Custard Tarts and Broken Hearts (50 page)

Nellie didn’t think much of Duff’s chances today. The women were so fired up it seemed to unlock the floodgates in her too. She finally allowed joy to bubble up in her own heart; the war was over, Sam was coming home! Letting it sink in, she suddenly found herself caught up in Maggie Tyrell’s skinny arms.

‘Come on, Nellie, give us a smile! It’s over!’ she said, swinging Nellie clear off the floor. They both toppled over, laughing, just as Ethel burst through the swing doors.

‘Come on, girls!’ Ethel bellowed. ‘Poor old Duff’s in tears up there. It was a mistake, he was gonna let us off anyway. The mayor’s up the town hall at ten, let’s go and have a party!’

Nellie joined the custard tarts streaming out of the factory, hundreds of them, singing, dancing, holding up the traffic in Spa Road, some jumping aboard vans and car running boards, pulling the whole street into their celebration. On the way, they gathered with them the women and children queuing outside the soup kitchen; then the tramps, outside the Sally Army, peeled away to join them too. It seemed the whole of Bermondsey had stopped work to converge on Spa Road, till, like a raggle-taggle army, they all reached the town hall. There, bunting had been hastily looped around the entrance and the Salvation Army band was playing ‘Tipperary’. Nellie joined the others, singing herself hoarse, until the mayor came out on to the town hall steps and there was a hush. After his speech, the bells of St James rang out, peal after deafening peal, and she allowed herself a moment to look around. How different the steps of the town hall looked today, revellers instead of eager-faced recruits, unbridled joy instead of anxious faces peering at the names of dead and wounded. The casualty list was still posted there, but Nellie’s heart was overflowing with happiness; tears of joy streamed down her face as she realized she need never search for a name on that list again.

It was the Friday before Christmas and she’d taken the day off work. Sam was due to arrive at Waterloo Station this very morning, and she wanted everything to be perfect, including herself. Nellie took the mirror off the kitchen wall, propping it up on a chair. It was the only way she could see herself full length. She smoothed her hands down the bodice of the midnight-blue dress she’d been saving for Sam’s homecoming. She tightened the broad, pleated sash, which emphasized her small waist, then pointed her foot; the shorter length showed off her ankles, which thankfully, were shapely. Satisfied, she hung the mirror back in its place above the kitchen fireplace and sat down to wait. Tonight the whole family would celebrate Sam’s safe return. Matty and Alice had spent all week cleaning the house. Nellie had baked a cake, with black-market butter and flour, and Freddie had ‘found’ a crate of beer outside Courage’s. They would all have their chance to welcome Sam home but now, just for an hour, she wanted him to herself.

It was no good; she couldn’t sit still. Was that footsteps? She went to the door, peering the length of Vauban Street. No, it was only a neighbour, bashing a rug against her front wall. She went back to the kitchen mirror, checking the back of her hair, which was caught up softly at the nape of her neck. Walking to the window, she twitched the net curtain. If he’d been lucky enough to get a lift on an army lorry, he might be turning the corner any minute. Resisting the urge to check the front door yet again, she sat there, willing him to hurry up, her imagination clearing his way through the weekday traffic, speeding his feet along the crowded pavements. What was taking him so long? What was there to keep him? She imagined farewells to his mates at the station; had he stopped for a beer? But, no, surely he wanted her arms round him, as much as she wanted his.

She’d almost given up, thinking perhaps his troopship had been delayed, when she heard it – the sound of boots ringing on cobbles. She flew to the door, flinging it open, and in a moment was in his arms, kissing him unashamedly in full view of the neighbours.

‘Oh, Sam, thank God, thank God, you’re home!’ she said, pulling him into the passage. He kicked the door shut behind them, taking her in his arms, squeezing her so she could barely breathe.

‘Ohhh, Nellie.’ His voice was thick with an emotion that seemed more like pain than joy. ‘Ohhh, Nellie.’ He kept repeating her name till she pulled away from him and looked him full in the face for the first time.

He was gaunt, grey, his chin dark with stubble. She searched his eyes. Their dark depths had always been lit by a gentle, welcoming warmth, so often revealing his feelings when his words could not. But not now. With a shock that made her take a step back, she realized there was no answering look in those eyes, which before had always sought her own. They told her nothing.

He noticed her recoil and, heaving the pack off his back, looked down at himself, shamefaced. ‘Look at the state of me, and I’ve made your new dress dirty.’ She began to protest, but he went on, ‘It’s been a long old haul, I must stink to high heaven and I’ve not slept all night…’

Putting her fingers to his lips, Nellie said softly, ‘Sleeping can wait…’ And, grabbing his hand, she led him into the kitchen.

Heedless of his filthy tunic, she twined her arms around his neck till he dipped his head, kissing her with a probing hunger she’d never experienced with him. His kisses were fierce but, after four years surrounded by death, had she really expected gentleness? She found herself matching the depth of his kisses. He still smelled of the battlefield, but she clung to him, her own mouth searching for that old answering tenderness. But with each kiss he felt further away and instead of finding him, she succeeded only in losing herself.

Nellie’s relief that Sam was back, and in one piece, carried her through the rest of the day. She filled the tin bath for him with boiling water from the copper, she fed him mounds of toasted ‘real’ bread, with the black-market butter, and put all his muted reactions down to his tiredness.

But when the others came home and still no spark returned to those dull, bruised eyes, Nellie had to admit that something was very wrong.

There had been a case of mistaken identity; it had robbed her of Sam for many months, but then he’d been restored to her, or so she’d believed. But identities are fluid things, she now realized, and in the furnace of a war, such as Sam had experienced, how could his have stayed intact? Surely the metal of any soldier’s character would melt and re-form every time they faced death, or saw a pal blown to pieces in front of them? Her foolishness shamed her. She’d believed she was getting back ‘her Sam’ from the war, but from the first time he’d held her in his arms, his uniform still caked with mud, still smelling of blood and sulphur, she felt this was not her Sam.

The signs were there to see, from the start. Their reunion had left her feeling anxious; she was hoping for a word from him, that he was overjoyed to be back, even that he loved her. But she’d got neither. In the evening, during the family celebration, he sat like the silent centre, around which all their emotions of relief and happiness swirled. Matty, dressed in her stage finery, sitting next to him, her arm through his, sometimes leaned her head on his shoulder. Nellie wondered if the young girl had noticed Sam’s odd remoteness too. Looking across the table at Sam picking at his food as the chatter got louder, Nellie thought he looked uncomfortable, cornered almost, and her heart sank as she realized he would rather not be the centre of all this loving attention.

Then, halfway through the meal, Freddie stupidly asked if there had been any more news of Jock. Nellie kicked him under the table, but it was too late. Sam, his already ashen face turning white, pushed his chair back and stumbled round the crowded table, out into the yard.

‘You idiot, Fred!’ Bobby hissed. ‘Why d’ye go an upset him?’

Matty went to follow Sam, but Nellie stopped her. ‘I’ll go,’ she said, glaring over at Freddie. ‘Alice, will you cut the cake while I get him back in?’

Sam was smoking, leaning up against the brick shed. She put her arm through his, leaning in close to him. ‘I know it’s hard, with Jock not coming home,’ she said softly.

He took another deep drag on the cigarette and blew smoke in the air while she waited for him to answer. Shaking his head, he threw down the cigarette, grinding it with his boot.

‘It’s cold out here, best get in, duck,’ he said.

Nellie went to bed, full of misery at the change in Sam. For so long she had looked forward to his homecoming and now it felt as if she had lost him anyway.Waking next morning with a sick feeling in her heart, she told herself she must simply wait patiently for him to learn to trust her, with all those dark tales she knew must be locked up inside him, along with what he knew of Jock’s fate. She hadn’t seen him for over two years and she was beginning to realize how little she knew about his war. Still, she wouldn’t push him; she told herself to be grateful they both had the rest of their lives to get to know each other again.

It was barely dawn and Alice still slept quietly on. As Nellie forced herself to get out of the bed, she thought she could smell burning. Hurrying across the cold lino to the window, she looked out over the back yard to see smoke billowing up. ‘That bloody Freddie!’ she muttered, thinking some of his contraband must have contained combustibles. She pulled on her shoes and dashed downstairs. Grabbing her coat from the passage, she sprinted through the scullery and out into the back yard, where she pulled up short in front of Sam.

‘What are you doing?’ she panted. ‘I thought the place was on fire!’

He looked up at her through flames, his gaunt face lit by their false ruddiness. He was in his civvies, which only served to emphasize how emaciated he’d become. A thin neck stuck out of his collarless shirt; his trousers were baggy and cinched in tight around his waist. It seemed to Nellie as though the war had pared him down to the bone. There was nothing left of him.

‘I’m burning my uniform,’ he said flatly.

Then she saw that he’d stuffed his uniform into the old dustbin. It was full of khaki, now crackling into flame, blackening and turning to ashes. Only his greatcoat had been spared, laid over the penny-farthing trailer, along with his spurs. He saw her looking at it.

‘I might as well hand back the greatcoat – up the army depot at London Bridge. They’ll give me a few bob for it,’ he said, turning away from her to poke the flames to life again.

‘Sam,’ she said hesitantly, ‘I think we ought to go and see Lily, don’t you?’

‘I don’t know anything, Nell,’ he said, and his reluctance was painful to watch. ‘I’ve got no good news for her.’

‘But still, she’ll want to hear whatever you can tell her. It’s the not knowing that eats away at you, I had it for long enough with you. She’ll be happy you’re home…’

Although Sam didn’t looked convinced about that, he finally agreed, and later that day they took the tram up to Rotherhithe to see Lily. It was heartbreaking for Nellie to see how brave her friend was in the face of Sam’s return, her joy unfeigned. As they sat round the kitchen table, Lily took Johnny on to her knee, listening, while Sam stitched together all her dark imaginings, with a few threads of fact about Jock. He told how they’d both been driving their team when it was hit with shrapnel. Jock had fallen, along with the other team driver, and Sam had been forced to go on alone. They’d been separated on the battlefield and Sam hadn’t seen Jock again. The battle of Ypres had dragged on another week or so, their battery decimated and Sam himself wounded.

‘After that, I didn’t know nothing till I woke up in that Belgian hospital,’ he said flatly. He’d forced out these bald facts in short, emotionless sentences and when he saw Lily’s tears begin to fall he simply got up and walked out. Nellie gathered Lily and Johnny into her arms. ‘I’m so sorry, Lil,’ was all she could say. ‘He’s not the same.’

The year turned and it was January of 1919 before Charlie came home, still only seventeen but now a manly, seasoned soldier. She hoped he might be able to reach Sam, but although the brothers greeted each other warmly enough, they never mentioned the war in her hearing. Wicks’s yard had closed during the war, so neither of them had a job to return to. They both sat, every day, scanning the newspaper advertisements for jobs, exchanging the odd complaint about the scarcity of work for returning soldiers. Charlie, always self-sufficient, one day announced, to everyone’s surprise, that he’d decided to stay in the army. Nellie waited for Sam’s protest, but he greeted the news with uncharacteristic indifference.

In the weeks since Sam’s return Nellie had been forced to admit that she hadn’t grown to know this new Sam at all. She began to ask herself how she could marry a man who was now a complete mystery to her. It was a cruel irony. For all she knew, this Sam might as well be that other soldier he’d been mistaken for in the Belgian hospital. He had come back older, sadder, harder, but worse than all this, Sam wouldn’t talk to her. She wanted to take the burden of some of his awful memories, but from the moment he’d stepped off the boat from France he hadn’t said a word about it. Perhaps he never had been a great talker, but she could always tell what he was feeling. Now she didn’t even know if he was happy to have survived. He was impenetrable.

And she wasn’t the only one hurt by his indifference. Even Matty couldn’t penetrate Sam’s new rock-hard exterior. It was a bitter sadness to Nellie, seeing how the little canary hovered around her once adoring brother. When she hugged him, he would slowly disentangle himself with a cutting, ‘You’re not a little girl any more, Matty.’ Nellie almost felt that those who loved him most were being punished, or perhaps he was punishing himself, by pushing them away. But what had he done wrong, except fight in a war not of his making?

One night, early in the new year, Nellie and Sam were sitting up late, waiting for Matty to return from the Star. She came in with a troubled look on her face.

‘Want something to eat, love?’ Nellie asked, but Matty shook her head, glancing at Sam. ‘Actually, I’ve got some news!’ She waited for Sam’s response and when it didn’t come, sighed.

‘Good news, we hope! Don’t we, Sam?’ Nellie said, rather too brightly.