The September Girls (54 page)

‘They were just friends,’ he said shortly. ‘Morag was already going steady with a lad who’s in the Army. Your son was only here a few minutes and asked if he could use the phone - he offered to pay, but I refused to take his money.’

‘Do you know who he called?’ She felt hurt that it hadn’t been his mother.

‘I didn’t ask.’

‘Is there a photo of Morag I could have?’

All of a sudden, he lost his temper. ‘There’s plenty, but you won’t be getting one,’ he rasped, eyes blazing. ‘They’re dead! Morag’s dead, your son’s dead and for the bloody life of me I can’t understand why you want to know this and want to know that. What does it matter? They’re gone and we’ll never see them again.
That’s
what matters. That’s
all
that matters, not this,’ he gestured angrily with his hand, ‘ - this other rubbish.’

‘I’m sorry to have bothered you.’ Eleanor ran to the door, tears blinding her eyes. She still had on her gloves and had difficulty with the catch. Hector Ingram opened it for her and she’d hardly stepped outside, when the door slammed shut behind her.

‘You weren’t long,’ Jenny remarked as Eleanor climbed into the rear of the car - until now, she’d sat in the front because it had seemed a friendly thing to do, but now she didn’t give a damn about being friendly. The engine was switched on, the car moved forward a few feet, then stopped. ‘Do you still want to go to the bridge where the accident happened, Eleanor?’ Jenny asked quietly without turning around.

‘I’d sooner not, not just now. I think I’d prefer to go back to the hotel and have a lie-down. You go back to the base, I won’t need taking anywhere else today.’ It struck her what a horrible thing the girl had been asked to do: keep company with a woman who’d just lost her son, drive her to such miserable places.

‘I’ll stay with you, if you like.’

‘It’s all right, dear. You never know, my daughter might arrive soon.’

‘I’ll give you my number at the base, just in case you want someone to talk to.’

‘Thank you.’ Eleanor closed her eyes and they didn’t speak again until she was dropped off at the hotel.

 

She was in a cave and the icy sea was pouring in, wave after wave of it. The cave’s walls were smooth, there was nowhere to climb, no escape, and with each wave the water got higher, until it reached her waist, her chest, her neck, and now she was swallowing it. She’d forgotten how to swim and knew that the next wave would be the last and she would drown.

‘Help me!’ she screamed. ‘Someone help me.’

‘Mrs Allardyce.’ The voice came from very far away, from somewhere outside the cave. ‘Mrs Allardyce. You’re all right, open your eyes.’

Eleanor obediently opened her eyes and found herself in the hotel room with Hector Ingram bending over her, his hands on her shoulders, pressing her against the bed.

‘You were having a nightmare,’ he said. ‘I could hear you shouting from outside.’ He stepped back, his face grim and showing no emotion. He wore a duffel coat and a thick woolly hat that covered his ears, making him look slightly sinister.

‘I was drowning,’ she gasped as she sat up, still breathless from her struggle with the waves, ‘and I shouted for someone to save me. Does that mean I don’t want to die? When I heard Jonathan was dead, that’s all I wanted to do - die.’

His face clouded over and his eyes glistened with grief. ‘I wouldn’t know. All I do know is that when they told me about Morag I wanted to die meself - I still do.’

Eleanor sighed. ‘But you can’t just
die
, neither of us can. You have other children, like me, and you have to go on living for their sakes.’

‘That’ll be easier said than done.’ He nodded wearily. ‘Look, I came to say I’m sorry about this morning. I shouldn’t have been that rude. To be blunt, I didn’t want you there. I didn’t want to be reminded of the night Morag died and that’s all you wanted to talk about.’

‘I’m sorry, too. I shouldn’t have come. I suppose everyone responds differently when someone they love dies. I wanted to retrace Jonathan’s footsteps and it was silly to think you’d feel the same.’ Outside, the sky had turned a sickly green. She reached for the wall light overhead, but Hector Ingram raised a hand, a signal for her to wait, and drew the curtains first.

‘I didn’t realize it was late enough for the blackout. I must have slept for hours.’ She put the light on, swung her legs off the bed. She’d removed her boots before lying down, but still had on her fur coat, although there was no heating in the room and she was freezing. ‘It’s probably time for dinner.’

‘You can eat?’ He sounded surprised.

‘No, but it’s warm in the restaurant and I order a pot of tea, then a second in lieu of a meal. I haven’t eaten since . . .’ She stopped, not wanting to say the words in case it upset him.

‘Neither have I. Do you mind if I have a pot of tea with you, Mrs Allardyce? I don’t feel like going back to the house on me own.’ For a moment, he looked quite lost: a strong man made weak by the loss of his child. ‘It doesn’t feel the same any more.’

‘Of course I don’t mind,’ she said. She was glad they’d sorted out their differences and knew how the other felt. It must be the reason why, right now, she’d sooner be with Hector Ingram than anyone else on earth. She looked at him shyly. ‘You must call me Eleanor.’

‘I’m Hector,’ he said.

 

Sybil arrived the following morning. She’d spent two nights and a day getting there and looked worn out. ‘Mummy!’ She hugged Eleanor tightly and burst into tears. Eleanor couldn’t remember seeing her daughter cry since she was a little girl. ‘It’s so awful. He phoned on New Year’s Eve and said he was going to a party in some girl’s van and that the weather was really wild. Perhaps I should have tried to dissuade him, but he wouldn’t have taken a blind bit of notice, would he?’

‘Of course he wouldn’t, darling.’ She patted Sybil’s back, deeply resenting that Jonathan had chosen to telephone his sister, not her, on New Year’s Eve. ‘You mustn’t blame yourself for anything, not ever. But tell me what he said, every word. Let’s go into the lounge and have something to drink - would you like coffee or tea? Oh, it’s so nice of you to have come.’

‘Coffee, please. Black might help to keep me awake. When’s the funeral?’

‘Tomorrow.’ Tomorrow it would all be over. Eleanor would go back to Liverpool, leaving Jonathan behind in the little graveyard, knowing that she would never see him again.

 

Jenny drove Eleanor home. They started off before it was light and it was mid-afternoon by the time they reached Manchester where Jenny stopped to drop Sybil off at the station to find her own way to Suffolk. The London train arrived about an hour later and she was lucky enough to find a seat, but the journey seemed to take for ever, the train stopping frequently to let on more passengers until everyone was so crushed together, they could hardly breathe. The air was thick with cigarette smoke and the smell of sweat, and it was a waste of time even to think of fighting your way through the mass of bodies to the toilet or in search of a hot drink.

When they got to London, it was very late and very dark. She wasn’t confident of being able to catch a taxi to Liverpool Street Station and the tube was packed with people who’d been to the theatre or the cinema and, unlike her, appeared to have had a marvellous time. She arrived in Liverpool Street feeling more dead than alive and discovered the last train to Ipswich - the nearest station to Melton Purvis - had already left and she would have to travel to Colchester and get a bus from there.

The train crawled along and it was almost one o’clock by the time it arrived at the blacked-out station. The handful of passengers who’d been on the train disappeared as if by magic, there was no sign of a buffet, she hadn’t a clue where to find a bus, or the vaguest notion how to get to Melton Purvis any other way. If only she’d had the wit to stay in London and find a hotel for the night! There was no desperate hurry to get back: she still had a day left of her week’s leave. Trouble was, her brain was so clogged with grief that she couldn’t think any more.

She managed to find the unlit ladies’ waiting room and stretched out on a bench, knowing there wasn’t the faintest chance that she’d fall asleep. The last six days had been the worst of her life, much, much worse than Malta where she’d had a perfectly horrible time.

‘It’s so nice of you to have come,’ Mummy had said, as if Sybil hadn’t come because she was heartbroken that her brother was dead, but to be ‘nice’.

She’d expected her and Mummy to comfort each other, but Mummy had met this thuggish chap dressed like a tramp who turned out to be the father of the girl who’d died, and they were as thick as thieves. ‘Each of us knows how the other feels,’ she cried tearfully.

What about how
I
feel? Sybil wanted to scream. I’ll miss Jonathan for as long as I live, but no one seems to care how much I’m hurting inside.

In the cemetery - Sybil felt as if she was standing at the furthest edge of the world - when the coffin was being lowered into the ground, she’d imagined her little brother inside, with his cherubic face and ever-cheerful smile, and a lump had come to her throat that emerged in a sort of choking groan. She heard her mother make the same noise and turned to put her arm around her, but the thug had got there before her and Mummy was sobbing her heart out on his shoulder.

Next day, Mummy had gone to his daughter’s funeral - she was buried in the back garden of his house - but Sybil had remained in the hotel, feeling unwanted, almost wishing she’d stayed in Melton Purvis and mourned her brother there. She could have asked the Reverend Richardson to hold a little service in St Jude’s. At least she would have been with friends who cared and the choir could have sung a lullaby for Jonathan as he began his last, long sleep.

Even on the way home, Mummy had got on her nerves, nursing the sculpture the thug had given her: three stick-like figures in a circle holding hands, crudely made. These apparently were his children and the smallest was Morag, the girl who’d died.

‘This was the first thing he ever did,’ Mummy sniffed. ‘I feel terribly honoured that he gave it to me. I shall cherish it all my life.’

 

As soon as she saw a glimmer of daylight appear beneath the waiting-room door, Sybil went to stand on the platform to wait for the Ipswich train. One came almost straight away and, when she reached the station, a staff car had just dropped off its passengers and the driver took her back to the camp. By half past seven, Sybil was in bed in her billet, dead to the world.

Next morning, after a shower, a hot drink and a slice of toast, she felt much better physically, but her brain was still numb from the shock of Jonathan’s sudden death and the awfulness of his funeral. She wondered if she could ever forgive her mother for being so offhand. After all, there were only the two of them left, if you didn’t count Anthony who seemed to have deserted his family altogether.

She made her way through the weak, lemony sunshine towards the stores, opened the door of her office and found a soldier she’d never seen before sitting behind the desk. He looked about fifty and must be a regular. ‘Good morning, Sergeant,’ she said, noting the three stripes on his jacket. ‘I’ll take over now,’ she added.

The man leapt to his feet and saluted. ‘Good morning, ma’am.’ He seemed surprised to see her. ‘Haven’t you spoken to Major French yet?’

‘Do I need to?’ She assumed the sergeant had been standing in for her while she’d been away.

‘I think he has fresh orders for you, ma’am. I’ve been put in charge of the stores for now.’

Damn! She’d liked working in the stores. It was a responsible job that she’d done efficiently, the only drawback being Corporal Tennant’s permanently unsmiling face.

‘How are you, Allardyce?’ Major French enquired kindly ten minutes later when she was seated in his office. He was a tall, sporty-looking man who’d been a minor tennis star before the war, as well as a solicitor and a member of the Territorials, the latter being the reason why he’d been called up before the conflict had even started. He was popular and well liked. ‘I was sorry to hear about your brother.’

‘Thank you, sir. I suppose you could say I’m bearing up, or at least trying to.’

‘That’s all one can do, isn’t it, try? By the way, I was at St Jude’s on New Year’s Eve. The choir put on a jolly good show, Allardyce.’

Sybil acknowledged this with a slight nod. New Year’s Eve had only been seven days ago, but felt like more like seven years.

Major French shuffled the papers on his desk. ‘I expect you’ll be sadly missed by the choir.’

‘Missed!’ She was being posted somewhere else where she wouldn’t know a soul. Her heart sank. She’d always had difficulty getting to know people, making friends. Melton Purvis had been the exception to the rule and she would miss it dreadfully. For some reason, she thought of Cara and the camp in Lincolnshire. Everyone had liked her and she’d made friends of them all.

‘Where am I being sent, sir?’ she asked dully.

‘Bombay, Allardyce. As you know, the Japanese have just raised their fearful little heads and we are vastly expanding our base in India - one never knows where they will strike next in that region. Singapore is likely to fall into their hands any minute and they have already entered Burma. Arrangements have been made for you to leave tomorrow.’ For a moment, he looked wistful. ‘I only wish I was going with you. I didn’t join the Army to push pieces of paper around. I’m raring to see some action.’

‘That’s exactly what my brother used to say, sir.’

 

She wanted to go into the village and say goodbye to everyone, but there’d been enough sadness lately and she couldn’t bear any more. Instead, she wrote a note to the Reverend Richardson telling him about Jonathan, that she was being posted abroad and was sorry she had to leave the choir. Really, she should phone her mother with the news, but she would probably cry and Sybil would know she didn’t mean it because Jonathan was the only person she’d ever truly cared for. A letter would just have to do. She would have liked to call Nancy who would be genuinely sympathetic, but Cara or Fielding might answer and they were the last people in the world she wanted to speak to.