Home for Christmas (7 page)

She told Lydia all this as they ascended the uncarpeted stairs, their footsteps clumping all the way to the top.

‘In ’ere,’ somebody called out from one of the two bedrooms.

A double bed took up most of the room in which a woman was propped up against a striped bolster. Lydia noticed it didn’t have a cotton slip and two pillows with it like the one on her bed at home. Just the bare bolster.

The woman looked to be in her late thirties, perhaps even her early forties. Two young girls, one of about twelve and the other ten, were at the washstand, a rickety piece with dented woodwork and broken tiles. Besides the bed, it was the only other piece of furniture in the room. They were pouring hot water from a jug into the basin.

‘We got everything ready for you, Sister,’ said the eldest in a forthright manner.

Lydia followed Sister Ursula’s lead and began pulling off her gloves and unfastening her cape.

‘We will need more water. Can you get some from the pump please?’ Sister Ursula asked the two girls.

The two girls looked at their mother. ‘Ma, we can’t.’

Their mother, her straggly hair clinging in wispy fronds around her pale face, shook her head. ‘Sorry, Sister. They ’ave to go to work, Sister. Our Lil’s got a job in the sugar factory and our Flo’s ’elping out at the greengrocer’s.’

‘Never mind. If one of your girls can show Nurse Lydia where the water pump is …?’ Sister Ursula asked. ‘Whilst you’re doing that, I’ll get started here,’ Sister Ursula said to Lydia.

Flo, the youngest, guided Lydia back down the stairs and out through the rear door into the back yard and along a path to an ancient water pump.

‘You need to give it a good tug,’ said Flo with the no nonsense manner of someone three times her age. ‘You ’old it and I’ll give it a pull.’

Lydia eyed the skinny girl with the long arms and eyes that seemed far too big for her face. The poor child; she looked too thin and weak to walk let alone battle with the water pump.

She suggested an alternative. ‘I’m older, bigger and stronger than you, so how about I tug the handle and you hold the jug beneath the spout?’

Flo shrugged her bony shoulders, prominent through the threadbare bodice she wore.

‘Up to you. ’Ave a go if you like, but I’m warning you, this pump ’andle’s got a mind of ’is own.’

‘I’m sure I can manage,’ said Lydia feeling too smug for her own good.

Flo folded her arms across her chest, a faint smile on her face as she moved aside to make room for Lydia.

Lydia took a deep breath, and using both hands gripped the handle tightly and gave it a mighty tug. The handle rebounded, jerking upwards. Lydia’s hands went with it, her aching arms feeling as though they’d been pulled from their sockets.

Flo regarded her with her big, soulful eyes and shook her head.

‘You hold the jug. I’ll pump,’ she suggested. This time Lydia didn’t argue. The water glugged and gurgled into the jug.

‘I’ll leave you to it, then,’ said the girl. ‘If the birthing of all me other brothers and sisters is anything to go by, it shouldn’t be long now.’

Lydia was of the opinion that the birth of the latest member of the family would be some time yet, but kept her opinion to herself. It wouldn’t do to be proved wrong again.

‘How many brothers and sisters do you have?’ she asked the girl.

‘Three brothers and three sisters. Our Lil’s the eldest. Then Toby. Then me. Teddy, Walter and Vi are all younger than me. There used to be an Olive and Dorothy as well but they went with the whooping cough and the scarlet fever. They was only little. Still,’ she said, as she fastened the one and only button on her cardigan, ‘must be going. Ta ta, Sister.’

On her return along the stony lane, Lydia worked out that Mrs Kinski had given birth to eight children, the eldest of whom was twelve. Two children had died. That worked out to one a year over eight years and four years to spare. It appeared that Mrs Kinski had produced a baby every eighteen months or so, far too many for the strongest of bodies. Poor woman. Poor children.

The wood of the door back into the house was white with age. Here and there were chips of dark green paint, but most of it was gone. Warped through lack of attention, the door took some tugging before it opened.

She gasped at a sudden scuttling across the floor in front of her. The house being ill lit it was difficult to see whatever had scurried across her path. The creature was probably more terrified of her than she was of it, she told herself, so she kept going and made the stairs without spilling a drop.

On reaching the tiny square of landing, she thought she heard a mewing sound. The sound escalated into the unmistakable cry of a new-born infant. The girl had been right. She had been wrong.

Sister Ursula was wrapping the baby up in what looked like the pillowcase missing from the bolster. Glancing at the washstand, Lydia noticed the water in the bowl was rose coloured. She also noticed the forceps.

‘It’s a boy,’ declared Sister Ursula on seeing Lydia. Her eyes flickered between Lydia and the bloodied forceps before fixing on Lydia with a mix of warning and pleading.

‘Boy or girl, it makes no difference. It’s still another mouth to feed,’ murmured Mrs Kinski.

Lydia emptied the bloodied water out the back window of the second bedroom, though getting to the window was not that easy.

Mattresses covered the floor, leaving only the smallest avenue to get through.

As she threw the water out of the open window, Lydia contemplated all that had happened and all that she had seen today. No more would she ever expect a cosy home in this part of the world or a mother feeling immense joy at the birth of a child. Poverty and pain dictated a mother’s response.

On the way back to the hospital, Sister Ursula said to her, ‘You will not mention the forceps.’ She spoke in German, having been delighted to discover that Lydia was familiar with the language, given her parentage. ‘I had no choice.’

Lydia frowned. Wasn’t it true that only a doctor could use forceps? Doctors possessed greater skills than nurses or midwives and using forceps was a task that also required great responsibility.

‘I know what you are thinking,’ Sister Ursula continued, sticking to German so her comments could not be overheard. ‘For the most part I believe it best a doctor uses forceps. However, there are times when one must do what one can quickly and without recourse to a doctor.’

‘But if anything had happened, I mean, I’ve heard the baby’s head can be crushed when forceps are used,’ said Lydia in German, the language she and her father had used when she was a child.

Sister Ursula stared straight ahead, as she spoke. ‘Yes and there are instances of a baby’s body coming out in bits. The truth of the matter is that, yes, I did take a risk in not summoning a doctor, but you see, a doctor would not have come. Mrs Kinski could not afford to pay for one. There was no choice. We have a live mother and a live child. That is payment enough. This is a secret between us, yes?’

On a Friday evening, just after six o’clock, Lydia left the ward after a long day. It had occurred to her to go for a walk. A glance out of the window to see a fresh wind fettering female legs with billowing skirts tempted her.

Somebody knocked at the door just as she was putting on her navy blue coat plus a matching hat with silvery grey pompoms on the side.

Sally, with whom she shared a room when she was on duty, looked at her and shrugged. ‘It’s not for me.’

Lydia wasn’t expecting anyone either, but seeing as she was already dressed for going out, she opened the door.

Agnes Stacey, her hair a glorious halo of unruliness around her face and dressed in olive green from head to toe, stood at the door.

‘My word,’ she said, eyeing Lydia up and down. ‘You’ve already got your hat and coat on. You must have guessed I was coming.’

‘Hardly …’

Lydia was speechless. Normally she might not have recognised a person on only meeting them once, but Agnes was more memorable than most.

‘I was just going out for a walk,’ Lydia began.

‘I came round to take you to the pictures. Have you seen the moving pictures yet?’

‘No. No, I have not, but …’

‘It’s my treat. Are you coming or not?’

Lydia finally agreed to go with her.

‘It’s only a short walk,’ Agnes said to her as they braced themselves against the wind, quickening their steps when it came at them face on between gaps in the buildings.

‘How did you find me?’ asked Lydia.

‘Easy. I telephoned your house. Some old battle-axe answered and said you were at the hospital. I told her I was a friend of yours, another nurse who wasn’t sure you were on duty tonight or not. She told me that you were but believed you finished at six. That was right, wasn’t it?’

Lydia shook her head and laughed. ‘Oh you are clever!’

Agnes looked pleased.

‘I spoke to an ambulance driver while I was at the hospital. He told me they were doing away with the last of the horse-drawn ambulances and replacing them with ones driven by petrol engines. I wondered …’ Agnes paused. Lydia thought she had a vague idea what was coming. ‘I wondered whether you could put in a good word for me. I can drive an ambulance. You know I can.’

Lydia was stunned, but also impressed by Agnes’s ingenuity. On the other hand, she wasn’t sure her recommendation would get her new friend what she wanted.

‘I could try, but do bear in mind that I’m only a student nurse.’

‘Perhaps we could devise a plan when you stay with us at Christmas.’

Lydia stopped in her tracks. ‘Where did you get this idea that my father and I would be staying with you at Christmas?’

Agnes’s wild hair was all over the place, half of it hiding her face. Sitting precariously on her thick head of hair, her hat looked in severe danger of slipping sideways.

‘Didn’t I tell you?’ she said, pushing past her and into Lydia’s room. ‘Sir Avis has invited you and your father to Heathlands for Christmas. I fully admit I had a hand in it; I told Sir Avis that I liked you and he thinks your father is a very good doctor. My, my,’ she said, her eyes darting from side to side and up and down as she gave the room due scrutiny. ‘What a miserable room. Like a cell for prisoners or nuns or something.’ She turned suddenly after cuddling a cushion then flinging it aside as though it were a bad-tempered cat.

‘You will come, won’t you? You do celebrate Christmas?’ Agnes asked brightly, her reddish-blonde hair glowing like autumn beneath her dark green hat.

Lydia was wearing pale grey kid gloves, but still she shoved her hands deep into her pockets, clenching her fists tightly. If she hadn’t been wearing gloves, her fingernails would have dug into her flesh.

‘Well?’ demanded Agnes when she didn’t answer.

‘We usually have a Christmas dinner – just the two of us though sometimes Aunt Iris, my mother’s sister, comes up from Dorset.’

‘Well,’ said Agnes, full of exuberance. ‘It couldn’t possibly compete with a Christmas at Heathlands. Everyone comes: staff, guests and even a few relatives whom Sir Avis is still speaking to.’

She laughed then, but halted on seeing the awkward tension on Lydia’s face.

‘Is there something else?’

‘My birthday’s on Christmas Eve,’ Lydia said hesitantly.

‘Well, that’s wonderful. We can celebrate that too.’

Lydia stopped and turned to face her new friend. ‘You don’t understand. We never celebrate my birthday. My mother died when I was born. My father still grieves, or at least I think he does. My father doesn’t really like my birthday to be mentioned.’

Agnes looked horrified. ‘It was hardly your fault. You didn’t ask to be born.’

Lydia shrugged. ‘What you’ve never had, you never miss, though there have been times when I’ve wanted to alter things.’

Agnes cocked her head. ‘Would your father turn down the invitation?’

Lydia sighed. ‘My father is very ambitious. Since my mother’s departure, he’s thrown himself heart and soul into furthering his career. German men of science – and that includes doctors – are very well respected all over the world.’

‘So you’re half German? Do you speak the language?’

‘I was brought up to speak it. My father thinks it will stand me in good stead.’

It was true. Her father had big ambitions; he wanted to become a truly middle-class Englishman with lofty connections. He’d wanted that the moment he’d come to England from Germany, a gifted doctor who had fallen in love with Emily Wilson, a girl from Dorset.

Agnes turned thoughtful. ‘I have a grand idea. You
will
come to Heathlands for Christmas and seeing as it’s your birthday on Christmas Eve, we’ll have a birthday party – just us young folk – you, Robert and me. I suppose we’ll also have to invite Siggy, Robert’s cousin. There has to be one cloud to spoil our day.’ On seeing Lydia’s puzzled face she added, ‘Siggy’s full name is Sylvester Travis Dartmouth. Sir Avis’s sister married an older man who happened to have a son by an earlier marriage. For some strange reason she dotes on him. Nobody else does!’

‘Sylvester Travis Dartmouth! That’s a mouthful. And this Robert, who might he be?’

Agnes hid her blushing face as they walked on into the wind.

‘He’s Sir Avis’s nephew and the most wonderful young man in the world.’

On noticing Agnes blushing, Lydia surmised that Agnes was in love.

Printed in black on sparkling white card with gilded edges, the invitations duly arrived courtesy of a special messenger.

Lydia’s father was over the moon.

‘We are indeed privileged,’ he said to her, sliding each card from hand to hand and back again, his face beaming with delight. ‘This will certainly be a change from just the two of us dining here, or three if your Aunt Iris deigns to impose on us for another year,’ he added with a frown.

‘You need to write to Aunt Iris and tell her we are indisposed. Quickly,’ Lydia advised.

It wasn’t so much that she didn’t welcome her aunt’s company over the festive season; it was just that she would much prefer to be with Agnes at Heathlands.

‘This Agnes. She’s the cook’s daughter?’

‘She is.’ Lydia thought of Agnes’s manner in that warm kitchen; her haughtiness, her unreserved confidence. Almost as though she owned the place, she thought to herself. She smiled at the thought of it.