Cousins at War (23 page)

Damn her, Neil thought. Was she being nasty or was she just being her usual sarcastic self? He would give her the benefit of the doubt. ‘Freda doesn’t try to take my mind off
anything.’

The softening of his voice told Olive all she wanted to know. He was either in love, or about to fall in love, and she’d have to do something to stop it. He hadn’t known Freda very
long, so the affair couldn’t have gone far yet, and with any luck she could do something to make sure that it didn’t go much farther.

When they came within sight of her house, she said casually, ‘Will we be going out again before you go back?’

‘I don’t think I’d better. My right leg seizes up when I’ve to sit for three hours at a time. I’m not as fit as I thought I was and I took Queenie to the Capitol
last night, as well.’

Not by one flicker of a face muscle did Olive reveal how she felt about this. ‘Thanks for tonight anyway, and remember, if you feel up to it, you’ll be welcome at the Den any
time.’

‘I’ll see how I feel. Goodnight.’ He held out his hand.

Things were looking bad, Olive mused, as Neil limped off. She had thought she had cooked Queenie’s goose for good, but he was still taking her out and now there was this new protagonist to
contend with, an unknown quantity. Freda was the real danger.

Feeling particularly down one afternoon, Gracie decided to pay a visit to her sister and was disappointed that Hetty was not alone. She had forgotten that Olive, like Queenie,
would still be on holiday, so they wouldn’t be able to speak freely.

‘Neil looked quite well when we saw him,’ Hetty smiled. ‘Have you heard from him since he went back?’

Olive tried not to show her interest. She hadn’t heard from him, but maybe his mother had. Gracie nodded. ‘Just the one letter, and he’s still getting on fine. He says his
leg’s very tired by the end of a day, but when he went back to the hospital for his check up, they said the exercise should help it.’

‘He was lucky to get off with a broken leg,’ Hetty observed. ‘He took Olive to the cinema, since he couldn’t dance.’

‘He took Queenie to the pictures, as well.’ Gracie felt she had to wipe the smug smile off her niece’s face. ‘He once said he went out with dozens of girls and I
wasn’t bothered, for I thought he wasn’t serious about any of them, but I’m beginning to have doubts about that now.’

‘Do you think he’s fallen for one of his girls at last?’

They were both astonished when Olive burst out, ‘If you think he’s fallen for that Freda, he hasn’t.’

Her scarlet face and the passion in her eyes made Hetty frown but Gracie said, very quietly, ‘Don’t be so sure about that.’

The girl jumped up and ran out, slamming the door behind her, and Hetty and Gracie looked at each other in dismay. Hetty was angry at her daughter for showing how she felt about Neil, and Gracie
was angry at Neil for apparently dallying with his two cousins’ affections. She was also worried in case he had gone a lot further than that with Queenie. . . and maybe with Olive, too, but
she couldn’t say that to Hetty.

When Gracie told Joe what had happened, he laughed, as usual. ‘So Olive’s still hankering after Neil? You’d think she’d have got the message by this time.’

‘She wouldn’t get the message supposing he told her to go to hell and never come back!’

‘I can’t see what she can do if he doesn’t want her.’

‘You don’t know her like I do.’ Gracie stopped, there was no point in trying to explain. ‘Joe, I’m sure Neil likes Freda and it doesn’t take much for liking
to develop into love, and love to develop into passion. He could end up having to marry her, and forced marriages never really work.’

Catching her husband’s look of exasperation, she changed her tune before he could say anything. ‘I just want him to be happy and I won’t try to stop him if he wants to marry
Freda. For one thing, it would put an end to Olive’s nonsense.’

Neil’s feelings for Freda had already developed beyond love; mere kisses were no longer enough, yet every time he was on the brink of unleashing his passion, his
conscience held him back. She was so innocent and pure that he couldn’t give in to the temptation, not until she gave him some sign that his advances would be welcome.

They had been keeping company – all it really amounted to – for three months when Freda remarked, ‘One of my friends is getting married next week.’

‘Oh, yes?’ Neil hoped that she wasn’t suggesting that they do the same – he wasn’t thinking of being tied down yet.

‘I can’t understand her. She was a nice girl, but she let her fellow . . . you know . . . and her father made him marry her.’

‘How did her father know he had . . . you know?’

Freda coloured, in spite of his broad teasing grin. ‘It . . . it was beginning to show.’

‘You mean she’s pregnant? What’s so awful about that? Even nice girls make mistakes.’

‘I’d never make a mistake like that. I’d never let any . . .’

‘It’s all in the luck of the draw. Some girls fall at the first fence, as you might say, and others get away with it.’ The subject was making Neil’s needs grow, and he
hoped that he could convince Freda that she would be in no danger if she allowed him to do what her friend’s ‘fellow’ had done.

‘But they shouldn’t be doing anything like that if they’re not married! It’s not nice.’

Neil couldn’t help laughing. ‘On the contrary, my darling, it’s very nice indeed.’

She looked horrified. ‘Have you . . .?’

‘Lots of times, but not since I met you.’

‘Did you love any of the girls?’

‘No, it was just a bit of fun, for them and me both.’

‘Did you make any of them pregnant?’ Her tone was harsh.

‘No, I knew what to do. Look, I’ll show you.’ He put his hand in his pocket and took out the small, flat envelope he had been carrying, hopefully, for weeks but she recoiled in
distaste. ‘Put it away. You’re filthy, Neil Ferris!’

A tiny seed of misgiving entered his mind, but he ploughed on. ‘I’m a man, that’s all. Like I said, those other girls were just a bit of fun, but I love you, and when two
people love each other, it’s natural for them to . . .’

‘But it’s wrong when they’re not married.’

‘It’s not wrong. Oh, Freda, please let me . . . I swear on my honour that nothing can happen.’

‘If you’re going to be like this,’ she said, icily, ‘don’t bother asking me out again.’

He fought back the urge to grab her, to force her down on the ground, but there would be no pleasure in it for either of them if she wasn’t willing. He had offended her sense of propriety,
but there were other nights, and he would work up to it in future, use all the tricks he knew that kindled a girl’s desires, and soon she would be offering herself to him . . . begging for
it.

Things had not been going smoothly for Olive during the day and she went home in a vile humour, ready to lose her temper at the slightest criticism. Fortunately, Hetty spiked
her guns by saying, ‘I put Neil’s letter on the mantelpiece. It came second post, but you haven’t been home since breakf –’

‘About time.’ Olive picked up the letter and took it up to her bedroom to read, her eyes lighting up at the first three words.

Olive’s depression had lifted several degrees now. Neil had admitted to thinking about her. Not in so many words, he was too shy, but if he had been remembering the old
picnics, he must have been thinking about her too. And another hopeful point, there had been no mention of Freda. Had she just been a flash in the pan?

Reading through the letter again, Olive devoured each word and lingered over the signature. ‘Yours, Neil.’ It was what she had longed for, it was as good as telling her he loved her.
He was on the right lines at last and it would only be a matter of time before he would come right out and say it. Perhaps she should give him a little help, since he found it so difficult?

‘Oh, Jesus!’ Neil dropped the letter he was reading as if it had scorched his fingers.

‘Bad news?’ Alf looked up from his own letter, the weekly epistle his mother always sent.

‘The worst!’ His friend’s sympathetic face made Neil carry on quickly. ‘No, it’s not what you think, it’s Olive again. She’s getting out of hand, really
she is.’

‘Don’t tell me she’s till pestering you? After me sinning my unsullied soul to make her think . . .?’

‘If you don’t believe me, read it!’

Alf bent to pick the letter off the floor, skimmed through it and whistled. ‘Short and sweet, but it sounds as if you’d made love to her at some time.’

‘She’s the last bloody person I’d make love to. I did kiss her once . . . maybe a bit too passionately, and she’s trying to make something of it. Her mother thought she
wasn’t getting over what you did to her and asked me to take her out till she found another lad and I didn’t like to say no, but I’m damned sure she’s no intention of
looking for anybody else. She wasn’t so bad for a while, but she’s off again. It looks like our little scheme didn’t work.’

‘Why don’t you take Freda home with you next time? You’ve been going steady with her for months now, haven’t you, and it would let Olive see you weren’t interested
in her.’

Alf jumped as Neil thumped his back. ‘That’s it! Good lad! You’ve saved my life.’

‘You should know by this time I’d do anything for a pal, even take over his cast-offs for a while. Now, will you give me peace to finish my mum’s letter?’

Neil sat back. He’d been a damned fool telling Olive he’d been thinking about the old picnics, that’s what had set her off again, but he’d been down in the dumps with
Freda being so cold to him. She was a little warmer now, though not warm enough, and, hopefully, if he got her away from her mother she might forget her fears. He really was serious about her. It
was entirely different from how he’d felt about Queenie, though that had been love, too, an innocent love where he hadn’t had to keep fighting down his desires. Not that he hadn’t
desired her, but the urge hadn’t been so powerful.

Thinking about Queenie reminded him of the letter he had written when he thought he was being sent abroad. When he started going steady with Freda, he had put it in his kit-bag, in case he
pulled it out of his pocket any time, and it might be a good idea to get rid of it altogether now. Making sure that Alf wasn’t looking, he rummaged through his things until he found it and
smiled tenderly as he read it. He had meant every word at the time, and he still felt something for her, but he had Freda now. What would she think if she saw this? Grimacing, he stood up and went
to the lavatory, where he put a match to the letter. It was safer not to have incriminating evidence lying about.

Gracie had worried all morning about how to tell her niece and as soon as Joe came home for his lunch, she burst out, ‘Neil’s taking that Freda home with him. What
am I going to do? It’s going to be an awful shock for Queenie, though she maybe doesn’t realise we know how she feels about him, and maybe it’s better to happen now rather than
have her keeping on hoping, for it wouldn’t have been right for cousins to marry, though if Neil hadn’t fallen in love with Freda, he wouldn’t have listened to what anybody
said.’

Her husband had raised his eyebrows at the unexpectedness, and length, of her speech, but it only proved how distressed she was. ‘Calm down, Gracie,’ he soothed. ‘Just tell me,
are you pleased about it, or no’?’

‘I don’t know myself and I wish I knew what this girl’s like. She could be common, for all we know, and not the kind of wife we’d like for Neil, but. . .’

‘Look, Gracie, if it’s her he wants for a wife, he’ll take her in spite of us and we’ll just have to accept her even though she’s as common as cat’s
shit.’

‘Ach, Joe!’

They both turned as Queenie walked in, and Joe said, ‘I’d better go to the lavvy before I take my dinner.’

Aware that he was giving her the chance to tell her niece on her own, Gracie felt obliged to get it over as quickly as she could. ‘Neil’s taking Freda home with him next
week.’

There was the merest pause before Queenie said, rather too brightly, ‘So she’s definitely the one?’

‘It looks like it.’

‘Well, I . . . just hope she’s good enough for him.’

‘That’s what I was saying to Joe.’

Joe’s return was a relief to both women, and Queenie kept up a steady stream of chatter until it was time for her to go back to the university. The lectures that afternoon were completely
wasted on her, but she did not allow herself the privilege of tears until she was alone late that night as Patsy was on night duty. There was no hope for her now she thought, mournfully. Neil was
bringing Freda home to meet his parents which could only mean that he intended to marry her. But . . . maybe Freda wouldn’t fit in. Maybe he would see her in a different light when he was in
his own home environment. Maybe there was still hope.