The Promise

by Lesley Pearse

  She looked up and down the street; everything looked exactly the way it always had in the gas lights. The welcome from Mog and Garth would be warm, she knew they would envelop her in their arms and promise her that she and Jimmy would always have a home with them. But elsewhere in the village Belle was going to face scorn. And for now she’d have to live with it.

  Picking up her suitcase, she resolutely put her shoulders back and crossed the road.

  ‘Belle! I thought you’d never get here,’ Mog exclaimed when she opened the side door to her. ‘You must be exhausted. What time did you leave France? How is Jimmy?’

  The quickfire questions were as Belle expected and she let herself be drawn into the narrow hall to be embraced.

  ‘Jimmy’s fine, Haddon Hall is lovely, and yes, I’m exhausted and it’s wonderful to be home,’ she said, burying her face in Mog’s neck and breathing in the familiar smell of lavender cologne and baking.

  ‘Come on in and I’ll make you a cup of tea,’ Mog said. ‘Your bed is all made up with a hot water bottle to make it cosy. Garth will be out to see you when he’s closed the bar. It’s never that busy these days.’

  As Mog made a pot of tea and put ham, cheese and bread on a plate, Belle noticed her face was drawn, her hair had far more grey in it and she had aged considerably. She was wearing a navy-blue dress which, though not old, was very drab, like the ones she used to wear back in Seven Dials. It was appalling that Blessard’s revelations and Mrs Forbes-Alton’s spite had made her revert back to the little mouse she used to be.

  ‘Save telling me about Jimmy until Garth comes through,’ she said, putting the plate of food in front of Belle. ‘Just tell me how you are. You said in your last letter he was very low, and I’m guessing that can’t have been easy for you to cope with. I’m sure you won’t like to tell me any of that while Garth is around.’

  Belle half smiled at how perceptive Mog was. ‘No, it’s not easy, mostly he’s so grumpy I feel quite defeated. But a few good nights’ sleep will put me right. I feel easier now he’s at Haddon Hall, and I’ll just deal with things as they come along.’

  ‘It’s not going to be easy for you in the village either,’ Mog sighed. ‘People still look the other way when I go into a shop, and I’m afraid they may say nasty things to you.’

  ‘I shall just ignore them,’ Belle said more bravely than she felt. ‘The only thing that upsets me is to see you looking so careworn and sad.’

  Mog shrugged. ‘Garth said he’ll sell up when the war ends and we’ll move to Folkestone or Hastings. But he doesn’t really understand what it’s like for me; as you can imagine, no one dares say anything to him about it. So he gets cross with me as he thinks I’m imagining the slights and whispers. You’ll also find he’s got no real understanding of how Jimmy is feeling either. To Garth he’s a wounded hero and a missing leg and arm are a badge of honour. The stupid man thinks Jimmy can sit in a chair all day in the bar and be as happy as a pig in clover.’

  Belle winced because that was exactly how Jimmy had predicted Garth would react. But she could hear the hurt in Mog’s voice about not being believed about how the neighbours were treating her. ‘I’ll soon put Garth right on all counts,’ she said. ‘The way Jimmy is now, we’ll be lucky if we can even persuade him to come downstairs. To be honest, Mog, he’s very bitter and withdrawn.’

  ‘He’s not loving towards you?’

  ‘No, not really. Well, he apologizes when he’s said something sharp, and I know he doesn’t really mean to be that way. But he’s got quite a chip on his shoulder.’

  ‘Oh dear.’ Mog slumped down on to a chair. ‘I can’t imagine him being like that. He was always so kind and thoughtful. It sounds as though you’ve had a tough time with him.’

  ‘Maybe I haven’t been sympathetic enough, after all, I’ve grown very used to bad injuries. I think he’d have been better in another hospital really, they tended to give him special treatment because of me. I think he resented too that I was off working during the day,’ Belle replied. ‘Oh, I don’t know, Mog, maybe all the men are like that with their wives at first. Please don’t tell Garth any of this. Jimmy may change back to his old self at Haddon Hall.’

  As Belle ate her supper she asked Mog questions about how she and Garth were, how the pub was doing and whether she’d heard anything from Noah.

  ‘We had a letter from him to say how sorry he was about Jimmy,’ Mog said. ‘You can take it to Jimmy when you go to visit him. Of course, he’s away most of the time as a war correspondent. Lisette has her hands full with Rose, the baby, and Jean-Philippe. Noah said he’ll visit Jimmy as soon as he can. And you must go and see Lisette. Noah said she wanted to know all about your work in France.’

  Belle smiled. She would be glad to go and see Lisette, who was the one person she didn’t need to hide her past from, Lisette’s being so similar. As for Noah, Belle would always have a special affection for him. He’d done as much as Etienne in rescuing her in Paris, and he was the one person who had known she loved Etienne back then, yet he’d never divulged it.

  ‘What about the pub?’ Belle asked. She felt Mog was avoiding that subject.

  ‘Not too good, ducks. Well, there’s not that many of the younger regulars left here. We get the old ones in still, but they’ll nurse a pint for hours. Money is tight for everyone, people are weary of the war now too. All in all, it means a big drop in takings.’

  Garth came into the kitchen later, and he beamed on seeing Belle and embraced her in a bear hug. ‘Good to have you back,’ he said. ‘We’ve both been lost without you.’

  He at least looked reassuringly the same as he always had, with his fiery hair and beard, and shoulders like a barn door.

  ‘Tell me about the wounded hero,’ he said. ‘Can they give him a peg leg?’

  Belle told them details of what Jimmy remembered about how he got his injuries, the treatment he’d received, and the possibilities of an artificial limb. She also made it clear how lucky he was to have been sent to Haddon Hall. ‘He’ll be there for at least two months. I thought I might try and get some digs down there, but I’ll leave him to settle in first.’

  ‘He should be back here with us,’ Garth said in indignation. ‘You and Mog can see to him.’

  Belle bristled. Garth meant well, and it was good that he wanted to look after Jimmy, but he didn’t have any idea how difficult it would be to take care of an amputee, especially here where there were stairs and narrow doorways.

  ‘He has to learn to do some things for himself before he can come home,’ Belle said. ‘He also has to come to terms with what’s happened to him.’

  Garth made a disapproving snort and Belle saw red.

  ‘Mog and I aren’t strong enough to lift him up to the lavatory, and he isn’t in the best of spirits either. You might imagine he’ll be happy sitting in the bar all day with you while people tell him what a brave man he is, but he won’t be, and anyway, that is the worst possible thing for him. At Haddon Hall he’s with men with similar disabilities and people who can teach him how to deal with them. At present he’s bitter; he needs to get that out of his system.’

  ‘We can make that store room into a room for him,’ Garth said, pointing to the room off the kitchen as if he hadn’t heard a word she’d said. ‘I can put a ramp down the back step for his wheelchair so he can use the outside lavatory. You won’t need to lift him then.’

  ‘He can’t wheel himself around with only one arm,’ Belle said through gritted teeth. ‘He can’t even pull his trousers down himself yet. For goodness’ sake, Garth, hold back your plans until you’ve seen and talked to him. I know you mean well, but Haddon Hall is the right place for him now.’

  Garth stared at her for a moment, then suddenly looked stricken. ‘It’s that bad, eh?’

  Belle could only nod, all at once realizing he hadn’t quite grasped how disabled Jimmy was.

  ‘I didn’t think,’ he admitted. ‘I just wanted him here with me.’

  ‘I k
now,’ she said, her irritation wiped out by his affection for his nephew. ‘But we’ll all have to be patient a little longer till we can be a proper family again.’

  He moved towards her and drew her to his big chest. ‘At least we’ve got you back,’ he said gruffly. ‘You look worn out and much too thin, but Mog and me will soon put that right.’

  Belle leaned into him, reassured that however bad some things were, Garth was still his strong, dependable self. Whatever difficulties lay ahead, she felt the three of them could tackle them together.

  For the first week of being home Belle felt completely lost. She had no role; Mog cooked and cleaned, Garth ran the pub, and there was nothing left for her to do. She dug out her old clothes and tried them on, finding they were all too loose because she’d lost weight. But even her old favourites seemed too colourful and fancy now and made her look like the scarlet woman people believed she was.

  On her first morning home she was shunned in the baker’s. Two women she knew slightly pointedly turned away as she walked in, as if she was suffering from an infectious disease. She bought the bread Mog wanted and as she was leaving she heard them talking about her. ‘The brass neck of her, coming back here,’ one said. ‘It’s her poor aunt I feel sorry for,’ the other added.

  She went back to the Railway immediately, trying hard to walk with her head held high, but inside she was crying. She stayed indoors for the rest of the day, making out to Mog that she was very tired rather than admit what had happened.

  Later Belle sat by the window of her bedroom remembering how happy she and Jimmy had been when they decorated the room together just before their wedding. Neither of them had put up wallpaper before, and they ruined a whole roll by putting their hands through it, hanging it crookedly or tearing it, before they got the hang of it. But they had laughed so much, delighting in the idea of creating their own little haven. She could see the flaws – parts where the pattern didn’t match up, little places where the paper had come away from the wall, the odd bubble which had never been smoothed out. But it hadn’t mattered to them, or that the furniture was second-hand. Belle had made the lace-covered counterpane and the curtains, and Jimmy had rubbed down the scarred, battered dressing table and wardrobe and re-varnished them.

  Their wedding photograph was now back in its place on the small table by the bed, a further reminder of how they’d both believed that day it would be happy-ever-after. Belle was only twenty-three, and the prospect of living in a place for years where people shunned her and pitied Jimmy was just too awful to contemplate.

  A week after taking Jimmy to Haddon Hall, Belle went back to visit him for the first time. She had made a real effort with her appearance because she thought it would please him. She had washed her hair the day before, and she’d put it up the way he liked it, with a few loose curls around her face. She’d painstakingly altered the red wool costume he’d bought her for their first Christmas together, so it fitted better, and shortened the skirt so it was just at ankle height as she’d seen in fashion magazines. Her red and navy-blue hat was one he’d always loved too; it perched on the side of her head at a rakish angle and needed a lot of securing. Over her outfit she wore her navy-blue cape with a fur collar because it had turned very cold.

  ‘You look very lovely today,’ Mr Gayle said as he opened the car door for her outside the station. ‘That should give your husband a real boost. Is it good to be back with your family?’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ she said. ‘Though it’s strange to have so little to do. I find the time drags. But that will change when Jimmy comes home.’

  The wind was whipping the leaves off the trees, leaving a thick carpet on the country lanes as they drove out to Haddon Hall. Belle was cold and couldn’t help thinking of Etienne back in France and wondering how he was coping with the cold on top of all the other miseries soldiers had to face.

  ‘I spoke to your husband briefly yesterday,’ Mr Gayle said, bringing her guiltily back to her visit to Jimmy. ‘He seemed much more relaxed and was looking forward to seeing you. I’m sorry I can’t take you back to the station today, but there’s someone calling for Mrs Cooling, the wife of another patient, at four thirty, and he’ll take you too.’

  Belle thanked him and asked how he and his wife had coped with the loss of their son.

  ‘Not very well at first,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘We were angry, bitter, we thought, “Why us?”, but then, so many have lost sons, brothers and husbands, we aren’t alone in our grief. In our village there is one widow who has lost all three of her sons. We are lucky to have two daughters and another son who is too young to be called up. Doing our bit for the wounded helps us. We’ve grown very fond of several young men who have passed through Haddon. Sometimes when I see the terrible wounds some of them have, and how difficult their lives will be because of them, I’m almost glad our John was killed outright.’

  ‘Yes, it’s cruel,’ Belle agreed. ‘I saw so many like that both in France and at the Herbert. I used to wonder how their families would manage to look after them.’

  ‘But your husband will improve.’ Mr Gayle reached out his hand and touched her arm. ‘Trust in that. Life won’t be the same for you as it was before the war, but you will be happy again, both of you.’

  ‘Yes, of course we will.’ His kindness prompted tears, but she bit them back. ‘We have a lot to be grateful for, and at least I’ve got some experience of the problems Jimmy will have to face.’

  ‘He told me you used to make hats. Maybe you could do that again at home, to give you an interest and bring in a bit of extra money?’

  ‘Yes, that’s a possibility,’ Belle smiled at him. She liked this man, for his warmth, kindness and practicality. She silently told herself she wasn’t going to wallow in self-pity any longer.

  Jimmy was in much better spirits. He beamed at Belle as she walked into the orangery and introduced her to his three companions with obvious pride.

  Fred, just nineteen, had lost both his legs, Henry just one leg, and Ernest had been blinded and was partially paralysed due to a spine injury. Belle spoke to each of them, asking where they were from and how long they’d been at Haddon Hall. They were all from South London, but only Ernest had been there for over three months.

  ‘My folks can’t cope with me at home,’ he said remarkably cheerfully. ‘But I don’t want to go home anyway. I like it here.’

  Belle wheeled Jimmy into the drawing room a little later so they could have some privacy. She knelt down beside his chair and kissed him, and for the first time he responded with enthusiasm.

  ‘That’s better,’ she said, sitting back on her heels. ‘I’d begun to think that bit of Jimmy was left at Ypres.’

  He smiled sheepishly. ‘I’ve been a bit of an idiot, too busy feeling sorry for myself.’

  ‘You had every right to feel sorry for yourself,’ she said. ‘Now, tell me about it here.’

  As Belle listened to him describing how it had been, she realized that it was the peace and quiet, warmth and comfort rather than any treatment which had improved his spirits. The only sounds outside the house were of the wind, birdsong and occasionally of someone chopping wood, unlike in the hospital back in France where the heavy guns in the distance and airplanes overhead could be heard constantly.

  The other patients were helping Jimmy too, as some, like Ernest, were far worse off than him and had no family visitors. Belle was pleased to hear Jimmy express admiration for his new friend. He seemed more optimistic about coping with his own disability as he’d been told that once the stump of his arm was completely healed he could be fitted with an artificial one, which he could use to support himself on crutches or to manoeuvre a wheelchair for short distances.

  He had been reading, learned to play chess, and laughingly said he’d found he could hop out of the wheelchair on his good leg to the dining table, lavatory or bed.

  ‘Only trouble is, I’ve got to learn to balance myself,’ he said ruefully. ‘I forgot last night and fell over and
couldn’t get back up. One of the lads suggested I hang weights on my left-hand side.’

  Belle felt her heart lighten to hear him joke about it. She had been afraid that would never happen.

  ‘Would you like it if I got digs down here?’ she asked him a little later. ‘I could come and see you every day then, and Mr Gayle said I could do some driving.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s such a good idea,’ he said, surprising her by the sudden sharpness of his tone. ‘You’ve been away from home for long enough, and anyway, they wouldn’t want you coming here every day.’

  On the train going home, Belle kept thinking about what he’d said. She doubted it was true that she wouldn’t be welcome at Haddon Hall every day; Mr Gayle would have told her if that was the case. ‘You’ve been away from home for long enough’ was more telling. He wanted Mog and Garth to keep an eye on her; he didn’t trust her any more!

  She couldn’t be angry, as she knew she wasn’t worthy of trust, but she was saddened that he thought she’d find another man because of his injuries. Didn’t he understand she had suggested moving down here to show him she wanted to be close to him?

  November came in with relentless heavy rain, making it impossible even to go for a walk to relieve the boredom. Mog was wrapped up in her household chores and didn’t want to share them however much Belle begged her to.

  ‘I like things done my way,’ she said fiercely. ‘You go and read a book or do some drawing. You just get under my feet.’

  Belle offered to help Garth in the cellar, but he wouldn’t allow her down there because that was ‘men’s work’. She could see his back was aching with carrying heavy crates of beer, and she reminded him she’d grown used to lifting stretchers with heavier loads than that, but he still refused her help.

  She tried sketching, but the only images which came into her mind were those of the station in France and the wounded being lifted off the hospital train. She did a few of them, but then put her sketchbook away. Drawing such pictures depressed her, and also made her think too much of the good friends she’d made in France.