Secrets of the Singer Girls (32 page)

Vera felt herself blushing for the second time in an evening, but then she spotted something that made her stare straight past Archie up the darkened street, her cheeks turning cold.

‘Hush, Archie,’ she ordered, gazing into the gloom. ‘Is that a policeman?’

Archie’s voice trailed off and he swung round to where Vera was looking.

Vera’s heart sank as the officer drew closer and she recognized the same older police constable who had informed her of Frank’s arrest.

‘Good evening, Miss Shadwell,’ said the constable. Apologies for disturbing you at this late hour, but may I come inside?’

Once indoors, Archie stuck protectively by Vera’s side.

‘I have some news regarding your father,’ said the constable. ‘He’s due for release on 3 March.’

Vera could scarcely believe what she was hearing. ‘But I thought he wasn’t due out until April,’ she gasped.

The police constable sighed in resignation. ‘Like everywhere, the prisons are overstretched at the moment,’ he explained. ‘There simply isn’t the manpower to staff them
adequately with so many wardens conscripted, and as your father doesn’t pose a
serious
threat to public safety, he is being released early. I thought you might like to be
forewarned.’

Vera was speechless as her brain attempted to digest the news.

‘We appreciate you taking the time to let us know, Officer,’ said Archie.

‘Not at all,’ he replied. ‘I was passing on my beat anyway.’

After Archie had shown the constable out, he returned to find Vera pacing the kitchen, the smile from their pleasant evening replaced by a dark shadow of worry.

‘Daisy,’ she blurted fearfully, ‘we have to get her home before Frank returns.’

With that her face paled. ‘Oh dear God, he’s coming home.’

‘Calm down, Vera,’ said Archie. ‘You can use the telephone in my office tomorrow to call Matron and explain your predicament. I’m sure she’ll understand and
authorize Daisy to be discharged.’

Vera’s heart started to beat fiercely in her chest.

‘Well, she has to,’ she replied shakily. ‘Because if Frank discovers where she is, he’ll go there himself and kill her with his bare hands. There is no time to
lose.’

It was mid-morning on a Sunday, and after a visiting chaplain had been to pray with the girls, Daisy had made to return to the common room when one of the domestic staff tapped
her on the shoulder.

‘Matron would like a word with you in her office, Daisy.’

Daisy felt her heart quicken as she hurried down the long corridor. She hoped and prayed her being summoned here this morning didn’t mean that prospective adoptive parents had been found
for Hope. Daisy took a deep breath before knocking.

‘Enter!’ called back a shrill voice.

Matron gestured to the seat opposite her desk and Daisy perched nervously on the edge of her chair, while the older woman consulted the manila files laid out before her.

‘Hope is eight weeks old and thriving. We are satisfied with her weight and she is now as healthy as any other baby born at full term.’

Daisy’s heart started to race as she waited for Matron to deliver the crushing blow.

‘However, despite our best efforts, we haven’t so far been able to secure a suitable couple to adopt her. No one has yet come forward. I warned you before her delivery that it is
difficult enough during these trying times to find adoptive parents for any child, much less one of a coloured persuasion.

‘Since you are not in a position to be able to offer a respectable home to this child, it falls to me to make suitable arrangements. I am not alone in this conundrum. One hears stories of
other coloured illegitimate children with no one to take responsibility for their welfare. I can only hope that this serves as a valuable lesson to you on the repercussions of immoral
behaviour.’

Daisy felt her face flush a furious red. She didn’t view her romance with Robert as immoral. But Matron wasn’t done with her yet.

‘I have written to the general secretary of the Church of England Moral Welfare Council, who advised me that Hope should be placed within a local authority home. One can only hope in time
that mixed-race children will be viewed as casualties of war and perhaps sent back to their father’s country of origin, where they might receive a better start in life.’

‘Hope will be shipped to America?’ blurted Daisy, unable to hide the horror in her voice.

‘Her long-term future is not certain,’ Matron replied tersely. ‘All we know is that shortly she will be transferred to a local home and cared for there until the government
decides what to do with these children. You, in the meantime, shall leave tomorrow.’

Matron carried on talking, but Daisy had stopped listening. She was drowning in misery and disbelief. After she was dismissed, she left the office in a trance and went straight to the baby
nursery. She would be in line for a roasting if any of the staff spotted her coming in here outside of feed times, but what did it matter? As of tomorrow, her life was over anyway.

There was Hope in her cot, ready to be packed off to some godforsaken home where she would be treated like an orphan. Now, as always, her beauty and innocence took Daisy’s breath away.

Daisy crept to her cot feeling like a fugitive and gripped the iron bars for support. For once, Hope wasn’t asleep. Her deep brown eyes were wide open, her chubby legs kicking out against
her nest of blankets as she gazed about her surroundings looking for Daisy’s face.

Hope had only been in this world eight weeks and already Daisy could not imagine a life without her. Her daughter was exquisite and had utterly beguiled her. From her tiny rosebud lips to the
minuscule fingernails that topped each delicate finger, she was perfection.

The centre of Daisy’s universe had shifted. Nothing came close to touching the love she felt for her child. Not the distant memory of her mother, or even the passion in her heart for
Robert.

How could she part with this little girl? How? It was just one more unfathomable cruelty in this whole senseless chapter of her life.

Stifling a sob, she plucked Hope from her cot and lifted her reverently to her face, gently nuzzling her with her nose, kissing her soft, downy head over and over, as if trying to drink in the
smell of her.

At the feel of Hope’s velvet soft skin against hers, Daisy could no longer stem the flow of hot tears that trickled down her cheeks, but she angrily brushed them away. Nothing would
obscure her view; she wanted to commit every last inch of Hope to memory.

Searing agony ripped through Daisy’s heart.

‘Mummy has to leave tomorrow. I’m so sorry,’ she sobbed. ‘If there was any other way, my darling . . . I hope one day you’ll understand and forgive me.’

The next day, Daisy took her leave of the home for unmarried mothers and felt as if she had been cut open. A little piece of her soul would now be missing forever.

Two weeks later, Frank Shadwell was released from his confinement. A sulphurous spring rain drummed on the cobbles as Vera opened the door to find her father standing on the
doorstep, a satisfied grin stretched over his face.

Vera’s first thought was that his incarceration had physically done him good. Daisy’s spell in the unmarried mothers’ home had left her paler and thinner than Vera had ever
seen her. In the two weeks since she had arrived home, she had drifted about the place like a ghost, barely eating or drinking. In the mornings, she went to work at the new factory and returned
home each night to shut herself away in her room with scarcely a word passing her lips.

In stark contrast, Frank’s time at His Majesty’s pleasure had left him with more meat on his bones. His face was fuller, and he was squeaky clean from regular washing in the prison
yard, but when he opened his mouth, Vera realized that he was still the same old Frank on the inside.

‘Bleedin’ hell,’ he growled, pushing past Vera. ‘I must have the luck of nine blind bastards to have to come home to a face like that.’

In the kitchen, Daisy looked up in terror. ‘Hi, Dad,’ she said weakly.

‘Look at the state of you,’ he mocked, when he set his eyes on his younger daughter. ‘You’re a bag of bones. Vera not been feeding you?’

‘Just been working hard,’ she replied quietly.

‘Good. Well, I’m home now and I’m going to be keeping close tabs on the both of you. I’m laying down the law as from now. This is my house and I’m your father and I
demand respect,’ he hissed. ‘And I don’t want that busybody Archie from the factory trying to get his feet under my table neither. He’s banned from this house from now on.
Understood?’

Vera nodded miserably.

‘Good,’ he said. ‘Now, fetch me some breakfast. I’m starving.’

As Vera walked to the range and set about preparing her father’s breakfast, a terrible, haunting fear unfurled in her heart. Just what would she have to do to end that man’s reign of
cruelty? For the last few months she had been given a tantalizing glimpse of what her future could be like. A life lived away from her father’s terrifying control. Her hidden feelings for
Archie, her sister’s illegitimate child, the legacy of her past . . . all were secrets that her brutal father would surely unearth over time. Their home would become a toxic melting pot of
fear, secrets and recrimination, and she had to find a way to get her and Daisy away from it. Their very lives depended upon it.

Across town, Poppy was also waking up to a sharp realization. It was Wednesday 3 March. The day had finally dawned. The day when she was due to meet Private Freddie Beecroft in
the flesh. By five that morning, she had tired of trying to sleep and had leaped out of bed and ripped down the blackout blinds.

Sal was right. Poppy had indeed been a prisoner to her own thoughts, and though a part of her longed to live a normal life, she knew she was a long way from what could ever be described as
normal. Freddie was sure to see that the moment he set eyes on her. His new life back on British soil was just beginning, just as hers felt like it was about to self-destruct.

Sighing, she fixed herself a weak cup of tea, scraped a bit of butter over a slice of wholemeal bread and pulled out his last letter.

Poppy’s stomach lurched and she pushed away her meagre breakfast. She was almost sick with fear at the thought of meeting Freddie. She must have been out of her mind to
start stitching secret letters to soldiers in bandages with no thought as to where it could lead. No. She would not go to the Tube station that evening. He could wait all night, for she would not
show up. She had locked her pain away and no one, not even someone as wonderful as Freddie, could touch it.

Sal found herself first on shift that morning. The factory floor was still near deserted when Poppy walked in.

‘Hello, ducks. How’s yourself?’ she chirped. ‘I saw a clump of gorgeous golden crocuses sprouting out of a bombsite of all places. I picked them for you.’ With a
flourish, she produced the cheerful yellow flowers from behind her back. ‘Ta-da!’ she grinned. ‘When I saw these things nodding in the wind, I says to myself, It’s a sign.
We’re going to win this war.’

Poppy smiled weakly. ‘Thanks,’ she mumbled. ‘You shouldn’t have.’

Determined to elicit more of a response, Sal pressed on. ‘Did you hear the news? Our boys bombed Berlin two nights ago. Means we’ll cop it tonight I shouldn’t wonder. If the
sirens go off tonight, don’t shelter with that awful landlady of yours – make sure you come with me and the boys down Bethnal Green Tube. Shouldn’t think we can persuade Vera and
Daisy to join us, but I’ll give it a go. It’ll be heaving at the Tube, but if we sing loud enough, we should be able to drown out the bombs.’

Poppy’s face paled. ‘I . . . I can’t go there,’ she whimpered. Before Sal had a chance to ask her why, Poppy turned and ran across the factory floor towards the
stairs.

Sal walked to the window and stared in astonishment as Poppy fled through the yard to the toilet block. ‘Oh, for pity’s sake,’ she muttered under her breath. ‘I’ve
had enough of this.’ Sal took the stairs two at a time and flew across the yard into the lavatory. She pushed the door open with a clatter.

The retching sounds from the locked cubicle stopped her in her tracks. ‘Poppy,’ she called. ‘Are you being sick?’

It was a full five minutes before Poppy shakily emerged from the toilet. When Sal set eyes upon her, her hand flew to her mouth. Poppy was a wretched sight. Her eyelids were ringed with red
dots, and her blue eyes seemed lost in the pallor of her face.

‘Poppy, you look terrible,’ she gasped.

‘I must have a stomach bug,’ she muttered, carefully wiping her face on the edge of a roller towel.

Taking a deep breath, Sal looked her in the eye. ‘I didn’t come down in the last shower, you know, Poppy,’ she said firmly. ‘I’m not moving from this spot until you
tell me what’s wrong, and don’t try fobbing me off either. I recognize fear when I see it. I’ve known something was wrong ever since I caught you sewing notes into bandages that
night. This problem of yours isn’t going to go away, is it?’