Coronation Wives (7 page)

‘It’s not that important.’

‘It is to me! I made myself a promise a very long time ago that I would be a virgin on my wedding day.’

‘Goodness! What an odd thing to say. I was beginning to think that idea had had its day. Obviously I was wrong.’

Janet gazed at something in the distance that was there but wasn’t, a memory from when she was younger and had come home to find … She shook the experience from her mind.

‘I suppose so,’ she said softly. ‘But I had my reasons for wanting that. It doesn’t matter now. Anyway, it was different for your generation.’

Edna waited for her to continue but, realizing that she wasn’t going to explain herself, took her courage in both hands and said, ‘Not everyone is a virgin when they marry. I wasn’t.’

Janet stopped eyeing one particular monkey who was holding his hands out to the watching crowds, like a beggar asking for alms. ‘You? I can’t believe it! I mean, you’ve got Colin and three kids …’ Janet’s voice trailed away.

Edna shrugged, gave a tiny smile and shook her head so that her brown curls fell forward from the pink slides she was
wearing to pin it back. ‘No one is perfect, Janet. Not even me. Not even your mother.’

Janet prickled at the last remark. No, her mother was not quite the respectable woman she pretended to be. But that too was a secret. ‘I’m not like my mother at all. That’s why I can’t tell her anything. We’re so different.’

Edna laughed.

Janet looked offended. ‘But I’m not like her.’

‘You don’t know that just yet, and believe me, I should know. I’m not like my mother, thank goodness, in fact I’m probably more like my father. But I
am
a mother myself so I know a good one when I see one. I think I see the best of Charlotte in you. Isn’t it true you enjoy working at the hospital? You obviously do care for other people just as she does.’

Janet studied her hands as if seeing them for the first time and not being too sure why she had fingers. ‘I love my job. I think I love my mother although at times she seems indifferent, at others surprising – even shocking.’

Edna accepted that Charlotte’s serenity could be misconstrued as indifference so did not challenge the comment. Shocking was not quite such an easily accepted description, but she chose not to react. Janet was feeling fragile. It was best to take things slowly.

She said, ‘We all experience sad and terrible times in our lives. There’s no guarantee given out at the beginning that it’s going to be perfect right until the end. I’ve certainly had my share, that’s for sure.’

‘Ah yes, Colin.’

‘Not just Colin.’

Edna studied her children. She rarely talked about her firstborn, but she thought about him a lot. Would his absence help to heal Janet’s hurt? It had to be worth using it.

‘I had a child before I married Colin. I had to give him up.’

Janet stared at her dumbstruck. ‘I didn’t know … I mean … I know you two fell out just before that Christmas you came to stay with us.’ The details were vague. She’d been at an age when her own problems had seemed far more important than those of grown-ups.

‘It wasn’t Colin’s. I had a romance, a brief affair while he was away. But I was still the same person I was before and I am now, though older of course. And Colin loved me still. It was just one of those things that happened. I have to live with it, but it changes nothing. I’m still the same and so are you. People love us for what we are, not what we’ve done or had done to us.’

Janet blinked. Edna was no longer the person she’d thought she was. It was difficult to say anything.

The silence lingered. Both women pretended to watch the children who, in turn, watched the monkeys as they dashed over the green dome of the mock Indian temple, screeching, scrabbling and fighting amongst themselves for the scattered peanuts and orange peel.

Edna remained tight-lipped until she judged the moment was right to speak. ‘You’ve had a horrible experience, Janet, but you cannot allow it to ruin your life. You have to go on. People depend on you.’

Janet swallowed at the dryness in her throat. ‘I’ll never forget that voice.’

Edna stroked Janet’s hair back from her face and tucked it behind her ear. Janet didn’t move, didn’t look at her. Her voice was soft. ‘You’ll do it. You’re strong, just like your mother.’

Janet shook her head away from Edna’s soothing fingers. ‘I am
not
like my mother!’

At first Edna looked taken aback, but rallied quickly. She shrugged. ‘Hopefully I’m not like mine.’

Perhaps because her feelings were in turmoil, Janet did not
want
to be soothed. She suddenly snapped, ‘I’m not a child. Please don’t treat me like one.’ She untangled herself from Edna’s sympathy and walked away.

Edna watched, aching because she knew how it was to feel confused, to bear disappointment and to wonder what to do next. Things would get better. She knew they would.

‘She’ll be all right,’ she said softly to herself.

There was no time to dwell on Janet’s plight. Pamela began to squall so loudly that all the monkeys retreated to the very top of their carved concrete home.

That was uncalled for, Janet said to herself. Edna’s been good to you. She stopped beneath a weeping willow. Feathery leaves threw delicate shadows across her face.

Edna had surprised her, and not just with her confession about having had a child before marriage. On the surface she appeared almost mousy, yet it occurred to Janet that she understood the vagaries of life and dealt with them better than most people.

The next day was Coronation Eve. It was also Pamela’s birthday and she was to have a party at the semi-detached where they now lived.

Colin had suggested that everyone wear their Coronation fancy dress seeing as the little girl’s birthday was so close to the enthronement of a new monarch and that they were all going to different places on the great day itself.

Colin’s parents were dressed as John Bull and Rule Britannia – the latter costume consisted of some suitably draped bed-sheets and a cardboard helmet coloured in with child’s crayons.

The room was a riot of noise. Children and adults were getting into the swing of things, talking, singing and helping small hands handle big spoons and wobbly red jelly.

Polly’s daughter, Carol, was dressed in a Bo-Peep costume. At nine she was the eldest child there, and had her mother’s looks and the cheek to match.

Edna overheard Colin’s mother ask Charlotte how her children were getting on.

‘Geoffrey’s enjoying university very much. And Janet loves her job at the hospital’

‘I always thought your Geoffrey wanted to be a soldier,’ Polly said as she took Charlotte’s empty teacup.

‘I didn’t want him to be. Neither did David. He wanted him to be a doctor.’

‘How’s Janet?’ asked Edna from behind a tray of tea, bread and butter plus a pot of strawberry jam.

‘Fine,’ said Charlotte.

‘Good,’ said Edna, smiled and wished she didn’t know that Janet was far from fine.

‘Who’s for jelly?’ Polly in her Pearly King costume, an obvious choice for someone who favoured wearing black and white, had a large glass bowl jammed under her arm and close to her bosom. Rows of podgy little hands shot into the air.

‘Not if yer gonna dip yer titty in it,’ said Carol, her hands on her hips and a perky tilt to her chin. The comment earned her a clipped ear.

The house in Kingscott Avenue was blessed with a garage and an inside toilet and bathroom located at the top of the stairs. A television sat like a small cupboard in one corner of the room and was drawing plenty of admiring glances and perhaps a little envy from some quarters.

‘Puts me in mind of a bloody gert eye watching me,’ said Polly between ladling out jelly and readjusting the bowl beneath her generous breast.

‘I can’t wait to see the Coronation,’ said Edna, her face as bright as any child’s and her eyes gleaming. ‘Fancy being able
to see the Queen and Westminster Abbey in my own living room. It’s a miracle, it really is. I’ve invited some of the neighbours.’

‘Ain’t they got radios?’ asked Polly. Edna ignored the sarcasm and tried again. ‘It’ll be quite a little party. You can come yourself if you like.’

‘Don’t need to, do I? I’ll be seeing the Coronation on the big screen up the Broadway. That’s the great thing about working in a picture ’ouse. They’ll be showing it for days after and I’ll get to know every single detail’

Edna persisted. ‘But it’s better on the day. In fact it’ll be quite a party.’

‘You just said that.’

Edna blushed. ‘I’m sorry, I just thought—’

‘Don’t bother. We’re ’avin’ a street party on the night. I got a lot of stuff to get ready. Anyway I prefer a bigger screen. Like I said, I can see it all at the pictures.’

Charlotte, who had heard the conversation, made a big thing of wiping Pamela’s face. It wasn’t really that bad, but she had to hide her smile. She knew her friends so well. Edna was being generous, longing to share her enthusiasm for the television set with anyone. But Polly was proud. She had no intention of appearing hard done by.

Polly’s daughter Carol chose that moment to push between Edna and her mother. ‘Got any more of that fruitcake?’

Polly slammed a piece on her daughter’s plate. ‘There you are.’

Carol inspected it, turning it this way and that. ‘It ain’t got no cherry.’

‘No,’ sniggered Polly and whispered close to Charlotte’s ear, ‘an’ neither have I.’

Edna heard her and looked shocked. ‘Polly!’

Charlotte pretended she hadn’t heard. Polly liked to shock
people. It was part of her armoury. Instead she turned to Edna’s parents who were sitting in the armchairs, tea plates balanced on knees, tea grimly raised to unsmiling lips. They were strangely quiet, Edna’s father glancing nervously at his wife as though waiting for her to stand up and put a stop to the merriment. At one time she might very well have done. Her sharp eyes never missed a thing.

If something odd was going on between the old pair, all those gathered took little notice. This was the children’s time.

Charlotte asked them if they’d like more tea. Edna’s father held out his cup. Edna’s mother looked at her as though she was speaking a foreign language.

‘There you are.’ Charlotte handed Mr Burbage a piece of cake and tried again with Edna’s mother. ‘What about you, Mrs Burbage?’

‘I think she’d like a piece,’ said Edna’s father, his eyes darting nervously from one woman to the other.

Up at the table, Polly’s Aunty Meg, who had just come in from washing dishes, raised the lid on the teapot. ‘We need a fresh brew, I think.’

Edna’s mother pushed past Charlotte and snatched the teapot from beneath Meg’s nose. ‘That’s my job!’

Taken aback, Meg asked, ‘Are you sure?’

Mrs Burbage was adamant. ‘It’s my turn to make tea now. Mother did it this morning. Now it’s my turn.’

Meg frowned and muttered, ‘Mother? Your mother’s been dead for years.’ She raised her eyebrows in Edna’s direction. Edna purposely ignored her. Meg shrugged her shoulders. Who could blame her? Ethel Burbage had always been a cow.

‘Silly old bat,’ said Polly, who was refilling the empty dish of a little lad with a very large appetite.

Looking anxious, Edna’s father got to his feet. Aunty Meg placed a hand on his shoulder and pushed him gently back into
his chair. ‘You sit there. I’ll go out an’ give ’er a hand.’ She turned to Edna. ‘Your gran died ten years ago, didn’t she?’

‘Yes.’

‘I thought so.’

Meg made her way to what she still called a scullery where a pale green kitchen cabinet stood to the right of the draining board. Ethel Burbage was bent over the sink ladling tea into a dark brown teapot. ‘One for Mum, one for Dad, one for Uncle Stan and one for the pot.’

As Meg watched she became aware that Charlotte had joined her. They stood silently as Edna’s mother tipped the slops into the pot and promptly filled the whole thing up with cold water from the tap.

Meg whispered against Charlotte’s ear. ‘I think she’s going doolally.’

‘She would choose today,’ Edna said angrily as she came out into the kitchen for a fresh tray of cake.

Meg took the brown pot gently but firmly out of the other woman’s grasp and said, ‘Ethel! What the bloody ’ell are you thinking of? This pot’s cold. P’raps the gas is gone. We’d better make another then, ain’t we?’

Edna turned her back on the scene and went back into the living room. She swallowed her anger and exchanged a brief look with her father. His anxious expression aroused her sympathy though did nothing for the simmering resentment she’d felt for her mother all these years.

‘Aunty Meg’s giving her a hand,’ she said matter of factly. She just couldn’t bring herself to talk about her mother in soft, gentle tones. Selfish and spiteful suited much better. Turn away, she told herself, dish out some more cake.

Polly gave her a hand. ‘Not right, is she?’ she said, making no effort to be tactful.

‘It’s been going on a while,’ said Edna and described the
first time she’d realized that her mother was not her old self. ‘She told us that her granny was making her a grey scarf for Christmas and that they would match the gloves she was wearing. She seemed oblivious to the fact that the temperature was in the eighties and climbing.’

Edna had hoped it would be explanation enough. Polly persisted. ‘What are you going to do about it?’

‘Nothing. There’s nothing I can do. I have three children and a husband to think about.’

Edna pushed the problem to the back of her mind. This was Pamela’s birthday. The child was strapped into her high chair as Edna spooned jelly into her open mouth while pondering past disappointments rather than any pity she might feel for her mother.

A spoon hammering against the side of the chair interrupted her concentration. A freckled face framed by sandy hair looked up at her. ‘Where’s Daddy?’ asked Peter.

‘Getting dressed, of course,’ said Susan. The eldest at seven, she looked more like her mother although she had also inherited her father’s amiable confidence and his unruly thatch of gingery fair hair.

Peter frowned and, looking slightly worried, whispered, ‘Is he going to wear a dress like yours, Mum?’