The Fleethaven Trilogy

by Margaret Dickinson

  Hunching her shoulders and hugging her coat around her, she plunged her hands deep into her pockets and, once more, she felt the wrinkled surface of the whelk shell.

  And remembering, she smiled.

  Epilogue

  On 19 September, 1964, the marriage between Robert Eland and Danielle Hilton took place in the local church, the bride walking proudly down the aisle on the arm of her father. As the bridal party came out of the church into the blustery sunlight, the two grandmothers, Esther and Beth, walked side by side, their arms linked, beaming proudly. The bride paused as she walked down the path and, lifting her long white gown, she moved amongst the gravestones to lay her bouquet on the grave of her mother, Kate. Then she stooped and from the bouquet she plucked a single red rose and laid it on the grave of Matthew Hilton, the grandfather both she and her new husband shared.

  Mr Arthur Marshall, still the owner of the Grange and all the surrounding farmland, save that belonging to Esther Godfrey and Brumbys’ Farm, was delighted to sell the crumbling, derelict house that had once been his family’s home to the young Mr and Mrs Eland, and though he still retained the ownership of the land surrounding it, he granted them the tenancy to farm the land too.

  So Rob and Ella painted and decorated and rebuilt their new home and moved into the Grange where Rob had always vowed he would one day live.

  Two years later, Ella was able to say, ‘And now we’re a family,’ as she laid Rob’s son in his arms, the two old ladies hovering impatiently in the background for a sight of their first great-grandchild.

  Two more boys were born to Ella and Rob and then a little girl with bright red curls and a smile like the sun appearing after storm clouds; a little girl they named Esther Elizabeth.

  Peggy retired from her job in Lincoln and came to live in her own rooms in the Grange, becoming self-appointed nanny to Ella’s growing family, and Philip Trent was a regular and frequent visitor, bringing his mother, too, whenever her failing health permitted.

  In the winter of 1975, Jonathan Godfrey died peacefully in his sleep and four weeks later, losing the will to live without him, Esther faded, withered and died. At her bedside, Beth Eland sat holding her hand until the end.

  They’re all buried in the small churchyard now: Esther and Jonathan, alongside their beloved Kate; Beth beside her husband, Robert Eland; and only a few feet away from them all, lies Matthew Hilton.

  Danny and Rosie still live at Rookery Farm, although now, Danny’s working day is more in the capacity of foreman.

  And Brumbys’ Farm? Of course, it now belongs to Ella and forms part of the land which Rob and she farm together. But the house lies empty, waiting to love and be loved once more.

  Though it is not entirely forgotten, for on summer days Ella will walk down the lane, over the stile and across the fields to squeeze through the hole in the hedge. She wanders through the empty rooms, pauses in a shaft of dusty sunlight, and hearing ghostly voices from the past, whispers in reply, ‘I’m here, Grannie, I’m still here.’

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Although ‘Suddaby’ airfield is fictitious, I would like to acknowledge that the Lincolnshire Aviation Heritage Centre at East Kirkby, owned by Fred and Harold Panton, has been a valuable source of information. The fully restored Control Tower and the magnificent Lancaster B Mk VII NX611 were an inspiration.

  My very special thanks to Cyril Barker, of Skegness, a Dunkirk veteran, who relived painful memories of that time in order to help me in my research.

  I am also deeply indebted to Mrs Fiona Ryan, of Skegness, for the loan of her personal notebooks and papers written during her service as a WAAF.

  My sincere gratitude to Mrs Betty Watson, of Skegness, an ex-WAAF, not only for sharing her memories with me but also for her wonderful help in reading through the final typescript.

  And last – but never least – my love and thanks to all my family and friends especially those who read the novel in the early stages – my sister and her husband, Robena and Fred Hill; Pauline Griggs; Linda and Terry Allaway; and my daughter, Zoë, who again helped with the final draft.

  M. D.

  Skegness, 1995

  Margaret Dickinson

  Reap the Harvest

  PAN BOOKS

  Reap the Harvest Contents

  Part One

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Part Two

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Thirty-Four

  Thirty-Five

  Part One

  One

  LINCOLNSHIRE, JANUARY 1953

  ‘So this is ya bastard.’

  Ella Hilton scowled at the old woman standing in the doorway, hands on hips, looking down at her. Beside her, she heard her mother draw in a deep breath and the hand, resting on her shoulder, stiffened as Kate snapped back, ‘Well, if that’s the way you greet your granddaughter the first time you meet her, Mam, we’ll turn right round and be off back the way we came.’

  Shocked, Ella gaped up at her mother; Kate Hilton rarely lost her temper, but she was angry now.

  The woman still stood there, barring their way into the house. ‘I told you ten years ago I didn’t want you here, or ya bastard, and I still don’t. Nothing’s changed.’

  The young girl clenched her fists. Even at ten years old, Ella knew what the name meant; she had heard it often enough shouted after her in the playground.

  ‘Oh I see,’ Kate was saying. ‘So I can’t even come back for my grandad’s funeral? Well, Mam, no one’s going to stop me; not even you. We’ll stay at Rookery Farm . . .’

  ‘With the Elands? You’ll do no such thing. I’ll not have you staying there – with them.’

  Ella felt the anger drain out of her mother now as Kate said, sadly, ‘The family feud still going on, is it? Can’t you ever forget or forgive anyone, Mam?’

  With a sniff, the older woman turned away. Sighing, her mother gave Ella a gentle push, but the girl held on to the door frame, refusing to enter. ‘No, Mum,’ she whispered. ‘Let’s go home. I don’t like it here and . . .’ Her wide eyes followed the rigid back of the woman and the unspoken words hung in the air, ‘. . . and I don’t like her.’

  Kate, once more the gentle mother Ella knew, said, ‘It’s all right. Come along,’ and she urged the reluctant child through the back scullery and into the warm kitchen of the farmhouse.

  ‘Sit in the chair near the range, Ella, and warm your hands. Poor child’s perished,’ Kate explained. ‘The train was freezing. I thought me dad might have met us at the station.’

  The woman thumped her rolling pin down on to the pastry. ‘Ya dad’s too busy with the ploughing to be meeting trains.’

  Ella perched herself on the wooden seat of the spindly chair at one side of the huge black range. Logs crackled in the grate and the kettle on the hob gently puffed steam from its spout. The warmth hit her cold cheeks, making them burn. Flexing her white fingers, she stretched out her hands towards the glow. Tiredness swept over her in waves; like the waves she had heard distantly as they had walked along the lonely lane following the line of sand-dunes all the way from the town to this remote farmhouse.

  They had walked for miles, it seemed to Ella, whose legs had begun to grow tired. ‘Can’t we wait for a bus, Mum?’

 
Kate had smiled. ‘You’d wait a long time, love. They don’t come out this far.’

  ‘No buses!’ the girl had exclaimed, her skipping stilled for a horrified moment. To their right the fields, brown and flat, stretched westwards as far as the distant horizon with only a lonely farm, or a line of trees here and there, to break the monotony.

  Then Ella was skipping again, taking little running jumps and stretching her neck, trying to see over the sand-dunes. ‘Where’s the sea, Mum? You said we were coming to the seaside. I’ve never seen the sea.’

  ‘Beyond the dunes and across the marsh, love,’ Kate had answered, waving her hand absently to the left. ‘You can go and look at it later.’

  Now, sitting in the kitchen that must once have been her mother’s home, Ella looked about her at the peg rug on the hearth, the brick walls painted red, the pots and pans lining the shelves and a ham hanging from a hook in the ceiling. Then her gaze came back to the woman standing behind the scrubbed table peeling and coring apples and laying the slices in a pastry-lined, circular tin.

  Ella studied her. So this woman, who had called her that dreadful name, was her grandmother.

  Although old in the girl’s eyes, Esther Godfrey’s hair was thick and still a luxuriant auburn colour though there were strands of grey at her temples. It was piled high on the top of her head and two combs thrust into its thickness held it in place. Only the curls on her forehead and escaping tendrils softened the severe style. Her skin, though tanned through working outside in all weathers, was smooth and remarkably unlined for a grandmother. The woman’s green eyes glanced up briefly and for a moment met Ella’s blue gaze. ‘Dun’t stare, Missy. It’s rude. And stop kicking ya Grandpa’s chair; ya’ll scratch it.’

  Unflinching, Ella glared back, deliberately widening her eyes but she stopped swinging her legs; not in obedience but because it was Grandpa Godfrey’s chair. Ella loved her Grandpa Godfrey. He visited them in Lincoln three or four times a year and had done so for as long as Ella could remember, but her grandmother had never once come with him. Ella had known about her, of course; had listened as Kate always asked, ‘How’s me Mam?’ but the young girl knew too that her mother and her grandmother had quarrelled years ago. Now, today, she had witnessed for herself the depth of bitterness between them. Ella put her head on one side and stared at Esther Godfrey, pondering what could possibly have caused a quarrel so dreadful that a mother did not ever want to see her daughter? The girl’s gaze flickered towards Kate and for one awful moment Ella imagined how devastated she would feel if, for some reason, she were never to see her own mother again.

  Her grandmother’s voice interrupted her wandering thoughts. ‘Wipe ya chin, Missy. Ya’ve got summat on ya face. Just here . . .’ The woman touched her own cheek, leaving a dab of flour.

  Ella stuck out her chin, thrusting the tiny port-wine stain on her left jawline towards the woman. ‘It’s a birthmark. I can’t rub it off.’

  Kate’s voice came softly. ‘Don’t you remember, Mam?’

  For a moment the older woman looked startled and stared at Kate, her mouth slightly open. She glanced back, just once, at Ella and then dropped her gaze.

  ‘Can I mash a pot of tea, Mam?’ Kate said, as if trying to change the subject. ‘I’m parched. We’ve had nothing since leaving Lincoln.’

  Esther’s shoulders lifted in a shrug. ‘Ya know where everything is,’ she said, neither granting permission nor withholding it.

  ‘Is he – is he still here?’ Kate asked as she moved between the shelves along one wall and the table, laying cups and saucers and spooning tea into the brown pot. Esther nodded and jerked her head towards a door leading out of the kitchen further into the house.

  ‘In his room,’ was her only reply.

  Seeing Kate move towards the door, Ella jumped up.

  ‘No, love, you stay here . . .’

  ‘I’m coming with you . . .’ she began.

  ‘Do as ya mother tells ya,’ the older woman snapped, but Ella took no notice and moved towards her mother.

  ‘It’s all right, Mam,’ Kate said swiftly. ‘She can come with me.’

  ‘Lid’s off,’ Esther said bluntly, mystifying the young girl even more. Ella watched her mother’s eyes widen and saw her swallow hard, hesitating for a moment, but then she took Ella’s hand, opened the door and together they stepped out of the kitchen and into a living room.

  Heavy blue velvet curtains shut out most of the light and Ella had only a shadowy impression of dark, solid furniture and the gleam of fleshy green leaves on a plant standing in a blue and white pot on the plush-clothed table. Not wanting to disturb the solemn tick of the grandfather clock in one corner, the girl found herself tiptoeing across the room and into the small hall beyond.

  Immediately before them was another door, but Kate paused, her hand on the knob, and looked down again at Ella. ‘You wait here love, just a minute ’til I see how he looks.’

  Her mother opened the door and disappeared into the room leaving Ella standing in the cold, dingy hall. She stood first on one foot then on the other. The minutes passed and Ella became impatient. She pressed her ear to the door but she couldn’t hear anything. Holding her breath, Ella slowly pushed the door open.

  In the centre of the room was a black iron bedstead with a black and white striped mattress. There were no bedclothes on the bed and on top of the bare mattress lay a coffin with brass handles. The lid stood on its end against the wall and her mother was leaning over the coffin almost as if she were talking to someone.

  Ella bit her lip, her whispered ‘Mum!’ echoing in the silent room. When Kate half-turned round, Ella saw, with a shock, that there were tears in her eyes. Although Kate brushed them away quickly with the back of her hand, the child-like gesture disconcerted the young girl. Ella tiptoed into the room. ‘What’s the matter, Mum?’ she whispered.

  Her mother put out her arm to draw her closer. ‘Don’t be frightened, love. He looks real peaceful.’

  ‘Let me see.’

  ‘I don’t think . . .’ Kate began.

  ‘Please, Mum.’

  As her mother lifted her up, Ella looked down at the man lying in the coffin. ‘Is that your grandad?’ she whispered.

  Pressing her lips together, Kate nodded.

  Like a figure lying on a cathedral tomb, smooth and marble cold, his hands rested upon his chest, fingers curling in natural repose. He was dressed in a long, white nightshirt, his head on an embroidered pillow.

  Ella shuddered. ‘Let me down . . .’ and her mother’s hold loosened and Ella was standing on the floor again, the silent, lifeless figure gone from her view.

  ‘Go back to Nannie,’ her mother said absently. ‘I’ll be back in a minute.’

  Determined not to go back into the kitchen without her mother, Ella waited in the hall. She glanced up the narrow stairs and then began to climb, pausing to listen every time a step creaked. She reached the top and stood on the tiny landing between two doors. Glancing just once over her shoulder, she lifted the latch, pushed open the door to her left and stepped into what was obviously her grandparents’ bedroom, for in the corner on a stand was Grandpa Godfrey’s best Sunday suit.

  Like the rooms downstairs, the furniture was old, but solid and lovingly polished to a rich dark mahogany colour. A picture of the Virgin and Child was the only ornament on the stark, white walls. Ella ran her fingers along the multicoloured patchwork quilt covering the iron bedstead and her feet made no sound on the thick peg rug at the side of the bed. In the far corner, a green-patterned bowl, huge jug and soap-dish stood on a marble washstand.

  Ella’s darting glance came to rest on a line of silver-framed photographs on the pink-painted mantelpiece above the fire-grate. She tiptoed forward and bent closer to look at them. One was of a little girl with long flowing hair; that must be her own mother, Kate, as a child. She knew now, since meeting Esther Godfrey, that Kate had inherited her hair colouring from her own mother, but where did Ella’s own colour come from t
hen?

  ‘Such a pretty strawberry blonde,’ the hairdresser always said as she trimmed Ella’s tightly curling hair. ‘But I do wish you’d let her grow it a bit longer, Kate. It’s so pretty . . .’

  ‘It’s not my fault,’ Kate would laugh. ‘There I was thinking I’d get a little girl I could dress up in pretty dresses with long, golden curls, a bit like Alice in Wonderland, and what do I get . . .?’ By this time Ella would be laughing with her mother, knowing what was coming next but knowing, too, that it was gentle, loving teasing. ‘A tomboy with short hair who’d spend her life in trousers and shorts given half a chance.’

  Ella’s wandering thoughts came back to the pictures in front of her. There was another of a young woman in a uniform. That was definitely her mother, because Ella knew she had been in the WAAFs in the last war. Kate’s two best friends from those days – Mavis and Isobel – still visited them quite often and they were Ella’s godmothers too.

  Another photograph showed a small child with straight, mousey hair and a sulky face. Perhaps that was her mother’s younger sister, Lilian. Ella couldn’t be sure, for her aunt lived away and they had never met.

  The last photograph stood at the very back of the shelf, half-obscured by a letter propped in front of it. Curious, Ella pushed the envelope to one side and found herself looking at a fading, sepia photograph of a young man in uniform. He was standing stiffly, as if he was hardly daring to breathe and in his eyes there was a look of – not exactly fear, Ella decided, he just looked sort of – lost. The girl frowned thoughtfully and put her head on one side, pondering. He looked strangely familiar, but she knew it wasn’t her Grandpa Godfrey as a young man because the man in the photograph had black curly hair and dark eyes whereas Jonathan Godfrey had fair hair, turning grey now. He was not very tall either, certainly not as tall as Grandpa . . .