Bells of Bournville Green (12 page)

‘So tell us all about yourself, Greta,’ Mrs Franklin said when they were still on their first pikelet. She leaned forward in her chair, with keen attention.

Greta swallowed. ‘Well, I work at Cadbury’s,’ she said, barely above a whisper.

‘You’ll have to speak up, wench,’ Mr Franklin said, a hand behind one ear. ‘My hearing’s not what it used to be.’

‘Your mother works there too, doesn’t she?’ Mrs Franklin continued her interrogation.

‘Yes,’ Greta agreed. She was starting to feel a slight itching in the corners of her eyes and put her plate down to try and rub them without smudging her makeup.

‘I’m in my twenty-fifth year with the company,’ Mr Franklin said proudly. ‘I joined in ’37, when I’d done my apprenticeship in machine tools, and I was there all through the war when it was made over to Bournville Utilities for the war effort. Course, that’s when I met Rita . . .’

‘I came down during the war of course – from Burnley . . .’

Mr Franklin took up again. Greta looked from one to the other as if they were a double act. ‘I said to Dennis as he was growing up, Dennis, you want to get an apprenticeship at Cadbury’s – it’ll set you up for life. Michael should’ve done the same of course – he’s our older boy, but he wanted to go into the motor trade. Still, he’s done well for himself . . .’

‘Oh, he has that. . .’ Mrs Franklin chimed in.

‘And I’ve had my finger in a few other pies as well. You have to learn how to invest wisely, that’s what I tell our Dennis . . .’

Greta soon realized that she was not going to have to tell them anything more about herself because the Franklins were quite capable of talking for the whole of teatime about their family: Michael and his wife and two children, and Dennis’s sisters, Angela, the eldest of the family, and her three, Maggie and the new baby, about Lorna, the frosty young woman upstairs who was training to be a nurse. Dennis sat smiling at this catalogue of successes, and Greta listened politely, eating and feeling inadequate and all the while feeling the itchiness in her eyes grow worse and worse. She was finding it difficult to concentrate. More than anything she wanted to rub furiously at her eyes.

She dragged her attention back to Mr Franklin, who was now telling her about the caravan they kept parked out beyond Redditch.

‘Nothing like it, getting into the country of a weekend – out in the fresh air, good long walks and no one else to please. We all go down when we can, Lorna, all of us – in the fairer weather of course. Marvellous.’ Mr Franklin sipped his tea.

‘Yes, that must be nice,’ Greta said, desperately blinking to try and clear her agonized eyes. She looked at Dennis, hoping he would notice she was in trouble, but he was watching his father, eyes shining with pride. For a moment he glanced at her and smiled, as if to say, see, I told you my family is special.

‘You’ll have to come out with us one weekend,’ Mrs Franklin said. Once more, this was an order more than an invitation. ‘We know how to show people a good time. You’d love it.’

‘That’d be nice,’ Greta said politely, half repelled, half attracted by their absolute belief in themselves. ‘I expect I would.’

Then, unable to stand the terrible itching any more, she put her plate down and rubbed at her eyes one by one, hoping desperately that she wasn’t rubbing mascara and eye-liner all over the place. Mr Franklin was talking about the difficulties of towing caravans.

‘What you don’t want at any price is them fish-tailing,’ he was saying.

Greta, with tears beginning to spill down her cheeks, shot a desperate look at Dennis, who at last paid her some attention.

‘What’s the matter, Greta?’ He jumped up. Suddenly everyone was watching her. ‘Has something upset you?’

‘Gracious!’ Mrs Franklin cried. ‘Whatever’s the matter?’

‘Nothing – I’m not upset – it’s just my eyes.’ She was screwing them up, trying to ease the dreadful irritation. ‘They’ve gone all itchy – I don’t know why.’

‘That’ll be the cat,’ Mrs Franklin said. ‘Oh good heavens, I never thought! You should’ve said you were sensitive that way! None of us are, you see.’ She made it sound like a weakness. ‘Fifi, get off, you naughty girl! Now you come with me, love, and we’ll bathe your eyes.’

She led Greta upstairs to a very smart, clean bathroom with blue lino on the floor and a woven white rug over it.

‘Here – cotton wool. Let’s get plenty of water on them to ease them. Oh dear – you should’ve said, love.’

‘I didn’t know,’ Greta said, in immense relief at the feel of the water on her burning eyes. ‘I don’t have much to do with cats, you see.’

Mrs Franklin fussed round her and was kind and motherly and Greta warmed to her a little more, though she still found her intimidating. Dennis and his father fussed over her when she went downstairs. They even got Lorna to come and check if there was anything seriously wrong.

‘She’s a nurse, you see,’ Mrs Franklin said proudly.

Lorna’s piercing blue eyes stared into Greta’s for a moment. ‘No – she’ll be all right,’ she said. ‘Have you washed your hands? Yes, well don’t touch your eyes again.’

‘I’m sorry to be such a nuisance,’ Greta said, mortified.

‘Not at all – now you sit down and I’ll make another cup of tea,’ Mrs Franklin said. ‘You still poring over your books up there, Lorna? She’s still at her books, Bill,’ she informed her husband.

They fussed over her so much that Greta was amazed. She had never known a family who seemed to be so much all over each other. Everything anyone did had to be remarked on by everyone else and chewed over. But they did take care of her and that felt very nice.

When Dennis said he’d walk her home there was a great to do about getting home before it was dark and did she need to borrow any boots? At last they stepped out into the dusky afternoon.

Dennis turned to her, beaming. ‘So – you’ve met my family. Marvellous, aren’t they?’

Greta smiled, gratefully. At that moment they did seem rather marvellous, and things hadn’t gone too badly despite her reaction to the cat. And she’d fixed on Dennis, she knew that now. He made her feel as if she’d been invited into a magic circle. ‘Yes. They’re very nice,’ she said. Of course they were! ‘Sorry about all the fuss.’

Dennis squeezed her hand. ‘Don’t you worry. You were in the best hands. Now – my turn to come to yours for tea next, eh?’

Chapter Fourteen

The freeze went on and on. In February, a thirty-six-hour blizzard hit the West Country, and villages and farms were cut off by gale-force winds and twenty-foot drifts. Sheep and cattle starved in the fields and barns. Later in the month, a massive snowfall hit the northwest of the country.

Birmingham, though more sheltered, was still buried deeply. The streets had to be ploughed or shovelled almost daily. Pipes burst, coal in the factory stores froze so hard that it had to be loosened with steam jets and hacked out by pickaxes. Though everyone got browned off with it all pretty quickly, there were compensations.

‘Have you seen the Girls’ Grounds?’ Pat said one sunny morning, arriving at work rosy-cheeked and smiling broadly. ‘It’s just a wonderland – absolutely beautiful!’

Greta was glad to find any chance to get out of home, and there were socials still laid on at Rowheath, the Cadbury recreation grounds. In the evenings there was skating under floodlights and she and Dennis went sledging. She perched behind him on a sledge, her arms round his waist, and they both laughed and screamed, whizzing along and just managing not to fall off at the bottom. They stood in the freezing evening, amid crowds of people enjoying themselves and clouding the air with their breath.

‘Shall we have some chestnuts?’ Dennis said.

The chestnuts were roasted on coke braziers and they stood savouring their delicious singed taste, watching everyone enjoying themselves and tapping their feet to music from the loudspeakers and smelling the tantalizing whiff of hot dogs and fried onions from another stall. Dennis put his arm round her and Greta snuggled up to him. She felt proud that he was claiming her as his girl. She looked up at him and he smiled, and popped his last chestnut into her mouth.

‘Warm enough?’ he asked, protectively.

Greta nodded. ‘Just about.’

‘We don’t want you getting cold. Shall we go soon?’

She nodded gratefully. It was a long time since she’d been able to feel her feet. Dennis was considerate like that, she thought. He took notice of things. Not like at home, where no one seemed to notice her at all.

On the bus, which crawled slowly along, Dennis kept his arm round her. They had been out and about together, a drink here, a visit to the pictures there. Dennis had liked the book she gave him, and one day when they were in a coffee bar, warming their hands round the cups, she’d talked about
Bonjour Tristesse.

‘It was sad,’ she said. ‘She was very close to her Dad and he was about to get married. She didn’t like it – well, in a way she did like it, that was the sad thing, ’cause she liked the woman he was going to marry – but she just mucked it up for them . . .’

‘Why?’ Dennis frowned.

Greta thought about it. ‘She was always pulled this way and that, inside herself, I mean – wanting one thing and doing another – as if she had to do the opposite of what was really going to make her happy.’

Dennis frowned. ‘Seems pretty daft to me,’ he said.

Greta watched his face. She knew he hadn’t a clue what she was on about. She drained her cup and put it down.

‘Maybe it’s not your sort of book.’ But she knew she’d understood it, even if he didn’t. And it made her want to read more books.

The thing she couldn’t work out was whether Dennis really fancied her or not. He said he did, but apart from kissing her hello and goodbye, he held off. It wasn’t what Greta was used to. Other lads had always been pushy, forever wanting kisses, hands trying to find their way to places they shouldn’t. Dennis is a gent, she told herself. But in a way she felt rejected and was confused by it. Didn’t he want more? And if he did, why didn’t he show it? Sometimes he felt almost like a brother. She didn’t want to seem loose but she expected him to want her. She knew he was well brought up and thought he was too shy. Maybe he needed her to make the first move.

One night when they had been out for a drink together, sitting pressed close together in the warm pub, they came out into the icy street and Dennis put his arm round her, as usual.

‘Can’t have you slipping over, can we?’

Greta giggled. ‘You don’t want me turning into a fallen woman, you mean?’

‘Steady on – that’s not exactly what I meant,’ Dennis said, though from his tone she could tell he had a twinkle in his eye and it encouraged her.

As they came up the hill and under the darkness of the railway bridge, she stopped him.

‘Oh Dennis – I don’t want to go home yet. . .’

‘What’s wrong with home?’ he asked, teasingly. ‘You don’t seem very keen to invite me in.’

‘I mean, I want to stay with you.’

She reached up and put her arms round his neck, drawing him towards her. ‘Give us a kiss.’

She heard him give a faint chuckle in the darkness and he held her in his arms. ‘There’s an invitation,’ he said. ‘Oh, Gret – you’re lovely, you are.’

He kissed her on the lips, enthusiastically but also politely. Greta remembered the urgency of Trevor’s kiss. But Dennis was much more of a gent, she told herself. She gave a little moan of pleasure. She wanted Dennis to be fiery, to
want
her. She wasn’t sure what she’d do about it then. She hadn’t thought that far, but she wanted to make something happen.

As she and Dennis kissed, she pressed herself against him, and she could feel that he was aroused. It made her feel excited and powerful. He did want her!

‘Ooh, Dennis,’ she murmured, hardly thinking what she was saying. ‘Let’s go further . . . Let’s find somewhere to go . . . I want to go all the way with you.’

The second she spoke she felt Dennis’s arms slacken. He pulled back and there was a long, horrible silence. She couldn’t see his face in the darkness.

‘What’s up?’ she whispered eventually.

He let go of her completely then and spoke to her, gently but firmly. ‘I’m shocked, frankly, Greta. I didn’t have you down as that sort of girl. You know – fast, like that. I mean, we’ve got to get this straight. I don’t hold with that sort of thing. My Mom and Dad, they courted for nearly six years before they got married. They were young, and they never . . . Well, I mean, they waited. They did the decent thing. And that’s what I intend to do. That’s the proper way to do things, in my book.’

Her cheeks were blazing, if he could have seen, and she felt cheap and dirty and utterly mortified.

‘I’m sorry, Dennis,’ she said, tearfully. ‘I just got a bit carried away.’

‘Well, I know it happens,’ he said stiffly. ‘But let’s not let it happen to us, all right love? You’re worth more than that.’

This thought filled her chest with a bursting ache, and the tears spilled silently down her cheeks.

‘Come on now,’ Dennis said, as if he was a teacher and she a wayward six-year-old. ‘We’ll forget about it. You’re a lovely girl, so let’s not hear any more of that, all right? Let’s get you home now.’

Her embarrassment stopped her tears and she wiped her cheeks in the dark. On the doorstep he gave her one of his polite kisses.

‘Goodnight, love.’

‘Goodnight, Dennis.’ She wondered again why he had anything to do with her.

And then he said, ‘Remember, you’re lovely. You’re a bright girl. You just need a bit of guidance.’

She watched him walk away again, tears in her eyes at being called lovely, yet wild with rage, like a child after a telling off.

Two weeks later she went up to her room at home, desperate to find a place she could be on her own. It was March now and the thaw had come at last. Icicles and snowmen which had hung around for weeks were finally seeping away. Lumps of ice lay stranded on bigger and bigger patches of emerging green. But at home there was no let-up in the stifling atmosphere.

She sat on the bed, in the small space between the cot and the folding bed. The room was full of a slightly sweaty-smelling clutter of Marleen’s clothes, stockings draped over the chair, and baby things all over the bed. Through the floor jarred the sounds of Marleen snapping at Mary Lou as she had her tea. Marleen had stopped feeling sick now, but it hadn’t eased her temper. It was worse if anything, now she had no sickness to distract her from her fury at the fact she was pregnant again. All she wanted now was to be out gadding and not tied down by babies.