by Annie Murray
‘It is,’ Aunt Hatt said.
‘I can give you help if you need it,’ Margaret said, looking at her husband. ‘We’re never far away, are we, Philip?’
He nodded kindly. ‘Course not. It’ll be good to have you back, Harriet.’
‘Well, while we’re on the subject,’ Clara said, also sitting up tall, ‘I’ve got summat to say myself.’
‘Oh, dear,’ Jimmy murmured. Again, there was laughter.
‘What d’you mean, oh, dear?’ his mother said indignantly. ‘It’s not going to affect you much, young man – you’re at school for another year at least. No –’ she looked round the table – ‘I feel much the same as Mother. If all you do is sit round grieving you sink into yourself. So I’ve decided what I’m going to do. There’s so many women at work now and all needing somewhere for their children. I’m good with children and with my three at school I rather miss it. What I’m thinking is, to start up one of those nurseries for working mothers – for a few children at least. For a small sum. And I can teach them all a little bit if they’re old enough. With a clutch of little ones about the place, I won’t have time to think – and that will suit me down to the ground.’
Thirty-Four
31 December 1916
‘You did what?’
Margaret stared in shock at her younger sister. Annie’s eyes, looking back at her, were gleaming with mischief. Up until then Daisy had seen nothing but affection in Margaret’s eyes, a joy that her little sister, in love, was sitting with them so clearly bubbling over with happiness. Annie had been telling them about Fergus’s work in France, laced with details about the eccentric lady who had set up the latest hospital in which he was working.
‘I sent him a bottle of malt whisky. It’s his favourite – from Scotland.’
‘Heavens,’ Philip said wryly from his chair as the family sat cosily round the fire. ‘Whatever is the world coming to? Are we to toast the New Year in with a tot of the same then, Annie?’
‘But . . .’ Margaret was so flabbergasted that Daisy and the others all started to laugh. ‘We don’t drink, Annie. We’ve never touched a drop of that sort of liquor in our lives!’
‘She never said she was going to drink it,’ Daisy pointed out, from the floor where she was sitting with Lily and Hester. They were playing with some of the toys she had made them as Christmas presents.
‘I still think . . .’ They could all see that Margaret was shocked to the core. Their strict temperance upbringing had put alcohol – and spirits in particular – well beyond the pale. For a moment their father, William Hanson, stood sternly in the room between them.
‘Really . . .’ Annie said seriously. She stopped herself. She had longed to say, All week I have been on duty with a VAD who scarcely knows one end of the human body from another and spends her existence shocked to the core by the male form, and there is one man who howls half the night whatever we try to do for him and a gangrene case which is not improving and that smell – oh, the relief of being here and out of that stench and able to spend the night here with my family – and yet I can still half smell it! But at the same time she did not want to bring these things into the warmth of the Tallis house and their New Year celebrations. For once she kept her mouth shut.
‘Fergus is not very far from the Front,’ was all she said. ‘Things are . . . I mean, in the grand scheme of all that is happening – really, what does it matter?’
Margaret looked coolly at her, but all she said was, ‘Let’s make another pot of tea. And John,’ she admonished her son, ‘if you really have to set up a battlefield in here, take it over there and keep it out of my sight. It’s the last thing I want to see in front of me on the Sabbath! Philip, you give him a hand moving it, will you?’
‘What’s your New Year Resolution?’ Lily asked Daisy solemnly. They had moved on to wooden bricks and were building yet another tower for Hester to bash down with her gurgling giggle. She never seemed to tire of this game.
Irritated, Daisy looked at her little half-sister. ‘None of your business,’ she whispered, giving a smile but not really meaning it. She wanted to be left with her own thoughts, but there were Hester’s endless demands as well as Lily. If she only had time to herself, she could sneak off up to the attic and carry on with the new design of bowl she was making. It had meant some very late nights. And when she was experimenting with making the little silver wire toys like the ones she had given as presents – a cat, a flower, some little people, even an engine – she had had an idea for something more ambitious . . . Once again, she was angry with herself for feeling so frustrated, so angry with her life when all about her, people were suffering such overwhelming loss and grief.
‘Oh, go on – tell me,’ Lily said, in her intense way. She was like her mother; she took things very seriously.
‘All right,’ Daisy teased. ‘My New Year resolution is never to let anyone in my room – ever.’
Lily looked down, hurt. ‘You never let me in there anyway,’ she said sadly.
Daisy felt guilty then. Why was she being so mean? It wasn’t Lily’s fault that she had got into trouble and had Hester and was now tied down and barely had a moment to herself (after all, who did, these days? Pa was working all the hours there were) or that now she had got tangled up with Den Poole and he felt he had a claim on her that she was not sure she had ever given him, and yet she did like him just a little – and who was she to be choosy now? Feelings swelled in her but she tried to be fair to Lily.
‘All right,’ she said. ‘Maybe no one can come in except my very special sister.’
Lily leapt to her feet all lit up and flung her arms round Daisy’s neck. ‘Oh, can I? Can I be the only one allowed in? I want to come and see you working and all your lovely things you make!’
‘No, I don’t,’ Daisy pointed out. ‘Not any more. Hardly ever.’
‘But you will,’ Lily said, drawing back to look at her with great feeling. ‘Because you’re very very clever and good at it – everyone says so. And you’re a Tallis!’
This hit home. Daisy looked into Lily’s earnest little face and gave a genuine, warm smile. I must be nicer, she thought. ‘Thanks, Lils.’ She reached over and ruffled her sister’s hair and Lily beamed at her.
Over cold ham and pickles, Annie regaled them with the more cheerful hospital news that she could think of, like the Christmas pantomime that had been put on by some kind people from Sutton Coldfield and all the carols and present giving. And soon they moved on to telling Annie the family news.
‘So, Aunt Hatt wants to come back and run the business?’ Annie looked amazed. ‘Well, that’s something I never thought to see.’
‘Makes sense.’ Philip stood up to carve more slices of the precious Christmas ham, sprigged with cloves and baked with mustard and sugar. ‘If anyone knows that business back to front it’s Harriet Watts. On the quiet she knew more of what was going on than her husband.’
‘It’ll be nice having her back here more,’ Margaret said. ‘I hope it doesn’t wear her out, though. I’ll go and lend a hand in the office if she needs it.’
‘And Clara wants to open a nursery,’ Daisy said.
Annie turned to her. She was such a fast eater that she had already polished off her meal. ‘Is she? Are you going to take Hester?’
Daisy was stopped in her tracks. Hester? Until that moment no such thought had occurred to her. To have more help than making do with the ladies in the office, with Margaret taking Hester when really she needed to be doing a host of other things . . . Why had she not thought? She could work at Vittoria Street without constantly feeling she needed to rush home and relieve someone else, could maybe even – oh, please! – be able to do a little more of her own work again. She saw Annie register the look of excitement on her face.
‘I hadn’t thought,’ she said, bewildered. She realized that she saw her struggles, her lack, as fit punishment. She was soiled, did not deserve better.
‘But, how could I?’ Her heart was
pounding with hope. ‘It’s rather a long way away.’
Annie shrugged. ‘Get up earlier.’
They all laughed at this and Daisy looked round, realizing that she was not seeing opposition in any of the faces around the table.
‘But . . .’ She didn’t want to bring trouble to the occasion. ‘I don’t think Clara would have Hester.’
They all looked at each other, not needing to have this explained.
‘I think she would,’ Margaret said gently. ‘Clara’s very forthright, but she’s come to terms with things. She’s got too many worries of her own to be . . .’ She did not finish the sentence.
‘Is she serious – actually taking other children and not just her own?’ Annie said, leaning forward in her intense way. ‘Because if she were to be running something and needing help – well, I can think of someone who’d be a godsend.’
‘Who?’ Margaret asked.
‘Lizzie Poole. She’s at her wits’ end with Ann. She could bring her there and work with Clara.’
‘Her wages wouldn’t be as good,’ Philip said through a mouthful, shaking his head. ‘They pay well at Kynoch’s – best she’ll’ve ever earned, I’d think.’
‘Well, Clara would have to charge people – a bit at least. And she’d have to pay Lizzie, of course. But then perhaps Clara wouldn’t charge for Ann and she would know she was all right . . .’
‘There’d be the tram fare,’ Margaret pointed out. ‘And she might not want to. You can’t just organize everyone’s life, Annie. Also, it’s a long traipse for her as well.’
‘Well, she’s already traipsing over to Witton,’ Annie pointed out. ‘That’s further if anything.’
‘She could get up earlier?’ Daisy suggested, and they all laughed.
Thirty-Five
January 1917
Aunt Hatt and Clara flung themselves into action as soon as Christmas was over and within a short time had formed a plan.
Margaret called into the office of Watts & Son next door as soon as work began again, to find Aunt Hatt bustling about and reclaiming her seat at the helm, prising open a tin of polish to give her desk a rub-over. Margaret took the tin from her hand and completed the job herself.
‘That’s it, Bridget, bring that chair round here, by my old desk – yes, and that table needs to be pulled further along. My goodness, what’s happened to the gas mantles in here – it’s like the Black Hole of Calcutta . . .’
The newer two women who worked at Watts’s now were scuttling about looking intimidated by the arrival of Harriet Watts, but Bridget Sidwell, who had worked there for years, in the time when Aunt Hatt ran the office, jumped to it, beaming with happiness.
‘It’s going to be lovely to have you back, Mrs Watts,’ she said as Margaret stepped aside to let them move the office’s biggest chair into its rightful place behind Aunt Hatt’s desk. ‘The works has been such a sad place lately.’
She looked stricken for a moment then, as if she might have said the wrong thing in reminding Harriet Watts of her grief, but Aunt Hatt looked back into Bridget’s eyes. She reached out to touch her arm.
‘It’s the only place I want to be now, Bridget. If there’s one thing I can do for Eb and for our Georgie, it’s keep this place going. And this place is full of them,’ she added, looking round sadly. ‘What’s the good of me sitting at home knitting socks for sailors? In any case, the house is going to be overrun with children. I’ve told Clara, it’s no good her trying to run any sort of nursery in her little house and why rent premises when they can have the run of mine, and the garden?’
‘Oh, Auntie!’ Margaret said, astonished. Was Aunt Hatt’s beautiful house really to have a crowd of children let loose on it? ‘Are you sure that’s a good idea?’
Aunt Hatt gave her a level look. Margaret was surprised to see how her aunt suddenly appeared more like the woman Margaret had known when she first came to Birmingham. Her hair was more faded, it was true, but in her grief she had lost her matronly girth, her face was thinner and somehow more lively, as if her suffering had chiselled her down into a younger, sharper woman again.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It’s where the life is – young things. Life and vigour. There’s been enough death and . . .’ She shivered, pulling her cardigan closer about her. ‘Terrible things. That’s what I want round me more than anything now. What does the house matter?’
Daisy stood in front of Clara, in the big parlour of Aunt Hatt’s house. She had carried Hester over on the tram, Hester bouncing excitedly on her lap.
Throughout the journey, although she was nervous, Daisy’s mind was full of calculations. Would Clara be snooty with her? Would she accept Hester and if so how much would Clara charge her? Might she be able to work it all out, do her teaching, help Pa in the business and then perhaps reserve a day for making her own things?
She had let Hester loose in the lovely big room, with its glass doors over the garden. Hester immediately half-crawled, half-toddled across to them and gazed out at the lawn. And now the two women stood facing one another. Clara was wearing a workaday brown skirt, her hair wrapped in a scarf. There were a couple of half-filled tea chests on the floor. Like Aunt Hatt, she was thinner than before and the strain told in her face. She looked forbidding and Daisy felt her heart sink. But, finding her courage, she set out to explain why she had come and what she was hoping for.
‘So – I was wondering . . .’ she finished her nervous explanation, ‘whether you might be prepared to let Hester be one of your first children?’
Clara was silent for a moment. Then, as if drawing herself together, she said stiffly, ‘I’ve not behaved the best to you, Daisy. When I heard about – well, you know – I was . . . I don’t hold with that sort of thing. It’s shameful. But then . . .’ Her eyes wandered and a look of acute sadness passed across her face for a moment.
‘I was sure about a lot of things back then. I suppose I’ve had that knocked out of me a bit, me thinking I knew what was what about everything. I don’t even really know what happened to you, to tell you the truth, and I don’t need to. But you’ve been brave, Daisy, keeping her and bringing her up the way you have, I’ll say that for you. I don’t know as I could’ve done it the way you have, people talking and thinking the worse of you. And she’s a lovely child.’
Daisy faced her, feeling emotional at these words.
‘Of course you can bring her,’ Clara told her, and Daisy saw her soften. ‘She’s family and she’s lovely.’
She indicated the tea chests, into which she had been packing some of the family china away out of reach.
‘Let me give you a hand?’ Daisy said, eager to please. ‘Pa can do without me in the works this morning. He knows I’m over here with you.’
‘All right – that’d be a help. Here you go,’ Clara said, handing her a blue-and-white vase from the mantel. ‘I know it should be out of reach up there, but you never know. Better safe than sorry.’
‘I think it’s marvellous you doing this,’ Daisy said shyly. She had always been in awe of Clara and still felt she had to be careful.
Clara turned, sheets of newspaper held in one hand. Her face was gaunt, and her arms were stick thin.
‘Don’t ever love anyone,’ she said, with bitter humour. ‘I’ve got to do something, Dais, or I’ll go off my head. Georgie and me . . .’ The tears came then, grief forcing through her brisk manner. ‘I loved him, Daisy – God, I did.’ She dropped the paper she was holding and sank on to a chair, covering her face with her hands. ‘I wake up in the night and I think . . . I can’t bear it. And then I know I have to because there’s no choice. But my Georgie – he was gentle. He should never’ve been there. There’s hardly any of them should. What’s it all for?’
She raised her head then, with a wild look on her face. ‘What are we doing it for? All of us? Us and them? The thousands and thousands . . .’ She stopped, staring blankly ahead of her.
Daisy dared to come closer and knelt at Clara’s feet, her own eyes full
of tears. Hester, taking note of the emotion in the room, came toddling over and put her hand on Clara’s thigh, which made both of them cry even more. Daisy sat back on her heels on Aunt Hatt’s thick carpet and sat Hester on her lap. Poor Clara – and Jimmy, Ella and Gina! It felt unbearable to her that they would never see their lovely father again.
‘I know it’s not my business, but you lost someone, didn’t you, Dais?’ Clara wiped her eyes and looked at them both. ‘Her father? I don’t think . . . I mean, I’m sorry if none of us really realized . . .’
Daisy cuddled Hester close to her, rocking gently back and forth. Hester put her thumb in her mouth and snuggled up.
‘It wasn’t like you – not like Georgie, who was a proper man and a husband and father. James Carson was . . .’ She shook her head. As she spoke his name for the first time in an age, he felt so far away and long ago.
‘He was a brilliant man, in his way – an artist, I mean. And I supposed he loved me, or thought he did. But he was selfish and full of himself. And I thought I loved him, but I think I really just liked him being so keen on me. I suppose I was rather full of myself in those days too.’ She gave Clara a wry smile. ‘A lesson hard learned.’
‘It certainly is.’ Clara leaned forward suddenly and pressed her damp cheek against Daisy’s. ‘You’re all right, Daisy. You’re a great kid. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. And you can be a help to me. Let’s be friends, eh? I’m sorry for the way I’ve behaved to you.’
Daisy smiled tearfully, warmed by Clara’s honest nature.
‘Yes, please,’ she said. She seemed to have lost so many friends since having Hester, having to be with her all the time.
‘So,’ she said. ‘This nursery. Do you have to tell anyone – ask anyone’s permission, I mean?’
‘I don’t know.’ Clara looked as if she had never thought of it. ‘All I know is, there are mothers with kids round here who are going out to work and they need somewhere to go. I suppose I might need to register with someone – the corporation? I‘ll have to find out. But it’s something I can do for the war. And I’m good with children. I miss mine being small.’
