The Girls They Left Behind (10 page)

‘Would you like me to come in with you?’ Jess offered diffidently. ‘I mean, there might be quite a lot needs to be done. I wouldn’t mind giving you a hand.’

The girl’s eyes warmed a little. ‘Would you really? But you must have a lot to do — those two boys are yours, aren’t they? And you’ve got a baby, too.’

‘The boys’ll be away tomorrow. We’re sending them back to the country.’ Jess looked at the two little girls, wondering why they hadn’t been evacuated too. Of course, a lot of children had come back, thinking there weren’t going to be any bombs. ‘And Maureen’s no trouble.’

‘Well, if you’d just come in with me.’ The girl laughed

again, a little nervously. ‘It’s silly, but I’ve got a sort of funny

feeling about going in. Almost like it might be haunted. Daft!’

‘It’s not. It’s reaction.’ Jess parked the pram in the tiny

scrap of yard in front of the house. ‘My name’s Jess Budd, by

the way. I live just over the corner, in April Grove — number

‘I’m Kathy Simmons.’ Kathy turned the key and pushed open the door. ‘Well, let’s see what they’ve given us, shall we?’ She went into the dark, narrow little passage and sniffed. ‘Phew! What a pong. Who lived here before?’

‘An old woman. She’d been on her own for years, except for her cats. She had quite a few — just let them breed.’ Jess surveyed the discoloured walls. ‘You can see nothing’s been done to the place since she died. Her family came and took away what bits of furniture were any use and Mr Carter — he’s the landlord, owns four or five houses in this street — he cleared out the rest and got a shilling or two for it from the rag-and-bone man.’

Kathy opened the door into the front room and looked in at

the bare floorboards and grubby walls. ‘Ugh! How could anyone live like this?’ Her mouth twisted. ‘Well, it looks as if I’m going to find out, doesn’t it, me and the girls.’

Jess gazed at her in dismay. Kathy had said that her house was smashed to bits. She must have almost no furniture, clothes or anything. How was she going to manage?

‘Do they give you anything to help out?’ she asked, wondering if she sounded nosy. ‘I mean, surely they give you a bed or something.’

‘Five pounds. That’s all. Five pounds, for everything you possess. After that, you’re left to yourself.’ Kathy shut the door and walked through to the tiny back room and scullery. There was nothing in the scullery but an old earthenware sink with a cold tap. The smell of cats was everywhere.

Five pounds to buy furniture seemed like a fortune to Jess, but when you thought about having to get enough beds for a

family of four, with another one on the way, and buy all the things you needed for your kitchen, and chairs to sit on and clothes for everyone, well, you could see that it wouldn’t go far at all.

‘We’ve got nothing of our own,’ Kathy said. ‘Just the clothes we were stood up in. And they weren’t nothing special, not on a Thursday afternoon.’ She grinned suddenly. ‘You’d think he could at least bomb us on a Sunday, when

we’d got our best clothes on, wouldn’t you!’

‘If you need any help —‘Jess began awkwardly. She couldn’t imagine what help she could give — there was no spare money in the Budd household, let alone spare clothes or furniture — but it seemed wrong not to offer. ‘I mean, I’ll help you scrub out a bit if you like. And when the baby comes, I’d be glad to come over and give you a hand. I’ve got a few of Maureen’s baby things too, you’re welcome to them if you’d like them.’

‘Oh, I would. That’s really nice of you.’ Kathy smiled at her and Jess thought how brave she was. Fancy being able to make jokes about being bombed out of your own house!

They stood for a moment in silence, surveying the dirty room. Kathy went across to the back door and opened it, letting the afternoon Sunlight straggle in. It made the dirt look even worse. She took a deep breath and managed a watery grin.

‘Well, I suppose there’s no use just looking at it. I’ll have to start getting straight. I’ll go round the second-hand shops for a few bits and pieces of furniture and some clothes to get us started.’ She looked around at the house she must turn into a home for her family. ‘You don’t realise how much you’ve got till you lose it. And you’ve got to get the blackout done before you can even think of anything else.’

‘I know,’ Jess said. She followed Kathy to the front door and they went out into the fresh air with some relief. Kathy’s two little girls were standing by Maureen’s pram, holding up a woolly rabbit that Frank’s sister-in-law had knitted for her. The street was quiet. ‘Do you think the Germans are really going to invade?’

‘Do you?’ Kathy asked.

It was the question on everyone’s lips. Some people didn’t want to think about it, they shrugged it away. Others brooded about it the whole time. All through the previous year, when so little had seemed to be happening, although the news had been unremittingly bad about what was going on in other countries, no one had really been able to believe that Hitler would forget Great Britain.

Jess shook her head.

‘I don’t reckon the Germans are going to come,’ she said

stoutly. ‘Our boys are fighting them off. Look at the way they’ve gone up after the raiders, day after day. The bombing would have been a lot worse without the RAF to look after us:

‘And it’ll get worse yet,’ Kathy said darkly. ‘Aren’t we one of the biggest powers in the world? Stands to reason he wants to take us over! Same as he’s taken everyone else over.’ She laid her hand over her abdomen and looked at the two girls. ‘It’s the little ones I worry about. Them, and him in here.’

‘I know,’ Jess said quietly. ‘And maybe if we’d thought there was going to be a war, we’d never have had this little one.’ She bent forward and prodded Maureen in the stomach. The baby squealed and chortled. ‘But we wouldn’t be without you now, would we? Specially with the other three evacuated.’ She looked at Kathy. ‘Didn’t you want to be evacuated? Is your husband in the Forces?’

‘In the Merchant Navy. He doesn’t believe in evacuation. Nor do I, really. I think everyone ought to stay where they are.’ Kathy’s face flushed a little. ‘Anyway, I never know when he’s going to get home for a night or two and I’d rather be here.’

Jest nodded. She knew how Kathy felt, for she hated the idea of leaving Frank. But if he weren’t here … Still, everyone had to make up their own mind.

‘D’you want another girl?’ she asked, changing the subject. ‘Or would you rather have a boy this time?’

‘Oh, a boy,’ Kathy said, with a passion that startled her. ‘I only want a boy. I only ever wanted boys. Well, I don’t mean I don’t love Muriel and Stella now they’re here — and I wouldn’t change them, not for the world — but I really do want a boy this time.’ She looked at Jess. ‘You’ve got a nice family, haven’t you. Three others, is it?’

‘Two boys and a girl. They’re a bit older than Maureen — she was our afterthought!’ She laughed selfconsciously. ‘Rose is thirteen now and the boys are nine and eleven.’

‘Oh, you’ll miss them,’ Kathy said. ‘I don’t think I could bear to let my kids go away without me.’

‘I will miss them,’ Jess said. ‘But it’s war, isn’t it. You just have to do the best you can. And I don’t want to go through

another experience like last night, not knowing where the boys were and then finding they’d been out in the street the

whole time. It still makes me feel sick to think of that.’ She shook her head. ‘You can’t keep them in all the time. Specially boys. They’re better off in the country, where they can roam about and play. And we go out to see them whenever we can. My husband goes out on his bike if we haven’t got enough for the fare.’

‘Well, if! get a boy this time I’m never going to let him out of my sight,’ Kathy said. She shut the front door. ‘Well, it looks as if we’re going to be neighbours. It’s a poky little place but it’s better than a corner of the church hall.’ She looked at Jess and gave her a wavery smile; it was clear she wasn’t far from tears. ‘Thanks ever so much for coming in with me. I think if I’d been on my own … ‘

‘That’s all right.’ Jess felt her own eyes sting. ‘And don’t forget, as soon as you want a bit of help you come over and say. I’ll be glad to give you a hand — take my mind off other things.’ She knew she was going to miss the boys and Rose dreadfully. But at least she had Maureen to think of, and Frank at home. She felt sorry for Kathy Simmons. Being bombed out °filer home with a baby due in a couple of months and no husband at home, she needed a friend or two. And the two little girls seemed nice enough. They seemed to enjoy playing with Maureen.

She pushed the pram across the road and round the corner

to number 14. Kathy was the first real casualty of the war that she had met, but there would be plenty more. She might even be one herself, before long.

The boys were playing leapfrog on the pavement outside

the house. She went indoors to get their tea. This time tomorrow, they’d be back out in the country and Maureen the only child she had at home.

The quiet of the afternoon was split by the sudden wail of the

siren. It rose and fell, filling Jess’s ears with its shriek, filling her heart with fear. She ran to the door but the boys came tumbling in before she could reach it, and she gathered up the baby and pushed them before her down the garden path.

Back at Bridge End the following week, the Budds found themselves centres of attention as their friends gathered round them to ask what it had been like to be in an air-raid.

‘It was smashing,’ Tim declared, swaggering along the country lane. ‘Planes flying over the top of us, dropping bombs all over the place. Terrific explosions. And a huge great fire, the sky was all full of flames. We thought the whole of Pompey was going to catch fire.’

‘Go on,’ Brian Collins sneered. ‘It couldn’t’ve been that bad. There wasn’t that many houses burnt down.’

‘It was the gasholder. It could’ve gone up like a bomb itself. They had every fire engine in Pompey there trying to put it

out.’

‘Weren’t you scared?’ a little girl asked, awed, and Brian Collins sniggered again.

‘Course he was. That’s why he’s come back, ain’t it? Scared out of his wits, not that he had many to start with.’

Tim scowled. He and Brian Collins had always been enemies. ‘I wasn’t scared,’ he said hotly. ‘It was my Dad said we had to come back. Anyway, I like being in the country. After the war we’re all going to come and live here, Mum and Dad. and our baby, all of us.’

‘You’re welcome to it,’ Brian said. ‘I’m fed up with the country. Old man Callaway treats me like a slave. I’d sooner be back in Pompey, going mudlarking.’

‘You’re not allowed to do that now,’ Tim said. ‘The harbour’s full of unexploded bombs. You’d get blown up.’

Brian made a face at him and Tim turned away. His Dad had told him often enough not to let Brian Collins goad him

into a fight. ‘You should always stand up for yourself,’ he said, ‘but you shouldn’t start it. Anyway, it’s not worth bothering with people like that. Just take no notice.’

Tim tried to follow his father’s advice, but it wasn’t easy when he saw the sneer on Brian’s face. He wanted to wipe it off with a good hard punch. But that would mean he’d hit out first, and put himself into the wrong, which Dad had told him was just what Brian wanted.

Rose was less eager to recount her air-raid experiences. She told her foster-mother Mrs Greenberry about it, and the

countrywoman’s face grew pale.

‘You mean you weren’t even at home with your Mum? And the boys were out in the streets? That poor soul, she must have been worried sick.’

Dad wasn’t home either,’ Rose said. ‘He was on his way home from work. He had to stop and help. There was people killed, bodies everywhere.’ Frank hadn’t told her that, but her own imagination told her it must have been so. She had lain awake, wondering what it had been like. It would have been better if he had told her, she thought, then she wouldn’t have to keep imagining it, but she hadn’t dared ask him. Even Mum had been cross when she’d mentioned it.

‘Little girls don’t have to worry about things like that,’ she’d told her. ‘That’s why you’re going back to Bridge End. You just help Mrs Greenberry like you help me, and forget about the war.’

Rose hadn’t wanted to come back to Bridge End. She liked the Greenberrys and she’d been frightened during the raid, but she’d still rather be at home with Mum. Especially when they knew that Southampton was being bombed and heard on the news that there’d been more raids over Portsmouth.

Suppose something happened to number 14. Suppose Mum and Dad were hurt — killed even — and Rose wasn’t there to help. Suppose someone forgot to let her know. ‘Of course they won’t forget,’ Mrs Greenberry said. ‘Anyway, nothing’s going to happen to your mum and dad. Now, you stop thinking about it and go down the garden and pick us a few peas. Mr Greenberry’s brought home a nice rabbit for our supper, and you know you like rabbit.’ But rabbit wasn’t enough to stop Rose worrying. And she picked at her dinner that evening, and went to bed with her stomach filled with the leaden lump of fear instead of Mr Greenberry’s homegrown vegetables and the rabbit he’d

brought from the farm.

Reg and Edna Corner had their worries too. They waited until Tim and Keith were in bed before discussing them. ‘I just don’t see how we’re to manage,’ Edna said. ‘You’re bound to get called up soon, and with a baby coming as well … ‘

‘I’m sure Mr Callaway will let you stop on in the cottage,’ Reg said. ‘I mean, he’s not going to get another worker, is he? He’ll get one or two of the older men — Simon Barrow, he’s still pretty spry, he’ll be glad to earn himself a bob or two. Or maybe he’ll get a Land Girl.’

‘And where’s she going to live?’ Edna demanded. ‘He’s already got young Brian billeted on him at the farmhouse. He’ll want this cottage, that’s what, and he’ll probably put up two or three more as well. No, the minute you’re called up he’ll have me out. I’ll have to go and stop with Mum.’

Reg gazed at her. It wasn’t what he wanted, starting a family this way, with him away in the Forces and Edna having to go back to her mother’s cramped little cottage. He looked round the little room. They’d got it so nice. Even though it wasn’t theirs, it was still their home for as long as he worked on the farm, and he’d expected that to be for a good few years, if not for life. What reason was there to move, if you were happy? And he and Edna had been happy, there was no doubt at all about that.