A Family's Duty (20 page)

‘I’m going to say hello to Grace and Rob. We’ve seen hardly anything of each other all this year, and now that
we know that Paul’s safe, I must offer an olive branch. You wait here – and you too, Rebecca. I won’t be a minute.’

But the encounter lasted longer than a minute: it became a story associated with St Peter’s for years to come.

‘Grace, my dear! How nice to see you – and Rob too. You’ll have heard my news, I expect, that Paul came through El Alamein alive, and hopes for home leave sometime in the New Year. How are Dad and Doreen? Sorry not to see them this morning. Are you—’

Isabel stopped at the sight of her sister’s face: it was contorted with hatred.

‘So, Lady Isabel, are you inviting me up to Hassett Manor to take tea with the daughter you stole from me? I’ve heard tales about her and those Italian prisoners. Don’t you
dare
come patronising me with your—’

‘Grace! Stop it! Stop it at once, behave yourself!’ ordered Rob as heads turned at the sound of their voices. ‘Your sister means no harm – she only wants you to be friends again, for goodness’ sake!’ He tried to pull Grace away as Isabel shrank back from the bitter words.

But somebody else heard them, and now came quickly to her mother’s side.

‘You dare to speak to my mother like that!’ cried Rebecca. ‘You’re a wicked, jealous woman, not fit to tie up her shoelaces. And don’t try telling me what I know already, that I’m your daughter that my mother adopted, because I’m just thankful that she
did
. I’m sorry for Doreen, with a mother like you. Come, Mother, let’s go home.’

She took hold of Isabel’s arm to lead her away, but it was that reference to Doreen which maddened Grace more than anything else. She spat at Rebecca and would have
physically attacked her if Ron had not held her back. Later it was said by those who saw her that she had been like a woman possessed by a demon.

‘Oho, your ladyship, so fine, so posh, so much above the rest of us, gloating over my poor Doreen! Yes, you’re right, you
are
my daughter, I gave birth to you – but do you know who your father was? No? Neither do I. I never knew his name, or any of their names, those poor, terrified boys being sent off to that hell in the trenches. A prostitute doesn’t get told many names, but I remember your father, the last one I had – he was an officer, a Captain somebody or other, older than the rest. He blamed me for being what he needed, he slapped me across the mouth and called me a whore, hit me when he went inside me; I was covered in bruises – he was vile. So that’s who
you
are, Rebecca bloody Neville: a bastard with a prostitute for a mother and a savage brute for a father. You’re
nobody
. And now you’ll come and gloat over my poor Doreen, damn you!’

At this point Rob took her arm and led her away forcibly. Her words turned to sobs as they passed under the lych-gate. Everybody saw. And heard.

At Hassett Manor Isabel and Sally comforted Rebecca as well as they could, though Isabel was visibly shaken.

‘That was news to me, Becky – she told me that she’d been engaged to your father who’d died in the war, but not the circumstances. We must never repeat it, my dear – we must pretend we never heard it.’

‘But Mother, everybody outside the church heard it – it’s no secret now,’ Rebecca pointed out. Cedric poured out a glass of sherry for them all.

‘As a matter of fact, I had a good idea of what she was
doing in London,’ he told them. ‘I visited Dolly’s Music Hall once with a friend, and we took a couple of the chorus girls out for a meal, nothing more – and she was one of them and recognised me. I told her to get in touch with her parents and you, which she did.’

‘Yes, that was when she told me that her soldier friend had gone off to the war in France, and was killed there,’ said Isabel. ‘And then she realised that she was pregnant. I knew she’d been a chorus girl at a music hall, but not—’ She stopped, unable to say the word they had heard.

‘And what did she mean about gloating over Doreen?’ asked Rebecca. ‘I hardly ever see the girl. She wasn’t at church this morning, and she usually comes with our Granddad.’

‘Grace was completely off her head, and didn’t know what she was saying,’ said Cedric. ‘You’ll have to avoid her, though it’s hard on Doreen and your father, Isabel.’

‘She ought to be locked away,’ said Rebecca. ‘I’ll never forgive the way she spoke to you, Mother.’

‘Ssh, dear, she’s to be pitied, and we mustn’t hold any grudges against her. We won’t do anything to embarrass Rob and Granddad and Doreen,’ Isabel said quietly. ‘And when we’re ready we must forgive Grace. We’ve been so blessed by Paul’s survival, and Jack Nuttall has suffered those terrible burns. We must pray for them all.’

Rebecca said nothing. She was thinking over what she had heard. She was the bastard child of a prostitute and a brute. What would the prisoners think if they knew?

It was time. Ernest and Devora Munday had to face saying goodbye to their nephew Jonathan Pascoe, as dear to them as a son, returning to the continent after fleeing from it as a Jewish child refugee four years ago. Now he was a British soldier in khaki uniform, and Ernest could not banish from his mind the thought that Jonny was going back to avenge the persecution of his race. The whole family, including little Ruth and Sarah, now schoolgirls, turned out to see him off at the station. They were joined by Isabel Neville who knew that the Munday household would be upset by Jonny’s departure, and the grief of his sister Ayesha who went into frightening asthma attacks brought on by her fits of crying; Ayesha rejected all attempts by her uncle and aunt to console her, and Ernest feared that her brain had been permanently damaged by her terrible experience of being forcibly dragged away from her parents and baby brother.

‘I’ll take her under my wing while you say goodbye to Jonny,’ said Isabel who knew how difficult this would be. Jonny looked pale but resolute, and kissed his aunt and sisters, briefly embraced his uncle and brother, and boarded the train. He hung out of the door window and gave a determined smile to them all, waving his hand as the train moved out, gathering speed until it disappeared from sight.

Isabel kept hold of Ayesha’s hand, and walked a little apart from the others.

‘Now, Ayesha, you’re fifteen years old, and I know that you’re going to help your aunt and uncle all you can. Remember that they’re very sad, too, now that Jonny has gone to the war, like hundreds and thousands of other brave young men. Now, I want you to stop having asthma attacks.’

Ayesha eyed her aunt suspiciously. ‘I can’t help having asthma,’ she said sulkily.

‘Maybe not, but you can sometimes stop an attack from coming on. When you feel one starting, take slow, deep breaths like this.’

Ayesha stared as Isabel gave a demonstration as they walked along. After a few hesitations and a glance at her Aunt Devora, Ayesha saw that Aunt Isabel had to be obeyed, or there would be trouble. She obediently started taking deep breaths.

‘That’s right. In through your nose and out through your mouth, a long exhalation, nice and slowly, Ayesha. Good girl!’

Ernest and Devora, walking arm-in-arm, exchanged a look.

‘What do you think is your sister’s secret?’ Devora whispered.

Isabel heard her, and without turning round, said, ‘Perhaps you could come over and deal with Lily and Jimmy one day. Other people’s children can react very differently!’

Back at the Mundays’ home in Everham, Isabel was invited to stay to lunch. Devora’s cooking, even on rations and according to strict Jewish prohibitions, was much commended.

‘You look tired, Ernest,’ said his sister.

‘So do you,’ he answered with a wry grimace. ‘So do we all. This war seems to be getting nowhere. The Jerries go on bombing our towns to rubble, and we return the compliment. The Japs are on the rampage in Burma, teaching the GIs a lesson, and—’

‘Wasn’t it terrible about that girls’ school in Catford that was bombed in broad daylight?’ Isabel shuddered. ‘Over thirty pupils and half the staff. It must have been a sight to make the angels weep.’

‘But old Rommel copped it at El Alamein,’ interrupted David, feeling that some positive thinking was required.

‘Yes, but at what cost? All those lives,’ said Isabel. ‘My boy was spared, but the Allingham boy wasn’t. If they had not got their other son, I think Mrs Allingham would lose her reason.’

‘Talking of which,’ said Ernest, ‘is there any news yet of our poor niece Doreen?’

‘Not yet,’ answered Isabel in a low tone. ‘I’m not quite sure when she’s due. It can’t be much fun in that Mother and Baby home in Berkshire, knowing it’s going to be adopted in the end.’

‘If she was a daughter of mine, I’d keep her at home and see it through with her.’

‘So would I, but Rob had no choice. Grace is half out of her mind, and Doreen’s better off out of harm’s way. Dr Stringer has put Grace on these tablets, phenobarbitone they’re called, and they make her sleepy. Dr Stringer says she might have to go into one of these – you know – mental asylums. I feel so sorry for Rob and Dad. I don’t know whether they’ve told Jack, not that he can do anything.’ Isabel sighed.

‘Thanks for coming over, Isabel,’ said her brother. ‘It helps to have the support of the family. Are you – are you expecting to see Paul soon?’

‘I really don’t know, but at least we can exchange letters now. They’re on what he calls “mopping-up operations”, but he hopes it’ll be before Easter. And needless to say, so do I.’

Isabel’s patience was rewarded and her prayers answered at the end of February. Captain Storey and Sergeant Richardson suddenly appeared on their home doorsteps, on leave for seven days. They were thinner, and their tanned faces showed signs of the hardships they had endured after months of desert warfare; but they were alive and home!

Life had never been so good. Corporal Dora Goddard and her closely knit circle of friends in the ATS were positively enjoying the war. When not on duty at the searchlight station – an adventure in itself – they danced the night away in the most glamorous of venues, the Covent Garden Opera house, converted into a huge ballroom where servicemen and women could meet and spend an evening of escape from the war. There were not only the GIs but Canadians and West Indians, in addition to which there were Czech airmen and
Norwegian sailors, all of them courteous and eager to meet girls like Dora. A black GI was especially exotic as a dance partner, and Dora smiled and joked as she danced with a nimble Afro-American who turned her round in complicated twirls, swinging her off the floor and landing her safely back beside him. Air raids might be going on outside, and fearful accidents like the one at Bethnal Green underground station where pedestrians rushing for shelter were caught in an avalanche of bodies falling down the staircase on top of one another in a tragic domino effect, crushing and killing a hundred and eighty. And still the dancing and the laughter went on, as if the Opera House was somehow magically protected from the dark and dangerous world outside. Clasped in the arms of an admiring soldier, sailor or airman, Dora imagined herself dancing among the stars in the night sky, an ecstatic experience.

Until on a day in early spring when she was summoned to the Warrant Officer’s desk.

Expecting some new order or a caution on a matter of discipline, she hurried to obey. The officer’s face was serious but not stern.

‘There’s a telegram for you, Goddard,’ she said, handing over the envelope. Dora gasped and tore it open. At first she could hardly take in the words: who was William Yeomans? Oh, of course – it was Billy – and she stared at his message.

Sudden death Sidney Goddard stop come home at once stop.

Sidney Goddard?
Dad?
Dear, kind, plodding Dad who did the lion’s share of the work on Yeomans’ Farm, never complaining nor appreciated? Dead? When? How?

‘Is it bad news, Dora?’ the officer asked gently, and when
told that it was the death of a parent, she immediately agreed that Dora must go home and take forty-eight hours of compassionate leave, beginning at once.

‘And it can be extended if need be,’ she said. ‘I am very sorry that it is such sad news.’

Mary Goddard was sitting dejectedly in the kitchen, but quickly rose when Dora entered through the kitchen door. Mother and daughter clung together in a long embrace.

‘Dora, my own dear girl,’ Mary whispered.

‘I’ve come as quickly as I could, Mum – just walked up from the station. How are you?’

‘I just can’t take it in, Dora, it was so sudden. He was all right when he went upstairs last night, though tired out as usual, after a day in the piggeries with a farrowing sow – seventeen piglets she had, and he said he’d have to get up around two o’clock to see how she was doing, with only ten teats for seventeen piglets. When I went up he was fast asleep, but when I woke at around six, he was laying just in the same position, but something was wrong, and I said to him – oh, Dora, he was dead!’ She sobbed as she clung to her daughter as if she was drowning, and Dora led her gently back to the basket chair she usually sat in.

‘All right, Mum, all right, I’ll put the kettle on,’ she said.

‘I never said goodbye to him – he just passed away in his sleep,’ wept Mary. ‘He was tired out, and he’d been like that for months, but he wouldn’t go see Dr Stringer. I blame myself for not being firmer with him. Billy phoned Dr Stringer who came and said his heart had given out. Billy said he’d telephone your base, then my dad, but my dad hasn’t come. At least Pam came down and got
breakfast – there was some ham already cooked, and she fried half a dozen eggs. Oh, Dora, he was so good, he never complained, I couldn’t have had a better husband, no matter who – and a father to you!’ She wept afresh, and Dora was conscience-stricken.
She
should have noticed Dad’s tiredness,
she
should have taken him to the doctor. As she was making tea, little Samuel came running into the kitchen. ‘I want a biscuit, Mary!’ he demanded.

‘Now, Sammy, you know that’s not the proper way to ask for anything,’ replied Mary in a tone that sounded as if this was a regular request. ‘What do you say first?’

‘Please, Mary, can I have one o’ them biscuits you made?’

‘That’s better. Dora dear, can you reach up for the biscuit barrel off that shelf?’

‘Good heavens, Mum! How often does
this
happen?’ asked Dora, though she reached for the barrel and offered it to him, making sure that he took only one.

‘Pam usually takes a rest while Derek has his afternoon nap, and this young man usually finds his way to the kitchen.’

‘Good grief! And he’s allowed to come pestering you for biscuits at a time like
this
?’

Dora was astounded at such thoughtlessness. ‘All right, young man, you’ve had your biscuit, now clear off and leave my mother alone. Go on, scram!’ She opened the door and waved him through it, closing it firmly behind him.

‘You’ve been far too soft with the Yeomanses, Mum, and it’ll have to stop,’ she said, handing Mary a cup of tea. ‘And what about Granddad? Has he been told yet?’

‘Billy said he’d phone him after he sent the telegram for you.’

‘Well, if he’d been told, he’d have been over straight away. I’ll tell him. Where’s the telephone?’

‘In the hall, but it’s for farm use only, Dora. He charges Sidney for using it, though he hardly ever does.’

‘Well, sod that. I’ll phone Granddad now.’

When Dora heard Eddie Cooper’s cheery ‘Hello!’ she suddenly wanted to cry.

‘Granddad, it’s Dora.’

‘What? Dora, my dear, where have you been? Your mum and dad have missed you so much. Are you speaking from London?’

‘No, Granddad. I’m at Yeomans’ Farm.’

‘Why, what’s up? Is my Mary all right? Is she ill? For God’s sake, tell me.’

‘Mum’s all right, but – oh, Granddad, my dad – my dad passed away in the night,’

‘
What?
Bloody hell, why wasn’t I told till now?’

‘Mum thought Billy had told you – oh, please come and see her, Granddad!’

‘I’ll be right over.’ He hung up. Twenty minutes later, he strode into the kitchen from the back door, and gathered Mary into his arms.

‘Mary, my poor girl, you’ve lost a good ’un,’ he said simply.

She clung to him and murmured through her sobs. ‘Oh, Dad, he was so good … he took me on … he’s been a good father to Dora, and I couldn’t have asked for a better husband.’

‘Sssh, Mary, it’s all right, I’m here now.’

At that moment Billy Yeomans came in at the back door. ‘I saw you coming,’ he said to Eddie. ‘I tried to phone you earlier, but there was no reply. It’s a bad business for Mary, and I’ve now got seventeen piglets to rear. Still, Mary doesn’t need to worry, she’s welcome to stay on here with no charge
for bed and board. By the way, has anybody been upstairs to see my mother?’

There was no answer. Eddie stared at Yeomans as if unable to believe his ears.

‘Then I’ll have to go up and see to the poor old lady myself.’ Frowning, Billy left the kitchen. They heard his footsteps on the stairs, and after a few minutes he came down.

‘That poor old soul!’ he said indignantly. ‘Nobody’s been up to see her – she’s had nothing to eat, and had to get herself to the commode. She said she didn’t want to bother Mary. Better put the kettle on, and do her a couple of eggs on toast. It’s too bad that she’s been left without attention.’

Dora guessed that this outburst of indignation was to cover his own lack of care, his failure to send for Eddie Cooper, and his annoyance at having to attend to the litter of piglets, which would have been Sidney’s job for several days. There was a moment of dead silence, and then Eddie spoke.

‘I always knew you were a selfish bastard, Yeomans,’ he said levelly. ‘You’ve treated my daughter and Sidney as slaves for years, and poor old Sidney didn’t have the guts to stand up to you. Well, now he’s gone, and I haven’t got to watch you and your wife working them both to death, not any longer. You can look after the farm and the house yourselves from now on, starting with eggs on toast for your mother, and giving her all the care that Mary’s given to her. You’d better let your wife know.’

‘Are you threatening me in my own home?’ blustered Billy, red in the face with a mixture of rage and embarrassment.

‘I’m not threatening anything, I’m telling you straight. My daughter’s coming home with me,
now
. Get your hat and coat, Mary, I’ll come back for your belongings later. No
more skivvying for the Yeomanses. You come as well, Dora.’

The door opened and Pam Yeomans appeared. ‘What on earth’s going on?’ she asked. ‘All this noise has woken Derek, and Sammy says he was turned out of the kitchen and had the door slammed on him. There’s no need to take it out on a little boy, even if there
has
been a death in the house.’

It was Dora’s moment. ‘Your husband’s lost Sidney Goddard, and you’ve lost my mother, so from now on you’re in charge of the house and poor old Mrs Yeomans. She won’t get the care from you that she’s had these years from my mother. Come on, Mum, let’s get out of here. I’ll fetch your hat and coat from the hall.’