‘Don’t you dare pay a penny,’ Libby insisted. ‘This is my treat.’ They shook hands, promising to email each other, and Melissa sped back down out of the busy shop
in need of fresh air. Confined spaces and too much talk made her throat tight. She would stroll back and enjoy the Christmas lights in the stores and the wonderful displays in Selfridges’
windows. Then she turned up through the backstreets, trying to process all the information she’d been given.
Caroline Lloyd-Jones was an alcoholic and so was Lew. Was this purely a coincidence or was there more? At least Melissa now had a married name for her and the address of the house in Scotland.
If this woman had a baby her signature would be on the birth certificate and she could match up all three. Was there an old lady out there somewhere who might be a relative, and if so
shouldn’t she be searching for her?
After what she’d just heard from Libby, she was no longer sure this mission was worth the effort. It was all so confusing. She reached the bottom of the High Street, pausing at the kerb to
cross over the road. It was then she felt the strangest sensation, a tingle of recognition, as if she heard her father’s voice crystal clear, whispering in her ear: ‘Keep going, Mel,
keep going.’
1965
Callie strolled down a pretty Cotswold lane, enjoying the smell of the brown ploughed earth and noticing the first flush of spring green on the hedgerows. Over the past eight
years, she had drifted from city hotel bar to the quietness of country pubs, from permanent to temporary and casual work in remote areas where the clientele were happy to clutch a pie and a pint.
She could top up her need when she pulled pints and accepted tips. It was not the life she’d imagined, but it was a living.
Her walk and her reverie were disrupted when the sound of yelling erupting from over the hedge. She could hear cursing and shouting so she ran to the gate and let herself into the field to see
what was going on. The farmer, whom she recognized as one of the regulars at the Wagon and Horses, his face red with rage, was beating a sheepdog with a stick. The dog cowered, yelping in pain, its
tail between its hind quarters. It was old and very skinny for a working dog.
Callie was immediately incensed. ‘What do you think you’re doing, Ted Fletcher?’ she shouted in her most imperious tone.
‘Mind your bloody business. Bugger off back to your bar.’
‘Don’t you dare treat your dog like that!’
‘It’s my beast, disobedient bitch!’
‘She looks half-starved to me,’ Callie continued, drawing nearer. The farmer held his stick in the air to warn her off.
‘Don’t you come all lah-di-bloody-dah lady of the manor with me, Callie. You’re only the bint from the Wagon and Horses. You’ll leave well alone if you know what’s
good for you.’
Callie saw the menace in his eyes. He was one of those barstool gropers, but she’d never given him any encouragement. ‘The poor thing looks injured. Let me look at her.’
Callie wasn’t afraid of bullyboys like this one; she’d seen too many in a different league wielding sticks in the camp. Suddenly it was as if she was there, back in the exercise
yard, defiant yet trying not to move in case she was beaten. It was the scene that for years kept flashing into her eyes as if she were watching it on a film screen. I haven’t fought for my
freedom to find bullies on my doorstep, she told herself as she tried to examine the cringing creature. Farmer Fletcher stood blocking her way. He was short but stocky, with hair coming out of his
ears and nose like pig’s bristles.
‘Let me pass,’ Callie ordered.
‘You and whose army?’ he mocked. ‘This is my land and you are trespassing.’ He lifted the stick more as a pose than a threat, but instinct kicked in from those far-off
training days in the SOE, and Callie dodged, caught him unaware, grabbed the stick with a strength fuelled by fury, and brought it down on his shoulders with a crash.
‘Now
you
see how it feels,’ she said, beating him without mercy until he folded up in pain. She felt the power of her anger. He stood for all the bullies, all those guards
who crushed their victims under their feet. Down and down went the stick until the man lay curled on the floor. Pausing to catch her breath she realized where she was and what was happening, but
she felt nothing but contempt for the whimpering man.
Callie grabbed the dog from under the hedge and left Ted lying there. He was still breathing, panting in pain. He’d live, but never to hurt that trembling dog ever again, if she had
anything to do with it.
The dog was light in her arms as she carried her back to the caravan at the back of the pub, which was her summer billet. ‘Come on, old girl, let’s see the damage.’ She looked
into eyes of the frightened animal, seeing pain, distrust, fear. ‘I know how that feels,’ she confided. She found herself crying. How long had this poor thing been subjected to
Fletcher’s bullying? ‘No more of that for you. You are my friend now,’ she said, stroking her softly.
The bitch was no more than skin and bone, and covered with fleas and sores. For all this obvious neglect, Callie knew there’d be a battle to keep her. Farmers had rights to working dogs,
but this was something else.
‘Dolly, that’s what I’ll call you,’ she announced. She put the kettle on to boil. First tend the sores and then give the old girl a clean-up. There’d be a lot of
grooming before Dolly was fit to begin her new life.
Dolly showed her appreciation by shitting all over the caravan floor. ‘So that’s how it is, then? Out you go on a rope so I can clean up. I’m not going to hurt you. I’ve
had enough sticks on my back not to want that for anyone except your owner.’
Three hours later the caravan and the dog smelled cleaner, and Callie was about to get ready for work when there was a loud banging her door. Two policemen stood there, demanding entry. She
recognized Constable Harry (two pints and a packet of pork scratchings every week night off duty) and smiled.
‘Is this your dog?’ the constable asked.
‘She is now,’ Callie replied, unconcerned. ‘I saw Dolly being ill treated in a field. I relieved her from her owner.’
‘That’s what we’re here for.’
‘I gave Ted Fletcher a dose of his own medicine, taught him a lesson.’
‘You fair bruised him black and blue. You can’t take the law into your own hands, Callie,’ said the village bobby. ‘He’s complained you assaulted him.’
‘Of course I did, after he took the stick to me. He was knocking this poor thing senseless. Look at her scars, and she’s half starved.’
‘She’s a working dog, not a pet.’
‘Dolly’s my pet now. I’ve rescued her and I hope Ted Fletcher will think again how he treats his dumb workers.’
‘It’s not as simple as that, Callie. He’s charging you with assault. You will have to answer questions down at the station and we’ll take down a statement. The dog comes
with us . . .’
‘Back to more cruelty? You know the man – have a heart. I’ll buy her off him, if I have to, but she’s not going back there. She’s an old lady past her best, anyone
can see that.’
‘That’s beside the point. You can’t go battering people.’
‘Funny, but, in my lifetime, I’ve seen plenty of people do exactly that.’
‘Not in this country, they don’t. Come along and we’ll get this sorted.’
‘Can I bring Dolly as evidence? We can’t leave her alone.’
The dog peered up at them as if in agreement. She limped along, such a sorry sight, but kept close to Callie.
‘Reckon that thing knows when it’s well off,’ Constable Harry muttered, giving Callie a wink.
Callie appeared before the magistrate shortly afterwards and pleaded guilty to assaulting the farmer in anger at the sight of his cruelty. ‘I wanted him to feel the pain
he was inflicting and I’m not sorry,’ she admitted.
‘You did that in spades, Mrs Jones. He’s walking with sticks and he demands his dog back.’
‘I demand the RSPCA look at her first.’ Callie was in no mood to be defeated now.
No one spoke and then the magistrate addressed her again: ‘What puzzles me is how a man that size let a slip of a barmaid beat him into the ground. He said you were in a frenzy of rage,
shouting at him in a foreign language.’
‘Did I? I’m afraid my memory has got the better of me.’ It was time to play the sympathy card. ‘The last time I saw men in breeches wielding sticks, they were thrashing
women and children to the ground and leaving vicious dogs to finish them off. You don’t forget that, ever.’
‘Not in this country?’ The magistrate leaned forward, all ears.
‘No, in a camp they called Ravensbrück, in Germany, and in other camps. Do you want me to go into more detail?’
‘You were an internee?’
‘I was, and I never want to see such things again. We fought for freedom from such treatment. I didn’t expect to find cruelty like that in an English field. They say tyranny begins
with little cruelties to which we turn a blind eye. For evil to happen, it only takes good men to do nothing. I heard that somewhere.’
‘Precisely,’ came the reply. Then there was silence while the magistrate considered his options.
‘Caroline Jones, as this is your first offence, I will caution you formally. There has to be no repetition of such violent behaviour, however well-intentioned. Do you
understand?’
‘Yes, sir. Can I keep Dolly?’
‘That’s a matter for the RSPCA, not this court. Please don’t go rescuing every down-trodden creature that crosses your path. That is all. You can go.’
‘Thank you. I’ll go and find Dolly.’
She went into the town in search of a pet shop for a new lead and collar, grooming products and flea powder. It was only when she returned to the caravan that she realized she’d not had a
drink all day.
The landlord was waiting in the pub with her cards.
‘Pack your bags. I can’t have you upsetting my regulars with that temper of yours. Clear all those bottles out from under the van – they’re a fire hazard – and take
that flea-bitten bag of bones with you. Don’t go asking for references from me. You’re trouble, you are.’
Callie shrugged. ‘Come on, Dolly, we know when we are not welcome. I’m sure there’s plenty more hostelries that want a good barmaid and a guard dog.’ Callie wasn’t
worried for the future. This was the best day’s work she’d done in years.
It wasn’t easy to find work locally with a dog in tow. Word spread about her assaulting a customer so pub doors were sometimes closed on her. She couldn’t drink and
feed a dog, but with Dolly by her side the need to keep topping up began to fade. Her body didn’t like this change and at first she would wake shivering and sweating, imagining camp guards
were chasing her through the pine forest. Some bed and breakfasts didn’t accept Dolly and made her sleep outside all night, but by now it was high summer and, as a working dog she was used to
being outside.
They were so hard up before Callie was due to collect her war pension that they slept under the stars and she used the public lavatories to freshen up. Callie realized she was slipping away from
settled work with accommodation into a precarious search for regular work, but she must take what she could get. Fortunately, there were plenty of fruit farms in the Worcestershire area offering
piece work picking strawberries and soft fruit, and the farmers had no objection to Dolly.
Dolly sat patiently while Callie bent her back with the other pickers and heard from them there were farms needing pickers right into the autumn so she would earn enough to keep them undercover
when winter came. This was encouraging and spurred her on, although she secretly wondered how long she could manage the work. It was good to be with these groups of young travellers in their gaudy
cheesecloth shirts and skirts, but Callie’s back soon ached and her eyes weren’t so quick to find the berries on the ground. She needed glasses and without them she was finding it
difficult to keep up with the others. Middle age had crept up on her by stealth. She knew she was not fit enough to keep this going for long.
The gang had their own way of living, in old vans and caravans around some makeshift tents they called Sunset Camp. There they sat round a campfire smoking hash and cooking stews of vegetables
and anything they could forage. It reminded Callie of her time on the run with Marie and Madeleine. When they realized she was homeless they asked her to join them and she didn’t
hesitate.
‘You look in need of a hearty stew,’ laughed a girl who called herself Petal, handing a steaming bowl of food to Callie.
There were other tethered dogs for Dolly to sniff around, and barefoot toddlers with matted hair running all over the camp, minded by young girls with long skirts and wild hair.
The travellers were kind and shared what they had, accepting Callie without question. They talked of their travels and places where they squatted in the bad months: derelict houses far from
view, boarded up empty mansions that could be entered and used. Some went to France for the
vendange
– the grape harvest – or north, potato picking. This was a whole new world
for Callie to consider, a gypsy-like existence in a caravan of ramshackle vehicles. There were older couples living simple lives, not interested in advancing their careers. They talked of peace and
love and meditation, some practised yoga and listened to Indian music, talking of gurus who preached the simple life. She was given a makeshift tent and a rug. Everyone pooled their takings to live
and find petrol.
In this shambolic-looking community, for the first time in years, Callie felt safe and, with Dolly as her companion, she never felt alone. Besides, everyone was friendly. There was an order in
this society, with rules about privacy and sharing and pulling together. Folk came and went, and there were arguments and personality clashes, but it was just easier to talk them through in a haze
of dope smoke.
Callie knew that, for her, life under canvas couldn’t last and she’d have to find them somewhere more permanent before winter set in. Yet once she returned to the bar work, she
feared temptation would get the better of her. What else was she fit for now?