Chasing Shadows

by Lynn Austin

  A hunched figure hurried up the sidewalk toward Eve—Mrs. Herder, bundled against the cold and the gently falling snow, walking her dog. Eve smiled at the older woman as they passed. “Hello. Lovely evening, isn’t it?”

  “If you like snow.” Her words were muffled by the thick scarf wrapped around her neck and chin. Mrs. Herder continued past, her rambunctious yellow Labrador stopping to sniff at mailbox posts one minute, then tugging on his lead the next. They seemed a mismatched pair, the young dog too large and energetic for the small, white-haired woman who reminded Eve of her granny.

  Eve quickened her steps, gazing at the houses she passed, wishing she had a home of her own for her and her son. What would that be like? Lights glowed from behind her neighbors’ windows, revealing glimpses of their lives, as if peering at distant television screens. She knew very little about her neighbors, including Mrs. Herder, even though she passed the older woman and her dog nearly every day. Eve only assumed her name was Herder because it was printed on her mailbox out front. The older woman lived in an historic house with a wide front porch that stood at the very edge of Eve’s neighborhood of new, postwar bungalows. Mrs. Herder still displayed a gold star in her window six years after the war had ended, as if she didn’t want anyone to forget that she had lost a loved one. The star stirred memories of Alfie Clarkson, Eve’s first love, who had also died in the war. Alfie and Mum and Granny—Eve wished she could hang gold stars somewhere to tell the world how much she missed them.

  She turned to watch Mrs. Herder and her dog walk up the steps and enter their house and felt a wave of homesickness for the little English village of Wellingford, where she’d grown up. Her neighbors had known each other’s names and had watched out for each other, their brick and stone cottages sitting shoulder to shoulder as if closing ranks against the outside world, not separated by private lawns and picket fences as they were here in America. The cottage in the village that she’d shared with Granny, and the nearby woods where she’d loved to roam, were the only true homes Eve could recall. But she had needed a new start for herself and Harry after the war, in a place where no one knew the shame of Harry’s birth. While she wasn’t proud of the way she had maneuvered that fresh start, things had turned out better than she deserved, for both her and her son. They lived with Eve’s widowed friend, Audrey Barrett, paying rent every month, and the four of them had become a family of sorts. But if Eve could wish for any gift this Christmas, it would be a home of her own.

  Harry wasn’t in his usual place, watching for Eve from the front window as she walked up the driveway to Audrey’s little bungalow. She went inside through the kitchen door, stomping snow off her boots. She pulled off her hat, then smoothed down her hair. “It’s snowing again,” she told Audrey.

  “The boys will be happy about that.” Audrey stood at the kitchen stove, mashing a pot of potatoes into gooey submission. “Personally, I don’t much like driving in snow.”

  “We drove our ambulances on some rather slippery roads during the war, remember?”

  “At breakneck speed. With bombs falling. But it had to be done.”

  Eve hung up her coat and followed the happy sound of Harry’s voice as he played with Audrey’s son, Bobby. She found them sprawled on the rug in the living room, paging through a brightly colored catalogue. The boys were the same age and nearly the same size and might have been twins in their corduroy pants and plaid flannel shirts, except that Harry had ginger hair—a redhead, the Americans would say—and was friendly and talkative and boisterous. Bobby had inherited his father’s ebony hair and his mother’s shy reserve.

  “What has you so charmed that you can’t even say hello to your mum?” Eve asked.

  “Hi, Mommy.” Eve sighed inwardly at her son’s American accent and wording. It was her own fault, since she had brought him to the States as an infant. Bobby, having been here for a year and a half, was starting to adopt the same type of speech, but at least he still called Audrey “Mummy.”

  Harry barely glanced up, as if he might miss something if he looked away for too long. “We’re picking out all the toys we want Santa to bring us from the Christmas Wish Book.” He pointed to the page, saying, “I want that airplane. Oooh, and that submarine, too! And I want this army truck and this tank and this motorcycle . . . We could play army, right, Bobby?”

  “That would be fun!” Bobby laid his hand on the page for a moment as if claiming territory. “I want all of the trucks on this page—and especially this motorbus!”

  Harry waited until his friend lifted his hand, then flipped to the next page. “I want this pickup truck. Look, it has lights that really light up! And wow, look at this steam shovel! We could dig holes with it!”

  “I want one,” Bobby said. “This army jeep has real lights, too!”

  Eve squatted beside the boys for a better look as they continued turning pages, gleefully pointing to fire engines and bulldozers and police cars. “It looks to me like you’re asking for every toy in the book.”

  “Not the girls’ stuff,” Harry said, making a face. “We don’t want dolls!”

  “Or baby toys,” Bobby added. “Just all of the boys’ toys on all of these pages.” Eve watched them flip through a few more pages, chorusing, “I want this and this . . .”

  She frowned. “There isn’t room in this house for all of those toys. And besides, you have so many playthings already.”

  “But they’re old toys, Mommy. These are new toys. We’re going to ask Santa for all of these new toys when we see him at the parade tonight.”

  “The parade? That’s tonight?”

  “Yep. Did you forget, Mommy?”

  “I may have, yes. I had a busy day at work.” A mind-numbing day, actually. One that was exactly like the day before it and the one before that, clacking out letters in a windowless office as part of a typing pool. After paying her rent and a portion of the debt she felt she owed Audrey, Eve would be lucky to have enough money left over to buy one toy for Harry, let alone an entire catalogue full of them.

  Audrey poked her head around the corner from the kitchen. “Dinner is ready. Wash up, please.”

  Eve stood and walked toward Audrey. “Where did they get the catalogue?”

  “It’s called the Wish Book, Mommy,” Harry called to her.

  “I think it came about a month ago, but I found it again when I straightened up this morning. They’ve been glued to it all afternoon.” The boys stood to wash their hands, carrying the catalogue to the bathroom with them.

  “Look at that, Bobby!” she heard Harry saying as they went. “It’s a whole service station, with gasoline pumps and cars and everything!”

  “I want one!”

  “That Wish Book seems to have opened a Pandora’s box of greedy longing,” Eve told Audrey with a sigh. She would never be able to buy even a quarter of those toys for her son.

  When they finally sat down at the kitchen table, Harry bolted his food in record time. “Hurry, Mommy, hurry!” he begged. “We’re gonna miss the Santa Claus Parade.”

  Eve continued to eat at a leisurely pace. “Don’t worry. We have plenty of time.”

  “Do you have to go away tonight, Mummy?” Bobby asked Audrey. The worried look on his face was exactly like his mother’s. Audrey had been a worrier for as long as Eve had known her, which was most of their thirty-two years. They had met as twelve-year-olds in the woods surrounding Wellingford Hall, where Eve’s mother served as lady’s maid to Audrey’s mother, the wealthy and aristocratic Lady Rosamunde.

  “No, my classes are all finished for the semester,” Audrey replied.

  “Don’t you remember how anxious your mum was when she was studying for her exams last week?” Eve asked. “We barely got a full sentence out of her.”

  “My final marks came in the mail today,” Audrey said quietly.

  “Well, are you going to show us or were they a disaster?”

  Audrey smiled her shy, Audrey smile, dipping her head a little as if bowing before roy
alty. “They weren’t bad.”

  “Let me guess—you earned top marks in both classes, am I right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good job, you! We’ll have to celebrate.”

  After eating, they stacked the supper dishes in the sink to save for later and bundled up for the short drive into town for the parade. On the way there, Eve heard the boys whispering in the back seat and she swiveled around from the passenger seat to look. They had the catalogue open and were pointing and murmuring, “I want a gun and holster set like that!”

  “We can pretend we’re the Lone Ranger!”

  “You brought the Wish Book with you? To a parade?” she asked in astonishment. The boys stared at her as if she’d asked a silly question.

  “Did they really?” Audrey asked, glancing in the rearview mirror. “You’ve been studying it all afternoon, Bobby.”

  “I know, Mummy, but I might forget to tell Santa something I really, really want.”

  “We’re gonna just show him everything instead,” Harry added.

  “You cannot sit on Santa’s lap with the entire Sears Wish Book in your greedy little hands,” Eve said.

  “Why not?”

  “Please, Mummy?”

  “Well, for one thing, Santa Claus brings toys to a lot of other children besides you two,” Eve said, “and the things you’re asking for would fill his entire sled.”

  “He can make lots of trips, Mommy. He has all night.”

  Eve glanced at Audrey and saw her trying to hide a smile.

  “Besides,” Harry continued, “Santa only brings toys if you’re good, and there are lots of kids at school who aren’t being good.”

  “They’ll get coal in their stockings,” Bobby said solemnly.

  Audrey found a parking spot near the village square, and as the boys tumbled out of the back seat, Eve spotted the catalogue peeking out from beneath Harry’s jacket. “The Wish Book stays in the car,” she said, yanking it out and tossing it onto the seat.

  “But, Mommy . . .”

  She shut the car door. “If you can’t remember everything on the list, maybe it’s because your list is too long.”

  A huge Christmas tree stood in the picturesque town square, waiting for the mayor to throw the switch and light it up at the end of the parade.

  “When are we going to get a Christmas tree?” Harry asked.

  “Maybe this weekend. We’ll cut one down from Uncle Tom’s farm like we did last year, remember?”

  Audrey’s late husband’s childhood friend Tom Vandenberg had been like a father to both of the boys, and he also held a special place in Eve’s heart. In fact, he’d hinted more than once that he’d like to marry her and be more than just a father figure in Harry’s life.

  Beneath the village Christmas tree was a throne for Santa and a roped-off section where the children could form a queue to talk with him. Eve took Harry’s hand in hers as they headed down the town’s main street, wading through the crowd of pedestrians, searching for a place to stand along the parade route.

  The quaint Connecticut town had been decorated with Christmas lights that twinkled against the snow, and the store windows were beautifully staged to tempt shoppers. Eve paused to look at a display of the latest aluminum kitchen appliances and coffeepots for modern housewives, along with aluminum ladders, Thermos bottles, and saws for their husbands. These were items that belonged in a home—a real home with a mother and father and children.

  She closed her eyes, fighting off the familiar emptiness when she considered her and Audrey’s makeshift family. At least Audrey had a respectable reason for being a single mum. And Eve should be thankful that her friend had invited Eve and Harry to share her home. She had lived off Audrey’s insurance money and her husband’s inheritance for nearly four years, living in Audrey’s house, driving her car. And although Audrey wasn’t demanding a penny of it, Eve was determined to pay it all back.

  “Wow! Look at that airplane, Bobby!” Harry pointed to a large propeller plane, also made from aluminum, dangling behind the store window from a wire. “Was there a big airplane like that in the Wish Book?”

  “I don’t think so. I want it!”

  “Me, too. We’ll tell Santa tonight. What’s the name of this store, Mommy? We need to tell Santa where he can buy it.”

  “Santa will know,” Eve said, tugging his hand. “Come on.”

  No matter how far they walked, the sidewalks were so crowded with families and children standing three- and four-deep to watch the parade that Eve couldn’t find a place where all of them could stand. The cadence of drums sounded in the distance. The parade was about to begin.

  Harry hopped up and down in frustration. “I can’t see! I can’t see!”

  “Mummy, look,” Bobby said. “They have daddies to help them.” He pointed to the families in front of them, and Eve saw that many of the fathers had lifted their small children onto their shoulders or held them in their arms so they could see. Eve and Audrey were both petite, and besides, the boys were too heavy to hold for the entire parade.

  “I need a daddy so I can see,” Harry told Eve. “Everyone else has one.”

  “It’s not fair,” Bobby pouted.

  “Oh, dear,” Eve murmured. She met Audrey’s worried gaze.

  The next moment, Harry dropped Eve’s hand and ran up to a well-dressed gentleman who was just coming out of the department store. He carried a brightly wrapped box tied with a silver bow. “Will you be our daddy?” Harry asked him.

  “Harry!” Eve gasped, horrified.

  “Mine, too! Mine, too!” Bobby echoed, running to the man.

  A tide of heat rushed to Eve’s face as she hurried over to apologize to the gentleman and yank her son away. But before she could utter a sound, the man crouched down to talk to the boys. “Hello, Harry and Bobby. Are you here to see Santa Claus?” Eve recognized him then. Mr. Hamilton was the leader of their Boys’ Club at church. But she was still horribly embarrassed. And judging by her friend’s expression, Audrey was too.

  “Yeah. We were going to show Santa all the toys we wanted in the Wish Book,” Harry told him, “but Mommy made us leave it in the car.”

  “I hope I can remember everything.” Bobby wore his fretful look again.

  Mr. Hamilton smiled. “I’m sure you’ll remember the important things.” He was probably in his midthirties and movie-star handsome. When millions of American GIs had landed in England during the war, Eve and Audrey and all the other women used to comment on how handsome the American men were—and here was another one, not wearing a uniform but a very expensive-looking overcoat, fedora, and cashmere scarf.

  He stood again as the high school marching band approached playing “Jingle Bells.”

  “It’s starting! The parade is starting!” Harry said, hopping up and down. “And we don’t have a daddy!”

  Mr. Hamilton gave Audrey and Eve a questioning look, as if not understanding.

  “To boost them up,” Eve said quickly, gesturing to the families around them.

  “I see. I’ll be glad to help.” He handed his package to Audrey and crouched again, then lifted up both boys, one in each arm. Mr. Hamilton was a big man, tall and broad-shouldered, as solid as a Frigidaire. He looked as though he could easily manage two boys.

  “But . . . I’m sure Mr. Hamilton needs to get home to his family and—” Audrey began.

  “I don’t mind at all,” he said with a smile.

  “Well . . . thank you. You can put them down whenever you get tired,” Eve said.

  Fire engines rolled past, red lights flashing. Prancing horses carried Roy Rogers and Hopalong Cassidy look-alikes shooting cap pistols. The mayor waved from inside a Model A Ford strung with fairy lights. Local business owners towed homemade floats with Christmas decorations and pretty high school girls singing carols. Santa’s elves gave out candy canes to the children along the way. Then Santa Claus himself arrived, his sleigh pulled by a shiny new John Deere tractor.

  “Hey! Where
are all his reindeer?” Harry asked.

  “Maybe they’re resting up for their big night,” Mr. Hamilton replied.

  “They’ll need a long rest after pulling a sled filled with all the toys you boys want,” Eve said. She and Audrey thanked Mr. Hamilton profusely when the parade ended and he had set the boys down on the sidewalk again. He tipped his hat to them and retrieved his package from Audrey.

  “My pleasure, ladies. I hope you have a very merry Christmas—and that you boys get everything you want from that Wish Book.”

  “Not a chance,” Eve mumbled. They followed the rest of the crowd back to the village square, applauding when the mayor flipped the switch and the towering Christmas tree lit up.

  The queue of children waiting to sit on Santa’s lap seemed miles long, and Eve was weary. The cold had seeped through her boots, chilling her toes. “It’s going to take hours for you boys to have your turn,” she moaned. “And then another hour to recite the unabridged version of the Wish Book to him.”

  “I have an idea,” Audrey said. “Why don’t you write letters to Santa instead? That way, you can take your time, and you won’t forget anything.” Audrey’s cheeks were as red as apples, and she was shivering. The boys seemed oblivious to the cold.

  “But I can’t write yet, Mummy. Just my name.”

  “I’ll help you. I promise.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Eve said. “Let’s go home.”

  “He’s only Santa’s helper, anyway,” she heard Harry telling Bobby as they trudged back to the car. “The real Santa lives at the North Pole and has lots and lots of toys to make.”

  Harry got into a tug-of-war with Bobby at bedtime, arguing over which of them would get to sleep with the Wish Book under his pillow. “It isn’t going under either one of your pillows,” Audrey said, taking it away. “It’s not as though you’ve lost a tooth and are waiting for the tooth fairy.” She set the book on their dresser for the night.

  “But, Mummy . . . ,” Bobby whined.

  “Didn’t you see all of those other children at the parade tonight?” Eve asked. “Santa has to bring presents to all of them, too. He can’t bring you every single toy in the Wish Book.”