Читать книгу Anne Bennett 3-Book Collection: A Sister’s Promise, A Daughter’s Secret, A Mother’s Spirit - Anne Bennett - Страница 23

Molly woke with a raging thirst. Her head felt as if it were made of cotton wool, and Ray was standing beside her bed, holding a cup of tea.

‘How are you feeling?’

‘Awful,’ she said, and her voice came out like a croak. She struggled to sit up and suddenly realised that she had a nightdress on that she had never seen before. ‘How did I get here and undressed and all?’ she asked, taking the very welcome cup of tea.

Ray looked confused. ‘What do you mean?’ he said. ‘I told you to choose and left you to it.’

Molly took a long gulp of the tea, for all it was so hot, before saying to Ray, ‘I can’t remember anything, not even getting undressed.’

Ray smiled. ‘That doesn’t surprise me,’ he said. ‘Let’s say you were not yourself last night.’

‘Was I drunk?’

‘A little, I think,’ Ray said. ‘But that was made worse by tiredness and the upset and distress you suffered in the raid.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t be,’ Ray said. ‘It happens to the best of us. Now, are you hungry?’

Molly suddenly realised she was. ‘Starving,’ she said, ‘and when I have eaten, I will start the search for Kevin.’

‘Too late for that today, my dear.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘It’s already turned five o’clock.’

‘You don’t mean in the evening?’

‘I do indeed.’

‘I can’t have slept all that time.’

‘You did, and all I can say is you must have needed it.’

‘Maybe I did,’ Molly said. ‘But I am still annoyed with myself. Can we not go out afterwards, when I have eaten?’

‘Out in the blackout with a full moon shining in the sky?’ Ray said. ‘How would it be if we were caught in a raid that went on for hours and we were unable to get home? Trust me in this, my dear.’

‘All right,’ Molly said with a sigh. ‘To tell you the truth, I still feel tired and not myself at all. I don’t think I would be up to it anyway.’

‘It is quite understandable,’ Ray said. ‘You sit and rest yourself and drink your tea, and I will rustle us up something to eat.’

When Ray had gone, Molly put the drained cup down and got out of bed, padded across the room and immediately caught sight of herself in one of the many mirrors. Her face was the colour of lint and her hair tousled about her head because she hadn’t plaited it and it had come adrift from the Kirbigrips that had held it fast. Her eyes looked puzzled and were screwed up in pain.

She was wearing the most beautiful nightdress, which she was sure she had never seen before. It was made of silk, and a deep azure blue with a white lace trim, and though it was floor length there was a split either side to her thigh. There wasn’t much to the bodice at all. It seemed to be made entirely of lace and it was so low cut it barely covered her nipples. Her face flushed with shame for, by her standards, the nightdress was almost indecent. She suddenly realised with alarm that her locket was gone. Scanning the room a little frantically, she spied it on the little table by the bed. But she never took it off. Then she told herself she couldn’t remember taking anything else off either, and she felt ashamed of her behaviour.

Ray didn’t seem bothered about any of it, though, and he brought her broth in on a tray. ‘Come back into bed,’ he said, ‘and eat this up. Then maybe you would like a bath?’

‘Oh, I would love one. Will anyone mind?’

‘How could anyone mind? There is only you and me here. I’ll have to find you something else to wear; the things that you had on last night are covered in dust. There are plenty of clothes here, and for all you are a bit on the small size, I’m sure I will find something to fit you.’

‘I can’t wear someone else’s clothes.’

‘Well, you sure as hell can’t go round in your birthday suit,’ Ray said with a grin. ‘It’s too cold, for one thing. Anyway, it didn’t bother you last night when you put on that nightdress.’

‘But who do they all belong to?’

‘Don’t you worry your pretty head about that,’ Ray said. ‘Eat up now. You’ll feel better afterwards.’

And Molly did. She was unaware of the white powder that Ray had mixed in with the broth. Afterwards a bath seemed a wonderful idea, and a few minutes later she was luxuriating in a hot bath full of fragrant bubbles. She washed her hair too with creamy shampoo.

Eventually, she stepped out and, wrapping herself in a towelling robe, she went through to the bedroom when Ray had laid some clothes on the bed. They were not at all the sort of things she was used to and she was not at all sure she wanted to get used to them either. She had virtually lived in dungarees and shirts for over five years, and though she had longed for something prettier and more feminine, she had never envisaged wearing clothes like those Ray had laid out. The lacy underwear and sheer silk stockings were nice enough, but the blouse was so clingy, none of her shape was left to the imagination and the neckline plunged so low it showed a fair bit of cleavage. The skirts were far too short too.

Fully dressed, she surveyed herself in one of the many mirrors. She looked like a different person and she knew without doubt that if there had been a person dressed as she was in Buncrana, people would assume she was fast, up to no good. Molly’s cheeks grew hot at the thought.

When Ray knocked on the door she was almost too embarrassed to open it, feeling sure she was showing too much flesh altogether. He obviously didn’t feel the same way, though, for she saw his eyes widen in appreciation.

‘Do I look all right?’ she asked tentatively.

Ray knew that Molly would have no idea how fetching she was. Her skin was fresh and glowing from the warm bath, her cheeks pink-tinged, and her hair was wrapped up in a towel, turban-style but some of her curls had escaped the turban and framed her pretty little face. For a moment Ray regretted that girls as beautiful as this one did not stir him in the slightest.

Molly’s eyes were troubled, but when Ray said, ‘You do not look just all right, you look wondrous,’ they cleared a little.

She looked doubtfully at her reflection. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Quite sure.’

‘You don’t think I look a bit, well, sort of fast?’

‘Molly, believe me, you are the picture of loveliness,’ Ray said. He caught up her hands and turned her round to face him, and added, ‘You also look seductive and extremely sexy, and what’s wrong with that?’

‘I … I don’t know that I want to be sexy,’ Molly said. ‘And these clothes feel strange on me.’

‘They don’t look strange.’

‘Well,’ Molly said with a shrug, ‘they’ll do, I suppose, till I can get something more suitable.’

Ray pulled Molly towards him and put an arm around her shoulder as he said gently, ‘Listen, sweetheart, Britain is at war. Making clothes in vast quantities is not considered important for the nation’s survival and most places that make clothes have been converted to making uniforms anyway, so there is little in the shops to buy. You were not the only one, either, to be left with just the clothes on your back. No one can afford to be too choosy these days. So these things may not be your choice, but there is little alternative.’

Molly knew Ray was probably right. After all, what did she know of war restrictions? And she had no desire to upset the man who had been so kind to her.

‘Anyway,’ Ray went on, ‘you have a lovely body. Never be ashamed of it.’

‘But it’s wrong to show yourself.’

‘Who said? The harridan of a grandmother?’

‘No, well, I mean she didn’t need to. I just knew.’

‘Why?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean why is it wrong to show your body?’ Ray said. ‘The female naked form can be beautiful. Look at some of the paintings.’

‘I … I haven’t seen paintings like that.’

‘There are many of them in the art gallery in the town, or were before the war.’

‘But in real life …’

‘Someone had to pose, don’t forget.’

‘I couldn’t do that,’ Molly said with a shiver of distaste.

‘Why not?’ Ray said, and without waiting for a reply, went on. ‘Look, my darling girl, you are no longer in a little tin-pot Irish town. You are eighteen years old and in a thriving city. Let yourself go a bit. And you do want to, even if you won’t admit it. Look at the nightdress you chose for yourself. It’s nice, very nice. You chose well and the fact that you can’t remember doing it is neither here nor there – you still chose it. Be honest with yourself. You wanted to look sexy.’

Did I? Molly wondered. She couldn’t seem to think straight; her head felt woozy. It wasn’t unpleasant, in fact it was quite a nice feeling, but it did mean she couldn’t seem to hold a thought in her head for long.

Molly was not to know how expressive her face was. Not that Ray scrutinised her closely and had a very good guess at what went on in her head.

‘So let’s have no more complaints about the clothes then,’ he said, leading her by the hand into the living room and sitting her down on the sofa.

‘No, Ray,’ Molly said. ‘I’m sorry. It was very ungrateful of me. But who did those clothes belong to?’ She was curious about the type of woman who would leave all her things behind in such a way. ‘Do they belong to your friend’s wife?’

‘He has no wife,’ Ray said. ‘And the things don’t belong to one person.’

‘Oh,’ Molly said, perplexed.

‘This flat belongs to a friend of mine, as I said,’ Ray said. ‘There is no need for you to know his name,’ he went on, because by the time Molly was given over to Collingsworth for his pleasure he definitely didn’t want her on her guard in any way. ‘He is away at the present time, as I said, but he often entertains ladies here, and he likes them to feel clean and comfortable – hence the toiletries in the bathroom – and then to dress up for him because it pleases him, and the ladies like to please him in all ways.’

‘Oh, oh, I see.’

‘You’re shocked, aren’t you?’

Shocked was an understatement. Molly wasn’t a fool and she knew what the girls would be doing to please him. She thought of the bedroom with the mirrors, and privately considered it one of the most disgusting things she had ever encountered. But she tried hard to cover that disgust as she cried, ‘No … no, not at all.’

‘Don’t deny it,’ Ray said with a smile. ‘You are shaken right down to the core of your good little Catholic soul.’

‘It’s just that I have never heard of such behaviour.’

‘And you think it wrong?’

‘We are taught it is wrong.’

‘What harm are they doing?’

‘Well, if they are … if they do … What I mean is, sex before marriage is a big sin, just about the biggest, and these people will go to hell when they die.’

Ray burst into a gale of laughter at this before asking, ‘For what? For bringing a bit of comfort and pleasure to one another?’ That maybe was a little exaggeration, for the girls didn’t always like it at first. They put up with it, though, as Molly would in time. The powders, their love of gin and the fear of being beaten virtually ensured their compliance until they got over their initial distaste.

No one had ever spoken to Molly of the pleasure to be had from sex. In fact, no one talked about sex much at all. Molly remembered Nellie telling her that her husband would tell her all about it on her wedding night. And she had wondered at the time how her husband would find out if it wasn’t up for any sort of discussion at all. Nellie had never mentioned any pleasure to be had, but made it sound more of a duty that a woman had to do for her husband.

Here Ray spoke openly of men and women bringing pleasure to one another sexually. It was all alien to Molly. Yet Ray was right in one way, for they were hurting no one. She wasn’t sure, though, that she could act that way, or even want to. She had never even been alone with a boy, let alone held hands or, heaven forbid, kissed.

She had allowed Ray to hold her tight when she was scared of the raids and had no objection to him draping an arm around her shoulder when he was explaining something, but he did those things as a brother might. Molly had never felt the slightest unease with Ray, but she didn’t know that she would like anyone else to be so intimate.

Ray watched her face and smiled to himself. Molly didn’t know what pleasures were in store for her.

‘Time for a drink,’ he said.

‘Oh, no, after yesterday—’

‘Nonsense,’ Ray said, surreptitiously tipping the white powder into Molly’s glass before adding the lemonade. ‘Brandy is good for shock and, protest as you might, I have shocked you to the core this evening, so I am afraid I must insist.’

Molly sipped the drink, which she did like the taste of. But within minutes of finishing it she felt lethargy beginning to creep over her.

Ray felt the sag against his body and said, ‘Come on, bed for you, before you are too far gone again.’

Molly wondered why she was so tired, but she definitely was, and she staggered as she got to her feet. Ray had to help her to the bedroom, and there she sat on the bed and tried to summon up the energy to get undressed. However, it proved too much for her and she slumped on the bed just as she was. Ray found her in a deep sleep a little later, so deep that when the sirens went off she didn’t stir. Ray smiled as he undressed her, leaving her clothes scattering the floor and this time rolled her into bed and under the covers completely naked.

In the living room, he stood for a moment listening, but the raid was some distance away and he decided to risk going out. He had to see Charlie anyway, but he took the precaution of locking the bedroom door as well as the front one, and pocketing both keys before he set off into the night.

Ray found Charlie in his local. He sipped his drink while Charlie told him what he had found out that day of the people that Molly had come to Birmingham to find.

‘Nothing on that Hilda,’ he said. ‘I mean, the people in her house didn’t know anything, so I reckon she has kicked the bucket and a neighbour of the granddad’s told me he had pegged it too and the kid was in an orphanage. She weren’t sure which one, but thought it was probably Erdington Cottage Homes.’

‘Molly is never going to know this,’ Ray said. ‘In fact, with the powders and brandy I am tipping down her neck she’ll barely be able remember her own name by the end of the week, let alone the reason she came back to Birmingham.’

‘But why brandy?’ Charlie asked. ‘She will get nowt but gin at Vera’s.’

‘Yeah, but I prefer brandy,’ Ray said. ‘Don’t worry, by the time she goes to Vera’s, she will drink anything going, and be willing to sell her old grandmother for the price of a fix.’

‘Hear hear,’ Charlie said, and they chinked glasses as the all clear sounded.

When Molly realised she was naked in bed the following morning she was filled with mortification. Never in her like could she remember going to bed in such a state, and she looked at her clothes littering the floor with horrified surprise, for she had always folded her clothes neatly, even the hated dungarees, before getting into bed.

She also felt ill, really ill. Her head was pounding and she felt as if she had weights pulling at her, dragging her down. She knew that day she had to look for Kevin, but she didn’t know whether she had the strength even to get to the bathroom unaided. There was a knock at the door and as Ray entered with a cup of tea, Molly swiftly pulled the clothes to her neck.

Ray smiled as he laid the tea on the side table and surveyed the floor. ‘You went a little wild in here last night,’ he remarked. Then he picked up the nightdress Molly had worn the previous night and said, ‘Did you choose another nightdress for yourself?’

Molly’s eyes were like circles in her head as she shook it slowly from side to side, dislodging the sheet as she did so and displaying her bare shoulders. Ray cried, ‘You have nothing on at all, have you?’

‘No.’

‘Well, now, you brazen little hussy, you try and tell me now that you are not trying to break out of the prudish prison your upbringing and the Catholic Church has put you in.’

‘I don’t know. Maybe,’ Molly said. ‘I feel so confused, and my head is spinning. I feel really ill, Ray.’

‘Have your tea,’ Ray advised, handing her the cup and saucer. ‘I’ve put a wee drop of brandy in it to guard against the cold. That will put you right.’

‘Good,’ Molly said. ‘Because I have to get up then. I have to look for something.’ For a moment her eyes were troubled and her brow puckered as she tried to remember. Then her eyes cleared and she said, ‘No, not something, but some people: my brother, Kevin, Granddad and Hilda.’

‘Not today I don’t think,’ Ray said.

‘Oh, but—’

‘Look,’ Ray said, and he drew aside the blackout curtains. Molly saw rain teeming down outside. ‘You couldn’t go out in this,’ he said. ‘And anyway, do you feel up to it?’

‘No,’ Molly said in a small voice. ‘Ray, what is happening to me?’

‘I’d say you were exhausted and you might have caught a chill or something on the way over. Nothing a couple of days in bed won’t cure.’

‘You think so?’

‘Yes, I think so,’ Ray said reassuringly. ‘Now, I’ll see if I can rustle us up some breakfast and you needn’t lift a finger. What do you say?’

‘I say that sounds just fine,’ said Molly.

Molly spent the day in bed, getting out of it only to use the bathroom, not even bothering to dress so that Ray laughingly called her his little wanton, but the next day she felt worse instead of better, and was only helped by the especially laced tea that Ray brought her in.

The weather had improved slightly by the afternoon, and as Ray drew the blackout curtains he noted the clear skies and the half-moon visible in the dusky sky, and knew that there could easily be a raid that night. In her drug-induced sleep, Molly had slept through the light skirmish on Wednesday night and there hadn’t been a raid on Thursday, but in case there was one that night, he gave Molly an extra ladle of brandy and more powder than usual to ensure she would sleep through it before he left the flat.

However, Molly had a nightmare, and in the middle of it she began to scream and woke with a jolt, panting with fear, which increased when she realised it wasn’t her screaming at all; it was coming from outside and it was the air-raid siren.

She felt disorientated and strange, and she struggled out of bed, calling for Ray. Her legs felt very wobbly and, holding on to the bed and the bedside cabinet, she made a staggering lurch to the door and was alarmed to find it locked. She hammered on it and shouted until she was hoarse, then faced the realisation that she was alone in the flat. Then total terror took hold of her. She sank to the floor and sobbed while all around her was the drone of planes, the whistle of descending bombs, the crump and crash of explosions, the barking of the ack-ack fire and then the ringing bells of the emergency services.

The hours ticked by and there was no let-up in the bombing. Time lost all meaning. There was no sign of Ray returning either, and surely now, she told herself, he couldn’t return in the teeth of a raid. Shaking like a leaf, Molly gingerly pulled herself up and stood swaying and holding on to the bedpost for dear life, waiting for the room to stop its listing. She was going to watch what was happening outside, face her fear like her father had always told her to do.

There were two windows in the bedroom, one overlooking the factory and the other on to the street, and she made for that one because she could hold on to the bed all the way round. Then with the blackout curtains pulled wide, she stood and watched as Birmingham burned.

Pockets of fire were everywhere, littering the skyline, spitting and crackling into the night with flames of yellow, orange and red vying with the arc lights raking the sky. Molly heard the bombs descend, saw buildings crumple in balloons of dust, some bursting into flames. Firemen valiantly played their hoses on them and ambulances streaked through the night. She watched for some time, mesmerised by it all, until in the end she cried at the sight of her city being destroyed and for the innocent men, women and children who had to try to live through it. She knew many would be injured or killed before the raid was over.

Suddenly, a bomb fell close, so close it shook the building. Molly felt the tremor beneath her feet and she fairly leaped onto the bed with a howl of anguished fear. Her whole body was quivering and her teeth chattering as she sat with her knees meeting her chin, her arms wrapped around herself and her head down, and waited for the building to collapse on top of her and for her to die.

Ray found her there the next morning. He had sat out the raid in a public shelter and then gone back to his own place after the all clear had sounded in the early morning to grab a few hours’ sleep. When he first saw Molly curled as she was on the bed, she was so still and the room so quiet he thought for a moment she had died of fright. The thought passed through his mind that Collingsworth would not get the virgin he craved, nor would he and Charlie get the money he had promised them.

However, Molly was not dead. As Ray took hold of one of her arms, he felt the pulse and he peeled her hands away from her knees. Molly’s eyes were open. That had startled him at first, but he realised they were seeing nothing. She was in some sort of trance and he caught hold of her shoulders and shook her a little.

When Molly came to and saw Ray’s face before her, the one face she had longed to see, she, who didn’t hug and kiss easily, was so overcome with joy and relief that she threw her arms around his neck and began kissing him all over his face.

He pushed her away and she began to babble, ‘Oh, please, don’t leave me, Ray. I can’t bear it when you do. Please stay with me. I will do anything, just about anything, if you stay with me.’

Ray smiled. He knew now that Molly would be putty in his hands and he put his arms around her and said, ‘All right. Stop this now. You are trembling like a leaf. I’m here, aren’t I, and not going anywhere?’

‘Oh, thank you, Ray, thank you.’

‘You are a silly girl to get into such a state.’

‘It was the raid, Ray,’ Molly said. ‘I was so scared and I called for you, and the door was locked.’

‘Of course it was,’ Ray said. ‘It always is when I leave, to keep you safe.’

‘But where do you go?’

‘To my own flat,’ Ray said. ‘I told you from the start that I have my own place.’

‘Did you?’

‘Don’t you remember when I offered you this place first?’

Molly shook her head. She concentrated hard, but when she tried to remember, all she saw was deep blackness, and the effort of trying to break through that made her head ache. The absolute terror she had felt during the raid, which she had been sure she would never survive, plus the powders Ray was feeding her, had obliterated her memory.

‘I remember nothing but the raid last night,’ she admitted at last.

‘Nothing?’

Molly shook her head. ‘All that went before is a blank. I don’t even know what I am doing here.’

‘We were in a shelter together because of the bombing, me, you and Charlie, my mate, and you said you had nowhere to go and I offered you this place.’

‘I don’t know who I am.’

‘Your first name is Molly, you told us that much,’ Ray said. ‘But I don’t know your surname. Does it matter? Are you unhappy?’

‘No.’

‘Well, then?’

‘But my memory—’

‘Will probably return all the quicker if you don’t worry at it.’

‘You think so?’

‘I know so,’ Ray said. ‘Trust me.’

‘Oh, I do totally, Ray,’ Molly said and added, ‘Will you stay here tonight?’

‘There is no bed but yours,’ Ray reminded her.

Molly remembered how intense her fear had been the night before and feared she would die of fright if she had to experience that again alone.

‘You can share it with me,’ she said.

‘Do you know what you are saying?’

Molly swallowed deeply and then looked Ray full in the face and said, ‘Yes.’

Ray knew then that if he had been a proper red-blooded male he would have taken the girl up on the offer and to hell with the consequences. The fact that he had no interest that way was one of the reasons he had been employed to collect up the runaway girls and those escaping council care, and groom them for the whorehouse, so his emotions were not moved in any way by Molly’s offer.

However, it would never do for her to know this and so he said, ‘I think you are not really yourself, Molly, or you would never have said that. And if I were to do this you could well regret it and resent me afterwards.’

‘I would never resent you,’ Molly said firmly. ‘I couldn’t. I think I love you.’

‘And I am fond of you too, Molly,’ Ray said, draping an arm casually about her shoulder. ‘That is why I can’t do what you ask.’

‘Oh, but, Ray, I can’t bear to be alone, really I can’t.’

‘I can give you something to help,’ Ray said. ‘Do you trust me?’

‘I do, Ray. Truly I do.’

‘So if I say that I can give you something that will make you sleep like a baby till morning, when I will be back, you’ll take it?’

‘I’d rather you stayed.’

‘We have been through this,’ Ray said, tight-lipped.

‘Oh, please don’t be cross with me,’ Molly cried, distressed. ‘I will do anything you want.’

‘Right, then,’ Ray said. ‘Now we know exactly where we stand.’