Wartime Sweethearts (8 page)

His father repeated what he’d said along with an elbow in his ribs. ‘I said he’s not from Warmley, is he?’

A bone in Charlie’s neck made a cracking sound as he jerked his head round. ‘No. I don’t know the name.’

‘Excuse me, ma’am. I need to get past.’

Such was the timbre of his voice and the unusual accent Mary felt an overwhelming compulsion to see from whom it came.

On turning her head she found herself looking up into a bronzed face. White streaks radiated from the corners of his eyes as though he had spent a lot of time squinting into strong sunlight.

For a moment it seemed as though the world stood still until he spoke again and broke the spell.

‘You’re twins, right? You worked this between you?’

She heard his voice but didn’t like what he was saying. ‘What do you mean?’

He glanced at Ruby up on the stage then back to her. ‘Just that I thought I was seeing double. Her up there, you down here.’

‘We’re sisters,’ Mary blurted. ‘Twins.’ There was no way she was going to admit to collusion. She only hoped her guilt didn’t show on her face.

Bullhorn’s voice bludgeoned its way between them. ‘Mr Dangerfield. If you are here, will you please come up to the rostrum!’

His smile was memorable. ‘Excuse me.’

Her gaze followed the back of his head as he made his way to the front of the crowd.

‘So that’s Michael Dangerfield,’ she heard her father say. ‘He’s definitely not from around here.’

‘No,’ she said, unable to take her eyes off the man standing up front with her sister. ‘No. He’s not.’

Ruby smiled with her lips and glared with her eyes at the man joining her on the rostrum. He nodded and smiled back.

‘Ma’am.’

Ruby nodded back.

‘A pound each,’ said the bald-headed Mr Neate, his smile exposing large yellow teeth. His hands shook as though he suffered from some nervous disorder when he handed them their prize money.

‘Congratulations,’ he said to both of them. ‘And may the best man – or woman – win when you attend the next heat in Bristol.’

‘It’s an Italian classic,’ stated Michael Dangerfield.

Ruby gritted her teeth. Surely this competition should be about British baking not foreign stuff.

A photographer from the
Evening World
asked if he could take a shot of them holding their respective entries outside the tent on a nice patch of green grass away from everyone else. He insisted they stood close together.

‘Like a bride and groom,’ he trilled in a sing-song Welsh accent.

‘Hardly,’ said Ruby, her teeth fixed in an insincere smile.

Once the photograph and names were taken, Ruby’s co-winner turned and said, ‘Something about you reminds me of a Hollywood film star. Jean Harlow perhaps?’

‘She’s blond. I’m not.’

‘Must be that peek-a-boo style. That’s what they call it, don’t they?’

‘Do they?’ Ruby was purposely offhand.

He nodded. ‘Yeah. As though she’s trying to hide one half of her face.’

This was too much. Ruby spun away. As she did so she dropped the loaf. At the same time a runaway pig shot past behind them pursued by a gang of giggling, drunken men.

Michael Dangerfield stepped back as he turned to see what was going on. His foot landed on the apple loaf.

‘I’m sorry,’ he shouted once Ruby had picked it up and was stalking off back to the tent.

‘Sorry? You just might be,’ she muttered.

Stan Sweet frowned and growled noises that sounded like ‘gerrumph’ and ‘errrrmmm’ when Ruby went up to collect the prize rather than her sister Mary.

‘That was your bread,’ he said a trifle testily. ‘What the bloody ’ell’s goin’ on ’ere? Our Ruby’s already won the apple pie bake off. What’s she doing goin’ up collecting your prize?’

Even if she hadn’t been listening Mary could have told by his beetled brow that her father was not amused.

‘Well?’

Mary beamed at him. ‘Whoever wins this goes through to the next round in Bristol, and whoever wins that gets to stay in London for a while.’

‘So?’

‘You said it yourself, Dad. I’m the baker. I’m needed here. It’s Ruby that wants to leave for pastures new. She needed my help to make it happen. You need me here, and anyway, I don’t want to go.’

‘It got stepped on,’ said Ruby when she finally caught up with them in the beer tent.

Her sister sighed. ‘What happened?’

‘I just told you. Someone stepped on it,’ said Ruby in an irritated tone.

Her father shook his head. ‘Now that’s typical of you. Ruby, you should learn to be more careful.’

Ruby could have told him that it wasn’t her that stepped on it, but his chastising comment riled her, made her feel as though she wasn’t quite perfect – like the mole she had on her face. Mary was never accused of being careless. Mary didn’t have a mole.

Even after a supper of thickly sliced home-cooked ham, farm fresh butter and bread still warm from the oven, Stan Sweet was still a bit miffed, though mellowed after a few beers over the road in the Three Horseshoes.

He stated his last words on the matter after eating another slice of ham, pickles and bread, one foot on the bottom stair. His bed was calling him.

‘We’ll speak tomorrow.’

He saw that Ruby was uncharacteristically quiet, but told himself she’d be fine in the morning.

The morning light of the first Sunday in September found its way through a gap in the curtains of the big front bedroom the twins shared with their cousin, Frances.

The bedroom had previously been occupied by their parents before their mother died a victim of the terrible influenza pandemic that had swept through Europe in 1919, as if the deaths in the Great War were not enough.

Their father slept in one of the small bedrooms at the back of the house, and their brother, Charlie, in the other.

The really good thing about the arrangement was that the resonant male snoring was kept at bay, thanks to the fact that there were two doors between them, their own and the ones to the rear bedrooms.

Sunday was the one day a week when no bread was baked and everyone could lie in, though the habit of getting up early was difficult to break.

Ruby was wide awake by about six-thirty. Even though she turned over, hugging the bedclothes around her head and willing herself to sleep, she was too excited. Her thoughts were occupied with the semi-finals and the prospect of going to Bristol and then possibly to London for the final. London was where she would seek new opportunities. Perhaps she might meet a handsome millionaire and be swept off her feet. Her plans, even though they might never reach fruition, came thick and fast.

Sleep wouldn’t come. The clock struck eight.

‘Are you awake, Mary?’

Mary sighed and rolled over on to her back. ‘Of course I am. I can hear you wriggling. The springs on that bed play a tune every time you move.’

Ruby was already lying on her back, eyes wide open, one arm behind her head. One of the bedsprings made a twanging sound as she shifted again. She had to share what she was feeling.

‘If I win, I won’t come back from London. I might not even come back from Bristol – depending on circumstances.’

Mary sucked in her lips so she wouldn’t voice what she really felt. Her sister could be both unrealistic and selfish in equal doses.

‘Mary? Did you hear what I just said?’

Mary closed her eyes and sighed. ‘I must have drifted off for a minute. But I did hear you.’

‘You do see why I want to leave, don’t you?’

For people who rose at four in the morning on every day but one, staying in bed on Sunday was almost compulsory. Even though Mary wasn’t feeling that tired, she was determined to stay where she was, delaying the moment when she had to swing her legs out of bed as she did on every other day of the week.

‘If that’s really what you want to do.’

‘It really is!’

‘Then do it. I’ll be here for Dad.’

Ruby rolled on to her side and raised herself on her elbow. Mary’s comment had made her feel uncomfortable. ‘You sound resentful.’

And you sound pretty displeased, thought Mary. ‘I’m just stating the facts.’

‘Well, so am I. I’ll be glad to go. Glad to leave the village. Sad to leave everyone behind … with a few notable exceptions …’

‘Especially old bastard Stead!’

Ruby gasped.

Mary’s eyes flicked open.

‘Frances Sweet! You are not to use that language in this house.’ She’d thought their cousin was still asleep. Obviously she was not.

‘It’s what the boys call him,’ Frances grumbled sulkily from beneath a mound of twisted bedding.

Frances was a restless sleeper, her bedding always bundled like a small mountain by morning.

‘I don’t care what the boys call him. You do not!’ Mary ordered. ‘Don’t let me ever hear you using such a word again. Is that clear?’

Frances fell silent, her scowl hidden by the bedclothes as she thought about it.

‘All right. I’ll call him Stinker Stead instead.’

Ruby preferred not to hear the name Stead mentioned at all. ‘For goodness’ sake! What is it with you and Gareth Stead?’

Frances dragged herself up into a sitting position, bending her legs so she could rest her chin on her knees. ‘I just don’t like him. Just because you do. Kissing him and all that … like this …’

Frances smacked her lips imitating the sound of the kisses Ruby had exchanged with Gareth Stead.

Ruby was furious. ‘Frances Sweet! Just you wait …’

Ruby threw back the bedding and rolled out of bed, but her cousin was too fast for her. In a trice she was out of bed and out of the door, her footsteps thudding down the stairs, her voice rippling with laughter.

‘Sometimes I hate that child,’ Ruby murmured.

Mary rolled over on to her back and stared thoughtfully up at the ceiling. All this talk of war and friction between members of the family tried even her patience.

She looked over at Ruby who was already brushing her hair so that a silky tress fell over the mole on her cheek. Her routine never varied. The first thing she always did when she got out of bed was to arrange her hair to hide the mole.

‘You used to love her.’

‘Well, today I hate her. Really,’ said Ruby, shaking her head. ‘I just cannot cope with her taking against Gareth like she does.’

‘Perhaps she’s jealous that you’re fond of somebody else besides her.’

Ruby reached for her stockings, rolled up together on the bedroom chair. ‘It’s all over between me and him! Bright lights here I come!’

Having fastened her girdle and pulled up one stocking, Ruby sprang to her feet hoisting up her skirt so she could fasten her suspender, snapping it into place with an air of finality.

Mary was glad to hear it but refrained from saying so. Ruby was rarely receptive to criticism – one of the reasons why her baking wasn’t as good as it should be.

‘I will miss you,’ Mary said softly.

Ruby finished brushing down her skirt and looked at her sister. ‘I’m very grateful, you know. Really I am.’

Mary, hands folded behind her head, sighed. ‘It was just a loaf of bread. Pies, bread, and such like, it’s only food.’

Ruby disliked the pensive expression on Mary’s face. She badly wanted to express exactly how she felt about Mary’s generosity. She could have said that Mary had always been the better baker, but she held back.

‘Shame about it getting stepped on,’ Mary added. ‘Clumsy oaf. I presume it was a man.’

Ruby was angry too and not just for his clumsiness. The way he’d declared his entry an Italian classic annoyed her, what with that and having to share a prize with him.

‘That man who put tomatoes into his entry. He said he should have won outright. He said the British people had no taste and no imagination when it came to food and that the apple loaf was mundane and didn’t deserve to be placed.’

Mary sat bolt upright. ‘He said that to you?’

‘Yes,’ said Ruby. ‘Didn’t you notice he was a bit full of himself?’

Mary was hesitant. ‘Not really. I was concentrating on the competition.’

The truth was she could still hear his voice in her head and could still see those expressive eyes. But what he said about British food was inexcusable.

‘Well, he was downright rude when he was stood next to me up on the rostrum. Right arrogant sod he was. American, I think.’

‘I don’t care what he was. He’s got a cheek. What does he know about British food?’

Ruby shrugged. ‘If he’s not British, it can’t be a lot. But he definitely had a very sarcastic attitude. Mind you, he didn’t say it too loud. He said it quietly so no one else could hear.’

Mary immediately raised herself on to her elbows. ‘He said that and then stepped on my bread?’

‘Like I said, he had a foreign accent. I hear he’s staying with Mrs Hicks at Stratham House. I think they’re related.’ Ruby frowned as a suspicious thought came to her. ‘Do you think he might be one of them fifth columnists they were on about at the pub? Sent here by that bloke Hitler to find out our secrets and make us feel bad about ourselves?’

‘I wouldn’t have thought a spy would head for Oldland Common and enter a baking competition,’ Mary replied while trying not to laugh.

‘Well he did. He also said that women didn’t make good bakers and that apple bread was a peasant bread. It was his fault I dropped it. And then he stepped on it.’

Mary sat up.

‘He did it on purpose?’

‘More or less,’ Ruby grumbled.

She eyed her sister sidelong, waiting for Mary to get on her high horse about all things British.

‘The cheeky sod! He stepped on my bread!’

The moment she was out of bed, Mary began grabbing clothes. Ruby instantly regretted expanding on the truth. The judge had said his entry was an Italian classic and Michael Dangerfield had merely confirmed it. He certainly hadn’t meant to step on the loaf she’d dropped. But once a lie was out it was hard to take it back.

‘What are you going to do?’ she asked not daring to admit she’d lied.

‘I’m off to have a word with our foreign friend. You said he was staying at Stratham House?’

‘Well, yes …’

Ruby chewed at her bottom lip, wondering whether she should admit the truth. Mary was normally a very calm person, but unstoppable when she was roused.