Orphans of War

by Leah Fleming

  For everyone’s sake, now she must put on a brave face and welcome them back to Brooklyn. But not yet, not until she could get used to the idea of Greg being married to Gloria. She couldn’t bear to see them together again until she could sort out her own feelings

  They all parted company before going to the funfair. The lights flickering across the South Bank were like beacons in the dark, those special up-lights coming from the pavement, torching their path that everyone was talking about, underlighting the statues and fountains and some of the buildings. It was eerie but magical. In the half-light Maddy could hide her despair in a bubble of chatter and false bonhomie.

  She shook their hands and wished them well, not giving Gloria the satisfaction of showing her distress.

  ‘I’ll get you tickets for the show tomorrow,’ she offered, hoping against hope they’d refuse, but Greg was quick to step in.

  ‘We’ve got tickets for a musical tomorrow, then it’s home James for us. It was lovely to see you both, though, and I promise we’ll keep in touch.’

  They were all making promises they wouldn’t keep, all of it so polite, so false and so empty. It was a relief to see them into the taxi.

  ‘You never know what a day can bring,’ said Plum on the way home. ‘I thought you handled that very tactfully, darling,’ as a hand reached out to her in the dark. That one motherly gesture opened the floodgates of pain and Maddy felt the tears stinging down her cheeks.

  Plum had guessed something of her anguish, even though she didn’t know the half of it. But it was enough for Maddy just to know that she still had one loyal friend in the world, one who was more like a mother than an aunt.

  The next evening, Greg didn’t hear a word of the musical and sat staring into the darkness in turmoil. The shock of meeting Maddy and Plum numbed him still. When would he ever get Maddy Belfield out of his hair? He thought he’d got over her rejection but one smile and she’d reeled him in again on an invisible line. He’d made a terrible mistake in marrying Gloria, poor girl. He’d rushed in for all the wrong reasons. What he’d felt for her was at first concern and then lust, nothing more. Maddy didn’t have to say or do anything to melt the ice around his heart. She was just Maddy, his friend once upon a time, but, more than his soul mate, the love of his life. What had gone wrong between them? He’d never understand. Now it was all too late to mend. He’d made his choice and he must play fair by Gloria, give her all the toys that would make her happy. They’d be fine, given a bit of space between them, a bit of give and take.

  ‘You don’t always get what you want,’ he’d heard Mr Afton say in a sermon. ‘You get what you need,’ and he’d been glad enough of her body in bed.

  The look of gratitude in her eyes when he’d found her digs and a job, when he placed a ruby ring on her finger, was genuine enough. There’d be plenty more of that with the new show house, and when kiddies came along. They’d want for nothing. It would do. It would have to do. There was nothing else he could give her.

  She wasn’t Maddy and never could be, but he’d try to make up for that one irredeemable fact for the rest of his life.

  Part Four

  20

  November 1956

  Maddy listened with concern to the World Service–first the British collapse at Suez and then Hungary. The uprising in Hungary that had gone so well at first was now turning nasty, and the Russian tanks were on the streets of Budapest. Students were dying and the crowds were helpless against such terror. Pleas for help from the West went unheeded and she thought of poor Mr Henry, who would be in a dreadful mood. Everyone in the atelier knew he still had relatives in that country and was concerned for his niece and nephew’s safety.

  At times like this she yearned to be safe among people she loved–not stuck in a hotel in the South of France, out of touch.

  The last time she’d been back to Yorkshire properly was over nine months ago, when Plum and Steve got married in Scarperton registry office, with a blessing in St Peter’s church. How proud she was to be the maid of honour.

  Plum wore a velvet two-piece, the colour of autumn leaves, with little mink cuffs and collar. They’d looked so happy, and Maddy was so envious, but Plum deserved every ounce of happiness.

  She’d brought Julian Shaw, the actor, as her escort. They’d been lovers on and off, but it had petered out because she was too busy and he was pushing for a film career in Hollywood. There’d been others, but no one special enough to tear her away from busy photo-shoots and fittings.

  Yet standing on that windswept parapet at Cap de Ferrat, as she was looking out in the weak winter sunshine to a turquoise sea, posing for the camera and trying to appear insouciant, there’d been a strange moment of clarity like a voice inside her head, pinging in her ear like crystal glass.

  What on earth are you doing here, Madeleine, when people your age are dying in the streets? Go home, do something useful…

  It wasn’t the first time she’d heard this nagging. It had begun when she stopped enjoying her work, when she realised there were gaps that needed filling and an emptiness inside her that being on parade didn’t fill, when she found herself restless and tired of London. It was a kind of schoolmarmish voice, bending her ear. Stop messing about and do something useful. It’s time to pay back for all you’ve been given. It almost sounded like the voice of Pleasance Belfield, her grandmother, or was it Granny Mills from Chadley, with her rich Lancashire burr? She knew what it was like to be bombed out, her whole world blown to smithereens. She’d had to face life alone in a strange place. That was what was happening now to children all over the world and here she was, prancing around half naked, shivering and trying to concentrate. What could she do to help? Sending money to the appeal seemed too easy…

  ‘Madeleine…Wake up! Madeleine!’ She stood in a trance, unable to concentrate. ‘Maddy Belfield, what’s got into you today?’

  It was at that precise moment that she knew her modelling career was over. One minute she was primping and preening, the next she was packing up bags, flying back to Paris and on to London and King’s Cross Station without a backward glance.

  Everyone thought she was having a breakdown but she was making for home, for the hills of home, in time for Christmas. I’ve been away far too long, she thought.

  Charmaine and Bella might think she was bonkers–it was not as if she’d made a fortune–but she didn’t care. Being a fashion clothes horse had given her an entrée into all sorts of glamorous worlds, but it must end one day whether she liked it or not. She’d had a good innings. Better to go before she was pushed.

  ‘Quit while you’re ahead.’ Old Mr Marshfield’s words came to her aid. She’d seen enough older models, reduced to catalogue work, trying to hide their age with make-up. Maddy was only twenty-six and there were still some good years ahead, but it was time for her to do something else, far from footlights and dressing rooms.

  The answer lay in the hills. That was all she knew. She’d make a pilgrimage to the old Victory Tree HQ and sort out her options.

  Her face was stuck into the Manchester Guardian on the way home, reading about those poor kids fleeing across the border at night and the terrible fate of those who stayed on. If only there was something she could do to help. Perhaps talking things over with Plum and Steve might give her a solution.

  They were still in the Brooklyn, holding the fort with the guesthouse, while Steve was busy with his medical practice. She was longing to see them both.

  How kind Plum had been all those years ago when they’d met Greg and Gloria at the Festival of Britain. How silly she’d been to get so upset, but Plum had never pushed for an explanation for those tears.

  Those two evacuees were never invited back to Sowerthwaite or to the wedding. They’d exchanged enough Christmas cards for her to know there was a child. It was a little girl called Bebe–one of Gloria’s affectations, no doubt.

  Greg’s building empire now stretched across the West Riding and he’d raced in the RAC Rally. There was always
a handwritten note in Plum’s card from Greg, which was left around for Maddy to read.

  She didn’t think about Gloria much. There was no point. Their friendship had just petered out. They’d got nothing in common but Greg, and thinking about them together just made her angry and mean. Her courage failed when she thought about asking Gloria one more time about that awful night. It was all so long ago, another lifetime ago, and she never wanted to see either of them again.

  She gazed out with anticipation as the train chuffed its way north. She’d forgotten how green the land became when they left Leeds station, how the hills rose up, grey stone walls in all directions, farmsteads dotted about. It was all so beautiful in a rugged, comfortable sort of way.

  Her London life was over and she was shedding it like a snakeskin. It had been a good experience but now she wanted another challenge. This was a big risk and a challenge, letting go of her career with no surety where the next one was coming from.

  ‘Never go back,’ someone once said, but she had to go back to find out who she was again. If only she could go back to being ten, dangling her legs from the Victory Tree, making wishes. Everything was so much simpler then. If only…

  Plum was waiting at the station in their Morris Traveller estate, piling bags into the back. ‘I’ve got your room ready. The dogs will go mad to see you. They’re old now, but they’ll expect a good walk up Simmonds Ridge before dusk. We’ll have the best Christmas yet, with no guests! I’ll put them all off. It’s just us, family together. I want to know what’s been happening. Your letters were intriguing. I can’t believe you just walked away from all that glitz and glamour to Sowerthwaite.’

  As they drove down the High Street Maddy saw the same familiar grey stone shops, the market square with its preaching cross, the cars and vans, the horse-drawn carts, the pubs and churches and pretty Christmas lights in shop windows. Sowerthwaite had grown prosperous since the war. A new housing estate had sprung up where once they used to play in fields. A swing park had been built for the children and the old school extended.

  They passed the Old Vic. It was shuttered up and sad-looking.

  ‘Do we still rent it out to the mill?’ Maddy asked.

  ‘I’m afraid not,’ said Plum. ‘The cotton mill’s closing down, didn’t I tell you? We’ve lost our lodgers there. Steve’s solicitor friend, Barney Andrews, suggests we sell it off for housing to a builder. It would make a nice townhouse for someone, with such a big garden at the back. Now, you ought to meet him. He’s very—’

  ‘No matchmaking, Plum.’

  ‘Forgive me, but the estate’s really yours now and it’s time you ought to know what it entails. I’m only caretaking until such times—’

  ‘But Brooklyn is your home,’ Maddy said, wanting to reassure her.

  ‘And your home too. In fact, Stephen and I were only talking last night…but it can wait until you’ve had a walk, a bath and a good meal inside you. You’re just skin and bone, young lady.’

  ‘Models don’t eat. We smoke, we drink, we pick at food–but not any more! I hope you’ve made a Christmas pudding and all the trimmings?’

  ‘We’ll have the full works, don’t worry. Grace is seeing to that. We’ll kill the fatted calf for the prodigal’s return. Have no fear, you’ll be as plump as a turkey by New Year if she has anything to do with it.’

  ‘Jolly good!’ Maddy laughed. It was marvellous to be home.

  Plum was dreading the end of their wonderful welcome home dinner of roast pheasant casserole with juniper berries, followed by blackberry and apple cobbler and cream, and the best coffee she could order from York.

  Maddy looked radiant in the candlelight in her thick stylish sweater dress, her hair wound up in a French pleat and her gold earrings flashing in the firelight. The strain had gone from her face, and that pinched tight look across her cheekbones was loosening. This was their first proper Christmas together for years but she feared she was going to have to spoil it all with some startling news. She was not sure how Maddy would react.

  Maddy kept darting in and out of the house like a child, admiring the Christmas decorations in the hall, the festive banners, reading cards pinned up that they’d opened. The tree had been left for them to decorate together later. The box of decorations was all prepared, each bauble with its own story of who bought it or made it. It was a beloved tradition that neither of them wanted to miss.

  Steve said that he’d break the news for her, but Plum insisted they both do it. Just as he was about to start, the phone rang and he was called out to a difficult birth on a farm up the Dale.

  ‘Maddy, I’ve got some news. I’m not sure how to say this.’

  ‘You’re not ill, are you?’ Maddy looked apprehensive.

  ‘No, not at all. It’s just that Steve’s got a new opportunity, a wonderful chance,’ Plum gulped.

  ‘That’s great. He’s a good doctor. He’s taking another practice?’

  ‘No, in a hospital clinic, but it’s in New Zealand…working with a friend he met in the war. They always promised they’d work together. You know he was in the Battle for Crete. They evaded capture with the help of these New Zealanders. They’ve kept in touch. He owes them his life and now he feels…’

  She saw Maddy’s face crumple. ‘New Zealand! But it’s the other side of the world!’

  ‘I know, dear, but it’s what he’s always wanted.’

  ‘So you must go with him, of course, but it’s so far away, by ship.’

  ‘Yes, but there are flights. I’ll stay on until everything is sorted out. They’ve got a replacement in the practice here so he’ll leave in the New Year and I’ll follow, but not for ages yet.’

  ‘How long?’

  ‘I hope to leave at the end of March. We can find someone to help run the guesthouse. That’s why you must speak to Barney. I’m sorry to land you right in it.’ Plum reached out for her hand.

  ‘Not half! I can’t believe it. Oh, Plum, just when I thought everything was settled,’ she replied, looking so woebegone.

  ‘I’m sorry. Nothing ever stays the same, does it? I have to go. Finding Steve has been the best thing in my life–a little late perhaps, but I want to help him all I can,’ Plum continued. Her face was alive with love and concern.

  ‘Forget what I said, I’m only being selfish. You’re the only family I’ve got and it’s hard to think of you being so far away. It’s such a shock.’ Maddy was trying not to cry.

  ‘I know we’ve not seen each other for ages, Maddy, not since our wedding, but we can write to each other,’ Plum replied.

  ‘It’s not the same, though, is it? I wish I hadn’t stayed away so long…’

  ‘You had your reasons, but no door shuts without another opening. I’ve always believed that. Look at how you all filled my life, you and the evacuees, when things were dire with Gerry. It was the making of me.’

  ‘I was sorry to hear Uncle Gerald died so suddenly and, just like his mother, with a stroke. I should have gone to his funeral but I was abroad at the time.’

  ‘Steve and I went out of respect for times past. Gerald was the last of the Belfield brothers; the only one to die in peacetime. End of an era,’ Plum sighed. ‘We met Daisy Abbott–not a bit like I imagined my rival would be. You know, I think we could’ve been friends…I felt sorry for her. So this is all yours now. I’m sorry to spring this on you but we must make it the best of Christmases. I’m scared too…I’m an old stick-in-the-mud at heart. Making a new life at my age is terrifying.’

  ‘Oh, Plum, what will I do without you?’ Maddy cried.

  ‘You’ll manage fine and dandy. Look on this as a great opportunity to sell up and move on yourself, if you want to,’ Plum replied, trying not to blubber.

  ‘Sell up Brooklyn?’

  ‘Why, yes. There’s nothing to interest you here, is there?’

  ‘But this is my home…I can’t sell it. Pleasance would turn in her grave and haunt me.’

  ‘Well, you’re free to do what you want now
, Maddy, you’re a big girl. It’s an expensive item to keep up. It’ll have to pay its way and the Old Vic needs sorting too. You’ll rattle around in here like a pea in a drum. Speak to Barney, he’s got some ideas.’

  ‘But it’s Christmas–I’m not going to think about any of it until after New Year. I shall take old Monty for a long hack over Simmonds Ridge and chew the cud if the weather holds. Your news takes some swallowing.’

  ‘I knew you’d see the sense of it. We’re going carol singing tonight with the choir and there’s the school Nativity play tomorrow night. We’ll do some last-minute shopping and get squiffy on damson gin. How’s that for starters? If it’s going to be our last Christmas here.’

  ‘No, it’s not…you’ll be back. Brooklyn won’t be Brooklyn without you…you must return. I’m not going to sell it.’

  They were both in tears. It was time for Plum to play the trump card. ‘Let’s go and decorate the tree, you always loved doing that.’

  The tree smelled of pine needles and ginger in the firelight. Out came all the wartime dough decorations: bells and angels, Santas and glass baubles, the shepherd’s crook filled with long-forgotten chocolate drops, stars painted with glittery paint and tinsel angels, pretty glass lanterns and bells from another era. Neither spoke, but Plum saw the tears trickling down Maddy’s face.

  She had been cruel to be kind. Better to spoil her illusions now so they could get on with their new lives and new plans and really enjoy Christmas together without any secrets.

  Maddy had chosen to return just when Plum was choosing a new life and she had no regrets about leaving with Steve. The girl was a woman, old enough to have lovers and admirers. She’d done her job, seen the girl right in dark times. Christmas brought out the child in everyone, and Maddy’s worst Christmas had been here all those years ago. This one would be brilliant.