by Lizzie Lane
‘Your car’s been fuelled up, miss,’ said the corporal outside the entrance.
‘Really? I thought I had enough to get back to base, and besides there’s a few petrol stations between here and there.’
‘Perhaps the wing commander has other plans,’ said the corporal.
There was something in the way he said it that made her think he was right. She was just about to question what he knew and wasn’t telling, when Hunter appeared at the top of the marble steps. He strode down them quickly, his face as grim as when she’d left him.
‘Croydon,’ he barked as he slid into the back seat.
Croydon! ‘I’ve never been there before,’ she said haltingly, reaching for an army-issue road map before starting the engine.
‘Good God, woman! Don’t bother with that. I’ll give you directions. We haven’t got all day!’
His brusque manner stiffened her spine. She just about managed to sound respectful. ‘Yes, sir.’
She’d looked long enough at the map to have a rough idea of where she was going. Each time he told her which way to go, her jaw tightened that bit more. And just when she was beginning to warm to him too. Well not now! Certainly not now!
The rest of the journey passed in silence except for him giving directions and one single attempt at normal conversation. He asked her if she was going home for Christmas.
‘No, sir.’
‘You’ve drawn duty?’
‘Yes, sir.’
It was evening by the time they got to Croydon airfield and the grey winter light was fast sliding into darkness. Huddled buildings with flat roofs loomed ahead of them. Beyond were the indistinct shapes of aircraft. All were blurred by a seasonal mist.
For some reason that she couldn’t explain, Lizzie’s heart began to race. Apprehension clutched at her stomach. Something was about to happen, though she couldn’t imagine what.
Get a grip on yourself, she thought.
‘Stop here.’
She did as ordered. Ahead of them was the runway. He took his leave of her abruptly and without undue ceremony.
She lingered, amazed by what she was seeing. A large aircraft sat there, its propellers already turning. She looked for the customary RAF symbol on the side, but in its place was a large white star. Her eyes widened. The implications were enormous. Wing Commander Hunter wasn’t merely flying in an American aircraft. He must be going to America. But why? What was going on?
Chapter Thirteen
It was three days before Christmas and two days after Michael had gone back to his posting that Gertrude came calling. She looked more serious than usual and was holding an opened envelope in her hand.
Mary Anne flung the door wide when she saw who it was. ‘Gertrude. How lovely to see you. Do come in. Can I get you a cup of tea?’
Gertrude’s grim-faced expression did not improve; in fact the straight, thin lips became even straighter.
‘No. What I’ve got to say I can say here.’
A cold fear clutched at Mary Anne’s stomach. Her gaze dropped to the letter. ‘What is it? Has something happened to someone?’
Her first thought was Harry, but then she noticed the envelope was plain brown with no official insignia. It was not a telegram. Her knees almost buckled with relief.
‘No,’ said Gertrude, her mouth snapping shut. ‘Except that I have been seriously misled. You have been dishonest with me, Mrs Randall, and I am not best pleased.’
Mary Anne frowned as she shook her head. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘This letter arrived at my house this morning. It is from a person stating that the man who’s been staying here these last few days is not in fact your husband!’
Mary Anne felt the blood rush to her face. What she’d feared all along had actually happened. But had Henry sent the letter? How dare he!
‘I can explain, Gertrude …’
‘Mrs Palmer to you!’
This was the side of Gertrude Palmer that Mary Anne had hoped never to see. An upholder of tradition and Victorian values, Gertrude was not the sort to be persuaded that sometimes – just sometimes – such things were acceptable.
Mary Anne was lost for words. She knew what was coming – and yet they’d been so careful. But someone had betrayed them.
‘I’m afraid you’ll have to go, Mrs Randall. I do not countenance lewd behaviour on any premises under my jurisdiction.’
Mary Anne was shocked, but refused to take it lying down. ‘If you’d known my husband, you would have jailed him for violence!’
It was a well-known fact that Gertrude Palmer sat as a magistrate. No doubt she’d had plenty like Henry before her in her time.
‘That is not the issue here,’ Gertrude said between clenched teeth. ‘The man you had in your bed was not your husband. It is not seemly. I cannot allow it.’
There was nothing for it. Mary Anne set her jaw and folded her arms. She would not be humbled. She’d had too many years of that. ‘How long will you give me until I can find something else?’
‘One week. That is all.’ She turned to go, but paused. ‘Here,’ she said, thrusting the envelope forward. ‘You might as well have this. I am informed of the circumstances. That is all that matters.’
Mary Anne took the letter. Her hand dropped to her side as though it weighed the same as a sack of coal. She had no wish to read it. There was nothing to be gained.
‘What about Stanley?’ she murmured, but it was too late to implore. Why hadn’t she done so at the time? Stunned, she thought, I was stunned. But she would go round to Henry again, she determined. She would try and catch him in and give him a piece of her mind. Alright, so he hadn’t been around when the pawnshop had caught fire. Perhaps it really had been looters and her imagination had merely been working overtime. But he could have written this letter.
She opened the envelope and looked at the writing. She frowned. Henry could barely sign his name, and even that was in a squiggly hand. This writing was neat and rounded. The grammar was tight and the sentences went straight to the point. She crumpled it in her hand and left it sitting on the table. There was no point in moping over what had happened. She had to find somewhere else to live. Her eyes misted as she looked around the room. It had been such a short, sweet stay.
The job of doing alterations and making good clothes from old ones was taken from Mary Anne. When she went through the shop, Edith was bent over the old treadle sewing machine. Defiant of Gertrude Palmer, it was she who glanced up and called out best of luck. Gertrude threw her a warning look. Edith just glared back at her.
Outside Mary Anne took a deep breath of fresh air. Tonight promised to be frosty. And soon I’ll be homeless, she thought dejectedly as she turned left out of the shop doorway.
‘Mary Anne!’
She stopped and looked round. Edith was running towards her, one hand holding on to her hat.
Edith was small and easily looked up into Mary Anne’s face. ‘I wanted you to know that I don’t think you’re a scarlet woman. I know there are sometimes circumstances beyond our control. I told Gertrude that.’
Mary Anne smiled weakly. ‘I wish I could believe that she’d listen.’
A sudden movement made her look over Edith’s shoulder. Gertrude was leaning out of the shop doorway, her face as dark as a December night.
‘I think you’d better get back here,’ she said.
Edith was adamant. ‘Look, we’re volunteers! You don’t pay us or own us. We can do what we like and speak to who we want.’ Edith’s uncharacteristic vibrancy lessened as she turned back to Mary Anne. ‘Where are you going?’
‘To find somewhere to live.’
‘Do you know who wrote the letter?’
Mary Anne shrugged. ‘At first I thought my husband wrote it, but the handwriting …’
‘Perhaps he got someone else to write it. Some people are better at writing letters than others. I’m not terribly good myself. My sister Cissy usually writes mine for me.’
Mary Anne s
tared into the distance. There had been something vaguely familiar about the writing. Did Stanley, her youngest son, write like that? Anger boiled inside her. How dare Henry do that? How dare he get Stanley to write for him! But what about Biddy Young? She could write; perhaps it had been her.
‘I hope you find somewhere,’ Edith said and patted her hand. ‘Good luck.’
Mary Anne made a sudden decision not to go to where Henry was living, but to seek him at work. Henry worked as a taxi driver. His usual pitch was outside Temple Meads Station. That, she decided, is where I’ll find him.
The cabs were lined up alongside the colonnade. Nudges and sly whispers were exchanged as the drivers eyed her approach. She couldn’t see Henry’s cab and presumed he was out on a fare. She paused, nervously considering what she would say. The gathered cabbies recognized her and divided into two camps; not physically with their whole bodies, but in their eyes. Some simmered with hostility, others with conjecture: if she was sleeping with one man who wasn’t her husband, why not another?
They’re shameless, thought Mary Anne, veering away at the last minute from the leering smiles, the secretive winks.
She headed into the station concourse and bought herself a platform ticket. She’d wait there if she had to. No doubt Henry would be told her whereabouts by one of his colleagues.
A ticket collector doffed his hat as he punched her ticket. She blushed and hurried on. Age had enhanced her looks. She had an elegance about her she had not owned in her youth. She’d been pretty, yes, but lots of young girls are pretty. Few women grow into elegance.
She sat on a bench. The smell of soot lay heavy in the air. Trains screeched and belched as they pulled in and out of the station with uncommon regularity. Uniformed men and women got on and got off, all going somewhere, all having been somewhere.
Glancing up at the station clock a while later revealed that she’d been there for half an hour. Henry had to be back by now. She passed back through the barrier, informing the ticket collector that she was just going out to see if her son had arrived.
‘But I will be back,’ she said lightly, flashing him a smile.
He promised not to charge her for another platform ticket when she got back. He doffed his hat again.
Just as she was approaching the wide entrance to the station incline, she saw Henry coming the other way. Her nerves tightened at the sight of him. The sites of old injuries throbbed anew as though warning her not to trust him, not to forget what he’d done.
His face brightened when he saw her. ‘Mary Anne!’
Despite her anger, Mary Anne felt that old nervousness taking hold of her. She clasped her hands together over the handle of her handbag. She wanted to run, but she also wanted to fight.
He eyed her quizzically. ‘Nash and the others told me you’d come in here. Are you going somewhere?’
‘I came to see you about this.’ She thrust the letter at him.
He frowned as he took it and spread it open. His eyes flickered between the letter and her. ‘You know I can’t read too well,’ he said gruffly and thrust it back to her. ‘What does it say?’
‘Do you get our Stanley to write letters for you?’
‘Sometimes he writes out my daily log for me.’
The daily log was where Henry recorded his fares and fees for the day. Someone in the family had always written it out for him. Stanley was now the only one who stayed with his father on a regular basis.
‘What does it say?’ Henry asked her again.
Mary Anne took a deep breath as she pushed it back into her handbag. ‘It slanders my name.’
He didn’t say anything, merely jerked his chin as though he understood exactly what she was saying.
‘Have you heard from our Harry?’
Mary Anne was taken aback. Father and son had never seen eye to eye.
‘He writes to me quite regularly.’
It was true. Like Michael he was based in England and did top-secret code-breaking work. Harry wrote regularly to his mother but not to his father. ‘What’s the point?’ he’d said in his letters. ‘He wouldn’t read them.’
Henry’s eyelids flickered as though he were censoring his thoughts before voicing them. ‘Did you ever hear from that lawyer bloke? I wouldn’t give ’im yer address, but I think that busybody friend of yours did.’
She shook her head. ‘Unfortunately, I think I was the wrong Mary Anne.’
Henry studied his feet as he spoke. ‘Understandable I suppose, seeing as yer family did have a few bob.’
Having no wish to bring up the past, she turned away. Her family had been reasonably well off. Henry had never had trouble with that – not until later, not until she had trusted him. ‘This damned war,’ he said suddenly. ‘I suppose the Yanks will come in when it’s all but over!’ She didn’t look back. ‘I have to go.’ He didn’t ask her where she was going and she wouldn’t tell him she was homeless. He’d only offer for her to stay with him and she wouldn’t do that. She couldn’t do that.
‘I still want you back, Mary Anne, even though you ’ave been living with yer fancy man,’ he called after her.
Mary Anne bristled. ‘Don’t call him that,’ she shouted back.
‘Get going then, and good riddance! Yer no better than yer friend Biddy Young. She’s got a fancy man too. Calls on ’er once a week when the young ’uns are at school – to ’ave a cup of a tea and a chat, she says. But I think we both know what that means don’t we? Eh? Yer both tarred with the same brush, and that’s the truth of it!’
His loud voice followed her down the incline to the main Bath Road. She winced at the sound of it, hating him saying those things. She wasn’t like Biddy! She wasn’t like Biddy at all!
Chapter Fourteen
Daw’s husband John had been lucky enough to get leave for Christmas and was making the most of it. Running a corner shop had some advantages for his Auntie Maria: she’d made a cake, cooked a chicken and had made a plum pudding from fresh plums pickled back in October. The custard was sweetened with a mix of honey and sugar saved over weeks from the rations. The flour used in the cake and pudding was boosted with breadcrumbs. The chicken had been reared from a little yellow chick bought the previous Easter.
Mary Anne sat on the opposite side of the table to Henry. Every so often he tried to catch her eye, but she made sure he didn’t. She could tell he had hoped for reconciliation. His merry expression turned morose. The corners of his mouth sagged with disappointment. His eyes followed the sherry bottle and the brown ales being passed around the table. He kept boasting that he had abstained for nearly a year. She didn’t believe him and her worst fears were realized when she saw him sip at a glass of sherry, then down it in one go.
She felt hot suddenly and excused herself. ‘I’m just going out back.’
The air outside was crisp and cold, the ground still covered with last night’s frost. She took great gasps of it, glad of the chill reddening her cheeks and clearing her head. Could she – dare she – go back in? Although her dress had long sleeves, she shivered. The door to the yard suddenly squeaked open.
‘You’ll catch your death standing there, Mother.’
‘Harry!’
Her big son wrapped her in his arms. ‘Merry Christmas, Mother.’ He kissed her.
‘Harry!’
She stroked his cheek, noting the extra hard lines that hadn’t been there when he’d gone away. His eyes looked deeper. Perhaps his thoughts were too.
‘I didn’t know you were coming home.’
‘It was a last-minute thing,’ he said as they strolled arm in arm back into the house. The warmth and the smell of roast chicken hit them. ‘That smells good,’ he added. ‘What’s the chance there’s some left for me?’
‘There’s bound to be. John’s Auntie Maria is Italian, remember.’
Mary Anne jerked at Harry’s arm, stopping him just short of the living-room door. ‘Your father’s in there, mind. And he’s just broken his pledge to be sober.’
/> She saw his features tighten, his eyes fix on the closed door. ‘You’re not back with him?’
‘Of course not. I was invited to Christmas lunch, and so was he. It’s a family thing and one way to make the rations go further.’
Harry’s expression was unchanged. ‘I don’t think this is a good idea. He’ll start on me, and then that’ll ruin it for everyone.’
Mary Anne didn’t argue. ‘Wait here. I’ll make my excuses and get my coat. You wait down in the yard.’
He nodded and whispered a brief agreement. She waited until he was out of sight before opening the door.
‘I’ve got a bit of a headache. I think I’ll go home. Do you want to come, Stanley?’
Stanley stopped stuffing a second helping of plum pudding into his mouth and shook his head. ‘I haven’t had me cake yet.’
Mary Anne smiled to herself. Stanley was a typical boy and stronger than he used to be. Strange things happen in war, she told herself.
John’s auntie insisted she take some food with her. ‘We must not let it go to waste,’ she said while wrapping cake and pudding in greaseproof paper and setting a pie dish filled with roast chicken and vegetables in the bottom of a brown paper carrier bag.
Daw wasn’t too disappointed that her mother was leaving early. John was home and she wanted time with him.
Henry got up from his chair and leaned on his knuckles. ‘I’ll see you out.’
Mary Anne was instantly filled with alarm. ‘No need. I can manage.’ But Henry insisted.
John’s Uncle Guido helped her into her coat. Henry looked put out, but she couldn’t help that.
Shouts of ‘Merry Christmas!’ sounded in the passageway behind her. Suddenly, so did the patter of small feet.
‘I’ve changed me mind,’ Stanley shouted. ‘I’ve got me cake.’ He waved a paper bag.
Mary Anne breathed a sigh of relief. At least she wouldn’t be left alone with Henry, though Stanley wasn’t that much of a deterrent. All she hoped now was that Henry would go back inside before seeing Harry; that way a quarrel might be avoided.
