Darkest Before Dawn (32 page)

Seraphina had been standing on the opposite side of the room, facing the small kitchen window and tossing remarks over her shoulder, but now she whipped round and enveloped Martha in a fierce hug. ‘I'm sorry, I'm sorry,' she babbled. ‘It's all my fault. I'm hitting out before I'm hurt, being beastly to you because I'm worried about Roger and our marriage and the way I feel. I
do
love Roger, but I don't think I know him terribly well, and he's so handsome . . . and there are WAAFs on his station, lots of them . . . oh, Ma, I'm in such a muddle! I didn't know being married was like this and I want to go and see Roger but I don't know how to behave any more. I don't know what's right and what's wrong – not for married people, I mean.'

Martha returned her daughter's hug with one of equal fierceness, feeling a great weight roll off her shoulders. She chided herself for never attempting to explain the facts of life to her bright, intelligent daughter, but she had assumed that Seraphina would be as knowing as most modern girls appeared to be. ‘Darling Fee, between a man and his wife, nothing can be wrong,' she said firmly. ‘Well, nothing which is loving and gentle and kind, at any rate. He – he isn't violent, or anything like that, is he?'

‘No, no,' Seraphina said. She was weeping openly now, and pulled back from her mother's embrace to dry her eyes with the backs of her hands. ‘No, he's kind and good, honestly, Ma. It's just that I miss him terribly and worry that he'll find someone else . . . but now I've told you, I don't feel so bad. And I will go and visit him just as soon as I can. Oh, Ma, I feel so much better now I've told you.'

At this point, Evie came back into the kitchen. Presently Angie joined them and they took their places round the kitchen table to eat their meal. Martha noticed Evie eyeing her eldest sister shrewdly, but the child said nothing, and when Seraphina told her sisters that she had applied to join the WAAF and expected to be posted in a very short time, Evie and Angie were loud in their envy and Seraphina was soon laughing and joking, and explaining to Evie that this was the reason why she could not accompany her to visit the Duffys.

By bedtime that evening, Martha thought that her daughters were happier than they had been for some while. She went off to her room feeling that she had accomplished a good deal by talking frankly to Seraphina. She found herself hoping, however, that her eldest daughter would not be posted before Christmas. They had always been together over the festive season in the past, and she knew that Christmas would not be the same if her eldest were far away.

But if she had married in peacetime, she would have gone to her new home weeks ago, she reminded herself, snuggling her face into her pillow. So I suppose that is something I have to thank Hitler for. Smiling to herself at the thought of thanking the Führer for anything, she slept at last.

Evie was doing the marketing, accompanied by Percy who was getting excited at the thought of the festivities to come, for Christmas was only a few days away. Because of the shortages, Martha and Mrs Baldwin had given the children a list and told them to plug away until they had got as much as possible. Only then would the families know what sort of Christmas they would have.

Rationed goods, of course, would be available to everyone, albeit in tiny quantities; it was unrationed goods for which the two children were scouring the shops and the stalls on Great Homer Street and Paddy's market. Clothing was not rationed but was becoming more difficult to find and more expensive, so Martha had commissioned Evie to try to buy stockings for her sisters as well as anything such as scented soap, talcum powder or lipsticks so that she and Evie would have something to send Seraphina and Angela for Christmas Day. For Angela, fired by her sister's example, had joined the ATS, and since both girls were still in the early stages of training, they would not be home for Christmas.

‘Look, Evie! There's handkerchiefs for sale. Do you think our mams would like a couple? From us, I mean – you and me? Or have you already buyed something for your mam?'

‘I bought her a nutmeg and a bottle of rennet so she could make us a junket, but I did that 'cos I love junket,' Evie admitted. ‘And I got her five balls of pink wool off the woman in the market who buys up old jumpers and unpicks 'em. But a hanky would be nice; how much are they?'

‘Dunno; can't see,' Percy said briefly, then lowered his bullet head and charged at the people between himself and his objective. Evie clutched his belt and got dragged in his wake so that they ended up hard against the stall with the hankies barely six inches from them.

Percy shot out a hand to pick one up and the stallholder promptly leaned across and hit his knuckles with a handy coat hanger. She was a fat, hard-faced woman, wearing a black coat buttoned up to the neck, and a purple felt hat pulled well down over her narrow brow. ‘No thievin', you nasty little slummy,' she said hoarsely, and her breath clouded around her mouth in the cold air. ‘Them handkerchiefs is best cotton, not for the likes of you.'

Percy stiffened indignantly. He was wearing decent clothes in honour of the school holidays and rightly objected to being referred to as a slummy. But Evie, wriggling past him, glared up at the woman in righteous indignation. ‘Best cotton? They ain't even new; you've given 'em a good boil in your copper and then ironed 'em into squares,' she said scornfully. ‘And they's only plain white, norra border nor a bit of embroidery on any one of 'em. What's you charging?'

The woman's hard, mean little eyes flickered from Evie to Percy, then down to the handkerchiefs. ‘They're sixpence each and they certainly is new, brand new, so they're cheap at the price,' she said truculently. ‘
And
, I'm rationing 'em, only one to a customer.'

‘Oh aye? And I can see you've been havin' to fight buyers off,' Evie said sarcastically. ‘As for sixpence each, that's bloody highway robbery. Why, you'll be lucky to get tuppence. It ain't as if they're big; I reckon one good blow and you'd have to put it down for washing.' She turned to her companion. ‘C'mon, Perce; let's find a stallholder who ain't charging fancy prices for second-hand goods what's probably full of holes anyway.'

The woman swelled with indignation but both children, used to the ways of such women, stood their ground, and the stallholder, realising that these kids might really be customers, let her breath out in a great cloud of steam and rubbed her mittened hands together. ‘Well, I ain't denyin' they're a trifle second-hand,' she admitted cautiously. ‘If you was to buy two each, I dare say I could let you have 'em for tenpence a pair.'

Percy gave a crow of triumph. ‘You said they were rationed to one per customer,' he jeered. ‘Now you're sayin' we can have two. Make up your mind, missus.'

‘I can give a discount if you buys in quantity,' the woman said loftily. ‘But lower'n tenpence a pair I will not go, so you can make your mind up on that one. Now come on, you either want 'em or you don't, an' if you don't, clear orf, or I'll send someone to fetch a scuffer, 'cos you're makin' a bleedin' nuisance of yourselves.'

Evie gave Percy a delighted nudge. Whatever the woman might say, the bargaining had now begun, and since no other customers had shown the slightest interest in the handkerchiefs – indeed, there were no other customers – she thought they might well end up with the handkerchiefs they wanted at the price they meant to pay. ‘We only want 'em if the price is right,' she said grandly. ‘They ain't bad, but as I said, they's plain white.' She turned to Percy. ‘I think we ought to take a look at the rest of the goods afore we goes spendin' our dosh.'

The woman began to protest, actually bending down and spreading out the handkerchiefs for their closer inspection, and after ten minutes of brisk bargaining Evie and Percy left the stall with eight white handkerchiefs between them, which had cost them a shilling each.

‘Fruit and vegetables next,' Evie said cheerfully, heading for the area of the market which sold such things. ‘If you see a queue, we'll join it 'cos it might be for oranges. One of the girls at school – her father works on the docks – said they've unloaded a ship full of oranges. And you never know, someone might have some onions. Are there onions on your mam's list?'

Percy consulted his list, then nodded resignedly. ‘Yeah, an' carrots. Someone told me mam that if you grate carrots into cake mixture, instead of currants and sultanas and that, it tastes just as good. I don't believe it meself but she'll try anything will me mam.'

‘Yeah, so will mine,' Evie agreed. ‘An' Mam says to try to get hazelnuts or walnuts, 'cos you can crush them up an' stick 'em in the cake mix, an' at least they grows in England. But of course, we shan't be able to ice the cake even if our mams do manage to find enough stuff to make one. Oh look, there's a queue! C'mon, Percy!'

By four in the afternoon, the children's shopping was complete and they were making their way home, discussing the sort of Christmas that could be enjoyed in wartime. ‘Mam says if there are no more raids, she'll take us both to the pantomime at the Empire after Christmas. Mind you, I reckon there's afternoon performances . . . matinees they call them . . . so even if there are raids, she could take us to one of them,' Evie said, standing down her large canvas marketing bag for a moment, to ease the ache in her arms. ‘That 'ud be a treat, eh, Perce?'

‘I don't see what difference raids make,' Percy said, standing his own bag down. ‘After all, if a bomb's got your name on it . . .'

‘Yes, I know what you mean, but ever since the end of November, when all them folk were killed in the shelter out Wavertree way, Mrs Wilmslow has refused to leave the house when there's a raid on. It's awful awkward for Mr Wilmslow because he's a warden and Mam doesn't like to leave the old girl by herself, so she rushes me to the shelter and then rushes back to the Wilmslows'. Sometimes she persuades Mrs Wilmslow to get into that sort of cage thing . . . what's it called . . . but sometimes the old girl refuses to move from her bed. Then Mam has to run back to me in the shelter so's I'm not all on me own, but she worries that Mrs Wilmslow might need something. So you see, she wouldn't like to be away from home when a raid was on.'

‘You mean the Morrison shelter when you say that cage thing,' Percy observed, heaving his bag up once more and setting off along the crowded pavement. ‘Well, a mat'nee would be just grand.'

‘Yes it would; I love the pantomime,' Evie said, as they drew level with the end of Lawrence Street. ‘See you tomorrow?'

‘'Spect so,' Percy said. ‘I've still got to buy spuds so I reckon Mam will send me out again.' He chuckled. ‘She's that glad to have me back, you wouldn't credit it.'

‘So am I,' Evie said generously, though the return of the Baldwin young from the country, where they had been evacuated seven months ago, had put quite a strain on Mrs Baldwin and Evie's own mother had felt obliged to give the other woman what help she could. Mrs Baldwin had never got the knack of baking bread and cakes and such, and frequently turned up at the flat with some of her rations in a string bag so that Martha might show her, for the umpteenth time, how to do it.

The Baldwin children had come home because Mrs Baldwin had realised that Percy was old enough to get a job, and because Ron was so unhappy that he had started bedwetting. The children had been separated, as were many large families, and the woman who had the care of Ron and Emmy was a mean and spiteful spinster who disliked all children, and beat Ron almost as a matter of course at the slightest excuse. Percy's foster mother had been very different: a kindly, generous woman who fed him well and pleaded with Mrs Baldwin that her charge be allowed to stay, but Percy's mother had insisted that he return to Liverpool. Not only could he get a job, but he was a great help about the house. In Percy's absence, Evie had made other friends, girls of her own age, and though she would never have dreamed of admitting it to Percy, she frequently longed for the days when she and her school friends had shopped and gossiped together, gone round to each other's houses, and shared secrets. None of this was possible with Percy in tow, but Evie knew that her old friend needed her and did her best to explain to her girlfriends why she had to spend so much time in his company.

‘Evie! Evie Todd! Where's you been? Where's you goin', come to that? I hope you ain't too high 'n' mighty to walk along of an old friend!'

Evie stopped in her tracks and turned towards the speaker. Because she had been thinking of her school friends, she was doubly surprised to find herself confronting Lizzie Duffy, the eldest of Toby's sisters. The girl was in ATS uniform and had pushed her cap to the back of her head. She looked very different, but Evie knew her at once. ‘Lizzie! What on earth are you doing in Liverpool, queen? I knew you were in the ATS because Angie and me went up to your place last month to say cheerio to Toby, but I didn't know you were stationed near Liverpool.'

‘I'm not . . . well, not so's you'd notice,' Lizzie said cheerfully, putting up a hand to smooth her pompadour of light brown hair back into place. She was a pretty girl with hazel eyes, a great many freckles, and a wide unselfconscious smile. ‘I'm stationed just outside Blackpool – my, it's grand up there – and the ATS has taught me ever such a lot. I can type now, you know, and do bookkeeping and all sorts. I reckon that when the war's over I'll get meself a decent job . . . unless I'm married, of course, which I'm telling you is on the cards. I've got a real nice feller – he's a Tommy – but he was sent abroad when Toby went, so now it's just letters.'