A Liverpool Legacy (23 page)

‘Take care,’ Denis warned, and Sylvie felt his arm go round her waist to steady her. ‘I’ve got to get you home in one piece, haven’t I?’ She smiled and he stopped to kiss her. She could see love, adoration almost, in his dark eyes. She shivered with delight and put up her face to be kissed again. Whatever had made her think Denis wasn’t romantic?

Their progress was slow and it took more than an hour to reach her home. ‘Mum’s home now,’ she said. The lights were on in the hall and as they watched they saw the light go on in the kitchen. Denis gathered Sylvie in his arms to kiss her a final goodnight, but she kept him with her for another half hour and by then they both felt very cold.

‘Come on in,’ she said, ‘I could make you a hot drink to warm you up before you walk back.’ She felt him hesitate. ‘Come on,’ she urged. ‘Why not?’

Millie met them in the hall. ‘Thank goodness you’ve got here. Denis, I rang your mother to tell you the buses had stopped running but she said you knew and had set out to walk home at eight o’clock. I was beginning to worry about you.’

‘We’re fine, Mum.’

‘Denis, you aren’t going to walk back again, are you?’

‘I’m going to make him a hot drink first,’ Sylvie said.

‘It’ll be midnight before you get home.’ Sylvie had to stifle a giggle at that. It wasn’t the walk that had taken so much time.

‘I suggest you stay the night with us,’ Millie went on. ‘Why don’t you ring your mother and tell her? We can make up a bed for you and you can come straight to work with us in the morning.’

Sylvie set about making three cups of cocoa while Millie found Denis a pair of slippers that had once been Pete’s so he could take his wellingtons off, and she took him up to the old nursery where the gas fire was popping and giving out welcome heat.

Sylvie fell asleep that night thinking of Denis, and the love for her she’d seen in his eyes. To think of him sleeping downstairs gave her a lovely feeling of security.

Chapter Twenty-Four

When Andrew pulled up on the drive of his mother’s house and walked to the front door, he remembered that other time years ago when he’d done this. It wasn’t so much that he hated Jeff Willis retelling their Asian experiences but that it made the years roll back to 1942 and reminded him of how much he’d lost. He let himself in and found his mother had already gone to bed. He made haste to do the same.

He’d have been wiser to do what Annabel had asked of him in the first place, opt for the Pay Corps and the chance to stay in England with her. His life might have been different now if he had. How many times had he regretted that he hadn’t? Thousands as he’d fled from the Japanese, but many more times since he’d returned to England. That had been one of the blackest days of his life.

As soon as the plane bringing him and Jeff home had landed, they tried to ring their wives but were told to try again later as the lines were still being repaired after a recent air raid.

A British Army colonel congratulated them on escaping from the Japanese and granted them a month’s leave, telling them their salaries would be paid since the fall of Singapore. Andrew tried again to telephone Annabel but still no luck. Together he and Jeff boarded a train to Liverpool. Andrew thought of him now as a trustworthy friend; they’d parted in Exchange Station with a handshake and a promise to keep in touch.

It was the evening rush hour; there was a queue to use the phone booths and no taxis. Andrew boarded a bus to Mossley Hill, bubbling with anticipation. The bomb damage shocked him. There were stark ruins, gaps where he remembered buildings, windows boarded up, holes in the road and piles of rubble everywhere. He couldn’t wait to get home to Annabel and almost ran down the road to the semi-detached house they’d bought when they married.

Thank goodness these houses were undamaged but they looked shabbier than he remembered. The rose bushes he’d planted in the front garden were in full bloom and the little lawn neatly clipped; it gave him pleasure that Annabel had been taking care of things in his absence.

He dropped his bag on the doorstep to ring the bell, rattle the knocker and put his key in the lock. As soon as the door opened he caught the savoury scent of a good stew. His stomach rumbled in anticipation. How marvellous!

Annabel came rushing up the hall to meet him, her dark hair flying out round her beautiful face. He put out his arms to give her a welcoming hug but she stopped dead as soon as she saw him and her mouth fell open. ‘Oh my God!’ she gasped. ‘I thought you were dead!’

The hall was spinning round him, he couldn’t get his breath. Her shock was palpable and he knew beyond doubt that his return was unwelcome. The bottom was dropping out of his world.

He stared at her half paralysed but managed to choke out, ‘Didn’t you get my letter?’ before he saw the man come to the dining-room door. They had been eating; their plates were still half full of stew.

‘Darling,’ he turned to Annabel, ‘who is this?’

She looked numb and was unable to answer. For the first time he noticed her thickening figure. ‘You’re pregnant?’ He felt as though he’d been kicked. Scalding vomit was rising in his throat.

He couldn’t stay here, couldn’t look at her beautiful slanting brown eyes. He couldn’t stop his fists clenching ready to punch the fellow who’d taken his place. He was older, taller, better looking, a civilian in a well-fitting suit. Andrew felt he was falling apart.

Annabel was weeping and trying to justify what she’d done. ‘You went away. You left me. I haven’t seen you for years. I couldn’t manage on my own, Victor rescued me.’

Victor was calmer than either of them and took over. ‘After the fall of Singapore, Annabel received a telegram saying you were missing believed killed. We really believed . . . I mean it’s now August.’ The official telegram was produced in evidence.

‘You didn’t write to let me know you were all right,’ she accused, near to hysteria. ‘What did you expect me to believe?’

‘I wrote to you when I reached Darwin.’ It was clear she’d never received it.

Andrew didn’t know how he got out of the house he’d thought of as his own. He couldn’t think. For an hour he walked the suburban streets not caring where he went. He still loved Annabel, still wanted her. He’d adored her, given her everything he could, but Annabel had rejected him. She’d turned her back on him, didn’t want any more to do with him.

It began to rain, which made him shiver, he’d grown used to the jungle heat, but it brought him back to the present. It was after ten and dark and he had to find somewhere to spend the night.

He’d go to his mother’s house. She was a widow and would be glad to see him, she always was. He hoped to see a phone box. He wanted to let her know he was coming. After his reception from Annabel, he was reluctant to walk in on her but he couldn’t remember where the phone boxes were and neither could he think of her phone number. Once it had been his phone number, his mother hadn’t moved from the family home. Well, not as far as he knew.

At least he knew the way. He’d been brought up in and around this district and had never moved far until he joined the army. He walked on until he came to his old home. He hesitated at the front gate, worried now about his mother. Did she still live here? Would she be coping after three years of war and widowhood?

No glimmer of light showed, there was no sign that anybody lived here, but a heavier flurry of rain drove him to the front door to ring the bell. He held his breath until he heard her coming to shoot the bolt off the door.

‘Andy!’ Her face lit up in a huge welcoming smile, she threw her arms round him. ‘How marvellous to see you again.’ She laughed with delight. ‘Ugh, you’re wet, like a drowned rat, come to the fire.’

Her welcome couldn’t have been more different to Annabel’s. That night, he’d pulled the blankets over his ears in his childhood bed. He’d had to tell his mother about Annabel, it had filled his mind and he’d broken down and wept. It was years since his mother had seen him cry and that had humiliated him further.

Even so, within an hour of entering his mother’s house it was as though he’d never left. His mother said she was looking forward to having his company for the whole of his month’s leave so he’d done the right thing by coming home.

But nothing could take away the raw hurt of Annabel’s rejection. He’d believed she loved him and he’d trusted her. The last thing he’d expected was that she’d take another lover. Just to let that cross his mind cut him to ribbons. If his flight from the Japanese advance had taken all his physical stamina, Annabel’s defection had delivered an emotional death blow. He couldn’t look at life in the same way again. She’d changed him for ever. He felt finished, totally drained and exhausted.

When his leave was up he’d reported back to the army as ordered, and been posted to Catterick Camp in Yorkshire, where he’d put his head down and been a cog in the army financial service. For years, he’d done nothing about getting a divorce, it had seemed too hard. One part of him hoped Annabel would get fed up with Victor and return to him, but his mother thought he’d feel better if he was free of her and kept saying so.

At the end of the war in 1945, a flood of divorces had been reported in the newspapers and Andrew had finally got round to it. Victor bought his share of the house from him so his mother thought he was finally free of Annabel. He wasn’t, he still thought of her, imagining things as they once were.

He met up with Jeff Willis every so often and had been introduced to his wife and three children. Jeff had survived their adventure in the Far East with less damage, but Andrew had always known he had a tough core. When the army no longer required Andrew’s services in 1946, he’d returned to live with his mother and started job hunting. It was then that Jeff had handed him the advertisement torn from a newspaper. ‘You’d be all right working for this fellow,’ he’d said. ‘Pete Maynard is a relative of mine. I reckon you’d get a fair deal from him.’

‘William C. Maynard and Sons? They’re quite a big Liverpool firm, I didn’t realise you had relatives like that.’

‘I come from the poor side of the family, though I count Pete a friend. I think you’ll like him.’

Andrew had liked him and he’d got the job. All he’d wanted after that was a quiet life.

Millie was afraid the first anniversary of Pete’s death would be difficult to get through and couldn’t help thinking how different her life would be now if she still had him with her. It fell on a Sunday and Valerie invited all the family to lunch on that day. They were all looking forward to the birth of Helen’s baby which was due in another ten days. She was sewing baby clothes and Valerie was crocheting a shawl, and Millie had helped by knitting a bonnet and matinee coat.

Late in the morning when Millie and her children had reached Valerie’s house, Eric telephoned to say he was taking Helen into hospital, and could he bring baby Jenny over to stay a little earlier than he’d arranged?

That put them all on tenterhooks and they could talk of nothing else. Eric brought Jenny and ate a hasty lunch before returning to the hospital. Millie had thought it would be a sad day with them all talking about Pete and remembering how much he’d meant to them, but the imminent birth changed everything.

Sylvie played with baby Jenny, and eventually they went on to discuss the future, the party Val was planning for the twins who would soon have their fourth birthday, and Simon who was facing exams and a new school in September.

Valerie was putting the twins to bed that night and Millie was tucking Jenny into a cot in their bedroom when Eric phoned to say Helen had had a baby boy weighing seven and a half pounds and they wanted to call him Peter after her father. Millie had to wipe away a tear before she went downstairs to rejoin the rest of the family. Eric opened a bottle of wine to drink to the new baby’s health and happiness, and then because they’d all enjoyed it so much, he opened another.

In future, this date would be remembered as baby Peter’s birthday and not as the day of his grandfather’s terrible accident. Millie knew she need never fear it again. She could see her family was ready to move forward and think of the future again, and she must try to do the same.

Sylvie began to dream of spending the future with Denis. She was quite sure he was the man for her. He could kiss her and bring her blood to the boil in a few moments. Every time she went out with him he brought her home, and they were spending longer and longer outside her front gate with their arms round each other, trying to say goodnight. But it was very cold, and darkness provided their only privacy. Sylvie thought longingly of the shed at the far end of their back garden. It would provide a lovely hidey-hole for them. One Tuesday she took the key to the shed door from the kitchen and looked inside. It was full of gardening equipment and furniture but nobody had been in since the end of the summer.

She decided it would suit them very well and pushed everything closer together to make more space. The cushions for the garden furniture had been packed away in a tea chest. She swept the floor and arranged them there in readiness. Then she oiled the catches on both the front gate and the side gate so Mum wouldn’t hear them being opened. At work the next day, she felt quite excited about what was to come that evening.

Connie and her friends in the office had talked of an imaginary line drawn on the ground in front of them, which they were forbidden to cross until they were married. Sylvie knew her mother had crossed that line, and back in the old days when she was young it wasn’t just a line, it was a great ditch with hedges that had to be climbed too. But the war had changed how many people felt about that. Loving Denis as she did, she could understand the thrills and temptations that had led Mum to do it and longed to experience love like that herself.

That evening, Denis took her to see Danny Kaye in
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
, and it was such a laugh that she forgot everything else. When he took her home afterwards the night was cold and clear and the moon almost full. He tried to kiss her goodnight at the front gate, but she took his hand and led him silently across the front lawn and into the back garden, keeping well away from the light blazing out from the hall windows. Very little light came from the sitting-room windows at the back because the heavy curtains were drawn.

Inside the shed the dark seemed thick and black, but Sylvie had brought a torch and shone it round to show him. ‘We’ll be safe from prying eyes here,’ she said.

‘Won’t your mother see the light and know you’re here?’

‘No, too many trees and bushes in between, and anyway once she’s drawn the curtains she won’t look out.’

He put his arms round her and kissed her and she urged him down on to the cushions. ‘We might as well be comfortable,’ she said. It was lovely to lie down with him and feel the weight of his body against hers. Sylvie undid the buttons on his coat, made him slip his arms out and used it to cover them instead. His kisses were eager and she returned them with equal joy. She wanted more and took off his tie and undid his shirt buttons, pushing her hand inside to stroke his warm smooth skin. She meant to encourage him to take a step further with his love-making.

Denis lifted himself up on his elbows. She knew he was smiling. ‘Sylvie,’ he said, ‘you’re leading me on. I think you’re trying to seduce me.’

‘Of course I am.’ She laughed softly.

He kissed her again. ‘I’m flattered, very flattered, but no. That must wait until we’re married.’

Until we’re married! His words thrilled her to the core. He hadn’t mentioned marriage so far but he was thinking of it! She hugged him again. She’d already imagined walking down the aisle to him in a beautiful white gown. Now she knew he wanted the same thing.

‘Yes.’ He seemed suddenly shy. ‘Would you be willing to wait? I really do want to marry you.’

‘Oh yes,’ she breathed and pulled him even closer. ‘There’s nothing I want more,’ she had to smile. ‘So it doesn’t matter now if we do make love, we can go all the way.’

‘Sylvie! No we can’t. We need to stop now before things get out of hand.’