by Daisy Styles
Emily, who over her working life had come across all types of people and had learnt never to take anybody at face value, added, ‘I agree with you, Sister, I think we’re going to get along just fine.’
‘I hope she doesn’t mind sharing with us two,’ Nancy said with a nervous giggle. ‘I talk in mi sleep and make, you know, rude noises.’
‘We ALL do that in this place,’ Emily said with a loud laugh.
‘Don’t you mind sharing?’ Shirley asked. ‘Three is quite a lot.’
‘It’s a whopping big room,’ Emily pointed out. ‘If we all get on, it could be fun, like boarding school,’ she joked. ‘Not that I’ve been,’ she added with a grin.
‘Talking of sharing,’ Nancy piped up, ‘have you noticed that Maureen and Olive have been moved from a double room to their own private bedrooms on the first floor, with a sea view?’
‘How did they fiddle that?’ Shirley asked. ‘They certainly aren’t paying residents – well, not that I know of.’
Nancy, who’d known the two girls longer than the others, said knowingly, ‘Couple of little operators if you ask me.’
‘I bet Olive wangled it – she’s got eyes in the back of her head,’ Shirley added. ‘And she’s been caught stealing too – as for Maureen, she’d do anything for a free meal.’
‘Now, now, young Shirley, less of the gossip,’ Sister Mary Paul chided.
After the nun had gone into the kitchen to collect more plates, Nancy lowered her voice to whisper to her friends. ‘They must have buttered somebody up.’
‘I’m surprised Isla didn’t get a private room,’ Emily remarked. ‘She looks like somebody who could pay her own way, and her granny drove her here in a big posh car.’
‘She’ll be better off sharing with us two,’ Nancy laughed. ‘If she’d paid for her own private bedroom, she’d be right next to Olive and Maureen!’
Emily grinned. ‘We might be poor but at least we’re honest, kid!’ she joked.
Isla was indeed from a very different background from her two room-mates, but, because of their circumstances and their recent painful experiences, they actually had a lot in common. Nancy and Emily quickly discovered that Isla was a bookworm; they teased her when they found her lying across her bed, or sprawled on one of the old battered sofas in the sitting room.
‘If Matron catches you lolling around with your head in a book, she might give you extra chores!’ Emily teased.
Over time, the three room-mates opened up about their individual stories. It might be that one of them would pour out her past on a walk across the marsh, dodging grazing sheep and their growing lambs, or when they were in bed in the dark, and confidences would be exchanged and fears for the future too. One afternoon the three of them sat in the sunny garden, Isla avidly reading the daily paper, Nancy knitting bootees and Emily half dozing.
‘What do you think you’ll do if there is a war?’ Isla said, as she laid aside her newspaper.
‘There’s certainly enough talk about it,’ Emily murmured sleepily.
‘If war is declared, women will be conscripted, just like they were in the Great War,’ Isla told her friends.
No longer sleepy, Emily suddenly sat bolt upright.
‘I don’t know what I’d do if I was forced to work. Who would look after my baby if I was conscripted?’
‘If women replace men in the workplace, the government would have to accommodate them and their children too,’ Isla replied.
‘How would they do that?’ Nancy said puzzled.
‘Provide factories with domestic quarters and nurseries for working mothers,’ Isla explained.
Nancy, who’d never given conscription a thought, was fascinated. ‘What kind of factories?’ she asked.
‘Factories that build bombs, ammunition, planes and tanks,’ Isla told her.
Emily nodded. ‘Isla’s right: if all the men have joined up, they’ll need women to work round the clock.’
Nancy’s eyes blazed with excitement. ‘I’d love to do something for my country,’ she said fervently. ‘I hate the thought of Nazis invading our land,’ she added with patriotic passion.
‘I’m with you, Nancy,’ Isla announced. ‘I’d like to fly an RAF Spitfire and shoot down every German bomber heading towards these shores.’
Laughing at the idea of Isla gunning down the enemy, Nancy abandoned the bootees she’d been struggling with. ‘Could we – we women – really do that?’ she gasped.
Suddenly galvanized, Isla jumped to her feet. ‘Why not? Imagine wearing a WAAF uniform and cap.’ She tried to walk as if she were marching off to war, but because of her ungainly body she could hardly keep her balance. ‘Well, not right now, fat and pregnant,’ she laughed, and settled back down on the warm grass beside her friends. ‘If war is declared, we’ll face big changes,’ she said as she flapped the newspaper she’d been reading in the air. ‘Food rationing, training camps, female conscription, the home guard, compulsory take-over of property, including stately homes. Hitler could turn the world we love upside down.’
Talk of war and all the uncertainties that went with it brought tears to Emily’s big blue eyes. Before she could stop herself, she blurted out what was on her mind. ‘I still have no idea where my George is! He could be anywhere, The Far East, Germany, Canada.’ Ada, hurrying by to hang up washing in the kitchen garden, spotted the three girls in a tight, emotional huddle.
‘Everything all right?’ she called out.
When Nancy shook her head, Ada put down the heavy washing basket she was carrying and approached the group.
‘Now then, Em, darling, what’s the matter, dear?’
‘I don’t know whether my fiancé’s alive or dead!’ Emily sobbed. ‘Life without George would be unbearable in itself, but, on my own, how will I manage to bring up his child, how will I support it in the middle of a war? I can’t bear the thought of not keeping George’s baby – it’s the only link I have with him,’ she wailed.
Reaching out, Ada took Emily into her arms. ‘There, there,’ she soothed. ‘Take one step at a time,’ she advised.
‘That’s what I try to do,’ Emily told her. ‘But sometimes I’m overwhelmed, petrified by what I may have to face in the very near future.’
‘You’re a strong woman, Em. It will work out, I promise you.’
Even though she spoke so determinedly, Ada honestly did wonder if Emily’s boyfriend might have died. The alternative – that he’d abandoned her – was in some ways even worse. She sighed and said nothing further; each of them in their own way would have enough to cope with in the months to come. What fate had in store for them after Mary Vale, only time would tell.
16. War
September 1939
On an idyllic September morning, as churches all over London emptied out their early-morning congregations and barrage balloons already floated ominously high in the bright blue sky, Neville Chamberlain delivered his broadcast from the Cabinet Room of Number 10, Downing Street, at 11.15 precisely. Clearly struggling to keep his voice steady, he spoke solemnly.
This morning the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German government a final note stating that, unless we heard from them by 11 o’clock that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us.
I have to tell you now that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently this country is at war with Germany.
During the short length of Chamberlain’s speech there were differing reactions all over the country. The older listeners remembered the horrors of the Great War and felt nothing but despair; other listeners, like Stan, were angry with Chamberlain for not having acted sooner.
‘The prime minister’s given Hitler time to make fools of us,’ he raged, as he sat in front of the wireless smoking one cigarette after another.
Knowing how her husband still grieved for the father he idolized, who had died bravely at the Battle of the Somme, Gloria laid a loving hand on his arm. ‘List
en to Robin playing in the back garden with the kids next door,’ she said with tears in her eyes. ‘He knows nothing of what’s to come.’
‘Leave him be,’ Stan murmured as he caught her hand and kissed it. ‘Poor little blighter will know soon enough.’
Grasping her husband’s hand, Gloria looked him straight in the eye. ‘Promise me you won’t volunteer right away,’ she said with fear in her voice.
Stan’s gaze didn’t falter; she caught her breath when she saw the determined look on his face; she knew exactly what it meant: ‘I’m not letting the memory of my dad down and I’m not letting my country down either.’
‘Sweetheart, you know that I have no intention of dodging my duty,’ he replied firmly. ‘The Nazis will try to raze this city of ours to the ground; they won’t care about the innocent – for God’s sake, look what the blighters have just done in Poland.’
Knowing what was coming next, Gloria began to cry. Stan stroked her long, dark hair. ‘It would make it so much easier for me to go if I knew that you, Robin and the baby’ – he nodded at his wife’s growing stomach – ‘were safely out of London.’
Gloria sighed as she buried her face against her husband’s shoulder. Her world and her lovely, happy life were falling apart; she couldn’t send Stan off to war worrying about his family; it was her duty to do as he asked.
‘I’ll go,’ she feebly agreed. ‘Robin and I will leave London.’ Turning her tear-stained face to the man she loved with all her heart, she quickly added, ‘But only after you’ve gone, Stan. I’m staying right here in Battersea, and we’ll be a family together until the moment you leave.’
Two hundred miles away, in Mary Vale, the girls and the staff alike were gathered around the big wireless in the dining room, listening, as was the rest of the nation, to Chamberlain’s speech – at the end of which half the girls started to weep.
‘I’ve got twin brothers. They’re only sixteen. How soon before they’ll have to go off and fight the bloody Nazis?’ Seeing the nuns eyeing her sternly, the tearful girl quickly muttered an apology: ‘Sorry, sisters.’
Another girl wailed, ‘Mi dad’s only forty; he lost his dad and his older brothers in the last war. He’s bound to be called up.’
Sensing hysteria was about to break loose, Ada swiftly took control. ‘Ladies! Let’s not panic,’ she urged. Turning to Sister Ann, who was looking distinctly shell-shocked herself, she said, ‘Would you please take those who would like to say some prayers to the chapel, Sister?’
Before she hurried away, Sister Ann quickly said, ‘I left Emily and Nancy with a couple of girls in the nursery.’
‘I’ll keep an eye on them,’ Ada promised.
After the nun had left with a string of weeping girls, Ada spotted Shirley. ‘Can you fetch a pot of tea into the nursery, dear?’ she asked politely.
‘Course, sister,’ Shirley willingly agreed. ‘What’s going to happen, Miss – will Hitler shut down the Home?’ she asked in a voice tight with tension.
Ada couldn’t help but smile. ‘I should think Mary Vale is way down on Hitler’s list of priorities, Shirley. Nothing much will change here, though we’ll need blackout curtains right away, and gas masks, and to be prepared for food rationing.’
‘You can’t ration cows!’ Shirley laughed. ‘There’ll still be milk to be had, and butter and cheese too.’
‘It’ll be spread a lot more thinly from now on,’ Ada warned. ‘Time to tighten our belts.’
When Ada arrived in the nursery, she could see immediately that they’d all been discussing the dreadful news too. She heard Nancy saying, ‘We’ll be all right here in Mary Vale; we’re miles away from any action.’
Emily scoffed at her friend’s comment. ‘You must be joking! We’re right on the coast, close to a dozen or so RAF bases dotted around the coastline, and a big shipyard in Barrow too.’
Shirley, who’d just walked in bearing a loaded tea tray, gasped. ‘OOOH! Will this area be a target?’
Ada tried as best she could to defuse the girl’s fears. ‘Calm down, Shirley, and be careful with that teapot,’ she warned, as she saw Shirley start to tremble. ‘Here, I’ll take it,’ she said, and relieved the nervous girl of the tray, which she put well out of harm’s way. Addressing all the girls, she said calmly, ‘Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, ladies.’
Later, when Emily was in the sluice room helping Sister Ada hand-rinse the terry-towelling nappies that had been soaking in bleach, she couldn’t stop herself from returning to the subject of war. ‘I’ve been reading about the evacuees,’ she started. ‘If homes like Mary Vale were to take in evacuees, it would become a place for married and unmarried women alike.’
Ada nodded. ‘That’s a point: it would no longer be a home exclusively for unmarried mothers and their babies. Plus, its secluded location might be very attractive to women and children in need of safety.’
Suddenly seized with fear about the future, Emily’s face paled. ‘What will happen to our lovely land?’ she said in a voice that was choked with emotion. ‘Could we British become slaves to the Nazis?’
Ada put a comforting arm around Emily’s trembling shoulders. ‘Come on, Emily, you mustn’t think like that; we’re British. Have you forgotten? We never give in!’
Leaving some of the girls praying, Sister Ann genuflected, then hurried down the dark corridor, intent on returning to her duties on the ward. Crossing herself as she rushed past the statue of Our Lady, she almost walked headlong into Father Ben, who was as white as a sheet.
‘Such terrible news, Father,’ she said woefully.
Father Ben leant forwards and said in a low shocked voice, ‘I know. And I have some other devastating news too, Sister.’
‘What is it, Father?’ she asked nervously. ‘What’s happened to you?’
‘I can’t speak about it now,’ he answered in a flustered voice. ‘I must see the Reverend Mother right away.’
Feeling deeply concerned about the priest, Sister Ann hurried back to her ward, where all her demanding duties took her mind off her worries for the rest of the day.
The following morning the Reverend Mother called a meeting in the convent sitting room for all the nuns in the order, and for the hospital staff too. Father Ben was absent but Matron was present and, oddly enough, Sir Percival too.
Looking quite unlike her normally serene self, the Reverend Mother came straight to the point. ‘I’m afraid I have some very upsetting news to report,’ she started.
The group gathered around her glanced anxiously at each other: what could possibly be more upsetting than the previous day’s terrible news? they wondered.
‘I’m sorry to say that Father Benedict has been removed from his post here at the convent with immediate effect,’ the Reverend Mother informed the tense group in one long breath.
There was a collective gasp of what was a mixture of shock and indignation. The Reverend Mother held up her hand for silence so that she could continue.
‘There have been some very serious allegations directed at Father Benedict; it’s been said he’s behaved’ – the Reverend Mother could hardly bear even to say the word – ‘inappropriately. An accusation which of course the convent must investigate.’
Shirley, who’d dropped in with a tray bearing a pitcher of water and some glasses, set it down on the table with a loud clatter.
‘That’s a LIE!’ she cried before she could stop herself. ‘Sister Ann says Father Ben’s the nearest thing to a saint on earth! He’d never harm a fly.’
Slightly embarrassed by Shirley’s passionate outburst, Sister Ann quickly put a warning hand on her arm. ‘Shhh, child,’ she hissed.
Wild with anger, Shirley muttered mutinously, ‘You know it’s a lie, Sister.’
The nun pressed a warning finger to her lips. ‘Shhh!’
Stony-faced Ada, also livid at the accusations directed at good Father Ben, demanded, ‘What kind of allegations?’
‘I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to speak,’ the
Reverend Mother responded.
Though outraged that the priest could be dismissed without any adequate explanation, Ada carefully modified her tone. ‘Please excuse me, Reverend Mother, I’m sure you know how loved and respected Father Ben is by residents and staff alike; it would help if we knew a little more.’
Looking flustered and embarrassed, the Reverend Mother answered stiffly, ‘I’m sorry, Sister Dale, I can give no further explanation.’ Addressing the group in general, she concluded, ‘For the moment, while the inquiry is ongoing, Father Benedict has been advised to return to his seminary.’
A stunned silence followed; nobody could believe that, whatever the accusations were (and they must have been weighty if the priest had been removed from his office), dear, loyal, modest, self-effacing Father Ben, who’d been so much a part of Mary Vale life, would not be with them for the time being. Sir Percival broke the silence, stepping forward and saying in a soft, reassuring voice, ‘I appreciate this has been an awful shock to you all. God knows no one here could fail to appreciate the work that Father Benedict has done for the Home over the years.’
A collective murmur of agreement ran round the room.
‘We have no choice but to leave the matter with the religious authorities, who will thoroughly investigate the case. Meanwhile,’ Percival quickly added, ‘as chairman of the Board of Governors, it is my responsibility to take over the administration of Mary Vale’s adoptions.’ Bowing in her direction, Percival added with a grateful smile, ‘With the assistance of Matron, of course.’
Ada exchanged a long look with Sister Ann: how had all of this vital reorganization been achieved so swiftly?
As if reading Ada’s mind, Matron stepped forward. ‘The information that Father Benedict meticulously filed away will help us to soldier on until his safe return,’ she announced.
As the meeting broke up and they returned to the ward, Ada turned to Sister Ann and Shirley. ‘What are we going to tell the girls?’
