Songs of Spring (20 page)

Perhaps with Joachim using the shed she might come to terms with it all. Perhaps it wasn’t right to close herself up so much against the world. She should throw open her own doors like this shed, and let a bit of life into herself. See what she could do to cheer the Rectory up. Poor Mrs Lilley was like a ghost, she was so thin now. The Rector was getting greyer by the day and more silent.

Now most families had suffered bereavement, people had given up wearing black and often they didn’t even wear armbands. Margaret wondered if people in Germany felt like they did. Odd really. When this war started, she’d only thought of Germany as the place where the Kaiser lived. She thought of it quite differently now she knew people
were over there struggling to grow food to eat and battling with grief, just like they were here.

Agnes came slowly into the kitchen, with her beeswax polish and cloth, looking as if even a touch of elbow grease was too much for her.

‘Sit down, Agnes. I’ll make some tea. You look all washed up.’

‘The baby kept me awake last night – it looks as if her good period is over. And I had another letter from Jamie, not so happy as usual. All this to and fro-ing has knocked the stuffing out of the Tommies’ morale, and it’s made worse by the miners and engineers being on strike here.’

‘It doesn’t seem right, does it?’ Margaret sympathised there. You never knew who was going on strike next these days. ‘There’s men out there fighting for their homeland, and there’s them exempted from call-up because of their job, then refusing to do it so that the men at the front are short of ammunition.’

‘I keep thinking my Jamie might be killed all because of them.’ Agnes burst into tears.

This was something Margaret could deal with. She slid a cup of tea in front of the weeping girl. ‘Now, Agnes, you’re overtired. Anyway, I read that Winston Churchill is going to have them called up if they don’t go back to work.’

‘And a good job too,’ Agnes said fiercely, wiping her eyes, and managing a giggle. ‘Suppose you went on strike from your Food Economy classes?’

George circled over base. He was keyed up and exhausted. The RFC – no, RAF – he still found it difficult to think of
the force under its new name – was doing its best to slow down the enemy advance. They were still raining down bombs like Mrs Dibble’s rock cakes, and though there were Fokkers and Pfalzes around in plenty, especially in the evenings, nothing was going to stop them from raining down thousands more. Today the squadron had bombed Epinoy Aerodrome in company with 3 Squadron and two others, and George was carried away with the thrill of success. Their 25-pounders had set not only hangars on fire, but enemy machines. One of them was thanks to the Major who had dived down to within ten feet to hit a Pfalz scout, and the plumes of smoke from workshops had filled George with fierce glee.

He landed his kite back on the bumpy grass, and to stretch his legs decided to stroll over the rough field to its perimeter. By the ditch at the far side, almost hidden by undergrowth, he stumbled across a wooden cross, and sick with horror George realised he was standing on a grave. This land had been fought over many times and there was nothing to indicate whether the occupant of this grave was British, French or German. And did it matter? George wondered wearily. Known unto God, wasn’t that the phrase? Just some soldier, who would never laugh again. Who died for what he believed was right. Or maybe he hadn’t even believed that. Soldiers fought on for they had no option, whether illusions of patriotism had died or not. The Tommies were still convinced they were fighting for right, however, and that increased their bitterness that strikers back home, so far from supporting them, were ready to starve them
of the tools to fight with, for their own selfish reasons.

George swore softly to himself, and promised this unknown soldier that the tide was beginning to turn. Soon it would all be over.

‘I,’ Caroline proclaimed unsteadily, ‘am twenty-six years old.’ To compensate for Felicia’s absence on Sunday, they were having a belated sisterly gathering at Monico’s. Phoebe had not come to the picnic either in order to avoid wartime train travel.

‘Plus three days,’ Phoebe added practically.

‘Don’t be smug. Just because you’re having a baby it doesn’t mean elder sisters don’t have the right to live.’ Caroline stopped, appalled at what she had said. Two glasses of indifferent wine and she lost guard of her words so easily.

‘It’s all right, Caroline,’ Felicia said quickly, seeing her ashen face.

‘It isn’t,’ Caroline replied fiercely. ‘How
could
I have said that?’

‘As easily,’ Phoebe said comfortably, ‘as I can think of my baby with happiness. As easily as if Isabel were here with us in the flesh as well as in spirit. How’s Mother?’ she asked, to change the subject.

‘She did her best to be birthday-like, but I think she’s still in shock,’ Caroline replied.

‘What comes after the shock?’

‘In Mother’s case,’ Felicia said soberly, ‘the pain.’

Caroline sighed. ‘What can we do?’

‘Phoebe’s baby will help rouse her.’

‘But that’s months away,’ Phoebe objected. ‘She can’t go on like this till January—’ She looked from one stunned face to another.

‘You told us November.’ Felicia was the first to speak.

‘Yes,’ Phoebe said quickly. ‘It may be a week or two late though.’

‘It’s elephants take a couple of years to produce their young, not you,’ Caroline said scathingly. ‘Just when is your baby going to be born?’

Phoebe toyed with her minuscule chop. ‘Actually,’ she finally said, ‘it’s due in mid January.’

‘Mathematics isn’t my strong point,’ Caroline said crossly, ‘but that means your baby started its existence in mid April?’

‘Yes,’ Phoebe muttered.

‘Which is when you were married.’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you mean to say’ – Caroline was furious – ‘that when Billy went down to confess all to Father, there
was
no baby?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Did Billy think there was?’

‘No,’ Phoebe retorted indignantly, ‘that wouldn’t have been fair.’

‘Fair!’ Felicia and Caroline shouted together, and a few curious faces turned to look at them. The level of noise in the restaurant was high, fortunately.

‘Phoebe,’ said Caroline grimly, ‘of all the dotty things you’ve done, this takes the cake.’

‘I second that,’ Felicia agreed. ‘Do you ever think of
anyone else? What do you think the effect on Father and Mother will be when they find out, or are you hoping it may escape their notice that your baby is two months late?’

‘It was Father’s fault,’ Phoebe rejoined, looking injured. ‘He wouldn’t let me get married when I wanted to just because Billy is divorced. He was going to be foul about it whether I married in April or after my birthday in June.’

‘But weren’t you being a little unfair on Billy?’ Felicia asked.

‘It did take a lot to talk him round,’ Phoebe admitted, ‘but even he agreed there’d be an almighty row sooner or later with Father, so why not have it now and we could get married when we wanted to.’

‘The deceit!’ Caroline was appalled. ‘And the hurt, that’s why it’s not honest.’

‘Like you living with Yves as his wife and letting the parents think you were just working with him?’

‘That’s different,’ Caroline cried. ‘That was to
save
them hurt.’

‘Didn’t succeed, did it?’ Phoebe answered smugly.

‘Phoebe, shut up,’ Felicia said swiftly, seeing Caroline on the verge of tears. ‘Pick on me if you have to. I’m not so vulnerable. You’ve behaved dreadfully to us all, and what Caroline said is quite right. What were you going to do if you hadn’t got pregnant, incidentally? Invent a miscarriage?’

‘I hadn’t thought as far as that.’

‘That’s your trouble, Phoebe. You never do think,’ Felicia said sharply.

That set Phoebe off again. ‘And you do, I suppose. Very
well, what do you think
you’ll
do after the war? Return to Ashden?’

‘I don’t believe I could,’ Felicia answered calmly.

‘Won’t you marry Daniel then?’

Felicia promptly lost the battle. ‘I don’t know, I don’t know. I don’t damned well
know
. Is that clear?’

‘Yes,’ Phoebe said sweetly.

‘I’ve had a letter from home,’ Caroline said jubilantly to Yves on 1st August. ‘George has been given a bar to his DSO. Isn’t that splendid?’

‘Good news indeed. Much needed.’

He was right. There still seemed to be stalemate on the Western Front. June had seen yet another big raid on the Belgian clandestine newspaper
La Libre Belgique
, although once more it had resurrected itself. In July the Russian royal family had disappeared and there were many dark rumours over their fate. What worse news could August bring? Caroline wondered.

It brought not bad news, but significantly good. On 8th August in a major new assault British tanks burst through the German lines at Amiens.

Front doors were frightening while you were waiting outside for agonising long minutes before knowing whether the news inside was going to be good or bad. Caroline could hear her heart beating loudly, as she tried to restrain her imagination from fearing the worst. She hadn’t seen Phoebe since their quarrel at the end of July, nearly a month, but news that she was having trouble with the baby had brought her rushing over. At long last – or so it seemed – Judith, Phoebe’s general maid, opened the door. She had not been trained to deal with emergencies, and spoke by the book in her timidity.

‘What name shall I say, miss?’

Caroline brushed her aside with a kindly, ‘You
know
me, Judith. Mrs Jones’ sister.’

At the sound of her voice Billy came out from the morning room to greet her. He looked as if he hadn’t slept for days – and probably hadn’t. He also looked somewhat
shamefaced, since he must surely know that Phoebe had told her the truth.

‘How is she?’ Caroline asked. ‘I came as quickly as I could.’ Not more bad news, she could not bear it after all that had happened.

‘She’s all right, and so will the baby be if she rests.’ Billy was crying, but with relief, not grief.

Thank you, God. Caroline made her own silent prayer of gratitude, and now that she knew all was well, Caroline felt the tears pricking at her own eyes. Another night summons, with all its awful recollections of May, had left her expecting the worst, since only the worst ever seemed to happen now. Each telephone call seemed to spell death or disaster, and Mrs Dibble hadn’t helped when she announced gloomily – though not in Father’s hearing – ‘There’ll be more bad luck, you’ll see. Troubles never come singly.’ A little Christian optimism and rather less Sussex superstition might be in order, Caroline felt. The night telephone call had convinced Caroline that Mrs Dibble was right, however, and it took some time for relief to relax the tension in her body.

‘Can I see her, Billy?’

‘She was dozing, but she may be awake by now.’

Caroline still found it hard to think of Phoebe as the mistress of a house. Marriage had only worked some wonders, however, for the house, run with a cook and a general maid, bore distinct signs of Phoebe’s happy-go-lucky approach to the finer details of household management. Not that she could talk. There were many times at Queen Anne’s Gate that she silently cried out for the help of Mrs Dibble, since Ellen’s household expertise was roughly on a
par with Isabel’s. This unbidden recollection sent a fervent rush of gratitude through her that Phoebe’s baby was safe, and she pushed open the bedroom door quietly.

Phoebe’s dark hair was spread out around her, and her eyes were closed. The normally pink-cheeked complexion was pale, and lying unaware of Caroline’s presence, she bore little resemblance to the sister she had grown up with. Then she opened her eyes, and Phoebe was back, grinning with pleasure.

‘I saved it,’ she crowed. ‘All by myself. The midwife said I was a born mother. I didn’t need Felicia to nurse me.’

‘Felicia doesn’t get much call for miscarriages,’ Caroline managed to joke.

‘It wasn’t a miscarriage. Although,’ Phoebe admitted, ‘it was nearly. I have to stay in bed for at least two weeks. Isn’t that awful? I wanted to go on Billy’s next tour in France.’

‘It will be a chance to catch up on your reading.’ Caroline tried to keep a straight face. Phoebe was notorious for her lack of interest in books.

Phoebe’s face grew even longer, then brightened. ‘I thought I might embroider some cushion covers. Mother could teach me. Is she coming up?’

‘I haven’t told her yet, darling. I wanted to be able to assure her you were all right.’

‘Oh.’ Phoebe sighed. ‘I suppose it’s selfish to expect her to come rushing up when travelling is so difficult nowadays. She could stay here though. Do you think she would? If you could persuade her, I promise I’ll confess my dastardly deed to her.’

Caroline looked at Phoebe’s wistful face, then thought
of her mother’s dazed grief over Isabel. ‘Do you know, Phoebe, I think it might be just the very thing she needs.’

‘Mrs Dibble!’

Margaret looked up in astonishment. Mrs Lilley actually sounded a little like her old self. She hadn’t heard that note of excitement in her voice since it had all happened, and here was the mistress hurrying into her kitchen just like she used to.

‘Mrs Phoebe isn’t well, Mrs Dibble. Caroline thinks it would help if I spent a few days there to ensure she does exactly what the midwife orders. My husband agrees. Do you think you can manage without me for a little while?’ Elizabeth asked anxiously.

It was hard for Margaret to keep a straight face. Poor Mrs Lilley was more hindrance than help nowadays; half the time she was unarranging everything that Margaret had just arranged. She had tried to help out with the shopping one day when Lady Buckford had one of her officers’ parties in the drawing room, and had managed to use a whole month’s sugar allowance. These newfangled ration books took some getting used to, even for those with all their wits about them, and Mrs Lilley was as scatterbrained as dear Mrs Phoebe at present.

‘You stay as long as you like, Mrs Lilley. Mrs Phoebe needs you and that’s more important than rations and agricultural rotas.’

The minute the last two words were out of her mouth Margaret realised she’d put her foot in it. Mrs Lilley’s face was as horror-struck as Pearl White’s when she saw the
train speeding down the tracks to which she was tied.

‘Oh, Mrs Dibble. I hadn’t thought of that. What am I going to do? I can’t possibly leave. I have my job to think of. And there’s the petrol allocations to do, not to mention a Rat and Sparrow Club meeting. Oh, what
shall
I do?’

Margaret scrabbled for an answer, and the Lord provided one. ‘Don’t you worry about a thing, Mrs Lilley. My Lizzie and her Frank can manage everything between them.’

‘But—’

‘But’s a word we don’t use in wartime, Mrs Lilley,’ Margaret said briskly. ‘Best foot forward, as they say, and your best foot is needed to take you to Mrs Phoebe at the moment.’

And that was that. Mrs Lilley looked at her doubtfully for a moment, and left, relieved and convinced. Which was more than Margaret was. She hoped she hadn’t bitten off more than she could chew – or, rather, than Lizzie and Frank could chew. She comforted herself that the cinema couldn’t take all his time, and he was well used to agricultural organisation. She decided to put her hat on and go straight away. Luncheon was only rissoles and they wouldn’t take long. Frank didn’t start at the cinema until the afternoon, and she found him at home looking after Baby Frank. She still thought of him as Baby Frank, for all he was toddling around.

‘Do you think you can do it, Frank?’

‘I think I can cope,’ he answered, so straight-faced she had her suspicions.

‘No laughing matter,’ she snapped. He was her son-in-law after all, and a bit of respect never did anyone any
harm. Belatedly she realised he wasn’t her son-in-law at all, although secretly she hoped he would be some day.

She found herself asking straight out: ‘How do you manage, Frank? Knowing …’ She broke off, appalled, but it was out.

He didn’t answer her for a moment, staring out of the window as covetously as the Kaiser must look at the map of England. ‘You mean if Rudolf comes back?’

‘Yes.’ She didn’t add that it was more likely to be when, rather than if. He knew that.

‘I manage like we all manage in this war. I go on from day to day. Even now that we’ve pushed the Germans back, nothing’s certain. It could end this year, more likely next, and who knows who’ll be in the chauffeur’s seat after that?’

‘No need for talk like that, Frank. Not after this last week.’

Only a week ago, at Amiens, our lads had driven them back seven miles, when they broke through on a fifteen-mile front. The newspapers were treating it as a great victory. That had happened before, of course, so like everyone else, Margaret was waiting to see. Percy said it was the tanks that made the difference. So far it looked good because the Germans hadn’t regained the ground, even though Ludendorff seemed to have endless supplies of troops. Children, many of them, so Joe had told Muriel, and even in England they weren’t too fussy about whether boys had reached their nineteenth birthday or not.

‘Can you come to see Mrs Lilley right away, Frank? I’ll look after Baby Frank.’

He hesitated. ‘Only for ten minutes. I have another appointment at twelve.’

‘It won’t take you long to get to the cinema from the Rectory.’

‘It’s at the Dower House.’ Frank looked awkward.

Wonders would never cease. What kind of appointment could Frank have at the Dower House?

Margaret dismissed this puzzle from her mind by turning her attention to potatoes as soon as she was back. The only uncertainty about potatoes was whether they had enough. She might have to ask Percy to dig some more, for you knew where you were if you grew your own. The government couldn’t make up its mind whether it wanted you to eat them or not. They had a pile of leaflets giving you potato recipes you’d
learnt
at your mother’s knee, and no sooner had that come through the letter box than one followed telling you not to eat them because they were scarce. Miss Caroline had told her that in London the polite thing to do when invited to dine at a private house was to arrive not with flowers or chocolates but a bag of potatoes. Quite right too.

On her way through to the garden via the ‘servants’ hall’, she caught sight of
Raymond
. The Rector had returned the book and it was sitting not in her own room but on the communal bookshelf. It was with some surprise that she realised that she had not glanced at it for at least a month, and the amount she had to do nowadays it might be yet another month before she did so again. Would Fred mind? It struck her that he wouldn’t, because Fred was not Raymond, and Raymond was not Fred. She struggled with this thought for a time, since for months the two had become intertwined.

If she put
Raymond
away, or passed it on to another grieving person – no, she wouldn’t do that. It would be influencing people. The important thing was that Fred would still be there, just as he always had been. In fact, she might see more of him.
See?
It wasn’t exactly
seeing
, just the sense that Fred was around, and that even if he wandered off on his own devices, that’s what he had always done. He used to lose himself for hours at a time in the garden or in the village. What was so different about heaven?

‘’Tis only the splendour of light hideth thee.’ She sang away with fervour as she put the book away in her own bookcase.

‘And if you should happen to run into Raymond up there, Fred,’ she added silently, ‘thank him for me, would you?’

‘Cumming has sent us an intercepted signal to von Falkenhausen in Brussels from Ludendorff. Have a look at it. It’s interesting.’ Luke tossed it on Caroline’s desk.

She glanced at it, then read it with more attention. ‘He calls 8th August a black day for the German army. I agree.
Very
interesting.’

Ludendorff’s tendency to gloom was by now well known, and if he foresaw the beginning of the end of the Kaiser’s scatty dreams, then the Army itself would soon see it, for it would percolate from the High Command down to the lowest ranking soldiers. Quite right too. Luke and Yves knew from La Dame Blanche that the indomitability of
La Libre Belgique
, which was managing to print articles smuggled out from the Vilvorde Prison, was a severe thorn
in von Falkenhausen’s flesh, and more good news was that the French had just launched a successful offensive of their own, having failed to persuade Haig into following up quickly on the Amiens success.

‘It won’t be long, with this kind of intelligence, before Haig does launch another attack,’ Luke declared happily.

Caroline did not reply, and Luke glanced at her. ‘Mixed blessing for you, sweetheart,’ he added sympathetically.

‘And maybe for you.’

‘Separate the two, Caroline. Rejoice that the war is creeping slowly towards some kind of conclusion even if it’s not an outright victory, and even if we have to wait for next year. We can deal with the results of it later.’

That was easy enough to say, Caroline thought crossly, though she admitted he was probably right. The recent apparent upturn in the Allied fortunes had forced her to face the fact that she was living in a fool’s paradise. The paradise element was splendid, but she was careering headlong towards disaster if she ignored its short duration.

Whatever the cautious hopes of the military, the general mood of the people, like Caroline’s, however, had not changed. Summer had not brought renewed hope, it had brought ration books, fines for hoarding, and the same old daily struggle; now in late August the thought that winter was coming once again, inexorably bringing even more shortages and hardships, added to the gloom. With no fuel, little coal, less food, and a grey drabness in clothes and entertainment, a hush had fallen over everyday life. Any rejoicing at military success was weighed down with the loss of loved ones, and fear that more might be in store.
Caroline would have her own form of bereavement to face, and the fact that it was inevitable did not make it easier.

Yves had seemed distracted these last few days, although even more tender and loving towards her, as if the coming parting had become suddenly more real to him also. He had gently warned her that if the next British offensive was planned for the north, he would have to leave.

‘For good?’ The thought that parting was nearer than she had reckoned with had made her cry out in horror.

‘No, I would return,’ he had promised, ‘but for how long we cannot know.’

‘I’m not sure it’s my place to tell you this, Caroline,’ Luke was now saying to her, ‘but I think I will. Have you noticed anything about Yves recently?’

‘He’s been preoccupied, worried about the next offensive.’

‘It’s not that,’ Luke said gently. ‘He’s had news of his wife.’

A sledgehammer hit her in the stomach. The wife was
real
; she was probably looking forward to Yves’ return. The monster Caroline had built up in her mind transposed itself into a normal, anxious woman, who was far more difficult for her to handle than a monster.