Coronation Wives

by Lizzie Lane

  Josef, who had sent her the letter regarding Edna’s first child Sherman, had been a prisoner here. Even now, she could see his face, impatience with a world gone mad reflected in his eyes. She’d also seen fear. It was only after Josef had returned home and felt safe that he’d reported how a prison guard had died because he was different. He’d also named the man responsible, though she had no idea whether the man was ever brought to justice.

  And here she was again, only now it was Susan somewhere behind that high fence, lying in a bed within one of these long, low buildings.

  She gripped the steering wheel tightly, closed her eyes then stabbed her foot on the accelerator. Uncaring of speed, she hurtled across Warmley Common at over forty miles an hour towards St George and Kingscott Avenue where Edna and Colin Smith were waiting for news.

  When she got there, Edna hung out of an upstairs window, her face almost as white as the net curtains bunched around her head. Charlotte smiled and waved. The curtain fell back into place. Halfway up the garden path the front door flew open. Edna looked apprehensive.

  ‘When can we see her?’ Hope shone in Edna’s eyes. Dark circles hung like bruises beneath them.

  Charlotte wrapped her arm around Edna’s shoulders. ‘Shall we go in?’

  The front room smelt of bleach, polish and Windolene. Edna had always kept a tidy house, thought Charlotte, but I can’t ever remember it smelling like this.

  ‘You’ve been busy,’ she said as she pulled off her gloves and thought about how best to report on her efforts with Professor Pritchard – not that there was anything positive to report.

  Edna was so eager to hear something good that she had not offered tea as she normally did, but Charlotte adopted a warm smile. ‘Where’s Pamela? I haven’t seen her for ages.’

  ‘In the back room,’ said Edna. ‘I didn’t want her getting this one dirty. It has to be just right for when Susan gets home.’

  A warning bell sounded in Charlotte’s head. Children made rooms untidy; it would be normal to say that. But dirty?

  ‘And where’s Colin?’

  ‘At work. I told him to go. He was getting on my nerves.’

  Charlotte was adept at keeping her expression under control. She rarely showed her true feelings, but she did now. Colin was not the type to get on anyone’s nerves, even those of the woman he’d married. He was gregarious, funny, the life and soul of any party, but also the shoulder to cry on.

  Charlotte sat down in an armchair, her gloves and handbag nestling in her lap. This wasn’t going to be easy and the right words were slow in coming.

  ‘Edna, I am afraid they will not allow visitors …’

  ‘No!’ It wasn’t like Edna to speak so sharply.

  Charlotte kept calm. ‘There’s nothing I can do. Nothing,’ she said shaking her head and slumping back against the stiff covering of the squarely constructed armchair. Confidence gained from the experience of helping others, mostly complete strangers, melted away. She had failed a friend, the worst failure of all.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said again.

  ‘My child’s alone in that place.’

  Charlotte looked at her gloves as she twisted them out of shape with tense, nervous fingers. ‘We can only pray.’

  ‘Hah! What for? A miracle? I’m not even asking if my daughter will ever walk again, all I am asking is that I can see her!’

  Edna paced up and down the room, threw her head back, cried, prayed and blamed herself for not keeping the house as clean as she should.

  Charlotte hung her head, her lovely kid gloves no more than a screwed-up ball between her clammy palms. Words were not enough. A balm was needed, some kind of salve to ease her friend’s pain, something to make her think of something or someone else besides Susan. There was only one course of action to follow.

  ‘Edna. I have to tell you something. You remember Janet talking about a letter?’

  Edna was unresponsive. Poor woman! Was it any wonder that she’d forgotten all mention of it in the circumstances?

  Charlotte continued. ‘I’ve received correspondence regarding your son, Sherman.’

  The crying and praying stopped, just as she hoped it would. She went on to tell Edna about the letters and what she was being asked to do.

  The haunted look left Edna’s eyes.

  Charlotte congratulated herself. Hopefully she’d done this right. She kept her fingers crossed under cover of her crumpled gloves. ‘Of course you need to talk it over with Colin, but I think it would …’

  At the mention of Colin, Edna’s new calmness dissolved. ‘I don’t want him! I want Susan.’ But Charlotte had seen the change in her eyes.

  Edna’s anger stayed in Charlotte’s mind as she drove home. Never had she felt so helpless as she did now, so low in spirit. Edna really did need a miracle and so far, she had failed to supply one. So try again, she said to herself. She’s your friend. You have to.

  At home she wrote a swift reply to Josef, then packaged all the letters into an envelope addressed to Edna.

  Edna’s reaction had surprised Charlotte. The timing had seemed right and yet … Failing was not something she was used to.

  That evening, in an effort to restore her dented self-esteem, she wrapped up well and went out into the greenhouse to pot spring bulbs and sow a few sweetpeas for flowering next summer.

  When the phone rang she presumed it was Colin with some news about Susan. Dropping the seed boxes, she tore off her gloves and rushed into the house.

  Geoffrey was on the other end. ‘It’s Dad. He’s not well. The ambulance is here.’

  Charlotte kept her head. ‘Is it fatigue? I told him not to work so hard—’

  ‘Mum! He’s had a stroke.’

  Suddenly it was hard to breathe, let alone speak, but she found the words. ‘I’ll be right there.’

  The train timetable was in the desk in the study, right next to a letter from Josef that she had not included with the rest. When she pulled out the timetable, the letter fell out with it.

  In the present circumstances, it only warranted a brief, guilty look. She couldn’t possibly deal with it now. Neither could she do any more for Edna. David was ill and needed her. She shoved the letter back into the desk, took the timetable and rushed upstairs to pack a small suitcase.

  Before leaving, she grabbed the two envelopes from her desk and left them on the hall table for Mrs Grey to take to the Post Office.

  That night Janet dreamed she was at Clevedon again. Jonathan was sitting on a blanket and she was hanging on his every word as he told her of how he was going to be the best doctor ever because that was what his mother wanted. The children were far out at sea, walking on water and waving at her with their fishing nets, but she wasn’t really seeing them. Susan screamed and a tidal wave rushed over the beach and Edna ran out of the shelter up on the promenade, waving her arms and screaming with rage, ‘It’s all your fault! You’ve killed her!’

  ‘No, it isn’t!’ shouted Janet and sat bolt upright, soaked in sweat. ‘It’s not my fault,’ she said in a smaller voice, covering her face with her hands, then threw herself into the pillow and burst into tears.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Janet called in on Polly to ask her to help Mrs Grey tidy up at Royal York Crescent prior to her father coming home from hospital.

  ‘Mother’s gone to fetch him.’

  Polly nodded silently. She was sitting on the very edge of a dining chair, almost as if she would spring up and shoot off at any moment.

  ‘I’d do it myself,’ she blurted, suddenly defensive in case Polly thought she was being priggish, ‘but things are happening at the sanatorium. I need to keep an eye on Susan.’

  Meg bustled in at that point with tea served from a big brown pot. She was all interest. ‘And how’s Edna taking things?’

  Janet shrugged and shook her head. ‘Not good, what with Susan and her mother not being well.’

  ‘Well, it’s difficult enough having elderly relatives. Worse still when t
heir minds are gone wandering,’ said Meg and sipped at her tea.

  ‘I’ll let you know how things go,’ Janet said. Her teacup rang like a bell as she put it back into its saucer. ‘Very nice,’ she said, admiring the pink roses and gold rim with a brief brush of her finger. ‘Bone china, is it?’

  ‘From Woolworths,’ Polly lied as Janet got to her feet. Billy had got it from a man who knew a man who had a warehouse. The rest of its origin was suitably vague. ‘I’ll see you to the door.’

  Meg followed them, her slippers slapping like flippers with each step.

  Janet paused at the garden gate and pulled on her gloves. ‘I’m sorry to have missed Billy. I haven’t seen him for quite a while. Is he working today?’

  Polly was taken off guard, but rallied swiftly. ‘He’s working.’

  ‘How wonderful! Has he a proper job now, or is he still freelance?’

  Polly crossed her arms and ignored Meg’s sidelong glance. ‘Freelance! He’s gone to see some new business associates up in Ashley Down. They’re on about making ’im a partner.’

  ‘Is that what they call it,’ muttered Meg.

  Janet did not appear to notice Meg’s comment.

  ‘I’m glad she didn’t hear what you said,’ Polly said to Aunty Meg as they waved Janet off down the road.

  ‘Just as well! Business associates indeed! Crooks, more like!’

  ‘I could hardly tell her that he’s in the nick, could I?’

  Meg sniffed and shook her head. ‘You mark my words, if Billy don’t sort ’imself out, he’s going to come to a very sticky end.’

  ‘Yeah,’ muttered Polly. ‘And I know bloody well where I’m going to tell him to stick the toffee!’

  Billy had not come home on the night the thugs called, but two coppers from the local nick had come calling and told Polly that the van was stolen. That was the first shock. The next was Billy being remanded in custody as the bloke responsible for pinching it. After Janet had gone she visited him in the cells. Dressed in her ordinary clothes, the things she kept for daily wear, and carrying a battered brown shopping bag that Meg had bought at a jumble sale for twopence, she caught the bus to Bedminster. Anyone seeing her would think she’d just gone shopping. After walking the length of East Street, which took her past the main haunts where her neighbours shopped, she re-boarded the same number bus she’d just got off and travelled to the centre. From there she walked to Bridewell where he would stay until sentencing.

  ‘I didn’t do it, Poll, honest I didn’t!’

  Billy’s features reminded her of Carol when she pleaded for half a crown after demolishing her pocket money in a single visit to the sweetshop.

  ‘Billy, you were driving it.’

  ‘A friend borrowed me it!’

  ‘He lent it to you,’ Polly corrected.

  The common way he said things usually made her laugh, but not now. It irritated. Far from giving her the security she’d always wanted, Billy had let her down. Like all the other men she’d ever known. She was going to be left all alone.

  Billy puffed on his Woodbine, then turned to the fresh-faced constable standing by the door. ‘How about a cup of char for me and the missus?’

  Once the coast was clear, the truth, such as it was, came out. ‘Remember that place I took you to up in Ashley Down?’ He leaned as close to her as the table between them allowed.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘The coppers want me to shop them about their betting rackets. I know ’ow it’s organized, you see, and where everything and everybody is. The van’s just something they’re weighing me with to make me blab, but I won’t. I daren’t. They’ll chop me bloody legs off if I do.’

  ‘Bollocks!’

  ‘Polly!’

  Normally her bad language didn’t go much further than ‘bloody’, ‘sod’ and ‘swine’. But these were extenuating circumstances.

  Billy grabbed her hands. ‘Please, Poll. Say nothing. They’re a nasty lot. They means business.’

  Up until then she would have shopped anybody if it had freed Billy. Now she wasn’t so sure. Never had she seen Billy so pasty-faced and so … still. Usually his face, his head and his limbs were a whirr of movement, a flow of continuous scheming animating his whole body. Telling him about the visit from the two bruisers was out of the question. Billy looked frightened. And if devil-may-care Billy was frightened, it stood to reason she should be frightened too.

  When she got home, she explained it to Meg as though it were nothing to do with Ginger and his pal visiting them. She talked of it as though it were another matter entirely and that Billy had had his fair share in it. However, Polly’s disappointment in him was genuine.

  ‘Men just aren’t worth it,’ she complained and flounced out into the backyard where she threw corn at the fowls.

  Meg felt obliged to tell her friend Bridget all about it. Bridget sat still and listened quietly though you couldn’t tell from her disparate eyes whether she was concentrating on what was being said or not.

  ‘Not going to Australia then,’ she said when Meg had finished.

  Meg sipped at her tea. ‘Well, not for a while anyway. Never mind. P’raps they might have changed their minds by then.’

  Bridget pursed her lips, drained her saucer and set it down on the table. ‘Not ever. Not if you’ve got a criminal conviction. My cousin Aemon Fitzpatrick got refused because of that. Mind you, he was a safecracker.’

  Meg’s spirits hit the ceiling. ‘Is that right – about them not letting him in I mean?’

  For a moment Meg could have kissed her – until she heard a smacking of slack lips as Bridget rolled them over her gums. Bridget’s teeth sat in her empty teacup whilst she slurped the rest of her tea from the saucer.

  ‘Well that’s it,’ said Meg, her spirits higher than they’d been for a long time. ‘Everyfink’s back to normal.’

  Bridget put down her saucer and wiped her lips. ‘Trouble is, you can’t tell ’er. If you do then she’ll want to know how you know. Can’t tell ’er you bin dumping the post in the bin, can you?’

  Meg fell silent. Bridget was right. She couldn’t say a thing. She had to let Polly live in hope and find out the truth for herself.

  ‘Oh well,’ she said after thinking things through, ‘at least I know the truth. There’s nothing for me to worry about.’

  Meg was almost walking on air going back to the house, which suddenly seemed warmer and cosier than she’d ever realized. Polly’s coat hung from a hook in the hall. Meg breezed into the living room.

  ‘Well!’ she exclaimed. ‘I’d better be getting some tea on.’ Polly sat at the draw leaf table, which was positioned in the middle of the room between the fireplace on one side and the fitted dresser on the other. Her head rested on her hands and she hardly looked up when Meg patted her on the shoulder. ‘No use crying over spilt milk Poll.’

  ‘I’m not crying, but I bloody well should be.’

  ‘Now come on. Every cloud’s got a silver lining.’

  ‘Well the one over my bloody ’ead is peeing on me.’

  ‘Polly! No need for that language.’

  ‘There’s every need! He’s innocent! Honest he is!’

  ‘How can you be so sure that Billy didn’t pinch it? I mean, much as I love the little sod, he’s about as pure as the driven slush!’

  Polly wanted to tell Meg about Billy’s predicament, but had promised to say nothing. She thought of the thugs’ visit and shivered at what might have been. ‘I didn’t tell him anything about our visitors,’ she said casually. ‘I didn’t want him to worry about us.’

  ‘No use crying over spilt milk,’ Meg repeated brightly. The happy face didn’t seem right in the circumstances. Polly decided that the enormity of the situation had not sunk in, so she tried to explain. ‘I don’t know why you’re looking so happy, Aunty Meg. We’re going to be living on my wages and your bit of pension. It’s not going to be enough and you know it ain’t.’

  ‘’Course I ain’t happy.’ Meg started d
usting with a pair of old knickers in an effort to hide the way she truly felt. ‘I’m as worried as you are, but there ain’t nothin’ we can do about it. Now how about a bit of liver and onions for yer tea? I’ll guarantee the gravy’s so thick you can cut it with a knife – just as you like it.’

  Rolling her sleeves up past her elbows as though she was about to knock spots off Joe Louis, she breezed off to the kitchen, her flowered apron – the crossover sort that was almost a dress – a flash of muddled colour.

  ‘Everything will work out right,’ she shouted from the other side of the door. ‘You’ll see. He’ll be out in no time. We can manage.’

  ‘Depending whether you’re you or me,’ Polly murmured.

  What Meg didn’t know was that Major Griffiths had heard through the Knowle West grapevine that Polly was in a more vulnerable position than she had been before. So far she’d avoided his overtures, but that night he called her into the office.

  He stood at the window, looking out at the field of red-brick council houses, square blocks of pre-war vintage sitting behind small gardens framed by privet hedges.

  ‘I hear your husband is no longer with you.’

  She could almost hear him gloating.

  ‘What’s it to you?’

  He turned, straightened his blotter and slid his fingers up and down a spike on which some receipts were currently impaled as though he were polishing it. ‘Well, I’m sure we can manage a little bonus – if you are willing to take on extra duties that is.’

  Polly was nervous, but loath to show it. She held her head extra high so that she was looking at him down the end of her nose. This job was all she had for her and Carol to live on. She needed it more than she ever had before, but she had to bluff it out. She folded her arms. ‘I thought you were going to report me to the police, money missing and all that.’

  He smiled that slow, greasy smile of his. ‘I hardly think we need to resort to such subterfuge, my dear, especially now. Circumstances have changed somewhat. I have needs that you can deal with, and you certainly have needs, if not now, you will certainly have them very shortly. Shortage of essentials – food, clothes, rent – is a wonderful impetus to dropping one’s inhibitions. After all, you have a daughter to think of.’