Daughters Of Eden: The Eden Series Book 1 (53 page)

Scott spotted Poppy the moment she came into the hall, although he could hardly miss her, as she was in a bright yellow dress with her mane of still blonded hair piled high. However, he barely even managed a greeting to her, let alone to her friends, before whisking her off to dance.

‘
Jeepers creepers
,' he began to sing lustily as he danced her round the floor. ‘I just love this tune! And the way you look! You are just purely
ravishing!
‘

Poppy laughed. The terror of the last few weeks evaporated as couple after couple passed them, everyone suddenly in explosively carefree mood.

‘Will you teach me to dance, Marge?' Billy asked, as Kate, Marjorie and he wandered over to a bar set out on a long trestle table to get some refreshment. ‘I really think I should learn how to dance.'

‘Knowing you, Mr Pick it up Quick,' Marjorie replied, ‘one lesson and you'll be treading the light fantastic as if born to it.'

‘I don't think so,' Billy said gloomily, watching Scott and Poppy float by. ‘Looks too bloomin' difficult to me. Think I'll learn the drums instead.'

Taking a bottle of Mrs Alderman's home-made pop he wandered off to the bandstand where he stood earnestly studying the soldier drummer's great expertise.

‘Wonder how many more Christmases the war will last?' Marjorie said, as she and Kate sat down at one of the tables that had been set around the dance floor, lit by a candle in a jam jar.

‘No, Marjorie,' Kate scolded her. ‘We agreed – no talk of war. It's the party rule.'

‘I don't remember agreeing to that, Kate.'

‘You do now,' Kate smiled, then raised her glass. ‘Happy Christmas. And an even better New Year.'

As they toasted each other, Major Folkestone appeared, almost unrecognisable out of uniform,
immaculate in black tie, and with his hair even more carefully creamed and parted than ever.

‘If you ladies will excuse me, I wonder if I could have the pleasure of this dance?'

Marjorie nodded to Kate that it would be perfectly all right for her to go and dance, only to find Kate smiling back at her.

‘I'm sorry, Marjorie,' Major Folkestone said. ‘I meant you. I'm sorry. I should have said. Please forgive me.'

Marjorie frowned and then stood up.

‘Yes, of course. I was day-dreaming. So sorry.'

‘If you'll excuse us, Kate,' the major said, before dancing away with Marjorie in strictly orthodox fashion.

The band was now playing ‘A Foggy Day In London Town', a slow foxtrot, rather than the hectic quickstep of ‘Jeepers Creepers'.

‘I'm not too bad at the slower ones,' Major Folkestone told Marjorie, trying to sound chatty. ‘But do for heaven's sake, if you suffer any toe injuries, remember no radio silence.'

‘You dance very nicely, Major,' Marjorie replied. ‘If anyone's toes are in danger it could well be yours.'

They danced a full circuit of the floor in silence.

‘I find it tricky talking while I dance.'

‘I find it practically impossible, Major.'

‘So why don't we just dance, Marjorie? And perhaps talk later?'

‘That would suit me really well, Major,' Marjorie said, a vague look of cheek in her eyes. ‘That way I can keep count of the steps.'

*     *     *

Kate had slipped out on to the front steps of the house. It was a bitterly cold night with a frost already forming and she hadn't been out there longer than a minute when she began to regret her excursion. But rather than lose face by returning straightway through the very doors she had just come out of, she took herself round the front of the house and let herself in through the Orangery.

As soon as she was safely inside the superb glasshouse she stood rubbing the tops of her bare arms to get warm. She stopped as she smelt a familiar aroma, turning to see a curl of blue smoke rising from behind a magnificent tropical-looking plant with huge shining leaves.

‘Eugene?'

‘The very same. Is that you, Kate?'

‘Are you drunk? You sound drunk.'

‘I don't think I remember ever being quite sober. Thank the Lord.'

Kate stopped, wondering whether to go and confront him, or simply sneak away and hope that he was drunk enough not to remember having seen her. But that would look as if she was afraid of him, which she most definitely was not. Which was probably why she found herself standing in front of Eugene, who was sitting slouched in an old cane armchair, cheroot clamped between his teeth and a glass of whisky in one hand.

‘Where have you been, Eugene?'

He stopped her, raising his hand.

‘Why didn't you tell me about your brother?' he demanded, looking up at her with a slow sad shake of his head.

Kate stared at him.

‘Why should I?' she finally replied, shaking her own head back at him. ‘Why should I have told you?'

‘Because you should have, that's why.'

‘You never met Robert. You didn't know him.'

‘I have met you, Kate. I know you.'

‘You didn't know how I felt about my brother.'

‘I should have treated you differently, had I known.'

Realising what he meant, Kate sat down opposite him and put one hand on his knee.

‘Are you trying to say—'

‘I'm not trying to say anything, Katie,' he interrupted. ‘I
am
saying. I feel, I feel – I have taken advantage of your plight.'

‘You can't take advantage of someone if you don't know the state they are in.'

‘Which is why I
should
have known.'

‘Actually, if you really want to know, if anyone took advantage of anyone, then it would have been me.'

‘Are you sure?'

‘Quite sure. Now, come on, let's join the party. No more getting lachrymose – this little lady wants to dance.'

Eugene stood up slowly, put his glass down on the table by his chair, looked at Kate carefully and tenderly put his arms about her.

‘Can't I have a go?' Billy asked the drummer yet again.

‘No, kid,' the soldier replied firmly. ‘Sorry.'

‘But why not?'

‘Because you can't play.'

‘How do you know?' Billy protested. ‘You haven't given me a go.'

‘Afterwards perhaps,' the soldier said with a grin. ‘OK. At the end. Afterwards. Maybe.'

‘After what?' Billy demanded. ‘The set? The party?'

‘The war,' the soldier laughed, crashing his cymbal. ‘And then only maybe.'

Marjorie came to the rescue. The soldier gave her the eye.

‘I'm almost tempted to let him have a go, so that I can dance with you.'

‘Oh please?' Billy cried, hopping on the spot. ‘Please dance with him, Marge! Then he'll let me play.'

‘Trouble is the other guys will kill me!' the soldier called, as the music grew louder. ‘Maybe later? One of the slower numbers? That don't need me.'

‘Maybe!' Marjorie called back. ‘And then maybe not!'

Scott and Poppy stopped by Marjorie, no longer dancing.

‘Look after Poppy?' Scott asked, on the move. ‘I have to fetch something!'

‘Billy wants to learn how to dance,' Marjorie told Poppy with a hidden wink.

‘I don't,' Billy grumbled. ‘I want to have a go on the drums.'

‘Tell you what,' Poppy suggested. ‘To see if you have rhythm or not, why don't you dance with me? Then if you have got rhythm, perhaps Marjorie and I will be able to persuade this nice man here to let you have a go.'

Poppy bestowed her best smile on the soldier, who was busy signing triplets on his side cymbal. He was so overcome he missed the next beat. By now Poppy had hold of Billy and was showing him the basic dancing position before carefully and skilfully dancing him off round the floor.

Someone tapped Marjorie on the shoulder. Still with half an eye on Poppy and Billy, who had his head down to watch where he was putting his feet, she looked round and saw it was Lily.

‘Have you got a moment?' she wondered. ‘I'd like a word.'

Marjorie eyed her. They had hardly exchanged a word since Robert's funeral, preserving only the niceties when their paths crossed, but avoiding contact of any deeper significance.

‘I had promised the next dance to Major Folkestone,' Marjorie replied, after what she hoped was a telling pause.

‘Please?' Lily said. ‘It won't take a moment.'

Overhead, thousands of feet up, the stricken Dornier DO17, nick-named the Flying Pencil because of its long slender fuselage, was limping its way back to base after yet another night raid. The crew were flying their seventh mission, the lucky mission their captain had called it – number 7 would bring them all home safely. They were a crack bomber crew, singled out by Goering himself for their accuracy and for their unblemished record
.

But number 7 wasn't so lucky for them after all – not that night. Their run of luck ran out on the approach to their target. As their squadron entered the mouth of the Thames to home in on London they were attacked by a
flight of high-flying Hurricanes, under the command of the famous daredevil Jimmy Richardson, who, although severely wounded by cannon shells that had ripped into his cockpit, stayed at his controls long enough to hit and take out one of the Dornier's twin engines before finally bailing out, landing in the seas far below which at once and mercifully put out the fire that had all but burned up his flying suit
.

Aware of the seriousness of the damage to his craft, the Dornier's captain at once ordered a return to base, knowing that to continue would be to sign his crew's death sentence. Stabilising the aircraft as best he could once he had turned tail, he realised that if the benign flying conditions prevailed, then they should just about be able to make it home … just about
.

And before the worst came to the worst they always had the option of lightening their aircraft up by dumping their bomb load
.

The only problem was that the shortest but not the safest way home was over land, not sea. In this instance the shortest distance between two points was very definitely a straight line – a straight line that was going to head the Dornier DO17 right over Eden Park
.

The two young women sat at a table at the back of the hall, as far away as possible from the band so they could speak to each other more easily.

‘I don't expect us to be friends,' Lily was saying. ‘That is, I don't expect you to like me, Marjorie. So that's not what I wanted to talk to you about.'

‘It's not impossible,' Marjorie replied. ‘We could still be friends.'

‘That would be rather up to you,' Lily replied, lighting up a cigarette. ‘But I know you've got a
thing about me, because of – because of Robert. And because I've always been a bit of a pain anyway. That's just me. Sorry. I don't mean any harm by it. Honestly.'

Marjorie looked at her, but said nothing.

‘If it hadn't been for Robert,' Lily continued, ‘I think we might have been friends. But because – well. Because he asked me out, and because he wanted to marry me—'

‘It doesn't matter,' Marjorie said quickly. ‘I'd really rather not talk about this if you don't mind. Especially not at a Christmas party.'

She went to stand up.

‘I have to talk about it,' Lily insisted, putting a hand on her arm. ‘We have to talk about it. To clear the air. You're choked with me because Robert asked me out – because he chose me, if you like.'

‘No I don't like actually. Not much.'

‘Yes, I know, Marjorie, but these things happen. At least that was how this thing happened. It wasn't as if I pinched him from you.'

Lily looked at Marjorie expecting some sort of answer, but Marjorie didn't reply. She just looked past Lily as if something totally riveting was happening behind her on the dance floor.

‘Well, was it?' Lily demanded. ‘It wasn't as if you'd been out with him.'

‘I spent a whole Sunday with him, if you must know,' Marjorie said defensively. ‘The Sunday you eyed him up.'

‘I didn't
eye him up
, Marjorie. And as far as I understood it from Robert, you'd gone to his home with Kate. It wasn't as if he'd asked you.'

Again Marjorie refused to reply, for the very good reason that she knew that Lily was right.

‘Look,' Lily continued, keeping hold of Marjorie's hand. ‘I don't want to sound sorry for myself, and I don't expect you to feel sorry for me. But I can't tell you what this has been like. These last few weeks – ever since Robert was killed. I'm not saying it's been worse for me than for Kate say – I can't say that. All I
can
say is that I have been to hell and back every single damned day. I know now it was all my fault Robert was killed. But for me and the wretched ring he would be alive tonight. We'd be dancing here, tonight.'

‘It was an accident.'

‘Robert wouldn't have been anywhere near that shop let alone that town if it hadn't been for
me
, Marjorie. He'd asked me to marry him – and I'd seen this ring in Bendon …' Her voice tailed off, and she quickly lit a cigarette.

Marjorie stared at her. ‘Once,' she began, in a different voice, ‘once I was moaning to my Aunt Hester about how something I'd done was all my fault, and she said no – no, it was an
accident
, Marjorie. That's why we have the word – that's why things like that are called accidents. Because they happen by accident – accidentally – not on purpose. They're awfully hard to come to terms with, she said, because we're always trying to come to terms with things. To tidy everything up and give a reason for everything, particularly when it comes to pinning the blame. But it isn't always someone's fault. Often it's exactly what the word says it is – an accident. You and Robert being in Bendon that day – that was a perfect example. You
wanted to get an engagement ring, you went to a town, it got bombed. There was an accident – and Robert – Robert got killed. But you might have gone to another town and there might have been a different accident and he might still have got killed. Or he might not. But whatever happened, it was not your fault. You didn't kill him. It was an accident.'