Song of Songs

by Beverley Hughesdon

  I hurried out of the music room, spurring my clumsy body into a trot, and headed for the family entrance. The butts were too far – I could not walk there fast enough, so I turned towards the stables. The groom offered to take me in the governess cart, but I asked him just to harness the lawn-mower pony for me – I had driven him since childhood. I climbed awkwardly up to take the reins and at my signal the pony plodded obediently off.

  The sharp crack of the shotguns told me I was nearing my goal, and swinging round the corner I saw Letty, barrel aimed high. Beside her was Ben. His body was slightly crouched, because he was used to firing from a trench, from a hole in the ground.

  I drove closer and he turned and saw me; at once he thrust his gun into the hands of my sister’s loader and came striding forward. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing driving that thing – in your condition!’ He was angry. ‘You get down this minute.’ Climbing quickly in, he seized hold of me and half-lifted me out; the lawn-mower pony bent his head and began placidly cropping the grass. ‘Now, what do you think you’re up to?’

  ‘I wanted to tell you something, Ben.’

  ‘Well, it’ud better be worthwhile, after you risking your neck like that.’

  ‘Ben, I was absolutely safe – why, I could still ride if I wanted – in a side-saddle.’

  ‘Ride! You ride like you are now – just you try, my lass just you try!’ His face was purple with fury. ‘Now, what do you want to tell me, then I can get back to me gun – and then you’ll have to wait out here until dinner time.’

  I looked at him, and my lips would not form the words. I had been rehearsing then all the way down in the governess cart – and now I was here he was impatient – he wanted to get back and shoot partridges. ‘It doesn’t matter now, Ben – you go and shoot.’ I turned and began to stumble away, trying to hide my tears.

  He came after me. ‘Obviously it does matter – what is it, lass?’ His arm came round me, and pulled me against him. I buried my face in his jacket. ‘You’re not starting, are you?’ Now his voice was urgent.

  ‘No – no, nothing like that.’

  ‘Just stay here a minute.’ He propped me against the back of the game cart and I sagged there, still fighting my tears.

  When he came back Letty was with him. ‘It’s all right, Helena – I’ll drive you.’ She jumped lithely up and took the reins. Ben helped me in after her – then climbed in himself and latched the door. ‘Where do you want to go?’

  ‘Somewhere quiet, Letty lass – but not too far from th’ouse.’

  She pursed her lips a moment before deciding, then shook her hands – the cart started with a jolt. I was a much better driver than Letty – it was not fair.

  Ben lifted me down on the slope below the ha-ha, and led me up to one of the horse chestnut trees just beyond the end of the garden. He had brought a rug with him from the shoot, and now he spread it out on the sheltered side of the trunk. ‘There you are – sit yourself down on that.’ He called. ‘Ta, Letty.’ My sister raised her hand before the cart jerked off.

  He dropped down beside me, his voice more gentle now. ‘What is it you want to tell me, lass – that’s so important?’ I could not answer – I felt painfully, desperately shy. ‘Come on now – out with it.’

  I could not look at him. My fingers plaited the fringe of the rug. ‘It was – it was something Alice said to me – this morning.’

  ‘Oh, ah – and what did Alice say, then?’

  I stared down at the plait, then plunged on: ‘She said – she said I was in love with you, Ben.’

  I heard him laugh softly. ‘Aye – I reckon you are.’

  I looked up at him; his blue-grey eyes were warm. ‘But – how did you know?’

  ‘If I’d not known afore I reckon I’d ’a’ known last night – when you come to me in a room full o’ smart folk – waddling like a duck you were, but you kept going – with your eyes as round as saucers!’ He laughed. ‘But I knew afore that, from the way you’ve bin with me these past weeks.’

  I felt rather flat. ‘So I didn’t need to come and tell you.’

  ‘Oh yes you did, lass – oh yes you did. Knowing it’s one thing, but hearing it said, that’s quite another. And you haven’t said it yet – only what Alice said. I want to hear you say it now.’

  He put his hands out and clasped mine. I looked back into his eyes, took a deep breath and said, ‘I love you, Ben – I love you,’ and threw myself forward into his arms.

  We lay together on the rug with the autumn leaves rustling above our heads while he stroked my hair and whispered words of love. Then he pulled me even closer to say, ‘It’s a funny thing, Helena – I’m lying beside you feeling on top of world – and for first time I’m not standing to attention down below. I love you so much it’s gone beyond that.’ He kissed my cheek. ‘But you needn’t worry, lass – I reckon it’ll come back later!’ I felt the familiar vibration of the laughter in his chest – and laughed with him.

  Chapter Ten

  I sang to him, my German love songs. He puzzled over the translations, fitting the English words to the German; so he understood when I sang of his gold ring on my finger, and of the joyful day when his image would smile up from the cradle beside my bed. When I had finished he said, ‘Our bed, Helena, you’ll have to alter that.’ Teasing, I sang ‘Der Schmied’ – the ‘Song of the Blacksmith’ was the best I could do, since Brahms had written no tunes celebrating footplatemen.

  ‘Am schwarzen Kamin,

  Da sitzet mein Lieber,’

  At the black furnace, there sits my lover.

  ‘Doch geh ich vorüber,

  Die Bälge dann sausen,

  Die, Flammen aufbrausen

  Und lodern um ihn.’

  But if I pass by the bellows then whistle, the flames flare up – and blaze all about him.

  He laughed aloud. ‘You got it wrong – it were Frank who worked blower that evening on radial tank – and I reckon it were your flames as were blazing up – when I got home that night you fair scorched pants off me!’ My face burnt with blushes.

  I sang Strauss’ song: ‘Glückes genug’ – abundant happiness – the abundant happiness of holding him in my arms as he slept, and of lying against his heart in the night. As he read it he said, ‘Way it’s written it should be a man singing it – still, if we both feel like that, it can’t be bad, can it Helena?’

  ‘No Ben – it can’t be bad.’

  Then it was Beethoven:

  ‘Ich liebe dich, so wie du mich,

  Am Abend und am Morgen,’

  I love you as you love me, at evening and at morning.

  He held me as I sat on his lap afterwards, a little breathless, and reflected, ‘You know, life’s real odd sometimes – to think of me sitting here in a house like this – hearing you sing me love songs – and in German, of all tongues. Still, I suppose if it hadn’t been for Germans we’d never have come together – so there’s justice in it somewhere.’

  Ben held his own at Hatton; speaking carefully, moderating his accent; and he had something to say. He was a trade unionist, a Labour voter, and he defended his beliefs vigorously: putting forward the point of view of his class but always arguing on equal terms. And of course, all the younger men had served in the war; it was a common bond between them, regardless of rank or social status. Ben, like them, had wielded authority and taken decisions – decisions which had meant life and death to those men they had been responsible for.

  One night, I wept in Ben’s arms, remembering my brothers, and the next day I made my pilgrimage. As soon as breakfast was over we walked together down the avenue to the Lostherne gate and out into the lane. I stood beside my husband in the windswept graveyard gazing at the white stone:

  ‘They were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they were not divided: they were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions.’

  Beside me Ben said gently, ‘They were only youngsters, lass – but at least they had a good
time afore they went – growing up here and with everything young lads could wish for ready and waiting for them. And they had each other for first twenty years, at least; and the Captain had you with him right to th’end.’

  So we left the green churchyard where my brothers lay together – in the peace they had fought to achieve for all of us, and for their unborn nephew, still in my womb. I would tell him of them one day, and he would be grateful.

  The first time I took Ben up to meet Nanny in the nursery he dropped down to the floor where Guy’s sons were playing with our old fort. He joined in with the game, taking it as seriously as the children did. But when Lance and Ted squabbled for possession of a guardsman and began to push at each other, Ben’s voice rang out, ‘Now then – that’s enough of that,’ and they stopped at once and agreed to his suggestion to toss for the toy.

  After that Ben took me up to the nursery every day and I sat with Pansy and Nanny while the children competed for his attention. One day, when Pansy had gone downstairs before us, he turned to me outside the nursery door saying. ‘They seem happy enough – and I know you think the word of your old Nan – but, well, it seems funny to me – keeping them shut up there like they were wild animals.’

  I laughed. ‘They are wild animals, sometimes.’

  ‘Mebbe – but you’re going to look after our youngsters yourself, Helena – with a bit of help if you need it.’ He glanced at me watchfully.

  I squeezed his hand. ‘I know, Ben. I’ve already told Nanny – she was terribly shocked!’

  ‘I can see now, since I been staying here, that Ainsclough must have been quite a shock to you, lass – more ’an I ever realized at first. You been a good lass – never complaining.’

  But I thought of the other women in Royds Street, who did not have Mary Grimshaw’s smiling face bringing them a cup of tea every morning, and said, ‘We’ve had Robbie’s and Eddie’s money, Ben – it makes a big difference.’

  ‘Aye – and I reckon I’m coming round to thinking it’s as well we have. You’d’ve coped because you’d have made yourself cope – but it would have been hard on you, Helena. I never thought clear enough afore.’

  ‘We neither of us thought – before.’

  ‘No. But – mebbe.’ He stopped, and reflected a while, before he went on, ‘Mebbe our bodies knew better ’an our heads. Because, for all them differences between us, Helena, we’re two of a kind, you and I. We fit together.’ I looked at him as we stood there in the draughty nursery corridor at Hatton and knew that, incredibly, he was right. Then he laughed. ‘Just as well we do, seeing as I’ve already put my youngster in your belly – so we’re tied together, whether we like it or not.’

  ‘Oh, but I do like it, Ben – I do.’

  He pressed my hand against his warm thigh. ‘So do I, lass – so do I.’

  *

  The little house in Royds Street seemed very small when we got home. In the kitchen Ben put the kettle on then sat down with a sigh. ‘I enjoyed me week – it weren’t like anything I’d ever done afore, or expected to do – but it’s nice to get home and be on our own together. And I’m even looking forward to going back to shed tomorrow!’ He laughed. ‘Life with the aristocracy is all right for a change – but I couldn’t live like that all the time. Happen you have to be born to it.’

  As I had been. But the war had come and had changed me as it had changed all of us – and now my home was in this small smoky valley, with my husband. I had much to be thankful for – and the child kicked in my womb.

  November 1921, Armistice Day. As the church bells tolled their signal the whole country came to a standstill; in those two long minutes of silence we stood motionless, remembering our Dead. The following Sunday the service was held to unveil the war memorial panels in our Methodist church. The names of all the men of the congregation who had served were written in gold, with a star beside each one who had died.

  We walked down to the church together; Ben’s medals were pinned on his breast, my service ribbons were fastened to my black coat, buttoned tight across my full belly.

  We raised our voices in Kipling’s hymn:

  ‘God of our Fathers, known of old,

  Lord of our far-flung battle line…’

  The minister proclaimed: ‘I am the Resurrection and the Life, saith the Lord.’

  We rose to sing again the age-old words of trust and comfort:

  ‘The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want…

  And then the panels were unveiled: ‘Let us remember with thanksgiving, and with all honour before God and men, those who have died, giving their lives in the service of their country.’

  The roll of the starred names was read. Ben’s face was taut beside me as he listened to them – the names of the boys he had played with, the men he had worked with – and the soldiers he had fought with. We listened silently, grieving for their unlived lives.

  As the echo of the last name died away my eyes rested on the name which was not starred:

  C. S. M. Holden, Benjamin, DCM, MM, L & CLI. He had come back, back to love me.

  The minister’s voice rang out in the dedication: ‘To the glory of God and in grateful memory of those who gave their lives, and of all those who served their King and country in the Great War.’

  The Great War – the final war – the war which had ended all other wars. We bent our heads and prayed together, and then the sobbing lament of the Last Post pierced our hearts – to be followed by the hope of the Reveille. Ben’s hand touched mine; for a moment we were back in France, serving our King and country.

  We sang and prayed and sang again. We listened to the lesson, the address – and then rose for the closing hymn:

  ‘O God, our help in ages past,

  Our hope for years to come,

  Our shelter from the stormy blast,

  And our eternal home.’

  ‘The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost, be with us all evermore. Amen.’

  At home that evening, the child was restless. I lay on the sofa, my hand on my belly, while he kicked vigorously. I whispered, ‘Be calm, little one – there will be no battles for you. Your father and your uncles went to fight for us, and they gave all that they had so that there would be no more war. Because of their sacrifice, you may sleep in peace.’

  But the child kicked on.

  Chapter Eleven

  The last month. Outside, the streets of Ainsclough shone grey and black in the rain and the days became shorter and shorter; up in the bedroom I lay close to Ben’s warm body, but that was all, now. He had been firm and I was glad – I needed all my energy for the child. My womb had dropped and the baby’s head pressed down into me; every night now Ben had to help me out of the bed and hold me on the chamber.

  I still walked out each day but when I came back my legs ached and by the evening my ankles were swollen – as Ben put them up on the pouffe his face creased with concern, though Dr Hartley said there was no cause for anxiety. She told me, upstairs one day when Ben was at work, that the child might come sooner than expected: ‘The head’s well down, my dear – I don’t think you’ll go much beyond the beginning of January.’

  ‘Please, don’t tell Ben – he’ll only worry more – let him think it’s further off.’ She smiled her agreement.

  We spent Christmas quietly together. At the chapel service I thought of my own son, so soon to be born, and happiness flooded through me. Ben’s sisters came on Boxing Day; Ada brought clothes she had knitted for the child, Ivy a large woollen shawl for me. ‘Best thing in world when you’re nursing a babby – keeps you both wrapped up so snug and warm together.’ I thanked them gratefully, and they shooed Ben away and settled down to give me the benefit of their experience; I liked to talk about babies and births now, but it only distressed Ben, and I had taken the textbook away from him – it was upsetting him. But I read it myself when he was out of the house; I wanted to know exactly what was going on inside me, so that when
the time came the child and I could work together. Now that my womb had dropped I could breathe easily again, and when he was restless I sang lullabies to him. Safe in my womb he listened to me, and his movements would slow and settle. ‘Not much longer, little one – not much longer.’

  On the last day of December I woke early – alert and full of energy, although I moved clumsily. Mary found me scrubbing the bath when she came; she said as she took the brush from me, ‘You won’t be long now – I remember whitewashing th’entire scullery day afore Mab arrived – Jim couldn’t stop me!’ She smiled. ‘Lucky Ben’s on early shift – he’d be scolding you for this. Poor lad looks right haggard these days – it takes men different. But they do say as where the man suffers the woman gets it easier – so that should do you a bit of good.’ She laughed as she flapped the cleaning cloth at me. ‘Into the kitchen with you and put your feet up.’ But I still prowled restlessly around.

  That night the bells rang out to welcome the new year: 1922. Ben stirred in his sleep and kissed me before dropping off again, but I lay awake listening to them; a new year – and under my heart I carried a new life.

  New Year’s Day was a Sunday, and Ben was home with me. I walked a little way, leaning on his arm, in the morning – but I could not settle when we got back, and that afternoon I kept visiting the closet. After the third time, when I came back warmly wrapped in Ivy’s shawl, Ben looked up anxiously. ‘Are you all right, lass?’