Goodnight Sweetheart (21 page)

Molly was trembling so hard that tea slopped wildly from the next cup she picked up, but to her relief the sailor taking it from her did so in silence.

Dawn was just beginning to lighten the sky when Molly let herself into number 78. Before they had parted to go to their homes, Anne had hugged her fiercely and said emotionally, ‘Molly, Eddie would have been so proud of you for tonight.’

Molly’s course ended, and to her relief she was passed as an emergency vehicle driver. She still went to bed every night reciting the names of Liverpool’s streets, which at least helped to stop her from crying for Eddie.

In May the tempo of everyone’s life began to change as the dreadful news came that Germany’s blitzkrieg had resulted in the fall of Norway and Holland and Luxembourg. June and Sally exchanged anxious looks as the three girls sat in front of the wireless one Friday evening listening to the news.

‘Our lads will sort out Jerry, you just wait and see,’ Sally pronounced loyally but with hesitation, causing a sharp thrill of anguish to pierce Molly’s heart.

‘Where are you going, Molly?’ June asked her when she got up and went to the back door.

‘I feel like a bit of fresh air, so I thought I’d go down to the allotment and walk back with Dad.’

She could almost feel the look she knew June and Sally would be exchanging behind her back – a mixture of pity and guilt.

It had been a warm day, and the scent of late spring hung softly on the evening air.

As she approached the allotments she could hear angry raised male voices, loudest amongst them Alf Davies’s.

‘… And I’m telling you that that bloody dog of yours has got to go.’

A group of men were gathered in one of the allotments, Molly’s father amongst them.

‘Take it easy, Alf,’ Molly heard him saying as she approached them.

‘You can’t blame the dog for doing what comes natural, like. He didn’t know that you’d trapped them rabbits for your own dinner, did he?’ one of the men laughed.

Bert Johnson was standing next to her father, his dog at his feet, whilst Alf Davies stood in front of him, red-faced with fury, refusing to join in the other men’s good-natured banter.

‘If he’d obeyed the law then the bloody dog wouldn’t have got me rabbits, would it? No dogs to be allowed exceptin’ for working dogs – that’s what the Government has said. Anyone who has a dog has ter have it put down … and if he doesn’t do it then I’ll tek a gun to the thing meself.’

‘You touch my dog and it’ll be you as is facing the wrong end of a gun.’ Bert’s voice was thin and tremulous, and Molly felt tears prick sharply at
her eyes. Why she should feel so concerned for old Bert and his dog she didn’t know. She only knew that somehow Bert’s plight touched a raw nerve with her.

‘Come on, Alf. Leave it be now,’ Molly’s father urged. ‘It were only a couple of rabbits, after all.’

‘That’s not the point. The law’s the law and the law says no dogs exceptin’ for working dogs,’ Alf insisted, plainly resenting the fact that the other men were siding with Bert against him.

Molly shivered, despite the cardigan she was wearing over her short-sleeved blouse, and wrapped her arms around herself. She had never really taken to Alf Davies, nor his wife, if she were honest, and she knew that the couple weren’t popular in the cul-de-sac.

‘Molly lass!’ her father exclaimed, suddenly seeing her.

‘I came out for a bit of fresh air,’ she told him. ‘It’s bin on the news again about the Germans invading Holland …’

‘And that won’t be the end of it, neither,’ one of the other men prophesied grimly. ‘No matter what bloody Chamberlain says.’

Molly shivered again. She slipped her arm through her father’s, turning to frown over her shoulder as she heard Alf continuing to berate old Bert.

‘He can’t really make Bert have his dog put down, can he, Dad?’

‘He might think he can, but I reckon between
us we can find a way to keep the dog out of sight until he’s calmed down a bit,’ her father comforted her, patting her hand. She had become so thin and pale since Eddie’s death, her once-ready laughter now silenced. He ached with sympathy for her, but he knew from his own experience that only time could soften the sharpness of her pain. She was so young that she was bound to feel it all the more keenly, but young enough, he hoped, to find happiness with someone else – although he knew he could not tell her that.

That night Molly couldn’t sleep. The scented sweetness of the night permeated her bedroom as she lay awake listening to the soft wuffling sound of June’s breathing.

She and Eddie would have been married for nearly two months by now. Eddie … Eddie … She rolled over and buried her face in her pillow, longing for the relief of tears. Somehow, these last few weeks, she had found it impossible to cry properly for Eddie, as though everything inside her had dried up into a barren emptiness.

 It was Pete Ridley, the milkman, who brought the news, leaving his horse to make its own ambling way down the road with the milk cart, as he paused to tell everyone, shaking his head and saying as how it were a crying shame. Molly stood as whey-faced as blown milk, listening to him telling her father that old Bert had been found dead this morning,
having shot his dog and then hanged himself.

‘That dog were closer to him than many a man is to his missus – closer. Meant the world to him, it did. Of course, I blame that Alf Davies, allus threatening to have it put down. Well, now poor old Bert’s gone and done the job for him. Aye, and finished himself off as well.’

Suddenly Molly realised that she was crying. Great choking sobs tore at her body, making her chest heave as she wept for old Bert, who had not been able to go on living without the dog he loved. But she had to live without Eddie, and she wept for him, and for all those men who would die, and all those women who would have to go on living without them.

 Molly wasn’t surprised to hear her father saying later that week that he had heard that Alf Davies and his wife had decided to move out of the cul-de-sac and rent somewhere else in another part of the city.

But the gossip about Alf Davies was soon forgotten in the excitement of Mr Chamberlain stepping down as Prime Minister and Winston Churchill taking his place.

‘Now we’ll show Jerry what’s what,’ John Fowler beamed, coming round to talk about the latest news with Albert.

Unlike Mr Chamberlain, the new Prime Minister did not minimise the danger of Hitler or the German blitzkrieg. 

‘Here, listen to what it says ’ere,’ Jean called out sombrely, causing the other girls to leave their machines and cluster around her as she waved the latest copy of the
Picture
Post
in the air. ‘It says “The Darkest Day of the War, Arras and Amiens fall to the Germans.” Where are they when they’re at home?’

‘France, yer dafthead,’ Irene told her sharply. ‘Go on, what else does it say? Oh, give it here and let me read it …’

Molly listened, aware of but somehow unmoved by what she was hearing, as though set apart from the anxiety of the other girls. After all, what did it matter now to her what happened? It couldn’t bring Eddie back.

She was the only person who
wasn’t
tensely waiting for every fresh news bulletin, though – she knew that. You could feel people’s tension, and see it in their faces. Only she seemed to be immune to it, sealed off from it by her bitterness and grief.

‘My father says that the Germans won’t take France because the BEF is sure to hold them back,’ Anne told her that evening as they left their weekly WVS meeting.

‘I hope your father’s right, Anne,’ Molly answered. ‘There’s enough good men dead already.’ She yawned loudly. She hadn’t been able to sleep for the last few nights, and when she did she dreamed of old Bert and his dog, the animal howling mournfully until suddenly it wasn’t the
dog she could hear but Eddie, crying out to her in agony.

Her loss had begun to sharpen the softness of her smile and to strip the flesh of her girlhood from her bones. She had retreated to a place inside herself where she could shut out everyone else, a place where she could mourn Eddie and the loss of her own future. The girls at Hardings whispered when she excused herself at dinner, not knowing what they could do to help their friend.

‘I hope that Dad is right as well,’ Anne agreed. ‘What with our Richard in France and Philip too …’ She took hold of Molly’s arm, her eyes dark with fear. ‘Molly, I’m scared for them.’ The two girls looked at one another, and then Anne shook her head and said firmly, ‘Just listen to me! Our Richard would give me a right telling-off if he could hear me.’ But nevertheless there were tears in her eyes and Molly could feel her trembling.

Seeing Anne so distressed pierced the protective wall Molly had built around herself. She reached out to Anne and hugged her reassuringly. ‘Try not to worry,’ she said. ‘I know it isn’t easy but, Anne, you have to believe that they will be safe, for their sakes. Try to tell yourself that they’ll be home soon.’

‘Oh, Molly, I do hope they will. I know it sounds silly but, do you know, I have to look at Philip’s photograph now to remember what he looks like.’

Comforting Anne made her own pain lessen a
little, Molly recognised as she did her best to calm her friend’s fears.

She had promised to call in at Sally’s on her way home so that she could walk back with June, who was now spending most of her spare time there.

Sally and June were laughing together when Molly walked in.

‘Oh, Molly, there you are. Me and Sally was just saying that we could do with you getting started with a bit of knitting for these two,’ June laughed, patting her belly.

The sound of their laughter and the sight of their happiness brought a resurgence of Molly’s pain. ‘Is that all you can talk about, you two – babies, and how your Frank and Sally’s Ronnie are going to push Jerry back to Germany single-handed?’ she demanded bitterly.

June flushed and looked shocked. ‘There’s no call for you to act like that,’ she protested.

‘We just thought that doin’ a bit of knittin’ would give yer sommat to take yer mind off … everything … but if you feel like that then you do not have to bother,’ Sally said huffily.

‘Do you really expect a bit of knitting for someone else’s baby is going to take me mind off losing Eddie?’ Molly laughed mirthlessly.

June looked uncomfortably at Sally and then shook her head. ‘Molly, we all know what you’ve bin through, but carrying on like this isn’t going to bring him back—’ She broke off as there came
an urgent knock on the door. Looking worried, Sally got up to answer it.

‘I thought you’d both want to know,’ Frank’s mother breathlessly announced as Sally invited her in. ‘I’ve just come from Mill Road Hospital – I’ve got a friend there, one of the sisters. She’s got
connections
, like, and she’s just told me that she’s heard that orders have gone out to our lads that they are to fall back. May God help them.’ Doris Brookes’s voice quavered slightly, and June, who had stood up when she had seen her mother-in-law, gave a small moan, and collapsed in a dead faint.

Immediately Doris reverted from anxious mother to professional nurse, instructing Molly to help her get June into a sitting position with her head between her knees, and commanding Sally to go and get a bowl.

‘Like as not she’ll be sick when she comes round,’ Doris pronounced matter-of-factly.

‘Will she be all right? Only she said as how she felt a bit faint, like, when she got here,’ Sally informed them worriedly.

‘She’s not said anything about any bleeding or that, has she?’ Doris asked, frowning.

Sally and Molly shook their heads.

‘Well, that’s all right then. No, I reckon it’s just a bit of shock done it. Allus bin a bit highly strung, your June has, Molly. If you had a bit of cork we could burn, that’d bring her round,’ Doris announced, as she took the bowl Sally had brought
her, adding, ‘Put yer radio on, will yer, Sally, just in case there’s bin any more news. It’s all right, lass,’ she told Molly bracingly as she saw her expression. ‘Like I said, your June has allus bin one for a bit o’ drama, and I warned my Frank so when he first said as how he were walking out with her. I told him he’d be better off walking out wi’ you! “You’ll end up having to fetch and carry for her, our Frank,” I told him, but he wouldn’t listen.’ Doris patted June’s hand. ‘She’s coming round now …’

June moaned faintly, slowly lifting her head. ‘Oh, what’s going to become of me and the baby if anything should happen to Frank? I told ’im all along not to join up.’ She gagged suddenly, giving Molly just enough warning to get the bowl in front of her before she was sick.

‘Oh, I feel right badly,’ June sobbed.

‘Come on now, that’s enough of that,’ Doris told her briskly. ‘Bawling your head off like that isn’t going to help anyone. How do you think you’re going to go on when you go into labour if you carry on like this after a bit of a faint?’

‘A bit of a faint?’ June objected angrily. ‘It were you as made me faint, frightening me half to death like that, and me carrying.’

Doris gave an unsympathetic snort. ‘There’s women carrying who go through far worse than that, I can tell you. I did myself—’

‘The news is coming on,’ Sally interrupted her.

All four women fell silent. As if he too sensed
the tension around him, even baby Tommy stopped gurgling, but the newsreader made no mention of any retreat by the British Army.

‘You want to be ashamed of yourself,’ June rounded on her mother-in-law, her face bright red, ‘coming round ’ere and frightening folk half to death like that. That friend of yours wants to get her facts right before she goes spreading any more gossip, otherwise someone will be reporting her to Mr Churchill, and he’ll have her locked up.’

‘Don’t tek on so, June. You’ll mek yourself poorly again,’ Sally warned.

‘I’m all right,’ June told her, ‘no thanks to some folk I could name.’ She sniffed. ‘I know you never wanted your Frank to marry me, but he has done and I’ll thank you to remember that in future. Frank isn’t going to be happy when he hears about this, not with me being in my condition.’