She made her way downstairs and helped the girls to lay the table, make the tea, and cut a plateful of bread and margarine. ‘Goin’ out?’ Lucy asked. ‘You look very pretty this evening!’
Debbie dropped her a mock curtsy. ‘Thank you, kind lady,’ she said. ‘And I might be going out; I’m not sure. Apparently, some feller came round this afternoon wanting to see me and Mrs Batley told him to try again this evening, when I’d be at home.’
Sandy, getting bottles of sauce and a jar of pickled onions out of the cupboard, gave Debbie an approving smile. ‘That’s right, queen, you make the best of yourself,’ she said. ‘I reckon it’ll be that feller who saw you home on Victory night. Now don’t look so disappointed . . . you weren’t hoping it would be Dicky, were you?’
‘No, not Dicky; another friend,’ Debbie mumbled. ‘Are the spuds done? If so, I’ll mash ’em. And the scouse must be just about ready.’
Presently the girls settled down to their meal, but Debbie didn’t join in the chatter. She was wondering how on earth she’d been so daft as to forget all about Ralph Middleton; it would be him, of course it would. But then she remembered that Mrs Batley had said that the caller had found out where she lived quite by chance, so it could not possibly be Ralph, and she had never imagined it was Dicky, because Mrs Batley knew Dicky as well as she did. Cheering up, Debbie began to join in the conversation, though she could not help shooting hopeful glances at the door every few minutes. The meal was long over, however, before someone rapped and the kitchen was empty save for Debbie herself and Phyllis, whose turn it was to wash up.
‘I’ll go,’ Debbie said unnecessarily, since Phyllis, up to her elbows in greasy washing-up water, could scarcely have done so. She shot down the hall and opened the door. Then she simply stared, eyes and mouth both rounding with sheer incredulity. Standing on the doorstep as large as life, and staring at her, was Uncle Max!
Debbie actually fell back a pace, but then she remembered her manners; remembered, too, that her mother had been fond of this man. She tried to smile. ‘Uncle Max! Well, fancy seeing you! Would you like to come in?’
Uncle Max hesitated. ‘Is there somewhere we could talk, somewhere private like?’ he asked diffidently. ‘I reckon I’ve a deal of explaining to do and I’d rather do it without strangers listenin’ in.’
For a moment, Debbie almost panicked. Once, she had been afraid to be alone with Uncle Max because of his tendency to grab and cuddle, but that had been years ago, when she was little more than a child. Now she was a young woman, quite capable of defending herself against an unwanted handshake, let alone anything more intimate. And giving Uncle Max a long, hard look, she saw that she was not the only one who had changed. In the intervening period, Uncle Max had grown old. He was a great deal thinner than she remembered, and when he took off his hat to enter the house she saw that the thick thatch of hair, of which he had once been so proud, had shrunk to a white, monk-like nimbus around his bald crown. Suddenly, she felt sorry for him. After all, she had acknowledged to herself some time ago that he had been genuinely fond of her mother, which must mean that he was not all bad.
As Uncle Max entered the kitchen, Phyllis was turning away from the sink and moving over to dry her hands on the roller towel behind the door. Debbie introduced them, explaining that she and Uncle Max would go into the front room for a chat and asking Phyllis if she could possibly make a tray of tea and bring it through. Then she led Uncle Max across the hall into the front room and settled him in one of the fireside chairs. When Phyllis entered the room bearing a tray upon which rested two enamel mugs of tea Uncle Max began to protest, to say that he did not mean to trespass upon their hospitality, but Debbie shook her head chidingly at him as Phyllis left the room. He was clearly nervous; his big-knuckled, heavily veined hands were actually shaking. ‘A cup of tea will do us both good,’ she said firmly. ‘Besides, I’m thirsty even if you aren’t.’ She settled herself in the chair opposite and took a sip of tea. ‘I suspect we’ve both got some explaining to do,’ she said, after a moment, as her visitor did not seem anxious to start. ‘I’m afraid I made no attempt to find you after Mam died. It might have been different if the house hadn’t been flattened, but once that was gone I simply searched for somewhere else to live. I wanted young company, I think, because my friend was killed in the same raid that killed Mam, you know. To be honest, Uncle Max, I think I was rather jealous of Mam’s affection for you. And I was never one for a lot of cuddling.’
‘I know, I know. Your mam ticked me off good ’n’ proper a couple of times, but I meant no harm. I were real fond of you and just wanted to show how I felt,’ Uncle Max said humbly. ‘When I gave you presents – and they weren’t much, just a few sweets, a couple of apples, some cigarette cards – you seemed to think I was trying to bribe you, but I weren’t, you know. I’ve always been fond of kids – why, I give your friend Gwen such things and she were grateful, seemed to like me. But I could tell you never really took to me, no matter how hard I tried to please you.’
‘Well, as I said, I was jealous, which I’m sure didn’t help. Now I’m older, I can see it was wrong of me not to contact you. But I knew you were all right and hadn’t been hurt because, like everyone else, I checked the casualty lists after every raid and your name was never on ’em,’ Debbie said.
Uncle Max grinned wryly. ‘Don’t say you weren’t disappointed,’ he said. ‘I checked the lists, too, for a mention of you. It was horrible, because I felt guilty, felt I’d driven you away from your home and your friends. But at least you weren’t on the casualty lists, so I comforted myself that you’d probably gone off to that village where the Soameses went. I told meself you’d be safe there, but that you’d come back to the city when the war was over, and then I could make my peace with you.’ He heaved a sigh so gusty that it lifted a wing of Debbie’s soft hair from her forehead. ‘But then VE Day came and I couldn’t help thinking how upset your mam would be that I’d lost touch with you, particularly as me circumstances have changed.’ He looked imploringly across at Debbie. ‘After the May blitz, I moved into lodgings with a very nice landlady. She were good to me and I did me best to be an ideal lodger. But then I had the chance of buyin’ a little place of me own. I’d saved up, you know, quite a tidy sum, and I’ve always wanted to own property. Oh, it ain’t a palace, by any means; it needed a lot of work doing, but I knew it would be a decent enough home once I’d finished with the decoratin’ and that. I bought it a year ago, just about the time of the Normandy landings, and moved in two months back. But a couple of days ago I – I went round to Wykeham Street. I don’t really know why except for old times’ sake. I walked up and down the road a couple of times – I won’t deny there were tears in me eyes – then turned back towards Fountains Road and bumped slap bang into Mrs Bingham, that friend of your mam’s who lived on Howley Street and worked in the Stanley as a cleaner. Well, she saw I were upset and she asked me back to her place so’s we could chat about old times.’
‘Yes, I remember Mrs Bingham; Mam always had a soft spot for her, though she said she often suspected that the old girl was a bit light-fingered. She used to warn the patients on her ward to keep an eye on their possessions whilst the cleaner was around,’ Debbie said with a chuckle. ‘So you went back to her place and she gave you a cup of tea and told you all the gossip; is that right?’
Uncle Max grinned again but Debbie thought he looked rather shifty. ‘Ye-es,’ he said slowly. ‘We sat in the kitchen but the door to the hall was open and I could see the parlour. And suddenly, just as I were explaining that I’d lost touch with you, she saw where I were lookin’ and got up to shut the kitchen door, only that just confirmed what I’d been thinkin’. I got to me feet, opened the door, and crossed the hallway into the parlour. And there were the brass fire irons which always stood in the parlour grate and the little roll-topped bureau which Jess was so fond of.’
‘The wicked old woman!’ Debbie said. ‘Oh, Uncle Max, I went and searched for that bureau and asked around, but of course it never occurred to me that it had been stolen. You see, my mam left a letter in that bureau, and the last thing she said to me was to go and find it, because it was important. So what did Mrs Bingham say when you accused her?’
Uncle Max gave a short laugh. ‘She said she’d rescued the stuff for her old friend Jess, ’cos she couldn’t bear to see such nice furniture took by looters,’ he said. ‘Then when she heard Jess had died, she said she’d hung on to it for you. So I said you were my responsibility and since I now had a house of me own, I’d take the stuff right away. I even thanked her for looking after it so nicely, ’cos it were all polished up a treat,’ he ended.
‘I suppose I can’t blame you for lying to her, but I’m not your responsibility and never were,’ Debbie said firmly. ‘So what happened next? I take it you now have the bureau and the fire irons in your new house?’
Uncle Max sighed. ‘You could have purrit better; you’ve made me sound like a perishin’ thief meself. But yes, I borrowed a van from a pal and the stuff is in my house right now. But of course, I didn’t mean to take it for myself. So the very next day I gorron a train and went into North Wales; the village is pretty small so I found the Soameses right away. Mrs Soames told me you’d never moved in with them but that you wrote regular. So she gave me your address and here I am.’
‘Gosh,’ Debbie said inadequately. ‘After all this time! I don’t mind telling you, Uncle Max, that I never thought I’d see Mam’s bureau again. But what did the old devil do with Mam’s papers and that?’
‘She said there weren’t nothing in it but bills and receipts and two half-used ration books,’ Uncle Max said. ‘I didn’t believe her for a moment because I know your mam bought war bonds and had at least one Post Office savings account, but the old girl probably stripped that lot within a week of getting her hands on the bureau. I’m afraid all I can offer you is what I took from Mrs Bingham, but you’re very welcome to it, seein’ as it’s yours anyway.’
‘I thought you said everything was left to you in Mam’s Will . . .’ Debbie began, then could have cursed herself. She had never intended to let Uncle Max know that it had been she in Mrs Roberts’s kitchen the day he took up residence in Huskisson Street. And now, looking into his once-hated face, she realised that the knowledge would give him pain and that all her old bitterness against him had faded. She might never want to live under the same roof as Uncle Max, but she realised that her mother, Gwen, and a good many other people had been right and she had been wrong. She had been prejudiced against him from the start, had seen him as an enemy, but, after all, he was under no real obligation to find her and hand the furniture over; he had done it because it was the right thing to do. And he had gone to a lot of trouble to find her, trekking out to Betws-y-Coed, asking a lot of questions, and finally, with her address in his possession, calling on her and telling her about the furniture when he could easily have kept quiet. And if Mrs Bingham had failed to find the secret drawer, then Uncle Max deserved Debbie’s thanks and not her condemnation.
‘Who the devil told you that?’ Uncle Max said, very red in the face. ‘It were wrong of me, of course it were, but I did tell folk as your mam had left a will, leaving you in my charge. After all, you were only fourteen or so and I knew your mam wouldn’t want you landed in an orphanage. Honest to God, queen, I meant to offer to let you lodge wi’ Mrs Roberts – me old landlady – just so’s we could mourn your mam together.’
Suddenly, unexpectedly, his eyes filled with tears and Debbie watched, horrified and conscience-stricken, as they ran down his face.
When Debbie saw Uncle Max off, late that night, they had reached what she felt was a comfortable compromise. He was to keep the fire irons, as a memento of Jess, and she would take the bureau, which she would collect from him as soon as she was able, since there was plenty of space in her bedroom for such an item. ‘I’ll hire a cart, or something, and come round after work. See you soon, Uncle Max,’ she said.
Chapter Thirteen
In fact, it was a week before the bureau stood in Debbie’s small bedroom. It looked extremely large and shiny, and Debbie acknowledged that, whatever her faults, Mrs Bingham had treasured it. She must have waxed it at least once a week, and now here it stood in Debbie’s sparsely furnished room looking, if the truth were known, somewhat out of place.
Debbie had hired a handcart from a nearby shop, together with a stout young man who had done all the heavy work of getting the bureau on and off the cart, and up the stairs of No. 4. Uncle Max had offered to do it but Debbie had explained that the young man had come with the cart for the humble sum of half a crown, and Uncle Max had probably been glad enough to give way, for the bureau was heavy.
Now, Debbie regarded her new possession almost shyly. It was as clean as a new pin and totally empty, though she had not yet tried the secret drawer. She knew where it was but found herself reluctant to slide it open because the more she looked at the bureau, fairly glowing with polish and elbow grease, the more certain she became that Mrs Bingham must have discovered – and emptied – the drawer long ago. However, nothing venture, nothing gain, she told herself, and pulled out the top drawer, laying it carefully on the bed behind her. Cautiously, she slid her hand into the aperture, fumbled around for a moment, found the slight indentation and pressed downward, then pulled. The false bottom came away smoothly, revealing another drawer, shallower than the first, and containing – oh joy! – several thin sheets of paper and a large white envelope with her own name written neatly on the front in her mother’s well-remembered handwriting.