Wartime Sweethearts (5 page)

Still their father had encouraged all of the children to have a go as early as they could sprinkle flour through their fingers.

He’d laughed those first few times they’d baked their own bread, made pies or pasties and cakes. Not at their efforts which he praised to the roof telling all three of them – Charlie included – that they were chips off the old block and he was proud of them. ‘Thing is you’re wearing as much flour as you’re putting in the bowl.’

His laughter and obvious pleasure was accompanied by him dabbing more flour on all their noses – not that it made much difference, seeing as their faces were already covered in it.

Frances came home from school at lunchtime, darting through the back kitchen and up the stairs.

‘What’s up with her?’ asked Charlie as a cloud of flour floated down from the ceiling when Frances banged their bedroom door. No matter how careful they were, flour got everywhere.

‘She’s of an age,’ said Mary.

Charlie looked puzzled. ‘An age? What age?’

Mary shook her head and reached for the rolling pin. ‘Never mind, Charlie. Let’s just say it’s women’s trouble.’

‘Women’s?’ He said incredulously. To him Frances was just a nipper.

Suddenly he realised she meant the monthly business and turned beetroot red.

‘I’ll just pop up to see if she’s all right,’ said Ruby, taking off her white apron and hanging it on the hook at the back of the door.

She headed for the stairs, closing the door tightly behind her.

‘What’s up with Ruby?’ asked Charlie once they could hear her footsteps overhead. ‘Same thing?’

‘Not quite. I’m surprised you noticed.’

He shoved his hands in his pockets, swaying backwards and forwards, mainly because he wished the subject of
women’s trouble
hadn’t come up. The women outnumbered the men in this house, which sometimes made him feel something of an outsider. He might find women fascinating, but they were also a little frightening.

‘Of course I noticed. Why shouldn’t I notice? So, what’s up with her?’

The contents of the saucepan containing apples chose that moment to reach boiling point. Mary turned it off.

‘Well,’ she said, her attention focused on the apple slices. ‘You may have noticed that she went out on Sunday morning all dressed up and looking as though the world belonged to her and her alone. She returned looking as though she’d lost it somewhere.’

‘Where’d she been?’

‘For a walk. So she said.’

‘You don’t think so?’

Mary set the saucepan on the window ledge to cool. ‘She went to the Apple Tree. I knew by the look in her eyes that she hadn’t been for a walk. She looked desperately unhappy and I didn’t need her to tell me the reason why. I could guess. She thought Gareth loved her.’

‘I see.’ Charlie nodded into his teacup. ‘So that’s why she’s dumped her job pulling pints. I take it he let her down?’

‘Of course he let her down.’

‘I hoped it would wear off, otherwise …’ Charlie pulled a face. ‘I was going to say that I would have had a word with the bloke, but then, what good would that have done? She had to find out for herself.’

Mary agreed with him. ‘Thank goodness she has. Now perhaps she’ll forget the man.’

Charlie set down his tea cup and clenched his fists. ‘I suppose I could still go along and have a word with him – keep away or else?’

‘I don’t think you need to, unless he starts pestering her. But I don’t think he will. He’ll move on to easier girls.’

She knew he was suggesting that he warn Gareth Stead to keep away from his sister. It was the ‘or else’ that worried her.

‘If you’re sure …’

Mary set a pan of milk on to the gas ring, let it heat up then added custard powder and sugar. ‘Leave it Charlie. Let sleeping dogs lie. In time she’ll forget him and find someone else.’

Charlie took another sip of his tea as he considered the rumours he’d heard regarding Gareth Stead. The man was a lecher, preferring younger women to those his own age. One girl in the village, Cathy Page, was only sixteen when her family sent her away to live in the city. Rumour had it that her staying away was necessary until the baby she was expecting had been born and instantly put up for adoption. Even then Cathy didn’t come back. A ruined reputation was easier to hide in a big city with a large population than it was in a village where everyone knew everyone else’s business. Ruby was lucky, even though she didn’t know it yet.

Frances was lying face down on the bed, one arm thrown over her head, the other beside her cheek.

‘I want a word with you,’ Ruby said, closing the door firmly behind her.

Frances said nothing and didn’t move. Her hair was loose from its usual braids and hid her face. It looked as though she were sucking her thumb.

‘Have you been spying on me, telling Mary everything that’s been going on?’

Although her tone was confrontational, she was careful to keep her voice down. The last thing she wanted was for her sister and brother to hear, but it was hard not to shout when she was feeling so angry.

Frances raised herself on one arm and looked over her shoulder.

‘I didn’t tell Mary anything. She just seemed to know that you and Mr Stead weren’t friends any more. She said it was for the best. So did Charlie. What’s a lecher?’

Ruby’s jaw dropped. ‘What? Who told you that word?’

‘Charlie. He said that Mr Stead is a lecher and that he wouldn’t leave a bitch in his company for long. I know what a bitch is. It’s a female dog.’

‘That’s disgusting!’

Frances frowned. Growing up, she decided, wasn’t easy. There was so much to learn, so many things she could do when she was younger that she couldn’t do now, like Mary telling her that she was too old to tuck her dress into her knickers so she could climb trees more easily especially since that bleeding had started. She wished she didn’t have that bleeding. It got in the way of everything, gave her stomach ache and the ugly towel she had to wear would probably show through her knickers if she ignored Mary and went scrumping. She decided to mention it to Ruby.

‘Mary told me not to tuck my dress into my knickers. Is that disgusting too, especially when I’ve got my – you know – when I’ve got to wear that towel thingy?’

Frances looked so confused and sounded so innocent, Ruby felt her anger melting. Anyway, she realised it had been misplaced. She smoothed her cousin’s hair back from her eyes, noting that the childish face was beginning to thin as she approached adolescence.

‘Well, you are getting a bit old to be doing that. Boys look at you different as you get older.’

‘Differently. Mary said it’s differently not different.’

Ruby laughed. ‘She’s probably right. She usually is though sometimes I can’t help pulling her leg about it. Here. I called in to Powells’ on the way home from the post office.’

Frances’s eyes opened wide at the strip of liquorice she gave her. ‘Thank you.’

‘Just don’t give me away. And don’t ever tell lies about Mr Stead. It could cause a lot of trouble – for everyone.’

Frances pulled a face and pouted her lips when she promised not to tell. After Ruby had gone, she sat herself up straight on the bed, the strip of liquorice lengthening as her teeth tore into it. If Ruby hadn’t given her the liquorice, she would have protested that she hadn’t been lying, that Mr Stead had helped her down from the wall after yet another foray into the orchard next door. That was when it had happened. That was when he’d sworn her to secrecy and told her it was just a game that adults played. Unconvinced, she’d kicked him on the leg and run away.

Stanley Sweet was up at four o’clock every week day morning to knead the rested dough and flash up the bread oven. As the oven whooshed into life, he listened for the sound of movement upstairs. Mary was down first, a white kerchief covering her head turban style, her face pink from the wash flannel and her eyes bright with excitement.

‘Is that enough dough for you, Mary?’

She prodded the plump mound he’d indicated with her finger. It felt springy beneath her fingertip. ‘That dough has the makings of a good loaf of bread,’ she said, looking up at him, and laughed.

It was a frequent saying of her father and made him laugh too. ‘Your apples are ready. Better get on with mixing them in with the dough before they go brown.’

Mary barely acknowledged him, her attention fixed on the job in hand.

Her father watched, breathing deeply as she folded the apples into the bread mixture. He’d never tired of the fragrance of a freshly baked loaf. Even the scent of the dough before it was cooked was a pleasure. Mixing the yeasty smell with that of sautéed apple slices and cinnamon only doubled his pleasure.

‘It smells really good, my girl. Can’t wait to taste it.’

He’d taught all his children to bake, and they were all good at it but Mary
loved
doing it and because of that, she went that extra mile, always aiming for perfection, a genius at making bread, but also cakes, pasties and all the other things they made for sale in the shop.

At Christmas it was Mary who decorated the cakes, even the great big one they baked especially for the folk up at the big hall, a splendid cake full of nuts, cherries and spices, moist with the flavours of ingredients sourced from all over the world.

Today was special. Today Mary was making her apple loaf to enter in the Oldland Common Best of Baking Award, Speciality Bread Baking Class.

The baking competition at the village fete had been a topic of conversation for some weeks. All three of his children were looking forward to it, as was Sefton’s girl, Frances, though not all for the same reasons.

Mary and Ruby were both entering the baking competition, Mary with her apple bread and Ruby with a straightforward apple pie despite her sister’s comments about any woman in the village being able to bake one. Hers would be better than any of them.

He frowned at the thought of that apple pie. Ruby was capable of so much more than that, something more elaborate. Not that he could say that Ruby had thrown it together, though he had to admit she’d seemed more slapdash than she usually was. She’s best serving in the shop, he thought to himself, best dealing with customers. He dismissed her oft-spoken comments about leaving the village and seeking her fortune in the big city – and that was before this fall out with Gareth Stead. She’d always had her head in the clouds.

‘Perhaps I could get a job baking at a posh hotel,’ she’d said only the other day.

Stan refused to believe she would really go. He couldn’t face any of his children leaving home. But if one of his girls should get the opportunity, he wouldn’t step in their way.

He went into the garden, got his spade and fork from the shed and proceeded to stab the latter into the compacted earth. It was due for a good turning over and slamming the fork in helped alleviate the angst he was feeling.

‘Damn the competition,’ he exclaimed as the prongs of the fork stabbed deep into the soil. If one of his daughters won they might be tempted by the bright lights of the city and want to leave home. He drew it out and was about to have a second go along with an exclamation damning the village fete when he thought better of it.

The village fete had been going for years and the whole village enjoyed it. So did his family. When the prongs went in this time, he damned Adolf Hitler instead then leaned on the handle, lit his pipe and mused on the pleasure the village fete gave to them all.

Frances would head straight for the fairground running alongside the fete, a place where old gypsy women told fortunes if you crossed their palms with silver, and half-naked children ran around dragging scrawny dogs or ponies on long lead reins or leashes. Swarthy-faced men stood around smoking something that smelled like weeds while they inveigled passers-by to buy their painted tin cans, freshly killed rabbits, and baskets woven from long fronds of cut willow.

There would be a helter skelter, a tombola and this year a carousel. If they were lucky there might even be a big wheel.

Charlie would make his way to the beer tent along with his mates. It wasn’t often any of them had a day off, and this day was the most special of the year.

Stan would be content to see his children enjoying themselves, and he’d be more than happy if one of his daughters should win one of the baking categories.

The baking competition was taking place in the main marquee situated at the heart of the fete. This year was the most special, the only year in which the winners of the four categories would go forward to a ‘Best of Baking’ regional final in nearby Bristol, and then on to London if they won that round. A prize of ten pounds for the best British baker was at stake.

‘Right,’ Mary said once the apple loaf was ready for the oven and she was slapping the flour from her palms. ‘I think it looks good.’

Her father agreed with her. Understanding the pride a baker takes in their work, he held back while she stood beaming at the risen dough, oddly greyish-green thanks to the apple mixture.

‘Ready?’

She nodded, biting her lip nervously as she watched her father scoop it on to the big wooden paddle and slide it into the oven.

When the iron door clanged open, the heat of the oven filled the room. The bread entered the oven, an amorphous shape of doughy whiteness. Father and daughter waited until the sweet moment the smell of yeast and apples fell over them like a blanket.

This was the moment Mary liked best when the very air in the room became imbued with the essence of bread, its smell and its moistness. When she took a breath she could taste it.

‘It already smells good,’ said her father.

The aroma began to swell in much the same way as the loaf itself until it felt as though they were breathing in its taste.

Her father beamed at her.

‘Now you’d better go and wash that flour from off your nose!’ He dotted her nose with his finger just as he had when she was a child.

Mary laughed. All these years of baking and she was still getting flour on her face.

She was still smiling to herself when she encountered her sister coming out of the bathroom. Ruby looked pale and there were dark circles under her eyes.