by Annie Groves
‘You’re quiet, dear,’ said her mother, breaking into Connie’s thoughts.
‘Sorry, Mum,’ she smiled. ‘Just enjoying the peace and quiet.’
Mandy ran on ahead of them all, picking the first of the wild flowers as she went. Primroses danced along the pathway and Connie could hear skylarks and stone chats calling in the open. A grey partridge ran across the field making his grating sound as he went and Pip looked up, sniffing the air as he sensed the presence of rabbits. There were a few other families around and occasionally they would nod to a passing rambler going along the same pathway.
Her mother had chosen a lovely spot for their picnic. Connie helped her put the blanket down and get out the food. Ga sat on a nearby log until Clifford had returned from the car with her folding stool. A few minutes later they were all eating egg sandwiches and drinking tea from the thermos flask. Mandy had found a tree she could climb and so she made the fork in the branches her table and chair.
‘I suppose they’ll give Reuben a right royal send off,’ Ga remarked. ‘The rest of the world and his wife turn up when a gypsy dies.’
‘There were loads of them in the hospital last night,’ Connie remarked.
‘What did I tell you?’ said Ga. ‘At least they were spared having that little toe-rag Isaac around.’
‘Can’t we all talk about something a little more cheerful?’ said Gwen.
‘Sorry, Mum,’ said Connie. She stretched herself out and took some writing paper from her bag. She penned a quick note to Roger and then lay back and looked up at the sky. Her mind drifted towards Eugène Étienne and the way he had got everyone pulling together during the bad weather. He was so much nicer than Mavis Hampton. Connie frowned. Was her leg all right now? Yes, of course it must be. Poor Eugène. She was probably still leading him a dog’s life. How handsome he was. She loved the way he’d stood with his hands in his pockets as she talked about Reuben. With his tousled hair flopping over his forehead he looked like a schoolboy. Her heart lurched with desire. Now if only Eugène was hers …
‘Ah, now you’re smiling,’ said her mother. ‘Penny for them.’
‘I like doing this sort of thing,’ Connie said quickly. ‘If Reuben’s death has taught me anything, it’s been a timely reminder that family is important.’
‘It would be even more lovely if we were all here,’ her mother remarked and Connie felt her face burn. She rolled onto her stomach in case anyone noticed. How she wished she could tell her mother about Kenneth but he’d made her promise to say nothing.
Her mother passed around some of her sultana apple cake and Connie sat up. They could hear someone shouting in the distance. ‘Help me, oh help me please …’ It was a woman’s voice. Pip, who had been resting with his head on his paws, leapt to his feet and growled. Clifford, who had been lying with his newspaper over his face, sat up too. ‘What was that?’
Gwen shrugged. ‘I’ve no idea.’
‘Shall I go and see?’ said Connie, jumping to her feet. Pip ran ahead of her and disappeared.
‘I’ll come with you,’ said Clifford.
‘Me too,’ cried Mandy from the tree.
‘No,’ said her father. ‘You stay with Mummy.’
The two adults hurried towards the clump of trees. A woman, frantic and panicking, ran around like a headless chicken imploring the other walkers in the area, ‘Have you seen a little girl? She’s seven. She’s got blonde curls and blue eyes. She’s wearing a pink polka-dot dress?’ A man, clearly the child’s father was running through the trees calling, ‘Janice, Janice, where are you?’
The woman saw Connie and Clifford coming and hurried towards them. Pip bounded towards the trees and in a short while, they could hear him barking furiously and presently they heard him yelp. Connie caught a glimpse of another person running and then a voice called to them from the pathway. Connie’s heart lurched. The child. Someone had found the child.
‘Excuse me,’ Connie shouted towards the woman who was walking away from them. ‘I think she’s here.’
He had come out onto the path holding a little girl’s hand. The child spotted her mother and ran to her. Connie’s throat constricted as she watched the child’s mother scoop her up into her arms and burst into grateful tears. The child clung to her. Then Connie’s heart did a somersault as she turned back and saw the child’s rescuer. It was Emmett Gosling.
The child’s father ran up to him and pumped his hand. ‘Thank you. We’ve been looking everywhere. One minute she was there and the next she was gone. Where was she?’
‘We heard a dog barking,’ said Emmett, ‘and then all of a sudden she came stumbling out of the undergrowth. I don’t think any harm is done.’ He turned and saw her for the first time. ‘Connie!’
‘Hello, Emmett,’ she said shyly. Her throat had gone dry and her heart was bumping. This has to have been fate, she thought. I never thought I would see you again and now here you are appearing right out of nowhere. He wasn’t quite as handsome as she’d remembered but he still had that gentle look in his eyes. He was dressed in tweeds and was wearing knee-length socks on the outside of his trousers and heavy walking boots.
‘How nice to see you again,’ said Emmett rather formally.
A woman came up beside him and slipped her arm through his. ‘Was she the missing child?’ she purred.
‘Yes, darling.’ Emmett smiled down at her and turning to Connie he added with a cheesy grin, ‘You must meet my wife, Lucy. We were married Easter Saturday.’
Married? Connie almost choked. ‘Congratulations,’ Connie smiled as graciously as she could. ‘I hope you both will be very happy.’
‘Oh, we will,’ Lucy assured her.
‘Connie and I went out together a few times during the war,’ Emmett told his new wife. ‘It was good to have someone to help while the time away.’
Connie’s heart sank. Someone to help while the time away? Surely she meant more to him than that?
He turned back to Connie. ‘Lucy was an absolute brick when Mother died.’
‘I’m sorry to hear she died,’ said Connie, regaining her composure. ‘I know you were fond of her.’ So fond of her that you stood me up on VE Day, she wanted to say.
‘Is this your husband?’ Emmett asked.
Connie and Clifford laughed. ‘Heaven forbid,’ Clifford said. ‘But I am married to her mother.’
The other walkers had already dispersed. In the distance, they heard a motorbike starting up. The tearful family were packing up their things. Clearly losing their daughter albeit for a short time had affected them deeply.
‘I didn’t like the nasty man, Mummy,’ said Janice.
‘He isn’t a nasty man, darling,’ said her mother glancing at Emmett. ‘He’s a nice man. He brought you back to us again.’
The parents shook Emmett’s hand again and they left.
‘Well,’ said Emmett awkwardly. ‘We’d better be off too.’
Clifford called Pip and he came to them, although he seemed a little subdued. Connie went to pat his side and the dog yelped again. ‘Must have fallen over or something,’ said Clifford.
Connie and Pip walked back to the others side by side. How could she have got it so wrong? She had truly believed she and Emmett were important to each other, but clearly he had other ideas. ‘Someone to help while away the time …’ That had hurt her deeply. How could she have been so stupid? Up until now, Connie had always prided herself that she understood people but perhaps she wasn’t so clever after all. As they packed the picnic things away, she caught a glimpse of the letter she’d just penned to Roger waiting to be posted. Perhaps she was wrong about him too.
Twenty
Reuben had a fantastic send-off. Friends and family had been ‘sitting up’ with Kez ever since her father died which meant that she’d had someone with her day and night. According to the Romani tradition, Kez had fasted the whole time. Connie hadn’t seen her friend since Clifford took them both home that Easter Sunday and she was concerned to see he
r looking so drawn and tired. Connie had managed to get time off to go to the funeral by swapping her off duty time with one of the other student nurses. She dressed in black with a white blouse as was the custom for women going to a gypsy funeral.
It seemed the gypsies had come from the four corners of the earth to pay their respects but Isaac wasn’t among them. He was still serving his time. They walked from Titnore Lane behind the hearse all the way to Broadwater cemetery, a distance of some three miles, holding up the traffic and creating a staring crowd as they went. The women who normally sold their flowers from coach-built prams parked along the Broadwater Road weren’t doing any business today. Instead, they stood in a silent line near the cemetery entrance. Reuben was in a glass-sided horse-drawn hearse with a lorry full of wreaths and flowers following behind. Kez had put a Gates of Heaven wreath which she’d made herself at the side of his coffin; a tall archway of green foliage, peppered with Love in the Mist and a dramatic spray of mimosa, daffodils and Queen Anne’s Lace on the left-hand side. As was the custom, the little black gates beneath the archway were permanently open.
The service, in the chapel at the cemetery itself, was beautifully done and to Connie’s surprise, Isaac was already waiting in the pew, a prison officer next to him. The officer’s coat hid the handcuffs on both their wrists until the Vicar, Rev McKay from St Mary’s, had a word with the man and Isaac was allowed to sit next to Kez without the cuffs. They had chosen the place to lay Reuben to rest with care. It was a sunny spot, halfway up a hill, overlooking the Findon Valley. It was peaceful and as they walked towards the open grave, the birds sang in the warm April sun and rabbits scurried into the undergrowth. Reuben would have loved it up here, Connie thought. As soon as the graveside ceremony was over, Isaac was taken away again and Connie couldn’t help voicing her disgust over his treatment. ‘Anyone would think he was a murderer, the way they’re treating him.’
Everyone got lifts back to the caravans in Titnore Lane and once they were all gathered, Reuben’s caravan was towed into the middle of the field to be set alight. Connie knew for a fact that he had many valuable things inside. ‘Aren’t you going to keep anything of his?’ she asked Kez before the thing went up in flames. ‘Something to remember him by?’
Kez seemed surprised. ‘We never touch a dead man’s things.’
‘Perhaps there’s something Isaac would want?’ Connie insisted. ‘Some of his own things.’ She couldn’t bear the thought of Isaac coming back to nothing.
‘All Isaac’s things are in his own tent,’ Kez said wiping her eyes. ‘The Roma believe touching a dead man’s things would bring bad luck.’
Connie watched the flames leaping into the air as a perfectly good home went up in smoke. She couldn’t understand it. All that lovely china and glass, his pots and pans, the watches he repaired … and nobody wanted anything. Even the caravan itself was valuable. Simeon had used gold leaf rather than paint when he’d decorated it and Reuben had always kept it up to date so far as repairs went.
As the flames died down, the gypsies took to the road again. Connie stayed to say goodbye. ‘What will you do now?’
Kez shrugged. ‘Move on, I suppose. This was the place where Reuben wanted to be. Simeon is talking to some mush about buying a piece of land over Slinden way.’
Connie kissed her children and hugged her friend. ‘How will Isaac know where you are when he gets out of prison? Shall I send him to Slinden?’
‘He knows we’ll be at the horse fairs,’ Kez said. She swallowed hard. ‘He’ll find us.’
Connie walked away with a heavy heart. Something had changed. It wasn’t just losing Reuben. Perhaps something in Kez had died with him. She seemed troubled, as if something was playing upon her mind. Whatever it was, Connie was worried about her.
When she got back to the nurses’ home, Connie found another letter from Kenneth in her pigeonhole. It had been penned using his left hand so the few lines were shaky and a little difficult to decipher. ‘My nose is better. It’s still a little …’ (Connie couldn’t make out that word) ‘but the Maestro says it will improve with time.’ Connie’s spirits leapt. Maybe now at last she could tell her mother. She wrote back immediately to ask.
It was the end of the week and the girls were going to a dance but Connie had been asked to do a short spell of nights because they were short staffed. She was a bit disappointed as she watched Betty and Eva getting ready. Although they were meeting up with Jane Jackson, Sally, back home from college and with her mother again for the Easter holidays, had declined to come. She was better, but still hadn’t quite got over losing Terry. Connie wished with all her heart she was going with them. In fact, she wished she was going herself. After all the angst of the past few days, she could have done with a bit of light relief and a good laugh.
Betty had some lovely things. Her mother was good with a needle and spent a lot of time making the latest Butterick or Simplicity pattern. Everyone still needed coupons but she managed to pick up some nice material on the market. The room was filled with excited chatter. Avon’s Wishing and Evyon’s White Shoulders perfume filled the air as Connie helped Eva with her hair and lent Betty the pearl earrings she had bought in H. Samuels.
‘Oh, I wish you could come too,’ said Betty, ‘especially as we’re meeting your friend Jane. She’s lovely, isn’t she?’
‘She tells me she’s got a new boyfriend,’ said Connie. ‘I haven’t met him yet. Tell me what he’s like, won’t you.’
‘Leave it to me,’ said Betty conspiratorially. ‘I’ll dish the dirt.’ And they all laughed.
‘Roger will be disappointed to miss you,’ said Eva, patting her hair in place.
‘You didn’t tell me he was coming,’ Connie cried.
‘You didn’t tell me you were doing nights,’ Eva countered.
Connie slumped on the bed. ‘I didn’t know until yesterday,’ she said. ‘Honestly, I sometimes think Ward Sister has it in for me because I swapped duties to go to Reuben’s funeral.’
‘You always let your imagination run away with you,’ said Betty. ‘Has anyone seen my stole?’
Connie was stunned into silence. Betty’s remark made her bristle but Connie let it go. Starting a row would spoil their evening. Betty found her stole and the girls were ready. Some of the other nurses were already gathered in the corridor. Connie stood at the door to wave them off, their high heels clacking along the linoleum floor. It was seven o’clock and she had an hour and a half before she had to be on duty. It was time to try out the new family phone.
‘Belvedere Nurseries. How can I help you?’ Connie’s mother sounded very efficient and when Connie told her so, they both giggled. It was lovely to hear her mum’s voice and it made Connie feel ever so slightly homesick. They chatted about Mandy and school. ‘She’s doing maypole dancing in the vicarage summer garden fete. Ga? She’s fine. Oh, and we took Pip to the vet.’
‘Why?’ Connie was alarmed.
‘You remember how he didn’t like anyone patting his side after we’d been on that picnic where the little girl went missing?’ said Gwen. ‘Well, the vet thinks he was hit with something.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Connie.
‘His side has been badly bruised. He was lucky not to have a broken rib, apparently.’
Connie vaguely remembered Pip barking as he rushed into the wooded area where the child was and then hearing a sharp yelp before he came out again. Everyone was so taken up with little Janice being reunited with her mother that Connie hadn’t given her dog a thought. Could he have been hit by a falling log or something?
‘The vet thinks he was hit or kicked,’ her mother went on.
‘Kicked!’ Connie was horrified. ‘Who on earth would have done that? Is he going to be all right?’
‘Yes,’ said her mother. ‘It’s just going to take time, that’s all.’
‘Poor old Pip.’
When she’d put the phone down, Connie thought back to that day. Something was niggling away at
the back of her mind. Something that was connected to all this, but what was it? She felt like she was grabbing at something only just out of reach.
When she reported for duty, Connie was sent to the antenatal ward. She was working with Sister Neil and she wasn’t looking forward to it. Connie had already had an altercation or two with her since she’d begun her training, once when Connie had been asked to tidy the linen cupboard and didn’t get the sheets in a perfectly straight line and another time when Connie had burst through some swing doors when Sister was coming in the opposite direction, causing her to drop a bottle of distilled water. Everyone said she was an excellent nurse but Connie thought her hard-nosed and unfeeling. Still, it might not all be bad. Connie had never actually seen a baby being born and this was a golden opportunity. Sadly, once again she was doomed to disappointment. It was a very quiet night with only one woman in labour with her first baby. ‘She’ll be hours yet,’ said Sister after she’d examined the patient. ‘It probably won’t come until the day staff are here.’
