The Color of Secrets (13 page)

Chapter 14

A
PRIL 1944

Eva lay on a blanket on the grass, drowsy in the afternoon sun. The only sound was the bleating of the sheep on the hill behind her and the odd whistle from Uncle Dai to his dogs. David had gone with them, running through the grass, his legs pink and chubby in the new boots Aunt Rhiannon had bought him.

He was so happy here on the farm, and she knew it should make her happy to see him thriving. But every time she closed her eyes, the ghosts were waiting. Mum glowering at her across the kitchen table, spitting out those awful words. Eddie with that disappointed look he’d had when he first set eyes on David. And Bill. Not a ghost. Not yet, at least. But every time he floated into her head, his eyes were full of anger, the way they’d been that night in the air-raid shelter. She tried to blot the picture out with better memories, like lying beside him in the cornfield on that hot August afternoon. But the images were growing fainter every day, like snapshots bleached by the sun.

She felt a sudden, sharp kick under her ribs and caught her breath. She moved her hand to the spot, feeling the tiny elbow or foot or whatever it was as it jabbed her again. She wanted to cry and laugh at the same time. It was as if Bill was saying
I’m still here—don’t you dare forget about me!

As if she ever could. Lying in bed at night, listening to the strange calls of owls and foxes, she would try to imagine where he was, what he was doing, and whether he was thinking of her and the baby. And she would play back that last meeting in the café over and over again. If only they hadn’t argued. If only she hadn’t run out on him. If only her mother hadn’t seen them. If only
. . .

“Eva!” Her aunt was half running across the farmyard, waving something in her hand.

“What is it?” Eva propped herself up on one elbow.

“A letter—with a US Army postmark!” Rhiannon was breathless with excitement. “Cathy sent it with a pile of mail.”

Eva tore it open. The date at the top was March 13: three days after her mother’s funeral. The handwriting was small and sloped at an odd angle across the page, as if it had been done in a hurry. Her hand was trembling as she shaded her eyes against the sun.

“My darling Eva,”
he had written,
“I tried to find you at the railroad and your friend told me what had happened. I was so sorry to hear about your mother. You must be going through a terrible time right now and I wish I was there to help you through . . .”

Eva caught her breath, tears welling in her eyes. The words blurred and swam on the paper. She swallowed hard and they came back into focus.

We have been moved to a new camp in the south of England, near a town called Newbury. I tried to get a 24-hour pass to come see you, but all leave has been canceled. They won’t tell us what’s happening, but it’s pretty clear that we’re about to start some big operation.

I know how you feel about sending our baby to the States, but please think about it. My aunt Millie lives in Chicago, where there’s no law against black and white people being together. She raised five kids of her own and I’ve written her to ask if she would take care of ours for the time being. What do you say, honey? I think it would be for the best.

I don’t know how long we’re going to be here, so if I don’t hear from you, I’ll write again from the next place we go. I miss you so much. I’ll never forget the time we had together. I guess those crocodiles swam too fast for us, didn’t they?

Take care of yourself and the baby.

With love,

Bill

Eva pressed the letter to her chest. She could feel the thud of her heart through the thin fabric of her smock and her mouth was as dry as the mud caking her boots. What was he saying? It was all about the baby, wasn’t it? No mention of her going to the States. No words of hope for a future together.

“Does he say where he is?” Rhiannon sank down on the blanket next to her.

Eva took a breath. “Near Newbury, but he could have gone somewhere else by now.” It sounded to her like someone else’s voice. Rational, composed, unnaturally calm. “If only I’d known earlier,” she went on, “I could have gone down there and found him, talked to him.”

“What? Go chasing off on a train in your state of health? I don’t think so!” Rhiannon reached over to pat her shoulder. “And anyway,” she went on, “do you really think it would have done any good, seeing him again? I thought he
. . .
well, you know,” she said awkwardly.

“You thought he’d
. . .
abandoned me?” Eva was looking straight ahead as she said this, unable to meet her aunt’s gaze. “Well, he hasn’t. He didn’t
want
to leave me. Didn’t have any choice in the matter, that’s all.”

Rhiannon picked up the envelope from where Eva had dropped it on the blanket. “He’s addressed it to E. Melrose. No Miss or Mrs. Does he know that you’re married with a child?”

Eva swallowed hard. “He didn’t at first, but he does now.” She turned away, pulling at tufts of grass. How could she tell her aunt about Bill? It was hard enough for her to cope with the fact that there was an illegitimate baby on the way. How would she react if she knew its father was a colored man? And that her sister-in-law would still be alive if she hadn’t spotted Eva walking out with him?

Eva brushed the fallen grass off the blanket. Somewhere behind her a sheep called to its lamb. A buzzard soared overhead on silent wings. It was so peaceful here. So safe.

Rhiannon squeezed her arm. “Don’t talk about him if it’s too painful. You’re with us now.” She smoothed the white apron that covered her dress, then stretched out her legs. “You know, it’s a long time since I’ve seen Dai looking as happy as he has these last few weeks. Having young David around has been a real tonic for us both, with Trefor away so long.”

“I’m glad,” Eva replied, thinking how ironic it was that she had Trefor to thank for this unconditional welcome. Her horrible cousin, who had made childhood holidays in Devil’s Bridge an utter misery with his endless spiteful tricks. And now he was in Italy, no doubt taking the role of conquering hero beyond all reasonable expectations.
God help them,
she thought.

“Do you feel up to sorting through the rest of the letters?”
Rhiannon asked. “There are quite a few addressed to your mother—
I’ll open them if you’d rather
. . .
”

“No, it’s all right,” Eva said. “I’ve got to face it sooner or later.” She shifted her weight onto her knees and, with an effort, rose to her feet. Tucking Bill’s letter into the pocket of her smock, she walked purposefully toward the farmhouse, determined to get through the next half hour without crying.

Eva wrote half a dozen letters to Bill over the next few weeks, but none of them could be posted. The farm was so remote that deliveries only came once a week. She tried not to get excited when the ancient postman wheeled his bike into the farmyard on Tuesday mornings. But every time he came, the sense of anticipation followed by crushing disappointment grew stronger. How could she write to Bill if she didn’t know where he was?

On the last day of May there was a letter from Dilys. Her neat, round handwriting sent a pang of guilt through Eva’s heart. That big, awful lie was like a concrete wall between them. If they hadn’t been parted so soon after their mother’s death, Eva doubted she could have kept up the pretense. She knew Cathy had been right. That it was better for Dilys not to know why their mother had been chasing her across the street in the dark. But to Eva it still felt like a betrayal.

Dilys was with an anti-aircraft battery of the Royal Artillery, learning to track enemy planes and direct the gunners’ fire. It sounded terribly dangerous, but the tone of the letter was cheerful enough. She warned Eva not to worry if she didn’t hear from her for a while because a lot of the Allied forces’ mail was going astray with all the movement going on.
Perhaps that was why there was nothing from Bill
, Eva thought.

The next day she wrote back to Dilys. It was a difficult letter to write. She tried to make it lighthearted, but as she began describing the advantages of life on the farm, she was only too aware of how miserable that might make her sister feel. In the end she settled for a few short lines. Then she composed a much longer letter to Cathy:

“I feel as if I’ve been wrapped in cotton wool and packed away in a drawer,” she wrote. “It’s so quiet in this part of Wales, it’s hard to believe there’s a war on. We can’t even get the wireless up here in the mountains. The only news we have is from the paper, which comes once a week with the post. I’m not complaining, though, because the food is fantastic. It’s as if rationing didn’t exist. We have eggs every day, and there are huge slabs of bacon hanging up on hooks in the kitchen. At breakfast time Uncle Dai just slices great thick pieces off and we eat it with homemade bread.”

She paused for a moment, glancing out of the window. “David is putting on weight at last,” she went on. “He’s starting to talk a lot now. Sometimes he asks where Nanna and Dilys have gone, which is upsetting. Often he talks in Welsh. It’s funny to hear him come out with things I don’t understand. He knows there’s a baby coming, but I don’t think he grasps what it really means.” She hesitated before writing the next line. Cathy was the only person in the world she could confide in, and she felt an overwhelming need to unburden herself. “I’m due in three weeks and I still haven’t told my aunt the whole truth about Bill,” she wrote. “It’s partly because I’m afraid of what she’ll say and partly because I don’t want to upset her. It’s going to be a terrible shock. I don’t think she and Uncle Dai have ever seen a black person—not even in a film, because the nearest cinema is in Aberystwyth, which is miles away.

“Bill said in his letter that he’d tried to get a pass to come and see me. But even if I could find a way of letting him know where I am, he’d use up all his leave just finding this place. I’ve got no idea where he is now, and I sometimes wonder if I’ll ever see him again.”

Perhaps you never will
, a voice whispered somewhere in her head. She bit the end of her pen, panic swirling in her stomach.

“I feel so useless,” she went on, her fingers slippery with perspiration. “I’ve asked if I can help on the farm—milk the cows or something—but they won’t let me do a thing. It gives me too much time to think and that’s bad. I miss work and I miss you. I wish I could talk to you. I hope that once the baby’s born, I might be able to come back, for a visit at least (if they haven’t thrown me out, that is). Can’t plan much further ahead than that at the moment.

“Thanks for collecting the mail. Please keep sending it on. I’m sure there’ll be something from Bill soon.”

As she wrote the last sentence, she willed it to be true. She couldn’t stop torturing herself with thoughts of him going out in some new town, dancing with other girls the way he’d danced with her.

She stuffed the letter into an envelope and grabbed her knitting needles, forcing herself to concentrate on the fancy pattern for a matinee jacket her aunt had bought on her monthly ride into Aberystwyth. Eva had not been allowed to go with her. “Too risky,” Rhiannon had said. “All those potholes in the road. You stay here where it’s safe.”

Eva’s only excursions from the farm were to attend chapel on Sundays. On the fourth of June she was there, as usual, after a hot, dusty ride down the farm track and along the narrow, winding lane that led down the valley.

David had leaned over the sides of the cart to grab at the wildflowers sprouting from the hedgerows, and now he was sitting underneath the pew, poking the stems of campions and dandelions through the buttonholes of his jacket.

The service was conducted entirely in Welsh, which Eva was struggling to master. Her attention often wandered, and she would find herself studying the rapt faces of the other members of the congregation instead of listening to the sermon. One thing that had surprised her on her first visit to the tiny chapel was the way people stared. Her auburn hair and freckles and David’s blond curls made them objects of curiosity. Like her uncle and aunt, most of the congregation had dark, almost olive skin, tanned nut-brown by the summer sun. The younger ones all had jet-black hair, and if she hadn’t known they were Welsh, Eva would have taken them for Italians or Spaniards.