Pattern of Shadows (15 page)

The back of Mary’s cotton dress clung between her shoulder blades and although it had only taken her twenty minutes to get from home to the street where Frank lived, sweat beaded her forehead and tendrils of hair had escaped from the roll she’d pinned at the back of her neck. She pushed open the small gate and took two steps to the front door. Number four; this was it.

Her heart thumped remembering the last time she saw Frank, but she was determined not to let him see she was nervous; after all she’d been dealing with bullies at home all her life. She wanted him to know that she would report him if he carried on with his maltreatment of the prisoners and then she would make sure he understood he and she were finished. But was she being stupid just coming here? She decided that if he answered the door and no one else was in the house she’d stand on the step and tell him.

She glanced up and down Barnes Street. The houses had an air of past affluence. Although terraced, they were stone fronted with bay windows and low walls enclosed small areas of tarmac in front of each one. There wasn’t a soul around; no one sat on their doorsteps, no one leant against the walls gossiping and there was no noise: no shouting, no radios, no cries of children. The only sounds Mary heard were the rumble of vehicles from Shaw Road and the shouts of male voices. It sounded as though there was some sort of game, perhaps a football match, at the camp.

Mary turned to look at the house in front of her. Amongst all the others this one stood out in its neglect. The paint on the door, once black, was dull and flaked
and the oblong leaded window in the upper panel was filthy. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a movement in the net curtain in the window next door. Taking a deep breath she grabbed the brass knocker and hammered. She waited, re-pinning her hair and straightening the collar of her dress.

The door was tugged twice before it opened. The woman who stood in the doorway gave her a toothless smile. ‘I know who you are; you’re our Frank’s Mary? I’m Nelly. Come in, out of this heat. I’ll give him a shout. He’s still asleep in his room, being on nights like.’ Mary followed the stout figure down the hall. The back of Nelly’s slippers were flattened and slapped against her feet. ‘I’ll make a brew in a minute, pet, but you’ll have to come through to the wash house, I’m just mangling some clothes.’

‘I only wanted a word with Frank if you don’t mind, Mrs Shuttleworth.’

‘Nelly!’

‘Nelly. It’s just that I’m on shift at two o’clock.’

‘Plenty of time.’ The older woman stood over a copper tub and stirred the washing one last time with the long wooden dolly-stick. ‘I’ll have to get this out on the line. First lot’s already dry.’ She lifted a white sheet out of the soapy water and fed it through the rollers by turning the large wheel on the side of the mangle. The muscles under the skin of her bare arms bulged. She gave Mary another gummy grin. ‘I take washing in from the big houses. Keeps the wolf from the door.’

‘I’m sorry, I don’t have much time and I still have to get back home to change.’

‘Well, if it’s that urgent …’ Frank’s mother was
obviously disappointed that Mary wasn’t going to have time to chat.

‘It is.’

‘Tell you what, then. I’ll rinse these and make a cuppa. You go and wake him up. Up the stairs, first right.’

‘OK.’

Mary waited a moment outside Frank’s bedroom and then, slowing her breathing, knocked.

‘What?’ He yelled. ‘Ma?’

‘It’s Mary.’

She heard the springs on his bed crunch and then he opened the door. ‘What are you doing here?’ She stepped back. He was wearing only his trousers and he scowled at her as he fastened the fly buttons and tugged fiercely on his belt, his arm muscles flexing under the skin. ‘What’s up with you? What d’you think I’m going to do? In my own house?’

‘After the other day? In mine?’ Mary shrugged. ‘I need to talk to you.’ She avoided looking at him. Hitching her bag further onto her shoulder and crossing her arms, she stepped into the room, wincing as he slammed the door. Hearing his mother singing outside in the yard as she pegged out the sheets made Mary feel a little less anxious.

Frank went to his bedside table and picked up a packet of cigarettes. He sat down on the edge of the bed and lit one. ‘Sit down.’ He gestured with his thumb towards a chair in the corner of the room piled high with clothes. ‘Shift that lot.’ He blew smoke out, making an impatient clicking noise with his tongue on the back of his teeth.

‘I won’t, thanks.’ Mary crossed to the window and watched his mother hook the wooden prop under the washing line and hoist it higher. Steam began to rise
instantly from the sheets. Now she was here she couldn’t think where to start. Without turning around she blurted, ‘I know you resent Tom and, especially after the other day, I don’t really care.’ She heard the crack of his knuckles. ‘What you said about him and about me just showed how nasty you are.’ The headboard of the bed creaked and then bumped softly against the wall as Frank leaned against it.

When he answered her, his tone was surly. ‘What do you expect, you and your flaming brother? I’m sick of everything. I should be out there fighting the bloody Jerries, part of this invasion that’s going on and here I am looking after a bunch of Nazis.’

‘I’ve heard all this before, Frank.’

‘Aye and you look at me as though I’m a rotten smell under your nose half the time.’

‘I don’t.’ She took a quick look over her shoulder at him. He was biting his nails. ‘But it’s … it’s not worked out, Frank. Even before you did what you did in our house you wanted too much, too soon.’ She heard his snort of derision and took a deep breath. ‘We’re finished. I want you to understand that before I leave here.’ She rushed on before she ran out of courage. ‘And the other thing is I’ve heard about some of the things you and the other guards do.’ She flinched as she heard him launch himself off the bed to stand behind her.

‘What! What’re you talking about?’

Her skin crawled when she felt his breath on her neck but she carried on. ‘They won’t let you get away with it, you know. They’ll complain.’

‘Complain? Complain?’ His voice trembled with suppressed rage. ‘They’ve got the life of bloody Riley up there. Half of them got sodding captured the first time
they saw some action. You haven’t a bastard clue! Besides it’s none of your business. Poking your nose in …’ Mary drew away. He stank of stale beer and cigarettes. ‘I could complain … complain about how bloody knackered I was … being told to stand and fight … but not being allowed to fire on the Boche planes that flew over us,’ she heard the sneer, ‘in case we warned the Panzer division that was coming up behind them. I could complain about being bombed left, right and sodding centre.’

He moved to the side of her. Mary shifted away from him again. She watched his mother balance the washtub on its rim and empty out the dirty water. It sloshed over her feet but she didn’t seem to notice and paddled through it to feel the hems of the drying sheets.

‘Like I said before, you’ve told me this already, Frank. I know it was horrible.’

He interrupted, ‘What do you know? Sod all! You didn’t have half your bloody leg torn to bits. You weren’t stuck on a truck for bloody days on end, a sodding sitting target. So don’t tell me you bloody well know.’ He was almost touching Mary. She flinched away from him. ‘You know nothing!’ He spat out the words and walked back to his bed. She heard him crush his cigarette in the saucer he used as an ashtray and then light another, adding to the fug of blue smoke.

She tugged at the lock on the frame and lifted the casement open. When he spoke again his voice was so low Mary had to half turn to hear him. ‘On the beach I was on a stretcher near a Red Cross flag. They’d to put Skipper next to me. They’d no choice.’ Frank smirked. ‘He had good teeth and a bad temper, that dog.’ He began to pace the floor behind Mary, banging one fist into the
palm of his other hand. She listened to cold hatred in his words. ‘A Red Cross flag, but the bastards still strafed us. I still dream about that … men yelling … screaming … shouting for water … no one daring to come near us.’ He raised his voice. ‘Shells whining and bursting all around. Bastards. Bastards.’ He stood close behind her and hissed the words. ‘And you wonder why I hate the bleedin’ lot of them.’

Mary sighed. ‘I know – I think I know how hard it is Frank. But you can’t keep using it as an excuse. If the Commandant knew how you felt, you’d be taken off your duties. Thousands of men are going through what you’ve been through. It’s not that I don’t feel sorry for …’

‘I don’t want your ruddy pity.’

Mary watched his mother emerge from the outside lavatory in the yard, her skirt up around her waist as she adjusted her pink bloomers. She stared up at Mary who turned from the window and went to stand in front of Frank.

‘Every time something goes wrong, every time,’ she emphasised, ‘you blame what happened to you. But you can’t carry on like this, Frank. And I’m sorry but neither can I. Like I said, it’s finished.’

‘It’s that bloody doctor, isn’t it? I’ve heard the rumours.’

Mary went cold. She stepped back as he stood up, punctuating each word with a poke of his finger into her chest. ‘The so-called sodding
Lagerführer
.’ He sneered. ‘
Schormann
; mouthpiece for that festering lot.’ Mary watched the speckles of spit gather at the corner of his mouth. ‘Well, you can tell your precious friend to watch his back.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, Frank. There
are no rumours because there’s nothing to gossip about.’ She walked as steadily as she could to the door. ‘I have to go now, I’m due on shift.’ She paused. ‘I didn’t want it to be like this, Frank…’

‘No, I bet you bloody didn’t.’

She was halfway down the stairs when he shouted again. His words sent a shock of fear through her. ‘Remember! Tell him … tell that
precious
Schormann to watch his back. Tell him, I’ll be watching him. Tell him, I’ll make sure the Nazi bastards are watching him as well.’

The wedding party piled off the bus, a rowdy giggling crowd, leaving it almost empty. ‘That bus driver had a shock seeing us lot,’ Patrick laughed.

‘The conductor sent his best wishes,’ Mrs Winterbottom said to Jean, peering from under the brim of her hat which had been knocked crooked in the crush. She straightened it and followed at a sedate pace as they crowded into The Crown. The groom’s father was already there. He sat in his usual place in the corner of the room by the large stone fireplace, pint pot in hand. There was no fire in the hearth; instead a large aspidistra filled the space, Betty Green’s contribution to the celebrations.

It was a gloriously sunny day. Some of the guests, mostly Patrick’s workmates and a few off-duty nurses from the hospital, collected their drinks from the bar and
made their way outside to sit on the benches. Except for Ellen, the family stayed inside.

‘I don’t know why you couldn’t have come to the Registry Office.’ Winifred stood over her husband, brave enough to challenge him in a roomful of people.

He didn’t answer. Instead he raised his glass. ‘Cheers, you two,’ he shouted across the room, ‘mine’s a pint.’

Mrs Winterbottom, resplendent in her matching floral hat and dress, once the curtains in the back bedroom of her house, looked at him with distaste and turned her back.

Mary watched Patrick carry the foamless beer over to her father. Wedding or no wedding, Stan Green wasn’t going to let sentiment get in the way of business. If anything the ale looked more watered down than ever.

‘You’re feeling generous,’ she said to her brother as he passed her.

‘I told you, nowt’s going to spoil today. Master of my own house now, our kid.’ He winked at her. She supposed he was right, Jean’s home was his now, though it didn’t seem quite right. She hoped when her friend realised that it wouldn’t be too much of a shock

‘What’re you having, Mam? Stout, sherry?’ Mary said, pulling out one of the chairs at her father’s table. ‘Sit down, it’ll be a crush once they bring the food out, so you’ll be better off over here.’ She put a hand on her father’s shoulder. ‘You’re OK with that aren’t you, Dad?’ She made the warning clear. ‘You’ll make sure there’ll be nothing that spoils the day for Patrick and Jean, won’t you?’

He waved his hand, refusing to meet her eye. ‘Just keep the drinks coming.’

‘I wish out Tom could be here, Mary.’

‘And me, Mam.’

Bill glowered into his glass.

At the bar Mary stood next to Jean and her new husband. Although Jean was paler than usual, the weight Mary’s friend had lost suited her and she looked lovely in the fitted powder-blue silk and wool crepe mix two-piece that she’d bought from the Co-op for eleven coupons; six of which were Mary’s, her wedding gift. She still gripped the prayer book that she’d carried for the ceremony and every now and then touched the artificial spray of white carnations on her lapel. Her dark curls escaped from the short lace veil and the swathe of pale blue net across her forehead accentuated her eyes. Mary grinned. Mrs Winterbottom could certainly work wonders with curtains and Dolly Blue.

She’d also made Mary and Ellen’s dresses.

‘Could have been a bit fancier,’ Ellen had grumbled, the first time they’d tried them on. ‘She just doesn’t want us take any attention away from Jean.’ The girls had been standing on kitchen chairs in the front room of Moss Terrace.

‘Sshhhh, stop whinging and stand still,’ Winifred had hissed through a mouthful of pins. ‘I might not like the woman but she’s done you both proud. Now let me finish this hem or we’ll be here all day.’

Elsie Winterbottom had come through from the kitchen holding a large tray with a pot of tea, a plate of biscuits and four china cups and saucers that Mary had never seen before.

‘Patrick,’ Ellen had mouthed, pointing at the biscuits.

Mary shrugged and frowned.

‘Your Patrick got the parachute silk for us,’ Mrs Winterbottom had said, ‘I cut it on the bias across the weave of the fabric so that it fits nicely’.

It did. It clung closely to their slender figures and now Mary pulled self-consciously at the waist, smoothing it down over her hips and watching Ellen blatantly playing to the admiring glances of Patrick’s friends.

‘Look at that lot gawking at her.’ Jean nudged Mary, who turned her back to the group of men following her sister to the bar.

‘Silly devils! I hope the wedding photographs turn out well,’ Mary said deliberately. It would be a good day to remember out of all the dark times they’d had.

‘I could have killed you lot for watching us through the window when we went into the studio for that photo.’

‘Well, you have to admit it was a scream.’ Mary grinned.

‘We were supposed to be driving away on our honeymoon,’ Jean said, ‘that’s why we had the country scene in the background.’

‘Sitting on two chairs behind a cardboard car?’

Jean giggled. ‘I’ll have you know that was a Lanchester Convertible.’

‘Best bit was when Patrick fell off his chair and knocked the whole thing over.’ Mary laughed.

‘Oi, watch it.’ Patrick punched her lightly on the arm. ‘It was a bloody silly idea anyway.’

‘He bent one of the headlamps, the photographer was furious.’ Jean joined in the laughter. ‘It was good of Tom to send money to Patrick to pay for the photographs out of his prison wages.’

A shadow crossed Mary’s face; whatever Patrick
thought about him, she knew Tom loved his brother. It had probably taken months for him to save the six shillings they cost. She just hoped Patrick appreciated it.

‘Hope you remember to write and thank Tom, Patrick,’ Mary said.

The laughter faded. ‘I will,’ he said, ‘don’t worry, our Mary, I will.’

‘Grub’s up.’ Stan Green carried in long wooden tray filled with salad, potatoes and bread and put it on the line of tables covered with blue-and-white checked tablecloths, alongside the elaborate wedding cake.

‘Cake’s lovely,’ Winifred called to Mrs Winterbottom. Jean’s mother sniffed and pushed the cake to one side to make room for the plates of food Stan was unloading.

‘Hey up, you’ll have it over,’ Winifred shouted again, finishing her third sherry. The cake tilted to reveal a small sponge underneath.

‘I thought you’d splashed out,’ Mary whispered to Jean, who giggled and clutched hold of Patrick’s arm, pulling him closer to her.

‘It’s a model, isn’t it Patrick?’

‘No!’ Mary said in mocked surprise.

‘We hired it from Hirst’s bakery.’

Patrick waggled his eyebrows. ‘Only the best cardboard for us today.’

‘Ice cream for afters,’ Stan called.

‘You really pushed the boat out today for us, Mr Green,’ Mary said.

‘Got an allowance for extra food,’ he said. ‘You know, dried egg, margarine, cheese and a few other bits and bobs.’ He gathered up the long strand of greasy hair that had fallen over his ear and stroked it back across his head.
‘And your Patrick got us some stuff as well.’

Mary blocked her immediate response. If her brother couldn’t use his black market connections today, when could he? Holding her plate aloft, she pushed her way through the groups of people, smiling and adding to the babble of conversations. ‘You had enough to eat, Mam?’

‘I have, love, I’ve had your dad’s as well; he didn’t want any,’ Winifred said. ‘It was a lovely spread.’ She smiled and patted her navy handbag that matched her dress. ‘I’ve put some by for tomorrow.’ Then she lifted her chin. ‘What’s Ellen doing?’

Mary looked over to where Ellen swayed around in front of Jean. ‘Show me your wedding ring then.’ Her voice was shrill. ‘God, I bet that cost a fortune.’

Mary could tell she was being sarcastic; she hoped Jean couldn’t.

‘Twenty-five shilling and ninepence from Wright’s in Bradlow.’ Jean twirled the ring round her finger with the pad of her thumb. ‘It’s a bit big at the moment but Patrick says when I get a bit of meat on my bones it’ll be just right.’

His smile softened the angular lines of his face.

‘Al says he’ll give me his grandmother’s wedding ring,’ Ellen boasted. ‘It’s twenty-four carat. He inherited it.’ She smoothed her hands over her blonde hair that, like Mary’s, had been carefully rolled to frame her face. ‘He says when we get home to Philadelphia …’ She obviously liked the sound of that as she repeated it. ‘When we get home to Philadelphia, we’ll have the biggest, fanciest wedding, one that will beat any over here into a cocked hat. He says when he takes me to America we’ll have servants. He says all American wives have servants.’

He says a lot of things from the sound of it, Mary thought, edging past the scrum of people at the food table. Her sister was heading for a fall with that American, she was sure of it. She touched Ellen’s elbow. ‘Come and have something to eat.’

‘Not hungry.’ Ellen was surly; she stood with one hand on her hip, head poked forward. ‘And I still don’t know why Al wasn’t allowed to come to the wedding, since we’re as good as engaged, he’s almost my fiancé.’

‘We don’t know him. None of us do. And how would you have explained him to Dad?’

‘Oh, bugger off, Mary.’

‘The ’appy couple are leaving now,’ Stan Green bellowed. Everyone cheered and swarmed outside. The brightness of the sun caused the sky to shimmer, the tar between the cobbles glistened and heat radiated from the walls of the pub.

‘Couldn’t have been a lovelier day.’ Jean’s mother linked arms with Winifred, who was fanning her face with her hat.

‘By, it’s a warm one all right.’ Four sweet Sherries each and they were best friends, at least for the day, as Winifred confided to her eldest daughter later.

Jean clasped Mary to her. ‘Thanks for everything.’ Tears threatened to spill over, but she grinned. ‘Especially for persuading Matron to let me back to work now I’ll be a respectable married woman and all that’

‘You are very welcome, sister-in-law.’ Mary beamed. ‘And I’ll take your wedding presents back to our house and look after them until you can pick them up.’

They giggled; the couple had been given seven
hand-knitted
tea cosies and two lots of egg cosies. ‘You guard
them with your life,’ Jean warned. ‘I’m expecting them to last until our Silver Wedding Anniversary.’ She grabbed hold of her husband’s hand.

Some of the nurses had been collecting bits of paper from the office paper punch at the hospital for the last month and now they scattered them like confetti over Patrick and Jean as they ran up the street, Jean’s hand flat on top of her head to hold on her veil.

‘Don’t forget, I’ll be back from Aunty Florrie’s on Friday,’ Jean’s mother called.

‘Thanks for reminding us,’ Patrick shouted. ‘I’ll be sure to lock the door.’

Even as Mary joined in the laughter, a cold sadness filled her. Whatever she’d felt for Frank it wasn’t love, she knew that now. And, as unbearable as it was, she could never reveal her feelings for Peter.