‘Won’t be partic’ly comfortable,’ she pointed out, ‘but we can’t have her wandering the streets.’
It was a warning she felt she had to repeat when she and Barbara reached the front door.
‘It ain’t exactly a palace,’ she explained, as they climbed the stairs towards it. ‘Just the two rooms. Enough fer me books an’ papers. But it’ll do you a turn till you can find something better. We got the camp bed for you. Remember? The one you had round Mabel’s.’
Barbara remembered only too well. Lying in that crowded bedroom, feeling unwanted. But she went where she was led and didn’t say anything. They reached the landing, which was as dark as the stairs, and Sis opened a door and led her into the light of an extraordinarily cluttered room.
At first sight it looked like a cross between an untidy library and an even more untidy newsagent’s. There seemed to be shelves above every item of furniture, all crammed with books, leaning into one another, piled on top of one another, heaped upon heaps, and every item of furniture was covered too, in files and newspapers and untidy piles of letters. There was a bureau beside the fireplace, sagging under the weight of the paper it contained, a dresser that was doing duty as a bookcase, an ancient chaise longue and a battered armchair with newspapers where other people would have had cushions. And hemming everything in, a vast quantity of dark heavy cloth, brown velvet curtains looped at the window, bronze chenille on the table, a faded draft excluder across the door, once red baize but now blotched and faded, even a wine-red mantel cover above the fireplace, trailing brown tassels and supporting a collection of china knick-knacks, a clock, a brandy bottle, a stone jam-jar full of spills and yet another letter rack. It was overwhelming.
But then she glanced at the third corner of the room and realised that it was a kitchen area with a sink and a cooker and that standing by the cooker, with one of her mother’s aprons wrapped around her waist and her dark hair caught up in a blue snood, was cousin Betty. There were two saucepans steaming on the cooker and she’d been prodding the vegetables with a fork, but the minute Barbara stepped into the room, she threw fork and saucepan-lid onto the draining board and rushed to hug her, throwing both arms round her neck and kissing her most lovingly.
‘Was it awful?’ she asked, brown eyes full of concern. ‘I’ll bet it was. You poor thing. We was all thinkin’ of you. Come up to the fire. Your hands are like ice.’
‘Oh!’ Barbara said. ‘It’s so nice to be home.’ Then she burst into tears.
They cuddled her and petted her and let her talk. Sis gave her hot milk laced with brandy and Betty removed her shoes and put her ‘poor cold feet’ on the stool to warm by the fire, crouching beside them to give them ‘a bit of a rub’ from time to time. And under their loving ministrations, Barbara told them all about the funeral – even down to how unkind her mother had been.
‘Grief,’ Sis explained. ‘That’s what that was. You mark my words. Takes us all different ways. Come an’ have yer supper. We got hot bacon roll. It’s more onions than bacon, to tell the truth, but least it’ll warm you.’
But Barbara’s grief had unleashed all sorts of anxieties. ‘What does your ma think of me?’ she asked Betty. ‘I mean, bein’ thrown out like that?’
‘Don’t you worry your head,’ Betty reassured. ‘She don’t think none the worse of you. We none of us do, do we Aunt Sis?’
‘No,’ Sis said. ‘’Course not. It’ll blow over.’
‘But what if it doesn’t?’
‘Then you stay here with me,’ Sis said. ‘Come up to the table an’ eat this while it’s hot.’
But Barbara’s head was still full of anxieties. ‘What am I going to tell Steve?’ she worried as she sat at the table. ‘I’ll have to write to him, won’t I, or else he’ll send his letters to the wrong address an’ I shan’t get them. Oh dear! What shall I say to him?’
‘Don’t say nothing yet,’ Sis advised. ‘Give yerself a chance to recover. Wait till he’s sent a letter to you an’ then write back.’
‘But what shall I say about being here? I shall have to say something.’
‘Tell him you’ve moved in with me.’
‘He’ll wonder what for.’
‘We’ll think a’ something. Say you come to give me a hand. He knows how untidy I am.’
‘But how will I get his letter? It’ll go to Childeric Road.’
‘We’ll collect it for you, won’t we Bet? Or we’ll get Bob to pop it in on his way to work. Now stop worryin’ an’ eat yer food or it’ll go cold and you won’t get the benefit.’
‘But what if …’ Barbara began. But then she made a great effort and stopped. This was a private, superstitious fear and she shouldn’t burden them with it, especially when they were being so good to her. But it cramped her chest with anguish just the same and she couldn’t put it out of her mind. What if Steve had been killed too? She hadn’t known Norman was dead until that letter came. She had always known he was at risk, out there with all those dreadful U-boats trailing him, but she hadn’t accepted the fact that he could be killed. He’d gone to sea and she’d assumed he would come home again, the way he always did. And he’d been dead for weeks and she hadn’t known. What if Steve was dead too? Now. This very minute. There could be another dreadful letter on its way, and she wouldn’t know that either until it reached her.
The food was in front of her and Betty was urging her to eat it. ‘You must be hungry. I’ll bet you never had nothing dinner time.’
So she ate, although she had no appetite; and slept that night in her narrow camp bed, although she was afraid of what she might dream; and went to work the next morning as though she’d been leaving the flat every day of her life. But the fear continued, niggling even under the steadying routine of work, and the days passed, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Steve’s letter didn’t come.
Victor Castlemain drove back to Phossie Fernaway’s feeling twice the man he’d been when he left the place. He’d played knight in shining armour to Spitfire’s damsel in distress. He’d looked after her and fed her and driven her back to London as if they were husband and wife. In fact he’d done a lot better by her than her real husband, if the truth be told. It was a real feather in his cap. He was still preening when Phossie came strolling back from the pub, self-satisfied and smirking, to tell him that the Skibbereen was in a really poisonous mood and that it was all his fault.
‘You en’ ’alf annoyed him,’ he said, searching for a new packet of fags, ‘not turnin’ up a second time. Livid he is. Says you’re on borrowed time an’ you’re to remember where your petrol coupons come from. You wanna watch out or he’ll dump you.’
Victor didn’t care what the Skibbereen said or did. ‘I got a life to live,’ he said. ‘I can’t be at his beck an’ call all the time. I was with my gal. Your fags are by the clock.’
‘Well he’s furious,’ Phossie said, retrieving the packet. ‘I wouldn’t like to be you. Once you can get away with but twice you’re asking for it. An’ I might say, you missed a good’un this time. Nylons. I’m goin’ up west to flog ’em.’
‘I’ll give you a hand, if you like,’ Vic offered, although he knew Phossie wouldn’t rise to it.
‘No fear,’ his friend said, enjoying the first puff. ‘These are mine. You find yer own.’
I will, Vic thought. That’s exactly what I’ll do. It’s high time I set up for myself. I been dancing to the Skibbereen’s tune quite long enough an’ he don’t treat us fair. Not by any means. Look at the cut he takes. I’ll visit a few warehouses on the quiet, watch what goods are coming in, find a docker who’ll let a few cases fall my way. There’d be a lot more profit in this business if I could cut out the middle man. And I might find something really choice that I can give to Spitfire. A few expensive presents wouldn’t come amiss at this point. Consolidation, sort of thing.
He started the very next morning while Phossie was still sleeping off his night’s exertions. And was still trying, without any success at all, late that ni
ght when the pubs closed.
The first man he approached said he dealt with the Skibbereen direct, the second, who was a burly docker with a long scar down the side of his face, said he didn’t hold with the black market. ‘Spivs an’ drones. I’d hang the whole bloody lot of ’em.’ The third was too drunk to make sense. But the next morning he suddenly struck lucky.
He was sitting in his local, drinking rather morosely, when a small sly man sidled up to him and joined him at the table. At first he thought he was a new runner for the Skibbereen and looked up ready for instructions but he got a surprise.
‘You in the market fer sheepskin coats?’ the man asked.
It was his opening. Served up on a plate. Just when he wasn’t expecting it. Now play it cool. Keep calm. ‘Could be? That depends on the price an’ the state of the goods.’
‘I got one outside,’ the man urged. ‘Like a look?’
It was a classy coat, full length with a fur collar, probably rabbit but very soft and pretty.
‘How many d’yer want?’ the man asked.
‘How many you got?’
‘A score. Sixty quid the lot.’
Three pounds each and I could sell them for four easy. Maybe four ten. Or five. I could give one to Spitfire an’ still make a profit. She’d like a coat like that, ’specially in this weather.
Greasy notes changed hands, the deal was done, the boxes handed over, and while Vic was packing them in the boot of his car, the man disappeared, without leaving a name or a telephone number or anything. I should have got that first, Vic thought. I wasn’t quick enough. But it didn’t matter. Word would get around. Now he’d done one deal, there would be others.
His satisfaction turned to anger when he’d ferried his cargo home and was checking it over in his bedroom. Then, and much too late, he discovered that the four boxes only contained four coats each instead of the five he was expecting, which meant that he’d paid damn nearly four pounds a piece for them. He raged for nearly half an hour, his face dark with fury. What a bloody twister! What a bloody, stinking little twister! If I see him again I’ll punch his face in. No wonder he didn’t give me his name, bloody little toerag. That just goes to show you can’t trust anybody in this game. Not a soul. Well all right. Next time, I’ll do the con act an’ if anyone’s going to be stitched up it’ll be the other guy. I’ll bloody see to that.
But despite everything they were still gorgeous coats and Barbara would look smashing in one of them. He couldn’t wait to see her and hand it over. If he sold the rest for a fiver, he’d still make a profit. I’ll go to the Kinema Thursday, he decided. See if she’s there. An’ if she’s not, I’ll cut off to the dancehall on Saturday. And the Saturday after if I have to. I won’t rush her. Softly, softly, catchee monkey.
As that second cold week progressed Betty was treating her gently too. She suggested a trip to the Kinema on Tuesday but didn’t press it when Barbara said she felt too down.
‘I reckon it’s gonna snow,’ Joyce observed, looking out of the kitchen window. ‘We had to put our coats on in class this afternoon. My fingers was mauve.’
‘Well make sure you take your gloves then’, her mother advised, ‘if you’re going out. Wrap up warm, the lot of you. I don’t want you getting chilblains again. We had enough a’ that last winter.’
So the three Horner girls went to the pictures and Barbara went home to Aunt Sis. She found her stoking the fire, puffing with the effort she was making. ‘Brass monkey weather,’ she said to Barbara as she came shivering in. ‘Your letter’s come.’
Relief turned Barbara’s legs to water. ‘Oh thank God!’ she said. ‘He’s all right.’ And she took the letter from the rack on the mantelpiece and sat down to read it.
Sis watched her. ‘You didn’t think he would be, did you?’ she said, her voice full of sympathy.
Barbara could admit it now. She could admit anything now. He was alive and well and all in one piece. He hadn’t been wounded. He’d written to her. ‘I was bein’ stupid,’ she confessed. ‘With Norman being killed I thought … well I s’pose I was sort of facing the fact that anything could happen to anyone. Still thass all right now. I was just being stupid.’
‘We’re all the same,’ Sis told her, clipping the tongs together and hanging them up. ‘We all worry. You can’t help it. It’s nat’ral if you love someone.’
‘Yes.’
‘Well there you are then. Now you can write him a nice long letter an’ tell him all about everything, an’ give him my love. What’s he been up to? Does he say?’
Barbara handed the letter across. ‘Patrols mostly, an’ moppin’ up.’ The words were soothing. They sounded much less dangerous than fighting. And Aunt Sis was right. Now she could write a nice long letter and let him know where she was.
It was done that evening, four pages of it, describing the funeral and how she’d felt about it and how it had upset her father and how unkind her mother had been. Now that he’d written to her she found she could be generous. ‘I know she didn’t really mean it,’ she wrote. ‘That was because she was upset but she shouldn’t have said I shouldn’t have married you. That was going too far and I told her so.’ Then having signed her name with its usual pattern of kisses, she added a postscript to tell him that she’d moved ‘to give your Aunt Sis a hand with her Union work. I never seen anyone with so many papers and forms and things.’ She felt quite pleased with the way she’d handled it, telling him just enough to keep him informed but not burdening him with tales about his mother and the unkind way she’d gone on. There’d be time enough for that when he came home. And he must come home sooner or later. They might even let him back for Christmas. Wouldn’t that be wonderful!
Next day, even though it was bitterly cold and spitting with rain, and even though she saw three buzzbombs in the course of the morning, which was quite unusual these days, and was held up for nearly half an hour while the civil defence dealt with the aftermath of one of them, work was almost a relaxation. And when Betty came round in the evening to ask her whether she felt up to going to the dance on Saturday, she was tempted. It shamed her to admit it, but she was.
‘I don’t know,’ she temporised. ‘That don’t seem right, not so soon after …’
‘No,’ Betty agreed. ‘Tell you what. We’ll leave it till Saturday. See how you feel then. It’s early days yet.’
It seemed the right decision. But on Friday morning Barbara had a letter that changed her mind. It arrived after Sis had left for work and just as she was finishing the washing up. It was from Steve and it was addressed to the flat, which showed he’d got her letter.
My own dear darling,
I am so very sorry to hear about your brother. It is a terrible thing to have happened. You must be in a dreadful state. I wish I could be with you. I know exactly how you feel.
His comfort spread up from the flimsy paper, from the warmth of his words and the sight of his lovely, steady handwriting. She felt as if he were standing beside her, wrapping her in his arms, kissing her hair. My own dear darling.
Death is always awful no matter how many corpses you see. I remember when Nan died, what a state we were in then. It took ages to get over it. She’d been ill for a long time and we all knew she’d never get better but that didn’t make it any easier. We missed her dreadfully. Death in war is much, much worse. People don’t die in a war. They are killed and most of them are young and have their lives before them and it isn ’t just a few here and there, there are thousands of them. I think the worst thing is there’s no time to mourn them. We just have to get up and go on. There’s nothing else we can do. If we sat down to grieve every time one of our mates got killed, the campaign would grind to a halt and the Germans would push us right back into the sea. It’s the same for people at home. If Londoners sat down to grieve every time there was a bomb or a doodlebug, the city would grind to a halt. That’s what Hitler was depending on when he started the Blitz. But it didn’t happen because people got on with their work and didn
’t stop. That’s what we do here. We bury the dead and keep going. It sounds callous, written down like that, but there isn’t any other option. So don’t let this stop you. Keep on going. Live your life to the full. It’s the best way to honour our dead.
I love you more than I can tell you. One day soon, God willing, I shall be home to prove it to you. Hold on till then my darling.
Yours,
S.
It made her cry for more than half an hour, and she would have cried longer had she not been due at the depot. It was such a loving letter and so sensible. As she walked through the dusty streets, passing the long modern frontage of their splendid Woolworths, she was agreeing with every word. Keep on going. Live your life to the full. I will, my darling. You just watch me.
That evening, when she heard Betty’s footsteps at the top of the stairs, she ran straight out onto the landing to greet her.
‘I’ve decided,’ she said. ‘I will go dancin’ with you.’
‘Good!’ Betty said and as they walked into the living room, she gave Barbara one of her daring looks. ‘I’m ever so glad. The thing is, I got someone to come with us this Sat’day.’
Barbara was instantly and happily alerted. A boy-friend. That had to be. How lovely! That would account for the new softness about her – and tonight’s new hairstyle. ‘What someone?’
‘His name’s Lionel,’ Betty said, tucking her hand in Barbara’s arm, ready for confidences, as they squashed onto the chaise longue together. ‘He works in the storeroom. We call him Lie. Daft, innit? ’Cause I don’t think he would. Ever. Lie, I mean. Anyway, they just come here from Whitechapel. Him an’ his family. They was bombed out so they’re living with his gran, sort a’ thing. He’s a smasher. You wait till you see him. He’s got really dreamy eyes, all lovely an’ blue, an’ lovely thick hair. Like Steve’s, only sort of fairish. You’ll love him. Vic’ll be there too, won’t he? We can make a sort a’ foursome.’
Barbara had forgotten all about Victor Castlemain. Now she felt quite conscience-stricken about him. ‘He asked me to the pictures,’ she remembered. ‘An’ I just ran off and left him.’
Avalanche of Daisies Page 23
