Authors: Anne Bennett
Meg asked her Aunt Rosie about Doris Caudwell when she saw her next.
‘I just felt she was trying to avoid answering any personal questions,’ Meg told her aunt.
Rosie burst out, ‘She’s just the same at work. In the beginning, when Robert told me about your dad having a fancy for this Doris Caudwell, and me working at the same place as her, I sought her out and tried to be a bit friendly, like. Well, I might as well not have bothered because she made it clear she wasn’t really interested in any sort of friendship with me. It’s not just me, either; she barely talks to the women she works with. They know as little about her now as they did the day she started.’
‘What about the woman she went to the Swan with first?’ Meg said. ‘Surely they must be friends?’
Rosie shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘No, Daisy’s a nice girl. See, her chap’s in the army and he was passing through Birmingham and the driver of the truck agreed to stop off in a pub near where his girlfriend lived so that they could spend an hour or two together. He didn’t know what time he would get there and so he told her to go and wait at the Swan pub. She was desperate to see him, but had never gone into a pub on her own before and wanted someone to go with her. Doris agreed to go. Don’t know why because she isn’t known for her kind gestures. But Daisy told me herself that as soon as Doris saw your father she might as well not have existed. She did talk more to Robert first, but she said anyone with half a brain could see that she had earmarked your dad, and more especially when Robert let slip that Charlie was a widower. And since that day she barely looks at the side Daisy’s on.’
‘Isn’t that rather strange, Aunt Rosie?’
‘I’ll say.’
‘What does Dad see in her?’
‘Well, now, Meg, this might be hard for you to take just now,’ Aunt Rosie said. ‘But, you see, your father is a normal, healthy man – and you know what I mean by that, don’t you?’
Meg nodded mutely, blushing slightly, and her aunt Rosie went on, ‘Doris can obviously give him what he can get nowhere else, and if you read what these magazines say about such things, it seems in men the sexual urge is much greater than in women. Men find it hard to do without it for very long.’
Meg didn’t say anything to her aunt but she was remembering back to Billy’s birth and the doctor saying her mother wasn’t to have any more children, and so there must have been minimal relations between her parents in the final few years. It made her uncomfortable thinking of her father and Doris in bed together, but that was what her aunt Rosie meant.
Then Rosie said gently, ‘If Doris is providing something your father needs and enjoys, he will not want to upset her, so if he is taking her part instead of yours, that’s probably why.’
That sounded very depressing to Meg. ‘That isn’t very fair, Aunt Rosie. Will it always be like that?’
Rosie shrugged. ‘In my opinion, men do anything for a quiet life,’ she said. ‘And this is a new experience for your father. Personally, I can’t take to the woman, but at the moment in your father’s eyes she can do no wrong. When they are married and settled down together, speak to your father quietly and on his own if there is something upsetting you. He does value your good opinion. I know that.’
‘No magic solution, then?’
‘’Fraid not. Did you expect there to be one?’
‘No, not really,’ Meg said. ‘I long ago stopped believing in fairy tales. But I can’t understand her not wanting to make friends with people. Maybe she would be a kinder, more understanding person if she let others into her life.’
‘Ah, but maybe she has secrets she doesn’t want others to know about,’ Rosie said.
‘Has she?’
‘How would we know?’ Rosie said. ‘But there is certainly something amiss, if you ask me.’
Rosie had been more astute than she knew. Doris couldn’t risk making friends because they would ask questions and expect answers. Charlie never did that for, just as he had never quizzed Maeve about her traumatic childhood, he had not been overly curious about Doris’s life in Yorkshire. He believed her when she explained her husband, Gerry, had died of a tumour and that she had nursed him till the end. He didn’t ask for details, nor did he keep on about it, in case it upset her. He quite understood that after his death she’d decided to move away and make a new start elsewhere.
‘But you can look on the bright side,’ Meg’s aunt concluded.
‘What bright side?’ Meg asked.
‘Well, this releases you, doesn’t it, if your father and Doris marry?’
Meg nodded. ‘Dad seems to think so,’ she said slowly. ‘But at what cost to the children, I wonder.’
The following Friday morning, there was a knock at the door. Meg assumed it was the rent man, though he usually came much earlier. She had the money put aside on the mantelpiece so she picked it up and the rent book, but was astonished when she opened to door to find Richard Flatterly outside.
‘What are you doing here?’ she asked in surprise.
‘Why shouldn’t I be here?’ Richard asked. ‘I happen to own the houses.’
‘I know, but Vince O’Malley collects the rent usually.’
‘Well, he’s laid up at the moment,’ Richard told her. ‘So, you’re stuck with me for a while. Don’t mind that, do you?’
Meg did mind very much. The last thing she wanted was to see Richard Flattery’s leering face every week, but you couldn’t say that sort of thing to the man who owned the house you were living in, so Meg contented herself with a shrug. ‘Doesn’t bother me.’
‘Oh, I’m sure that’s not true,’ Richard said seductively, touching her hand as he had once before as he gave her back the rent book.
Meg took a step backwards, almost tripping over Ruth, who was peeping through her legs to see who was at the door. She picked Ruth up and held her almost protectively against her. Ignoring Richard’s comment, Meg said, ‘You must excuse me, but I am meeting a friend in town,’ and she shut the door quickly lest he put his foot in the way to prevent it closing.
‘It’s not what he says so much, but it’s the way he says it,’ she said later to Joy.
‘I hate men like that,’ Joy said. ‘They give me the creeps. They need a good slap.’
‘I agree,’ Meg said. ‘But I can hardly do that when the man is my landlord.’
‘No,’ Joy agreed. ‘I can see your problem there all right.’
‘Mind you,’ Meg said, ‘he probably won’t want to pound around the houses collecting money for long. I should think he will get another rent man in soon enough. I can’t imagine he has any sort of loyalty to his employees.’
‘Few have,’ Joy said. ‘What about you? Now you’re nearly free, why don’t you think about what you’re going to do with your future?’
‘I may do,’ Meg said. ‘I really would like to work and better myself, but not just yet. I can’t leave Daddy in the lurch till I know what’s happening.’
Joy’s words did make Meg more hopeful for her own future, though, and that night as they sat eating the evening meal, she mentioned to her father that Richard Flatterly had called for his own rent that morning. ‘I expect he’ll engage another rent man before long, though,’ she added. ‘With the numbers of unemployed, I’d say that he’ll be spoiled for choice.’
‘There’s not the lines of unemployment there were once,’ Charlie said. ‘But whether there are or not, they will not be engaging anyone else.’
‘Oh?’
‘Oh, you can bet that it isn’t young Richard’s idea,’ Charlie said. ‘He wouldn’t give a body the skin off his rice pudding, that one. His father now, he’s a decent sort – in fact our rent man, Vince, saved his life in the Great War. He told me about it one night in the pub. Vince played down his part in it at the time, but others filled in the details after. He risked his own life to save the officer’s and was shot to bits for his trouble, riddled with shrapnel, and apparently his life hung in the balance for some time. He recovered, but you must have noticed the limp.’
‘’Course.’
‘Well, that was what he was left with,’ Charlie said. ‘Still gives him gyp, that leg. That’s what’s wrong with him now. Anyway, old Flatterly promised him a job for life in gratitude. He is an honourable man, so Richard will have to collect his own rents till Vince is better.’
Meg wrinkled her nose. She hated the thought of dealing with Flatterly every Friday morning, but there was no point in complaining about it.
Doris Caudwell had never had any interest in the news or what was happening in the world around her, and tended to dismiss as overreaction all the worries and anxieties about Germany. Charlie, in contrast, was fanatical about what was happening, knowing any war could involve him. When listening to the latest news broadcasts, she was surprised to hear many were talking about the war as if it was a foregone conclusion. Doris asked Charlie about it one night as they sat having a drink in the Trees public house. When Charlie said he might be called up, it gave her a start.
‘I thought you’d be too old.’
Charlie laughed. ‘Thanks.’
‘Oh, you know what I mean, Charlie.’
‘Well, I know at the moment it’s only supposed to be blokes aged twenty or thereabouts, but I’m told by quite reliable sources that forty-one will be the cut-off point if things get more serious. And if I am called up I must go.’
‘So what are we going to do?’ Doris asked, frowning.
‘Well, we could get married, although then our time together might be very limited till this war is over. Are you prepared for that?’
Doris didn’t even have to think. ‘Of course I’m prepared, though I never thought of us being at war again after the last time.’
‘Yeah,’ Charlie agreed. ‘Must be hard on the old ones who maybe left the bodies of family and friends in the fields of France – and now we’re starting again. They must wonder if they died in vain.’
‘True,’ Doris said. ‘And I wish you hadn’t got to go and risk your life too, but if you have to then I don’t want you sailing over the bright blue sea without making an honest woman of me first. Think what delights will be in store for you when we are married,’ she said seductively, running her hand up the inside of his leg beneath the table.
Charlie felt himself harden. ‘Stop it, for Christ’s sake,’ he said huskily. ‘Or I won’t be able to walk out of here.’
‘Let’s finish these drinks and go back to my flat then,’ Doris suggested. ‘And I can show you a good time, even if you won’t get the cherry on the cake just yet.’
Charlie was more than willing and that night Doris stripped off completely. She had a lovely body and was not coy about showing it off and Charlie realised that it was the first time he had seen a totally naked woman, despite the years he had been married to Maeve, the love they had shared and even the children she had borne. Then Doris took him in her arms and they fell back on the bed. She put his hand on her plump breasts as she wriggled her body beneath him, driving him wild. Her hands were over every bit of him and he bent his head and gently took one of her nipples in his mouth. He felt as if he was drowning in exquisite bliss, and then Doris was astride him and leaning forward so that he took the other nipple in his mouth and he was licking her breasts, running his hands between her legs, and she too was moaning with desire.
‘Do you love me, Charlie?’ she asked.
‘My darling girl, I adore you.’
‘D’you love me more than Maeve?’
‘I love you more than anyone,’ Charlie said, for at that moment he did; he needed to ease the ache inside him more than he’d needed anything in the world before.
‘And are we going to marry, Charlie?’ Doris whispered in her throaty voice that sent shivers running up and down his spine.
Charlie was in the throes of passion and he said almost impatiently, ‘Of course, and as soon as it can be arranged. I’ll see the priest after work tomorrow and arrange for the banns to be read.’
‘Do you promise?’
‘I promise.’
The intensity of the kiss that Doris gave Charlie surprised him; her tongue darted in and out of his mouth and as his excitement and passion rose higher her hands on his body were electrifying. Just when Charlie felt he couldn’t bear any more, that he would be engulfed by it all, Doris flipped herself onto her back again and pulled Charlie on top of her. As he entered her for the first time, he felt as if he was drowning in rapture.
Later he lay beside her in the bed. ‘Oh, my darling girl,’ he said. ‘How I love you.’
‘I love you too, Charlie,’ Doris said, for they were the words that Charlie wanted to hear.
‘Thank you,’ Charlie said. ‘You don’t know how much I have wanted to do that.’
‘Oh, I do.’
‘Why did you let me tonight?’
‘Because you think there is going to be a war, and we are as good as married and we might not have long together. Anyway, I wanted it too, you know. That’s the trouble with being a widow or widower – you’re used to sex and you miss it. Don’t you miss it?’
‘Oh, yes,’ said Charlie. But to him that experience had not the slightest resemblance to the sex he had thought he’d enjoyed with Maeve. Not that he could remember much about sex with her because for so long before she died he had lain beside her like a board, and they had seldom even kissed in case his feelings had overtaken him. There was just the once he had slipped up and the result had been catastrophic.
No, thought Charlie, my children can moan and perform all they like, but I am sticking to this woman who can transport me to the door of paradise.
Doris’s arms were creeping around him again. ‘Are you ready for some more, big boy?’ she asked provocatively.
Charlie’s arousal was immediate and he turned to her with a little growl of pleasure. After that he had no will to go home. He slept the night with Doris, waking before the alarm went off to make love again before getting up for work.
Meg had lain in bed wide-eyed all night, waiting to hear her father come in. She dozed eventually, but when she woke she crept down to the bedroom to check whether her father had come in. His bed had not been slept in. Terry had already left for his paper round, and though she was thoroughly worried, she tried to keep any concern out of her voice and manner as she got the children up and off to school.
As the house fell silent, Meg picked Ruth up and headed next door. She was so agitated she knew she had to talk to someone. May made the usual cup of tea and gave Ruth her button box to play with as Meg explained to May that her father hadn’t come home the previous night.