by Lizzie Lane
Phyllis slammed it into silence with the palm of her hand so hard that it hurt. She sighed, tucked her hands behind her head and stared up at the ceiling, visualising what her life might have been if she hadn’t got hitched so hastily, but then, it was a case of needs must. Robert had insisted on it before he went to war.
When she’d announced her pregnancy only six weeks or so after their honeymoon, Robert had preened, accepting that the child was his. From the very first, suspicion lurked in Hilda Harvey’s eyes.
One winter night when she was too cold to sleep, Phyllis had got up intending to go downstairs and make a hot drink, when she overheard her mother-in-law’s acid voice express her doubts.
‘Honeymoon baby indeed!’
‘So what if they went to bed together before they tied the knot?’
Her father-in-law was yet again sticking up for her in that calm voice of his and she had blessed him for it. She had gone no further down the stairs but stayed to listen.
‘Wash your mouth out, Tom Harvey! I know my son! He’s God-fearing and upright. He would never commit such a wicked sin as that!’
Even from this distance, she had heard poor Tom Harvey’s heavy sigh.
‘Then it can only be a honeymoon baby, surely.’
Heart in her mouth, she had waited for the answer. It wasn’t long coming.
‘He’s married beneath himself. I told him so, but he’d made his mind up. She’s of the lower orders, just a common factory girl. What can you expect?’
Phyllis had slunk back against the wall, feeling her way back to the bedroom door with a sick feeling in her stomach.
As the weeks had gone by, Hilda’s comments had become more pointed and a lot more worrying. Most were regarding what the baby would look like when it was born.
It was such a trivial respite from monotony, but each month Phyllis received a visit from the district nurse who would take her blood pressure and monitor her progress. Even then Hilda hovered, venting her spleen in waspish undertones.
‘Robert was a very handsome baby. Very fair, almost white. I myself wouldn’t want it any other shade.’
Her pompous comment was accompanied with a contemptuous glance at Phyllis’s flame-coloured hair.
The district nurse had responded that all babies were beautiful, no matter what their hair colour. ‘Or skin colour come to that,’ she’d added. She had not seen the stony look on Hilda’s face but kept her attention and care fixed on Phyllis. ‘Just you look after yourself, Mrs Harvey,’ she’d pronounced. ‘Make sure you get your extra milk allowance and the free orange juice and cod liver oil. There are free vitamins too if you want them. You’ve only to ask. And plenty of fresh air. You and baby need it.’
Feeling bloated, Phyllis now swung her legs out of bed. For a moment she looked at a pair of podgy feet poking out from beneath the full-length nightdress her mother-in-law had thought a good present for a bride going away on honeymoon. The neckline was high, the hem reached to her ankles. It was made of winceyette, a welcome fabric in winter, but too warm for May. Her ankles were puffy and her pregnant stomach obscured the upper half of her thighs.
In her dream, she’d been slim again and off for a night out with her mates at W. D. &. H. O. Wills. My, what wouldn’t she give to be back working in the stripping room, the music on the wireless competing with the booming voice of Aggie Hill? Aggie was statuesque, broad in the beam and had arms the size of hams. Like a mother hen, though of far larger proportion, she took care of her girls, her ‘chicks’ as she called them.
The dream had been no more than that and left Phyllis longing for the old times when she could see her feet and dance all round the stripping room, out of the door and along East Street with her best friends.
They’d called themselves the Three Ms, Maisie Miles, Bridget Milligan and herself when she’d been Phyllis Mason. She was now Mrs Robert Harvey, a fact she was constantly reminded of by a mother-in-law who seemed to regard her as her son’s personal possession.
Robert had been posted abroad, presumably to France, though he’d been reticent to tell them the exact details. In his absence, his mother had taken on the role of chaperone and surrogate nurse, as though the unborn child was some kind of valuable for which she was sole custodian and Phyllis a lockable safe.
At least when the baby was finally born, she would have someone to love, someone to love her and then it might all be worthwhile.
Sunshine streamed into the room when Phyllis pulled the curtains back and the sky was a crystal blue. She had to get out, escape this oppressing atmosphere for as long as possible.
She’d had her twenty-four-week check-up at the clinic and the next wasn’t due until the twenty-eighth week, two weeks’ time. However, the district nurse had told her she could pop in at any time if she had any worries.
Excited at the prospect of an unscheduled day out, she hummed as she washed, dressed and brushed her hair, even chancing a little face powder. Her mother-in-law didn’t approve of face powder. Neither did her mother for that matter, but today Phyllis felt almost inebriated. Come hell or high water, she was going out.
Robert’s father wished her good morning when she appeared in the doorway, the breakfast table set out before her. His smile was kind but there was a weary look in his eyes that had little to do with lack of sleep, more to do with his wife.
‘It’s going to be a nice day,’ he said, his smile wavering on receipt of a withering frown from his wife. He cleared his throat and turned his attention back to his newspaper.
Tom Harvey worked for the local authority. He didn’t talk much about what he did, except that it entailed piles of paperwork. The main thing he did talk about, which Hilda seemed keen to hear, was the new council building on College Green. Eventually a gold unicorn would stand at each end of the roof, just like the ones on the city’s shield which also displayed a ship and a castle, above the Latin inscription, ‘Virtue et Industria’. It was the one piece of history that Hilda Harvey seemed to have swallowed whole and couldn’t help regurgitating when the chance arose.
‘Virtuous and industrious. That totally describes those who made this city great,’ she snorted and made it sound as though she’d put in a lot of effort herself.
Tom Harvey looked the part of a council official, his tie and shirt collar tight round his throat so that his Adam’s apple bobbed against it when he spoke as though trying to escape the breath-squeezing confinement. His black hair was plastered to his head with a copious amount of Brylcreem and his moustache looked as though it had been painted on.
‘Don’t take too much notice of my wife,’ he’d said one day when Hilda’s venom had really got to Phyllis. ‘Her brain isn’t always in tune with her tongue.’ He’d patted her hand, and although Phyllis didn’t quite understand what he meant, for the sake of his kind disposition, she had smiled readily and said that she did.
Hilda Harvey winced when he gave her a goodbye peck on the cheek, barely glancing up from the task of slicing bread that was at least two days old.
‘It’s fine toasted,’ she said as she sawed through the hard outer crust and through the equally hard inner core. ‘We can’t waste anything. My Robert’s life might depend on it.’
Once it was toasted, Phyllis applied a scraping of butter, aware her mother-in-law was keeping an eye on how much she dared use; ditto marmalade, a pale-coloured watery substance that slid off her knife. Hilda added water when it reached the halfway stage so it would go further. If any more was added, it would be easier to drink it, Phyllis thought.
She took a deep breath. ‘I need to go to the clinic. I’m out of orange juice.’
Hilda’s eyes narrowed, her pupils like chips of gravel in her narrow face. ‘Do you now.’
‘I could get some bread whilst I’m out.’ It wasn’t that far to the clinic where she collected the things an expectant mother was entitled to; she wanted to go further. She wanted a whole morning out.
Phyllis pretended not to notice Hilda’s flinty ex
pression. She thought on her feet, her words carefully chosen. If there was one thing Hilda could not tolerate it was somebody getting the better of her; what was hers was hers and belonged to nobody else. ‘I’ve heard of bread being left on the shelf ’cause people ain’t been in to claim what’s rightfully theirs. Seems daft to me. Might as well claim our share whilst we can, don’t you think? Before bread gets rationed too.’
So far bread was not rationed, a fact that many were grateful for, but it didn’t mean that it wouldn’t be.
Hilda was aghast. ‘I suppose you’d better,’ she muttered, her thin lips purple with disdain.
What joy, an hour or so at the clinic, plus another hour or so queuing for bread! A whole half day away from the depressing atmosphere of the Harvey household. ‘Would you like me to get a pot of marmalade as well?’ On the outside, Phyllis was innocent amiability, on the inside she was desperate, like a canary wanting to fly from its cage.
‘Marmalade!’ Hilda looked scandalised. It was as though Phyllis had suggested dancing nude down the street. ‘We have enough to be going on with.’
Phyllis helped carry the dishes to the draining board. ‘It’ll be nice to get out.’
It was her one mistake. The moment the words were out, she knew Hilda would adopt a wounded expression. It turned out she was right.
‘Well, I’m sorry my company and my house make you feel that way. I’m sure I’ve only done my best to make you feel at home.’
‘I didn’t mean anything by it.’ She hadn’t, but Hilda never flinched from the opportunity to make Phyllis feel of little value, that she knew nothing and was nothing without Robert.
Hilda tossed her head. ‘I’ll say nothing except that Audrey, who Robert once courted, wouldn’t speak to me like you do. She was a respectable girl. Went to church and wasn’t fast – not like some I could mention.’
Phyllis flinched but swallowed the insult. She apologised for a second time.
‘As it happens, I’ve got a meeting at the church hall this morning for the association campaigning against women joining up, so I won’t have time to buy bread so you might as well do it.’
Phyllis felt five pounds lighter. She would have her half day out. ‘Your meeting sounds interesting.’ The truth was she wasn’t in the least bit interested, but Hilda did respond to flattery, her begrudging air hiding her inbuilt smugness.
‘I’m starting a campaign to keep women out of uniform. Men go to war. Women look after the home front.’ She puffed up with self-importance. ‘Our aim is to persuade women not to put on a uniform. Not to join the services alongside men. It’s not seemly.’
Phyllis knew it was useless saying that the government were in charge, not her mother-in-law and that if it was what a girl wanted to do, she would do it. ‘It sounds a very good idea,’ Phyllis offered instead and wished Hilda the best of luck with her meeting.
‘No luck is needed,’ came the sharp retort. ‘God is with us. He knows as well as we do that women were never destined to wear a uniform. Wives and mothers. That’s what he meant women to be.’
‘There to look after the family,’ said Phyllis as though she agreed with everything said. ‘Feed, clothe and keep house.’
‘Just a loaf,’ snapped Hilda fixing Phyllis with a warning look sour enough to make milk curdle. ‘Take the key from behind the mantel clock.’
Despite her girth, Phyllis felt like skipping round the room. It wasn’t often she got her hands on a key to the front door.
‘Make sure you put it back afterwards,’ warned her mother-in-law.
‘Without fail,’ returned Phyllis, and felt a stab of pain that fast faded to nothing.
Phyllis gulped the fresh air in deep draughts. It felt so good to be out and away from Hilda’s dark shadow. Sometimes she wondered whether her mother-in-law was just a little mad. Hilda Harvey was always complaining about her nerves and her sweet husband, Tom, tolerated behaviour that was becoming odder and odder. There were occasions when Phyllis caught a worried expression on his passive countenance as though he knew very well that there was more to her spiteful behaviour than nerves.
Sometimes when Hilda was at her church meeting, he’d relate to Phyllis how she’d once been and she detected true love shining in his eyes.
‘She was quite a dish back then,’ he said, his eyes sparkling in a way she’d never seen them sparkle before.
He seemed to like talking to her, but ultimately was defensive of his wife, excusing her manner as being due to the change. There was always an excuse, she thought.
At the clinic, Phyllis had collected her free bottle of orange juice and declined the cod liver oil.
‘Everything all right,’ the duty nurse had asked brightly.
‘Fine,’ Phyllis had responded with an equally bright expression.
Now Phyllis looked in the window of a shop selling baby clothes and smiled. Most of the baby clothes were for older than new born; it was taken for granted that people knitted matinee jackets, bootees, caps and bonnets. Although she already had some, Phyllis went in and bought two tiny flannelette nightdresses for which a ration book was not needed.
Feeling pleased with her purchases, she left the shop but stood in the doorway a while watching the world go by, the ordinary wonderfulness of a tram rattling past, the sky smudged with smoke from factory chimneys.
There were people everywhere, mostly women of course, all intent on getting what they could with their ration books.
The queues were long and the comments critical from the women queuing.
‘It can only get better,’ said one in a strong Bristolian accent, an unlit cigarette hanging precariously from the corner of a toothless mouth.
‘Well, it can’t get any bleedin’ worse,’ returned her companion, a trio of metal curlers jangling over her forehead. ‘All this queuing for a pound of onions!’
Children cried, women nattered, and men shouted as they loaded or unloaded vans, lorries and carts. A pair of shire horses pulling a Georges’ Brewery dray stamped their hairy hooves outside the green tiled walls of the Barley Mow.
Phyllis’s steps slowed then halted when she was directly opposite the warm red brickwork of the tobacco factory and the entrance she knew so well.
The arched windows of the first floor held her attention and suddenly she thought how attractive they were. This was no ordinary factory thrown up cheaply so production could commence as quickly as possible. Skilled craftsmen, who would have been just at home building a castle as a factory, had made the East Street factory exactly that, a Gothic palace, a handsome edifice of which the owners, the builders and those who worked within could be proud.
Up until this moment she hadn’t realised just how handsome it was. She’d been more familiar with the interior than the exterior, a sweet memory that brought a tear to her eye. If only, she thought, as she imagined her workmates inside, the air buzzing with gossip and laughter. Working there seemed a lifetime ago but was only a matter of months. She missed it desperately. If only she hadn’t decided to learn to type. If only the typing teacher had been a woman and not Alan Stalybridge. It was a hard lesson to learn.
‘You all right, luv?’
She started from her thoughts. The question was put by a woman pushing a pram. Two other children clung onto the handlebar.
Taken by surprise, Phyllis responded that she was: ‘Just taking a breather.’
The woman laughed. ‘Make the most of it, luv. There’s barely time to breathe once they get to this age. Seven years ago, I was twenty-one and looking forward to ’avin’ the first one. Seems a lifetime ago.’
Phyllis was horrified. Gaps in the woman’s teeth showed when she laughed. Yet she couldn’t be much more than twenty-eight, Phyllis thought. Expectant mothers were prone to losing their teeth and nobody could afford the price of a dentist. It was bad enough finding the price of a doctor or midwife.
Phyllis brushed at her eyes and turned away from the place where she’d felt at home, where she’d been one of
the girls. At the same time, the baby seemed to lurch in her stomach making her gasp. She reassured herself that it was nothing to worry about. Getting ready to be born, she thought. Her mother had said something to that effect, how they twist and turn to get themselves in the right position to enter the world.
‘Round about seven or eight months,’ her mother had told her. She was almost seven.
A tram rattled past. A newspaper seller shouted the latest news and it wasn’t good. Despite the evacuation from Dunkirk, there was still some action going on and men were missing in France and Belgium. So far there’d been no word from Robert, but it had been reported that communications were chaotic. Her mother-in-law was adamant that he’d be home soon.
‘He’ll be back. He knows he’s got a good home awaiting and a mother who loves him.’
Her father-in-law had been more circumspect and had gone so far as to make excuses for his wife’s abrasive manner. ‘Don’t blame her too much for trying to keep you and the baby safe, stopping you going out and suchlike. She’s doing it for Robert.’ His expression had turned awkward, almost embarrassed. ‘Robert is all she cares about.’
Phyllis’s heart had gone out to him and she accepted it was true. Robert was the centre of Hilda Harvey’s world. Nobody else mattered, and that included her husband, Tom Harvey.
‘You ’eard what I’ve ’eard,’ said a woman in the queue outside the greengrocers. ‘Them soldiers that’s come back from France are being billeted in Victoria Park. There’s tents everywhere, a rough roof over their ’eads, but better than nothin’, I suppose.’
‘Why ain’t they goin’ ’ome?’
The other woman shrugged. ‘P’raps they’ve come back without all their marbles. A lot who came back from fourteen to eighteen went a bit like that. A bit doolally.’
Frightened by the women’s comments, Phyllis quickened her steps, hurrying towards Bedminster Bridge and Redcliffe Hill, suddenly oblivious to the jangling of the trams, the shouts of horse drawn vehicles and the blowing of horns as she crossed the road without looking. What about Robert? Would he be a bit doolally? Was that why they’d heard nothing from him?
