The Camberwell Raid (16 page)

‘Not yet,’ said Lilian.

‘Would it be Esther?’

‘Not to my knowledge,’ said Lilian.

‘Salome, say?’

‘Here, leave off,’ said Lilian.

‘Fanny, then?’ said Bill.

Lilian burst into laughter, and passengers turned their heads to look.

‘It’s Lilian,’ she said.

‘Well, I don’t know why you were shy about it,’ said Bill, ‘nothing wrong with Lilian, y’know. I like it.’

‘Thanks,’ said Lilian, ‘you can leave me an extra pint tomorrow morning.’

‘Pleasure,’ said Bill. ‘Does that mean you’re expectin’ company.’

‘No, just that I’m going to make a milk pudding,’ said Lilian. ‘On the other hand, I will have company, I suppose, if you happen to drop in tomorrow evening.’

‘Well, that’s a welcome invite, that is,’ said Bill, ‘and I’ll be pleasured to keep you company.’

What made me invite him, thought Lilian, I’m daft.

And that wasn’t all. She didn’t need an extra pint, or a milk pudding.

Ginger Carstairs and Dusty Miller had checked more than once on the closing time of the bank. Each
time
it had shut its door to customers promptly at three-thirty.

At home, young Fanny Harrison wondered if Tim Adams would actually ever take her to the pictures.

ROSIE TELEPHONED MAJOR
Armitage at his Godalming home on Friday morning. He at once said he was delighted to hear from her.

‘How kind. Thank you, Major Armitage.’

‘I’m your father, Rosie.’

‘Oh, yes, we both understand how that came about,’ said Rosie. ‘Anyway, will it be convenient to visit you tomorrow with my brother and sister? It’s Saturday and convenient for all of us.’

‘I’ll come and fetch the three of you,’ said Major Armitage. ‘I’ll leave early and be there by not later than nine-thirty. And I’ll drive you back, of course. Believe me, I can’t wait to show you around. I’m hoping it will persuade you to spend the Easter weekend here.’

‘That’s next week,’ said Rosie, ‘when I’ll be attending a double wedding with most of my family.’

‘That’s a pity,’ said Major Armitage.

‘Not for us,’ said Rosie.

‘No, I did mean for me, of course. However, tomorrow, then.’

‘Yes, tomorrow, thanks so much,’ said Rosie. ‘Goodbye for now.’

She informed Chinese Lady of the arrangement, and Chinese Lady looked a bit dubious.

‘You sure it’s wise, Rosie?’ she said.

‘Oh, but it’s right for ’er to go, isn’t it?’ said Eloise.

‘If your Aunt Victoria happened to drop in,’ mused Chinese Lady, ‘I could get her to read Rosie’s teacup. Your Aunt Victoria’s got the gift. It’s always been sorrowful to me that I’ve never been able to read tealeaves meself. If I could, they might tell us what Major Armitage might be up to.’

‘It won’t make any difference, Nana,’ smiled Rosie.

The breezy milkman dropped in on Lilian that evening, as promised. Lilian was determined to put up a fight, although she’d made it difficult for herself by donning a velveteen dress of a delicate peach shade that did splendid justice to her healthy figure. Bill said she was a pleasure to behold, and Lilian said she supposed he talked like that to all his lady customers. Bill said he looked after their dairy requirements, as he was obliged to, but regulations didn’t allow him to talk familiar to them. Lilian said he talked very familiar to her. Bill said that was different, they’d been out together and were coming to be intimate friends.

‘Intimate my foot,’ said Lilian.

Bill, looking around her plushly-furnished living-room, said, ‘You’ve made a nice home for yourself, Mrs Hyams. You wouldn’t like a piano, I suppose, the one I got lumbered with when Dorothy and her mum moved out? I don’t play meself.’

‘I don’t have room for a piano,’ said Lilian.

‘I wouldn’t say that,’ mused Bill, ‘and I’d like comin’ round regular to listen to you playing. I’m fond of piano music. Did you make yourself a milk pudding with that extra pint?’

‘I haven’t had time,’ said Lilian.

‘Well, as I’m here, I’ll make one for you,’ said Bill, ‘I’ve done a lot of good cookin’ in my time. Where’s the kitchen?’

‘You’re not getting into my kitchen,’ said Lilian. ‘You can sit down and I’ll bring in a pot of tea.’

‘If you need any help, just call,’ said Bill.

It was like that all evening, Bill a bloke with his mind made up, and Lilian a woman fighting a rearguard action. It was all quite lively in its way. When she told him she was a fashion designer, he said that was a lot different from being a dairy roundsman, and that if she’d designed the dress she was wearing she must be very talented. Lilian said yes, she was, that her name was well-known in the fashion world. You could probably make a good marriage with a prosperous somebody from Paris, said Bill. Yes, I probably could, said Lilian. Somebody from Paris could be an advantageous French husband to you, said Bill. Yes, he could, said Lilian. Still, as he hasn’t turned up yet, said Bill, you won’t mind me comin’ round now and again? I won’t mind at all, said Lilian, providing you’re invited. Very right and proper, said Bill.

When he finally left, Lilian didn’t feel defeated, but she did feel she ought to put barbed wire around her defences. Or perhaps when she next saw him, she’d tell him Rabbi Solomon wasn’t too pleased at her allowing a Gentile bloke to cross her doorstep.

Still, what a lively evening.

Boots and Mr Finch had departed for their respective offices by the time Major Armitage arrived the next morning. Emily had elected to stay home so that
she
could run an eye over the man claiming to be Rosie’s father. She and Chinese Lady were determined to meet him, and they came out of the kitchen into the hall with Eloise when Rosie answered the ringing doorbell. And there he was, mature, distinguished and moustached, dressed in country tweeds, his motoring cap in his hand.

‘Good morning, Rosie,’ he said.

‘Good morning, Major Armitage,’ said Rosie, composed of manner and delightful of appearance. Her tailored spring costume of royal blue looked perfect. He regarded her in fascination, still finding it difficult to believe how striking she was, and how excessively different from what he had envisaged when Mr Tooley first told him the child had been a girl.

‘I’m delighted again,’ he said.

‘Thank you,’ said Rosie. ‘Oh, before we go, would you like to say hello to my mother, my grandmother and my sister?’

Major Armitage received this polite, smiling reference to her family with a smile of his own. He had no intention of making any kind of wrong move.

‘Yes, I should like to, indeed I would,’ he said, and Rosie introduced him, first to her mother, Mrs Adams, then to her grandmother, Mrs Finch, and finally to her sister Eloise. Major Armitage shook hands with each of them in turn, declaring it a great pleasure to meet the people who had cared for Rosie all these years. He might have said his daughter Rosie, but didn’t. He was pleasant, courteous and friendly, and neither Emily nor Chinese Lady could find any outward fault in him. As for Eloise, she thought him very distinguished and soldierly, a typical English country gentleman, even if he hadn’t
been
very gentlemanly in the way he had fathered Rosie.

Tim appeared, holding his cap.

‘Oh, hello,’ he said.

‘You and I have met before,’ smiled Major Armitage.

‘Yes, so we have,’ said Tim, ‘how’d you do, sir?’

‘I’m fine,’ said Major Armitage, and looked at Rosie. ‘Are we ready to leave?’ he asked.

‘All ready,’ said Rosie, and she and Tim and Eloise left a couple of minutes later, after the Major had said goodbye to Emily and Chinese Lady, and assured them he would return with the three young people in the evening. No reference to the fact that he was Rosie’s natural father had been made by anyone.

‘Well, I don’t know, I’m sure, Em’ly,’ said Chinese Lady, when they were alone. ‘I never met a more civil gentleman, and it flummoxed me a bit.’

‘Mum, he was civil all right,’ said Emily, ‘but a real gentleman wouldn’t interfere in Rosie’s life, not when she’s been one of us all these years. I wish Boots had been here instead of goin’ to work. Well, for once in me life I just didn’t know what to say, I’d have been willing to leave it to him.’

‘Boots wouldn’t of said anything, Em’ly, he’d have just been polite,’ remarked Chinese Lady. ‘He’s goin’ along with Rosie, he’s letting her make up her own mind about things. Mind, he won’t just stand about if Major Armitage tries to get the adoption set aside as unlegal. Boots will fight that all right.’

‘I like Rosie for takin’ Tim and Eloise with her,’ said Emily. ‘Well, it’s to show Major Armitage she feels closer to them than him. Oh, ’elp, did you see his car? It’s posh all over.’

‘I still like horses and carts meself,’ said Chinese Lady. ‘No good will ever come of motorcars. They’re not natural.’

The motorcar was a Bentley. Tim was almost awestruck. Rosie had made him sit in the front, next to Major Armitage, while she sat in the back with Eloise. Eloise was a very intrigued young lady, with an intuitive feeling that Rosie was more taken with her natural father and his background than she cared to admit. It was right for her to be loyal to her adoptive parents, of course, but not wrong for her to have feelings for Major Armitage, who was obviously very rich. Not that Rosie’s adoptive parents were poor, oh, no, the business had made them prosperous, but Major Armitage was a landowner and looked an aristocrat as well. Why, he could probably make a debutante of Rosie, and have her presented at Court. Could Rosie resist that? Eloise had promised she would help to ensure that Rosie’s life remained unchanged, but one couldn’t work miracles, of course. If Rosie did decide to live with her natural father, well, thought Eloise, I will make it up to my own father and be as good as two daughters to him. Yes, it would be up to her to see that he didn’t miss Rosie.

With the car heading towards Purley and Reigate, the day fresh but fine, Rosie murmured, ‘What are you thinking about, Eloise?’

‘Oh, I am thinking about everything,’ said Eloise, ‘and that I ’ave never been in a car like this.’

‘It’s a Bentley,’ smiled Rosie.

‘I know of Rolls-Royce cars,’ said Eloise, and Major Armitage, despite his preoccupation with the traffic and his ambitious interest in Rosie, picked up the accent in Eloise’s English.

‘A Bentley is on a par with a Rolls-Royce, but has more dash to it,’ he said.

‘Dash? What is dash, please?’ asked Eloise.

‘More go,’ said Tim.

‘More go?’ said Eloise.

‘Quite so,’ said Major Armitage.

‘Ah, I think I know,’ said Eloise.

Rosie, smiling, said, ‘Eloise’s late mother was French, Major Armitage.’

‘I see,’ he said. ‘The present Mrs Adams is the second wife of Mr Adams?’

‘Mr Adams met Eloise’s mother in France during the war,’ said Rosie.

‘I see,’ said Major Armitage again, the Bentley gliding effortlessly past cars and buses by making use of clear tram tracks.

‘Yes,’ said Tim, ‘but—’

‘No buts, Tim, it was love at first sight,’ said Rosie. ‘Eloise will tell you so.’

Tim caught on.

‘Yes, I’ve heard her say that,’ he said, and Eloise smiled and squeezed Rosie’s arm gratefully for the words that had let Major Armitage infer a certain marriage had once taken place.

On the Bentley went, passing through Croydon and Purley to head for Dorking and the road to Guildford and Godalming, the engine purring, Eloise examining the passing countryside and remarking on the fresh green colours of spring. Major Armitage participated without effort in the many moments of general conversation which kept the atmosphere from becoming strained, although at no time did Rosie appear other than completely at ease.

Just before they reached Godalming, Major
Armitage
took a left turn into a road of green verges. He passed over a little crossroads in half a mile, and Tim noticed a signpost marked ‘Headleigh Hall’.

‘Well, I’m blessed, you’re signposted, sir,’ he said.

‘So we are, Tim, so we are,’ smiled Major Armitage.

Tim, who’d been brought up by parents who had no fixed prejudices, had none himself. So, while he was against any attempt by Major Armitage to change Rosie’s life in any way that would affect her relationship with her adoptive family, he could not help liking him. Nor could Eloise, and for that matter, nor could Rosie herself.

Half a mile from the crossroads, Major Armitage turned right between two open iron gates and entered a long drive bordered by lime trees. The way broadened out after two hundred yards, and Headleigh Hall appeared then, a manor house built of warm rose-red brick faced with stone, its double front doors imposingly huge. The car continued on, passing the tall side of the mansion and executing a slow sweeping turn that brought it round to offer a view of the rear facade. It was magnificent, with its array of many windows, its two outer gables and a smaller central gable. These gables formed the letter ‘E’, indicative of an Elizabethan manor house.

Major Armitage had slowed down to no more than five miles an hour. Perhaps this was to allow his passengers time to take in the full splendour of his country home, and to let Rosie in particular reflect on what life there could hold for her. At any rate, the eyes of all three passengers were open wide.

‘Crikey,’ breathed Tim.

‘Oh, ’ow beautiful,’ said Eloise.

‘Lovely,’ said Rosie, and the Bentley came to a
gentle
stop close to a great sward of green grass. From there she and Tim and Eloise were offered a captivating view of the house and a breathtaking view of the estate. The bright day sharpened the colours of every vista and touched the rose-red brick with sunshine.

‘It’s like a castle,’ said Tim.

‘Not quite, Tim old chap,’ said Major Armitage, and eased himself out of the car. He opened the passenger door, and Eloise alighted, followed by Rosie. Tim emerged, and they all stood together to gaze in fascination at the view of parkland, farm and copses.

‘Wonderful, isn’t it?’ enthused Eloise.

‘Armitages have lived here for close on a hundred and forty years,’ said Major Armitage. ‘You can imagine what kind of a family home this was for us. I’ve two brothers and three sisters, all married with their own families now. I’ve no children myself.’ He smiled. ‘Except for Rosie,’ he added. ‘My wife, unfortunately, is a semi-invalid. Ah, here she is.’