Time Shall Reap (41 page)

‘He wasn’t that bad,’ Louise protested. ‘His ears maybe stuck out a bit and his nose was reddish, but I thought he’d quite nice eyes.’

‘Nice eyes?’ Betty exploded. ‘I hadn’t time to look at his eyes for keeping track of his hands. It was like wrestling with an octopus, but you were too taken up with your Ernie to notice. I’d to slap his face eventually, and I told him I’d gone out to see a film, not to be manhandled by an ape. Yeuck! I feel sick just thinking about it.’

‘I wondered why you suddenly marched out of the hall.’

‘That’s why, Lep, but you didn’t need to come with me, I’d have managed on my own. Thank God you’re back, Laura. At least I’ll have you for company again.’

‘Sorry I ignored you, Laura,’ Louise said, ‘but as you’ll have gathered there’s been a crisis. How was your leave?’

‘I thought you’d never ask.’ Laura smiled broadly as she sat up. She had been itching to spring her surprise on them, and at last the moment had come. ‘Hold on to your hats, this is going to make your hair stand on end.’

Louise waited expectantly, but Betty said, ‘I’d prefer a good laugh after what I’ve just been through.’

‘I don’t think it’s funny, but maybe you will. Are you ready? Well, I’ve been living in sin with a Norwegian sailor.’ Laura savoured their astonishment to the full.

‘You’ve been what?’ Betty gasped. ‘Oh, come off it, Laura. You’re handing us some duff gen.’

Rather shocked, Louise said, ‘Are you pulling our legs?’

‘No, it’s the truth. We met on the train going down and he’s tall and blonde, with gorgeous blue eyes and an accent that makes me go all shivery.’

‘Well, go on,’ Betty urged, impatiently. ‘How did this living in sin bit start?’

‘He wanted to stay in the same hotel as me, so we took two rooms ... just for six nights, because ...’

Betty’s face dropped. ‘Two rooms? I might have known.’

‘He only used his room for two nights, then ... well, it just sort of happened, and we only used one after that. Then I went to Hull with him, and we booked in as husband and wife.’

‘My God, Laura, you’re a dark horse! You always said you wouldn’t get involved with anybody, and now ...’ For once, Betty Fry was lost for words.

‘Love makes a girl do things she’d never have dreamt of before, isn’t that right, Lep?’ Laura winked mischievously.

Louise looked flustered. ‘Ernie and I have never ...’

‘I was only teasing you. But Fridjof and I had ...’

‘Freejoff?’ Betty screwed her nose up in puzzlement.

‘Fridjof Hougland, and don’t ask me how it’s spelt.’ ‘Freejoff Hoogland?’ Betty repeated, then grinned. ‘What a mouthful, and it really exercises your lips, doesn’t it?’

‘Wait, that’s not all.’ Laura told them about her visit to the Watsons. ‘Margaret gave me a lecture ... so I’m going to write to Dad tomorrow. You’ll be pleased about that, Betty.’

‘Yes, I am.’

‘But you ain’t heard nothing yet. Before I left, Fridjof asked me to be his wife, and I said yes.’

Grabbing her hands, Betty danced round the room with her. ‘You’ve slept with a man and you’re going to marry him – all in ten days? That’s pretty good going.’

‘It’s usually done the other way round,’ Louise pointed out, in her usual prim manner.

The other two collapsed on Laura’s bed. ‘Oh, Lep, trust you,’ Betty giggled. ‘But do you know anything about him, Laura? What sort of work he does in civvy street, etcetera.’

‘He told me about his family one afternoon we were out walking. His father owns a sawmill somewhere near Trondheim, and Fridjof and his two brothers worked there before the Nazis invaded Norway. They’d got away by the skin of their teeth, apparently. Their mother died when the youngest one was just a toddler, but their aunt, the father’s sister, brought them up. She’s getting old, though, and Fridjof says she’ll welcome me with open arms. He can’t express himself in English very well yet, but that’s what he meant.’

Betty’s eyes had widened again. ‘So you’ll be going to Norway after the war? But you’ll get married before that, of course, so when’s the wedding going to be?’

‘We hadn’t time to discuss it, but he’s going to write ... well, get his Captain to write for him.’

‘Can I be bridesmaid? Can’t you just see me carrying a posy and looking like the fairy on a Christmas tree?’ Betty placed her finger under her chin and made a small curtsey.

The idea of Betty, so tall and well-built, sitting on a tree and looking like a fairy doll, was so incongruous that it sent her two friends into near hysterics, and they were still shrieking with laughter when the door was flung open by an apparition in a thick flannel dressing gown, head bristling with metal curlers. ‘What’s going on in here? You’re making enough noise to waken the dead.’

‘Sit down, Mrs Adams,’ Betty soothed, guiding her to a chair. ‘Laura’s going to marry a Norwegian sailor she met.’

‘Oh, that’s different.’ A huge smile replaced the frown. ‘Congratulations, Laura, m’dear, and ... wait a minute! I’ve a bottle of whisky downstairs.’

She hurried out and returned carrying a bottle and four glasses. ‘I’ve been keeping this for a celebration some time, but there’s been nothing to celebrate for years.’

After her third glass, she became nostalgic about her own wedding day. ‘My Aleckie was a trawl skipper and we’d a right big do – all our relations were there.’

‘They’re nearly all related here,’ Betty whispered to Laura, ‘so it must have been some affair.’

Chuckling, Laura whispered back, ‘I can just imagine them hooching and skirling all night.’

Refilling her glass, Mrs Adams continued, her eyes misty. ‘It went on till six in the morning, and it might have carried on if the men hadna had to sail with the tide. The good Lord only knows how they got their boats out, they were that drunk.’ She let out a loud cackle.

Betty winked at Laura and Louise. ‘So you hadn’t had your first night until your husband came back, then?’

Mrs Adams laid her finger on the side of her nose. ‘We werena daft. We had it the night before, for we knew what the wedding night would be like.’

She spluttered, and the other three howled with mirth, then Betty told a few bawdy jokes about newly-weds, so it was quite some time before the household settled down.

Laura wrote to her father the following day. She had been trying to think how to word the letter, but finally settled on simplicity and truth, and just told him that Margaret Watson had made her see sense and asked if she could visit him on Saturday of the following week. His reply came in two days, rather guarded, but agreeing to the visit, so she went to Aberdeen on her next twenty-four-hour pass. She had made up her mind to be calm and sensible, but as soon as she went into the bungalow her father gathered her in his arms and she burst into happy tears.

David spoke first. ‘Why didn’t you write before, Laura? I’d nothing to do with the mess things were in.’

Wiping her eyes, she defended herself. ‘You told me you were leaving home too, Dad, remember?’

‘I changed my mind.’ His eyes dropped. ‘I ... I made your mother leave instead.’

‘I didn’t know about that till Margaret Watson told me. I thought Mum would be here, that’s why I never wrote, but I’ve forgiven her now.’ Assuming that it would take a little diplomacy to make him do likewise, she said gently, ‘She’d been left to bring a child into the world on her own, and when people took it for granted that John was Helen’s baby, it saved any scandal about Mum, and then after Helen ... oh, Dad, can’t you see why Mum did what she did?’

‘I do see, Laura,’ he muttered, ‘but I was hurt that night because she hadn’t trusted me enough to confide in me.’

‘It wasn’t like that. She was in agony over having to give up her child, and she was frightened she would lose you. She had to live with her guilt for more than twenty years, not able to share the burden with anybody. Can’t you forgive her, too? You must have loved her once.’

David’s anguish showed in his eyes. ‘I still love her, Laura, and I forgave her long ago. I’ve missed her more than you’ll ever know, and I wish I knew where she was so I could tell her I need her.’

‘I mean to find her, for both of us. First, I’m going to ask Helen Watson if she’s any idea ...’

‘She hadn’t, the last time I saw her.’ A faint ray of hope had appeared on his face. ‘But that was ages ago, and maybe she’s heard by this time.’ He eased his leg out and massaged it, excusing himself, when he saw his daughter watching, by saying, ‘It gives a wee twinge now and then.’

She tried to cheer him. ‘If all else fails, we can get the police to issue a wanted poster.’ His look of alarm made her hurry on. ‘Something along the lines of ... Elspeth Fullerton, née Gray, five feet one inch tall, light brown hair greying in parts, wanted by husband and daughter.’ Her laugh was a trifle unsteady.

David smiled crookedly. ‘Her hair used to be golden, and she’s desperately wanted by her husband.’

‘Me, too.’ Laura hesitated. ‘I haven’t told you yet how I came to be speaking to Margaret.’

‘I thought you must have been stationed near Hull before you went to Banffshire.’

‘I was stationed at Wick before, but I went to London on my last leave, and ended up in Hull.’ Her eyes softened.

Observing this, David said, ‘It’s something to do with a lad, I take it?’

‘It’s everything to do with a lad, a Norwegian lad and his name’s Fridjof Hougland. He’s a sailor I got speaking to on the train and we booked into the same hotel.’ Seeing her father’s eyebrows lift, she said, ‘I know what you’re thinking, and you’re absolutely right. We slept in separate rooms for two nights, but after that we only used one.’ Pulling a face, she added, ‘Does that shock you?’

‘Nothing shocks me nowadays.’

‘It’s OK, he’s asked me to marry him. We’d to leave after six days – the rooms had been booked – and he’d to join his ship at Hull, so I went there with him. You see, he’d had his appendix out in Aberdeen, and he’d missed one trip.’

‘And when you were in Hull, you met Margaret Watson?’

‘Not actually met. We passed their street and I went in without thinking. She made me see how stupid and selfish I’d been – that’s why I wrote to you – and I must find Mum because I want her to be at my wedding.’

Clasping his hands together, David said hopefully, ‘It’s going to be like it was before, isn’t it? All three of us together again?’

‘Plus a new son-in-law, don’t forget.’ Laura got to her feet. ‘I’ll have a quick wash then go over to Quarry Street.’ She glanced round approvingly. ‘You’ve kept things looking quite nice, Dad.’

‘I’ve done my best. I’ve even polished your mother’s clock every week. I used to resent it being here, you know, because I was sure it reminded her of him. I made her life a misery at times with my jealousy, but it hasn’t bothered me for a long time. In fact, not long after she left – no, I’d better call a spade a spade, she didn’t leave of her own free will, I put her out. Anyway, she’d only been gone a week or so when I came to my senses about it. John Forrest meant to give her the clock on their wedding day, but ...’

His pause made his daughter grip his shoulder in sympathy, but he went on, ‘... but he was killed. Your mother had made no secret of having loved him, and it was natural enough that he’d ... made love to her before he went to France. I’d have done the same myself before I went back to Belgium, if she’d given me the chance, but she still hadn’t got over him at that time. So you see, I’m not jealous now, and I love the clock as much as she did, for it just tells me that another man had loved her as much as I did ... as I do, and I’m grateful for that. Oh, I’m not explaining it very well, but can you understand what I mean?’

‘Yes, Dad, I think I can, and I’m glad you got over it.’

‘I’ll have to make your mother understand as well, once she comes home ... maybe you’ll help?’

‘I’ll try, if we find her. I’d better go and see Helen, that’s the first step.’

‘Laura Fullerton! What a grand surprise.’ In spite of the welcome, there was a hint of wariness in Helen Watson’s tired eyes.

‘Helen, I’m here for two reasons. First, to apologize for what I said to you the last time I was here, but as you’ll understand, I was so upset I didn’t know what I was saying.’

‘Lassie, I understood only too well. There’s no need to apologize, we’ll let bygones be bygones and just forget all about it.’

‘Thanks, Helen, but the other thing is, I want to find Mum. Did she ever write to tell you where she was?’

‘Never,’ Helen said, sadly. ‘I’ve been worried sick, and I’m glad you want to find her.’

‘Could she have gone back to Auchlonie?’

‘I doubt it, for she’d nobody left there.’ After thinking for a moment, Helen snapped her fingers. ‘I’ve just minded, what about Mrs Robb? They were aye awful friendly.’

Laura’s face lit up. ‘I’d forgotten about Mrs Robb.’

‘And there’s your mother’s Auntie Janet.’

‘I didn’t know Mum had an aunt in Aberdeen.’

‘She was a nasty besom, and she put Elspeth out, so I wouldn’t think she’d go back there.’ Becoming aware that the girl was looking somewhat uneasy, Helen asked, ‘Is something bothering you, lass?’

‘No, there’s nothing.’

‘Aye, there is so something. You’d best tell me, so I can sort it out, whatever it is.’

‘Well, I never knew she had an aunt, and why did the woman put her out? Is this something else she was hiding?’

‘No, no, Laura. She bade wi’ her auntie for a while when she came to the town first, but they’d a terrible row, and she never went near the woman after that.’ Helen paused, wrinkling her nose. ‘She’d have been desperate, of course, so you never ken, and if I mind right, this Janet bade near the Co-opie baker in Rosemount Viaduct. She was the kind that aye made out she was real poorly, and her poor man did everything for her. Elspeth liked him, so I suppose it’s just possible she ... his first name was Harry – I mind that, for it was the same as my sister’s man’s – but his last name ... began wi’ a B, I’m near sure.’

‘Baxter? Beattie? Burnett? Bremner?’ Laura suggested, helpfully. ‘Bruce? Buchan? Bisset?’

‘No, it wasn’t any o’ them, and I’ll mind myself, if you’ll just let me be.’

‘It should be easy to find them, once I know their name.’