Christmas at Emmerdale

by Pamela Bell

  ‘That’s a nice welcome,’ said Maggie, laughing. She ought to smile more often, Rose thought. She was beautiful when she smiled.

  ‘Our mam said as we couldn’t start eating until you got here,’ confided one boy and darted ahead to burst into the hall. ‘They’re here! They’re here!’

  A burst of applause greeted Maggie and Rose as they went into the hall and glasses of hot punch were pressed into their hands. In the mysterious way of village gossip, the women had already heard about what they had been doing, and they found themselves at the centre of a group demanding details about the birth. There were gasps when they heard about the twins.

  ‘I said she were big,’ Mary Ann Teale exclaimed.

  ‘Rose!’ Charles Haywood drew her away from the group. ‘I cannot believe what I am hearing!’ he said. ‘Is it true that you have been assisting at a birth?’ He sounded revolted at the very idea. ‘It’s not fit for a young lady like you to be exposed to such things.’

  ‘Oh, Papa, it was wonderful,’ Rose said and burst into tears.

  ‘Come, come, my dear.’ Dismayed, her father found a handkerchief and gave it to Rose. ‘There is no need to cry.’

  She mopped her face with the handkerchief and drew a shuddering breath. ‘Oh, I know, but it was just so amazing. And I’m sorry if you dislike it, Papa, but my mind is made up. I’m going to be a nurse.’

  Before he could answer, Janet Airey had climbed up onto a chair. ‘Right,’ she shouted and clapped her hands for attention. ‘Has everyone got a glass? I’ve got a toast to make.’

  There were murmurs and shuffling as everyone made sure they had something to drink. ‘This has been a bloody year,’ Janet said in her blunt way, ‘but we’re ending it with some good news. Here’s to Beckindale’s newest arrivals, Margaret and Rose Warcup!’

  The hall erupted with cheers and cries of ‘Margaret’ and ‘Rose’.

  ‘And now,’ Janet went on gesturing at the tables of food, ‘let’s eat up this bloody feast we’ve got here!’

  There were more cheers as Janet was helped down from her chair by her dour husband. Rose didn’t think she had ever seen Dick Airey smile, but she noticed the affectionate pat he gave Janet when he thought that no one was looking. The intimacy of the gesture made Rose wistful. Janet pretended to swat her husband’s hand away but it was obvious that she didn’t really mind.

  Would she and Mick ever have the chance to grow that comfortable together? Rose hoped so.

  Until then, she would do what she could, so she went to greet the soldiers she knew from the hospital and help them with their plates.

  She was licking gingerbread crumbs from her fingers when Levi appeared at her side. ‘Good evening, Rose.’

  Her heart jerked at the sound of his voice. She had been keeping an eye out for him and had just begun to relax at the thought he might not have come to the party at all.

  ‘Levi!’ She patted the base of her throat. ‘You startled me! I didn’t think you were here.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have been if I hadn’t offered a whole barrel of beer and a big box of chocolates, no questions asked,’ said Levi. He tapped the side of his nose. ‘A good deal’s all it takes to change people’s minds. They were all nice as pie when they knew I had something they wanted.’

  Tom Teale and three elderly men with whiskers were tuning up on the dais. There would be dancing soon and then they wouldn’t be able to talk.

  Rose turned to him abruptly. ‘Levi. Can I ask you something?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said with one of his obsequious smiles.

  ‘The fire at the Woolpack … I saw you there that night.’

  Did something flicker in his eyes? ‘The whole village was there that night,’ he said. ‘Most exciting thing that’s happened in Beckindale for years, I should think.’

  ‘Ava Bainbridge died, Levi. It wasn’t exciting, it was horrible.’

  ‘She was a bitch. Don’t pretend you liked her now.’

  ‘No … it’s just … you said that you were going to get the letter back for me and now it’s gone. It must have been destroyed in the fire.’

  ‘Lucky that,’ said Levi with a grin.

  The fiddles were starting up and dancers were taking to the floor. She couldn’t ask any more now, but she would, Rose resolved. One way or another she would get Levi to tell her the truth about what happened at the Woolpack that night.

  Over Levi’s shoulder she could see her father frowning. He didn’t like her talking to Levi for so long.

  ‘I haven’t got a letter for Mick,’ she said, making to leave. ‘I’ll write after Christmas. Shall we meet then?’

  ‘I thought we could dance,’ said Levi.

  ‘Oh, I don’t think—’

  ‘If you’re worried about your father, the rules don’t apply tonight,’ he said. ‘Everybody’s dancing with whoever they like.’

  Sure enough, there was her mother dancing with Sergeant Owen, who had been enjoying Jane Eyre as she read to him. He had lost the half of his face covered by a thick bandage and his remaining eye was too blurred to read for himself. He was a rough Welshman and other circumstances her father would certainly never let her mother dance with him.

  Maggie was being whirled around by a one-armed corporal. The hall was crowded with other unlikely couples dancing together: Betty Porter and Joan Carr, Mr Bates with his ten-year-old granddaughter, Hannah Rigg and Peter Swales. Even Arthur had taken to the floor with pretty little Molly Pickles. Rose wondered what her father would say when he saw that.

  The sudden longing for Mick was so intense that Rose gasped and put a hand to her stomach. If only it were Mick beside her, asking her to dance with his reckless smile and the smile that creased one cheek. If only she could put her hand in his and let him draw her against him so that she could rest her head on his shoulder.

  But Mick wasn’t there. Levi was, and in that moment, Rose hated him for not being his brother.

  Levi’s eyes narrowed at her reluctance. ‘After everything I’ve done for you, it would be a shame if another of Mick’s letters went missing, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Is that a threat, Levi?’ Rose was proud of how steady her voice sounded.

  ‘Of course not. I’m just asking you to dance.’

  He held out his hand and Rose had no choice but to take it.

  Maggie saw Rose looking downcast as she danced with Levi Dingle and was saddened. Rose had been so happy as they walked down from the Warcups’ cottage, chattering about her plans to be a nurse. Maggie hoped the vicar hadn’t talked her out of it.

  It was a wonderful party. She was astounded at the array of food the women of Beckindale had been able to assemble. One of the more prosperous farmers had donated a ham, which took pride of place in the middle of the table, surrounded by fruit cakes and mince pies. There were fruit pies and boiled puddings and jam tarts. Cakes and pikelets and scones. Gingerbread and plum pudding. Cheesecakes and parkin and treacle toffee. And less excitingly, bread and creamy farmhouse butter and the cheese Maggie had brought from her dairy.

  Even her Yule cake had been there.

  ‘What’s this supposed to be?’ Janet had demanded, taking it out of basket and holding it up for everyone to see.

  Maggie flushed with embarrassment. ‘It was meant to be a Yule cake.’

  ‘Oh, aye?’ Janet’s lips twitched. ‘It’s not like any Yule cake I’ve ever seen. What do you reckon, Betty?’

  ‘They’re not usually quite so flat,’ Betty said taking the cake and examining it with mock seriousness. ‘But maybe this is Maggie’s own version. It’s interesting what you’ve done with the bottom,’ she added solemnly, displaying the charred base to much laughter. ‘Is that a speciality of Emmerdale Farm?’

  Maggie couldn’t help laughing. ‘I followed the recipe exactly,’ she protested and it felt good to know that they were laughing with her and not at her.

  ‘I’ve got a light hand with cakes.’ Joan Carr patted her arm. ‘I can teach you how to make i
t,’ she said.

  Maggie smiled. ‘I’d like that.’

  The hall was crowded, and although some familiar faces were missing, there were others to fill the gaps, soldiers from the hospital, with bandaged heads or wooden legs or sleeves pinned where an arm once had been, but all ready to join in with the spirit of the season.

  A Christmas tree stood at the end of the hall. It was decorated with little candles and the chocolates Levi had procured nestled in its branches. Maggie saw little Iris Bainbridge tiptoe up to tree and take a chocolate, glance around quickly to see if anyone was watching, and pop it in her mouth.

  As the dark winter afternoon drew in, the candles were lit with great ceremony and the rest of the chocolates distributed amongst the children. Maggie was glad to see that all of Frank’s younger brothers and sisters were there, part of a gang of wildly excited children that ran in and out of the hall and chased each other across the dance floor. All except Molly, who at fourteen had suddenly grown up and wasn’t short of partners to dance with.

  Nancy Pickles sat on one of the chairs ranged around the edge of the hall, rocking a sleeping child on her lap while she talked to Bert Clark’s mother. Percy Bainbridge was there, too. He wasn’t dancing, but there seemed to be plenty of women fluttering around him, making sure that he had an extra large slice of cake. Even Tom Skilbeck had come, leaning against the wall next to William Hutton, his harsh face carved with new lines of grief for his dead daughter. He nodded at Maggie across the room but didn’t say anything.

  When there were only crumbs left on the plates and even Maggie’s Yule cake had been eaten, a space was cleared for dancing in the middle of the hall. Tom Teale started with his fiddle, and then the accordion and tin whistle joined and soon everyone was tapping their feet.

  Determined to enjoy herself, Maggie danced with everyone brave enough to take a heavily pregnant woman for a turn on the floor – or with arms long enough to reach around her: with the vicar, with Mr Webster from village shop and with Betty Porter’s husband. Henry. She danced with Frank’s younger brother, Ned, and with another of Janet Airey’s lanky sons. She danced with almost all the soldiers, too. Her chest ached to see how badly hurt they were and how gallantly they made light of their injuries.

  She didn’t ask about their experiences of the war. For that short time there was a tacit agreement to forget the war, its miseries and privations, the griefs and anxieties they all felt, the tensions and slights of everyday life. None had a place inside the warm, bright hall where the village gathered together in good cheer and community to celebrate Christmas 1915 the best way they could.

  At five o’clock, the soldiers headed back to the hospital, the smaller children were taken home to be put to bed and the very elderly decided that they had had enough. Almost everybody else walked up to the church through the snow for the Christmas Eve service.

  Maggie hadn’t intended to go. She hadn’t been to church since Ralph had died, and she had decided to go straight back to the farm. She was very tired after all the dancing, too, but it had been such a good party that she found herself carried along and into the church.

  Enveloped in the smell of old, cold stone and musty hassocks and surrounded by her neighbours, Maggie listened to the Reverend Haywood’s sonorous voice and remembered the previous Christmas, spent alone and in a despair so deep she had thought it impossible ever to be happy again. She thought about the soldiers still huddled in the trenches at the front or, like Joe, fighting in a country so strange she couldn’t even imagine it.

  Then she thought about Polly’s babies, tiny Margaret and Rose, and about the child inside her, kicking restlessly. What kind of world would they grow up in? What joys and sorrows awaited them?

  When the congregation filed out of church, it was to find that the snow had stopped and the clouds had cleared. Maggie shook hands and wished everyone a happy Christmas and walked down to the bridge. The world was dark and rigid with ice, but above her arched an ink-black sky a-glitter with stars so bright she could see the outline of the fells. Silent night, she remembered the words of the beautiful carol they had sung together in the church. Holy night.

  At the bridge, she paused. If she strained her eyes, she could just make out High Moor in the starlight. Her childhood home. Having to leave it had left her lonely and adrift and she had clung to the idea of it as her home when she first married Joe.

  But now, now it was different, she realised. The farm was home now. It was hers, not Joe’s. She thought about Fly, about Blossom, the cows and the flock of sheep she had worked so hard with that year. She thought about Hugo, keeping the fire going for her. ‘I’ll be here when you get back,’ he had said.

  There was no sign of the war ending and the future was uncertain, but she had Hugo to help her. She had friends and a place in Beckindale. She had animals that depended on her and in a few weeks, she would have a child of her own. She had hope, where once there had been none. For now, that was enough.

  Pulling the collar of her coat closer against the cold, Maggie smiled and set off up the lane, heading home to Emmerdale Farm.

  EMMERDALE 1918: FACTUAL OVERVIEW FOR THE BOOK

  Many of the stories in this book have been inspired by real accounts, diaries and letters of men and women from Yorkshire who lived through the Great War, including stories from Esholt – the real Yorkshire village – on which the Emmerdale set is now based. Whilst Emmerdale is a fictional village, it embodies the community life of villages across the whole of the country; villages that hold the stories of ordinary men and women whose lives were transformed entirely in 1914.

  The country had never mobilised in such a way; as sons, husbands and brothers marched out of villages across Yorkshire, women were thrust into jobs typically done by men, and with that work came a new era of female liberation. Maggie Sugden’s story is inspired by a real farmer’s wife, Annie Marriot. In 1914 Annie’s husband George enlisted and left his milk dairy the sole responsibility of his wife. For the next four years Annie successfully kept the dairy running, as well as bringing up her young children. George returned in 1918 with a shrapnel wound to his leg and sadly died in 1920 of septicaemia. For the first time in history, women just like Annie proved they could take on any role a man had done and played an enormous part in winning the war.

  The story of Rose King working as a nurse at Miffield Hall is based upon real accounts from Temple Newsam, a country house outside Leeds. The house became a fifty-bed hospital for injured soldiers run by Lady Dorothy Wood, wife of the owner. First used for Belgian officers in 1914, it gave comfort and care to thousands of men who had been wounded, gassed or suffered the devastating psychological effects of shell shock.

  But not all soldiers were lucky enough to make it to hospitals in England; just over 700,000 British soldiers would never return. Across Britain mothers, sisters and wives were robbed of their men. In Esholt, the village the Emmerdale set is modelled on, Joshua Booth – the son of the real Woolpack landlord – was killed in 1917 by a stray shell in the trenches of Ypres, leaving behind his young sweetheart Winnie. Winnie would never fully get over the loss of her first love and kept all the precious letters Joshua had sent to her from the trenches until her death in 1992.

  The Dingle brothers appearing at a training camp on the edge of the village was inspired by real accounts of Raikeswood Camp in Skipton, which opened in 1915 to house the newly formed Bradford Pals. The opening of the camp resulted in young recruits flooding the area; going on route marches through the local countryside; seeking their own entertainment in the evenings and forming new relationships with local women. It is easy to imagine the three Dingle brothers amongst the fresh-faced trainee soldiers fraternising with local villagers.

  The war transformed the country; for all the loss and pain endured there were also huge advancements in technology, class and gender roles. Suddenly the heir to an estate like Miffield was fighting alongside the penniless Dingle; the old order fell away and with it came the vote for women in
1918 and new opportunities for a modern Britain. There is not a village, house or street in England that was not touched by war, and its legacy is still felt today. We must never forget the great sacrifice made by so many; the gallant acts of bravery and the quiet stories of transformation of these ordinary men and women.

  Copyright

  First published in Great Britain in 2018 by Trapeze Books, an imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd Carmelite House, 50 Victoria Embankment,

  London EC4Y 0DZ

  An Hachette UK company

  Christmas at Emmerdale © 2018 ITV Studios Limited.

  Emmerdale is a trade mark of ITV Studios Limited.

  “Emmerdale” television series © 2018 ITV Studios Limited.

  All rights reserved.

  The moral right of Pamela Bell to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN (hardback) 978 1 4091 8499 7

  ISBN (export trade paperback) 978 1 4091 8593 2

  ISBN (eBook) 978 1 4091 8501 7

  www.orionbooks.co.uk