War Orphans (12 page)

His suggestions were always accompanied by a salacious wink. Joanna took it that his comments were some kind of joke. If it was she didn't understand it.

Normally Joanna would gnaw on whatever Elspeth had left on the side of the plate. Tasting meat was a rare occurrence since her father had gone away.

On this occasion the chop bones ended up wrapped in a piece of newspaper. She also found some broken biscuits at the bottom of the tin, though she was careful not to take too many in case her stepmother noticed. Elspeth only always ate whole biscuits. The broken ones were for Joanna though she was expected to make them last. The bones from Elspeth's plate would form Harry's breakfast in the morning along with a small sliver of cheese rind and a spoonful of pork dripping. There were also the bones from Mrs Allen's stew which she would place within the puppy's reach in case he got hungry.

Once the dishes were done and everything for Harry was safely stored in her satchel, Joanna made her way up the stairs to bed.

She was careful not to turn the light on without drawing the blackout curtains. Once she'd switched it off she opened them again, her face glowing in the silver light of the moon, her eyes scanning the stars, the only lights she could see.

Before the blackout had been imposed she used to gaze out of that window, wishing she could be far away from The Vale. She'd read of faraway places with strange-sounding names but had never been anywhere except a Sunday school trip to Weston-super-Mare. It had rained most of the day, but she hadn't cared. The distant horizon was spread out before her and she couldn't help wondering what was beyond.

In the morning she woke up early, washed, dressed and went downstairs to light the fire. She'd already laid the kindling on top of screwed-up newspaper so it was just a case of fetching coal from where it was stored in the cupboard beneath the stairs. The door to the coalhouse was next to the kitchen, a big improvement on the lot of some people who still had to bring it in from outside. The coalman had to come through the house to tip it in but everyone in The Vale, unless they were the end ones on a block of four which had a side entrance, had to endure the same.

Joanna shuddered as she lifted the door latch. For a moment she could go no further forward. She'd been shut in there so many times. She could cope when the light from the kitchen flooded through the open door onto the heaps of black coal. The times she was locked in there when all was darkness were an entirely different matter.

By the time Elspeth put in an appearance the fire was lit and the tea was made.

Her stepmother was still wearing her dressing gown. The remains of red lipstick were smeared around her lips and congealed lumps of mascara hung from her eyelashes. A cigarette drooped from the corner of her mouth and her dressing gown gaped open, revealing what looked like purple pinches on her breasts.

Seeing Joanna's gaze, Elspeth slapped a hand across the back of her head.

‘What the bloody hell do you think you're staring at?' Her voice was coarse and loud as she pulled the gaping garment
around herself. ‘They're just bruises. That's all they are. Right? Just bruises. I bumped into a door. Several doors.' She grinned as she said it and then laughed.

Joanna had experienced enough bruises in her time to know her stepmother was lying. The purple marks were very much like the purple blotches that came up on your arm if you sucked it long enough. The older girls at the big school in Marksbury Road called them love bites. She dared not ask if that was the case.

Bowing her head she shrugged her shoulders into her coat. The multi-coloured knitted scarf she wound around her neck had been knitted by Mrs Allen from odd bits and pieces. Joanna pulled on her wellington boots, the only footwear that didn't pinch her toes. The day was too wet to wear the second-hand shoes purchased at the same time as the coat.

Elspeth went out in the kitchen to pour herself a cup of tea and fry herself some bacon. Two fresh rashers had been placed in the pan. Two slices of bread were already cut. Joanna knew better than not to have Elspeth's breakfast ready.

‘It'll have to be earlier next week,' Elspeth shouted after her. ‘I'm on early shifts.'

Joanna reached for her satchel and headed for the door, relieved to be going outside whatever the weather might be. She was also relieved her stepmother would require her breakfast earlier next week. It would give her more time to gather things for Harry's breakfast.

‘Just a minute. I want a word with you.'

Joanna stopped in her tracks and did her best to look innocent as she placed her hand over her satchel.

‘Is something wrong?'

Even though Elspeth couldn't possibly see into her satchel, it was as though the bones, the biscuits and the other bits and pieces had jumped out and were dancing on her shoulders.

Elspeth's smeared lips widened into a self-satisfied smile. ‘I'm on early shifts next week but late shifts today. Do you understand what that means?'

Joanna waited expectantly.

‘What it means, you stupid kid, is that I won't be here when you get home, so feed yourself, wash up, and don't wait up. I begin my new job this afternoon. We get given our shift schedules one month in advance. This means working tonight as well.'

Joanna said nothing, her eyes as round as marbles in the pallor of her face, her fear replaced by relief. Her mouth was too dry to say anything.

Elspeth peered at her through a pall of cigarette smoke. Her smile slackened. ‘Well, you could at least congratulate me.'

Joanna swallowed and wasn't sure what to say.

‘Will it be interesting?' she asked in a small voice, hoping to God her comment met with favour.

‘I don't suppose it will, but the money's good. I would have preferred a job as usherette down the Rex.' A dreamy look came to her face. ‘Three matinees a day, five days a week. I would have been seeing all the latest pictures before anybody else had the chance. Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, Errol Flynn, you name them I would've been seeing them. And Jean Harlow. People say I look like Jean Harlow. Now there's a thing. A job at the Rex would have been nice. Still, I suppose in these times you've got to be grateful. And in any case, the factory pays better. I'll probably be making bombs to dump on Hitler. Anyway, this factory job means I won't be here when you get home for five nights of the week so you'll have to manage without me. Any problems, go see the old bag next door. She'll look after you. Got nothing better to do than poke 'er nose into other folks' business. Just don't go telling 'er anything about me. Right?'

Joanna nodded. She wasn't quite sure what secrets her stepmother required her to keep, but Mrs Allen was not a nosy person. She was kind and had twinkling eyes and was very generous with her cooking. If it hadn't been for her she would have starved.

It never occurred to Elspeth to question why her stepdaughter left for school when it was still dark and Joanna was thankful.
Her stepmother was full of the new job and when she spoke of coming home late – very late – her eyes had gleamed with excitement.

Joanna too was excited. The new job meant she wouldn't have to worry about getting home late.

That morning, despite the fact that it was still dark outside, she skipped her way down the garden path, too happy to care if she tripped over something or knocked into the dustbin.

With her satchel slamming against her hip she ran all the way to the allotments, slipping and sliding on the frosty pavements and cobbles. Even the hard-baked mud paths around the allotment were capped with frost and the intermittent puddles slicked with a thin layer of ice, but she danced around them, glad to be out and extra glad that she'd have the house to herself this evening.

Harry was wrestling with a sack that he'd managed to pull out of his bed, twisting his little head this way and that and growling as though the sack was a living thing.

He left the sack in the heap the moment she entered, jumping up at her, sniffing at her satchel and wagging his rump and little stump so much she felt sure he would wag what little he had left.

Once she was on her knees, he rained sloppy kisses upon her with his little pink tongue, jumping and dancing all over and around her.

Joanna took out the lamb bones, the cheese rind, the scraping of dripping and the broken biscuits and placed them in a cracked plate she'd brought with her.

Harry woofed all of it down without a moment's hesitation, then continued to lick the plate, making it rattle as he pushed it around the floor with his tongue and his nose.

Joanna took the sack he'd been wrestling and remade his bed. Once that was done, she refilled his water dish from the watering can which she had had the foresight to fill the night before.

The chill light of a winter's day had barely pierced the dirty window frame when she left.

The bones and gravy from Mrs Allen's stew she left within Harry's reach. He tucked in immediately.

‘You have to make them last all day,' she said to him.

He continued to gnaw, sucking and chewing, completely oblivious of her presence.

Joanna was worried. There was no food left in her satchel only the old bicycle lamp, a few school books and a clean piece of newspaper into which she could place a few scraps from her school dinner.

She took more than she used to now, storing some of it in an old tea caddy she'd found inside the shed. The extra food was for Harry to eat on the weekend when the school was closed. She also poured him some milk from the third of a pint bottle she'd taken yesterday.

Soon it would be Christmas and she would no longer be able to bring him food from her school dinner plate. Somehow she would have to store even more than she did for a weekend to last him over the whole of the Christmas season.

‘I shall store extra bits and pieces in the tea caddy,' she told herself, but was not reassured by this decision. The fact was Harry was quickly growing bigger and eating more and more. Somehow she had to figure out a way to get hold of more food. She frowned at the prospect. There were so many plans and decisions to make. Sometime in the spring she had to teach him to walk on the lead, to let him out into the fresh air. She certainly couldn't keep him indoors for ever.

At the sound of his plaintive howl she looked nervously around her, casting her eyes over the vegetables the flowers and the fruit bushes. Harry wouldn't eat anything she could see growing, but she had to do something or he would starve to death.

‘I have to go now,' she said to him, holding his jowls as she gazed into his button bright eyes. ‘You'll have to make those bones last all day until I come later. Promise me you will.'

Harry whimpered.

‘Good,' she said, kissing the top of his head. ‘I'll see you later.'

After carefully closing the door behind her, she set off down the path that would lead her back to the main road and eventually to school.

A rabbit awake from hibernation and out searching for breakfast chose that moment to run out from cover and cross her path. If Miss Hadley was right, rabbits should be hibernating. Obviously this one had grown tired of being confined in a dark hole in the ground. Definitely a wild rabbit, not domestic like the ones Paul had owned.

She thought of Paul's pet rabbits being killed for the pot. Paul had been loath to eat them though he openly confessed to snaring the rabbits that plagued the allotment holders around here.

A plan busily formed in her head. Paul could be the answer to her problem, though it meant she would have to let him in on her secret. But Harry could not stay in the shed for much longer. Neither could he live on scraps for ever. Catching a rabbit and cooking it seemed the ideal solution.

The junior boys were congregated around the school gate where they entered into their playground. Joanna headed for the girls' entrance but waved to Paul as she went in.

‘I want to see you later,' she shouted to him.

He waved back, a cheery smile lighting his face. She'd avoided his company since finding Harry, but now she needed him. Everything would be fine, she told herself. Paul wasn't the kind to tell tales. It was her only option.

Seb Hadley was not just angry, he was confused, and although he knew he shouldn't lean so heavily on his daughter, he just couldn't help himself.

Although Sally was positively blooming since meeting her Frenchman, he couldn't get over the feeling of being discarded in favour of a sweetheart.

That evening he stayed up waiting for the sound of her key in the lock.

Much as he tried to rein in the jealousy that brewed inside, it burst out of him.

‘What sort of time do you call this?' he demanded when she dared to walk in the door after half past eleven at night.

The sparkle in Sally's eyes vanished. Her happy expression disappeared too. Only the pink flush of her cheeks remained.

Without her needing to say a word, he knew she was in love. He could see all the signs. If Grace were still alive they would both be glad for her. Although he knew it was wrong, he feared losing her.

There wasn't a day went by when he didn't wake up and immediately reach over to the cold half of the bed where Grace had slept beside him for thirty-odd years. There wasn't a day went by when he didn't mourn her loss and resurrect vivid memories of their years together. The past meant everything to him; the future seemed only bleak and empty. At least he had his daughter, his life raft between the past and the future. He couldn't easily let her go.

Sally was dismayed though not entirely surprised. ‘Dad. You can't go on like this. I miss Mum as much as you do, but I have my own life to live. You can't keep clinging to me like a drowning man.'

‘So you're off, are you? Yes! I can see it in your eyes. Don't lie. I know you want to go off with him and leave me all by myself!'

‘Dad! You've got to snap out of this. Other men have lost members of their family and with this war going on there will be a lot more. Think of the children who are likely to lose parents, the parents likely to lose sons. We're all in this war together, Dad, and we all need to pull together. So why aren't you? Why aren't you growing vegetables instead of flowers to the memory of a woman who would tell you the same as I am telling you? Get out there and dig for victory.'