Wartime Family (39 page)

The beginning of January was cold and thick with frost. Mid January brought a rise in temperature, but the leaden sky was heavy with snow. Children snapped icicles off window ledges, sucking them like ice lollies.

Stanley and a few of the other boys had made a cart for collecting coal out of an orange box and some old pram wheels.

‘We’re charging threepence for delivery,’ he explained to his mother, his red nose shining like a beacon in his icy white face.

‘Threepence is it?’ She handed him a threepenny bit. ‘We’re down to half a hundredweight until the coalman can get through. Another sack of Welsh steam wouldn’t go amiss.’

Wrapping her cardigan around herself, she went back inside. The back part of the house that had survived the fire kept fairly warm, shut off from all that remained of the front part which had been totally gutted. The back half of the roof was still intact and so was the chimney. The door between the living accommodation and the shop remained tightly shut. The old counter and the glass-fronted display cases no longer existed, the lingering smell of charred wood a continuous reminder of what used to be. The door to the front bedroom was all that separated them from falling from the upper floor to the ground.

After giving the coals a good poke, Mary Anne filled the kettle and put it on the hob. A rich stew simmered on the other hob, its delicious aroma rising with white steam and a satisfying bubbling sound.

She heard the back door open and then close, followed by clumping footsteps going upstairs. She presumed Stanley had gone upstairs to fetch his balaclava. Then she heard the door open and close for a second time.

Funny
, she thought,
I didn’t hear him come back down. Maybe you’re going deaf.

She grinned. Most likely a wheel had come off his cart.

‘That smells good. You always were a good cook.’

Immediately recognizing Henry’s voice, Mary Anne straightened, still tightly gripping the poker.

‘What are you doing here?’

His face was red. Cold or drink? She settled on the latter.

He was wearing a thick muffler around his neck. She caught a glimpse of a white shirt collar and dark tie.

His smile was hesitant. He rubbed his hands together. ‘Just been to a funeral. Old Alf Routledge has passed over.’

‘I hope he burns in hell.’

‘Aye,’ said Henry, his eyes flickering. ‘There’s a few that think he’s gone in that direction.’ He glanced towards the stew again. ‘If you’ve a drop to spare, the church was freezing, and course, being Methodist there was no chance of a drink to warm the cockles.’

‘There’s no stew either. Get out.’ The tip of the poker glowed red as she raised it above her head.

Henry eyed a curl of smoke as it spiralled upwards from the red-hot tip. ‘Is our Stanley around?’

‘No.’

‘Where is he?’

‘Gone for coal.’

He jerked his chin by way of a nod. ‘I would have liked to see him.’

‘So you can beat him again?’ Mary Anne shouted. ‘So you can leave red marks across his back, just like you used to across mine?’

She had never really forgiven herself for going back to him for that short period of time. She’d written to Michael about it, trying to explain. He’d been understanding – almost too understanding. In a strange kind of way he’d made her feel worse than ever.

‘It was what you thought best at the time,’ he’d said. ‘But all the same, it makes me feel like killing him.’

‘I was drunk,’ Henry said now. ‘I’m sorry.’ He looked up suddenly, his eyes piercing. ‘I could make it up to you. I could change.’

She stared at him in disbelief. How many times would he say that?

‘No! I want you to leave.’ She backed off, feeling behind her for the door to the stairs. ‘Leave me alone. Go away.’

His face was like a stretched mask, his mouth forming an obscene oval as though he were uttering a silent scream. She saw the disbelief in his eyes.

‘You’re me lawfully wedded wife, Mary Anne. You’re not his, not that Boche bastard that took you from me. You’ll never be his, ’cause you’re married to me.’

Gripping the poker with one hand, she felt behind her for the door knob. The door was charred and rough beneath her fingers. Backed into a corner, she had no choice but to face him. She saw his inner ugliness, the vindictiveness of the power he’d had over her. She’d promised to love, honour and obey him and for years she had done just that, purely for the sake of the family. By doing so she had forgotten herself. There was no chance of her ever going back.

‘Michael’s twice the man you are, Henry Randall. Being with him is as different as chalk is from cheese. There’s no forgiveness in you, no understanding whatsoever.’

At first he seemed rebuffed by her words, but he recovered quickly. With a contemptuous scowl, he looked her up and down. ‘Look at you! A middle-aged woman long past her best. What do you think he wants you for? Yes, yer definitely past yer best, Mary Anne. He’s years younger than you. How long do you think he’s going to stay with you? Until yer hair turns grey and yer teeth fall out?’ He laughed. The sound of his laughter echoed in her head. He could be right, but somehow she didn’t care. Michael was
her
choice, just as Edward had been.

‘He’ll stay with me. I know he will.’

Henry laughed again. ‘You’ve got four kids. Does he know that?’

‘Five,’ said Mary Anne, her eyes shining. ‘I’ve got five. Remember? Edward’s daughter, the child I was forced to give away. She held a gun to your head, or at least you thought it was a gun.’ Despite the situation, she began to laugh. ‘You looked so scared. Henry Randall, terrified of a novelty cigarette lighter!’

Henry’s jaw dropped and as his anger rose, his eyes turned bloodshot, his jaw clenching and unclenching. ‘Make a fool of me, would you?’ he growled, his hands clenched into tight fists.

If she could just get out into the passageway and up the stairs … She wasn’t sure where she would go from there, but it might be her only chance of escape.

Hanging on to the poker with one hand, her fingers folded over the door handle with the other, she turned it, swinging it open.

She ran up the stairs, stumbling halfway and dropping the poker. She heard it clatter to the ground. There was no time to go back, no time to retrieve it. Unarmed and frightened, she ran along the landing. If she could barricade herself in …

The door was shut. She tried the handle. Swollen and misshapen after the fire, it jammed. There was no time to force it. Henry was right behind her. He reached the top of the stairs, barring her way to the bedroom.

Henry raised his fist. ‘That beating I gave you the other week weren’t enough, I reckon.’

Mary Anne swallowed hard. The bruises she’d received outside the Red Cross shop throbbed. She was trapped. Helpless. ‘Henry. No. Please don’t,’ she implored.

He stopped as though a sudden thought had occurred to him. ‘You’re right,’ he said, his tongue sliding along his bottom lip. ‘We don’t want it to show, do we? This is a matter between husband and wife, and best kept secret.’

For a moment she dared believe that he’d had second thoughts. But her moment of hope was short lived. Slowly, his eyes never leaving her face, he began to take off his belt. Her stomach churned with fear. She watched the leather slide out from his waistband and saw the wicked glint of the steel buckle.

Her breath caught in her chest. ‘No,’ she whispered as fear swelled her breasts and caused her blood to race to her face. ‘No. I will not allow this to happen.’

He gave no sign that he’d heard her. His eyes narrowed as he wrapped the belt around his fist, leaving the buckle hanging. It was hard to drag her gaze away from its cruel glint. The years of submitting to such treatment fuelled her anger. No, she would not submit this time. Not this time and never again.

She sidestepped away from him, sliding along the wall until she was in front of the door that was never opened, the door that had once led to the front bedroom. Her heart thudded against her ribs. She knew what she had to do, but could she do it? Could she time it right?

The consequences of what she was about to do were as frightening as what would happen if she failed. It was the only way out for a desperate woman. But she knew she had to do it.

She braced herself across the doorway, fumbled behind her for the handle, found it and pushed the door open.

Daylight flooded in from what remained of the shop frontage. Above her was sky. Below her was rubble, blackened pieces of roof timber and shards of broken glass.

‘If you touch me I’ll jump.’

At first he looked surprised, but then slowly a cruel smile slithered across his face. ‘Go on then. Jump.’ He began slapping the belt buckle into his left palm. ‘It’s your choice. The belt or that. Please yourself.’

Like a woman hypnotized, she stared at the belt and its shiny steel buckle. From behind the cold wind tousled her hair and played with her skirt. She glanced over her shoulder. It was quite a height. Jumping might not kill her, but she could be seriously injured. Sharp glass and broken masonry would see to that.

‘Choose,’ he said cheerfully as though he were offering her a choice of fur coats or gold bracelets. ‘Choose your punishment. And you do deserve punishment, Mary Anne, by Christ you do!’

‘I don’t … How can you say … Think about what you’re doing, Henry!’ As her breath caught between words, her eyes strayed to the slowly opening door of the front bedroom. A shaft of light coming through a gap in the bricks glinted off something shiny.

The footsteps charging up the stairs had been Stanley’s after all!

Suddenly the door swung open, slamming against the wall. Stanley leapt out. He was clutching what looked like a gun.

No, she corrected herself. It was just Elizabeth’s cigarette lighter.

‘Leave my mother alone!’

Surprised at first, Henry swung round. He laughed when he saw who it was and what he was holding.

‘Go on then. Shoot me!’ He ripped open his shirt and spread his arms wide. ‘Go on then! What are you waiting for? It’s only a cigarette lighter.’

Mary Anne immediately regretted telling him that the gun wasn’t real.

‘No it isn’t.’ Stanley dropped to one knee and took aim, his eye aligned with the barrel of the small pistol. ‘I will do it. I will shoot you if you don’t leave my mum alone.’

While Henry’s back was turned, Mary Anne moved away from the doorway. She did it quietly, easing herself along.

Henry’s laughter turned to a determined snarl. ‘Keep out of grown-up business, son. This matter’s between me and your mother.’

‘I’ll shoot,’ said Stanley, his voice trembling and tears streaming from the corners of his eyes. He’d seen this scenario too many times before; he knew what his father was capable of. He wouldn’t have his mother hurt again. He wouldn’t allow it to happen. ‘I hate you. You deserve to die!’

His father stood squarely facing him. ‘Then you’ll have to shoot me in the back. First I’ll deal with yer mother, and then I’ll deal with you.’ Henry turned swiftly, lunging to where Mary Anne had been standing.

Just as he did so, Stanley fired the gun. A shower of ceiling plaster fell on Henry’s head. A soldier, trained to react quickly. Henry threw himself to the ground. If he’d been three feet further back he would have hit only the landing floor. As it was he’d been in the process of lunging at Mary Anne. But she’d moved aside. Henry fell out through the door and landed on the mound of rubble and shards of broken glass.

One hand covering her thudding heart, Mary Anne stared wide-eyed at her son.

‘The man gave it to me,’ Stanley said before she’d had a chance to ask him the obvious question.

‘George Ford,’ she murmured. It could only have been George Ford.

Henry Randall was buried on a sunny day in Amos Vale Cemetery. Harry was granted compassionate leave to attend.

‘It’s a lovely day,’ he said to Lizzie and Patrick. Out of regard for appearance rather than respect for his father, he did his best not to smile. It wasn’t easy. Only Daw looked sad.

It was Daw who threw the first handful of earth on to the coffin. ‘Whatever he was, he was still our father.’

Her mother nodded and did the same. Harry and Lizzie followed suit.

They were passing a tomb shaped like the palanquin of a maharajah, and elephant supporting each corner. It was said to be the tomb of an Indian prince. That was when Daw voiced what she was thinking. ‘However did he manage to fall through that door? He had his faults, I knew, but I would have thought he was more careful than that.’

Mary Anne and Harry exchanged secretive looks that Daw did not see. If she had she might have questioned what was going on, but only Harry was party to that.

For what seemed like ages after the accident, Mary Anne had stared down at Henry’s twisted body. She’d had no doubt that he was dead. It was how to explain his death that mattered now.

‘Stanley. Give me the gun,’ she said.

As if in slow motion, Stanley had handed over the gun. It was small, though not as small as Elizabeth’s cigarette lighter, and light in the hand.

‘Did George Ford give you this?’

He’d nodded. ‘To protect myself.’

Mary Anne had looked at him in horror. ‘Against who?’

He’d shrugged. A mix of anger and frustration had overwhelmed her. Still with the gun in her hand, she had shaken him by the shoulders, so hard it was a wonder his head didn’t fall off.

‘Against who, Stanley? Tell me. Tell me now!’

He’d struggled out of her grasp. ‘Me dad, of course. He told me to shoot me dad if I had to.’

For a moment she’d been speechless, horrified that George Ford had told him to commit murder, and sad that war had made a monster out of Elizabeth’s husband.

‘How many more will be affected like him?’ she’d said to Harry when he’d first arrived at the scene.

‘Where’s the gun now?’

She got down on her hands and knees, reached beneath the bed and brought out a willow-pattern chamber pot. ‘Here it is.’

If the situation hadn’t been so serious, Harry would have burst out laughing.

‘In the jerry?’