The Girl With No Name (28 page)

Charlotte got used to living with Miss Edie. There was little warmth between them, but neither was there any further animosity. On the days when Miss Edie was working down in Cheddar, Charlotte often went home after school with Clare, to the Prynnes. She liked going there and playing in the kitchen with Sandra and Clare. Ma Prynne was very easygoing and though housework wasn’t high on her list of priorities she kept a warm and comfortable home. Compared with the chilly, immaculately tidy Blackdown House, it had a welcoming warmth. When Miss Edie came home on the evening bus, she knocked on the Prynnes’ door and Charlotte joined her for the dark walk home.

In the evenings they sat together in the kitchen, Charlotte doing her homework at the kitchen table, Miss Edie reading gardening books, doing the mending or altering clothes.

‘We should make some for you,’ she said, one Saturday afternoon when Charlotte had finished her homework and was sewing a button back on to her winter coat. ‘I think there’s a box of my mother’s in the attic. There might be things in that which we could adapt for you. Let’s go and see.’

They both put down their sewing and trooped upstairs to the third bedroom. Miss Edie unlocked the door and together they went in.

Charlotte looked round her with interest. She’d never been in here and had always wondered why it had to be kept locked. As far as she could see there was nothing of value in the room, simply a bed, and a few other sticks of furniture, nothing worth locking the door for. In one corner she noticed a small triangular door tucked into the slope of the eaves. Miss Edie crossed the room and bent to open it. The door was stiff and it took several sharp jerks to pull it open. She knelt down and shone her torch inside.

‘This is the attic,’ she said, over her shoulder. ‘All my parents’ things are in here.’ She crawled through the door and disappeared. Charlotte, approaching the door, put her head through. Beyond was the roof space, about five foot high on one side, sloping sharply to the eaves on the other. Stacked against a central wall were suitcases and boxes. Some of these had labels stuck to their sides and by the light of Miss Edie’s torch, Charlotte could see a box labelled,
Mother’s Shoes
and another marked
Winter Clothes
and yet another
Father’s Suit
.

Miss Edie grasped the handle of the one labelled
Winter Clothes
and said, ‘This one looks hopeful. Come and help me pull it out and we can take it downstairs into the warm.’

For a moment Charlotte hesitated, then taking a deep breath as she’d learned to do going into St Michael’s air raid shelter, she crawled through the little door and into the attic space beyond. There was no room to stand up and she stayed on her hands and knees, breathing deeply.

‘Here we are,’ called Miss Edie from behind a pile of boxes. ‘Just come over here and get hold of this handle with me. It seems to have got caught on something.’ Together they manoeuvred boxes to release the suitcase, but it wasn’t the case that came free, it was the boxes, crashing down around Charlotte, knocking her sideways and trapping her under the eaves. Miss Edie’s torch was knocked from her hand and clattering to the floor, went out.

Miss Edie swore under her breath but Charlotte began to sob.

‘Are you all right, Charlotte?’ she asked. ‘What’s the matter?’

‘Let me out! Let me out!’ Charlotte cried, her voice rising in panic. ‘I can’t get out. Let me out!’ Miss Edie struggled to extricate herself from the pile of boxes and then began to pull them away, pushing them out through the attic door into the bedroom. The faded light of the winter’s afternoon coming through the bedroom window was enough to see by and she managed to clamber out herself, pulling more boxes and the suitcase out behind her. She crawled back in, now able to get to the boxes that were trapping Charlotte into the space under the eaves and pull them away. Needing more light, Miss Edie felt round for the fallen torch, but when she did find it, it refused to light and she shook it in frustration.

She could hear the girl sobbing and she called out to her, ‘It’s all right, Charlotte, it’s all right, I’m coming. Don’t panic, I’m coming to get you out. You’re all right.’

Was the child hurt in some way? she wondered as she wrestled her way through the accumulated junk to reach her. The attic space was larger than she remembered, running the length of the house. Where had all this stuff come from? When her parents had died, she had simply boxed everything up and shoved it in, stacking it against the chimney breast. Where had the rest come from?

At last she managed to clear a space and could see through to where Charlotte was stuck. With only the light through the open door to aid her, she could see little more than the girl’s face, but she continued to move things out of the way and at last managed to clear a pathway. She lay down on her stomach and reached her hand through.

‘You’re all right, you’re all right,’ she soothed. ‘I’m here now and you can get out. Take my hand.’ At first Charlotte seemed not to hear, then suddenly Miss Edie found her hand gripped so tightly that her fingers were crushed.

‘Well done, good girl, see if you can turn round a bit and slide out backwards. Easy does it. Good girl, nearly there.’ As she continued to encourage the child, she felt her shifting under the sloping roof, her head almost touching the rafters. The further she squirmed back the higher the roof was over her head, the more room she had to move.

‘Come towards the light, Charlotte,’ Miss Edie said, trying to keep her voice calm. ‘That’s the way, good girl, I’ve got you.’ She backed out through the door into the bedroom, almost dragging Charlotte behind her. Once they were both safely back in the bedroom she flopped on to the floor, gathering the girl into her arms and hugging her close. For a moment Charlotte remained rigid and then she seemed to relax, her body soft against Miss Edie’s rather angular one, and for a long moment they rested on the bedroom floor in silence. Then Charlotte pulled away, rubbing her tear-streaked face with her hand.

‘Sorry,’ she muttered, ashamed of her panic.

‘It doesn’t matter. Go in the bathroom and wash your face,’ suggested Miss Edie, gently, ‘and then we’ll go back downstairs and have some tea.’

When Charlotte got to her feet and went into the bathroom, Miss Edie continued to sit on the floor. She longed for Charlotte to be back beside her, to feel the warmth of her body against her own. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d hugged anyone at all, certainly not her parents, they weren’t the hugging sort. Herbert, then. She hadn’t held anyone in her arms since Herbert had held her in his and kissed her goodbye. They had stood on the platform at Temple Meads station in a world of their own as they waited for the train. Others were also saying goodbye, but Edie, with the engagement ring newly on her finger, was entirely unaware of them. Herbert was returning to France and every moment spent with him was precious. People might have frowned at them, kissing in public, but they didn’t care, and they held each other tight until the train steamed into the station. Dearest Herbert, it was all so long ago.

She heard the lavatory flush and got stiffly to her feet. All round her were the boxes and cases she’d dragged from the attic in her efforts to release Charlotte. The whole room was a mess and for the first time, Miss Edie, who had a place for everything and everything in its place, didn’t care. She picked up the case marked
Winter Clothes
and closed the door.

Christmas approached and the village bazaar became the talking point. Marjorie Bellinger and Avril Swanson took on the organisation. There were to be stalls of Christmas items, decorations made by the children in the village school, pieces of handicraft brought home from the secondary school. The scouts were running a bran tub and had been round the village collecting unwanted or outgrown toys to wrap in newspaper and hide in the barrel they’d begged from Jack and Mabel at the Magpie. The Morgan twins had decided to have their own stall. Nobody knew what they were going to sell, but Marjorie agreed to give them a small table in the corner. Miss Mason at the school had taught the girls two country dances and there was to be a display in the afternoon when the selling part of the bazaar was over.

All the money raised was to go to the Red Cross, who were doing such wonderful work with the wounded, both civilians and servicemen. When they had finally opened the suitcase rescued from the attic, Miss Edie and Charlotte found several jerseys and some warm winter dresses, blouses and skirts. Miss Edie held each one up, marvelling that she could remember her mother wearing this or that.

‘We’ll unravel this old woolly,’ she said, holding up a blue cardigan which was misshapen and had certainly seen better days. ‘I’ll make you a new cardigan.’

At the bottom of the case were some old napkins, a checked table cloth, three torn pillowcases and some sheets.

‘I don’t remember any of these,’ Miss Edie said, holding them up. ‘I don’t think there’s much we can do with them.’

‘Can I take them to school?’ asked Charlotte. ‘Miss Gardener who does handicraft has asked if we can bring in any unwanted pieces of material. We’re making things for the bazaar.’

‘Of course you can,’ agreed Miss Edie. ‘I expect I can find you some more.’

Charlotte took the pile of fabric into school. She was delighted. She had decided to make a patchwork cushion cover for Miss Edie for Christmas. Several of the other girls were doing the same and they pooled all the scraps of material they’d brought so that there were lots of colours and patterns to choose from. Charlotte enjoyed handicraft lessons. She enjoyed sewing and planned her cushion cover with care, joining her chosen patchwork pieces with tiny stitches. When she had finished the patchwork front of the cushion, Miss Gardener found a piece of smooth blue fabric in the handicraft cupboard to make the back.

Clare looked at the finished cushion cover and sighed. ‘You sew ever so well,’ she said. ‘Look at my handkerchief. It’s all creased and all my stitches show. It’s taken me for ever and Miss Gardener says I’ve got to make two of them, or it isn’t enough for a Christmas present.’

‘It’ll be fine when you’ve washed and ironed it,’ Charlotte told her, though secretly she had her doubts. But it had been such hard labour, surely Mrs Prynne, for whom it was intended, would like it, however it looked.

Once they had finished their own Christmas presents, the girls were expected to make things for the bazaar. Charlotte happily hemmed squares of coloured cotton to make hankies, and Molly, who preferred to knit, had learned to turn a heel and was making socks.

The day of the bazaar arrived two Saturdays before Christmas. There was great bustle as stalls were set out in the church hall. Just before it was declared open by Major Bellinger, the Morgan twins arrived to set out their wares. They arrived at the hall with two wheelbarrows full of bundles of sticks. They had been out ‘sticking’ every weekend since they’d heard about the bazaar and the wood they’d collected had been tied up in bundles to use for kindling. They were charging sixpence a bundle, delivered.

Mrs Prynne looked at the bundles and said, ‘That’s a bit cheeky! Sixpence for wood we could go and collect ourselves for free.’

The vicar, overhearing, smiled and remarked, ‘Ah but you didn’t, you see, and this is for such a good cause!’ He beamed at the red-faced Mrs Prynne and moved on round the room, leaving her to buy a bundle out of shame and to get himself a raffle ticket for a chance to win the Christmas cake made by the Mothers’ Union.

‘We pooled all our butter and sugar ration,’ Janet Tewson told him proudly. ‘They say it won’t be long before they ration eggs as well.’ She grinned at him. ‘Not that you’ll be short, what with those hens scratching about your garden, vicar.’

‘I’m sure we can always swap some eggs for a jar or two of your delicious honey, Mrs Tewson,’ the vicar said.

‘Do you think my mother would like these?’

Charlotte turned round to find Billy Shepherd standing beside her at the fancywork stall. He was holding up two of the hankies that Charlotte had hemmed herself.

‘I expect she would,’ said Charlotte, adding with a smile, ‘Hankies are always useful and I made those.’

‘You did?’ Billy peered at them. ‘I thought they were shop ones! The thing is, I saw some with initials in the corner, you know, done in coloured thread, but it looks as if they’ve all gone.’

‘I can put initials on the corner if you like?’ Charlotte offered. She had seen Billy around the village from time to time and they’d exchanged smiles, but he hadn’t spoken to her since the day of the welcome party. He wasn’t at school any more, he’d left to help his father on the farm, but she’d not forgotten how much trouble he’d taken to make little Val enjoy the races that day and she wanted to do something for him in return.

‘Really?’ Billy sounded impressed. ‘Could you?’

‘If you buy them now, I’ll take them home and embroider them so they’re really special. What’s her name?’

‘Margaret,’ he replied, ‘Margaret Shepherd. Can you do the M and the S?’

‘Yes, if you like,’ answered Charlotte.

‘Hmm, but I can’t afford much extra... for the M and S, you know?’

Charlotte burst out laughing. ‘I’m not asking you to pay me,’ she cried. ‘I’ll do it for you because... it’s Christmas.’

‘You’re on!’ Billy handed over the money for the hankies and then gave them to Charlotte, who put them in her pocket. ‘I’ll do them tonight, or tomorrow,’ she promised. ‘What colour would you like?’

Billy thought for a moment. ‘Think her favourite colour is green,’ he said. ‘Have you got green?’

‘I expect so, I’ll do my best.’

Good as her word, Charlotte found some pale green cotton in Miss Edie’s workbox and carefully worked the initials M and S, intertwined, in the corner of each hankie. Miss Edie watched with interest as, working without a pattern, Charlotte embroidered the initials.

‘You sew very well, Charlotte,’ she said. ‘You must have been well taught.’

‘I like sewing,’ Charlotte said. ‘I always have.’

As each of them realised what she had said, they smiled. Another tiny piece of the jigsaw of her life was turned face up.