The Heart of the Family (10 page)

‘To be honest, sir,’ Charlie had lied charmingly to his father-in-law-to-be, ‘although I know I have a duty to my father to take on the responsibility for
his business so that he can retire – and of course there’s nothing I want more than to be with Daphne – I felt that my duty to my country had to come first.’

‘Quite so, dear boy,’ had been Daphne’s father’s approving response as he clapped him on the back.

The service was over, and the congregation was free to stream out into the sunny warmth of the May morning.

‘Charles is such a hero, Daddy,’ Daphne enthused, as they walked homewards, tucking her arm through her fiancé’s as she smiled happily up at him. ‘He put his own life at risk to help that poor soldier by going to see him.’

Charlie was proud of the modest demeanour he managed to conjure up as he dismissed Daphne’s praise with a small shrug.

‘Of course, Mother is dreadfully disappointed that she won’t be able to show you off to all her friends now that you’re going to be staying here, Daffers,’ Charles told his fiancée cheerfully.

‘Oh dear, is she very cross?’ Daphne asked him uncertainly.

But her mother was made of sterner stuff and said firmly, ‘Don’t be silly, Daphne. I am sure that Charles’s mother understands that it is far more sensible for you to stay here at home with us. Now, Charles, about the wedding,’ she continued briskly. ‘I’ve written to your mother already explaining that in view of our own sad loss and the war, we really feel only close family should attend. I’ve spoken to the landlord at the Fox and Hounds and I’m sure your parents will be very comfortable there. We’d put them up here, of course, but what with my own sister and
her girls – they are to be Daphne’s bridesmaids, of course – and the rest of our family there simply wouldn’t be room …’

‘If I could just have a word, Bella …’

Bella frowned. She’d just come in from church and the last thing she felt like doing was listening to some complaint from her billetees, and she knew from Bettina’s expression that it would be a complaint. Bettina always had plenty to say for herself, unlike her mother.

Bella wasn’t in a very good mood. She’d had to walk back from church on her own as Laura had gone to see her family – again. Really, she was spending more time away from Wallasey these days than she was spending here.

To make matters worse Ralph Fleming had been in church with his wife and his children, smirking at her in that horrible way of his. He’d even had the cheek to come across to her when she was standing with her mother, putting his hand on her arm and acting like they were the best of friends. She could imagine what a field day all the nasty old cats of gossips would have been having if she hadn’t pulled away from him and pointedly asked after his wife. But even that had only made him give her another of those knowing smiles. He couldn’t possibly know about how lonely she felt sometimes at night and how she’d even imagined …

Quickly Bella checked her thoughts. What on earth was the matter with her? It must be all this rationing, putting strange thoughts into her head and even stranger urges into her body.

‘Oh, very well, what is it?’ she asked Bettina.

‘Mother and I have found another billet. I’m not sure when we’ll be moving out yet, but it shouldn’t be very long. We’ll be living with some Polish friends. I know you’ll be pleased to have your house back to yourself again.’

Bella stared at her. ‘But you can’t leave now,’ she protested, blurting out her panicky denial before she could stop herself. They couldn’t leave. Not now. She’d be all on her own. No! That wasn’t why she didn’t want them to leave. It was because she wanted to keep her house.

Now it was Bettina’s turn to frown.

‘But you’ve wanted us to leave from the minute we arrived,’ she pointed out.

Bella knew that this was true. But that had been before her father had told her that he was giving her house to Charlie. That would be impossible whilst the Polanskis were living here. They were refugees and not even her father could insist on them leaving, whether he was on the council or not.

‘Well, yes,’ Bella had to admit, ‘but … but I’ve got used to you now,’ she told her.

That was true too. She’d also got used to Maria’s cooking and the way she ironed Bella’s things and kept the house immaculate. She had even got used to the sound of them talking to one another in Polish and had in fact, although she hadn’t said so, learned to recognise some of their words and understand a little of what they were saying.

Her panic grew. She couldn’t let them leave.

‘Are you sure that moving to a new billet is the right thing for your mother? I mean, with that weak chest of hers, some of these billets are very damp, so I’ve been told.’

‘It is Jan who suggested that we move and who found us somewhere.’

Oh, it would be, Bella thought bitterly. Her whole body felt as though it was burning with the heat of her own shame. She hated being reminded of Jan and the way she had shown herself up so badly by letting him think that she wanted him. Of course she had not wanted him, not one little bit. She hated him, in fact.

‘As I said, I don’t know quite when we will be leaving,’ Bettina repeated.

Bella sat down on one of her kitchen chairs. She was supposed to be going round to her mother’s for her Sunday lunch but suddenly she didn’t feel like doing so. Her mother would go on and on about the wedding and Daphne, and how wonderful Charlie was, Bella thought wrathfully, and she would be expected to smile and agree.

She didn’t want to think about how empty the house was going to feel without Bettina and Maria. No more smells of strange Polish dishes cooking when she came in; no more Maria standing in the kitchen doing the ironing, making Bella cups of tea, fussing round her own daughter and, of course, her precious son when he came to visit.

She would be on her own. Completely alone.

What was the matter with her, Bella asked herself. Anyone would think she was afraid that she was going to miss them and that was ridiculous. No! She’d be glad to have her house to herself. Very glad.

‘And what, might I ask, is this?’

Lena could feel the blood leaving her face as she stared at the battledress jacket her auntie was holding. How had she found it? Lena had hidden it away in her drawer under all her own clothes.

‘Answer me, you little slut.’

Lena winced as the slap from her aunt’s hard hand caught her off guard, jerking her head back and leaving her skin stinging. Shocked tears filled her eyes.

‘Come on, who is he? And don’t you go lying to me ’cos if you do then you uncle will knock the truth out of you,’ Auntie Flo threatened.

Lena felt sick. Thank goodness she had thought to hide away Charlie’s papers in her handbag, pulling back the lining to put them there along with her Post Office book before sewing the lining back.

‘He was just a soldier wot was in the street the night the pub got hit,’ she told her aunt. She couldn’t risk telling Auntie Flo all about Charlie yet – not until he arrived to claim her and rescue her from the misery of her home life.

‘Oh, yes, of course. And this soldier he just
happened to give you his jacket, did he? Don’t give me that.’ Her aunt had raised her hand again but this time Lena managed to dodge out of the way.

She’d been out for a bit of a walk on account of having felt a bit sickly when she’d woken up and she realised now that her aunt must have gone through her things whilst she’d been out.

‘You’ve got bad blood in you – we all know that – aye, and we all know what it leads to as well. Well, I’m telling you now that I’m not having our Doris’s chances spoiled by you bringing shame on her by doing what you shouldn’t with some soldier. I knew I should never have taken you in. Your mother was bad enough, getting involved with that Eyetie, but you …’

Lena had had enough. She had her pride, after all. She lifted her chin. ‘I haven’t done anything any different than Doris’s bin doing.’

‘What?’ Auntie Flo shrieked. ‘My Doris’s a decent girl, wot’s got an engagement ring on her finger, and wot’s getting married. You’re nothing but a slut wot’s bin rolling around wi’ some soldier. What did he do?’

‘Nothing,’ Lena told her, trying to dodge out of the way when her aunt grabbed a handful of her hair.

‘Don’t you go telling me that, you lying hussy. I knew you was trouble right from the first. Mrs Hodson is right, you’re a bad lot,’ her aunt yelled as she banged Lena’s head back so hard against the wall that the pain had Lena seeing stars.

Her aunt might have released her but she wasn’t finished with her, Lena knew.

‘You wait until I tell your uncle Alfred what you’ve bin doing. He’ll have his strap to you and
no mistake, and you won’t go telling him “nothing”, I reckon.’

Now Lena was frightened. She’d been hit with the strap from her uncle’s belt before and she knew what the pain was like. Desperate to protect herself she protested defiantly, ‘I haven’t done anything wrong. My Charlie loves me. He said so, and—’

‘Don’t give me that,’ her auntie Flo interrupted contemptuously. ‘No decent man would ever love summat like you. How much did he pay you?’

Lena was too shocked to answer.

Her aunt grabbed hold of her upper arms and shook her violently.

‘I said, how much did he pay you? Have you gone deaf as well as being daft?’

Lena wasn’t so naïve that she didn’t know what her auntie meant. She might have her secret romantic dreams, but she still knew what was what.

‘It wasn’t like that,’ she told her aunt. ‘He loves me and I love him, and he’s going to come here and take me away, and when he does he’ll have something to say to you on account of what you’ve done to me.’ She was crying now, deep gulping sobs of mingled shock and pain, caused by her aunt’s cruelty, which shook her whole body as she pushed past Flo, snatching up her handbag from the table, as she ran out through the open back door, desperate to escape from her aunt’s taunts and the threat of her uncle’s belt.

Her desperation took her down the back alley that ran behind yards to the houses and their outside lavatories, and out into the road intersecting Bessie Street. She had run so fast that she was panting, sweat dampening the underarms of her Sunday best
frock that she’d worn for church that morning. Already she could feel the skin over her cheekbone tightening where her face was swelling from her aunt’s blow. Her head ached as well. She couldn’t go back. She knew her uncle’s temper. Her mother had once told her in a rare confidence that her sister’s husband had half killed a man way back in a moment of temper, when they had all been young, and had only got away with it because no one had told on him.

She would have to write to Charlie now and ask him to come to take her away. He’d understand, of course, she knew that. After all, he loved her. He had said so. She’d have to stay somewhere, though, until he did come for her. Somewhere where he could find her. Maybe if she went round to Simone’s she’d give her a bed for the night. The hairdresser lived only down the street from her salon, but then Lena remembered that Simone had said that she was going to Blackpool for the day with one of her many beaux. Simone had winked when she had announced that she might be staying the night. But then she was one of those women who could get away with that kind of behaviour somehow. Perhaps because she was the best hairdresser in the area and perfectly capable of making sure your hair was ruined for life if it suited her, Lena thought ruefully.

Down at the bottom of the road, beyond the flattened houses and then the warehouses of the dock area, the glint of the sun on the water momentarily caught her attention. Absently she watched the sun-gilded dancing waves, and then it came to her, and she knew exactly what she had to do. Relief poured through her. She would have to tidy herself up a bit
mind, but she could do that at the ferry terminal. It was a pity she couldn’t change her clothes but at least she was wearing her best frock. Her auntie said that red wasn’t a suitable colour to wear for church but Lena knew that red suited her and it was such a lovely colour that wearing it always made her feel happy. Thank heavens she had grabbed her handbag before she’d left.

Oooh, she couldn’t wait now that she’d made up her mind. Her tummy was full of butterflies, but that was with excitement at the thought of meeting her Charlie’s family. Her family an’ all, they would be soon. Then her auntie would see how wrong she’d bin with all that nasty stuff she’d gone and said to her. Her lovely Charlie didn’t think she’d got bad blood, not one little bit, he didn’t. Tears burned the backs of her eyes.

It would have been different for her perhaps if her mam and dad hadn’t taken against one another in the way that they had, both of them going on all the time about how they wished they had never got wed to one another. Her dad, being Italian, had been a bit of a one for raising his voice and waving his arms around when he and her mam were having ‘words’, and Lena had known from being very young that it was on account of her that they had had to get married and that neither of them had been pleased about that. It was from her father that she’d got her own looks, although he had always said she wasn’t properly Italian and his family had refused to have anything to do with her and her mam. They’d wanted to see her dad married to some cousin of his and there’d been a real to-do when he had ended up having to marry her mam. Never forgiven her mam
for that, her dad’s family hadn’t, so her dad had always said.

Fiercely Lena blinked away her threatening tears. She wasn’t going to start crying, not for anyone. Her mam and dad were gone and she’d got to get on with her life as best she could. She’d certainly make sure that her Charlie knew how much she loved him and she’d make him proud of her too, that she would.

As she headed for the ferry terminal Lena drifted happily into one of her daydreams – a new one this time in which she was linking arms with her proud new mother-in-law, who was telling her tearfully how grateful she was to Lena for making her son such a wonderful loving wife, and how she couldn’t have chosen better for him herself.

Such was the effect of this daydream that by the time she had reached the terminal Lena was well on the way to convincing herself that her auntie finding Charlie’s battledress jacket was probably the best thing that could have happened. She was just in the middle of hearing Charlie’s mam saying that Lena was better than any daughter could have been when her fantasy was rudely shattered by her seeing her reflection in the mirror in the ladies’ washroom at the terminal.

My, but that bruise was a corker, and she’d got blood on the white collar of her frock as well from her cut lip.

Hurriedly Lena set about doing what she could to make herself look decent. Luckily she’d got her comb in her bag and a nice bright red lipstick.

They’d had their Sunday tea with Grace’s family and now Seb and Grace were making their way back to
the nurses’ home, walking slowly hand in hand and savouring the late afternoon sunshine.

‘I think that Katie and Luke must have had words again,’ Grace told Seb with a small sigh. ‘He’s my brother and I love him, but I feel ever so sorry for Katie as well. I was talking to Mum about it in the kitchen and she says that Dad was a bit on the jealous side when they were courting.’

‘They’ll work it out, love,’ Seb tried to reassure her, giving her hand a comforting squeeze.

‘I hope so, Seb. I can’t think of anyone I’d like for a sister-in-law more than Katie.’

Seb smiled but inwardly he couldn’t help wondering if it was in part the eagerness of Luke’s mother and sisters to make Katie a part of their family that was causing some of the trouble. Katie was the kind of girl who naturally wanted to please others, and Seb hoped that she wasn’t being trapped into a relationship with Luke because she knew it was what his family wanted.

It was his and Grace’s future in which he was more interested right now, though. He’d have liked to have found somewhere a bit more private and more pleasant to tell Grace his news than the bombed-out streets of her home city, but they would soon be within a couple of minutes of the nurses’ home, and if they bumped into any of her friends also returning from a day off the opportunity for them to talk privately would be lost.

Drawing Grace closer to his side, Seb said quietly, ‘There’s something I need to tell you, some news I was given just before I left Derby House this morning.’

Grace knew immediately that despite his calm, almost casual manner what he had to tell her was
important. She stopped walking and turned towards him, a small anxious frown creasing her forehead.

‘What kind of news?’

Seb twined his fingers between hers and closed their joined hands into a soft fist.

‘There’s to be a new Y Section post opening, in Whitchurch, so not too far away, and I’m to be transferred to work there. It will mean a promotion.’

Grace was trying hard to smile and look pleased, but all she could think was that she would no longer have the comfort of knowing that no matter what happened Seb was only a few minutes away from her.

Knowing what she would be thinking, Seb checked that there was no one around to see them and then drew her into his arms, holding her tight.

‘It will be all right, I promise,’ he said gruffly. ‘I know it’s a bit of a shock. Took me a bit aback this morning when I was told, I can tell you. Of course it’s an honour to be chosen, but all I could think was that you and I were going to be further apart than we’ve been used to. I’ll be honest with you, Grace, if I’d thought I’d be allowed to turn the post down I would have done.’

‘Oh, no, you couldn’t have done that,’ Grace protested just as he had known she would, her voice muffled by the protection of his body. ‘Your work is very important, Seb, and like you’ve said yourself, it’s an honour to be chosen for promotion. We are fighting a war, after all. It’s just that I can’t help feeling a bit upset. I’m going to miss you so much.’

He could feel the dampness of her tears seeping through his shirt.

‘I felt the same,’ he assured her, ‘but it won’t be
as bad as you think. There’s a good railway service, I’ve checked already.’

Grace was trying to be brave and to remember that she ought to put her country first, but sometimes an hour was all they had, and she was used to being able to run down to Derby House or have Seb come up to the hospital whenever they could make the time, just to say ‘hello’ to one another.

Seb wished as he had never wished before that he wasn’t sharing his room at his digs with another chap and that Mrs Morris, his landlady, was a bit more obliging. This was definitely one of those times when he felt the best way to reassure Grace would be in his arms and in private.

She really must not be such a baby, Grace warned herself. If she was like this at the news that Seb was moving a handful of miles away, what on earth would she be like if he were ever to be posted abroad? Suddenly she wished desperately that her training was over and that she was free to marry Seb without losing all that she had worked for, but it was only May and it would be well into the autumn before she completed her three-year training period.

As though he had been thinking the same thing, she heard Seb saying huskily to her, ‘You know what I reckon we should do? I reckon we should think about setting a date for us to get married, the minute you’ve finished your training.’

‘We did say that we’d wait until the war was over,’ Grace felt bound to remind him.

‘I know we said that, but I don’t want to wait any longer than we have to. I want to make you mine, Gracie. I want that more than I can say.’