The War Widows (7 page)

‘Not to worry,’ she whispered. ‘If your name is Susan Brown, then it’s me come to collect you. I’m Lily Winstanley, Freddie’s sister. I’m sorry I was late.’ Stretching out her hand as if to gather up Susan in one fell swoop, there was no hiding her relief. ‘Freddie said you were bonny but I was expecting…never mind…’ There was no hiding her surprise.

‘Freddie, you know my Freddie, Miss Lily?’ said the Greek lass, jumping up excitedly. ‘I have his address: twenty-two Division Street, Grimbleton.’ A piece of paper was shoved under Lily’s nose. Arms were flung round her. ‘He is coming for me too?’

‘Hang on,’ Lily gasped, stepping back quickly. ‘Not so fast…It’s her I’ve come for: Susan Brown from Burma, Freddie’s intended. I don’t know anything about you. Show us that address again,’ she said, peering at it intently and then at them both.

‘But that is my address too,’ cried Susan, peering at the lettering. ‘My Stan lives at twenty-two Division Street, Grimbleton. It is written on my heart.’

The other girl folded her arms. ‘But I am Anastasia Papadaki. Sergeant Freddie Winstanley is
my
man and Konstandina is his child. I name her after his mother, Konstantia. It is the custom, yes?’

‘No, No! I am Susan Liat Brown. Mr Winstanley is
my
intended,’ screamed Susan. ‘And this is his child, Joy Liat. He is my man. I have his address. You, lady, are a
big liar! I have a photo…See!’ Susan produced a tattered sepia photograph. ‘It was taken in Rangoon before he left on a ship, when I was a teacher. See…we are in a concert party.’ Her smile was triumphant.

Lily peered at it with dismay. There was no doubting that was Freddie grinning at the camera, dressed in a Pierrot costume.

‘Give me here. On the bones of Agios Vasilios…
Ne! Ne!
Yes! That is Freddie,
my
Freddie. We meet in Athens when I was nurse,’ said the Greek, refusing to give way. ‘She is liar. Susan is dead!’

‘How am I dead if I am here with little Joy?’ Susan shouted back, clinging to the toddler. ‘She is his little Joy.’

There was a deafening silence as they both stared at each other. Lily’s heart was thumping a drumbeat. It would take the judgement of Solomon to sort out this mess.

‘Oh heck,’ she said, scratching her head. What have you been up to Freddie? she sighed.

They were all looking to her for guidance. ‘What do we do now?’

‘These women go nowhere,’ ordered the officer, already pink in the face. ‘Not until the man in question comes to collect them in person. He can’t have two wives in this country, whatever he’s been up to. So one of you is going to be disappointed, I’m afraid. Sergeant Winstanley must choose his bride.’

‘That might prove difficult, sir. Can I have a word in private?’ Lily whispered to the officer.

He pointed to a corner out of earshot, both looking
over at the mothers, who were each wishing that the other would disappear into thin air. How on earth was this mess going to be sorted out?

Miss Brown was standing frozen like a statue, tears rolling down her face. Anastasia was standing with her arms folded. And there were the two kiddies to consider: were they both really Freddie’s little girls? The two of them then came storming across, led by the Greek, who was all fired up.

‘Come on, missy…I no trust them. They hide words from us. We have daughters. Maybe there are two Freddie Winstanleys. One for each of us.’ Miss Ana was taking charge. ‘You and me is going to sort this out.’

The officer stood in their path. ‘There’s been a development,’ he said softly. ‘I’m sorry but under the circumstances, you must both go with Miss Winstanley and sort this out amongst yourselves, the two of you and the family. His mother is waiting to meet you. Good luck!’

He looked relieved to be shovelling this awkward problem on to the stunned woman in the tweed suit. And Lily was too shocked to do anything other than gather up their luggage and propel them towards the door like a taxi driver.

It was raining hard as they trooped towards the black van with no time for Lily to put on her mackintosh so it would hide the black armband sewn onto her sleeve. The mothers would be far too upset to note its significance or the fact that they were getting soaked.

Somehow cases and bodies and children were crammed into the back of Gertie. The gloomy ride back
to Grimbleton was a blur of steamy windows accompanied by the ammonia smell of wet nappies and the sniffing of tears in the back. Gertie coughed and spluttered in protest at the extra weight but trundled them northwards. If only she was driving the bigger Rover saloon but it was still in the garage, standing on bricks, out of action for the duration.

What on earth must these two poor lasses be thinking? Lily felt her hands shaking at the wheel. Perhaps it was lucky that the windows were steamed up so they missed the worst of the soot and the grime, the gaping bomb sites around Manchester, the dark satanic mills.

Lily’s heart was thudding as the streets of Grimbleton came into view.

What on earth was she going to do with two of them? What would the family say to two women with the same address? How did they explain away two little girls, not the size of tuppence halfpenny? What would the neighbours think, and Walt too?

This would be the biggest bombshell to hit Division Street since the air raid in ’41. I’d like to give that brother of mine a piece of my mind. He’s gone too far this time, she thought.

Then she remembered he was dead and these two didn’t know. None of them would ever see him again.

The baby, Dina, was whimpering, tugging her back to reality. Freddie may have passed away but he’d sure as hell left quite a legacy behind.

Susan peered at the back of the driver’s head, at the roll of brown hair anchored with pins and at the felt hat. What was she doing in this clanking van? Had they been kidnapped? Why was she crushed in the back with strangers and the smell of stale bottoms? This was not how England should be, surely?

It should be a beautiful carriage and horses like the picture on the tin of chocolates that Stan brought as a gift to Auntie Betty, her guardian. There was a pretty house with a golden grass roof. Roses tumbling from the walls and a blue, blue sky. She had read many school books with castles and great stone palaces in them, wide parks with tall trees, but nothing like this.

Outside it was all grey and sooty, no moonlight on this wet afternoon. Gaslamps flickered like troubled spirits. For all she was brought up as a Christian girl, she believed her grandmother when it came to
honouring the
nyats
, those guardian spirits of house and home. She whispered,
‘Kador, kador
,’ so as not to incite their anger. It was bad enough to be sharing this van with the imposter who claimed Mister Stan was the father of her child. The liar! He would not be so quick to take another woman after their tender embrace.

After all the preparations to get to British soil, home of her late father, Ronnie Brown, the hoarding of rations and planning, the obtaining of permits and passports, nothing was as she had dreamed. It was true British soldiers liked Burmese girls but never got round to marrying them, but she thought Mister Stan was different.

‘If anything happens and you need my help, beautiful flower, just write to this address,’ he promised when his leave was cancelled quickly. She had carried his words close to her heart in her tunic pocket when other Tommies asked her for a date. Was it all the lies of a cheating man?

She clutched ‘Precious Teddy’, the teddy Auntie Betty had given to Joy for comfort. It smelled of home, of spice and pickle, cigarettes and the ship. Something was wrong. But she had not walked hundreds of miles out of Burma, fleeing the Japanese through the jungle, to be stopped now.

Burmese ladies might look like delicate orchids but their will was made of iron. Sometimes in her dreams, she was back in those hills on the trek north from Rangoon in the summer of 1942. Fear stalked them all the way. There was one valley where the sun hovered over the ridge of hills above them, and when
it slid away the hills seemed to crouch down and whisper, ‘You’ll never get out of here alive.’ They called it the valley of death and many succumbed to dysentery and bite infections. They were town people, not used to rough terrain. She was younger and more nimble. She walked with the children, cajoling them to keep going, singing songs to cheer them. ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’ was their favourite.

One night they were attacked by bandits who torched their camps and stripped them of their bundles, cigarettes and rings, and separated the girls from the men. The women clung together, fearing the worst of fates. They would be sold into slavery but not before the men had sampled the goods, she was warned.

How wonderful are the ways of God’s angels when rescue came that very night from a patrol of young Japanese warriors who saw the flames. They killed the bandits and gave the Burmese rice, sharing their rations.

Su could never understand how the enemy could be kind one minute and vicious the next. An officer took her aside and asked if she was British.

‘No! No! Burmese,’ she protested. ‘I am ayah to these children,’ she lied. ‘I’m taking them to safety. War is not a place for children!’ He nodded and let her go.

Under cover of darkness, they were allowed to slip away unharmed. How strange that it was the enemy who showed mercy.

Wrapped only in her long skirt, she had trekked for hundreds of miles with rope tied around the soles of her sandals for shoes. She had lived while others died of sores, starvation and exhaustion. Their bodies were
consumed by the creatures of the jungle. Of the hundreds who set off on that epic trek, only the young and the tough survived to reach the Assam border.

Here there was respite, food and medicine, and she found kindness among the nurses. It was they who persuaded her to turn round and walk back to join the Women’s Auxiliary Service of Burma, helping the wounded men off ships and giving them char and wads, smiles and dances.

Mister Stan was her reward for all her duty, waiting at the station to guide them, parading in the church, dancing and singing. He was a good man and Ana was a big liar!

When they got to his house and they saw she was a real lady who could drink tea from a china cup with her little finger held just so, everything would be ‘tickety-boo’. She had brought real tea in her case, not the floor sweepings she had drunk so far. The truth would come out and the Greek girl would be sent packing. They would see she-Susan-was a true lady with proper manners.

‘Manners maketh the man’, she had been taught. She knew her Shakespeare. She held herself straight with neat ankles and slim waist. She wore an English dress with almond oil on her hair. Her skin was not dark like an Indian’s. She was true Anglo-Burmese, with skin the colour of warm ivory. When she walked down a street heads turned. Once they saw her they would know she was true fiancée of Mister Stan. The big liar would be found out!

*  *  *

Gertie glided to the kerbside without breaking wind and drawing attention to their arrival.

Lily peered out into the gloom and took a deep breath. ‘This is it. Come inside, ladies,’ she smiled, trying to look in control.

The two women didn’t budge, transfixed with terror, shaking their heads at her request. Their girls were fast asleep. There was no coaxing the two of them out of the back. If only there were interpreters, liaison officers, on hand to negotiate this tricky situation. They would know how to diffuse the time bomb waiting to go off.

At least there was no reception party waiting on the doorstep. It was dark and the curtains were drawn. What if Mother had been standing stern-faced with a bolstered bosom and breath like dragon smoke belching into the night air, and Ivy hovering to inspect the ‘missionary’? To Lily’s relief, the coast was clear.

‘Come inside, it’s cold out here.’ She offered her hand but they shrunk back in unison. Admittedly, Waverley House was not looking its best in the dusk and mizzle, with its blackened brick fascia and windows bulging from the sides like frog’s eyes. The shadows on the pavement, lit by gaslamps, flickered like her failing courage. There was nothing to do but leave them in the van and run up the steps to open the vestibule door.

The mosaic tiled floor smelled of Jeyes Fluid. Everything was spick and span. Polly had been busy, a fire blazing in the hearth and twinkling brass ornaments flashing. All was in readiness for the new arrival to inspect. Lily crept towards the parlour, hoping to
find Esme alone. Better to isolate her, explain the little local difficulty before she jumped to the usual conclusion that it was all Lily’s fault.

Ivy was standing in the bay window pointing to the van outside, all dolled up in her best skirt with box pleats and John West salmon twinset, her hair fixed in cardboard waves. You could be seasick on those crests. How did she have time to titivate her hair when it was as much as Lily could do to roll hers up like a hosepipe round her head?

‘At last! We nearly sent out a search party for you.’ Ivy paused for breath. ‘Well, where is this mysterious ladyfriend then? I hope you drove her up Green Lane to show her the better end of the street. No one wants to see rows and rows of terraces and factory doors, and it’s a good job we had a cold meat platter waiting or tea would be ruined. I’ve had to feed Neville and now he’s all messed up.’

Lily hovered by the door, clutching her driving gloves, flushed with anxiety.

Levi was quick to seize the moment. ‘What’s up with you? You look as if you’ve lost a bob and found a tanner. She not turn up then? I thought so, and all that wasted petrol,’ he moaned, glancing up from his
Evening News.
‘I knew you’d be hopeless…’

There was no response to his jibe.

‘What is it? The cat got your tongue?’ snapped Esme. ‘I can see summat is up with you.’

Hang on, why did they always expect her to pull the rabbit out of a hat, make a tanner do a bob, dance a fire dance? Good old Doormat Lil, the oily rag that did
all the dirty work. Well, now they were going to get such a jumping jack up their backsides and no mistake!