Polly's Angel (57 page)

Grace had nodded eagerly, squeezed his hand – then sighed doubtfully. ‘Well, I'd love that, Sunny, but . . . don't you think Polly will be expecting you?'

‘No,' Sunny said light-heartedly. ‘You know our Poll, she'll enjoy herself no matter what, and there's plenty of fellers around today. She wrote a while back, said something about someone called Tad . . . I got the feeling that he was special to her. So come on, where'll we go first? I haven't eaten since last night, how about a meal? We might find some fish and chips!'

And the two of them had set off, heading for Byrom Street where Sunny remembered a place which, in peacetime, had been famous for its excellent food.

As Sunny had said, there was plenty for two young people to do and see in a city celebrating the end of a long, hard-fought war. They ate their meal, talking eagerly about their jobs, their friends, fleshing out the letters that they had been exchanging regularly, now, for a twelve-month. And then they went out into the excited crowds to begin to celebrate.

By nightfall, Sunny and Grace had watched the firework displays, danced in the street, eaten food which had been offered to anyone in uniform at various street parties and caught up with each other's news. With some reluctance they had returned to Lime Street since both were due back in their service positions by next day, and sat on a wooden seat under the clock waiting for their trains and discussing their future. Sunny waxed eloquent on his captain's suggestion that he should stay with the service, and told Grace impressively that he could have a fine career in the Navy even in peacetime. He didn't want to be a sailor for the rest of his life, he told her, but just for a few years, until things were more settled. As he talked, Sunny caught hold of Grace's hand and thought that this was the first time he had noticed a likeness between Grace and Polly, though he knew that they were sisters. Of course Polly was a little raver for looks and Grace no more than passable, but somehow, today, he thought that had he had to choose he would have put Grace as the more striking of the two. Polly had golden curls and blue eyes and a dear little face, but Grace . . . Grace had style, he decided, and a sort of elegance which the bubbly Polly most certainly did not possess. I'm proud to be seen with her, Sunny thought, and was astonished at himself. He was a catch and he knew it, girls flocked round him, always had, and here he was with a girl he had never thought so much as pretty, admiring her style and elegance, two attributes which he had never even thought about before. But he dragged his mind away from his companion's looks and listened to her conversation, noticing also for the first time what a pretty voice she had, with almost no trace of the scouse accent which he himself had retained.

Grace, knowing nothing of his thoughts, continued to talk naturally and earnestly. She had told him several times of her life in New York with Sara, and of how she missed Jamie and her other friends, so now it seemed quite natural to tell him of her plans for the peace. ‘I've had a lovely letter from Sara, telling me that I'm welcome to live in the flat again just as soon as I can get a passage,' she said. ‘Poor Sara, it's been a horrid time for her, though she's known nothing of the shortages and the bombing and so on. But she doesn't think Brogan will get back as quickly as they would both like, so I suppose she'd be even more pleased to see me.'

Sunny stared at her. He could feel his mouth dropping open and, what was more, suddenly heard his own voice, with a note of almost desperate incredulity in it, say, ‘Get a passage? You don't mean . . . you can't mean you're thinkin' of goin' back to the States when the war ends?'

Grace, in her turn, stared. ‘Well, I think so,' she said slowly. ‘I don't suppose there will be much for me here, Sunny – in the way of work, I mean. What's more, though I could live at the Strawb for a bit, I suppose, I couldn't expect the O'Bradys to take me in again. They'll be having all their family home, not just Polly. No, it's better that I go back to Sara. She says the delicatessen where I used to work were delighted to hear I'd be returning there and said my job was waiting for me. So you see—'

Sunny interrupted her without apology. ‘But Grace, you – you don't want to go off, half a world away from – from your pals,' he said. ‘Oh, I know I said I'd stick with the Navy for a bit and so I shall, but – but sailors marry, you know, make a home ashore, raise a family. And you and me's always got on great, wouldn't you say? So why go all the way to America, when I'm on your doorstep, queen.'

There was an astounded silence. Sunny, watching Grace's face closely, saw her cheeks flush very becomingly and her eyelids droop over her eyes. Was she angry? Had she not guessed that he was fond of her? Oh, he might not have declared himself so soon, in fact he had made up his mind to tell her that they must meet more often now that peace had been declared, but at the thought of her going right away a lump of ice seemed to have frozen his stomach and a sense of panic assailed him. She was the nicest girl he knew, they had a great deal in common, he couldn't let her go without a struggle! But she was still looking down at her hands and not answering and Sunny realised that he hadn't actually said – well, what he wanted to say. So he took a deep breath and then spoke with more earnestness than he knew he possessed.

‘Gracie, I want – I want you to be me girl, not just me bezzie, like you have been.'

‘Oh, Sunny,' Grace said, lifting shining eyes to his face. ‘It sounds – it sounds . . . But I thought you and Polly . . .'

‘Polly's me pal, but only a pal,' Sunny said at once. ‘A grand girl, I agree. But she's not the one for me, Grace, and she knows it. I've got me eye on quite a different sort of girl. One who won't fly up into the boughs if I say I'm staying in the Navy for a while, for instance. One who doesn't think an awful lot of herself, but who suits me just fine.'

There was a longish pause before Grace said quietly: ‘Oh. I'm sorry, Sunny, I didn't realise you – you had a girl, I just hope I've not spoiled your day, taking it for granted that we'd go about together.'

‘That was my idea, not yours,' Sunny said. He leaned across her and took her other hand, pulling her round until they were facing each other. ‘Grace, you must know that I like you, enjoy being with you.'

‘I hoped you did,' Grace said shyly, the pink colour slowly blooming in her cheeks once more. ‘Only there was Polly . . . and there have been heaps and heaps of other girls, you've told me so yourself.'

‘Oh aye, but none of them meant anything, really, not even Poll when it came down to brass tacks,' Sunny told her. ‘So if you don't mind me staying in the Navy, how about us going steady? We've done a lot of getting to know each other today and we'll need time and a lot of meetings before – well, before we think about getting engaged, but . . . well, how about it?'

‘Oh, Sunny, I'd like that,' Grace said breathlessly. ‘If you're sure, that is? It 'ud be better than going to the States – better than anything!'

‘I'm sure,' Sunny said, and was leaning across to kiss her when, with a shriek of brakes, a train drew into the platform. Above them, the echoing voice of a railway official informed them of the train's various destinations and Sunny stood up. ‘No time for anything even when there's a peace on,' he grumbled. ‘I'm for this one . . . come and see me off, then I can kiss you without anyone thinking twice about it!'

The day had begun well and went on better, Polly decided as she and Monica, with Deirdre on one side of them and Peader the other, fought their way first on to a tram and then off it again, to surge amongst the cheering, stamping, flag-waving crowds and to cry a little because everyone was so happy. The crowd cheered wildly – Mr Churchill first, of course, then the King and the Queen, then the royal children. In the midst of such excitement it would have been hard to remember one's own personal troubles. Polly, determined not to think about Tad, found that for the moment at any rate she was simply responding to the happiness around her, and when someone started to play the National Anthem on an accordion she joined in with the rest, bawling out the words raucously.

‘Do you realise, Mon, that some of these kids haven't ever heard the church bells ring before?' Polly shouted at one point as the bells of the nearest church began their long, loud-mouthed clamour. ‘Well, I suppose they might have, but not that they can remember, I mean.'

‘I know what you mean,' Monica shouted back. ‘Look, fireworks!'

It was a waste, but who could resist letting off fireworks when they were so glad? Polly squeaked as the rockets whizzed past her and up into the blue, bursting in a shower of almost invisible sparks, so strong was the sunshine. And presently she began to pick out the faces of people she knew – old friends from school, mostly in uniform, neighbours, shopkeepers, even. It's an odd thing, so it is, Polly found herself ruminating, but to Liverpool people the city's like a honeypot to bees – they have to come back. They can go to the ends of the earth, I do believe, but at the end of the day they'll come back to Liverpool. Why, neither Sunny nor Grace had any thought about spending VE Day where they were stationed; they both wanted to come home, to come back here, and so they have, no doubt. If they aren't here yet, they soon will be, I'm sure of that. Oh, I do hope they come round to Snowdrop Street, otherwise . . . well, it will be a quiet sort of day for me.

It was a day to remember, the sort of day, Polly reflected, which would still be in people's memories in fifty or so years' time. People who scarcely knew one another hugged and danced together, boys climbed on to the statues in St George's Plain and hung flags from the ears of a great bronze horse, girls put wreaths of spring flowers on the statue of Queen Victoria and decorated the huge stone lions crouched on their plinths in the same way. And as darkness fell everyone watched the uprush of rockets, the whirl of Catherine wheels, the flaring brilliance of Roman candles.

The street party in the late afternoon had been a great success, with the children so excited at first that they could scarcely eat, and then so drunk with the wonder of it that they could scarcely stop and crammed their mouths with sausage rolls, sandwiches and little cakes until their parents declared they were quite ashamed – though they, too, had been busy reducing the feast to a memory.

Yet two things stood out in Polly's mind as the family made their way slowly homewards. One had occurred halfway through the afternoon, when she and Monica had gone off for half an hour to join in the dancing taking place in a nearby gardens, and she had seen, through the crowd, a young man she was almost certain was Sunny. Well, she told herself reasonably, how could she mistake that bright blond hair and the height of him?

She had caught Monica's arm, shouting that she had seen Sunny, that he was probably searching for her . . . and then, even as she fought her way towards him, she had seen him sling an arm around the shoulders of his companion and lean down, to lightly kiss the side of her face. The girl had looked up and in that instant, Polly had recognised her and stopped pushing her way through the good-humoured crowd.

It was Grace! Grace Carbery who was Polly's sister and whom Polly had always considered to be good but plain. But now, in that fleeting moment, Polly saw that Grace was not plain at all, she was very pretty, with silky brown hair and a straight little nose. And when Grace looked up at Sunny – for it was definitely he – Polly also saw, with a cold little shock, that Grace's eyes were brimming with affection for the young man whom she, Polly, had once thought of as her own property. Oh, she did not want him, not if she could have her dear old Tad, but nevertheless . . .

It had shaken her considerably, however. She stood where she was for a moment and saw the couple swallowed up in the crowd, and then turned and made her way back to Monica. ‘Did you find Sunny?' Monica asked, pushing her hair behind her ears and smiling at Polly. ‘Only the crowd's so thick—'

‘No,' Polly said shortly. ‘Never mind. Come on, let's go back to Snowdrop Street.' And they had done so, with Polly trying very hard not to keep searching the surrounding faces for Tad, because though she knew he was not coming, she could not help hoping that he might still turn up.

The second thing that she would remember, she thought now, plodding tiredly along beside Monica through the dark and emptying streets, was Monica herself. At one point, when the fireworks were at their most dazzling, Polly had looked at her sister-in-law and she had seen that Monica's face was streaked with tears.

It had brought it home to her, then, that on this wonderful day which she was enjoying so much, there were people shut up in their homes with hearts which must be breaking when they thought of their own young people, their husbands, children, lovers, who would not be coming home now that the peace had come. There were girls like Monica who were brave and loving, who told themselves every morning, every night, that they were waiting for news, that their husbands, lovers, brothers were safe. But in their hearts there had to be a little seed of doubt, a suspicion that what they were rejoicing in was premature, that for them there might be no cause to rejoice.

As the glare from the rockets died down Monica turned away for a moment, and when she turned back Polly saw that she had rubbed her face dry, that her eyes seemed to be no brighter than other eyes in that great throng. ‘What a day!' Monica said, taking Polly's arm. ‘We shan't forget today in a hurry, our Poll!'

And Polly, giving her a hug, talking brightly, though with a little catch in her voice, thought that Monica was braver and more loving than anyone she knew. She wouldn't want to spoil anyone's fun by showing a long face on this day so she was putting all her courage and strength into an enormous pretence – Oh God, let Martin be safe, Polly prayed. I'll buy the biggest candle in the city and light it for Martin tomorrow so I will. And I'll have a word with God about Monica, too, while I'm about it. Because it had been two years since the last sighting of Martin, if it had been Martin, and in that time the allied forces had over-run Italy, releasing prisoners and searching out the men who had gone on the run. Even to Polly's desperately optimistic hopes it seemed strange indeed that Martin had not got in touch with them. If he was alive that was. Peader, with his eyes full of sympathy, had tried to tell her not to expect miracles.