A Girl Can Dream

by Anne Bennett

  ‘Oh, I should imagine there’s more to it than that,’ Meg said. ‘And really you can’t help feeling sorry for her because she’s completely alone. Her first husband is dead, and their parents, they had no brothers or sisters and she had no children of her own. You must admit that’s sad.’

  ‘Yeah, I suppose.’

  ‘And added to that, she knows very few people here,’ Meg went on. ‘She comes from Yorkshire but was sent here to sew parachutes like Aunt Rosie.’

  ‘Where did Daddy meet her?’

  ‘In the Swan.’

  Jenny’s eyes opened wide. ‘Was she on her own?’

  ‘I think there were two of them.’

  ‘Mom said she thought women who went to the pub on their own like that were no better than they should be. I heard her telling May one day,’ Jenny said.

  ‘You shouldn’t have been listening.’

  ‘I couldn’t help it,’ Jenny cried. ‘Anyway, that’s what she said. D’you think that?’

  Meg did a bit, but it would hardly help Doris’s case to say so. She chose her words with care. ‘I don’t know really. The world is changing all the time. I mean, there are more women working now, married women with families like Aunt Rosie, often doing a man’s job. And more women in the Forces than there have ever been, and maybe that changes your perception a bit. Anyway, let’s not condemn the woman out of hand. Let’s give her a chance, because if Daddy has chosen her, then it would be better for all of you if you try to get on with her.’

  As the family were worrying about Doris, news came of discontent spreading throughout central Europe with Hitler’s invasion of Czechoslovakia. Not only was the British Government alarmed, but also the governments of many other European countries, especially those near to Germany. Hitler, rumours of war and now Doris Caudwell – Meg felt weighed down with her anxieties.

  Meg spent an uneasy couple of weeks with the children. But they were off school from Wednesday for the Easter holidays and she would be meeting Joy on Good Friday. Her father was off work then too, but he declared on that morning he had plans of his own and he would be out all day. Meg could barely bring herself to talk to him and so she said nothing to this and later he came up behind her as she was washing up.

  ‘You seeing Joy today?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘Then take this.’ He pressed a pound note into her hand. ‘Get some chocolate eggs for the children.’

  Meg nodded. ‘All right.’

  She had intended doing that anyway, as the children had given up sweets for the whole of Lent, so she thought they deserved chocolate eggs on Easter Sunday. She also relished the freedom of going out without Ruth because her siblings would look after her and, she thought wryly, she might be able to have a proper conversation with Joy and a hot cup of tea as she wouldn’t be charging around after Ruth all lunchtime.

  That day, though, Joy had news of her own that was so upsetting it put Meg’s problems with her father and Doris into perspective.

  ‘My brother Colin’s joining the Territorial Army . . He has to report next week to Thorp Street Barracks. Our cousin, Barry, is joining as well.’

  ‘But what’s it all about?’

  ‘War, that’s what it’s about,’ Joy said. ‘They don’t ask for a whole lot of young man to volunteer and train them to fight for nothing.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And there’s something else,’ Joy said. ‘One of our neighbours is in the TA already and he had been doing manoeuvres abroad somewhere. Anyway, his wife was telling Mom he’s been recalled. People say if we go to war they’re going to be used to guard key installations.’

  ‘Golly,’ Meg said. ‘It’s really getting serious, isn’t it?

  ‘I think so. Dad said Hitler had cast his eyes at Poland now, and if he attacks them we will be at war because we have a pact or some such thing.’

  ‘So Nicholas was right all along,’ Meg said.

  ‘Looks like,’ Joy said. ‘Don’t you wish he hadn’t been?’

  ‘You bet I do,’ Meg said. ‘But if war comes there isn’t a thing we can do about it.’

  ‘I know,’ Joy said. ‘And that’s what’s really scary.’

  NINE

  Despite the worrying world news, life had to go on and what was interrupting Meg’s sleep was not Hitler’s invasion of Czechoslovakia, but this Doris Caudwell that her dad appeared to have such a fancy for. She knew for the sake of her siblings she was going to try very hard to like the woman but whatever she said, the children could not be persuaded to warm to the idea of a stepmother of any size, shape or description. They had no desire to meet her and were cross and difficult when they heard that their dad had invited her to Sunday tea.

  Meg felt she had to make an impression so cleaned the house to within an inch of its life on Saturday while Terry emptied the ashes and black leaded the grate before laying the fire afresh. Meg polished with such vigour that the scent of lavender still lingered in the air on Sunday morning. When Charlie came down dressed ready for Mass the following morning he found Meg on her own apart from Ruth. She was looking around the room in some satisfaction for she felt she had done all she could and the room looked as cosy and inviting as she could make it. Her father said, ‘Your mother would have been proud of you for the mature way you are dealing with this, Meg looked at her father coldly, hardly able to believe that she once thought him the greatest man in the universe. ‘I would rather you didn’t mention my mother today of all days,’ she said crisply. ‘If Mom was still alive, we wouldn’t be having this conversation, nor would we be having a visitor. As for being proud of me, well, it is just to show this Doris that we know how to treat guests.’

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t call her “this Doris”,’ Charlie said.

  ‘Well, I wish lots of things were different too, and “this Doris” is how I think of her,’ Meg said. ‘But don’t worry, I know how to conduct myself. As for me being mature, I’m as heartsick as the children, if you want the truth, but I am keeping a lid on my feelings for their sakes. Today they will have to welcome a person they don’t want and didn’t think they’d ever need.’

  ‘I know,’ Charlie said.

  ‘No, Dad,’ Meg replied, ‘I don’t think you have the least idea how any of us are really feeling. All I’ll ask is that you don’t rush into this. Take it slowly and make sure we all get to know Doris much better before you make it permanent. It will be better for the children that way.’

  As they walked to Mass together later, Charlie was deep in thought. He knew that Meg was right, but he had a feeling things might be taken out of his hands because of what was happening in Europe. He had discussed it with his brothers.

  ‘I reckon I’ll be called up if we go to war,’ he’d said.

  Robert had been astounded. ‘Surely not?’

  ‘Well, I’m only thirty-eight,’ Charlie had said.

  ‘It’s the young fellows they’ll need.’

  ‘It’s every able-bodied fellow they’ll need to beat Hitler, if you ask me,’ Charlie said. He glanced at Alec, two years his senior. ‘You might be going along with me. I was talking to a bloke at work and he said when war is declared there will be a call-up of men from the ages of eighteen to forty-one.’

  ‘How do people get to know these things?’

  ‘I don’t know, but if he’s right, that’s the two of us.’

  ‘Susan will go mad.’

  ‘Think the War Office will care about that?’ Charlie said. ‘She’ll have to cope like everyone else. It’s my kids I worry about.’

  And he did, because if he wasn’t around at all maybe the authorities would take a dim view of Meg looking after all the children on her own. She was only just sixteen now. The children might be taken off her and put into care. He had heard dreadful tales about children placed in care. A man he worked with, having no handy relatives to look after his two children – a baby of twelve months and a little boy of two and a half – had them placed in care while his wife
was undergoing surgery in hospital. He tried to see them quite a few times but was prevented from doing so and told it would be upsetting for them. He thought probably that was right, and concentrated his energies on helping his wife get better as quickly as possible.

  A couple of months later, when his wife was home and recovered enough to care for the children, they were told that as the children had had no contact with either parent for some time, they had both been adopted and were settled now with new parents. They were not allowed to know where and there was no way they could fight the decision through the courts. Their children were lost to them. The man said his wife was destroyed by the thought she would never see her beloved children again, and six months later she threw herself under a train.

  If war was declared, Charlie might have to marry Doris quicker than he had really intended to. He knew she would have him. She’d been hinting at marriage for some time, though initially she had balked when he’d told her how many children he had. She certainly hadn’t banked on that. She didn’t even like children.

  Charlie didn’t notice her initial reaction, however, comfortable in the assumption that all women wanted children and considered it a tragedy if they couldn’t have any. So he expressed his sympathy to Doris for her childless state and said that it must have been a great cross to bear.

  Doris could see that Charlie was nervous about her meeting his children as he called for her that afternoon. She knew all there was to know about men and was aware that while Charlie lusted after her, when she wasn’t driving him mad with passion he cared deeply for his children. It was plain to her that to have him she would have to have them, at least for now. The eldest, though, he’d said was sixteen, and the second was fourteen, so soon they’d be off his hands, out to work and sorting themselves out. The other three were coming up and she’d soon have them working for their keep. Pity he’d been landed with the baby. She wondered why he’d kept it when he admitted that he hadn’t taken to the child, but that could be gone into later. But still, the children were there for now so a lot hinged on how they would get on that day.

  Doris started as she meant to go on. But she dressed with care. She’d had a marcel wave the day before and her hair tinted so there was no hint of grey in her dark blond locks, which fell in folds very becomingly. She had a lovely figure, though she was inclined to be busty, which Charlie took to be an advantage, and the navy-blue costume she’d chosen accentuated her figure to perfection. She wore it over a lacy pink blouse that showed no hint of cleavage, and a pale blue cloche hat that did not disturb her hair too much, and she had on silk stockings and smart black patent shoes with a small heel.

  She applied many cosmetics to accentuate her features. Maeve had used very little other than a pot of Pond’s cold cream, so Charlie was unaware of how Doris was using her products. He just knew that he had seldom met a woman of Doris’s age, which she said was thirty-five, with such flawless skin and a dusting of pink on her cheeks, or one with such long eyelashes, almost perfectly shaped eyebrows, dark, mysterious eyes and a wonderfully kissable, red pouting mouth. When Charlie arrived to escort her he thought his Doris the picture of loveliness and when he took her in his arms the potent waft of perfume she was wearing almost made him light-headed.

  ‘Oh, my darling girl,’ he cried. ‘You look terrific, just terrific. My children will soon love you as much as I do. What a pity it is that you were blessed with no children of your own.’

  Doris said nothing, but suppressed a smile as they walked along Bristol Street toward the Halletts’ home. She had never intended having any children. Her husband, Gerry, had agreed with her and said there were ways of preventing pregnancy and he had dealt with that side of things.

  Their lives had consisted of going out and having a good time. Drink and drugs featured highly, and though Doris had been trained as a seamstress, she had given that up when she had moved in with, and later married, Gerry. He was a drug dealer and an inveterate gambler. All sorts of shady characters came to their flat and Doris had to be ‘nice’ to many of them. A gambling debt that Gerry had incurred could be cancelled out, or substantially reduced, if she gave the punters a good enough time. She knew many ways of pleasing a man and thought prostitution easy money, and she was always in great demand.

  However, Gerry had killed someone in a drunken brawl and had taken off into the night, leaving her with the dead body and the knife. She had been taken into custody. There was no evidence to charge her – her fingerprints were not on the handle of the knife – and she was released. However, witnesses said she had been as drunk as a lord herself and, rather than trying to stop the fight, she had egged them on, calling on Gerry to ‘stab the bastard’. She couldn’t remember whether she had said that or not, but she knew the family of the dead man were gunning for her and that if she stayed around they would find her.

  Her troubles were compounded when she arrived at her flat to find her landlord had moved all her belongings onto the pavement, piled into a variety of containers, and while she was deliberating about her next move, a group of heavies approached to extract the gambling debts Gerry had run up. She had little money of her own – Gerry took care of that and she hadn’t a hope in hell of paying the debt – but she managed to stall the men and agreed to meet them the following week when she would give them all the money she owed. Instead she immediately registered for war work, claimed to be a widow and a trained seamstress wanting work away from the North because it held too many memories, and two days later she had gone south to Birmingham.

  However, Gerry’s debts were considerable and Doris knew the type of men to whom he owed money didn’t give up easily; their nets were wide. Though she had covered her tracks well, she really needed to change her name, and the easiest way to do that was to marry someone – and preferably someone respectable. The fact that she was already married didn’t worry her one jot. She doubted she’d ever see Gerry again because he was wanted for murder, and if he was stupid enough to put his head over the parapet he would hang if he was caught.

  That first night in the Swan she’d noticed Charlie Hallett straight away and recognised him as a malleable man, one she could manage easily enough, and so when she heard he was a widower with his own house and in good steady employment she made a play for him. It was her chance to be respectable and could work as long as Charlie Hallett did not learn of her past life. She had been a good judge of his character because Charlie seemed remarkably uninquisitive about the life she had led before she’d arrived in Birmingham and, being an easy-going sort of chap, he had been like putty in her hands.

  She knew Charlie’s brothers didn’t like her – not that she cared; she had overheard them talking to Charlie outside the pub one night. ‘Look, have your fun,’ she’d heard the elder one, Robert, say. ‘Just don’t marry her, that’s all I ask. I think that woman is bad news and I’d hate to see you chained to her for life.’

  ‘She’ll suck you dry if you do,’ the other one, Alec, had warned. ‘I’ve met her type before as well.’

  Doris didn’t care because the more they said against her, the more Charlie defended her. She had slept with a great many men, so she knew how to please, though she had held him off at first. She allowed only chaste kisses so that she always left him wanting more, especially as she teased and tormented him.

  Eventually, though, she allowed further liberties, so their lovemaking grew more ardent and exciting. He saw her almost every day; everything else took a back seat as all he could think about was Doris and how she made him feel. She could and often did take him to the peak of desire, and in that state nothing else mattered to Charlie, not his brothers’ disapproval, nor even his children’s unhappiness. He was enthralled by Doris and the heights of sexual gratification he never knew existed.

  She told him that she wouldn’t totally submit to him until she had the ring on her finger; she wasn’t that type of girl. He believed and respected her, and felt bad for pressing her, despite the fact that he was often
almost consumed with craven lust as the blood pounded round his veins. Even his sleep was punctuated with sexual and lurid dreams. He was a virile, red-blooded man who missed sex a great deal, and though he had truly and deeply loved Maeve, by the time he was ready to take Doris home to meet his children, he knew he needed her in a base and carnal way and he would never be able to let her go.

  As soon as Charlie left the house to fetch Doris, Terry was dispatched to take Ruth and Billy for a walk as arranged, and, Jenny and even young Sally helped Meg to prepare the table. First they draped it in the white lace cloth their mother had used on special occasions, and then brought in the dishes and plates and laid them out. There was one filled with slices of ham and a dish of tomatoes and a larger one filled with green salad. Beside it was a plate of salmon paste sandwiches and another of crusty bread and a tub of butter. On the sideboard, laid on a folded tablecloth, was a trifle and some little choux buns dusted with sugar, which had been Maeve’s speciality, and which she had taught Meg to make.

  Meg was proud of all she had done and thought the room looked inviting with the easy chairs drawn up to the fender, gleaming in the light of the glowing fire that she had lit to take the chill from the room, even though it was the last week of April.

  Meg thought that though Doris Caudwell’s clothes were lovely, especially her hat atop her beautifully waved hair, her face was caked in powder with pink rouged cheeks, so different from the her mother’s natural beauty. The smokiness around Doris’s eyes and the fluttering ridiculously long lashes did not hide the fact that those black eyes were as hard and cold as steel, and her lipstick was like a crimson slash across her face. Meg didn’t like what she saw and she castigated herself for not giving the woman a chance. She remembered her manners and turned to greet her, trying to push down her uncomfortable feelings at seeing another woman by her father’s side and in her mother’s home.