Jenny's War (38 page)

‘I am afraid, however,’ Harry was saying, ‘that my colleagues may feel they need to question your mother. Just to see if she has any idea where this Arthur Osborne might be.’

‘She won’t know. He’s long gone and she’s got this other feller now.’

‘Ah yes,’ Harry consulted the notes he’d been making as Jenny talked. ‘Mr Jenkins. Is that right?’

Jenny nodded.

‘And you’re sure there’s nothing more you want to tell me about him?’

Jenny shook her head. ‘He never really did anything – you know – but I just didn’t like him.’

‘I’m sure your “feelings” were right, love. You did well to get yourself out of there.’

‘Will you be questioning him?’ Miles asked.

Harry shook his head. ‘Not at the moment, Mr Thornton, but I shall report everything to my superior and he’ll take it from there. But Jenny can forget all about it now. There’ll be no further action as far as she’s concerned, I can assure you of that. Now she’s back with you, I’m sure she won’t be getting into any more scrapes, at least none that are on the wrong side of the law, that is.’ He ended with a rumbling laugh as he heaved himself out of the chair and picked up his helmet.

When the policeman had left, his rotund form wobbling a little on his bicycle, Georgie tweaked Jenny’s nose playfully. ‘Father was right, as he usually is. Now you can forget all about it.’

‘I just hope Mum doesn’t get arrested.’

‘I don’t think for a minute she will, Jen. Like you say, she’ll talk her way out of anything and besides, rather like you, she was under Arthur’s thumb.’

‘I’ll find out from PC Webster how things go,’ Miles promised. ‘He’ll keep us posted about your mother, I’m sure.’

‘Thank goodness that’s all over,’ Charlotte said, getting up. ‘And now we have the weekend to look forward to. Felix is coming. You remember Felix, the artist, don’t you, Jen?’

‘I remember you talking about him, but I never met him.’

‘Didn’t you?’ Charlotte said in surprise. Then she wrinkled her forehead. ‘Come to think about it, I don’t think he did visit in the early years of the war.’ She smiled. ‘Too busy trying to protect his precious paintings from the bombing, I expect.’

‘And don’t forget Cassandra is coming this weekend,’ Georgie put in. ‘She’s got seventy-two hours’ leave.’

Jenny glanced at Charlotte and saw the delight fall from her face at the mention of someone called Cassandra. ‘Ah yes,’ she said quietly. ‘I’d almost forgotten.’

‘Who’s Cassandra?’ Jenny asked, innocent of the bombshell that was about to fall.

‘Cassandra is my girlfriend, Jen. She’s in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force. She was stationed where I was after I got back. She’s lovely. You’ll like her, I know you will.’

Jenny stared at him, wondering how he could be so stupid. How could she ever even begin to like any girlfriend of Georgie’s when she was so desperately in love with him herself?

Cassandra was certainly lovely to look at, but there was no way Jenny would ever take to her in a million years. And to Jenny’s surprise, Charlotte didn’t seem to like the girl either. Though she was polite and charming to her as she was to everyone, there was not the warmth in her tone or in her actions with which she’d welcomed Jenny or greeted Felix, who arrived on the same train as the smartly dressed Waaf. But Miles fussed around Cassandra, making sure she had everything she needed. In the kitchen, Jenny heard Mrs Beddows give a wry snort. ‘Men! They fall over themselves for a pretty face. “Handsome is as handsome does”, that’s what I say.’

‘She’s very beautiful,’ Jenny said, setting the dirty plates she brought from the dining room on the kitchen table. Whilst there were extra guests and Kitty was on ARP duty, Jenny had offered to help Joan.

‘I’m frit of serving posh guests, miss,’ the young girl told her fearfully.

‘You needn’t worry about Mr Kerr. He’s an old darling.’ Already Jenny was charmed by the flamboyant artist. He seemed to know all about her and her ambition to be an artist. Charlotte had obviously told him. ‘And as for Cassandra – ’ Jenny sniffed dismissively – ‘you certainly needn’t bother about
her
.’

Some of the anxiety left Joan’s face as she giggled. ‘You sound as if you don’t like her much, miss.’

Georgie’s mine, Jenny wanted to shout, but she bit her tongue and smiled weakly. ‘Maybe she’ll improve on further acquaintance,’ she said, rather grandly, and stuck her nose in the air. Then she dropped the charade and chuckled along with Joan. ‘But I doubt it.’

‘Last time she came,’ Joan began, confiding in the girl who was about the same age as she was, ‘I had to act as her lady’s maid.’

Jenny’s eyes widened. ‘She’s been here before? I thought this was her first visit.’

‘Oh no. This is her third – at least, I think it is. Isn’t it, Mrs Beddows?’

‘Isn’t it – what?’ Mrs Beddows was putting the finishing touches to a trifle, her tongue caught between her teeth as she set the cherries on top of the whipped cream. Jenny watched her. ‘D’you know, I haven’t tasted cream since I left here.’

Mrs Beddows smiled as she glanced up and winked at her. ‘That’s the advantage of living in the country, lass. The master’s been able to see that none of us go short and he keeps on the right side of the law, though quite how he does it, I don’t know.’

‘He makes sure we all get a fair share and not just in this house neither,’ Joan said knowingly.

‘And how d’you know a thing like that, missy?’

‘’Cos me dad ses, that’s how. Me dad ses there’s not a finer feller in this country than Mr Thornton, even though he’s a stranger.’

‘A stranger? Mr Thornton?’ Jenny was appalled. ‘How can you say that? He’s lived here years.’

Mrs Beddows was bending double with laughter. ‘You’re never a local in the countryside, lovey, unless you’ve been born here.’ She straightened up. ‘Mind you, Mr Thornton’s better thought of than most townies. I came with him when he moved here and I reckon I’m only just beginning to be accepted by the locals, but I’m still “’er what come here with the squire”.’

Memories came flooding back. Name calling in the playground at school when she’d been here before had included the derisory ‘townie’ amongst other names. Jenny shuddered and tried not to think about that time. And yet it had turned into a happy experience, but that had all been down to Miles and Charlotte and, of course, Georgie.

‘There – all done.’ Mrs Beddows stood back to admire her own handiwork. ‘Now just you be careful carrying it upstairs. Which of you is going to take it up to the dining room?’

‘She is.’ The two girls pointed at each other and spoke at the same moment. There was a pause before Jenny sighed and said, ‘Oh, all right, then. I suppose I’ll have to.’

‘You won’t get the sack if you drop it,’ Joan said. ‘I might.’

‘I don’t think so, but you shake so much when you go in there, you most likely would drop it.’ Jenny picked up the trifle and cast a wicked glance at Joan. ‘If I do trip up with it, I’ll just have to mind I’m chucking it in the direction of Lady Muck.’

‘Now, now,’ Mrs Beddows chastised gently, but Jenny could see the older woman was having difficulty in keeping a straight face.

‘So – how many times has she been here before, then?’

‘A couple of times.’

‘And?’

‘And – what?’

‘How serious is it?’

‘With Georgie, you mean?’ Mrs Beddows shrugged. ‘He seems very – ’ she paused, not quite knowing what word to use in front of the young girls. In her own mind she’d have said he was ‘besotted’ but the word didn’t sound quite seemly to use about Georgie. It made him sound weak and the brave young pilot was no such thing. She sighed inwardly. And yet didn’t love make you weak? She supposed he must love the girl, but the cook couldn’t see why. Miss Hoity-Toity was her name for Cassandra. She glanced at Jenny, still standing holding the trifle. ‘Now, don’t you drop that, Jen, else you’ll have me to deal with – not the mistress.’

‘You still haven’t answered my question,’ Jenny said doggedly. The glass bowl in her hands was beginning to feel cold and slippery so she set it down on the table again. ‘Please, Mrs Beddows, tell me.’

The cook stared at her as she heard the urgency in Jenny’s tone – the yearning. My goodness, Mrs Beddows realized with a pang. The poor child fancies herself in love with Master Georgie. Oh dear, oh dear. She’s in for some heartache, there’s nothing so sure. She pulled in a deep breath. There was no point in lying to her, no point at all, but she couldn’t bring herself to say more than, ‘I think he’s very fond of her.’

Jenny stared at her for a moment then picked up the trifle and carried it carefully up the stairs and into the dining room to place it in front of Charlotte to serve. Fond. Mrs Beddows had said ‘fond’. That was nothing much to worry about, but as she took her place at the table once more, next to Felix Kerr, she saw Georgie’s eyes on Cassandra’s lovely face and to Jenny’s jealous eyes his feelings for the young woman were a whole lot more than ‘fond’.

‘Now tell me, young lady,’ Felix said, putting his arm around Jenny’s shoulders as they all finished eating and rose to go into the drawing room. ‘Have you kept up your painting?’

Jenny bit her lip. ‘I’ve tried.’ She hoped Miles and Charlotte wouldn’t tell Mr Kerr what she
had
been doing while she’d been away. ‘But it was sometimes difficult to get paper and paints. I did quite a lot, but I had to leave them all behind when we went back to London.’

Overhearing their conversation, Charlotte said, ‘Your table’s still waiting for you in the studio upstairs. We’ve never moved it. You can go up there any time you want to. Help yourself to whatever you want, darling.’

‘Studio?’ Cassandra’s eyebrows, plucked into a neat curve, rose a little. ‘You have a studio, Mrs Thornton? Are you an artist, then? I hadn’t realized.’

Jenny felt a stab of pleasure. Despite her air of superiority, Cassandra had not been invited to call Charlotte by her Christian name and yet, from the moment she’d arrived here as a scruffy little urchin, Jenny had been made to feel part of the family at once. No such courtesy had been extended to Georgie’s girlfriend, it seemed. She risked a glance at Georgie’s face. Was he upset by the fact? It didn’t seem so. He was ushering Cassandra across the hall and into drawing the room, his arm protectively around her waist. As Cassandra sat down and crossed her shapely legs, she asked, ‘What do you paint?’ She made it sound as if Charlotte was a mere amateur.

Before Charlotte could even open her mouth to reply, Jenny saw Felix’s eyes sparkle with mischief. ‘Obviously you don’t know very much about the art world, Miss Willoughby, or you would have heard of Charlotte Thornton. Her work sells exceedingly well in the best gallery in London.’

Since Jenny knew that the outlet for Charlotte’s paintings was Felix’s own gallery, she understood the twinkling in his eyes.

‘And Felix is a very well-known artist, Cassandra,’ Charlotte said gently, no doubt feeling guilty at Felix teasing their guest. ‘You must have heard of Felix Kerr.’ But Cassandra’s next words must have wiped away any feeling of embarrassment. The young woman wrinkled her forehead as she drawled, ‘No, I can’t say I have, but of course Daddy’s in banking. He doesn’t move in the arty circles.’ She said the last two words with a scathing tone, as if such a thought was anathema to her and her family.

‘He must be finding it difficult just now,’ Felix said easily. ‘As we all are. The art world has virtually shut down.’

‘They’ve taken a lot of the valuable paintings out of the city, haven’t they?’ Miles said, handing out the cups for Charlotte whilst she poured.

Felix nodded. ‘Away from the bombing.’

‘We have a portrait gallery at Willoughby Hall,’ Cassandra said, accepting a cup of coffee. ‘But Daddy has had all the paintings wrapped up and put down in the cellars until the war’s over.’

‘Very wise,’ Miles murmured. He smiled across the room at Jenny. ‘You must take up your painting again in earnest, Jenny. You showed real promise.’

‘I still have your picture of the beach in my bedroom,’ Georgie said, grinning.

But it was Cassandra’s face that was the ‘picture’ on hearing his words.

‘You’ll be going to school here, I take it,’ Felix said, still addressing Jenny. A moment’s fear crossed her face as she remembered her last so-called welcome to the village school. ‘Well, I’ve left. I’ve been working. I would have liked to have stayed on because I – I missed so much when – when we were moving about. But I don’t suppose I could go back now.’

‘Then we’ll engage a tutor to help you catch up,’ Miles said. ‘Maybe we could get you into the grammar school in Lynthorpe. Perhaps you’d have a better chance of getting into art college from there.’

Jenny almost dropped her cup and saucer as she stammered, ‘Art college?’ Suddenly, her face was alight with hope and joy. Art college! She’d only ever dared to dream such a thing and now here was Miles talking as if it could really be possible. Even when Jim had suggested it, she’d known, deep down, that it would never happen. Not while her mother was around. But if Miles and Charlotte were suggesting it, then that was entirely different. If she could go back to school, catch up with all the lessons she’d missed as Miles was promising, then maybe – just maybe – she could make something of the scruffy little urchin, the city street kid.

And maybe then Georgie would forget all about his toffee-nosed girlfriend. But first she had a lot of growing up to do. She knew he was watching her, she could feel his gaze upon her, but at this moment her brilliant blue eyes, wide and shining, were fastened on Miles’s face. ‘Do – do you really think I could?’

‘Why not?’ Miles said, spreading his hands as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Jenny turned her gaze to Charlotte. ‘Am I good enough?’

‘You showed a lot of promise for your age when you were with us, Jenny,’ Charlotte said seriously. ‘But we’d need to see how you’ve progressed.’

Jenny’s face fell. ‘I haven’t had anyone to advise me. Mum—’ She stopped, unwilling to say anything else derogatory about her mother. Enough had been said already.

‘Don’t worry,’ Charlotte promised. ‘I’ll help you.’