Читать книгу The Willow Pool - Elizabeth Elgin - Страница 10

She was back, and never before had two days taken so long to run. Meg blinked up into the sky, breathing deeply, because even the air here was special; golden-coloured and scented with green things growing, and hay and honeysuckle.

She smiled at Mrs Potter, who always peeked through the post office window whenever a bus arrived, checking in those she knew, making a mental note of those she did not, and who, two weeks ago, had drawn the attention of a stranger to a printed postcard.

‘Candlefold,’ Meg whispered, lips hardly moving. ‘Where I live; where I was born; where I am meant to be.’ And where she would stay till Fate – or the Ministry of Labour and National Service – decided differently.

At the stile she stood quite still, listening to the safe stillness: a bird singing, leaves rustling green above her. Even the lambs were still, laying close to the ewes who stared steadily ahead, mouths rotating cud, like the blank-faced tarts who stood on every street corner the length of Lime Street, chewing gum.

But Lime Street was a long way away and in just a few more seconds she would see the old house, the worn stone steps, the thick, squat door and the pump trough. In just a few more seconds, she would be home.

‘You’re back!’ Mary Kenworthy smiled. ‘And just as I was thinking I’d have to go all the way to the garden to tell Polly that lunch is ready!’

‘What’s to do with that thing, then?’ Meg nodded in the direction of the bell that hung outside the door.

‘They’re both asleep, upstairs – thought we’d get our lunch before they’re awake.’ She broke two more eggs into the bowl. ‘Omelette and salad and stewed apples,’ she answered the question in Meg’s eyes. ‘Be a love, and tell Polly it’s on the table in three minutes, will you?’

The walk to the kitchen garden took Meg across the courtyard, beneath the far arch, past the henrun and across the drying green to the tall, narrow gate in the eight-feet-high wall. Mr Potter’s little kingdom where the war was shut out every morning at eight o’clock sharp and not confronted again until work was over for the day and the gate clanged shut behind him.

Meg saw Polly on her knees beside the strawberry bed and whistled through her fingers.

‘Hey! Ready in three minutes!’ she called, then ran down the path, delight at her heels. ‘What are you doing?’ Everything that happened at Candlefold delighted her.

‘Strawing up,’ Polly grinned, linking her arm in Meg’s. ‘The berries are starting to swell so we put straw beneath them to keep them clean and to keep the slugs away. Then when we’ve done that we’ll net them over, and that’ll take care of the thieving blackbirds too. But I’m so glad you are home. Yesterday there wasn’t a letter. I felt so miserable I got to wondering what else could go wrong, and you not coming back was high on the list. But this morning –’

‘This morning there were two letters and I am back. And if you thought I wouldn’t be, then you’re dafter than Nanny Boag – who is asleep, by the way!’

Home again, and omelettes for lunch, stewed apples for pudding, and the sky high and blue and bright. Life was all at once so good that it almost took her breath away.

‘Pull out any weeds, and tuck the straw around the roots,’ Polly instructed later that afternoon, initiating Meg into the mysteries of Mr Potter’s garden.

‘I don’t know which is weeds and which isn’t …’

‘Anything that isn’t a strawberry plant, just yank it out before you shove the straw in. We’ll be having strawberries and cream in two or three weeks.’

‘Creeeeeam!’ Wasn’t cream illegal, Meg demanded.

‘We-e-ll, yes, but once every Preston Guild, Mummy pours the morning milk into a large bowl and skims off the cream that rises to the top. It’s illegal to sell it in the shops, but nobody can stop you skimming your own milk. And, like I said, she doesn’t do it often. Davie and Mark are due leave at the end of June, so I hope there’ll be plenty of sun to ripen the berries. When that happens, we have to be up good and early to do the picking and have them ready for the van that calls. I often think how pleased some lady will be to get some – even though she probably won’t have sugar to spare to sprinkle on them.’

‘Nor cream,’ Meg grinned. ‘And I wonder how long she’ll have to queue for them, an’ all. That’s when your Davie will be on leave, then – three weeks from now?’

‘Twenty days. I’ve started crossing them off on my calendar. Mind, the bods in the armed forces are always told that leave is a privilege and not their due, but most times nothing happens to stop it.’ She crossed her fingers. ‘We’re having two days here, then spending the rest of his leave with his parents. They live a few miles from Oxford where Davie ought by rights to be, studying engineering. Oh, damn this war!’

‘What d’you mean! It was because of the war youse two met!’

‘Mm. That Davie met Mark and Mark brought him home for a weekend. Funny, isn’t it?’

‘Nah! Just meant to be.’ Meg removed a weed then manoeuvred straw beneath the berry plant. ‘Ma always said that what was to be would be; that the minute you are born there’s this feller who knows what’ll happen to you an’ he writes it all down. Your Book of Life, it’s called, and there’s no gettin’ away from it.’

‘And you believe that, Meg?’

‘Makes as much sense as anythink else.’

‘More sense than believing in God?’

‘’Fraid I’m not a God person. I mean – what about when Ma was bad and I’d believed, and prayed for her to live? Well, where would I be now, eh? He’d have let me down stinkin’, wouldn’t He?’

‘We don’t always get everything we want.’

‘Then why bother?’

‘Meg, you really don’t believe, do you?’

‘Reckon not. Ma didn’t either; only in the Book of Life thing.’

‘But what about Christmas and Easter?’

‘We never bothered. Christmas trees and Easter eggs cost money, she said, an’ it was all a big con by shopkeepers to get cash out of you, and by the Church, so you’d go and put money on the plate. All down to pounds, shillin’s and pence!’

‘So you don’t say your prayers or go to church?’ Polly whispered. ‘Nor ask God to take care of your young man?’

‘Told you, I haven’t got a young man. Kip’s only a friend.’

‘He sent you shampoo and scented soap you told us at lunchtime!’

‘A friend,’ Meg said firmly. ‘And we’d better stop nattering and get on with this strawing, or Mr Potter isn’t goin’ to let me work in the garden again!’ And she liked working in Mr Potter’s garden. It was better than running upstairs every time Nanny rang her bell. Anything was better than being near the old biddy, who’d been in a right mood, earlier on.

‘You’re back,’ she had grumbled. ‘I thought you’d gone, Meg Blundell!’

A fine way to greet someone you hadn’t seen for two days and who’d brought up your lunch, an’ all!

‘Bad penny, that’s me!’ she’d said saucily. ‘And if you aren’t hungry I’ll take this tray downstairs again!’ She was starting the way she meant to go on, turning away to show she meant what she said! And the old girl had jumped to her feet like a two-year-old and grabbed hold of her lunch with a look like thunder on her face.

‘Give it to me, girl, and get out! And never, ever, give me backchat again! Remember your place here and that a word from me will get you dismissed instantly, and without a reference too!’

So Meg had got out of the nursery and drew in her breath and held it all the way down two flights of stairs and into the courtyard.

‘Ten!’ she’d gasped, thankful she had kept a hold on her temper, rubbing her hands on the roughness of the pump trough, remembering Ma, who knew all about Nanny Boag too. But maybe when Mark had been little, Nanny had been a nicer person, or why did Mrs John put up with her?

And so, remembering how desperately she wanted to stay at Candlefold, she had determined never again to let the old woman upset her, and no matter how much she might long to give her a piece of her mind, she would do as Polly said she should: turn her back, and walk away!

She tugged fiercely on an offending weed and wished with all her heart it could have been Nanny Boag’s nose!

Days were ticked off on Polly’s calendar; the strawberries swelled and Mr Armitage had thrown caution out of the window and taken a scythe to the grass on the brick house lawns because it was eighteen inches high and as good a crop of hay as he had seen this year. And wasn’t every forkful of hay needed for the war effort? And whose hay was it, anyway?

‘Now you’re supposed to leave that grass three clear Sundays,’ he told Meg, who had watched the sweeping strokes of his arm with fascination. ‘And it’s got to be turned every day so it’ll dry. Any good with a hayfork, young Meg?’

She had been obliged to admit she was not, but was very willing to learn if he would show her how. And so haymaking became another delight, with she and Polly turning an acre of grass twice a day. At first, her arms ached with the effort, then she began to look forward to their stealthy visits to the brick house lawns, each time wondering if they would be caught by the faceless ones on one of their visits.

‘So if They catch us at it, what can They do?’ Meg reasoned. ‘I mean – They only requisitioned the house, now, didn’t they? Surely nobody’s goin’ to make a fuss over a bit of grass?’

‘An acre of hay, actually. And I think that requisition covered the whole shebang, with the exception of the kitchen garden, Meg. But it’s drying beautifully. I reckon we’ll get it cocked and carted away before anyone from London finds out. Armitage says it’s good hay, and nice and herby; says a bit of neglect has done it the power of good, but don’t repeat that to Mr Potter, will you?’

‘I won’t. And had you thought, Polly, that by the time the hay is ready, Davie will be here on leave?’

‘I’ve hardly thought about anything else! Ten more days to go. And we mustn’t forget, Meg, that when the hay is loaded and carted off to the farm, we must wish very seriously as it goes by.’

‘Whatever for?’

‘Because you always wish on the first load of hay you see every year. Hay wishes are good ones, like first-swallow wishes. Hay and swallows have never let me down, so keep an eye open for your first swallow. They’ll be arriving any day now!’

‘Wouldn’t know a swallow if I saw one, Polly. You’ll have to show me.’

Mind, she was getting good with robins and tits and thrushes and blackbirds; especially with blackbirds since now she knew the difference between cocks and hens! Only give her a little more time and she would know as much about the countryside as Polly!

‘Bet I know what you’ll be wishin’ for,’ she teased, so happy that all at once she felt peculiar – like someone had walked over her grave – if she’d been dead and buried, that was. ‘And it’s OK! I know you can’t tell me, and I won’t tell you what I wish either!’

But her wish was there in her mind already, so that when she saw her first swallow of the summer and when the hay wagon trundled past, she would close her eyes, cross her fingers and say in her mind, ‘I wish to stay at Candlefold for ever, and live here till I die …’

They saw their first swallow next day as they fed and watered the hens. It came swooping and diving out of the sky above the drying green.

‘There you are, Meg. Wish!’

Eyes closed they wished tremulously, smiling secretly.

‘You’re sure it’ll come true?’

‘Always has, Meg, though now I always wish for the same thing – y’know, pile them all up so in the end it’s got to come true.’

‘A sort of long-term wish, like mine. An’ maybe when we load the hay there’ll be another one of the same, eh?’

‘Oh, yes! I do so miss Davie. There wasn’t a letter this morning, y’know …’

Meg had noticed. It was always the same, the no-letter look: sad and yearny, sort of.

‘There’ll be two tomorrow. Maybe he’s on manoeuvres.’

‘Maybe.’

‘An’ he’s out in the wilds with no pillar box.’

‘Probably.’

‘An’ I’ll tell you something else. This isn’t our lucky day, Polly.’ She nodded in the direction of two camouflaged trucks that swooped in from the lane to stop outside the far archway. ‘Wouldn’t you know it? That lot from London, on the snoop! What’ll they say when they see our hay? Just a few more days, an’ we’d have got away with it!’

‘No! It can’t be!’ Polly, face flushed with disbelief, gasped. ‘But it is! It is! Davie Sumner! Darling!’

Then she was running, laughing, to where two soldiers stood, dressed in battledress tops, khaki trouser bottoms bound by puttees, their brown boots shining. And the two of them grinning with delight at the upset they had caused.

With a cry of joy, Polly went into Davie’s arms, to stand close, cheek on cheek, not kissing, just glad to touch and hold, to fondle the back of his neck with her fingertips.

‘You weren’t expected yet!’ She closed her eyes and offered her mouth. ‘Davie – nothing is wrong …?’

‘No.’ He kissed her lips gently. ‘Leave next week.’

‘Then what? Why?’ She turned to hug her brother. ‘Meg, this is Mark.’

‘Mark,’ Meg whispered, offering her hand, feeling it tremble as Mark Kenworthy folded his own around it. And if he was good to look at in a silver-framed photograph, then standing there, warm and real, he was altogether too much to take in. And he looking down at her with eyes bluer than Polly’s, even; eyes that swept her from head to toes – slowly and deliberately so there could be no mistaking his approval.

‘Glad to meet you at last, Meg.’ He let go her hand to raise his cap in salute, all the time smiling as if he really meant it.

‘And this is Davie, my fiancé.’

Polly’s voice seemed far away and strange, like an echo, because something had hit Margaret Mary Blundell with such force that she recognized it as a very real boing! and knew that unless she held her breath and counted slowly to ten, she was going to do something very stupid, like falling in a delicious, disbelieving faint.

‘Davie …’ Meg murmured, knowing she should be liking what she saw – a happy grin, a fresh, freckled face, thick, untidy hair the colour of a ripe conker. But she was incapable of doing anything because the boing! was reverberating unchecked around her stomach and slipping and slicing to her fingertips and toes.

‘Well – come on, then – tell. Why are you here, and are you sure it’s nothing sinister?’

‘Nothing more than a thirty-mile detour on the way down to Burford Camp – in Wiltshire.’

‘You’re both being posted somewhere new, then?’

‘No. Going to collect a convoy of trucks and lorries, actually – escort them north,’ Mark supplied. ‘Fifty-three to be exact and all newly passed-out drivers. First time any of them will have done a long-distance convoy. And to add to the confusion, there are ATS drivers amongst them – women …’

‘And what is wrong with women?’ Huffily, Meg found her voice, stung to defend her own sex, and because she wasn’t going to let him get away with being so gorgeous nor play havoc with her insides without some show of protest, she glared as she said it.

‘Nothing at all. In their right and proper place ATS girls are a delight. But I don’t appreciate them in a long-haul convoy, Meg Merrilees. They’re just not built for driving heavy army lorries!’

‘No. I reckon they’d all rather be in their proper place at home, but a lot of them didn’t have much of a choice!’ Meg flung.

‘Now stop it, Mark! C’mon – let’s find Mummy!’

Polly took Davie’s hand, her happiness a delight to see.

‘Shall we?’ Mark indicated the archway with an exaggerated sweep of his hand.

‘Er – no, ta. I’ve got things to do – the hens, for a start.’ This was a family thing and she wasn’t pushing in. ‘And why did you call me Merrilees? My name is Blundell!’

‘You haven’t heard of Meg Merrilees?’ He was looking at her as if she were stupid.

‘No. Should I have?’

‘I’d have thought so. She was a gypsy, who lived upon the moors. It’s a poem!’

‘Oh. I see.’ She didn’t see, of course, because no one had taught her poems about gypsies. ‘Er – well – got to go. Nice meetin’ you,’ she added, remembering her manners.

‘Nice meeting you too. See you around. Bye, Merrilees!’

And he was gone, boots clattering on the courtyard cobbles, back straight as a ramrod. So sure of himself, she thought angrily; sure of his charm, the certain knowledge that his smiling gaze could charm the ducks off a pond! Likely he did that to all the girls he met, but it wasn’t goin’ to work with Meg Blundell – too right it wasn’t! Her insides were back to normal again. She was in charge of her emotions though she knew now exactly what Polly had meant about that boing! It had really been something – till she’d got the better of it, that was!

But for all that, her hand was just a little unsteady as she laid eggs as carefully as she was able in the bottom of the bucket. Meg Merrilees, for Pete’s sake! A gypsy, was she, because she couldn’t talk proper! Skittin’ her, was he?

Well, sod Mark Kenworthy, because he wasn’t gettin’ the chance to throw her into a tizzy again, she would see to that! Nell had been right. Likely he was no better than the rest of them, and out for one thing!

Well, she wouldn’t let him make a fool of her like some scally had made a fool of Ma! And anyway, would a feller like him, who could have any girl he took a fancy to, be interested in someone from a slum like Tippet’s Yard and who was illegitimate, an’ all? Bet your life he wouldn’t, so forget him, Meg Blundell; stick to your own kind!

Yet, for all that, she wondered if he could dance and remembered that Polly had said he could. Oh, heck! Imagine dancing with him. Close. It didn’t bear thinking about!

‘There you are! Where on earth did you get to, Meg? They’ve gone now, and you weren’t there to say goodbye! Mark asked especially; said I was to say so long to you – Davie, too.’

‘Ar, well, that was nice of them both, but I reckoned it was family, so I went to see Mr Potter, ask if he wanted anything doing. I heard them go.’ Such a hooting and laughing and crunching of tyres on the gravel drive, and she breathing a sigh of relief – or was it regret? – that they’d gone. ‘Less than two hours! Talk about a flying visit!’

‘Mm. They only had time for a sandwich. Mark looked in on Nanny, then went to sit with Gran, and Davie and I went to look at the hay at the brick house. Then we sat on the front steps as if we’d every right to be there, and talked and talked.

‘And I forgot to tell you! Mummy had a letter from a school friend this morning – they’ve kept in touch for years and years – and would you believe it, her daughter got married about a month ago. She sent a photo of the bride. Such a beautiful white dress with a full skirt and train.’

‘Don’t tell me. Bet she’s offered the lend of it!’

‘She has! Isn’t that lovely of her? And we are about the same height and build. She’s even offered her wedding shoes, which are size five, like I take.’

‘And will you mind being married secondhand, then?’

‘Of course not. And think of the coupons I’ll save. Davie and I were talking about it, and when he comes on leave we’re going to ask if we can get married before I’m twenty-one. It’s so awful, waiting, when we both know there’ll never be anyone else.’

‘I’ll agree with you there. You and him look good together. Made me a bit envious, wishin’ I was close to someone. But I haven’t met him, yet …’

‘So you didn’t like Mark? Surely you found him just a little bit attractive?’

‘Listen, Polly, your brother isn’t for the likes of me. I’d be a right fool, wouldn’t I, to let myself fall for him?’

‘Why would you? And I’ve told you before, you don’t let yourself fall in love; it just happens. Seems pretty obvious that you just didn’t like him. A pity, that, when I’d thought we could make up a foursome when they’re home and go to a dance somewhere.’

‘I didn’t say I didn’t like him, and I certainly wouldn’t mind going dancin’ with him – in a foursome. But I wouldn’t let it go any further than that!’

‘You’re a strange girl.’ Polly frowned. ‘You seem so set against being in love. Why, will you tell me?’

‘I’m not against it!’ Meg coloured hotly, because she had fallen for Polly’s brother, if that boing! had been anything to go by. But his sort would take advantage of her sort. Stood to reason that any feller as good-looking as he was would think girls were there for the taking. ‘I – I’ll know when I’ve fallen in love, and when I do you’ll be the first to know. I wonder where they are now.’

‘Going like the clappers to make up the lost time, I shouldn’t wonder,’ Polly smiled dreamily. ‘Such a lovely surprise. And by the way, what did you do with today’s eggs?’

‘Left them in the wash house – didn’t want to come to the house, like I said. I’ll get them for you.’

She hurried off, glad to be away from Polly’s questioning and from her own downright lies, because to think of Mark kissing her made her go very peculiar.

But thinking about it was all she would do, because kissing and all that was what got girls into trouble, and she was living proof of it!

Yet mightn’t it be nice to give it a whirl? Just the once? For the heck of it?

‘Especially not for the heck of it, Meg Blundell, if you know what’s good for you,’ hissed a voice in her ear that sounded remarkably like Nell Shaw’s.

‘Oh, damn and blast!’

She shook the voice away, gazing intently at ten brown eggs, wondering why all of a sudden life seemed to have become so very complicated.

It was Sunday – six days more to cross off on the calendar – and they worked for the best part of the day on the hay on the brick house lawns, gathering it into lines with three-foot-wide wooden hay rakes. The better the day, the better the deed, Armitage said, and since the war didn’t stop on Sundays, he could see no reason why they shouldn’t get it cocked and loaded and safe in the barn by evening.

‘Right! Are you ready?’ They stood side by side, eyes closed, fingers crossed as the load of hay bumped past them. ‘Wish, Meg …’

And though she had never felt so tired in her life before, and there was a blister on her hand, Meg knew she had never been so happy, and hoped with all her heart that her wish to stay at Candlefold for ever and ever would be granted. Oh, please it would!

‘Tomorrow, if anyone asks, I’ll be able to say that Davie will be home this week. Think of it, Meg; this week. Seven whole days to spend together.’

‘I’m goin’ to miss you when you go off to Oxford.’

‘No you won’t. There’ll be Mark around.’

‘So there will. But I’m here to work, remember, an’ I’ll be busier than ever when you’re away.’

‘So you won’t be going out with my brother, if he asks you – which he will!’

‘You think so? Oh, I don’t think he will – me bein’ a servant, I mean.’

‘You’re not a servant. You’re Candlefold’s home help, and I’d miss you if you left. It’s my guess he’ll ask you out once Davie and I have gone to Oxford. Don’t be so prim, Meg. Say you’ll go!’

‘He hasn’t asked, yet.’ Mind, it might be fun for the heck of it, whispered a voice in her ear nothing at all like Nell Shaw’s. ‘Let’s wait and see, shall we, Polly?’

It was then they heard the bell and ran laughing down the lane to the far archway, then across the yard to arrive breathless in the kitchen.

‘All safely gathered in. Armitage says there’s the best part of a ton, and all good stuff for the war effort, and I’m starving!’ Polly gasped.

‘Then off upstairs, the pair of you, for a wash. It’ll be on the table in two minutes. Roast rabbit, and gooseberries and custard for pudding. Away with you now!’ Mary Kenworthy smiled, feeling almost contented. Mind, there was always the war out there, ready to take all your waking thoughts if you let it, but on the credit side was a wagonload of good hay, and Mark and Davie coming home on Friday.

It was because of her relaxed mood that they decided to play gramophone records in Mrs Kenworthy’s room instead of listening to the nine o’clock news. Had they listened, maybe the shock of what Mrs Potter was to push through the letter box next morning might have been less acute. And since Polly always waited for the morning mail it was she who burst into the kitchen, eyes wide.

‘My God! Hitler’s invaded Russia! Go on – read it!’

‘Russia!’ Mary Kenworthy reached for her reading glasses. ‘Oh my goodness, let me see!’

The headlines in the Telegraph were large and unmistakable: ‘RUSSIA ATTACKED ON 1,800 MILE FRONT’. Agitated, she spread the paper on the kitchen table so they might read it together. ‘Yesterday, it was. Early in the morning. More than three million soldiers! And Mr Churchill was on the wireless last night. The one time we miss the evening news, and he’s on!’

‘It says he said we’d give Russia all the help we can; said he’d warned Stalin about it. Will our troops be sent there to fight?’

‘I – I wouldn’t think so, Polly. After all, we’ve never got on very well with the Communists, have we?’

‘But they are fighting Hitler now, so that makes them our ally!’

‘It says,’ Meg jabbed a finger, ‘that Mr Churchill offered any technical or economic assistance. There’s nuthink about sending troops.’

‘Oh, I hope not. And had you thought – Davie and Mark’s leave might be cancelled now?’

‘Darling, don’t upset yourself before we know what it’s all about,’ Mary Kenworthy soothed, ‘and I think we should spare a thought for the Russian people. It seems they’ve been terribly bombed and weren’t able to put up much resistance.’

‘Then Stalin should’ve listened to what Mr Churchill told him,’ Meg said matter-of-factly. ‘An’ if all Hitler’s soldiers and bombers are attacking Russia, they’ll maybe leave us alone.’ She remembered the seven-night bombing of Liverpool and was instantly contrite. ‘Mind, it isn’t very nice for them, gettin’ bombed.’

‘What shall we tell Gran and Nanny?’

‘I think we’d better switch on for the eight o’clock news, hear what the BBC has to say about it, then when we take up the breakfasts we’ll know better what to say.’

‘Gran’ll be all right, but how Nanny is going to take it is anybody’s guess,’ Polly shrugged.

‘Then it’s my guess that she’ll pull up the drawbridge and pretend none of it is happening,’ Meg offered.

‘So how about we get ourselves a cup of tea and a slice of toast and jam,’ Mary Kenworthy smiled brightly, ‘and listen to the news? Switch on, will you, Meg? Polly, cut the bread, please. And let’s all think how lucky we are safe here at Candlefold.’

‘And let’s hope them – those – Russians’ll give Hitler the shock of his life, ’cause he’s invaded whichever country he thought fit,’ Meg muttered. ‘About time someone stood up to him!’

Then she wondered what Nell and Tommy were thinking and saying about it back in Tippet’s Yard, and all at once she missed them and wished she could be with them – just for a little while …

Next morning low clouds blotted out the sun and not long afterwards it began to rain; drops the size of halfpennies making dark circles on the flags and cobbles of the yard.

‘Rain!’ Meg was dismayed, because it shouldn’t rain at Candlefold! Since she’d come here the sky had been blue, the sun constant. Now, all was gloomy and rain fell steadily. ‘It looks as if it’s set in for the day!’

‘We did need it, Meg. The ground was getting very dry.’ Mrs John said. ‘Armitage said that once the farmers had got their hay in, it could rain as soon as it liked.’

‘There’ll be no work done in the garden now,’ Polly shrugged, ‘so tell me what needs doing inside.’

‘If you wouldn’t mind, you and Meg can make up the beds ready for Mark and Davie, and give the rooms a clean – put out towels.’

‘If they come,’ Polly sighed, taking sheets from the linen cupboard.

‘Of course they’ll come. Give me one good reason why they shouldn’t!’

‘We-e-ll, Russia, for a start.’

‘Them Russians can look after themselves. Mr Churchill as good as said we wouldn’t be sending troops. But how about Nanny – sayin’ the Tsar would send the Cossacks in and soon put paid to the Germans?’

‘Nanny’s in another world. She just doesn’t want to know!’

‘So what would happen if everybody did the same, then? What if our lads in the Forces acted like she did? “Stick yer ’eads in the sand, lads! Pretend it isn’t happening!”’

‘Meg – don’t. It isn’t like you to be vindictive!’

‘All right! I’ll say no more! Let’s talk about Davie. Had you thought that when you wake up in the morning, there’ll only be three days to go?’

‘Go-to-beds, I used to call them. Y’know – how many more go-to-beds before Father Christmas comes.’

‘Then it’s four go-to-beds, and your Davie’ll be here and you’ll be wondering why you worried! Now chuck them pillows over, will you?’

‘Meg – don’t ever leave, will you?’

‘I won’t. And that’s a promise!’ A promise, she thought as she stuffed pillows into cases, she would do her utmost to keep. ‘Had you thought,’ she smiled, ‘that this rain will do the strawberries a whole lot of good – make them swell?’

‘So it will. You’re getting to be quite a country girl, Meg Blundell! Mind, enough is enough. If it rains too much they’ll rot, then Mr Potter will hit the roof. All our work wasted. Now, let’s get these rooms seen to, then we’ll have a chat with Gran. Being in bed watching it rain must be awful, and cold wet weather makes her joints ache more.’

‘Then we’ll try to cheer her up a bit.’ Meg liked Mrs Kenworthy, who was so grateful for even the smallest attention and hardly ever tugged on the bell pull at her bedside. And the old lady had remembered Ma, so it was almost certain she knew what had happened to her and even, Meg brooded, who the feller was. Yet Meg had insisted her mother’s name was Hilda and that her father died at sea, because she’d known instinctively the time had not been right for questions. Nor for answers either, because the Kenworthys might want to forget what had happened under their own roof twenty years ago, and all the upset it must have caused. ‘We’ve neglected her these last few days, what with the haymakin’, an’ all.’

‘Mm. But I enjoyed it, Meg. It was great stealing our own hay, and getting away with it, didn’t you think?’

‘Yes, an’ serve London right for nicking your ’ouse without a by-your-leave. We’ll do it again next year, eh?’

If she were still here, that was. If National Service didn’t catch up with her. If They said that helping to look after two old ladies and working sometimes in the kitchen garden to dig for victory wasn’t enough, and she had to go into the armed forces or get herself back to Liverpool to work in munitions. Big money to be earned there, but she didn’t want big money. A pound a week suited her very nicely and she wanted nothing to change.

‘Hey! You were miles away! Bet you were thinking about Mark!’

‘No, I wasn’t! I was thinkin’ about when I’m twenty and have to register. I don’t want to, you know.’

‘Nor me. When is your birthday, Meg?’

‘August the twenty-ninth.’

‘Goodness! And mine’s on the twenty-eighth, would you believe! Sometimes I wish I knew where I was born, but Mummy always says she was never told, that they got me from the Church of England Adoption Society, and they wouldn’t say. They don’t, you know. Where were you born, Meg?’

‘Lyra Street, Liverpool 3.’ The lie came easily to her tongue. ‘Mrs Shaw – the neighbour I’ve told you about – was there, helping the midwife, I believe.’

Lies, which led to more lies, and all the time wanting to say she had been born here at Candlefold.