Jenny's War (17 page)

‘Can I keep my things now, then?’

‘What?’ Dot looked up and her eyes narrowed. ‘I’ll think about it. See how good you are.’

‘Aw, let ’er keep ’em, Dot,’ Arthur said, giving Jenny a sly wink.

‘I said “I’ll see”, didn’t I? Besides, it ain’t for you to say. She’s
my
daughter. You keep out of it, Arfer, if you know what’s good for you. I never wanted ’er back, you know that. She could ’ave stayed there for ever for all I care.’

Jenny gasped and stared at her mother. She was hurt. Her mother didn’t even want her but, more than that, she was angry – uncontrollably angry. And it made her tongue unguarded. ‘Then why did you send for me? I wanted to stay there. I didn’t want to come back here. So why?’

Dot’s hand smacked Jenny’s cheek before the girl could dodge out of the way. She rubbed her face ruefully. Her reactions had slowed. Before she’d gone away, swift though Dot’s slaps always were, she’d rarely landed a blow. Jenny had always been quicker to duck.

There was a malicious smile on her mother’s mouth. ‘Gotcher! Not so quick now, are yer? See, you’ve been spoiled in more ways than one. Well, I’ll soon have you back in line, miss. And don’t you ever – ever let me hear you say again that you didn’t want to come back home, else I’ll tan the ’ide orf of yer.’

Greatly daring, Jenny said, ‘But you said
you
didn’t want
me
back, so why?’

‘What I say and what you can say are two different things,’ Dot said irrationally. ‘No, I didn’t want you back. I never wanted you in the first place. I tried to get rid of you. Nearly killed me, it did, going to a woman in the next street. Sitting in a hot bath and drinking gin and then her poking about at me, but you still clung on.’ Dot’s face twisted into a wry smile. ‘Still, did me one favour. Left me not able to ’ave any more brats, so I suppose I’ve got that to be grateful for. I can ’ave me fun and not worry about bringing another mistake into the world.’

‘Steady on, Dot,’ Arthur said quietly. ‘Little lass won’t understand what you’re on about.’

Dot’s eyes narrowed. ‘She knows all right. And there’s something else she’d better know. And it’s never too early to learn it.’ She reached out and nipped Jenny’s ear, twisting it painfully. ‘If you ever come home with your belly full, you’re out on your ear. And see if your precious fancy friends’d want you then, eh?’

Jenny said nothing. Her anger dissolved, overwhelmed by her mother’s hurtful words. But she wasn’t stupid; she wasn’t going to tell Dot any more about her time in Lincolnshire. She’d keep her mouth shut; not another word would pass her lips about Charlotte and Miles and never, ever, would she even breathe Georgie’s name in Dot’s hearing. She couldn’t bear to have her mother spoil her memories. Only in the loneliness of her bedroom would she relive those happy times.

‘Get that stuff upstairs, then. You can keep it for now, but if I get short of money . . .’ Dot left the threat hanging in the air, but Jenny knew that it would only be a matter of time before all her nice new clothes started disappearing one by one.

‘The stuff I bought for you is on your bed, but I ’spect that won’t be good enough now.’

‘Course it will, Mum.’ Jenny forced herself to sound grateful, trying to mend fences.

She went upstairs to the cramped bedroom at the back of the house. How small it seemed after the big bedroom at the manor. She glanced round at the dirty wallpaper and peeling paint and then moved towards the bed, where two dresses and a coat lay. The cotton dresses, as she’d known they would be, were faded and mended. The blue coat looked a little better but there was a strip of darker material where the hem had been let down. Some other girl had worn the coat until she could wear it no more. The cuffs were frayed, the elbows shiny. Jenny smiled sadly, realizing that before she’d gone away, the sight of such clothes would have thrilled her. Maybe her mother was right; Charlotte and Miles had spoiled her.

She tipped everything out of her suitcase on to the bed and began to hang her new clothes in the wardrobe. There was no use trying to hide anything; her mother would find it and she’d get a slap into the bargain. She sighed.

She came to the bottom of the pile and found the drawing book, the pencils and the box of paints that Charlotte had given her. She chewed her bottom lip, glancing round the sparsely furnished bedroom. Now she really didn’t want to lose these. Where could she hide them? The only place she could think of was on top of the wardrobe. Maybe Dot wouldn’t think of climbing up to look there. Quietly, Jenny pulled the chair near to the wardrobe, climbed on to it and tried to push the drawing book, pencils and paints as far back as she could out of sight. But they wouldn’t slide any further than about halfway. Jenny wasn’t tall enough to see from the chair she was balancing on what was in the way. She’d never put anything up there. She stretched out her fingers and touched something hard and round. Scrabbling at it till it came nearer the front, her hand closed around it and she pulled it down. It was a tin of peaches. Jenny stared at it in amazement, before understanding dawned. Her mother was hoarding food in case they ran short. She reached up and put the tin back where she’d found it, pushing it as far back as she could. It clinked against other tins. Jenny climbed down. The only place now to hide her paints was under the bed. She knelt on the floor began to push her belongings far underneath but again there was no room there. The whole area beneath her iron bedstead was taken up with boxes and packages. She pulled one out and opened the lid. It was full of more tinned fruit. She opened another to find bottles of whisky.

‘Jen, are you going to stop up there for ever?’ Her mother’s strident voice drifted up the stairs. ‘Yer tea’s ready. Look sharp, me an’ Arfer’s going out.’

Jenny pulled a face. ‘Fancy that,’ she muttered sarcastically. In her normal voice she called back. ‘Coming.’

Hastily, she pushed all the stuff back under her bed, but she was still faced with the problem of where to hide her paints. She’d have to leave them in the bottom drawer of the chest of drawers for the moment. Maybe she’d think of a better place later . . .

As they were finishing tea, a loud knock came at the front door. Jenny saw Arthur and Dot glance at each other in alarm. Jenny began to get up from the table to go to the door, but Dot grabbed her arm. ‘You sit there. Keep quiet and don’t move.’

‘Why?’

‘Ssh, I said,’ Dot hissed, her eyes round with fear. ‘Arfer, is the door locked?’

Arthur shrugged. ‘Jenny came in last, I . . .’

Dot’s grip tightened on Jenny’s arm. ‘Did you lock the door?’

‘No, I—’

‘Ssh.’

‘We never lock the door,’ Jenny whispered, catching some of her mother’s fear. ‘Why?’

‘We do now. Just sit tight. Mebbe they’ll go away if—’

But at that moment they all heard the front door rattle and open. Dot drew in her breath sharply, her eyes widened as she stared, terror-struck, at Arthur.

Then a cheery voice called out, ‘Jen, are you ’ere?’

Jenny leapt to her feet and dragged herself out of her mother’s grasp. ‘It’s Bobby! Bobby!’

Dot relaxed as she muttered, ‘Silly little bugger, frightening us like that.’

But Jenny was gone, out of the room and rushing through the front room to the door. She didn’t see the look of relief that passed between Arthur and Dot. ‘Just make sure she knows to keep the doors locked now, eh?’

‘I will,’ Dot muttered grimly. ‘Don’t want no more scares like that.’

The boy was standing in the doorway grinning. ‘Thought it was you. I saw you walking down the street with a posh gent. Who was he, then?’

‘Miles. I’ve been staying with them in the country. Oh Bobby, it was awful when you went off on that train.’

His face was bleak for a moment. ‘I know. And it were no better when we got where we was going.’

‘Didn’t you like it?’

‘Like it?’ Bobby was scornful. ‘You kidding? We went to a farm – right out in the middle of nowhere, it were. Mind you, they did keep me an’ Sammy together. But work. Cor! Up at five to do the milking before we went to school and then the same when we got home at night. And talk about the cold. It was freezing in winter. Mind you, we came home just before that first Christmas. We wrote home soon after we got there saying how awful it was, but we reckon the farmer’s wife must’ve opened our letters and burnt ’em, cos Mam never got ’em.’

‘So, how did you get home, then?’

Bobby grinned. ‘Sammy ran away. Came all the way back home hitching lifts and he told Mam and she sent for me.’

‘You could have come to where I was. It was great, it—’ She stopped and glanced over her shoulder, fearful that her mother might be listening. ‘I’ll tell you sometime. So, your mam hasn’t sent you anywhere else.’

Bobby shook his head. ‘She wants us with her, specially now Dad’s gone.’

Jenny gasped. ‘Gone?’

‘Oh, not that. At least – ’ Bobby grimaced and his eyes were suddenly fearful – ‘not yet.’

‘What d’you mean?’ Jenny whispered.

‘He’s gone back in the navy.’

‘You said he might.’

Bobby nodded. ‘Volunteered, he did. He used to be in the merchant navy, yer know, but he came out when Mam had our Ronnie and got a job on the docks so’s he could be at home with his family. Fat lot o’ good that did, didn’t it? Now there’s a war, he’s gone back anyway.’

Jenny didn’t often read the newspapers or listen to the wireless, but she’d heard snippets about ships being attacked in the Channel by the Luftwaffe. Bobby’s dad would be in constant danger. She didn’t know what to say, didn’t know how to comfort her friend. She wanted to tell him about her own loss, how Georgie had been posted missing, presumed killed. Even though she had stoutly declared to anyone who would listen that he was still alive and would come back one day, secretly deep in her heart she knew that there was always the possibility that . . . no, no, she wouldn’t believe it, she couldn’t believe it.

She had to believe that somewhere he was safe.

Now she squeezed Bobby’s arm. ‘He’ll be all right,’ she said huskily.

Bobby made a valiant effort to smile and say cheerfully, ‘Come round whenever you want. Mam’ll be pleased to see you.’

‘I will.’ She leaned forward conspiratorially. ‘I might nip in later. Mum and Arfer are going out.’

‘Nothin’ new there, then.’ Bobby chuckled and cast her a sympathetic glance. ‘Just mind they show you how to get into the Morrison before they go out, in case we have an air raid. We get ’em all the time.’

Jenny’s eyes widened. ‘All the—?’

‘S’all right. We’re safe as houses, specially if we go down the underground.’ Now he laughed. ‘Actually, we’re safer than houses ’cos that’s what’s getting bombed.’

‘Oh Bobby!’ Jenny could think of nothing else to say.

Later, after Dot and Arthur had roared off in his sports car, Jenny went next door.

‘Jen – ’ Elsie Hutton greeted her with open arms. ‘It’s good to have you back, darlin’, but I’d rather you’d stayed safely in the country. Didn’t you like it?’

Unbidden and before she could stop them, tears sprang to Jenny’s eyes. ‘I loved it, Aunty Elsie, but Mum sent for me to come home.’

Elsie’s mouth was a hard line as she nodded grimly. ‘I thought as much. Never stopped going on about how she was the only one whose kid hadn’t come back and she didn’t want anyone to think she’d sent you away to get rid of you.’ Elsie snorted derisively. ‘But she should have left you there. London’s been taking a battering for months now an’ it’s not over yet.’

Jenny nodded, accepting the truth even though it hurt. ‘She only sent for me ’cos everyone else has come home and she didn’t want to be the odd one out. I know that. She didn’t really
want
me back. Not like you wanted your boys.’

Elsie put her arms around Jenny. ‘Aw, don’t you worry. You’re welcome here any time. An’ when we go down the shelter or the tube, we’ll send our Bobby round for you an’ you can come with us.’

Jenny hugged her in return, thankful to have this family who she knew really did care for her.

‘Now,’ Elsie said briskly, ‘come an’ have a bite of tea with us.’

‘Oh, I don’t want to take your food. ’Sides, I’ve already had tea.’

‘Then come and sit with us while we have ours and then you and Bobby can have a game of Ludo.’

The evening passed pleasantly enough and though part of Jenny was pleased to see her old friends again, the other part of her yearned to be back at the manor, playing with the doll’s house, out on the lawn playing football with Miles or painting in the quietness of Charlotte’s studio.

Or on the beach with Georgie.

‘What’s all that stuff under my bed?’

As soon as the words left her lips, Jenny knew she shouldn’t have asked. Dot gasped and lashed out at her. But Jenny, quicker once more in her reflexes, ducked. ‘Don’t you poke your nose into what doesn’t concern you.’ Dot tapped her own nose. ‘Keep it out. You hear?’

Jenny glared at her. ‘It’s in my bedroom.’

‘
Your
bedroom.’ Dot laughed nastily. ‘Since when did you contribute to the rent for this place? If it’s anybody’s now, it’s Arfer’s. He’s moved in an’ he pays the rent.’

Jenny had guessed as much.

When they’d arrived back the previous night, or rather early this morning, laughing and staggering up the stairs, she’d heard her mother’s bedroom door bang and, through the thin walls, other noises that a young girl should not be subjected to. In the morning, Arthur had still been there, sitting at the breakfast table, smoking, as if he did indeed own the place.

And now it seemed, in a manner of speaking, he did. He paid the rent.

‘And don’t you go telling folks about what’s under your bed, neither.’

Jenny said no more but she counted the boxes under her bed from time to time and noticed that sometimes there were more, sometimes less. And yet they never had tinned peaches for tea, nor did she see Dot and Arthur drinking whisky. There was no one she could ask, but gradually even she began to understand that with all the rationing and the shortages, people would pay a little bit extra to someone who could supply what they wanted. And Arthur, it seemed, was that ‘supply’. But she was careful never to ask questions, never to tell anyone – not even Bobby – about what she’d found.