others.
‘So how’s Father doing?’ asked Robert as they paused by an elegant stone fountain.
‘It’s been very difficult for him since we heard about Paul’s death,’ she answered faintly.
‘Still drinking?’
‘Yes.’
‘Worse?’
Leonore sighed. ‘These days it is very rare for your father still to be sensible by mid-morning, Robert. It is as though his life no longer has any meaning.’
‘Not even the horses?’
‘No.’
‘Poor you.’
‘This is silly,’ said Leonore, doing her best to hold back her tears. ‘I came to visit you, to uplift your spirits, and all I do is cry.’
‘Well, watch this. This’ll cheer us both up.’ Robert grasped the arms of his chair, raised himself shakily to his feet and took a single, wobbly step towards the fountain.
‘Darling, that’s wonderful,’ Leonore exclaimed joyfully, grabbing his arms to steady him.
‘Careful, you’ll tip me over. I haven’t quite got the hang of this standing business yet. But I should be walking unaided in a couple of months. I might have a bit of a limp, but I think it’ll look rather dashing. Quite distinguished, in fact. What do you think?’
Soon the rapidly fading afternoon light had driven them indoors where they joined the other patients and visitors taking tea in the palm-filled conservatory.
‘I can’t tell you how happy spending these few hours with you has made me, Robert. Just seeing you, and knowing you’ll soon be well.’
‘I’m glad, Mother. It can’t be easy at home.’
‘I thought we weren’t going to talk about that. Listen,’ she said, eyes suddenly bright, ‘I’ve made a decision. To celebrate your homecoming I have decided to tell you a secret. Something I never believed I could have trusted you with knowing.’
‘Not been arrested with those suffragette chums of yours, have you?’
‘Don’t tease, Robert, I’m being serious.’
At that moment a young woman in a brilliantly white starched uniform came striding into the conservatory. She lifted a heavy brass bell from a side table and rang it vigorously.
‘Don’t ring the bell yet, Nurse,’ pleaded Robert. ‘They’ve only just got here.’
The nurse smiled at him. ‘Think you can get round all of us, don’t you, Bobby? Think you can get us to break the rules just for you?’ She flicked him playfully under the chin and turned to Leonore. ‘Your son is such a flirt. All of us nurses have to watch him. Any opportunity, eh, Robert?’
Much to the amusement of the visitors, the other patients joined in the general frivolity directed towards Robert and his escapades, readily contributing their own rowdy innuendos concerning Robert’s reputation with the nursing staff.
‘Take no notice of them, Ma. They’re jealous of my good looks, that’s their trouble.’ Robert guffawed loudly. ‘And they’ve nothing better to do, any of them, than besmirch the name of an honourable man.’
Leonore managed to produce a thin smile. ‘You seem very popular, Robert.’
‘All helps to pass the time,’ he said, winking broadly at the nurse.
She rang the bell again. ‘Sorry, Bobby,’ she said flirtatiously. ‘Matron’s orders. Now there’s one lady you can’t twist round your little finger.’
Leonore hurriedly gathered her things together and tried to put on her gloves. ‘Blast these things,’ she said as her nail caught in the lining.
‘Calm down, Ma. What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing, Robert. I have to go, that’s all. The cab will be waiting at the gates to take me to the station.’
‘Can’t stand saying goodbye, eh?’
‘That’s right,’ she said, straining to produce another unconvincing smile.
‘You’re not getting away as easily as that,’ said Robert accusingly.
‘What are you talking about, Robert?’ she asked, no longer able to hide the strain she was feeling.
‘Before you go, Mother, I want to know this deep, dark secret you said you’d share with me.’
‘I’m sorry, Robert. It’ll have to wait,’ said Leonore. ‘My cab.’
* * *
During Robert’s months of convalescence in the hospital, Leonore struggled with her conscience. Could she really trust her son with the knowledge that he had a child? On more than one occasion she had reached the point of telling him everything. At those times she not only felt he was ready to know, but he had every right to know that he had a daughter, that he had made such a wonderful contribution to the world in the form of little Sylvia. But each time something happened to persuade her otherwise, his manner or actions convincing her that he had not changed at all, that he was still a Worlington through and through.
For Robert, the whole thing became quite a game, guessing if today was the day when it would be revealed – whatever ‘it’ was.
On 9th July 1918, Leonore was forced into making a decision. Robert was declared fit enough to return to Worlington Hall, and she was going to collect him. To take him home.
* * *
‘I feel like I’ve been released from prison,’ said Robert as he climbed cautiously into the cab, gingerly testing the power of his legs to mount the step. ‘My dash to freedom,’ he said, the effort showing in his voice. ‘I didn’t think those brutes of nurses would ever let me go.’
‘Don’t be so stupid, Robert,’ snapped Leonore tersely, as she settled herself next to him. ‘You were not in the hospital against your will. And the nurses were hardly warders. Look at them all waving to you. They treated you royally. If you had been imprisoned, you would know it is an entirely different matter.’
‘You’re a trifle touchy, Ma,’ said Robert, grinning happily and waving back to the nurses and patients who had lined up to see him on his way down the drive. ‘The old suffragette hackles rising, are they? Thinking about your jailbird friends?’
‘I am growing extremely weary of your suffragette jokes, Robert.’ Leonore pressed herself back in her seat.
‘Sorry. Point taken.’ Robert flinched as the cab picked up speed.
‘No, Robert, it is I who am sorry,’ said Leonore, seeing her son’s pain. ‘I have a lot on my mind.’ She sounded worn out.
‘Father getting you down?’
‘No.’ Leonore looked out of the cab window towards the flower-sprinkled hedgerows but saw none of them. ‘I was wondering about your behaviour with the nurses.’
‘What?’
‘It appeared to me you had gained yourself quite a reputation amongst the other patients.’
‘Me?’
‘Yes, Robert, you. A reputation for being, well, a man not unlike your father used to be. In fact, the way you yourself used to be. Before you went away, I mean.’
‘You’ll have to take things a bit slower, Ma. I’m not sure you’re making any sense.’
‘I shall say it more plainly, Robert. Do you still behave in the irresponsible manner which your father encouraged so outrageously?’
‘Do spit it out, Ma.’
‘With girls, I mean, Robert. With girls.’
Robert took his mother’s anxious face gently in his hands. ‘You are funny.’
‘Robert. I asked you a question,’ she said, pulling away from him. ‘Please do me the courtesy of answering.’
‘Very well.’ Robert dropped his head back against the rough upholstery of the cab and closed his eyes. ‘Making jokes, playing the fool, they’re ways of coping out there. Everyone does it. If you don’t keep things light-hearted you begin to see the reality of what’s going on around you.’
He screwed his eyes tighter, trying in vain to shut out the memories.
‘The death. The maiming. The filth of it all. And it’s the same in the hospital. You make light of everything. Even having your legs amputated if it happens.’
‘Oh, Robert.’
‘It’s not bravery, it’s so you don’t have to think. Or remember. Don’t have to recognise that some of the poor buggers won’t ever get out of that place. And when you lie there in your bed at night and the nurse switches off the lights you see it all so clearly. As though you were still out there. The flashes and explosions lighting up the night sky. And boys, not men most of them, but boys, being blown to pieces. Bits of them dangling on the barbed wire. Right in front of your eyes.’ Robert clenched his jaw tight. ‘And the stench of rotting flesh. And always the same picture in your mind of your friend’s head coming away in your hands when you try to lift off his helmet so you can help him.’
‘I don’t know what to say.’ Leonore’s voice was hardly audible. ‘I hadn’t thought.’
‘Thank God you don’t have to think about such things.’ Robert opened his eyes and looked out at the green countryside. ‘Especially on a beautiful day like this.’ He turned to face Leonore. ‘There’s no way to really deal with it, you see, so you lark around. Play tricks and laugh. It stops you having to think. The nurses too. They say we went out as boys and girls and came back, if we were lucky, as what? Grownups? I never knew that seeing your friend’s head come away in your hands was part of growing up.’
‘Oh, Robert.’
‘I know, Ma,’ he said, trying to comfort her. ‘There’s nothing anyone can say.’
‘But there is, Robert. There’s something I want to say to you. The secret.’
‘That’s more like it,’ said Robert, pleased with the diversion. ‘I could …’ He swore under his breath, wincing as the cab bumped to a halt in the station forecourt, jarring his still painful legs. ‘My bloody luck,’ he complained good-naturedly, ‘we’re at the station. I suppose I’ve missed another chance to hear this damned secret.’
‘Language, Robert. I’m still your mother, remember. But you’re wrong, you will hear the secret. If we can get a carriage to ourselves, that is.’
‘Righto,’ said Robert enthusiastically. ‘If that’s all you want… Porter! Over here.’
* * *
‘She was bo
rn on the sixth of June 1914, her name is Sylvia.’
Robert ignored the waves of pain which shot through his legs with every swaying movement of the train. After the death and destruction he had witnessed on the battlefields, the idea of having a child, a living, breathing child, was like a miracle.
‘She was four last month, then. My daughter.’ He was stunned by the wonder of it. Suddenly he spoke with panicked urgency as if it had occurred to him that life would always dash his hopes. ‘I suppose she will forgive me.’
‘Robert, Sylvia doesn’t even know she has a father.’
‘No, not Sylvia. Jessie Fairleigh. Jess. Will she let me, I don’t know, make amends?’
‘I hope so, Robert, I really do. For the three of you. And for me.’
* * *
Robert and Leonore were alone in the Chinese Room. Outside in the hall Tyler was busily fussing over taking Robert’s things up to his room. Because of the war there were no footmen to carry out such menial tasks in the household, so Tyler added an importance to the most trivial of jobs in an effort to maintain his status. Sir George was safely settled in the library, having already started on his second decanter of port.
Robert stood in front of the fireplace, leaning on the mantelshelf, taking his weight on his forearms, his back to the room.
‘It’s strange,’ he said, staring into the grate. ‘It’s as though I’ve never been away from here. I can almost hear the gramophone playing, and see Julia and Paul dancing in each other’s arms. Poor Julia. I wonder if she’ll ever be happy again.’
Leonore went to her son’s side and touched him softly on the shoulder. ‘Would you like me to speak to Jess?’
‘Yes, oh yes.’ He turned round to face her. ‘Would you?’
‘Of course.’
‘Do you think it’s too late to speak to her this evening?’
‘I’ll go now.’
* * *
The Cockney Girl Page 29