‘But I thought you said your mum was—well—not coping very well with it all.’
‘That’s right.’ Annie sighed. ‘I hoped it would help, having to see to Bobby. You know, it cheers you up sometimes, doesn’t it, having a kiddie chattering on? But yesterday Bobby said that his grandma didn’t want to listen to him. She just tells him to go and play.’
She could not understand why her mother was quite so grief stricken. It had been a miserable marriage. She had never seen any sign of love or even affection between her parents. Yet her mother was totally obliterated by her loss. The very roots of her life seemed to have been torn up. And each sigh, each tear was a reproach to her, the daughter who had reached out too late.
Jenny shook her head. ‘Poor lady. How long were your parents married? Thirty years? You don’t get over that in a hurry, do you? Look, why don’t you send Bobby back with our lot? We’re taking it in turns to look after all of them after school while we’re doing this.’
Annie was amazed. Bobby had never been invited to anyone’s house before. It was as if he was contaminated.
‘That’s really kind of you. If you’re sure—’
‘ ‘Course I’m sure.’ Jenny called through to the next room. ‘That’s all right, isn’t it, Sheila? Young Bobby can come and play with our lot after school each day. Then Annie won’t have to worry about him.’
Sheila stopped scrubbing the parlour floor and sat back on her heels. ‘Yes, good idea. It’s my turn today. He can stop and have tea.’
A resentful voice inside Annie wanted to ask if they really wanted her Bobby playing with their whiter-than-white offspring, if they were sure something nasty wouldn’t rub off him, but she silenced it. It would be so nice for Bobby to have some friends.
In an odd way, Annie began to enjoy herself. It was a gruelling job, scrubbing out, hard on the back and the hands and the arms, working always in the cold and the damp, with the smell of wet and mould in your nostrils. But the sense of purpose kept the guilt penned up. Sometimes she felt that if she could just scrub hard enough, she would clean the guilt away as she did the material filth from the flood.
The band of women were cheerful and practical and hardworking. Jokes and stories were thrown back and forth as they laboured, advice was handed out, agreed with or contradicted. Together, they dragged the furniture out to air, cleaned the walls and floors, washed the curtains and rugs.
On the third day the postman arrived, offered his condolences and enquired how things were going.
‘I’ve been keeping these for you until I was sure you’d be here,’ he said, handing Annie some letters.
As he drove away, Annie glanced at the envelopes. There were two official-looking things for her father and—her heart seemed to stop for a moment as she instantly recognised the writing on the third letter.
‘Tom!’ she gasped.
She tore open the envelope and scanned the short letter. The fact that it hardly said anything did not matter. Tom had thought about her. Despite everything, Tom was concerned enough to write and find out if she was all right.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered, smiling at his signature through tear-filled eyes.
She put the letter carefully back in the envelope and slipped it into her pocket.
She hardly had time to adjust to this turn of events when three men seconded from neighbouring farms arrived and started clearing up the yard, sweeping and hosing out the barns and outhouses, sorting out the usable feed and straw from the ruined stuff and getting the milking parlour scoured and functioning. Annie could hardly believe it. It would have taken her weeks to achieve all that on her own.
As she worked inside the house, Annie tried to think what she should do about Tom’s letter. She wasn’t sure whether she should even answer it and, if she did, how much she should say. She turned the question over and over in her mind, but could come to no satisfactory answer. Sometimes she even felt a faint resentment that he had written at all, as it had stirred up all those old feelings that she’d thought she had got the better of. She tried to put the matter out of her head and concentrate on the job in hand.
There was great satisfaction in bringing it all back from the edge of ruination. On top of this, for the first time in her life Annie was part of a team. She still wasn’t quite ready to believe that she was accepted, but it was very nice while it lasted. She could even put up with Molly’s well-meant interference. Not content with just cleaning up, Molly wanted to make sure that Annie and her mother were provided for.
‘Now, my dear,’ she said as they all sat round having one of their many tea breaks, ‘have you done anything about claiming insurance? Or probate? Did your father leave a will?’
‘I—I don’t know. I don’t think so. He didn’t trust banks and solicitors and the like. He said they were all thieving sh—oh!’ Annie broke off as she realised what she was saying. Molly’s husband was a solicitor. ‘I didn’t mean—’
Molly waved away her embarrassment.
‘Lots of country people think like that. Misguided, but there you are. Now, where would he have kept his papers?’
‘I’ll have to ask my mum,’ Annie lied. There were some things that she did not want Molly Selby prying into.
That evening, before squeezing into the Riley with the others, she took the tin deed-box from on top of her parents’ wardrobe and hid it in the basket she used to carry her flask and sandwiches.
Her mother was not at all eager to open the box.
‘He never let me look in it. Said it wasn’t my place to know,’ she said, looking at the box as if it were an unexploded bomb.
‘But we’ve got to see what’s there, Mum. Otherwise we won’t know who the farm and everything belongs to.’
‘I don’t know, Annie—’
‘Don’t worry, Mum. You won’t have to see to any of it. I’ll deal with everything,’ Annie reassured her, wondering as she said it just what she was going to do. She knew as little as her mother about legal matters.
There was not much inside the box. There was her own and her parents’ birth certificates—not Bobby’s, which she had in her own safe place—her parents’ wedding certificate, the mortgage agreement for the farm and—a will. Not a solicitor’s will, but one written on a printed will form from Woolworth’s. It was short and to the point, leaving everything to ‘my son if I have one, or else to my wife, Edna Cross ‘. It had been witnessed by the neighbour who was caring for their animals.
‘Look at the date—two months before I was born,’ Annie said.
‘He hoped you was going to be a boy,’ her mother said.
‘Well, that was tough luck for him,’ Annie retorted.
Her mother’s eyes filled with tears.
‘Annie! Don’t speak ill of the dead.’
‘Sorry.’
She frowned as a new thought struck her.
‘Did you want me to be a boy?’
‘It would have made him happy.’
The pain of it silenced her. She got up and went to the window, staring out at the night sky. She was as unwanted as poor little Bobby. She should have been a boy. He shouldn’t have been born at all.
‘Well, you’ll have to put up with me. Is there anything in here that looks like insurance papers?’ she asked, covering her feelings with a Molly-like briskness.
There wasn’t. But there was a mysterious message. It was written in pencil on the back of a feed bill, in her father’s handwriting.
By the fireplace in the back bedroom.
‘What does this mean?’ she asked.
Her mother shook her head. ‘I don’t know, dear.’
Annie put the paper in her pocket. The rest she bundled back into the deed-box. It was so difficult. If only she knew about these things. If only she had been allowed to stay on at school, then she might understand more. There was only one thing for it—she was going to have to ask Molly. Molly in turn insisted that she speak to her husband.
Mr Selby turned out to be a quietly-spoken serious m
an, several years older than his energetic wife. He shook his head over the will, but said that it was valid as a legal document and that he would oversee the business of ensuring that everything was transferred to the widow. Like his wife, he was concerned about how Annie and her family were going to live. There were no insurance policies to claim on. There was talk of compensation for farmers, but that might take months and in the meantime how were they going to survive?
‘You say that if there had been a bank book, it would have been in here. But I would have thought there would have been something put by in the way of savings. Ask your mother. She might know where your late father might have hidden a store of bank notes. Under the mattress is a popular place.’
Annie thought of the message on the feed bill.
‘I’ll ask her,’ she said.
‘You do that,’ Mr Selby said. ‘You will need something to tide you over. If your mother wishes to keep the farm, that is. She may want to sell it, though I have to say that she will be unlikely to realise very much on it in the condition it is in at the moment. In fact, I very much doubt if anyone would want to buy it.’
Annie thanked him for his advice. Mr Selby rose as she left the room and opened the door for her himself. He held his hand out and, as Annie shook it, took hers in both of his.
‘It has been a great pleasure to be of service to you, Miss Cross. My wife is very impressed with you, and I am inclined to agree with her. But you have some difficult times ahead of you. I will be in touch with you in the matter of the will, but if there is anything else about which you need advice, remember that I am here to help.’
Annie was stunned. Nobody in authority had ever spoken like that to her before.
‘Th–Thank you—’ she stammered.
As she left the office, she wondered if the flood had worked some sort of magic on the people of Wittlesham, making them all kind and helpful.
On Sunday, Annie took Bobby for a walk. She asked her mother to come too, but Edna insisted she was too tired. Annie did not persist. She needed to think—about Tom’s letter and about what they were going to do with the farm. Somebody had to make some decisions, and she supposed that somebody was her. It was a blustery day and Bobby had on the brown balaclava and matching gloves that she had knitted for him. Glad to be out of the gloomy atmosphere of the hotel, Annie raced him along the clifftop road until they were both red-nosed and out of breath. Annie found herself laughing. Already she felt much better.
‘Where are we going, Mum? To the pier? Can we go up the pier?’
‘No, I thought we’d go and look at Silver Sands.’
‘But that’s a long way.’
‘I know, but we can do it.’
At first, Bobby scampered ahead, chasing seagulls and pretending to be an aeroplane. Then after a while he came and walked by Annie’s side, slipping his woolly paw into her gloved hand.
‘Aunty Gwen died, didn’t she?’ he remarked matter-off-factly.
‘Yes, she did.’ Annie’s throat ached. It was hard to keep her voice steady.
‘I liked Aunty Gwen. She was nice.’
‘Yes, she was.’
‘Is she coming back?’
‘No, darling. When people die they never come back. They go and live in heaven.’
They had a long discussion about heaven which lasted them until they were out of the town and striding along the sea wall. Annie could see the exact spot where she had first met Tom. Such a lot had happened to them both since then, so much had been lost through misunderstandings. Annie felt the clouds of indecision lift from her mind. Tom had stretched out a hand of friendship. They had known each other far too long for her to reject it. She would write back, and in the same style that he had written to her—a short, friendly note.
With that decided, she felt strong enough to face the devastation at Silver Sands. The fences were torn away, the caravans were smashed and turned over, the chalet tipped off its piers and leaning drunkenly sideways. The only thing that appeared to have survived the storm unscathed was the brick-built toilet block. Annie stared at the chalet, imagining Reggie trying to pull Gwen up on to the roof in the wind and the rain, and then the sea wall giving way, and Gwen being washed out of his grasp by the massive wave … Tears slid down her face as she felt his desperation.
‘Mummy? Why are you crying?’
Annie brushed her sleeve across her face. ‘I’m not crying, darling. It’s just the wind making my eyes water.’
‘It’s not very nice here any more. Where are the swings?’
‘I don’t know. I suppose they’re in a heap here somewhere with everything else.’
Reggie and Gwen had such plans for this place. She had heard them enthuse about it for hours. Once they had paid off their loan, they were going to buy more caravans, and then, if they could buy the chalet next door, which also had a big garden, they would expand the whole enterprise, but never have the vans crowded too close together. They were going to carry on the job they had started in making the place look pretty with flower beds and trees. They were going to add to the swings and see-saw and make a big children’s playground with every sort of ride.
‘After all, if the kiddies are happy, the mums and dads are too,’ Reggie pointed out.
Their favourite plan had been to open up a café serving teas and ice creams and meals.
‘After all, it’s not much of a holiday for Mum if she still has to cook,’ Gwen said.
‘We might even be able to get a licence, run a bar for the men in the evenings,’ Reggie said, raising cries of protest from Gwen and Annie.
‘Why not the women as well? They like a drink sometimes, ‘specially if they’re on holiday.’
‘If you put all that in, they won’t need to leave the camp at all,’ Annie said.
Reggie grinned. ‘That’s the idea,’ he said.
It was very hard to picture happy people enjoying their holidays here now. The place was a desolate wreck. And she had promised to buy it from Reggie. She shoved her hands into her pockets and hunched her shoulders against the raw wind. She couldn’t possibly keep her promise. They had no money, nothing but a damp house and a flood-damaged farm with hardly any stock and eight years of mortgage still to be paid. Unless …
‘Come on!’ she called to Bobby. ‘We’re going home. There’s something I want to look for.’
Molly and her Mrs Mop Brigade had done a wonderful job. The house was clean and orderly, and the furniture that could be saved had been polished. But, despite having the wind blowing through it day and night, it was still running with damp and not fit to be lived in.
Bobby walked in cautiously, as if he was expecting his grandfather still to be lurking there.
‘It’s funny in here. It sounds funny and it smells.’
‘I know, that’s because we had to throw lots of stuff out. But when it’s dried out, Mrs Selby says the Flood Committee will find us some things to replace them. Come on.’
They went up to the back bedroom, a dark little room with only an iron bedstead and a pile of old newspapers in it. There was very obviously nothing by the fireplace. Annie knelt down pulled out the dusty grate. Nothing but some fallen soot. She felt cautiously up the chimney. More soot trickled down, making her cough.
‘What are you looking for, Mum?’
‘I don’t know—’
She stared at the floorboards, frowning. That note must have meant something. Then she noticed that one of the boards had been sawn across, making a section only about a foot long. She pressed it and it moved very slightly. Her heart began to beat faster.
‘Bobby, run down and get me a knife from the kitchen.’
Bobby was back in a flash. Annie prised up the board and felt around in the space between the joists. Her fingers met with a parcel wrapped in sacking.
‘That’s it!’
‘What, Mum?’
She pulled it out. It was quite light and covered in dust. She opened it up and caught her breath. Bobby let out a long whi
stle.
‘It’s treasure. Hidden treasure!’
It was all in notes—bundles of ten shillings, one pounds, white fivers, all neatly done up in rotting rubber bands. She counted it and counted again, unable to believe her eyes.
The old skinflint. He’d kept them all without a decent coat or a smart pair of shoes, he’d never let her mother have anything new in the house, they’d had to scrimp and save, make do and mend, and all the time there was a fortune under the floorboards.
‘Whose is it, Mum? Who put it there?’
‘Your grandfather. So it belongs to your grandma.’
‘Is Grandma rich, then?’
‘Richer than she ever thought she’d be, yes.’
What was her mother’s reaction going to be? At a guess, she was going to find this much money a worry. She would not know what to do for the best. At the moment, she could hardly decide which of two skirts to put on of a morning. Still holding a bundle of five-pound notes, Annie wandered into her own bedroom and over to the window. She stared out across the fields at what was left of Silver Sands.
It was up to her to make the decision. She felt sick with the responsibility. She had never had to make her mind up about anything to do with money before. Her father had always held the purse-strings and given the orders. There had been no choices. She and her mother had to do as they were told.
Bobby came in and joined her at the window. He put his hand in hers.
‘What are you doing, Mum?’
‘I’m thinking—about this money. You see Silver Sands? I don’t know, but I think we could buy it.’
If only she knew something about land and prices. The weight of her ignorance was dragging her down.
‘But it’s all broken.’
‘I know, but it could be fixed, and much sooner than the farm. The land’s all salty and nobody seems to know how long it will take till it’s usable again. Some people are saying it’s going to take years. But if we could get Silver Sands going, we’d be able to keep the wolf from the door. Perhaps even more than that. Reggie was always sure he was going to be rich one day …’
But Reggie was a man and knew about business. She was a farm girl who had missed a lot of her schooling because her father had needed her to work. How could she possibly make a go of it? She wouldn’t know where to start. Then she found herself remembering the night of the flood. If she had not fetched up against that tree, she would have been washed away. She would be dead now, drowned, like Gwen and her father. She’d not survived that just to go on living like a drudge for the rest of her life. This was her chance. She had thought her big chance had come when she’d met Bobby Joe, but she had been wrong. It was now, and it was up to her to make something of it.
We'll Meet Again Page 27
