Читать книгу Wave Me Goodbye - Ruby Jackson - Страница 9

Late May 1940

Grace had never experienced anything as miraculous as spring on a farm. The beauty that met her eyes in the following weeks amazed her. Tiny curled leaves that opened overnight to show their different shades of green, fat flower buds that unfurled to reveal beauty that almost made her weep. Massed primroses made way for daffodils, hyacinths and delightful wild flowers that she had never seen before. Blossom appeared on trees and in the hedges that separated the fields.

‘See them hedges?’ Hazel told her. ‘Every species of plant you’ve got in there shows you a hundred years in the life of the hedge. Look, know what this is?’ he asked, pointing to a slim branch.

‘No.’

‘Hazelnut, and that’s …? He pointed.

‘Holly,’ answered the delighted Grace. ‘And what’s the prickly one with the blossom, Hazel?’

‘May, Grace. Hawthorn,’ he added since she had looked so surprised. ‘And don’t ask me why it’s called May. Esau’ll know, probably; his wife knew a lot about flowers, but all I know is we called it May blossom.’

‘I think it’s because it comes out in May,’ Jack told her as they drove back from their next milk delivery. By the way, Lady Alice told me there’s a dance in the next village on Saturday night. She says we can use the milk lorry if anyone wants to go.’

The air became heavy with expectancy.

‘Well?’ he asked. ‘Does anyone want to go?’

Is he asking me to go? Grace wondered, and what should she say if he was? They were, by far, the two youngest people on the estate, although Lady Alice was scarcely ten years older. For a moment, Grace found herself wondering about her employer. She was very pretty. Still not too old and the only child of an earl: why was her ladyship still unmarried? Perhaps she had loved and lost, like Grace herself with Sam? Grace took control of her mind. You’re beginning to act out stories like Sally, she berated herself.

‘Where does Lady Alice eat, Jack?’ Much more down-to-earth than, ‘Does Lady Alice have a gorgeous boyfriend?’

Once or twice a week, Lady Alice joined the estate workers when they were gathered in the kitchen for a reviving cup of tea, but she did not join them for meals.

‘What’s that got to do with whether or not you want to go to the dance?’

‘Of course I’d like to go to a dance but that means you’d have to drive.’

‘Of course I’ll drive, if you’d like to attend. For heaven’s sake, woman, how many dates have you been on?’

Grace thought first of the mean little house in Dartford and then of her friends. ‘We all went out together, I suppose, to the church hall and the pictures. My friend Sally’s dad used to sneak us in sometimes.’

‘It’s possible that, by the time of the next dance, if there is one, you will be able to drive, Grace, or, if it’s in the summer, we might be able to get our hands on some bikes, but in the meantime, Miss Paterson, would you do me the honour of accompanying me, and anyone else who wants to come along, to the farm workers’ dance at the village hall?’

Grace longed to accept. The first time a man in whom she was … at all interested had asked her for a real date and she hesitated. How she longed to say, ‘That’d be nice.’ She smiled. It was definitely a real date, but what would he say if she told him, and she had to tell him for how embarrassing it would be when he found out in the middle of the village hall?

‘Has anyone ever told you that you have the most beautiful eyes?’

Beautiful eyes? No, no one had told her but she knew that her eyes were – quite nice. ‘Lady Alice?’ she repeated, since she had no idea how to reply. ‘We never see her eating?’

‘You are supposed to say, “No, Jack, you’re the first person,” or, “Every sensible man in Kent, Jack.” My dear Miss Paterson, you have to learn how to take a compliment. But, never mind, we have years for you to learn. Of course Lady Alice eats. Did you think the aristocracy didn’t? There’s another kitchen in the main wing of the house. That’s where I was the day Lady Alice asked me if I could drive. The housekeeper gave me some coffee while I was waiting.’

Grace was fascinated. She had wondered often about the condition of the beautiful house. There was a housekeeper. She had no real idea of just what a housekeeper did besides looking after the house, a bit like a housewife, she supposed. ‘I thought Mrs Love was the housekeeper.’

‘She looks after this wing. I think there are three servants in the main house: a housekeeper, and two housemaids. Most of the house has been mothballed for the duration.’

Grace’s overactive imagination suddenly produced a picture of the lovely old building completely covered in round white balls and she stifled a laugh. The memory of his words ‘My dear Miss Paterson’ did not make her want to laugh. She wanted somehow to hug the words to herself.

‘Are you in the ditches today, Jack?’

‘Trimming hedges.’ He sighed. ‘I do admire men like Hazel and Maurice; they know everything there is to know about farming. I can manage the work that only asks for brute force, even though it’s a strain, but the finer points … Sometimes I feel so unutterably stupid. They never lose patience when they’re with me but I bet they laugh their heads off in the pub.’

‘They wouldn’t laugh cruelly, Jack, and besides, you can save lives and they can’t.’

‘I was in the middle of the third year and so I would have a jolly good try, but I’m a long way from being a doctor.’

They drove on in a contented silence until they reached the back gates to the estate.

‘Up for a driving lesson, Grace?’

Grace’s stomach seemed to turn a complete somersault. A date and now a driving lesson. ‘I’d love it, Jack.’

‘I think Saturday morning will be the best time but I might be able to ask her ladyship if it’s fine if we try just after tea some evenings. Evenings are getting longer and it’s easier to learn in daylight.’

Grace looked again at her favourite view of the splendid house. ‘Jack, do you ever feel that there’s been some mistake and there isn’t a war on?’

He pulled the lorry up to the milking parlour before he answered. ‘No, I know only too well that there’s a war on. I listen to the wireless reports, and read the papers, but I think I know what you mean. Where are the battles, where are the German planes that were supposed to be bombing England into nothingness? Mind you, there are rumours that it’ll hot up in the summer. There is some rationing but we’re eating like kings, although Mrs Love did say things’ll change when the others arrive. And then those fabulous sausages we had that day, they’re from his lordship’s personal supplies; he’s augmenting our rations but that can’t go on for ever. And bear in mind, Grace, if this war goes on and on, as I think it will, practically everything we eat will be rationed.’

‘I didn’t know that.’ Grace remembered Lady Alice saying that, while living on this estate, she would learn more than how to poleaxe a pig. She fervently hoped that she would never be asked to poleaxe anything but she certainly was learning, not only about land management and animal husbandry but also about people. Valuable lessons.

‘Cheer up, Grace; you look sad. I’m very much looking forward to dancing with you on Saturday. Are you going to wear that pretty frock?’

She felt herself blushing and not only because he remembered the dress. ‘Yes, it’s the only one I have.’

They sat looking at each other for a few quiet moments. Then Jack opened the driver’s door. ‘We’d best get these churns washed or Hazel will be after us and, believe you me, he’s scarier than Lady Alice.’ With that, he jumped out of the lorry.

‘I can’t dance,’ she hissed after him.

He heard the hiss, stopped, turned round and laughed. ‘Of course you can. Relax, Grace, dancing is a natural animal mode of expression.’

‘An animal mode of expression. Thanks very much, Doctor.’ At least she had told him.

‘When my mother went into service, it took a regiment of servants to carry buckets of hot water upstairs for baths, Grace. People didn’t have a bath every day. Hot water straight from a tap is wonderful, isn’t it?’

Grace was on her way upstairs to take a bath before dressing for the dance. She certainly did not want to tell Mrs Love that there had been no running water at all in the house in which she grew up and so she merely agreed. To her surprise, Mrs Love kept beside her as they progressed up the stairs.

‘Spending quite a bit of time with young Jack, Grace. Not sure her ladyship would think that a good idea. A girl has to think of her good name, you know.’

Grace stopped in the middle of the staircase. ‘My good name. What do you mean?’

‘No need to get uppity. I have a responsibility. Until other girls arrive, you’re the only woman in a houseful of men.’

‘Harry and Jack hardly make up a houseful, Mrs Love. Besides, I never see them in the house, except at the table.’

‘I know that and you know that, but you’re going to a village dance tonight and the village doesn’t know that. Just be careful.’

Her joyful anticipation of a pleasant evening somewhat spoiled, Grace hurried past her.

‘I see you’ve had his wireless the past two days. That’s nice.’

Grace longed to say that listening to the wireless was more interesting than listening to Mrs Love but she restrained herself. Jack had handed her the wireless in full view of the assembled farm workers. Seemingly, Bob Hazel had taken a larger wireless out of an uninhabited cottage a few days before and had put it in the men’s dormitory. Jack had loaned his much smaller one to Grace; there was nothing more to it than that. Surely, Mrs Love knew that.

She switched on the radio when she reached her room. How cheering it was to hear music and the evening news, although she would not be hearing that this evening. She would be dancing. A recording by the great Joe Loss and his band was playing as she took out her frock – she’d removed the tie – a carefully reserved pair of stockings, not silk, and her sole pair of elegant shoes. In a few weeks, Grace, who had assiduously saved what remained of her pay after the amount for her food was taken off, intended to buy white sandals for the summer. For the first time in her life, she had a little money of her own and could buy whatever she wanted. So far, clothing was not rationed but probably would be, like everything except those foods classed as non-essentials. Clothes rationing was ‘only a matter of time’. She went off to the bathroom, thinking how perfectly the white sandals she could see in her mind would look with the green frock. Perhaps Jack would ask her to walk out with him. She could see them, hand in hand, walking along beside one of the streams on the estate, her new sandals startling white against the green grass …

No, Grace, don’t rush, she told herself, and stepped into the lovely hot water.

To her surprise, and slight disappointment, Harry and Esau had both decided to go to the dance. Esau said that he looked forward to an evening of company with farm workers he knew from the area, and Harry, who assured Grace that he would not ask her to dance with him, was looking forward to live music.

‘I were listening to that Joe Loss while I shaved. That’d be a turn-up for the books if bands like his was to play for us.’

‘He won’t be in the village hall tonight, Harry; you’ll have to make do with an old joanna, a fiddle and a squeeze-box,’ Esau said laughing.

Grace, who was more accustomed to records played in the church hall, thought that the three musicians that evening were superb. ‘We had local bands in the church hall sometimes, Jack, but I don’t think any of them were as good as this.’

The hall was absolutely packed with people of all ages, even fairly young children, and a brave attempt had been made to decorate it with such spring flowers as were available. The three-piece band was playing lustily and, while the others found a table, Jack took Grace onto the floor to dance.

It was some time since Grace had even attempted to dance but, to her great surprise, she was delighted to find that she could move easily with Jack, who was obviously an experienced dancer.

Of course. Jack was a university student. Students probably went to dances, if not every night, at least on Fridays and Saturdays.

‘At your university, Jack, were there dances every night?’

‘Work hard, play hard, Grace. Dancing’s a great way to relax, don’t you think?’

‘I haven’t been to many dances,’ she said.

‘We’ll have to remedy that. You just need more experience to become a good dancer; honestly, you have a great sense of rhythm.’

Great sense of rhythm. She had heard those words before. Who had said them? Sally. It was Sally Brewer and she had been talking about Sam. Grace closed her eyes and conjured up a picture of Sam, but the picture did not want to form. She was here in Bedfordshire with Jack Williams, who thought she was pretty. Without regret, she felt the dream of Sam float away.

Sam will always be special, she thought, but this is different. That morning, she had had her first short driving lesson with Jack, who was nothing like Sam. Jack was not quite so tall as Sam, and he was more slender, but she was delighted to find that, like Sam, he was kind. He seemed to know that she was nervous and spoke quietly and approvingly. She felt herself respond to him. Such joy not to be shouted at, not to be found wanting. For a second, sitting there beside him in the lorry, she had wanted to push his slightly too long dark hair out of his brown eyes but had managed to control her hand. She blushed now at the memory. How forward that would have been. What would he have thought?

He had noticed her blush. ‘It is a bit hot,’ he said, ‘and Lady Alice says we’re supposed to mingle with the locals. Besides, I can see lots of lads who want me to break a leg so that they can dance with the prettiest girl in the hall.’

Grace, aware only of Jack and the music, looked around the room. Yes, several men were looking in their direction. ‘They want to be able to dance like you, Jack.’

He laughed. ‘Believe me, that’s not it. We’d best join the others.’

With a final flourish, he steered her across the room to the table where their friends were. There was beer and cider to drink, and plates of tiny sandwiches were on all the tables. The empty glasses on their table, the crumbs and a crust or two showed just what a good time was being had.

‘Is this what’s called height-of-sophistication party food, Jack, lad?’ asked Harry, pointing to the few tiny sandwiches that were left.

‘In wartime, yes.’

‘You were right about the music, Grace,’ said the very happy Harry, as he lurched to his feet. ‘Anyone ready for another beer?’

He ambled off and was soon seen standing in a corner near the stage, drinking his second beer and tapping his foot to the music.

‘Is he all right?’

‘He’s a responsible adult, Grace. Esau, are you sure you don’t want to dance or join some of your old friends?’

‘Benefit of age, lad; they’ve been over while you two were dancing.’