Home Sweet Home (34 page)

‘Pity the wife, if he ever does get one,' commented Michael.

Mary began piling the dirty dinner plates. ‘So how about you and your Corporal Smith, then? Clearly you're still carrying at torch for him. Are you going to marry him?'

Ruby looked down at the table.

‘I fear looking into the future. I've had just one card. And that was from a prison camp.'

Mary sighed. ‘He's tough. He'll survive. You just see if he doesn't.'

Ruby smiled sadly. ‘Yes. Yes, he is.'

They washed the dishes between them, carrying on their conversation, chattering as if time and distance had never happened.

Once they were sitting comfortably in front of the crackling logs, breathing in the smell of apples, Michael brought drinks.

‘Sherry. I'm afraid it's all we have. We need to visit Aunt Bettina before long for a re-stock.'

Ruby thanked him and, once he was holding a glass, suggested a toast. ‘To the end of the war!'

‘And to a growing family,' Michael added. ‘Mary says just two, I suggested a lot more than that.'

‘Six,' declared Mary. ‘You said six!'

They all laughed.

‘Hopefully, the war
will
be over by then,' stressed Ruby.

‘Yes,' said Mary.

Ruby knew that the way her sister suddenly looked down at her feet was ominous. A quick glance at her brother-in-law confirmed something ominous there too.

‘I expect you'll look for somewhere to settle once the war is over – somewhere nice where you can bring up a horde of children,' Ruby said laughingly.

Michael looked at her. ‘Yes. That is exactly my intention. I've got the chance of a job in Canada. It's a good job and well paid.'

‘You sound as though you've made up your mind.'

Of course he had, hence the look on her sister's face. She didn't need to be a mind reader to know that her sister didn't want to go to Canada.

It was at breakfast the next day, after Michael had left for the base, that her suspicion was confirmed.

Ruby took over spooning porridge into Beatrice's mouth while Mary rolled out the pastry for that evening's supper, mutton pie.

‘What are you going to do?'

Mary shook her head. ‘I don't want to go.'

‘I didn't think you would.'

‘Moving up here was bad enough.'

‘It must have been difficult at first, though you seem content enough now.'

‘Yes,' said Mary, her mouth tightening as she slammed the rolling pin down on to the pastry. ‘Living here I can at least get on a train down to see my family, after the war, I mean. But Canada …' Her arms slackened and her throat moved as she swallowed. A faraway look came to her eyes. ‘Sometimes I wish I could turn back the clock …'

In the past, Ruby might have sided with her and said that of course she shouldn't go, but not now.

‘Mary. What makes you think that your family – your old family – is going to remain in the same place they've lived all their life? It's all in the past. Frances is going to get married someday soon, and so am I, I hope. It's unlikely we'll remain where we are, and besides, we're your old family. You've got a new one now.'

‘Someday soon?'

Ruby licked her lips. She hadn't meant to come out with it quite so swiftly.

‘Frances is pregnant. She told us just before I left for London. That military policeman friend of mine.'

‘Isn't he …?'

‘Yes, a bit too old for her. Dad is livid and swears he won't sign for her to get married.'

‘He has to,' Mary exclaimed sounding dismayed. ‘Frances mentioned on the phone that an American soldier had asked her to marry him, but she said nothing about being pregnant. I didn't realise that the Declan she mentioned was your friend, either. What about the child? It's not an easy life for a child born out of wedlock.'

Ruby sighed. ‘You try telling Dad that.'

Although she'd always been the gentler of the two, Mary adopted a determined stance. ‘I will tell him. You can bet on it.'

‘Anyway,' said Ruby, wishing to steer the conversation back to her sister's concern about leaving the country and her family behind. ‘Would it really be so bad if you moved to Canada?'

‘I suppose I would make new friends. I have here, though there's not many of us, and all air force wives. The rest of the time I'm here by myself. With Beatrice, of course. Writing letters is fine, but it's not the same as having somebody else to talk to.'

Ruby stood up and wound her arm around her sister's shoulder. ‘You're a very lucky woman, Mary Dangerfield. You have a handsome husband who adores you and a lovely daughter. Your world is complete, whereas mine …' She sighed. ‘I've got no husband and not even a sweetheart, really.' She stroked the imagined lines from the corners of her eyes at the same time peering at her reflection in the small mirror hanging to one side of the window. ‘I'll probably end up an aged spinster! Then you'll feel lucky! Poor old Ruby, you'll say. A dried-up old spinster!'

Her humour worked, Mary's laughter attracting the curiosity of her small daughter.

‘You'll be fine,' Mary said in a kindly manner. ‘I envy you.'

The two sisters exchanged loving looks. Mary looked happier and more accepting. Ruby, although she smiled, knew what she'd stated was the absolute truth. There was no Mister Right dancing attendance on her and she'd feel a great emptiness inside until Johnnie came marching home – if he came marching home.

‘I don't mind being a spinster,' she finally said. ‘Anyway, I've got Charlie to look after.'

‘And John Smith. He'll come home, Ruby. I'm sure he will.'

It was a couple of days later when Michael took her back to the station and the train to London. The journey across London to Paddington Station would be gruelling and she wouldn't arrive home until very late at night. The alternative would have been to stay in London overnight, but she didn't want to do that. She'd done her duty by speaking to the group at the Dorchester Hotel and did not wish to bump into either Andrew or his mother. Initially, Andrew lying to his mother had made her bristle. Now it made her laugh.

Michael was abnormally quiet all the way to the station. Ruby guessed the reason why.

‘Don't worry, Michael. She will go to Canada with you. I'm sure she will.'

The suddenness of her comment caused him to veer towards the middle of the road. ‘She told you?'

‘Of course she told me. I'm her sister.' She smiled at him. ‘Don't you two ever speak to each other?'

Michael kept his eyes on the road ahead, though it was totally empty, a narrow ribbon running between flat fields. Overhead, a single aircraft made its way across the sky.

‘My fault. I've been a bit preoccupied of late trying to persuade the high command that I'm fit to fly. I want one last crack at the enemy before it's all over. Just one.'

‘Haven't you done enough?'

He gave her a weak smile that tugged at her heartstrings. ‘It may sound stupid, but I can't help feeling guilty. A lot of my old pals are dead. I'm still alive.'

‘You shouldn't feel guilty about it.'

‘So I'm told, but I can't help it.'

Ruby turned her head as though eyeing the endless landscape, purely so he wouldn't see the moistness in her eyes for all those boys, all those who would never have the choice between living in England and living in Canada.

Once her emotions were under control, she turned to him and smiled. ‘Let me remind you that you're never going to be a concert pianist, thanks to your insistence on becoming an RAF pilot.'

At first he didn't see that she was being flippant.

‘I never—'

Then the penny dropped. Smiling, he shook his head.

‘You've made your sacrifice,' said Ruby, her tone turning more serious. ‘You've sacrificed quite a lot and your beautiful wife and darling daughter would prefer that things went no further.'

He laughed again and for a moment she felt triumphant until the truth hit her that he would still go back into action if given the chance.

It was only two days following Ruby's return home that Frances went missing. She'd left a note.

Gone to find my mother.

The house had a bay window and a brass knocker.

Tilting her head back, Frances counted the windows: two on each floor and there were three storeys. The façade looked well maintained and the net curtains behind the gleaming windows were crisply white.

Taking a deep breath, Frances lifted the knocker and rapped sharply.

A sound of movement came from within before the door opened and an older woman with a round face and a ready smile stood there. ‘Good morning. Can I help you?'

The woman's voice was high and squeaky and she had the comfortable look of a Beatrix Potter mouse.

‘My name's Frances Sweet. I wrote to you asking for news of my mother, Mildred Sweet. She stayed with you for a while. You said you might be able to point me in the right direction.'

‘Ah, yes. Do you wish to stay?'

Frances was immediately panic-stricken because she'd stupidly forgotten to ask in her letter whether she had a vacancy. ‘Do you have a room?'

‘As a matter of fact, you're in luck. Miss Scott moved out two days ago and I haven't got round to turning the sign over.'

With a nod of her dimpled chin, she indicated the
No Vacancies
sign in the ground-floor bay.

‘Come in,' she added chirpily, opened the door wide then shut it firmly once Frances was inside. ‘I presume you haven't eaten. You'll be wanting supper, won't you? Yes. Of course you will.'

She went on chattering, asking questions that she answered before Frances did.

Frances had arrived just as the night was drawing in and Mrs Kepple, the landlady, had already lit a fire in the front parlour. The smell of something hearty and warming came from the kitchen at the back of the house.

‘Beef stew,' she said on hearing Frances's stomach rumbling.

‘It smells wonderful.'

‘And so it should,' said Mrs Kepple. She seemed a good-natured sort and jolly too, despite the man-sized fists that rested on her ample hips and the wrap-around apron straining at the seams over her belly. ‘I put in plenty of dripping, enough meat to give it flavour, vegetables of every kind – including carrots – old Mr Dent, my greengrocer, was generous with the carrots this morning. And I added doughboys. I s'pose you'd call them dumplings, but my grandmother always called them doughboys so it's in me, so to speak … Doughboys was what they called the American soldiers back in the Great War.'

After Mrs Kepple finished describing tonight's stew in detail, she went on to the pudding she'd baked for afters. ‘Suet pudding with treacle. I did put a few sultanas in it as well and I've got custard too for them that wants it …'

Frances refrained from interrupting. It seemed that when Mrs Kepple talked about food, there was no stopping her. She went over the ingredients and preparation of meals in great detail. Presumably the privations of the war had a lot to do with it. People did seem to think about food a lot more, not just longing for food no longer available, but also pondering how to make bland ingredients into filling and nourishing meals. Suet pudding and a stew with dumplings – or doughboys as Mrs Kepple put it – were a case in point. The landlady's eyes sparkled as she went over the details. Once that was out of the way she told her the price of the room. ‘Just let me know how long you want it.'

The room she showed her into was at the back of the house. There was a bed, a chest of drawers and a washstand complete with jug and bowl. A clean towel was folded up beside it.

Mrs Kepple announced that the window overlooked the back garden. ‘Not that you can see much at this time of night.'

Once her landlady had left the room, Frances sat down on the bed. There was no fire in the grate. Frances shivered, not just because the room was chillier than she was used to, but also her bedroom back home was warm thanks to the rising heat of the bread oven. Apprehension sat like a ball of knotted wire in her stomach. Sometime soon she would meet up with her mother, and the prospect was daunting.

That night at dinner, in the comparative warmth of the dining room, she only picked at the stew and hardly touched the dessert. The other guests, a gentleman named Mr Ford, a woman who looked to be in her fifties named Miss Standish, and a young woman named Emily Parkin who worked at Woolworths, were all nice enough.

The conversation was courteous but friendly and, thankfully, nobody asked her awkward questions.

She couldn't help thinking of her mother, more so when Mrs Kepple handed her a scrap of paper. ‘That's where she's living. I'm sure she's still there.'

Having made enquiries of its location, she had decided to catch the early bus the following morning. She couldn't bear to wait longer than she needed.

Even though Miss Parkin ate up the food she'd left, Mrs Kepple looked quite hurt. ‘Didn't you like my stew, Miss Sweet? Or my pudding?'

Frances apologised. ‘I'm sorry. I'm not feeling very hungry after all, and anyway, Emily didn't let it go to waste.'

‘Certainly not,' said Emily as she spooned the last spoonful of suet pudding into her mouth. ‘I'm on my feet all day. I need plenty of nourishment.'

‘Of course you do, dearie,' said Mrs Kepple, patting the plump young woman on the shoulder. ‘Isn't it nice to see Woolworths and all the other shops getting back to normal? All we need now is for Germany and Japan to surrender and everyone will be back where they belong!'

Frances made her excuses and went up to bed. Before undressing, she cracked open the blackout curtain and looked out of the window. The moon was bright and the rooftops glistened with rain.