Daughters of the Mersey (20 page)

June worked long hours but she enjoyed her days off in the middle of the week when everybody else was either at school or at work. Today, she was going to the shop because Mum had promised to make her a party dress and June knew her mother wouldn’t expect to be paid for it. She was hoping to persuade her to use one of Elaine’s patterns. She wanted a dress that made her look a little older and more sophisticated than she was. She wanted something new to wear to the smart restaurants to which Ralph
took her. He was always happy to buy dresses for her, but clothes rationing had become a perennial problem. A dress length took fewer coupons and Mum might give up some of her own, or persuade Pa to give up his.

‘Come early,’ Mum had said, ‘before we get busy.’

Last evening, June had gone out with Ralph and spent the rest of the night with him in his house. He had brought her a cup of tea in bed before going to work and she’d snoozed on for another hour.

The shop was busy when she got there and Ida’s sewing machine was positively racing while Mum dealt with customers. June picked up the folder containing Elaine’s patterns and sat down to make her choice.

Mum looked tired, but then she always did. Putting up with Pa would take a lot out of anybody. He expected to be waited on hand and foot. She shouldn’t let him get away with sitting about and doing nothing all day.

Mum pushed a pattern book into her hands and said before turning to another customer, ‘These would be more suitable for your age group, pet. Go up to the flat and make us all a cup of tea, I’m dying for a drink.’

June did so and her mother joined her there ten minutes later. ‘I’ve seen a pattern that I like,’ June told her. It was one of Elaine’s.

‘That would look good on me,’ Mum was pursing her lips, ‘or any middle-aged woman. I don’t think for you . . .’

‘Mum, I adore this bodice.’

‘Well, I could do you the bodice on a full skirt. That one is all swathed round the hips, it wouldn’t suit you at all and there’s a lot of work in it.’

‘All right,’ June grudgingly agreed. ‘I saw some green satin
downstairs that I like.’

‘It would make up well in wool and you’d get more wear out of it. I’ve got a nice blue material. I’ll show it to you when we go down.’

June said nothing. That was the best thing to do with her parents. They offered her choices but it was all a façade, they always wanted to choose everything for her.

‘Why don’t you pop in and see Pa while you’re this close?’ her mother suggested. ‘He talks about you a lot, wondering how you’re getting on. How do you like nursing?’

‘It’s all right, though it’s mostly domestic work so far. They don’t allow me near medicines or wounds yet.’

‘That’ll come. You could stay and have supper with us tonight. I’ve made a casserole.’

‘I’m sorry, Mum, I’ve planned to go out with some of the girls tonight. We’re going to the pictures to see Margaret Lockwood in
The Lady Vanishes
.’ She’d seen that on the placards as the bus had passed the Plaza. ‘I can only do that on my nights off.’

‘Of course, pet. So you’re making friends with the other girls in your group?’

‘Yes, they’re very nice. There’s one I really like called Mary O’Leary. She has the next bedroom to mine. I’m going out with her tonight.’

June found it a struggle to get away and she had to agree to her dress being made up in that blue wool which Mum said would be warmer for her. As if being warm was more important than looking smart. She took the bus to the top of Grange Road and went round the big shops looking at the goods on offer. Not that she had
any money, so she couldn’t buy anything, and it didn’t look as though she’d have much in the future. Her salary for the first year was £3.10/- a month, plus her keep and her uniform, but she had to buy her textbooks and her shoes and stockings out of that.

When it started to rain she went to Ralph’s rooms. She loved being here on her own, it was almost like having her own place. It was well past lunchtime and she was hungry, so she made a pot of tea and a sandwich from what she found in the larder. He knew she’d be here and had promised to leave work as soon as he could.

The wind howled round the house during the afternoon and it was raining more heavily when he came home just after five, bringing a gorgeous chocolate cake. More than anything else, June enjoyed the time she spent with him in his rooms.

By eight in the evening they were getting hungry again. It was stormy by then and they could see the big trees in the park tossing furiously but that didn’t stop Ralph taking her to New Brighton for dinner. After all, he could drive them from door to door so they needn’t get wet, though the canvas roof was saturated and June felt an occasional cold drop fall on her head.

They were soon seated at a table in the restaurant window. The rain was gusting against it and blotting out any view but it didn’t matter, Ralph was on good form, laughing and joking. He was so much fun. They shared a bottle of wine and the food was much better than that in the hospital.

When they left, the storm was at its height and in the blackout June couldn’t even see the sea as they drove along the promenade, though she could hear the full tide thundering against the sea wall and the boom and
suck as torrents of water crashed over on to the road.

The windscreen wipers couldn’t cope with the downpour. ‘I can barely see the road through this.’ Ralph was peering nervously out and his unease put June on edge. ‘A good job there’s not much traffic about.’

June shivered, it was a wild night to be out. After they’d crossed Poulton Bridge and were coming into Birkenhead’s dockland, Ralph spoke again. ‘That big pub looks closed. The customers must have gone home early.’

‘What time is it?’ June tried to see her watch in the light from the dashboard. She usually aimed to be back at the nurses’ home before they locked the front door but she wasn’t too worried because her room was on the ground floor and she always took the catch off the window and left it fractionally open so she could squeeze her fingers in and push it up. As they neared the St James’s roundabout, they could hear the piercing shriek of police sirens over the noise of the storm.

Ralph turned the car carefully into Laird Street and June felt panic streak through her as she saw multiple headlights racing towards them, one set on their side of the road.

As she felt Ralph try to swerve to avoid it she let out a scream and her heart bounced into her throat. A split second later came a violent jerk as their car was rammed and then the earsplitting scrape and tear of metal and splintering glass. June felt as though she was being twisted and her head wrenched from her body. An almighty force catapulted her through the air. She felt a searing pain before she blacked out.

T
HE FOLLOWING MORNING, THE
telephone disturbed Steve
as it rang in the hall outside his study. He stirred and stretched on his bed, knowing he’d fallen asleep again after Leonie had brought him his morning tea. ‘Damn,’ he swore.

By now she’d have gone to work. He couldn’t rush to answer it, he still felt half asleep. It would surely stop ringing before he reached it. He let his head fall back on the pillow and waited for the annoying noise to stop. It took a long time. Probably it was somebody wanting to speak to Leonie.

About an hour later it started ringing again. Steve had his false leg strapped on and was almost dressed but he’d heard Mrs Killen come in and start to Hoover. He knew she’d answer it.

He heard her call, ‘Mr Dransfield, somebody from the hospital wants to speak to you.’

He sighed, that must be June, but what could she want this early in the morning? Perhaps she was ringing to say she’d come and have supper with them tonight.

He’d got to his feet but Mrs Killen was hammering on his bedroom door. ‘They say it’s important and can I get you to the phone.’

‘All right, I’m coming.’ It made him irritable to be rushed. June knew he couldn’t cope with that. He snatched
up the phone, ‘Hello, June,’ he said.

A brisk authoritative voice answered. ‘I’m Sister Jackson, speaking from the General Hospital. Is that Mr Dransfield, father of Nurse June Dransfield?

‘Yes.’ He was abrupt. ‘Who else is likely to be here?’

‘Oh!’ Her shocked gasp told him she wasn’t pleased at being spoken to like that. ‘I’m afraid I have some bad news for you, Mr Dransfield. Your daughter has had an accident.’

‘What sort of an accident?’ he demanded. This woman was upsetting him.

‘She was a passenger in a car involved in a crash, and was brought in here shortly after eleven o’clock last night.’

He took a deep breath. That didn’t seem likely. ‘Is this a joke?’

‘Of course not, Mr Dransfield.’ The woman was affronted. ‘Nobody would joke about a thing like this.’

It sounded a serious accident. ‘Well, I don’t think it can be my daughter. Was it a man driving the car?’

‘Yes, I believe so.’

‘June doesn’t know anybody who has a car, and she’s one of your nurses, surely she’d have been in bed by that time.’

‘Mr Dransfield,’ she sounded as though she was drawing on the patience of Job, ‘it is your daughter. There is no doubt about that and I must ask you please to come to the hospital to see us. As she’s under age we need a parent to sign a consent form. She might need an operation.’

Steve could feel himself shaking, ‘But I don’t understand. What’s happened to her? Is she badly hurt?’

‘She has multiple cuts and concussion, together with a deep gash on the head.’

‘But what was that you said about
an operation?’

‘Mr Dransfield, if you could come in and speak to her doctor, he will explain your daughter’s condition to you. Speaking generally, after trauma the brain can swell and surgical intervention may be required. Please come in and sign a consent form so that we can treat your daughter if, in her case, it proves to be necessary.’

Steve couldn’t get his breath, he couldn’t cope with this. Not June! How could this terrible thing have happened to her? ‘I’ll ring her mother and let her know,’ he choked out eventually. ‘She’ll come and see you.’

There was no way he could go out on the bus this morning. He definitely wasn’t up to it. He was shaking all over and his brain had turned to mush. He couldn’t even think of the number of Leonie’s shop.

‘Are you all right?’ Mrs Killen pulled a chair behind him and pushed him on to it.

‘No, I feel terrible. Something’s happened to June. Can you get Leonie on the phone for me? She’ll have to go to the hospital to see her.’

Leonie was equally shocked. She blurted out something of the problem to Ida and asked her to hold the fort until she got back. She grabbed her coat and ran the twenty yards along the road to the bus stop. Some distance away, she could see a bus lumbering towards her.

She was worried, not only about June but about Steve too, he could hardly get the words out to tell her what had happened and he couldn’t remember of the name of the sister who had rung him.

She, too, found it hard
to believe June had been out in a car with a man. June didn’t know any men and she hadn’t been at the hospital long enough to get to know a man well enough to go out with him. And last night had been so stormy. A tree had blown down in next door’s garden.

Leonie didn’t like hospitals. The smell of disinfectant brought back searing memories of visiting Steve when he’d been injured. She was directed to the nurses’ sick bay – a side room on Ward 3. She found Sister Jackson sympathetic when she told her Steve was an invalid. She was efficient, too, and the consent form was produced for Leonie’s signature.

‘This might not be needed,’ she said, ‘but we should have it ready because we don’t want any hold-up if it is.’

‘How is she?’

‘She has quite a deep cut on her head. She’s had seventeen stitches in it.’

Leonie gasped, that sounded horrific. ‘Seventeen stitches?’

‘Yes, and I’m afraid they had to shave off her hair on that side.’

‘Oh dear! She’s very proud of her hair, she won’t like that.’

‘The good news is that when her hair grows again any scaring won’t show.’

‘I hadn’t thought of that.’

‘She’s been unconscious for most of the time and hasn’t been able to say much so far, but she’s drifting in and out of consciousness this morning.’

‘But she will get better?’

‘We have every reason to suppose she will, but the outcome is never certain. We have to hope, Mrs Dransfield.’

‘I don’t understand
how she came to be out with a man in a car in that awful storm.’

‘We understand it was her boyfriend.’

‘But she doesn’t have a boyfriend. Do you know this man’s name?’

Sister was looking through the file she’d made for June. ‘He was brought here too, of course. You’ll find him on Ward One. His name, yes, I made a note of it. His name’s Ralph Harvey.’

‘I’ve never heard of him,’ Leonie burst out, but then paused. ‘Hold on, Ralph . . .?’

‘Harvey.’

That could be Elaine’s brother, couldn’t it? Leonie was frowning, ‘Yes, I think I know who he is.’

‘I’ll take you in to see her then. I arranged for somebody to sit with her so we’d know when she came round.’

Leonie followed her into a side ward. It contained two beds but only one was occupied. A nurse was sitting by June.

‘Thank you, Nurse Coates. Nurse Dransfield’s mother is here now and will stay with her for a while.’

Leonie sat down on the chair she vacated. June was lying flat without pillows and her eyes were closed. Her skin was the colour of tallow, with numerous red grazes. Her arm was attached to a drip, her fingers were bandaged and she had a large pad of cotton wool taped to one side of her head. What made June recognisable was her long golden hair spread out across the sheets.

Leonie couldn’t stop her sharp intake of breath. Her daughter looked really ill.

The sister checked her drip. ‘This is just to keep her hydrated while she’s unconscious.’

Leonie reached for her
daughter’s free hand. It felt cold.

‘Speak to her, it might help to bring her round.’