by Annie Murray
She saw longing in his eyes too, and fear and doubt. The more time they spent together talking, week after week, the more intense it became. But she could not break through it. She knew he was afraid of what he was. And she had the same fear. She had not told him about Hester, about her own past. He was such a straightforward man, from a quiet, country background. And didn’t he see her as some kind of goddess – an ideal, virginal and pure? If he found out what she really was it would break the spell. How could they even begin?
That third week in August she had visited Stephen on the Monday afternoon and passed the time talking about drawing and smithing and working with wood. Daisy told him about her mother and stepmother, about John and Lily. Their talk was about everything except all the feeling that was gathering between them, even though with every week it seemed to grow more powerful. She got up to leave, feeling as if here, with him, was the only place she was meant to be, and that to leave was tearing herself apart.
‘I’d better go and brave the weather,’ she said, managing her patient-visiting, cheerful voice as she buttoned her coat. She had dressed carefully in her dusky-pink frock, a cream wool cardigan to keep warm and her blue coat.
‘Daisy.’ Stephen’s voice was low, cautious, but behind it she could hear the emotion he was keeping at bay. She looked into his eyes.
‘Your coming here – it’s . . . it’s the best thing that happens all week. And the classes. But this . . . I . . .’ He looked down, with a sad expression. ‘I wish I could just declare myself like a man – a whole man who could be any good to you. That’s what I feel.’
Daisy was so moved that her eyes filled with tears. She reached for words, honest words, but found herself overcome by emotion.
‘Stephen . . .’ To her embarrassment, tears began to run down her cheeks and he looked horrified.
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean . . . I’ve said the wrong thing. Stupid, stupid . . .’ He banged a fist on the table so that some of the other visitors looked round.
‘No!’ She sat down again, leaning across to try and gain some privacy in the crowded room. Fiercely she wiped her eyes. ‘No, it’s not stupid. I’m sorry, Stephen. Only . . .’ She still couldn’t say it, not with all honesty. There are so many things you don’t know about me, that will disgust you. If I tell you, you might never feel the same again. She groped for words which were kind, which would tell him what she felt.
‘It’s not your legs. It’s . . .’ she began in a rush, then stopped abruptly. For the first time she reached out for his hand. She saw the effect it had on him, a dawning, a hope, and he grasped hers back as if it was the most vital thing he had ever found. His hand was cool, slightly clammy as if from fear.
‘What then?’ he said desperately. ‘But it is my legs, isn’t it? Be truthful, Daisy. I’m a wreck. Why would any woman . . .’ He trailed off, looking down miserably.
‘No. It’s not that. It’s just a bit fast – a bit soon,’ she said, feeling like a liar. ‘I love talking to you, Stephen. I . . .’ She cut herself off, hating her lack of courage. Drawing in a breath, she sat up straight, still holding his hands. ‘Stephen – I’m not what you think. There are things about me that – if you knew, you wouldn’t think the same of me at all.’
He looked at her, a look of irony, of scorn, almost, crossing his face. ‘Oh, really – you think so? And what could they possibly be, Miss Tallis? Are you some kind of criminal?’ He leaned towards her then, face softening into vulnerability. ‘Come closer.’
Hesitant, she bent and he put his lips close to her ear.
‘I love you, Daisy,’ she heard him whisper. He could say it, could risk himself. ‘You’re the most beautiful, amazing girl I’ve ever met.’ He held her hand in one of his and stroked it wonderingly with the other. ‘If you can feel anything for a mess like me – well, that means the world to me. It’s the only thing that matters . . .’
For a second, she wanted to pour everything out: the reality of her life, Hester, everything, to lay herself at his mercy. But Pa’s words, back when he had been at his most bitter – You’re no earthly use to anyone now – blocked her mind like a wall. Stephen’s disability was a result of his doing his brave duty, inflicted by someone else – hers, her own stupidity and wantonness. And because of that, she had thought that Den Poole was the only man who would ever want her now; Den, who had persuaded himself that she was promised to be married to him . . . She drew in a breath to speak, then let it go again. All she could do was to squeeze his hand in return.
His face fell and he released her hand, looking away. ‘I see. Well, now I know.’
‘No!’ she protested again. ‘Please – don’t think . . . It’s just that I can’t . . .’ In frustration and fear she petered into silence. She was afraid she was going to burst into tears and started hurriedly gathering her things together. ‘I think I’d better go. We can . . . we can talk again . . .’
She nodded goodbye to him, not trusting herself, and swiftly left the room.
Forty-Six
‘Guess who’s here?’
Clara opened the door when Daisy went to pick up Hester that afternoon. She looked cheerful and Daisy forced a smile on to her own face.
‘Hello, Daisy!’ Auntie Annie appeared from the big room where the children spent most of their time, Hester trotting along beside her. Hester saw Daisy and ran over to her. ‘I finally had a day off, so I came to help Clara and Aunt Hatt with the move today.’
‘Lovely to see you.’ Holding Hester by the hand, Daisy went and kissed Annie, smiling. But she was appalled at how Annie looked. She was so thin that her eyes seemed even bigger in her face. Though Annie had lived in their house for a month after the death of her fiancé, growing more gaunt by the day no matter how much Margaret chided her to eat, Daisy still found her appearance a shock. It was heartbreaking to see. She could hardly imagine how Annie managed her work on the wards. But there was nothing she could think of to say that would help.
‘Well, now Clara’s moving in here they needed some help rearranging things,’ Annie said. ‘And it meant I could see Lizzie too. I’ve been very bad at visiting.’ She smiled sadly and Daisy saw the bones of her jaw moving under the skin.
A moment later, Lizzie Poole emerged from the room as well. Lizzie, as a contrast to Annie, looked stronger, even a little taller. Her hair was tied back and she wore a flowery overall over her frock. Though Daisy saw Lizzie most days now, it was only seeing her beside Annie that she realized how much more grown up and substantial Lizzie looked. Her face was a good colour and she moved about vigorously. In fact, Lizzie seemed to be blooming. Though she was a pale girl, with mousey hair, Daisy took in, for the first time, that Lizzie was really pretty.
‘All right, are you, Daisy?’ Lizzie said. ‘She’s been a good girl today – but then she usually is, aren’t you, Hessie?’ Little Ann Poole came along in Lizzie’s wake.
‘Hello, Daisy!’ Aunt Hatt came down the stairs then as well. ‘It’s all go here, I can tell you.’
She had obviously already seen Annie, but even so, Daisy saw her eyes rest on her niece for a moment in a troubled way. Aunt Hatt seemed perkier, Daisy thought. Having Clara and the children living in the house would be good for her.
‘Have all the children gone now?’ Aunt Hatt asked. ‘We can have some tea.’
‘There’s just little Joseph left – his dad’ll be here any minute.’
‘Well, we’ll get the kettle on,’ Aunt Hatt said.
‘Perhaps Mr Higgins would like a cup as well, poor man?’ Clara said. ‘I don’t suppose he gets much company. And you don’t need to rush off, do you, Lizzie?’
‘Well . . .’ Lizzie hesitated and Daisy thought she saw a blush rise in her cheeks. ‘I don’t suppose a few minutes will hurt. Ivy can get the tea on.’
Daisy took Hester back into Aunt Hatt’s big room and found a little boy of about two years old quietly and solemnly playing with some wooden pegs, which were to be fitted in various shaped holes in a boar
d. He had a round, babyish face and big blue eyes.
‘Hello, Joseph,’ she said. He stared at her warily, before going back to his game.
She gathered Hester’s things and within minutes the tea was ready and another knock at the door brought Tom Higgins. Daisy had never seen the man before and she was taken aback by how young he looked. She could see where Joseph had inherited his big blue eyes from.
‘All right?’ he said shyly, coming into the room. She saw that the left arm of his jacket was pinned up, above the elbow. ‘Hello, Joseph.’
The little lad went to him in his solemn way and buried his head in his father’s knees.
‘He’s ever so good,’ Daisy said.
‘Sometimes too good, I think,’ Tom Higgins said, sounding worried. ‘A bit on the quiet side, you know. Course, he misses his mother, but he don’t know how to say so. It was only . . .’ To her surprise, she saw the young man’s eyes fill with tears. ‘Just six months ago – today. I was still in hospital with this.’ He looked down at his arm.
‘Oh.’ Daisy felt her own eyes fill. ‘Oh, how awful.’
‘Yeah – well.’ Tom Higgins sniffed manfully. ‘You just have to keep going. Come on, Joey.’
‘Mr Higgins,’ Lizzie Poole said. ‘Mrs Watts says would you like a cup of tea before you go?’
‘Oh!’ He straightened up from bending over Joseph, seeming shy and at a loss for a moment. ‘Well – yes, all right. Ta very much.’ To Daisy he added, ‘Not as if there’s any rush to get home really.’
As they all sat and drank tea together, with a bit of dry cake, Mr Higgins told them that he and Joseph now lived back with his widowed father and got by the best they could. He had a clerical job at Fort Dunlop.
‘I was there before the war,’ he said. ‘Could do the job with both hands tied behind my back if I had to! That’s summat good anyway.’
Little Ann Poole kept toddling up to Tom Higgins, apparently fascinated by him, and they all laughed.
‘She doesn’t see many men, you see,’ Lizzie explained shyly.
‘Oh, why’s that?’ Tom Higgins said. ‘It’s the opposite problem in our house – all men for Joey. That’s why it’s good him coming here.’
‘I look after my sisters,’ Lizzie said. ‘My brother’s away – he’s in the artillery.’
‘How many sisters’ve you got then?’ Mr Higgins seemed most comfortable talking to Lizzie of all of them.
‘There’s three apart from me,’ Lizzie said. ‘Our Ivy’s nineteen now, so ’er’s out working. Ethel’s nine so she can get herself to school, and there’s Ann here – she’s two.’
Ann stood staring mesmerized at Tom, with her mouth open, and he looked at Lizzie. They both laughed.
‘I’d better be off,’ he said after a time. ‘Pa’s trying to find someone who could cook for us but no luck so far. The women all want factory work these days. So he’s trying his best for now.’ He rolled his eyes. ‘Not sure what’s on tonight!’
‘Poor man,’ Lizzie said as Clara let Tom Higgins out at the front.
‘Something about a house with only men in seems even sadder than one with only women,’ Aunt Hatt said, sitting back with her cup and saucer. She appeared to wilt. ‘Oh, I feel quite exhausted.’
‘He’s nice, isn’t he?’ Lizzie said to Daisy. ‘Don’t you think he’s a nice man?’
‘Auntie Annie says she’ll come and see us a bit later,’ Daisy told Margaret, when she had reached home through the cloudy gloom of the afternoon. She stood at the door of the front office, where her stepmother was still busy.
‘Oh!’ Margaret looked up quickly at the clock. ‘I’m almost finished.’ She looked concerned. ‘How did she seem?’
Daisy could sense both Edith and Muriel listening intensely. The sight of poor Edith also wrung Daisy’s heart. She was so pale and drawn, though, they all agreed, very brave.
‘Well, still rather thin and tired looking,’ Daisy said carefully.
‘Did she say she was coming for tea?’
‘No,’ Daisy said, smiling. ‘But she most likely will. She never thinks of things like that, does she?’
Margaret rolled her eyes and smiled. ‘No. Hello, Hessie – have you had a nice day?’
Hester nodded sullenly.
‘She’s tired out,’ Daisy said. ‘I’ll go and get her ready for bed.’
‘Can I help?’ Lily said, appearing from the back room.
‘All right,’ Daisy said. ‘She likes you singing to her.’
Lily happily led Hester to the stairs.
‘Oh, there’s a letter for you.’ Margaret passed her in the doorway and went into the back room.
Den, Daisy thought, with a sinking heart. All sorts of mixed feelings woke in her – guilt and dread and confusion.
‘It’s not from Den this time.’ Margaret voiced her thoughts, holding out a pale blue envelope.
Relieved but puzzled, she looked at the rounded, careful handwriting on the envelope, almost like that of a child. She put it in her pocket, frowning.
Upstairs, she waited while Lily sang to Hester in her sweet voice, ‘Rock-a-bye Baby’ and ‘Jack and Jill’ until Hester’s tired tears faded to hiccoughs and her eyelids grew heavy.
‘Thanks, Lil,’ she whispered. Lily was nine now and the two of them were getting along better. Lily was a serious, grown-up girl for her age and Hester adored her. Daisy watched fondly as Lily tiptoed out of the room with exaggerated care.
She sat looking down at Hester, full of love for her. She was such a beautiful-looking child, her dark lashes flickering lightly as she settled into sleep, her chubby face and thick, dark hair. It seemed impossible now that Hester had not always been in her life. With a terrible pang she thought of the agony of the time when she had given her up. She might have left her in the village and never seen her again . . . The idea of it was so painful that she forced herself to stop thinking of it.
Leaning over, she lightly stroked Hester’s head and the child gave a little murmur and smacked her lips.
‘My little love,’ Daisy whispered. It was all impossible and her heart ached. Hester was her love – and Stephen. His face appeared in her mind with that lovely smile. The face of the man she loved. But he had such a wrong idea of her, as if she was some kind of saint. How could she possibly tell him about Hester? But how could she ever have any kind of real friendship with him if she did not?
Getting up, she left the room very quietly and hurried up to her own. The tree she had begun fashioning from silver wires was on the chest of drawers. She had splayed the ends at the bottom and neatly soldered them to make tapering roots and she was working on a complex mesh of branches.
One day Margaret had come in and seemed drawn to it.
‘Oh, that’s beautiful, Daisy – it’s the tree of life!’
‘Is it?’ Daisy said.
‘From Matthew’s gospel – the tiny mustard seed grows into a great tree and all the birds of the air come and shelter in its branches. It’s one of my favourite stories. The tree is like love – embracing everyone.’
‘Oh,’ Daisy said. She had smiled. ‘Yes, that is lovely. It’s not finished yet.’
For a second, she was sorely tempted to pick it up and start working on it. It was absorbing her, adding little twists and curlicues, leaves and tiny birds.
But there was no time. She had to get changed and ready to teach at Vittoria Street that evening. Moving briskly, she took her shoes off and felt the rustling of the envelope in her pocket. She sat on the bed and pulled it out. The handwriting meant nothing to her.
The Kemptown Hospital
Eastern Terrace
Brighton
25th August 1917
Dear Miss Tallis,
I am writing to you on behalf of your fiancé, Denis Poole, to let you know that he has been wounded and is here at the Kemptown, in Brighton. I am one of the VADs caring for him on the ward and he has asked me to write this for him as he is not able at present, due to his injuries.<
br />
He assured you that he is on the mend and in good spirits, but requests that you visit as soon as is possible for you.
Yours most sincerely,
Lucinda Barkham
Forty-Seven
‘I’ll come with you,’ Margaret said. ‘You’ve no idea how to get all the way down there – across London as well!’
When Pa pointed out that neither did she, Margaret retorted, ‘Two heads are better than one.’
Pa looked up from his plate of cheese and pickles with that stony look in his eyes when he didn’t like something.
‘It’ll cost a bit. You won’t do it there and back in a day, will you?’
Margaret just gave him one of her forthright looks which said, In this case, Philip Tallis, I know what’s right better than you do and this is what’s right and you can say what you like. She would never have actually said those things, but that was what the look meant. Daisy, thinking about it later, on the train as they rumbled south towards the coast, turned away from the window where she had been watching the wet green fields sliding past outside. Margaret, in her best hat and coat, sat calmly at her side, scanning a copy of The Times which someone had left on the seat.
‘Thank you, Ma,’ she said softly. She knew these were words she did not use often enough.
Margaret looked up and lowered the paper into her lap. ‘I’m fond of Den too.’ She gave Daisy a very direct look. ‘Fiancé, Daisy?’
Daisy could only hold her stepmother’s gaze for a moment before she looked away again. She could not think of anything to say.
It was blustery and grey in Brighton and the temporary hospital was a good walk from the railway station. They had been told that the local train which they might have taken was exceedingly slow, so they decided to see something of the town on foot. They had to keep asking the way, but apart from those exchanges, they walked in silence. Daisy carried the small overnight bag in which they had each put the few things they needed with them.
