The Heart of the Family (20 page)

Lena smiled tiredly. She couldn’t wait for tomorrow night and the comfort of a proper bed.

They had reached the village and the bus lurched to a halt. Once again Gavin ushered both Lena and Dolly towards the farm and settled them both in the barn before going up to the farmhouse to get them a hot drink.

‘Sweet on him, the farmer’s wife is,’ Dolly told Lena as soon as Gavin had gone, rubbing the side of her nose knowingly with her finger as she added, ‘He thinks I’m wrong but I know I’m not. I must say that I never thought that a grandson of mine would go and start courting a dull stick like he’s got himself involved with. Mind you, I blame our Janet. Always had fancy ideas, she has, and there’ll be no getting that head of hers through the door if she does end up with a teacher for a daughter-in-law, it will be that swelled.’

Dolly was beginning to grow on her, Lena admitted as she laughed at her description of her daughter. She was so tired that she was virtually falling asleep sitting up, listening to Dolly’s apparently endless stories about her Romany grandparents when Gavin arrived back with mugs of cocoa for them.

Neither the scents of the barn nor its shadowy corners felt as alien to her as they had done last night, and the cocoa was warming and relaxing. Her mother had always made bedtime cocoa. Tears suddenly stung Lena’s eyes. She always told herself that she didn’t miss her mother, but right now for some reason she did.

Dolly was starting another story.

‘That’s enough now, Gran,’ Gavin announced, getting up and coming over to pick up the empty mug Lena had just put down. ‘Lena here’s falling asleep, and I certainly need to get some kip.’

They’d got a full convoy due in tomorrow night, and he’d be working. Most of the convoys arrived in the early hours – it was safer that way but it meant that he often had to work nights.

This was the second time she was having to feel grateful to Gavin this evening, Lena acknowledged sleepily. Not that she wanted to feel grateful to him. She didn’t want to have to feel anything for him. She had, after all, seen the way he had looked at her when Dolly had first introduced them. Well, let him prefer his teacher girlfriend and think that she wasn’t good enough for someone like him. She certainly didn’t care.

Something made Lena wake up abruptly and give a sharp cry of protest that immediately woke both Dolly and Gavin.

‘Wassar matter?’ Dolly demanded gummily, having removed her teeth before she went to sleep, whilst Gavin was already sitting up, and lighting one of the paraffin lamps the farmer had left for them.

‘Something ran over my legs. I could feel it,’ Lena told them shakily.

‘Probably be a rat. Barn is bound to be full of them,’ Dolly told her dismissively before settling down to go back to sleep.

A rat? Lena looked wildly round the small dimly lit area, drawing up her knees and wrapping her arms protectively around them.

‘More like you moved in your sleep and a bit of straw prickled you,’ Gavin offered soothingly, but Lena wasn’t reassured. Dolly, with her talk of the barn being full of rats, had scared the wits out of her and Lena knew she couldn’t possibly go back to sleep now.

Seeing her expression, Gavin sighed. Trust Gran to say what she thought without thinking about the consequences. Lena was now plainly horrified and would, he suspected, refuse even to think of going back to sleep. He looked at his watch. Half-past two.

‘If it was anything, like as not it would have been a cat,’ he told Lena. ‘There are several of them about.’

The farmer kept them to kill the mice and rats, but he didn’t want to risk giving Lena that piece of information. Any country-bred child would have known and accepted that a barn would be home to vermin, but Lena was not country bred.

Lena was still trembling, stiffening at every small sound as she looked fearfully into the shadows.

‘You’re starting your new job tomorrow so you need to get some sleep,’ Gavin reminded her, wanting to calm her down so that they could all go back to sleep. Unlike his gran, who was now snoring away happily, Gavin’s conscience wouldn’t let him go back to sleep himself whilst Lena was huddled up like she was and plainly terrified, little as he approved of her. She wasn’t his sort at all. Gavin’s mother had raised her children to work hard and have ambitions. When Gavin settled down it would be with a no-nonsense sensible sort of girl who would be a loyal wife and a good mother, not someone like Lena who would have other men looking at her all the time with that figure of hers and that almost too pretty face. It stood
to reason that a girl like her would attract male attention. Even he wasn’t able totally to control his instinctive male reaction to her. She was that sort, Gavin thought disapprovingly, and trust his gran to take up with her.

‘I daren’t lie down in case it comes back again,’ Lena admitted in a small voice.

No matter what he might think of her Gavin knew that she wasn’t making up her fear and that it was very real for her. Another thing his mother had taught him was to always look out for the weaker sex and to mind his manners. Struggling to conceal his impatience he swung his feet onto the stone floor and then pushed his straw bale over to Lena’s, telling her brusquely, ‘Shove up then,’ as he sat down on his bale next to her.

The warmth of his body against her side was immediately and unexpectedly comforting. So much so that Lena could feel her face starting to burn bright red. Not that he would be able to see that, thank goodness.

‘If it does come back again it can run over my legs and not yours, so why don’t you try and go back to sleep?’ Gavin told Lena firmly.

‘I can’t. I’m too scared,’ she admitted reluctantly.

Gavin needed his sleep and was beginning to regret giving in to his Sir Galahad impulse. Determinedly he leaned down and extinguished the lamps, ignoring Lena’s small gasp of protest. The pool of light from the lamps had been comforting and had made her feel safer.

‘We can’t waste them,’ Gavin pointed out ‘and anyway it wouldn’t be safe to leave them on. Now why don’t you lie down and go to sleep?’

‘I
can’t
. I’m too scared.’ Lena insisted, adding pleadingly, ‘I’ll be all right if you just keep talking to me. I won’t be able to think about the rat coming back then.’

The last thing Gavin wanted to do was talk to anyone, least of all a girl like Lena. Girls like her were dangerous, even when they weren’t your type. That was something he knew instinctively, and he knew that his mother would agree with him, but he was too well brought up and naturally compassionate towards others to turn his back on her.

‘Only if you lie down,’ he told her firmly.

Reluctantly, Lena slid back down into her blanket.

‘So how long have you been on your own?’ Gavin asked her, once his own eyes had adjusted to the dark and he could see that she was lying still.

‘My mum and dad were killed in the November bombings. I’m not really on my own,’ Lena admitted. Then when he didn’t make any comment she said, ‘I’ve got an auntie.’ Now what on earth had made her admit that? Lena didn’t know. She only knew that something about Gavin, despite his disapproval of her, made her want to be truthful with him.

‘I was living with her but she’s thrown me out and told me that her hubby will take his belt to me if I try to go back, because … because of summat I did that she didn’t like.’ She couldn’t bring herself to tell him about Charlie. Suddenly what she had done with Charlie, instead of being something loving and special, felt more like something wrong and shameful. She knew instinctively that Gavin would think that it was and that he would think the worse of her for it. Good girls like his schoolteacher didn’t go around letting men share intimacies with them
without the benefit of a wedding ring. She had been a fool and she wished now that she had had more sense.

Gavin could guess all too easily what that ‘summat’ had been. What did surprise him, though, was that Lena should admit to it. That made her either very brazen or very naïve. Naïve? A girl like her? He was the one who was naïve if he thought that.

‘It’s all on account of my dad being Italian, and me having bad blood.’ Lena’s voice was defensive now.

Gavin frowned in the darkness. The last thing he wanted was to feel sympathetic towards her, but there’d been a fair bit of talk in his own family about his gran’s Romany blood, and Gavin knew that his mother preferred not to talk about it and was ashamed of it, even if his gran was fiercely proud of her grandparents.

Lena yawned. Her eyes felt heavy but she didn’t want to go to sleep. Not with that rat around. Besides, there was something reassuring and comforting about lying here talking to Gavin and knowing that he was listening to her.

‘I’ve told you about me, it’s your turn now. Tell me something about you,’ Lena demanded.

Gavin tensed. Was she trying some kind of come-on? If so she was wasting her time.

‘There isn’t anything to tell excepting that I’ll be glad when my mother gets here from Shropshire to take Gran back there with her. Not that I’ve told Gran that yet, and you’re not to either,’ he warned Lena firmly, ‘otherwise we’ll have her taking off again. Part of the trouble is that she’s never liked
staying in the same place for too long. She likes to tell everyone it’s on account of her Romany blood but my mother says it’s because when she was a kid her mum and dad were forever moving around to dodge the debt collectors. He was one of them who preferred shirking to working, was my granddad, by all accounts,’ Gavin admitted ruefully. ‘I can’t say that I’m not looking forward to seeing my own bed again either.’

‘You’ve got a billet then?’ Lena asked him enviously.

‘Yes. I’ve been lodging with Chris Stone, the pilot of the tug boat, and his wife ever since Mum decided to evacuate. Mum wanted Gran to go with her, but she insisted on staying put in the house she was renting, and of course when that got bombed she’d nowhere to go. Mrs Stone is doing her best to find somewhere close to them for Gran until Mum can get up here to collect her, but I daren’t let her out of my sight. She likes to make out she can take care of herself and that she’s as tough as old boots, but I don’t like to see her living rough like this, especially not at her age.’

This was safe enough ground, talking about his grandmother.

‘I dare say your school teacher girl wouldn’t approve either,’ Lena felt daring enough to say with the darkness to act as a barrier between them.

‘Alison is a terrific person, and Gran would be able to see that for herself if she only gave her a chance. She’s done wonders for those kids she teaches, and it can’t have been easy for a girl like her to come up here and have to deal with slum kids.’

‘How did you meet her?’ Lena couldn’t help but
be curious, and besides, asking questions helped to subdue that funny painful hurting feeling she got inside when she heard his admiration for his Alison in his voice.

‘At night school. She teaches there a couple of nights a week. I want to get my pilot’s exams as fast as I can so that I’m properly qualified. It isn’t enough any more just to know the Mersey and the tides; you’ve got to be able to read charts and project tides, and show that you’re up to the work. It’s like Alison says, once you’ve got proper qualifications you can work anywhere. Course, then I was daft enough to tell Mum that I’d met Alison and now she’s putting two and two together and hearing wedding bells.’

Gavin sounded more amused by his mother’s hopes that annoyed. Lena could hear his love for his mother in his voice, and a small hard lump of loneliness clogged her throat as she wondered what it must be like to be part of a family like Gavin’s. Well, she’d never find out, would she, because from the sound of her, Gavin’s mother would no more countenance someone like her as a prospective daughter-in-law than Charlie’s had.

Lena gave a tired yawn and snuggled deeper into her blanket, her breathing slowing and then deepening into sleep.

Gavin, however, remained awake, watching over her until he was sure that she was asleep, even though he told himself that he had no cause to concern himself over her in any kind of way and that he’d warn his grandmother in the morning not to go getting involved with Lena. She was the sort that his
mother would have described as ‘common’. Easy on the eye and probably easy in other ways as well, if he had guessed right about the reason her auntie had thrown her out.

‘They’ve come. Look.’ Sasha danced excitedly round the kitchen as she waved the two official-looking envelopes in front of Lou and Jean, the expression on her face one of both hope and apprehension.

Lou said nothing, but there was a tight uncomfortable feeling in her stomach.

‘Here’s yours.’ Sasha handed Lou one of the envelopes and then started to open her own, only to stop and shake her head.

‘I can’t. You open yours first, Lou.’

Now it was Lou’s turn to shake her head.

‘Oh, give them here,’ Jean demanded, her own nerves on edge on the twins’ behalf, but whilst Lou passed their mother hers, Sasha opened her envelope, pulled out the letter and read it quickly before looking at her twin and her mother, her face alight with relief.

‘They’ve accepted me,’ she told them unnecessarily. ‘Hurry up and open yours, Lou.’

‘You do it, Mum.’

Jean told herself that it was Lou’s anxiety in case she hadn’t been accepted that was making her look so glum, but even when Jean had opened the letter and given her the good news that she too had got a
job as a trainee telephonist, Lou’s smile wasn’t anywhere near as wide as Sasha’s.

‘We’ve got to celebrate,’ Sasha announced. ‘I know, let’s go to the Grafton tonight.’ When Jean frowned Sasha told her quickly, ‘We’re old enough now, Mum, and besides, Katie and Luke are going. Katie said so.’

‘Very well then,’ Jean agreed, giving them each a fierce hug. ‘I’m ever so pleased for you both and ever so proud of you as well. Just wait until your dad hears.’

‘It will only take us ten minutes to walk to the exchange, and once we’ve done our training and we’re not probationers any more then we’ll be in reserved occupations so we can stay here in Liverpool,
and
we’ll be doing our bit for the war effort,’ Sasha announced happily.

With every word that Sasha said, Lou’s heart grew heavier. She felt both guilty and scared because she couldn’t share her twin’s enthusiasm. What was happening to them?

The Naafi was filled with the low buzz of urgent conversation, as more men came in, wanting to talk about the ‘Orders’ that had been made known to the troops just over an hour ago.

‘We all knew it had to happen and that we wouldn’t get to sit the whole war out here,’ Luke heard one of the other corporals saying.

Out of the blue they had been told that they were being sent into combat, and that within a week they would be on troop ships on their way to an unnamed destination.

They were all pretty sure that that destination
must be the desert, and Luke was filled with conflicting emotions and thoughts. As a soldier he itched to do his bit in a proper arena of war, instead of being on home defence duties. It was what he had trained for, after all. But then he was also worried that he wouldn’t be up to the demands that going into action would place on him when it came to his responsibility towards his men. Then as a son he felt anxious for his parents, knowing how worried his news would make them, especially his mother. And then lastly, and perhaps most important of all, he thought of Katie and what his news and his posting would mean to their relationship.

He would be seeing her later on – they were going dancing at the Grafton – and he’d arranged to call round at his parents to collect her.

When they’d first declared their love for one another, Luke had told Katie that if he should get sent into action, he would want to put his engagement ring on her finger before he did so.

‘Are you going to tell Katie tonight then?’ Andy, one of his men, asked him. Andy was seeing one of the girls who worked with Katie and the four of them would be meeting up later at the Grafton.

‘I’ll probably tell her this afternoon,’ Luke answered him. ‘What about you?’

‘Seeing as Carole’s auntie has invited me round for me tea, I’ll probably tell her then. What do you think, Corp? I don’t fancy the desert and all that sand. It’s worse than Southport, so I’ve heard,’ he joked.

‘It might be, but seeing as we don’t know where we’ll be going I wouldn’t go out buying a bucket and spade yet if I was you.’

Ribbing one another was their way of dealing with the situation and all those things that could not be said, like their apprehension about what lay ahead. And anyway, Luke had more important things to think about than where they were going right now, like getting to the post office to draw out enough money to buy that engagement ring he’d promised Katie so that he could claim her as his future wife before he had to leave her.

If he were honest, Luke felt relieved that he would be putting a ring on Katie’s finger. That way there could be no confusion and no chance of other men thinking that she was fancy-free. Given his own way he’d have had Katie wearing his ring already. She had been the one who had said that they should wait. But she had agreed that it would be different if he were to be sent overseas. He’d never been entirely comfortable with the fact that she wasn’t already wearing his ring, even though they’d both agreed that they wouldn’t marry until the war was over.

Emily shook her head with fond indulgence, watching Wilhelm talking to Tommy as the POW worked on the vegetable patch and Tommy helped him. She’d been a bit put out at first when Tommy had shown such a liking for the German, but then sensibly she had told herself that it was a good thing for Tommy to spend time with an adult member of his own sex, and one who was far kinder to him than Con had ever been. She’d never known anyone have as much patience as Wilhelm, or be as careful about muddy boots on her kitchen floor, or be as well mannered.

‘I’ve brought you each a cup of tea,’ she told them unnecessarily.

‘Wilhelm says we’re going to need some string.’

Emily sighed. ‘Well, when you’ve had your elevenses, you can get on your bike and cycle down to the ironmonger’s, Tommy, but I doubt that you’ll be able to buy any.’

String was one of those things that people hoarded and used sparingly, knowing that it was almost impossible to replace.

Tommy had come on ever such a lot and had taken to living in Whitchurch like a duck to water, apart from that funny incident that first Sunday.

‘You have a good boy,’ Wilhelm told her in his careful English as they both watched Tommy run down the path.

‘Have you got any children?’ Emily felt obliged to ask him. She had heard that some people didn’t think it was right to talk to the German POWs but she felt obliged to ask, seeing as he had praised Tommy.

‘
Nein
. I have no wife either. I have to work on my father’s farm and there is no time to find a wife. Then my father is gone and so is the farm, and I have to join the army and fight, and that is bad.’

Emily felt very sorry for him.

‘But now I am here and that is good,’ he told her.

She shouldn’t be staying out here – she had no reason to do so, after all – and yet Emily discovered that she was reluctant to leave and go back into the house. There was something about being here in the warm sunshine, sharing a companionable silence with Wilhelm whilst he worked, which made her want to linger.

So this was Whitchurch. They had arrived just over ten minutes ago, and Seb had been granted permission to
leave the borrowed motorcycle safe and secure in the small shed belonging to the owner of the café where they had gone for a cup of tea.

‘Come here visiting someone, have you?’ the teashop owner asked with friendly curiosity after she had brought a pot of tea to their table.

‘We’re just enjoying the good weather,’ Seb answered her easily, ‘and we thought we’d see where the road took us.’

The woman laughed good-naturedly and left them to their tea, much to Grace’s relief. She didn’t like not being honest, but Seb had stressed to her the importance of not saying anything.

Grace was still feeling guilty about having to tell Seb that they’d have to get back instead of finding somewhere to stay. He hadn’t said anything, only given her a bit of a look.

‘It isn’t my fault,’ she had protested. ‘And if I’d made a fuss it would only have set Mum off asking awkward questions.’

Looking at Seb now, she reached across the table to cover his hand with her own and whispered, ‘I am truly ever so sorry about tonight, Seb. I know you must be disappointed.’

‘Yes. Very,’ he agreed almost tersely, increasing Grace’s feelings of guilt. She’d been aware of the increased passion and need in his kisses these last few weeks.

‘I’m disappointed too,’ she told him, ‘but you know what Mum’s like, and if she’d started getting suspicious …’

‘It isn’t your fault,’ Seb assured her, but Grace felt that his heart wasn’t entirely in reassuring her, and that hurt, especially when she herself was also feeling
disappointed and guilty, caught between her mother’s expectations and Seb’s passion, and wanting to please them both. Right now more than anything else what she wanted from Seb wasn’t passion but tenderness and the comfort of his arms holding her tight whilst he whispered to her that he loved her. Seb, though, instead of reassuring her, seemed somehow to be slightly distant from her. Because he was disappointed and because he was a man, and men felt these things differently from women, Grace tried to comfort herself.

‘Come on,’ said Seb. ‘If you’ve finished your tea we’d better go and have a look round.’

As it was a Saturday the town was busy, and there was even a small market, although the stall holders didn’t appear to have very much to sell, thanks to rationing, and several of them were closing up already, even though it was only late morning.

‘Whereabouts is this place you’re being posted to?’ Grace asked Seb.

‘It’s a quarter of a mile or so outside the town. Not that far.’

‘Will there be accommodation on site for you?’

‘I don’t think so. I think we’ll be billeted on people instead.’

The sleepy little agricultural town was a world away from Liverpool, Grace reflected, discreetly studying a group of Land Army girls standing outside one of the shops in their dungarees and Wellington boots. A bit further down the road was a cinema. Was there a dance hall, Grace wondered. There must be. Would Seb be going to dances there without her?

As though he had read her mind, Seb’s hand tightened on hers.

‘I’m going to miss you so much.’

‘I’m going to miss you too,’ she agreed huskily, not far from tears. She turned to him and said impulsively, ‘I wish we
could
have spent the full weekend together, Seb, just you and me.’

Suddenly Grace wanted very much for them to make that final physical commitment to one another that would surely tie them even more firmly together.

‘Perhaps it’s for the best that we can’t,’ Seb told her gently. He knew how much her nursing meant to her and if out of his love for her he ended up not being as careful as he should be, and if because of that they had to get married quickly, then Grace would be dismissed from her training programme, and he knew that she would hate that.

‘We’ve only got to wait a few more months,’ he reminded her. ‘As soon as you’re qualified we’ll be getting married.’

Grace nodded. They had originally said that they would wait until after the war had ended before they married, but now when Churchill himself had said that they were in it for the long haul, she and Seb had talked things over with their parents and had decided that they would marry as soon as Grace was qualified.

When they had made that decision Grace had assumed that Seb would remain based in Liverpool and that they could live with her parents until the war was over. Now, though, with Seb getting transferred down here, that wouldn’t be possible.

Guessing what she was thinking, Seb told her lovingly, ‘Once you’re qualified you could apply for a transfer down here, Grace. I could apply to live out and we could find somewhere to rent.’

Grace entwined her fingers with his. She was being silly feeling all upset like this, she knew, but she had got used to taking it for granted that he was close at hand.

They had drawn level with a newsagent’s and Seb disengaged his hand from hers, telling her, ‘Hang on here a minute, will you? I need some cigarettes.’

It was pleasant standing in the sunshine, or at least it would have been if she hadn’t been feeling that this alien country town was going to take Seb away from her, Grace decided.

A boy came cycling towards her, stopping his bike outside the ironmonger’s. Grace watched him idly, and then stiffened.

‘Grace, what is it? What’s wrong?’ Seb demanded anxiously as he came out of the tobacconist’s and saw her face. ‘You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’

‘I feel like I have,’ Grace told him feelingly. ‘You won’t believe it, Seb, but there’s a boy just gone in that ironmonger’s that is the image of Jack. You know,’ she reminded him when he frowned, ‘Auntie Vi’s youngest, that was sent to Wales when the war began and then got killed when a bomb was dropped on the farmhouse where he was staying. It can’t be him, of course – I know that – but seeing him gave me ever such a turn.’

Seb had taken her arm and was leading her firmly away from the ironmonger’s. Grace pulled back and turned to look over her shoulder but the bicycle had gone and so, she assumed, had the boy.

She didn’t think she liked Whitchurch very much, Grace decided, and she knew that she wished that Seb hadn’t been posted here.