Only a Mother Knows

by Annie Groves

  With that in mind Dulcie had decided it was time to let bygones be bygones, recognising that whatever her mother had done in the past, no matter how misguided, she’d only wanted what was best for her own kids – like any mother would, she supposed.

  ‘Wish me luck,’ she said to Edith through the open window of the car, thinking that it was just like the old days and they were all back in the East End – except the last time she was here she wasn’t wearing an expensive fur coat and driving a car that cost as much as the house they used to live in.

  Dulcie knew her mother was making a rare visit to the East End visiting her Aunt Birdy – who reportedly sang like a nightingale and who Edith took after. She knew this was where her mother’s heart lay and if it hadn’t been for Hitler she would never have moved to the countryside. Sighing now, Dulcie started the car, which almost glided the short journey to the café where they’d arranged to meet.

  Dulcie was secretly thrilled, even though her mother had said she could only manage it that day as she was visiting the East End anyway. But, uncharacteristically, she hadn’t risen to the bait. What would be the point when she had so much now: her husband and the impending arrival of her new baby to occupy her time, and the doctor said she had to watch her blood pressure. Above all Dulcie wanted her mother to enjoy her grandchildren and, if she was honest, she wanted to show off a bit too, let her mother see that she had come up in the world. Dulcie Simmonds has made good! She could see it now written in big lights in the West End – well, she could if there wasn’t a blackout.

  Pulling neatly into a convenient parking space, Dulcie eased her increasing bulk out from behind the wheel of the Bentley and walked the mercifully short distance down Cambridge Heath Road to the café. Opening the door she immediately spotted her mother sitting near the counter, waving like nothing had ever happened.

  ‘Oh, Mum, it’s so lovely to see you again!’ Dulcie cried, hugging her mother, overcome with emotion. However before they could even find a table, their reunion was cut short as they heard the siren begin to wail.

  ‘Come on, Mum, leave your tea and let’s get to the shelter,’ Dulcie said, taking her mother’s arm. But when they got outside they could see the searchlights arcing across the night sky before an explosion blocked out the sound of rain hitting the ground. Dulcie wondered if Edith and Rick had managed to get to the underground shelter and hoped they would make it in time. Although Edith usually said she didn’t want to go down the tube because she couldn’t stand the smell of TCP that was used to disinfect the place, Dulcie suspected she’d be one of the first there, giving an impromptu concert party to entertain the crowds.

  It was getting on for a quarter past eight when Tilly, cold, wet and fed up, caught sight of the officer who was waiting to receive the classified documents. Hurriedly she handed them over and saluted, before jumping back on her motorbike and heading briskly away from Victoria Park. It felt like no more than a couple of moments later when the air-raid Civil Defence siren sounded, and almost at once she saw an orderly line of people submerge into the Bethnal Green underground shelter. Of all the nights to be caught out here, Tilly thought, and she hoped that if there really was a raid she could get out of the East End in time.

  Dulcie kept a firm hold of her mother’s arm as the siren continued to sound. It was just hard luck if Edith and her mother met up now, she thought, as there was no getting away from the air raid when it came. And after the bombing of Berlin she was certain the retaliation would be swift and deadly. The East Enders had taken everything the Germans had thrown at them in the Blitz and they had staunchly stood their ground, but now, eighteen months after Hitler tried to bomb London into submission, people were tired of living hand to mouth.

  ‘I could tell there was going to be a raid, Dulcie,’ her mother said. ‘The wireless in the caff went dead, did you notice? That’s a sure sign.’ The woman was now hurrying towards the shelter ahead of her daughter, whose bulging girth was slowing her down a little.

  ‘No, Mum, I didn’t,’ Dulcie said, recalling that she was too busy trying to get her mother out of the café and persuading her to hurry up and leave her cup of tea.

  A gigantic search light came on in the vicinity of Victoria Park and Dulcie began to worry; if there was a raid now there was no way she could throw herself on the ground out of harm’s way. Her mother, unperturbed by such thoughts, had already dived for cover near the bus stop.

  ‘Mum, come out of there, we’ll make the shelter, get up!’ Dulcie could feel her heart racing, sure this wouldn’t be doing her unborn child any good.

  Then they didn’t have time to move anywhere as a huge explosion rent the air and Dulcie had no alternative but to get on the floor. As her mother pulled her down, she noticed a young lad of about fifteen being knocked off his bike by the noise of the overhead volley and everything seemed to be in slow motion as people rushed to the underground. She fervently hoped Edith had managed to get down below before the crowd surged forward.

  ‘Now take your time,’ called Ted from the bottom of the narrow stairwell, ‘everyone will get in safely as long as you don’t push …’ But he didn’t have time to say any more as another volley of overhead explosions could be plainly heard. In seconds the fifteen-by-eleven-feet stairwell was crowded with nervous people trying to get into the shelter. He could have sworn he saw someone trip on the stairs.

  ‘Here,’ he exclaimed to those nearest him, ‘let me through there, someone’s fell!’ But it became impossible to move one way or another as the bodies began to descend. Ted felt himself being lifted off his feet by the sheer mass of people and pushed back against the white-tiled wall in the bottom of the stairwell. He tried to break free from the oncoming throng but it was too difficult. He was still trying as blackness overcame him.

  ‘Edith!’ Dulcie yelled, but there was no sign of those Titian curls piled high on her sister’s head, whilst all the time the stairwell to the underground was disappearing under a sea of bodies. Would Edith have stayed up top, hoping she’d still get a lift home? Or would Rick have come with her and made her take shelter below?

  Dulcie stared in disbelief and growing dread at the scene unfolding before her, as the crowd turned into a desperate crush of bodies. In moments some people, obviously stunned, were pulling at arms and legs, anything they could get hold of, to try and get other people out. Old and young were fighting for theirs and their neighbour’s lives. If it hadn’t been so horrifically tragic Dulcie would have choked up with pure pride at the bravery of the rescuers; ordinary men, women and even children fought desperately to get everybody above ground.

  She let out an agonised cry when she saw people piling up on the stairwell knowing whoever was underneath could surely not be saved. Wasn’t there anybody here who could help them? Looking around desperately, Dulcie saw her mother was safely tucked away by some railings and so she edged forward to see if there was anything she could do to help those near the opening of the shelter – but she couldn’t get close.

  ‘Dulcie! Come away out of there, you’ll get crushed!’

  As Dulcie turned she saw Tilly throw down her motorcycle and run towards her. Never had she been so glad to see her friend, and the two young women briefly hugged. ‘What are you doing here?’ Dulcie gasped, aware that Tilly was in her uniform, and a very wet uniform it was too.

  ‘Can’t say,’ replied Tilly, managing a grin even though the horror. ‘What about you? Aren’t you meant to be taking it easy with your bump?’

  ‘Yes, but I was going to pick up our Edith from the tube and besides, I had this one chance to meet Mum for a cuppa,’ said Dulcie, pointing to the railings – but her mother was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘Oh, no.’ Dulcie felt as if the air had been sucked from her lungs. ‘She was there. She was over there. I thought she was safe. Tilly, she’s gone, she’s gone.’

  ‘Don’t panic, Dulcie, there’s no time,’ Tilly said, more calmly than she would have believed possible. ‘What’s she wearing? Try to
remember. What’s she wearing?’

  ‘A red headscarf,’ said Dulcie. ‘It’s horrible. Doesn’t suit her at all. But you can’t miss it.’

  How she burst through the crowd she would never know but with an almost superhuman surge of strength Tilly drove herself towards the railings and somehow caught a glimpse of a red scarf. Reaching out, at the absolute limit of her endurance, she grasped the woman’s arm and hauled her backwards out of the crowd and out towards the entrance of the shelter.

  ‘I found her!’ she cried. ‘But did I save her?’

  ‘Tilly, you did it! You did it! Mother! Mum!’ shouted Dulcie, trying to fight her way through the crowd, but it was impossible to get anywhere near the spot where her mother was lying on the pavement panting for breath, the forlorn scarf now around her neck. She couldn’t get close enough to reach her. There were just too many people in between and she was far too bulky to worm her way through. Dimly she registered the sound of approaching ambulances and fire engines.

  Under ground, Edith, having gone below at the first sound of a siren, was growing increasingly worried for the safety of her mother and her sister. Would they have made for the shelter at the tube station? Or would they have found a way to avoid the raid? Slowly it occurred to her that something wasn’t right on the platform; there seemed to be an incident back towards the tunnel to one of the stairwells. Then, just as she saw the first trickle of injuries filtering through to the aid station, the first abdominal pain caught her and took her breath away.

  ‘Oh my Gawd,’ Edith exclaimed, ‘my baby ain’t gonna to be born in the bloody underground!’ Gripping her side, she couldn’t help but observe it was quite ironic really, because that was where the child had been conceived.

  ‘Tilly, Tilly, is that you?’ Olive asked, jumping out of the WVS van and hurrying towards her daughter. ‘Why are you here? Sorry, shouldn’t ask! We’ve been called out to help at this emergency, even though no bombs have dropped tonight …’

  ‘I can’t say anything, Mum. I have to get back to Whitehall, I’m on duty … Dulcie’s over there, she’s lost Edith … No, I mean Edith should be around here somewhere, Dulcie can’t find her … But it might be too late for her mother … Can you …? I’ll ring you …’ In moments Tilly, shocked to the core at what she had seen, left her mother with tears in her eyes, grabbed her discarded motorcycle and sped down Bethnal Green Road back towards her next assignment.

  Agnes felt that her arms would break if she tried to heave another body from the pile that was now beginning to thin out a bit. Babies, young children, old people who were wide-eyed and lifeless … She would never get over it, she was sure.

  ‘You’ve been a heroine tonight, Agnes, if it hadn’t been for your help we would have seen many more casualties,’ said one of the regular staff at Bethnal Green tube station.

  ‘I didn’t do anything special,’ Agnes said in a flat voice; she would never forget this day as long as she lived. ‘It’s what anyone would have done. What everybody did. But have you seen my Ted? You know, he usually works as a driver out of Chancery Lane.’

  ‘No,’ said the man, ‘but that doesn’t mean anything. You can’t really see what’s what down here. Look, here comes the stationmaster, let’s ask him.’

  But the stationmaster wasted no time when he reached them. ‘Come with me,’ he said to Agnes, who was startled to be picked out in this way. Full of trepidation, she edged past the pile of bodies that still remained.

  ‘Close the door, Agnes, there is something I have to tell you.’

  When the stationmaster informed her that Ted had done all he possibly could to stop the rush of people coming down the steps to the air-raid shelter Agnes felt extraordinarily proud, but the feeling was fleeting when she heard the next words.

  ‘I’m sorry, Agnes, there was nothing anybody could do, and Ted was taken to the local mortuary at Whitechapel Hospital half an hour ago …’

  Dulcie was amazed as she made her way over to St John’s Church across the road from the tube station, which had been commandeered and turned into a makeshift mortuary.

  It felt unreal, but she found herself one of a number of people who were walking up and down the rows of tables searching for the faces of their loved ones. And as she approached the last row Dulcie could clearly see her mother lying there, red scarf now neatly tied around her neck, and it was obvious she was dead.

  Only a Mother Knows

  THIRTY

  Easter Sunday was late this year and the weather was warm enough for Olive to put the table out in the garden, which was a good thing as there were so many arriving for tea. Tilly was coming over from Whitehall this afternoon, having been given a few hours’ leave. It was a good thing that she had some time off from that demanding posting, thought Olive as she finished ironing the dress she had made for Alice out of some pretty yellow material she’d paid coppers for.

  Rick, after the tragic accident that killed his mother, was going to stay with his father, who was so quiet hardly anybody remembered he existed. Truly on the mend now, Rick was going to the pictures with Tilly after tea to celebrate standing as godfather to Edith’s child, Anthony, born prematurely in the Bethnal Green underground shelter.

  It was strange, Olive thought, that Dulcie failed to mention Edith had been married to a producer chap who had gone to the desert to entertain the troops with a group of ENSA entertainers, but that was the war for you, she sighed, strange things happened all over.

  Sally was still keeping herself busy working horrendously long shifts at the hospital to take her mind off poor George, although Callum’s letters seemed to be a comfort to her of late and little Alice was eager to see her favourite uncle when he came home again. God willing.

  Whilst poor Agnes had recently decided that she could no longer set foot inside the ticket office again now that Ted had gone. She had decided that her place was on the farm her father left her and was leaving on Tuesday. She said she had tried to persuade Ted’s mother and two sisters to go with her to Surrey but Mrs Jackson was having none of it. She was born a Londoner, she’d said, and she would if need be die a Londoner. Agnes could only sigh, knowing it wasn’t her place to take responsibility for Ted’s family, but Olive knew she would have liked to help out if she could.

  Dulcie was bearing up, as Dulcie always did, consoling herself with the knowledge she and her mother had at least made amends before Mrs Simmonds died. It transpired, after the post mortem, that the woman had suffered a heart attack and felt no pain whatsoever, which was some comfort, Olive supposed.

  ‘And how’s my favourite lady on this wonderful sunny Easter Sunday?’

  ‘Oh, Archie, you made me jump – I was miles away.’

  Was I there with you?’ Archie’s smile twinkled in his eyes.

  ‘Oh, don’t let Nancy hear you talking like that or she’ll have it around the neighbourhood in no time.’

  ‘Let her,’ said Archie as he took Olive’s hand and gently kissed it, ‘life’s too short for regrets.’

  ‘Oh, Archie,’ was all that Olive could say.

  ‘Oh David …’ was all that Dulcie could say when she looked down at her brand-new baby girl. The birth was so sudden, just after Sunday lunch, before they were due to set off for Olive’s Easter tea, that they had barely had time to summon the midwife, let alone drive to hospital.

  ‘Our daughter is beautiful, my love.’ David had arranged for Dulcie to be taken to a private nursing home after the birth but now their child was here she was having none of it.

  ‘My mum had three of us with no hot water and an outside lavatory and we didn’t turn out so bad,’ Dulcie said contentedly.

  ‘Dulcie, you will have all the care you could possibly desire after giving birth,’ he said.

  ‘I’ve made the arrangements,’ Dulcie said with a sleepy smile as her eyes grew heavy, handing David his daughter whilst the midwife went into the adjoining bathroom. Moments later as the midwife quietly waved goodbye there was a gentle tap on the doo
r and Dulcie was thrilled to see Olive tiptoe into the room.

  ‘I won’t stay long today, I just want to have a little peep … But you know where I am if you need me,’ Olive sighed as she looked into the crib. ‘Well, aren’t you a clever girl, Dulcie, and David is such a lucky man.’ She hugged Dulcie, thrilled that she now had something magical to hold on to – the gift of motherhood. Then she realised that Dulcie was gently weeping on her shoulder. It was a strange time for the young woman: losing her mother and gaining a daughter only seven weeks later – a little early by Olive’s reckoning, but it didn’t matter as mother and baby were perfectly fine.

  ‘Oh, Olive, what am I going to do?’ Dulcie cried. ‘I haven’t got a clue.’

  ‘Of course you have, my girl,’ said Olive in exactly the no-nonsense tone of voice that Dulcie needed right now. ‘You now have the most precious gift, only a mother knows …’

  Only a Mother Knows

  About the Author

  Annie Groves was born and lived in the north-west of England all of her life. She was the author of the Pride family series, Ellie Pride, Connie’s Courage and Hettie of Hope Street, for which she drew upon her own family’s history, picked up from listening to her grandmother’s stories when she was a child. Her next set of novels were set during World War II and included Goodnight Sweetheart, Some Sunny Day, The Grafton Girls and As Time Goes By. These were followed by the Campion series, Across the Mersey, Daughters of Liverpool, The Heart of the Family, Where the Heart Is and When the Lights Go on Again, which are also based on the wartime recollections of members of her family, who come from the city of Liverpool. London Belles, Home for Christmas and My Sweet Valentine have introduced a set of glorious characters living in Article Row in London’s Holborn district.

  Annie Groves, whose real name was Penny Halsall, also wrote under the name of Penny Jordan and was an international bestselling author of over 180 novels with sales of over 84 million copies.