Ruby's War (2 page)

Steep wooden steps led from the station's platform on to the railway bridge. At the top, Granddad put down the larger case. She could hear his chest rattle, as his whole body bent to the task of filling his lungs with the thick, damp air.

‘This bridge is the highest point round here,' he said between gasps. ‘On a good day you can see for miles.'

Ruby was about to ask if she would be able to see Blackpool Tower, when the darkness around them filled with the yowling of injured animals. She shuddered. They sounded very near.

‘Did they make you jump?' Granddad laughed. ‘It's only the engines in the shunting yards. You'll get used to them soon enough. Other side of this bridge, there's big sheds for trains. Goods trains. Massive things.'

The road was busy. Beams from the narrow headlights of a blacked-out bus appeared suddenly at the top of the bridge. When the updraught from the double-decker hit them, it made her blink and press as close as she could to the rough wood fence.

‘Now watch yourself,' Granddad said. ‘The footpath's
narrow over these two bridges. Not too bad when we get down the other side. Have you a torch?'

‘I have one at home … at Auntie's,' she said.

Ruby followed her grandfather down the first bridge and up to the top of a second one. Below her the silver tangle of railway lines clattered, the straining engines spat and the sound of their wailing filled the night.

At the foot of the second bridge, there was a row of blacked-out shops on one side of the road. On the opposite side, she could see a large, white public house, a line of white cottages, followed by a short string of terraced villas and then a longer terrace of smaller houses. As they walked by the shops, Ruby found it hard to see but she made out the darkened windows of a butcher's shop, a newsagent, and then the broad, dome-shaped door of a church hall. Between them, she glimpsed narrow side streets, each with a line of the same squat houses. Her grandfather turned down one of the streets. Points of light bounced towards them from the torches of passers-by, who called out ‘good neet' into the blackness.

Granddad rapped sharply on one of the front doors and pushed it open. She followed him, stumbling down the two steps into a small room. There was a table in the centre with a gas mantle hissing softly above it. The shadows above the gaslight hid the face of a woman standing by the table. All Ruby could see was her old-fashioned black blouse and the equally black brooch at the collar.

‘Who's this?' the woman asked, as her granddad put down the big suitcase.

‘This is our Will's little lass,' he said. ‘Ruby, love, this is your Auntie Maud. Always makes a fuss of your dad, does
Maud. She's not seen you since you were a babby.'

‘Humph,' Auntie Maud said, taking a seat at the table. ‘I thought she was with her mother's people.'

‘Well, Ethel thinks she'd be better here,' Granddad said, sitting down next to her.

‘Oh, does she,' Auntie Maud said, opening the newspaper that was lying on the table.

The room fell silent. Now that the woman was seated, Ruby could see that she had round glasses and the same sharp nose as Granddad. Gazing into the shadows beyond the gas mantle's yellow light, she could make out a heavy dresser with an oval photo frame on top and a full-length photograph of a young man in uniform hanging on the wall above it. She wondered if the young man might be her grandfather. The only other piece of furniture was a single bed, partly hidden by a curtain that hung from the ceiling. There was a huge white shape under the counterpane.

‘That's your Uncle Joe, Ruby,' Granddad said, taking off his cap and nodding towards the figure on the bed. ‘He's not well,' Granddad added. ‘He needs someone to …'

‘He's got someone,' Auntie Maud snapped.

Getting up from the table, Maud hobbled over to the hearth and filled a small white teapot from the kettle. They watched as she made her way slowly over to the bed, pushed back the curtain and put the spout of the lidless teapot into Uncle Joe's mouth.

‘So you'd best take this lass home. And if your fancy woman don't like it, then she knows what she can do. If she does clear off, 'appen the little lass can manage for thee.'

‘Just for a couple of nights. She'd be a good help.'

‘Not for an hour. No. I know you too well, our Henry.'

‘What do you say, Joe?'

Uncle Joe had the same thin nose as Auntie Maud and Granddad, but the rest of him was very white and fat. He made Ruby think of a young gull, so when he turned his bloated form towards them and fixed them with a bright black eye, she almost expected him to open his mouth and squawk.

‘You never mind what Joe thinks,' Auntie Maud said. ‘You just get that lass home.'

Then Maud sat down with her back towards them, and all Ruby could see was her aunt's fine grey hair, plaited and rolled into a tight bun at the nape of her neck. The room was silent again, except for the rustle of the thin newspaper as Auntie Maud turned the page. Then the clock on the mantelpiece began to stir, making first a grating sound as though it was clearing its dry throat, before commencing its uncertain chime. On the opposite side of the table, Granddad's shoulders appeared to shrink, making his mac look much too big for his narrow frame. It was seven o'clock. Ruby remembered that she hadn't eaten since breakfast at seven-thirty, and as though reacting to a signal, on the final stroke her stomach began to rumble. The chimes were also a signal to Granddad who, as the clock fell silent, made for the door.

Ruby followed him outside. In the blackout, the houses appeared to be so close together that she wondered if it would be hard for even the brightest sunlight to force its way down into the cobbled street. When they reached the main road, Granddad crossed over and made for the public house. Blackout material had been used to cover the glass
in the door, but the name, The Railway Inn, had been cut out of the blind and the letters covered with a translucent mauve fabric. Through the dim shapes in the blind, she could see sleeves and shoulders pushed up against the door of the crowded bar.

‘We'd best go round to the back,' Granddad muttered, turning into the narrow alleyway and capturing a soldier and his giggling girlfriend in the beam from his torch.

‘Clear off, you dirty buggers,' he shouted. ‘I've a young lass here.'

Ruby wanted to tell him not to worry on her account – she'd lived in a guest house since she was nine and was used to courting couples. But Granddad had disappeared, and she was left to struggle with her suitcase in the dark. Then she heard a door open and music spilt out into the night.

‘Come on, Ruby, love,' Granddad called. ‘Where are you?'

She headed towards the sound and a strong, warm hand took hers, guiding her into a narrow passageway that smelt of cigarette smoke and stale beer.

‘This here's Johnny Finlay, Johnny Fin,' her granddad said, nodding towards the large man standing next to him.

Johnny Finlay, who was over six foot five, bent down, put his huge hands on his knees and smiled. ‘Nice to meet you. Is that your music case?'

Johnny Finlay wasn't a handsome man; there wasn't even one hair on his wide bony skull, his nose was flat with a funny bump in the middle and his front teeth were missing. If she'd been alone, Ruby was sure she would have screamed with fright.

‘Oh, she's got all her parents' musical talent,' Granddad said. ‘Now, Ruby, you wait here with the cases. Me and Johnny have a bloke to see.'

When he opened the door to the brightly lit bar, she heard someone call his name. Then Johnny Fin gave her a friendly wave and followed him. Ruby sat down on an empty beer crate. Since her mother's death, whenever Auntie Ethel had given her a dull job to do, or when she'd finished her schoolwork before the other children, Ruby would slide back to the time before Pearl's accident, and as there was nothing of interest in the hallway, she closed her eyes.

She was back at Everdeane. It was winter, and all the visitors had gone. She was with her mother in the guest bedroom they'd shared out of season. Sometimes in the early evening, they would sit together in the large bay window to watch the setting sun. Then, if she'd a booking at one of the clubs in town, her mother would sit down in front of the mirror, put on her make-up and become Pearl Barton, nightclub singer. Ruby had loved those times. Her mother would laugh and sing and talk about the club or the theatre where she was going to perform and how she might get asked back to sing again.

Ruby could smell her perfume, hear her excited giggles and the distant, tinkling music carried down the prom on the sea breeze. She felt someone shake her by the shoulder, smelt Pearl's face powder and opened her eyes. For a moment she thought the woman in the dimly lit hallway was her mother, but she wasn't as pretty.

‘What are you doin' here?' the woman asked. ‘Are you all right, love?'

The woman wore a glittery top and had blonde hair set in finger waves and, although she wasn't as pretty as her mother, when she smiled Ruby could tell that she was kind.

‘It's all right, Vera,' a voice called from the doorway. ‘She's with Henry. I think he's trying to get up a bit of Dutch courage before he takes her home. It's his granddaughter.'

‘Dutch courage? And you're letting him?'

‘Best keep out of it.'

‘You can just go and tell him now, Bert Lyons, it's more than your licence is worth to have a child in your pub.'

‘She's not doin' any harm.'

‘I know that, you soft bugger. The poor kid's sat on her own in the dark, while he gets drunk. You tell him you're not serving him, and he's taking her home, now.'

Ruby followed her grandfather back through the yard to the front of the pub. This time, he didn't seem to notice the couple cuddling in the dark. They walked back along the main road, past the row of white cottages, the darkened houses and the blacked-out shops and church hall on the opposite side. When the rows of houses ended, the footpath narrowed and the air became colder.

‘Be careful,' Granddad said. ‘Here. Hold on to the belt of my coat. This bridge over the river is narrow. It's not far now.'

As they edged their way up the little humped-back bridge, Ruby could hear the running water. They were almost at the top when the sound of a bus engine broke through the inky silence. The tiny slits of light from its headlamps sprang up in front of them, and her granddad pushed Ruby in close to the rough stone parapet.

‘Bloody fool,' he shouted. ‘Fancy coming over at that speed in the blackout.'

At the bottom of the bridge they turned off the main road. Above them, the moon slid out from behind the clouds. They'd turned into a narrow lane with a single row of cottages on the opposite corner. Granddad didn't cross over but walked up the lane between the tall hedgerows until they came to a single white stone cottage.

‘Here we are,' he said, fastening up the belt on his mac. ‘You hungry?'

When he opened the front door someone screamed. A blonde-haired girl, wearing nothing but salmon-pink French knickers, was standing in the centre of a white sheet, her arms wrapped across her naked breasts. For a moment there was silence, and Ruby felt the warm air from the room swirl against her cold legs. Then the door behind the girl burst open, and a fat woman charged at them.

‘Don't just bloody stand there, get out!' she shouted and slammed the front door.

‘Shall I go round the back, Jenny, love?' Granddad called through the letter box.

When there was no reply, he took out his cigarettes and squatted on his haunches. Clouds began to cover the moon and the darkness crept towards them, stealing up from the gate along the narrow garden. He pulled up his collar to light a match, and then all she could see was the tip of his cigarette, pulsing slowly with each inhalation. Ruby squeezed her music case tightly and swallowed hard. When he'd finished, he knocked on the door again. This time it swung open.

The fat woman's cross face appeared from behind a
swell of white cotton sheet. ‘Will you shut that door,' she said, shaking and folding the fabric.

Then, with the folded sheet under one arm, she began collecting pieces of fine tweed cloth that were scattered on the furniture and the floor. Depending on the way it caught the light, the fabric was either a soft lilac or violet in colour. One of the pieces, a sleeve, lolled on the back of an easy chair by the open fire, another hung over a wooden chair next to the table, and still more were piled on the tabletop, where they clashed with the red crushed-velvet cover. The plump woman moved easily, bending to scoop up each piece of fabric, folding each one as she moved on to take up the next one. With each movement, her crystal drop earrings glittered icily.

Ruby shivered. In front of the range was a large brass fender with boxes for holding kindling built into its two corners. She would have loved to sit on the padded top of one of the brass boxes and stretch out her fingers to the coal fire, but thought it was better to stay by the door, until she was invited to sit down.

‘I offered to go round the back, Jenny, love.'

‘What, an' walk in on our Sadie again, when she's in the scullery havin' a wash?'

The plump woman scooped up the pieces of a paper pattern that were lying on the floor, and as she settled down in an easy chair to fold them, there was a knock at the front door.

The blonde girl, now fully dressed, hurried in from the scullery. ‘I'll get it,' she said. ‘It's only Lou.'

She opened the front door to a dark-haired girl of about her own age.

‘Oh, is this my suit?' the girl asked, picking up a stray scrap of fabric from the flagged floor.

‘I was hoping to have it tacked up by now, and you could have tried it on,' the woman replied. ‘I was pinning it on our Sadie, but we was interrupted.'

‘Who's this?' Lou asked, smiling at Ruby.