Orphans of War (23 page)

She was bored with sitting still but one more day
or two was better than doing it all again if it would make her normal. Aunt Plum would come on the train to visit her and Gloria knew where she was.

‘There may be a slight shift, a little glide, but nothing like the last time, I promise.’ With that he flounced out of the room to the next patient.

She was dying to find a mirror to look at his handiwork and see if the miracle was true–that there would be no more turn in her eye.

When her visitors arrived, for them it would be like looking at a whole person–they’d see the real Maddy Belfield at long last. She couldn’t wait to see their faces. She stared at her wristwatch with despair, noting that it was hours before visiting time.

Gloria was determined to catch a bus into town to see her friend in the Eye Hospital when she finished her shift. Putting on her best skirt and blouse, borrowing her mother’s duster coat with the swing back panel and a pair of real nylon stockings that she had to roll over at the top because her legs were still short, she primped in the mirror fixing her hair into a bang over her forehead.

There was no way she wanted Maddy to see her looking like a mill girl, with fluff in her hair and overalls. Nor did she want her to know they were living back to back in Hunslet up a steep hill that was a buggar to push her baby brother up in his go-chair.

She tried not to think of Brooklyn days, the green hills and gentle life they’d lived before Mam tricked them back with her lies.

The nearest they’d got to Hollywood so far was seeing Danny Kaye at the Rialto.

Every waking hour she hated living here, and Sid had run off twice as far as Skipton to be with his friend Alan. It wasn’t fair, and now she would see Maddy and her old life would come flooding back.

It was all right lying in letters. She missed Maddy. They’d had such good times and no chance to say a proper goodbye. She didn’t want anyone feeling sorry for her. One minute she’d been racing round Brooklyn on Maddy’s bicycle, the next back on a train, with her mother promising them the earth and being as nice as pie. But it was all lies. She’d felt such a fool to have trusted her mother but with no money, no proper clothes, there was nothing she could do to get back.

How could she have believed all that guff about America? This was like living in Elijah Street, only worse somehow, because now she knew there was another world outside these mean streets.

Little Mikey was real enough, but the Yank had done a disappearing trick once he found out Marge had two more kids in tow. His letters just dried up with his money cheque, and Marge had stopped pretending she’d be a GI bride.

Mother was working in a garment factory piecing up clothes while Mikey was in a day nursery. Sid was put in school and Gloria’d been given a job slopping out in a woollen mill canteen. Sometimes she felt so angry inside she thought she would burst.

Mam just wanted her wage packet and a free babysitter for Mikey, and half the street seemed to think
she’d sit for their kids too. If only she could tell her friend Maddy the truth–but she’d told too many lies in her letters about her wonderful life in Leeds. Better to lie than to be pitied.

She walked into town to save the bus fare and in her pocket was a pair of real nylons as a present for her friend, nicked from her mother’s dressing-table drawer. They were payment for all the hours she’d sat amusing her brothers.

As she walked over the bridge, making for the Headrow, the wind beating her face, she smiled, thinking about the tree house HQ in the Victory Tree. Those hikes into the Dales with Greg and the gang carrying her on piggyback, trying to jog on Monty’s back, the parties at Brooklyn Hall and the good times with Mrs Plum. It was all in another world. Coming to Hunslet was hate at first sight.

Sowerthwaite was another life all together, a softer way of living, where people were polite and spoke in gentle tones and wore smart, freshly ironed clothes, sipping their drinks, not ramming them down their throats. They ate with forks and knives, not picking chips with greasy fingers and slurping tea. Even their swear words were easy on the ear.

If only she’d not been so gullible last year as to believe her mam’s promises, but they’d been too young to say no to a grown-up. It was obvious that everyone was glad to see the back of another vaccy family, off the books and out of their hair. She knew now that Conleys were common and looked down upon for being townies. When she’d tried to be ladylike at the
table, remembering the manners she’d learned from the Belfields, Mam just laughed at her and told her not to be so lah-di-dah.

The Hollywood ruse was just the Yank’s excuse to get Mam’s pants on the floor. They’d all heard the joke about ‘Utility knickers: one Yank and they were off!’ Now there was yet another child to feed and Gloria felt trapped. Going to the pictures twice a week was no substitute for country life, and the food shortages meant queuing for everything they once took for granted in the country.

There was a queue waiting for visiting hours at the hospital. She’d left a note on the table telling Sid to go next door till Mam came home. There’d be a row when she got back and there was no tea on the table, but this time she was doing something for herself and it felt good. Mam could look after her own kids for once.

The bell rang and she walked down the corridor, wondering if Maddy would recognise her all grown up. She opened the door of the private room slowly and there was a roar of pleasure that made up for everything.

‘Gloria! Gloria! You came…you look so glam!’ Maddy’s arms reached out to her. ‘Sit down, sit down…I’m so glad you came.’

‘Try and stop me…Wow, you look so different. Your eye is straight!’ she peered at Maddy’s grey eyes, which were blinking with excitement. She’d never noticed how thick those lashes were and how long, as they were usually hidden behind thick glasses. Maddy was sitting in striped pyjamas, with bunches either side
of her head like a schoolgirl. ‘How are things back home?’ Gloria asked.

‘Just the same. Plum and Grandma are at each other’s throats. Uncle Gerald’s in Germany now. Isn’t it exciting–the war will soon be over!’

‘Have you heard from Greg Byrne?’

‘Auntie P got a letter. He’s somewhere in Europe, fixing lorries, I expect. You know what he’s like if there’s any wheels to fix. I can’t imagine him in uniform taking orders.’

‘I can. He’d look good, don’t you think? Have
you
got a boyfriend?’

Maddy blushed. ‘I’m still stuck in a girls’ school–where on earth would I meet a boy worth talking to?’

‘I’ve had three since I came back, but they’re not up to much. But I’ve had my first kiss and fumble,’ Gloria lied, wanting to seem sophisticated and experienced.

‘Gloria Conley!’ Maddy whispered. ‘You’re far too young for boys.’

‘You’re never too young to get experience but I don’t want to end up like my mam. I want to choose a good one who’ll take care of me good and proper.’

‘How’s your job?’ Maddy changed the subject.

‘Which one, serving in the canteen or baby-sitting all hours down the street? I should open a nursery,’ Gloria smiled, trying to make a joke of it all. But when she saw Maddy looking so young and carefree, she just crumpled with the unfairness of it all.

‘You always were good with kiddies, not like me,’ said Maddy, trying to be kind.

‘When do you leave school then?’ Gloria said, composing herself.

‘Next year, all being well,’ came the reply. No dirty canteens for Miss Belfield, she thought. Maddy didn’t have a clue about real life.

‘And then what?’

‘Secretarial college, I hope. I’m not going to finishing school.’

‘In London?’

‘No, in Leeds. I don’t want to go far away from home.’

But I’d love to be a million miles away from mine, thought Gloria, though she said nothing. ‘Goody, we can be pals again here if I can stick it out long enough…It’s horrible!’ To her embarrassment Gloria found herself weeping real tears onto the bed clothes.

‘What on earth’s upset you? Is it something I said?’ said Maddy holding her hand.

‘I hate it here. After the Brooklyn…why did it have to all change? It was the best thing living there. I miss it so much. I’ll never forget what you did.’

‘Oh, don’t get upset. You could always come back, you know,’ Maddy suggested.

‘And stay with you?’

‘Well, no, but I’m sure Aunt Plum could find you a job. There are loads of ladies who might need a mother’s help or something,’ she offered.

‘Do you think so? I’d never thought of that.’ Gloria felt a surge of hope.

‘Stay where you are, get a good reference and I’ll ask Aunt Plum if she can help.’

‘You’re an angel. Then we could go out together like old times!’

‘Hang on, I’ve got exams to do and then I’ll be studying in Leeds, but it’s worth a try. You know the area. I’m sure someone will want you. Here, blow your nose.’

Maddy looked embarrassed, offering her a pretty lace hanky, and Gloria remembered the nylons.

‘I brought you these,’ she smiled, holding them out.

‘Gosh! Real ones. I’m still in ankle socks. Grandma says I’m too young for stockings and Plum says I’m not.’

‘Rubbish. I’m a bit younger than you and I wear them. It’s about time you glammed up a bit, new eyes and a new hairstyle, I say,’ Gloria added, sizing up the girl in the bed with a critical eye.

‘Do you really think so?’

‘We’ll be the sirens of Sowerthwaite, you and me,’ Gloria laughed, feeling suddenly like there was hope of a return to Brooklyn in sight.

‘But I’ll still have to wear glasses for things,’ Maddy sighed.

‘Not all the time, and you won’t look like Long John Silver any more, will you? I think you should get rid of those bunches, for a start. Have you got any scissors?’

‘In the drawer, but Granny will have a blue fit. It’s taken years to grow them, my hair is so curly.’

Gloria rooted in the bedside drawer and pulled out a pretty pink leather case with nail files, buffers and silver scissors. She combed out the tangled bunches
and Maddy squealed at the lugs and tugs. ‘I see what you mean about the length, but let’s give you a bang at the front across your forehead like me.’

Before she could protest, Gloria snipped a fringe from the front hair and released the rest on either side. ‘There, that’s better!’

Maddy looked in the cabinet mirror. ‘Oh, what’ve you done?’

‘Made you look your age, that’s what, Madeleine Belfield. The rest is up to you…forever friends, remember? You will ask Mrs Plum, won’t you? I’ll do anything.’

‘Leave it to me, and do come again. If I’ve gone home you know where to find me. I’ve got your address. I promise we’ll find you something, and let’s write to Greg and tell him all about it. We can send him a parcel and some photographs of my new eye.’

‘You’re on, Maddy, and thanks.’

Gloria skipped down the dark streets with a broad smile across her face. One day soon she’d be on that train to Sowerthwaite and nothing would induce her back again. She was going home!

Greg sometimes wondered about the wisdom of the British Army in placing a perfectly able mechanic into a canteen. If an army marched on its stomach then heaven help anyone who trusted their strength to his feeble efforts at serving decent grub. No one took a blind bit of notice of his skills, only where the vacancies were.

Everything about this institution was about churning
men out in sausage machine regularity, ignoring their civilian aptitudes in favour of square pegs into round holes. He was better trained than most in institutional living and quite enjoyed his square bashing weeks: the marching parades, drums banging, kit inspections, the lads acting daft in the huts but before he knew what had hit him, he was ricocheting over the Channel onto Sword Beach in an old Bedford Truck.

‘Keep yer head down when you get up there,’ yelled the sergeant, pointing out a hill ahead. At least he was driving the canteen, and mounted up the ramp in a swift manoeuvre at the first attempt, and kept the show on the road, driving past lines of soldiers, military police and sullen natives. There were guns and artillery ahead. The convoy snaked round the high hedges, unsure of what lay waiting to ambush them.

When his truck died, everyone started hurling abuse at him as if he’d sabotaged it on purpose. ‘Get that bleedin’ thing off the road!’ He bumped it over tussocky grass, terrified that there were mines in the grass sewn as thick as thistles. This was the moment that Greg’s war began in earnest.

Someone brought out the petrol stove and tea was brewed–business as usual. It was a fractured petrol pipe that had done the damage but no one had a spare. The truck was going nowhere and neither were they, canteen or not, so all they could do was dig a slit trench and get stuck in for the night.

Enemy aircraft were flying low and Greg decided to try out his firing skill, aiming his gun high, pretending he was out with Mr Batty doing a bit of poaching.
When someone was out to get you there was an edge to the firing off like no other, he thought.

The rest of the night passed without incident and the truck was patched up when he went on a recce to filch a pipe from another abandoned truck. Only it wasn’t as empty as he’d thought when he fell over the leg and the boot lying on the ground. He felt sick at the sight of what remained of the poor driver.