Always I'Ll Remember

by Bradshaw, Rita

  By the time they climbed aboard, Clara seemed quite recovered, chatting animatedly about the farm, but the child’s brief dizzy spell worried Abby considerably. If she didn’t see a significant improvement in her sister’s health and general wellbeing over the next few weeks she would take her to a doctor, she decided.

  Once the train had left the station, Clara forced down a sandwich and went to sleep with her head on Abby’s lap. Abby stroked the small forehead lovingly. Clara had always been a thin little thing, admittedly, but now she looked as though a breath of wind would blow her away, and although losing their father had been a terrible shock for the little girl, her subsequent emotional state was surely extreme for a child of nine. Abby turned to gaze out of the train window, her mind buzzing. And there was the Winnie and Vincent thing to deal with at the farm too. How had it all panned out after she’d had to leave so hurriedly? As far as they knew, Vincent had got back to the farm at some time during Saturday night because he had been at work in the yard the next morning when they had gone down to breakfast. The farmer and his wife had still been up when the three of them had walked into the kitchen after driving the lorry back, and during the subsequent explanation had said very little, neither defending nor denouncing their younger son’s behaviour. Sunday had been very strained for everyone and Monday hadn’t been much better. Vincent had refused to talk to the three girls at all and Winnie’s red eyes were ignored by Mr and Mrs Tollett. Then had come word about her da and everything and everyone else had faded into insignificance.

  Clara stirred, muttering something unintelligible and making a flapping movement with her hand before sinking back into sleep. Abby gazed down at her sister as she brushed a strand of hair from Clara’s cheek. Thank goodness she’d got Clara away from their mam for the time being. That, at least, was one thing less to worry about. Now Clara was with her she intended to keep her in Yorkshire for the duration of the war, however long it was, and in this she knew she definitely had the backing of her Aunt Audrey and Granda.

  It was later that afternoon that Audrey popped her head round the front room door and said to Silas, ‘Mrs Ingram’s just tipped me the wink there’s some rabbits to be had at the butchers on the corner so I’m going to see what’s what. Nora’s in the kitchen if you want anything. All right, Da? I shan’t be long.’

  Silas nodded, motioning with his hand that he understood. It had started already, like he’d known it would. As soon as she’d got back from the factory Audrey had been round next door inviting Nora for dinner. He watched his daughter leave the room, affection vying with irritation at her good-heartedness. And what was the betting Nora would play her sister like a violin, not resting until her feet were firmly under the table every night and she practically lived round here? She was still after Ivor if he knew anything about it and he, for one, wouldn’t put anything past her. Not Nora.

  He heard the sound of voices in the kitchen and then the back door banged and all was quiet.

  His mind returned to the question he’d been asking himself for days, ever since Raymond’s accident. What should he do? What could he do? Would it make Nora less bold if she knew he had tumbled her little game and knew what had gone on in the past? He really didn’t know, he admitted for the umpteenth time. His eldest was a law unto herself.

  He shut his eyes for a second, and then, decision made, raised himself on his pillows, waiting for the pain in his chest to subside before he called, ‘Nora? You there?’ A full minute passed with no response from the kitchen, so again he drew on all his reserves of strength, taking as deep a breath as the pain would allow and yelling, ‘Nora? You hear me?’ before falling back and gasping for air as his heart laboured.

  This time he heard the chair being pushed back on the flagstones, and a moment or two later his eldest daughter was standing in the doorway to the room, surveying him with cold eyes. ‘What’s the matter?’ she said flatly. ‘You having a bad turn?’

  It was a few moments before he could say, ‘Didn’t you hear me afore?’

  ‘What if I did?’

  Let it pass, let it pass. ‘I want a word with you, that’s all.’

  Nora looked down at the old man, her face stretching slightly and her eyes widening before she wiped her face clear of all expression. He couldn’t know. No one knew, no one except Clara and she was out of it now. ‘What about?’

  ‘Now Clara’s out of your hair, you thinkin’ about gettin’ a job somewhere? You’re going to have time on your hands with the house empty.’

  She stared at him. ‘What’s that to do with you?’

  ‘Plenty.’ Silas’s gaze didn’t falter. ‘It’ll do no one no good you broodin’ all day, and likely you’ll find company if you get a job, company for the evenings, I mean. Audrey and Ivor have got their own lives to lead.’

  Nora wanted to slap her father from here to kingdom come. Audrey! Always, always Audrey. ‘It might have escaped your notice but my husband has just died. Likely Audrey thought she was doing the Christian thing in asking me round for a bite.’

  ‘Don’t come the grieving widow, lass, not with me. You couldn’t stand the sight of Raymond, now then.’

  ‘You know nowt about it.’

  ‘Oh aye I do. And I tell you this, you spoil things for Audrey and I’ll swing for you. Ivor don’t want you, get that through your head. Whatever went on, it’s finished with.’

  Nora was speechless for a moment and then, her voice trembling with bitterness, she said, ‘What’s he said to you?’

  ‘That don’t matter.’

  ‘It does to me.’ Her voice had risen and she swallowed hard as she walked into the room, warning herself to keep control of her tongue. Whatever Ivor had said she knew her father well enough to know that shouting at him wouldn’t get her anywhere. ‘You tell me what he said to you, and every word, mind.’

  ‘I don’t have to tell you nowt, woman.’ His voice was defiant but as she approached the bed he drew back, his face skeletal against the pillows.

  ‘Maybe.’ Her voice was low but distinct. ‘But I dare bet he made out he was all innocent and light, didn’t he? You men, you’re all the same.’

  ‘Whatever he said and whatever went on, Ivor’s your sister’s husband and nothing can change that. How you could do that to Audrey I just don’t know.’

  ‘Oh you.’ Her lips were pressed tightly together and she stared at him with loathing for a moment. ‘You’ve always thought the sun shines out of her backside. Audrey this and Audrey that until I was as sick of her name as I was of the pair of you. But you might like to know you’re wrong about one thing. I don’t want Ivor any more, in fact the sight of him makes me sick to my stomach, if you want to know, but every time I’m round here he’s squirming with fear and that’s good enough to keep me coming. And who knows, it might be today or tomorrow or a year from now I tell your precious Audrey the truth about her wonderful husband, or then again perhaps never. It’s all up to me, isn’t it?’

  Nora was too incensed to notice Silas’s gaze had become transfixed over her shoulder. As the old man went to speak, she poked her finger in his bony chest and said, ‘Whatever he’s told you, know this, Da. He wanted me all right. He wanted me so bad there were times we didn’t make it to the bedroom. I didn’t have to do much persuading, believe me.’

  When she paused for breath her father’s utter stillness registered for the first time, along with the look on his face which was like a mesmerised rabbit. Nora knew instantly who was standing behind her but she stepped away from the bed before she turned, and then very slowly.

  Audrey had obviously met Ivor on the way back from the shops and the two of them were standing just inside the room. It was Ivor who recovered first, thrusting his way past his wife who was standing in white-faced silence. ‘You liar!’ he cried. ‘You dirty little liar.’

  ‘I’m not lying and you know it.’ Nora didn’t raise her voice but stared him full in the face until he turned to look at his wife.

  His voice tremb
ling, he said, ‘Audrey, lass, she’s gone barmy. All this with Raymond has turned her brain.’

  ‘She seems rational enough to me.’ The words were thin and painful.

  ‘You can’t believe—’

  She stopped him with a raised hand. ‘Just tell me the truth, Ivor. Have you ever touched my sister?’

  ‘Lass, how can you ask? I swear—’

  ‘Don’t, Ivor. Don’t swear if it’s not true.’

  ‘For crying out loud, Audrey, what do you want me to say?’ He was blustering and everyone knew it. ‘I’ve told you, she’s lying. You’re not going to take her word against mine, are you?’

  ‘When, Nora? When did it start?’ Audrey walked further into the room but she did not look at her husband, she looked at her sister. ‘Tell me when it started.’

  Ivor swallowed deeply. ‘Now hang on a minute—’

  ‘Years ago.’ Nora’s chin rose defiantly. ‘And it went on for years an’ all, whatever he says now.’

  This couldn’t be happening. Audrey stared into the eyes of her sister. And yet she knew it was Nora and not Ivor who was telling the truth. How did she know? Her head was buzzing. The answer came instantly. Because it explained so many things she had dismissed in the past but which she now knew had been stored in some chamber in her head. Ivor’s unease round her sister, the excuses he’d made if she’d ever suggested getting together with Nora and Raymond in the early days, his changed behaviour at Christmas and other holidays when they got together as a family - oh, countless things. ‘Why?’ Again it was to Nora she spoke.

  Audrey’s quietness had taken Nora aback. Whenever she had imagined this day - and she had, many times - it had always featured her sister’s raised angry voice, floods of tears and maybe the sound of breaking crockery. But here she was as cool as a cucumber. She stared at Audrey, her gaze flicking briefly to Ivor and then Silas before it came to rest again on her sister’s frozen countenance.

  ‘Well?’ Audrey’s eyes hadn’t left Nora’s face. Her voice still level, her words still spoken in the peculiar undertone which so unnerved her sister, she said, ‘I think I deserve to know why you saw fit to take my husband. You, my own flesh and blood.’

  ‘Don’t come the martyr, not you who’s always had everything. I might as well not have existed after you were born, do you know that? Oh, Mam wasn’t so bad, I think she still loved me in her way, but him.’ Nora’s eyes flashed to the old man in the bed. ‘He didn’t even see me any more, that’s how bad it was. Audrey this and Audrey that, wishing me dead because of you. Oh aye, he did that,’ she said as Audrey made a sound of denial in her throat. ‘I heard him one night. Bargaining with God he was or, as Mam said, the other side more like. I only married Raymond to get out of the house, anyone would have done, and straightaway I knew I’d made the biggest mistake of my life. And all because of you, you and him. But still I couldn’t get away from you. You had to come and live next door when you got wed, didn’t you, always rubbing it in how happy you were and how much Ivor loved you. Your precious Ivor! Well, I proved how much he loved you.’

  Audrey had taken a couple of steps backwards during this. ‘I never did anything to you,’ she said. ‘Nothing except love you as my sister and make excuses for you all the time.’ And then as Nora went to say more, she said, ‘Get out of my house and don’t come back. I never want to see you again.’ Her voice had risen slightly on the last word and although Nora’s mouth had opened, something in her sister’s face must have warned her to say nothing, because her lips shut with a little pop. The two stared at each other for a moment which seemed to stretch and tighten, and then Nora stalked out of the room, brushing past Ivor as though he didn’t exist. They heard her go into the kitchen and then the back door banged and a quivering silence descended.

  Ivor was the first to break it. ‘Audrey lass,’ he said, but even as he spoke Audrey turned to look at her father.

  ‘Did you do what she said? Bargain with God?’

  Silas didn’t try to prevaricate. In truth he had been cut to the quick, not just because Nora had heard what he’d said all those years ago and the damage it had done to her, but because his Audrey was being made to suffer now. He made a slow obeisance with his head. ‘Don’t look at me like that, lass,’ he said brokenly. ‘I couldn’t feel worse than I’m feeling now.’

  ‘And you knew about her and him?’ She couldn’t bring herself to say Ivor’s name. ‘You knew and you didn’t tell me?’

  ‘I didn’t know till it’d been over for years and what was the point in saying anything then? And he didn’t want her, lass. He—’

  ‘No, don’t.’ Audrey stopped her father. ‘He can lie for himself. He’s had lots of practice.’ She felt numb, queer, odd. She had never felt like this in all her life, not even when they’d had the telegram about Donald.

  ‘Audrey, you have to listen to me, lass.’

  Ivor had tears rolling down his face when she turned her gaze from her father, but the sight of them didn’t pierce the numbness in the slightest. ‘No, I don’t have to listen to you,’ she said very clearly. ‘You can listen to me for once.’

  ‘Please, lass—’

  ‘You went with her. You touched her and you let her touch you and not once but many times. I don’t know who you are. Everything, our marriage, everything has been a lie.’

  ‘Lass—’

  As he made a move towards her, Audrey stiffened, her voice rising as she said, ‘You lay one finger on me and I’ll kill you.’

  It wasn’t the threat, which was ludicrous, but her manner and the way she was looking at him that froze Ivor.

  ‘All the time, for years and years, you an’ her have been laughing at me behind my back. Audrey, big, fat, stupid Audrey who’ll put up with anything and who can’t see beyond the nose on her face.’

  ‘No, no, it was never like that. God in heaven, I didn’t—’

  ‘Don’t call on God, Ivor.’ The numbness was going and she had to get out of the room before she started shouting and pummelling him to a pulp. ‘He doesn’t approve of adultery, didn’t you know?’ And again, as he raised his hand, she said, ‘Don’t touch me. Don’t you dare touch me.’

  Drawing in a deep breath she forced her legs to move her out into the hall and through the kitchen, one hand clutching at the skin of her throat and the other round her middle. It was only when she reached the privy in the backyard and the door was bolted behind her that she let out her breath. She sat down on the edge of the seat, bent forward and stared blankly at the floor.

  When she heard footsteps outside she didn’t alter her position, not even when Ivor’s voice came soft and low. ‘Audrey? Audrey lass, please listen to me. Open the door and let’s talk. Look, this thing with Nora was madness but it wasn’t like you think. I swear to you I never loved her. From the first it was just of the flesh and even then it sickened me. I was the biggest fool on earth and I know it, but I never stopped loving or wanting you. You’re me sun, moon and stars, lass, you always have been. Please come out so we can talk.’

  It was some minutes before he gave up and she heard him go back into the house. She hadn’t said a word.

  Ivor and Nora. Ivor and Nora. The refrain was pulsing in her head. And her da had known. How could he have known and not told her? There was nothing left. Nothing.

  She began to sway a little as the hot tears ran down her face but there was no relief in their coming, just a grinding pain that had her gasping. She turned her head and leaned her brow against the brick wall and it was a long time before she moved again.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Clara had been at the farm for just six weeks when the sisters received word their grandfather had passed away in his sleep one night. He had gone peacefully, Audrey wrote in her large, childish hand, and she didn’t expect they would be able to come home for the funeral but she wanted them to know, since she wasn’t sure if their mother would write to them. She would be working fulltime at the munitions factory now that she didn’t have th
eir granda to see to, so likely her letters would be fewer. She hoped Abby understood.

  Abby stared at the letter for some while, reading it over a few times. Her aunt had never been a long letter writer but the weekly news from home had been welcome the last years, her mother never having put pen to paper once since she’d been at the farm. But this letter . . . It wasn’t just the sad news it held but there was something else, something strange. It just didn’t seem as though it had been penned by her aunt at all, although it was definitely her handwriting. But then Aunt Audrey had cared for Granda for years, she told herself after a time of weeping for the old man she had loved so much, and she would feel his loss badly. That was probably what she was sensing. And her aunt was right, she couldn’t request yet more leave on compassionate grounds as she’d done for her father’s funeral. It was too soon, for one thing, and she was needed at the farm, and also with Clara settling in so well she didn’t want to do anything to upset the child, and taking her back to Sunderland might well do that.