Keep the Home Fires Burning (45 page)

‘I don’t know what sort of person you are,’ Sam said. ‘I thought I did. I thought that we knew nearly everything about one another, but then you suddenly stopped writing to me. I sent a letter every week.’

‘There were lots of reasons,’ Sarah said. ‘I couldn’t write to anyone at first because I was flat on my back for weeks.’

‘I understood that,’ Sam said. ‘The nurse that wrote that first letter for you telling me what had happened explained that. But afterwards? Peggy wrote and told me that you didn’t want me in your life any more. She told me that you said those very words, and I have never known Peggy lie. You broke my heart, Sarah.’

‘I nearly broke mine saying those words,’ Sarah said. ‘And Peggy told the truth because I did say them.’

‘But why?’ Sam said perplexed. ‘I wanted to support you. I know it was only through letters, but that was all I could do at the time. To cut me off the way you did, and not even to try and explain why …? I couldn’t understand it. I would never had said that the girl I had been writing to
for some time had a cruel bone in her body, but that
was
cruel, Sarah.’

Sarah sighed. ‘I know it was now. But at the time I wasn’t thinking about the pain I was inflicting on anybody else. I was just thinking of myself, although I really did think that you would be better off without me.’

Sam shook his head. ‘I can’t understand how you would ever feel that way.’

Sarah took one of Sam’s arms and held it tight as she went on, ‘You need to understand how I was then. How mixed up – still am, to an extent. Peggy had to bully me into coming here.’ She felt him stiffen and said, ‘That wasn’t because of you – I longed to come, yearned to see you once more – but I couldn’t face people and I have seldom left my bedroom since I came home from hospital. You see, I sneaked a look in the mirror when the last skin grafts had just been done, the others were only just bedding in and the hair hadn’t grown fully over the deep scar on my head. The only word to describe myself then was grotesque. To be honest I couldn’t live with the image of myself then and I thought you deserved to have someone better.’

‘Better?’ Sam repeated. ‘You mean less flawed. How shallow you must have thought me.’

‘No,’ said Sarah. ‘I knew you weren’t – well, in my rational moments I knew. But I wasn’t rational, not to start with. When Peggy told us about you being injured … I can’t really explain how I felt, and it was strange for me to feel
anything because I had cut myself off so much. Then when she came back and said you had been blinded …’

‘You felt sorry for me?’

‘No,’ Sarah said firmly. ‘I was sorry you have been injured, but it wasn’t pity I felt for you. I have never told you this before, but I think I love you, Sam.’

‘You think?’

Sarah smiled. ‘I know I do. I love you, Sam Wagstaffe.’

‘And I you, Sarah Whittaker.’

‘Ah, Sam,’ Sarah said, and it was as if a hard lump inside her had melted away and set her limbs trembling. She got to her feet and kissed Sam on the lips. ‘And my face doesn’t matter to you?’

‘Not a jot,’ Sam said. ‘Anyroad, I don’t imagine I will be any oil painting when they dig all the shrapnel out of my face. Will that matter to you?’

‘Of course not.’

‘Well, then,’ Sam said, and then he asked gently, ‘Can I feel your face? I will be gentle.’

Sarah removed her hat before she leaned forward and Sam gently touched her face so very tenderly. When he felt the slight ridges in her skin, his heart turned over for what she had suffered. ‘You’ve had your hair cut short?’

‘I had to have it cut,’ Sarah said. ‘They shaved my head to stitch the cut on my head and so it was all different lengths.’

‘Such a lot has happened you,’ Sam said, catching hold of her hand. ‘I need to know it all.’

And so Sarah held tight to Sam’s hand and told him everything from the time she had sat on the wall beside her uncle and tried to read the censored remains of the letter he had sent her.

Much later, Peggy came in to find them both in deep conversation. She had not had to see the doctor at all, she just thought they needed time alone and so she had read some magazines in the visitors’ room to give them precious time together.

After meeting Sam again, Sarah felt as if she had been reborn. For so long she had kept a lid on her feelings, because despite the beautiful words he used sometimes when he wrote to her, she thought maybe she was reading too much into them. When she’d first met him she’d been dazzled by him. Meeting him again at sixteen had kindled a love that had matured with her. What she felt for Sam Wagstaffe now was no childish infatuation, but a deep and abiding love, the sort of love that lasts a lifetime.

Marion saw that as soon as Sarah came home. Though the others plagued both her and Peggy with questions about Sam, Marion said nothing because she recognised that Sarah had met her soul mate and she was heartsore for her because she knew just how hard her life was going to be if she saddled herself to a blind man.

‘Are you going again tomorrow?’ Magda asked.

Sarah shook her head. ‘Sunday is really the only
day in the week that Peggy’s family can go and visit, but I’ll tell you where I am going tomorrow and that is to Mass.’

Marion was so amazed that her jaw dropped open.

‘Don’t look quite so surprised, Mom,’ Sarah said. ‘It’s about time. And anyroad,’ she added simply, ‘I want to thank God for bringing Sam into my life.’

Polly and her family were delighted to see Sarah at Mass, and her grandfather had tears in his eyes as he held her close. Many people knew what had happened to Sarah, but though some gave her curious looks, she paid no heed to them. Marion was immensely proud of her.

After dinner was eaten and cleared away Marion went round to see her sister. It was a cold and blustery afternoon and Polly was sitting by a blazing fire. Orla, seemingly the only one home, swept the clutter off another easy chair for Marion and then fetched a bucket of coal and even offered to make them both a cup of tea.

‘What’s she angling for?’ Marion whispered as she went into the small kitchen.

Polly chuckled. ‘Oh, you know the measure of Orla all right,’ she said in a similar low voice. ‘She thinks I don’t know, but Mary Ellen let it slip that a crowd of her friends are going to the pictures tonight and she wants to go and she’s spent all her money. She’s a devil with money – it burns a hole in her pocket. I mean, I give her back the same as the others and she has it spent in five minutes.’

‘And will you give her the extra?’

‘I expect so,’ Marion said. ‘If I don’t then Pat will, anyroad. Right soft, he is, with the kids and always has been. And don’t look like that, our Marion, because I’ll tell you something for nothing. I would rather have him that way than the other way.’

Marion nodded. ‘Fair enough. I feel the same about Bill.’

Orla appeared then with two cups of tea and Polly waited until she had gone out into the yard before she said, ‘Anyroad, you ain’t come round here to talk about our Orla, or even the merits of our husbands so out with it.’

‘Well, you’ve seen the change in Sarah?’

‘I have and it was lovely to see her at Mass today.’

‘Yeah, wasn’t it? She told me that she wanted to thank God for bringing Sam into her life again.’

‘She’s certainly has got it bad,’ Polly said. ‘Amazing what the love of a good man will do for a girl. So what’s the long face for?’

‘Well, he is a fine young man and there’s no denying that,’ Marion said. ‘But he has two things against him.’

‘Two?’

‘Yes. The first is that Sam is not a Catholic, and Father McIntyre will be down on me something fierce when he finds out. But I think it’s far more of a handicap that he’s blind. I don’t want our Sarah throwing her life away like that.’

‘Like what?’

‘Oh, you know, Pol.’

‘Are you sure she would be throwing her life away?’

‘For God’s sake, Polly, how will he ever support her? What sort of life will she have if she goes ahead and marries him?’

‘Look, let’s leave Father McIntyre out of it for now,’ Polly said. ‘He’s nothing but a sanctimonious hypocrite. And you’re more than a match for him, anyroad. So really, your only objection centres on Sam’s blindness.’

‘Well, yes,’ Marion said. ‘Isn’t that enough?’

‘And what would you do if, God forbid, Bill was blinded in an explosion? Would you walk away from him?’

‘Of course I wouldn’t,’ Marion said. ‘You should know me better than that. I married for better, for worse, in sickness and in health.’

‘It would mean some massive adjustments for you both.’

‘Yes …’

‘Well, all I’m trying to say is that at least Sarah would know what she was going into and they could learn together.’

Marion still shook her head and Polly went on, ‘Anyroad loving Sam and being loved in return has certainly lifted your Sarah out of the doldrums.’

‘Oh, I can’t deny that,’ Marion said. ‘And she doesn’t have her face covered with dressings any more.’

‘She doesn’t need them,’ Polly said. ‘I never
would have believed that they would have made such a good job on her face.’

‘I know,’ Marion replied. ‘But she doesn’t seem to see what we see, and what really disturbs me is that she might in the end agree to marry Sam because he can’t see her. You know what I mean?’

‘Surely she wouldn’t do that?’

‘She just might, Pol,’ Marion said. ‘And that ain’t really a good enough reason to go into a marriage that will have to last a lifetime.’

Sam’s parents felt the same way as Marion did when he told them that he intended to marry Sarah.

‘Married?’ said his mother in disbelief.

Sam heard the tone in his mother’s voice and he said almost defensively, ‘I have been writing to her for over two years, and Peggy has told you who she is.’

‘I know that, son,’ his father said. ‘But things have changed for you.’

‘D’you think I don’t know that?’

‘Well,’ said his mother, ‘d’you think you’re being fair to the girl?’

‘Sarah is no fool,’ Sam cried desperately. ‘She knows what she’s doing.’

‘Does she?’ his mother asked. ‘I thought she wasn’t yet twenty.’

The words hung in the air and Sam’s parents saw the sudden sag of Sam’s shoulders. How could he ask Sarah to throw her life away looking after him? She thought he deserved better when her face
was scarred and disfigured, and she certainly deserved better than spending her life playing nursemaid to a blind man.

His father spoke into the silence. ‘Was there any understanding between you? Any promises made?’

Sam remembered the declarations of love that they had both made just the previous day and yet he shook his head.

‘So no harm done then,’ Sam’s father said, relieved. ‘You’ll just have to explain to her.’

No harm done, Sam thought, when I feel as if my heart is shattered. But this is no time to think about myself. If I love Sarah then I must release her. ‘Tomorrow,’ he said, struggling against the tears that threatened to overwhelm him, ‘I was going to ask Sarah to be my wife.’

‘And now?’

‘Now I see how unfair I am being.’ Sam felt as if the words were being dragged out of him. ‘I will try and make her see that.’

Sam felt really upset when his parents had left and Peggy, who went in to see him afterwards, saw tears glistening in his eyes and could have wept herself as he told her what he had to do.

‘Don’t tell her, Peg, will you? This must come from me.’

‘I’ll not tell her, never fear,’ Peggy said. ‘But have you thought what you’re doing? You will break her heart.’

Sam sighed. ‘All I know at the moment is that it hurts like hell, and yet I know it’s the right
decision. I am releasing Sarah to seek a better life for herself.’

‘And what if she doesn’t want one? And what about your life?’

‘She must be made to see that parting is the best thing for her,’ Sam said. ‘As for me, I’ll only have half a life from now on and that hardly matters.’

Peggy thought he was making a big mistake, but she couldn’t dissuade him, though she tried over and over. However, Peter and Daisy were also waiting to see their big brother before visiting time was over and in the end she had no option but to kiss Sam on the cheek and leave him.

When Sarah got to Sam’s ward on Monday afternoon she found him in a very pensive mood, but she told herself that he was bound to have off days. Blindness was a lot to come to terms with. And so she sat down by the bed and took hold of his hand as she said, ‘Come on, now, I did all the talking on Saturday and now it’s your turn.’

Sam heard the laughter in Sarah’s voice but his remained grave as he said, ‘I’ve been doing a lot of thinking since then.’

Still in a jocular tone, Sarah said, ‘Oh, you don’t want to do too much of that kind of thing. Hurts your head, too much thinking.’

‘I’m being serious, Sarah,’ Sam said. ‘It was lovely that you came to see me on Saturday. No, what am I saying? It was more than just lovely, it
was amazing, terrific, and I know now that I love you dearly and for that reason I cannot let you throw your life away.’

A cold feeling washed over Sarah and wiped the smile from her face as she asked, ‘And how exactly am I doing that?’

‘Sarah, I am blind.’

‘I knew that on Saturday,’ Sarah said. ‘Nothing has changed.’

‘Everything has changed,’ Sam said. ‘Can’t you understand that? We can have no future together.’

Sarah gasped, ‘What are you saying?’

‘You know what I’m saying,’ Sam said almost harshly. ‘Don’t make me spell it out, for Christ’s sake.’

‘Do I get no say in any of this?’

‘No, because you are young,’ Sam said. ‘You would not be totally aware of what you’d be taking on.’

‘Yes I would.’

‘In time you would begin to resent me.’

‘No, I should never do that,’ Sarah said. ‘We have shared a special relationship for almost three years.’

‘And now it is at an end.’

‘Oh God, you really mean it.’ Sarah was having trouble drawing breath and she felt as if her heart had been shattered into a million pieces. And then she suddenly pulled her hands away from Sam’s and got to her feet. ‘It’s my face, isn’t it? Whatever you said to me on Saturday you, Sam Wagstaffe, aren’t man enough to cope with a disfigured wife.’