A Distant Dream (25 page)

Realising that she was shivering with the cold, she closed up and left, now knowing exactly what she was going to do about the boat.

A couple of weeks later, on a Wednesday afternoon, May walked into Lyons Corner House in the West End, looked around for a few moments, then went over to a table where a woman was waiting for her.

‘Hello, my dear,’ greeted Mrs Sands. ‘Thank you so much for coming.’

‘No trouble at all,’ May assured her, sitting down. ‘It doesn’t take long on the tube.’

She looked around the crowded café, at the many people in uniform, the Nippy waitresses weaving in and out of the tables. As a conversation starter she said, ‘I see that the Corner Houses are managing to keep the service going despite food rationing, though there isn’t so much to choose from these days.’

‘The war is bound to have an effect.’

‘The Nippy waitresses have gone from all the tea shops, though,’ said May. ‘It’s self-service now. They couldn’t get enough staff with so many women doing men’s jobs, apparently. One of the women in our local tea shop was telling me about it.’

‘That’s a pity. It won’t be the same without them,’ said the older woman. ‘Still, change is inevitable in wartime, I suppose.’ She sighed, shrugging her shoulders. ‘I noticed that the John Lewis store near here has some bomb damage.’

‘Yes, it was bombed a couple of months ago,’ confirmed May. ‘The West End is looking quite battered.’

A waitress came over and Mrs Sands ordered tea and buns for them both.

‘Is your husband not coming?’ enquired May.

‘No, I asked you to meet me because I wanted us to have a chat on our own,’ she explained. ‘He has come to London with me but I left him in the room at the hotel having a nap.’

‘Are you just here for tonight?’ asked May.

Mrs Sands nodded. ‘I wanted to see you to thank you personally for your wonderful generosity in giving us the boat and it’s too far to come just for the day,’ she said. ‘It means so much to us to have
Sands Nest
back in the family again. I was very moved when we heard from the solicitor of your intentions. We are so grateful to you, my dear.’

‘Yes, I guessed you would be pleased,’ May told her. ‘Doug had such wonderful memories of his childhood there with you and Mr Sands.’ She paused, not sure if she should continue, but decided to take a chance. ‘I think his childhood was the last time Doug was truly happy.’

The older woman looked desperately sad. ‘Yes, he was a very happy child; always laughing and full of fun. But when he reached adolescence he changed. He started to have dark moods and withdrew into himself. He shut himself away from his father and me mentally.’

‘All the time?’

‘No, there were times when he seemed like his old self, but the darkness would always come back,’ she explained. ‘We did think of getting medical advice but he was grown up by then and refused to see a doctor.’ Her eyes were full of tears. ‘I don’t think there’s anything they can do about that sort of thing anyway.’

‘So do you know what caused it?’

‘No, because he refused to talk about it,’ she said. ‘I don’t think he realised the extent to which it affected other people. His father had no patience with it at all.’

‘Was he a strict father?’

‘Very. He wanted Doug to go away to boarding school, but I refused to allow it.’

‘How did Mr Sands take that?’

‘We argued about it for months,’ she confided. ‘He thought if we’d sent Doug away to school he would have been tougher; had more confidence in himself.’

‘Does he think he wouldn’t have had the psychological problems?’ she asked.

‘He does sometimes try to pin the whole thing on me for not letting him be sent away, yes,’ she admitted. ‘And who knows, he could be right.’

‘It was in his make-up, I think. Part of his personality,’ said May. ‘He had been a lot better lately as it happens. Ironic really.’

‘Yes, it is,’ Mrs Sands agreed tearfully.

‘I don’t see anything of Doug in his father,’ May mentioned.

‘No, he was more like me in every way.’ Mrs Sands paused thoughtfully as though guessing May’s thoughts. ‘My husband is not a bad man, you know,’ she said as the waitress brought the tea. ‘He is just very set in his ideas and impatient with people who don’t think along the same lines. He used to get so angry with Doug over the moods. He thought he had no right to inflict them on other people and make them miserable.’

‘They did take some tolerating, I must admit,’ said May. ‘I only knew your son for a short time, but I found that side of him quite upsetting. It’s a shame, because he was such a lovely man in other ways. I wish now I’d been more patient with him.’

‘You stayed with him, that’s the important thing,’ said the other woman, pouring the tea.

‘I suppose so, but I can see why some people may have been put off,’ she said. ‘He gave me the impression that he’d had girlfriends before who got fed up with it.’

‘Yes, he did have a few, but once he didn’t live with us any more I didn’t know what he was doing. We lost touch for a while.’

‘One good thing you did for him was to give him the boat,’ said May. ‘That was where he was happiest. He found some sort of peace there.’

‘Yes, I know,’ she said. ‘He loved it as a boy and that’s why I’m so pleased we can keep it in the family now that he’s gone.’

May sipped her tea. ‘What will you do with her?’ she wondered. ‘I expect it will cost a bit to keep her moored where she is now if you’re never going to use her. Will you take her to a stretch of water near you?’

‘Oh no,’ Mrs Sands said at once. ‘She has to be on the Thames; that was the essence of the whole thing. We’ll have her stored in a boatyard somewhere until after the war, then we’ll put her back on the river and use her as accommodation when we come to London. We might even have boating holidays again one day.’

‘Yes, why not,’ said May.

‘It’s somewhere that I can revive some happy memories,’ she said. ‘We moved away from the family home because of my husband’s job, so all the memories are in the boat.’ She fixed May with her gaze. ‘Thank you so much, my dear.’

‘It’s a pleasure,’ said May, and she really meant it.

It was such a weight off her mind having handed the boat back to its rightful owners that she was positively light hearted when she got home, where Betty and Joe were waiting for her.

‘I sometimes fear for your sanity, May Stubbs,’ said Betty when May had finished telling her and Flo about her business with Mrs Sands. ‘Fancy giving the boat away. Anyone would think you had money, the way you carry on.’

‘I didn’t give it away,’ she told her. ‘I returned it to its rightful owners.’

‘Rightful owners my Aunt Fanny,’ protested Betty. ‘That boat was yours. Doug wanted you to have it or he wouldn’t have left it to you. If you didn’t want to keep it you could have sold it and had a decent bit of dough in your purse.’

‘You are as bad as my father about this,’ protested May. ‘Why can’t the two of you understand that some things can’t be measured in financial terms?’

‘When you’re in the moneyed classes maybe that’s true, but when you’re in the lower ranks like us you have to grab anything that comes your way. Isn’t that right, Mrs Stubbs?’

‘Don’t drag me into it,’ protested Flo. ‘My daughter has a mind of her own and when she gets an idea into her head no one will alter it, not you, nor her father, and believe me he has tried. It was her inheritance so her decision.’

‘So let that be an end to it please,’ said May.

There was an interruption from below. ‘Swings please, Auntie May,’ said Joe, staring up at her with his gorgeous pale brown eyes.

‘Yes, of course I’ll take you to the swings, darlin’,’ she said, picking him up and kissing him. ‘Come on, Betty, get your coat. And hurry up or the kids will be out of school and we won’t be able to get Joe on anything.’

‘It’s bloomin’ cold out there,’ Betty said. ‘I think I’ll wait for you here, if that’s all right, Mrs Stubbs.’

Flo exchanged a glance with Betty, then said, ‘Course it is, love; you can talk to me while I get the meal ready for tonight.’

For once in her life Betty wasn’t thinking of herself. She knew that Doug’s death had devastated May, even though she didn’t make a performance of it, and the only real comfort she seemed to get came from being with Joe. May’s love for him exuded from every pore and Betty thought she would let her have a little time on her own with him. Besides, it really was cold out and it would be nice and warm in the Stubbses’ kitchen.

May and Joe had the small recreation ground to themselves on this grey November afternoon and May sat with her arm around him on the roundabout, feeling him close to her and cherishing the moment. Doug’s death had traumatised her, but because he had always been so much outside of her normal circle, it sometimes felt as though he had never been in her life at all now that he had gone. She had resumed her old routine as though she hadn’t left it.

But everything was different for her now emotionally. She had been part of a couple; now she was on her own again and had to adjust to the loneliness of it. As the damp, smoky scent of incipient evening rose around her, she was transported back to earlier times spent under the lamp-post on the corner of the street when the air had smelled just like this; the three of them, her, Betty and George. An ache of longing rose inside her for simpler times when life had been safe and carefree.

‘May loves young Joe, doesn’t she?’ said Flo as she rolled out pastry on the kitchen table with Betty sitting opposite.

‘Yeah, she’s a brilliant godmother, as George and I knew she would be when we chose her.’

‘Have you heard from George lately?’ Flo enquired.

‘I get a letter every now and again,’ she said.

‘Where is he now?’

‘His letters are censored so I’m not sure, but it’s somewhere warm.’

‘We could do with a bit of that round here,’ said Flo lightly, putting cooked meat and gravy into a pie dish and covering it with pastry.

‘Not half.’ Betty had switched back to her normal self-seeking ways as an idea to brighten up her life came into her mind. ‘I was thinking, Mrs Stubbs, as May seems to draw such comfort from being with Joe, might it be a good idea for her to have him here one evening and let him stay over for the night?’

Flo narrowed her eyes. ‘You want to go out, do you?’ she said.

‘I wouldn’t mind a night out at the flicks, but that isn’t why I’m suggesting it,’ Betty fibbed. ‘I thought it might do May good; give her something else to think about other than her bereavement and do me a favour at the same time. I never get to go out of an evening. My mother-in-law won’t look after Joe for me because she can’t cope with him on her own.’

‘I suppose if the raids ease up it might be an idea,’ said Flo. ‘Anything that cheers May up is all right by me.’

‘People do go out despite the raids now that we are all used to them,’ said Betty.

‘And look what happened to poor Doug,’ Flo reminded her.

‘Mm, there is that,’ she said. ‘But some people say if a bomb is meant to get you it will wherever you are.’

‘That’s rubbish,’ declared Flo. ‘If it were true you might as well not have air-raid shelters and we’d all carry on as though bombs aren’t dropping out of the sky.’

‘Of course nobody means we should take it to that extreme,’ said Betty.

‘I should hope not.’

‘But they have longer programmes and entertainment at some of the cinemas if there’s a raid on, so I’ve heard,’ said Betty. ‘The organist comes up and they have a sing-song after the big film. It helps to take people’s minds off the bombs.’

‘That’s just asking for trouble,’ said Flo. ‘They wouldn’t stand a chance if a bomb hit the cinema.’

‘I suppose they hope it won’t,’ said Betty, disappointed to find opposition to what had originally been an altruistic gesture. ‘Anyway, it was only an idea. May can have Joe for a night and I’ll stay in if it will make everyone happy. I was only trying to help.’

Flo had known Betty all her life and she knew that May was the giver in that friendship. Betty always wanted what was best for Betty, but Flo was quite fond of her just the same. Probably because she was so transparent she could be comical at times.

‘You need to speak to May about it,’ she suggested. ‘It’s nothing to do with me.’

‘Right you are,’ agreed Betty.

The idea of having her godson for a whole night really appealed to May and she was confident that he would be happy to stay with her because she had built an excellent rapport with him.

‘You go off to the pictures and Joe and I will have a nice time together,’ she said later when she and Betty were on their own with Joe in the living room. ‘Let’s do it when we get a couple of quiet nights.’

‘Your mum seems to think that I am only offering for my own ends,’ said Betty.

‘Knowing you, you probably are,’ said May without animosity. ‘But that’s fine with me; you never get to go to the flicks, so why not take the opportunity and please me as well.’

‘Why does everybody always suspect my motives?’ asked Betty, looking peeved.

‘Probably because we know you so well,’ replied May.

‘I really did have the idea for your sake,’ Betty insisted. ‘At first, anyway. It was only afterwards I thought I might as well make the most of it and go out.’

‘I believe you, thousands wouldn’t,’ laughed May. ‘Look, I’ll be enjoying myself with Joe, so why shouldn’t you go to see a film, organist and all if they have one.’

And so it was arranged for the next time there was a lull in the raids.

Flo and Dick embraced the idea of having Joe to stay and Flo put the geyser on so that May could have hot water to bath him.

‘Might as well make the most of it before the government puts hot water on ration,’ said Flo lightly.

May gave a wry grin. Every week it seemed something else either disappeared altogether or went on ration. People were urged to grow their own food and keep chickens. Anyone coming to stay either provided their own food or brought their ration books. Betty had decided on the former for Joe and sent along milk and orange juice, which his child’s green ration book entitled her to, as well as bread and cheese for his tea and porridge for breakfast.