Chocolate Girls (18 page)

‘Gracious, someone’s not very happy—’

Edie heard Frances’s calm voice on the stairs. She came down wearing a soft crimson wool dressing-gown, hair woven into a loose braid. Edie looked desperately at her.

‘I’m ever so sorry,’ she began.

‘Who’s this little one then?’

‘Warden handed him in last night,’ Janet said. ‘Family were bombed out somewhere off the Bristol Road. He needs looking after for the day.’

‘I’ll come as soon as I’ve finished work, I promise!’ Edie babbled, overwrought. ‘I feel terrible coming to you like this. I can look after him, and tonight I’ll go and see if his family’s come for him, only I didn’t know where to go and I know it’s an awful bother for you.’

‘Oh, I don’t suppose he’ll be too much bother,’ Frances said. ‘I’d have thought it’s the least I can do. You brave girls have been up all night, in the thick of it. It might make me feel a bit more useful. Let’s have a look at you, shall we?’

She took the child in her arms and he stopped crying for a moment, taking in the change of circumstances, then began roaring all over again. Frances laughed.

‘I think a good breakfast and a clean-up would help make this fellow a bit happier. D’you know, I’ve even still got a couple of ancient napkins of Janet’s somewhere – I use them as cloths. And we’ll go and make him some porridge.’

‘Are you sure?’ Edie said. But already she was reassured by the confident way Frances took the boy in her arms. She even seemed to be enjoying it.

‘Of course I’m sure. It’s no trouble. And what about you, Edie? You look as if you could do with a warm cup of tea and some breakfast. Come along and have some with Janet.’

In her tiredness, and in the face of this kindness after her treatment from her own mother, Edie burst into tears.

‘Oh, poor old you!’ Janet’s comforting arms wrapped round her. ‘It’s been the most wretched night, hasn’t it? Let’s go and get the kettle on.’

The day seemed such a long one. Everyone was full of talk as to how bad the night had been: ten hours of fear, misery and destruction. From her workmates, Edie learned some of the companies that had been hit, and the Great Western Arcade in town, the main signal-box at New Street, putting the station out of action. And houses, businesses, workshops all round Birmingham.

At dinnertime she sat with Ruby in the dining-room. They talked about the damage to Kitty Road. A Mrs Malone who they’d known most of their lives had been bombed out.

‘Our mom’s joined that stage show,’ Ruby said, rolling her eyes comically. But Edie could see she was actually pleased and proud. ‘It’s cheered her up no end. Only trouble now is she’s never flaming at home! And when she is she spends half her time putting greasepaint on her face. Says she’s got to practise!’

‘You ought to go as well,’ Edie said. ‘You’ve got a nice voice.’

‘Don’t be daft.’ Ruby blushed. ‘You know what, though – that fella, Wilf, in the Machines Construction department – he’s asked me to go out dancing with him!’

‘Wilf? He’s old enough to be your father!’

‘I know, but he’s all right. And at least I’ll get a night out sometime,’ Ruby said petulantly.

‘But you’re a married woman! What would Frank say?’

‘Oh, don’t be such a prude, Edie.’ She was looking quite sulky now. ‘Why does Frank need to know? They have all sorts laid on for them on that base. It’s only a bit of fun, and God knows we could do with some.’

Edie saw there was no point arguing. She told Ruby about the baby.

Ruby stopped with her spoonful of leek and potato soup half-way to her mouth.

‘What, you took him home? To number twenty-seven?’

‘To begin with.’ Edie’s face tightened. ‘Got short shrift from her of course. No, Janet’s mom’s got him. For now, anyroad.’

‘Ahh, has she? She’s a lovely lady, ain’t she? But where’s his mom? Dead?’

‘I don’t know,’ Edie said. ‘Don’t even know where he came from.’

By the late afternoon she felt dizzy with lack of sleep. As soon as the shift ended she tore back to Linden Road without waiting for Ruby, or Janet.

Frances opened the door, finger to her lips.

‘Come and see,’ she whispered.

She led Edie into the back room, where Marie Falla was knitting by the fire. She was a slender girl, her black hair cut in a bob. She smiled as they came in, nodding towards the fireplace.

‘He’s been ever so good,’ she said.

In the large bottom drawer of a chest, comfortably bedded down, the little boy was sleeping, clean and happily fed, his dark lashes curling above the angelic apple cheeks, mouth gently sucking on his thumb as he slept.

‘A thumb-sucker,’ Frances smiled.

‘He’s beautiful, isn’t he?’ Edie couldn’t stop staring at him. She so badly wanted to pick him up and love him, but she knew she mustn’t disturb him. ‘I’ll have to go back and enquire about him tonight, tell the WVS helpers where he is.’

‘Yes, of course,’ Frances said. ‘But there’s no need to take him with you at this stage, is there? It’s so cold and miserable out there. He’s well settled here, and he’s been no trouble, Edie, really he hasn’t.’

‘Thank you ever so much,’ Edie said, amazed once again by Frances’s kindness. ‘I don’t know what I’d have done if you hadn’t been so good about it.’

‘Not at all. Now, come and have a cup of tea while I put some food on. You look absolutely all in, dear. You both had such a night of it. You must go home and try and get some sleep.’

‘’Til the next air-raid anyway,’ Edie said gloomily.

Sipping her hot tea, she looked up at Frances. ‘I expect someone’ll come looking for him. But if they don’t, well, I must look after him. I just must.’

‘I know.’ Frances looked up from slicing parsnips the other side of the table. ‘He’s lovely. And you lost your own tiny one. I do understand, dear, how you must feel.’ Seeing Edie’s eyes fill, she went on, ‘Let’s just wait and see. But I’ve been thinking today. I’m sure we could all manage something between us. We all have to do our bit at the moment in whatever way we can. I’m sure I could help look after him until things are sorted out.’

‘Oh!’ Edie smiled in wonder. ‘Thank you. You’re so, so kind, Mrs Hatton!’

‘You sound blooming cheerful this morning, Ginger,’ one of the other girls observed, as she and Edie walked in for the morning shift. The various blocks of the works, swathed in camouflage, loomed around them in the grey morning. ‘Can’t say I’m ever up to singing at this time of day.’

Edie looked round. ‘Singing? I never was!’

‘Oh yes, you were! Humming, anyhow.’

‘Was I? I never even knew I was doing it!’

‘Well, someone’s put a smile on your face, haven’t they?’ the girl said cheekily, and one of the others joined in as they went in to collect their overalls.

‘Go on, tell us, Ginger! Who is ’e? Bit of a Christmas cracker then?’

Enjoying herself, Edie raised her eyebrows and gave them an enigmatic smile.

‘What you don’t know can’t hurt you, can it?’

The others ‘ooohed’ in response.

‘Daft pair,’ Edie laughed and went to her workroom to begin the day.

But it was true, there was a song in her heart. It was two days before Christmas and this month had been the happiest she could remember in a very long time. Today she felt especially fresh after a good night’s sleep unbroken by the air-raid sirens, but she had been up very early when David woke, giving him his morning feed and changing and dressing him. David was her name for him (‘He just
looks
like a David,’ she told Frances and Janet.) She thought it a nice, solid name, and right for him.

She sat in the kitchen drinking a cup of tea and cuddling him on her lap until he wriggled to be let down to toddle round the room, slipping on the lino in his little wool socks. Once or twice he sat down on his bottom with a bang, screwed up his face in pained surprise, then scrambled up and was off again. The very sight of him filled her with joy and tenderness and she could hardly wait until the end of the shift each day to get back to him and care for him. Over these very few weeks he had become the centre of her life.

In her happiness she pushed to the back of her mind the knowledge that he wasn’t really hers. He
felt
like her own, as if he had been a special gift brought to her to guard and cherish. She had been very jumpy in the first fortnight when he was with them. Every knock at the door set her heart pounding: was it someone who had come to find her little boy and take him away? Someone who had more right to him than she did? Such thoughts especially haunted her when she lay down to sleep at night. Who was she to deserve the care of such a beautiful child? What if his mother was alive, perhaps injured, in a hospital somewhere? Poor, heartbroken woman, to have lost her little boy! But no, Edie told herself. She had enquired repeatedly and left her address with the WVS and for the ARP warden in case anyone came to ask about ‘David’. But so far, no one had come. He must be an orphan and she was the one to save him. The thought that someone might still come and claim him was almost too painful to think about.

In any case, most of the day was too busy for her to dwell on these thoughts. The other element of her happiness was her inclusion in the Hatton household. After a week of her rushing back and forth with him to and from Stirchley every day, leaving him at the Hattons in the daytime, Frances suggested that Edie rent the fourth bedroom in their house and share it with David. At first she had been nervous of the idea, convinced she would be imposing on them, but Frances and Janet had gone out of their way to make her feel welcome, and soon, delighted, she agreed.

She adored living there, in the neat house, with its cosy kitchen where there was space for a table to sit round for breakfast. In the front parlour was the more formal, though pretty furniture: chintz-covered chairs round the hearth and the piano, which Frances and Janet occasionally played. There were dog-eared hymnbooks from when Frances had been a Sunday school teacher years ago, Mozart sonatas and ‘Für Elise’. But best of all Edie liked the snug back room with its cosy old chairs, colourful crocheted blankets draped over them to hide the bald patches. There were bookshelves and a wireless on the side table, and always newspapers and books and Frances’s bag of knitting. Edie came home every day with a sense of excitement at the thought of being so comfortable, so kindly treated and in such good company. Often after work she and Janet knelt on the Turkey rug by the fire making toast, warming a dish of butter on the hearth, and eating it with cups of tea and chatting unstoppably while David played on the floor. She’d never sat and talked so much in her life. Marie Falla was pleasant and easygoing and had found a factory job, so she was also working long hours, but when she came home she’d often come and join in.

As well as her fondness for Janet, Edie revelled in being close to Frances, for whom she felt something almost akin to worship. She would have done almost anything for her. Frances also encouraged her drawing and painting, and Edie had begun sketching her portrait, and was reasonably pleased with it, although she was really stronger at nature paintings. She also made herself as useful as she could, feeling that although she was paying rent she owed Frances Hatton far more than money and wanted to make things easier for her. Soon Frances said she didn’t know what she’d do without her in the kitchen.

‘Janet’s never been very handy like you are,’ she confided one evening when Edie had prepared the vegetables for dinner. ‘You’ve done those in record time – and with this little chap pulling at your legs all the time. You’re into everything, young man, aren’t you?’ She bent down to stroke David’s curls, and straightening up again, said, ‘I do want you to know, Edie, what a ray of sunshine he is for me in the house. I know you feel we’re doing you a favour, but you are doing us one as well. I don’t see much of my grandchildren. Marian, Robert’s wife, isn’t very family-minded. Having David about lifts one out of all the gloom of these days. And it’s very nice to have your company as well, dear.’

Edie smiled, delighted, and thanked Frances yet again.

‘I love living here,’ she said. ‘You feel like family much more than my own do.’

This was the absolute truth, though there were a number of unfamiliar things to adjust to. She loved the calm civility of the household, the kindness shown to everyone who came through the door. And quite a number of people
did
come through the door, many of whom were members of the Society of Friends. They were always very polite and pleasant, but also rather startling. She had still not puzzled out why so many Quakers felt it necessary to dress as if they were about to go on an extended hike over the Cairngorms. There was a Miss Cave who came from time to time who always wore walking boots and a woolly hat, even when invited for tea. And they were so intense and interested in everything that was going on, as if it was all their own personal responsibilty. Never in her life had she met people who talked like that, about their charitable works, as if they thought they might make any difference to the way things were. So far as she had always understood it, things were as they were and that was that. And she was touched by their concern for each other: there had been sad news over the past weeks. Two local families of Friends had been bombed out. In one case no one survived, but in the other every possible help was given by everyone and Edie saw how kind they all were. She was very nervous in their presence to begin with, but as everyone was so nice to her she soon learned to relax. Even with the idea that they were Conscientious Objectors who would rather go to prison or labour on the land than go to war. What her own mother would have to say about that!