Stay Where You Are and Then Leave (22 page)

Joe, Dr. Ridgewell, Granny Summerfield, Alfie, and Old Bill Hemperton all made their way quick-smart to number sixteen and hurried inside, where they found Margie and Georgie sitting on the couch together, holding each other, their heads on each other's shoulders.

“Georgie!” cried Granny Summerfield, running forward and throwing her arms around both of them.

“Help me,” whispered Georgie, looking up at his mum and his wife. “Help me. Please. Someone help me. My head…”

“Are you all right, Georgie lad?” asked Old Bill Hemperton, leaning forward.

“Mr. Summerfield, it's me, Dr. Ridgewell.”

“Dad!”

Alfie fought his way through and buried his body against his father's, locking his arms around his waist, pushing everyone else aside. A moment later, a great noise built from outside in the street, and everyone, except Alfie and Georgie, turned their heads to look out of the window.

“What on earth…?” asked Old Bill Hemperton, watching as all the doors began opening and the people from the houses opposite came out and started crying and hugging each other. “What's going on out there?”

“Stay here,” said Margie, opening the front door, and as she did so, Helena Morris from number eighteen and Mrs. Tamorin from number twenty ran past.

“What's happening?” shouted Margie. “What's going on out here? Why all the fuss?”

“It's over!” said Mrs. Tamorin. “Haven't you heard? The war's over. We won.”

On the sofa, Georgie's eyes closed tight and tears started to stream down his face as he wrapped his arms tighter around his son, holding him in a close embrace.

The war was over at last.

And there were still six weeks to go to Christmas.

 

CHAPTER 14

TAKE ME BACK TO DEAR OLD BLIGHTY

Kalena Janá
č
ek looked into the front parlor of her home at number six Damley Road and found her father sitting in an armchair with a newspaper open on the floor beneath him. On his left sat an open shoeshine box made of dark-brown mahogany wood, twice as long as it was wide, with a gold-colored clasp to unlock the lid from the base. Carved into the side was the word
Holzknecht
, and an emblem that displayed an eagle soaring above a mountain, wild-eyed and dangerous.

Mr. Janá
č
ek was shining his shoes.

“Do you have the present?” she asked, and her father nodded, pointing toward the table, where a copy of
Great Expectations
by Charles Dickens sat. It was July 1922, almost four years since the end of the war, and Alfie Summerfield was having a thirteenth birthday party.

“We should go,” said Mr. Janá
č
ek, putting his shoes on and standing up. He reached for his cane—the one that he'd bought when he first came back from the Isle of Man; the same one that helped him make his way from number six to the sweet shop and back again. His leg had been fine before he left, of course; this was something that had happened to him inside the camp. “Should we tell them our news today or wait?” he asked.
Should we tell zem our news today or vait?

“Not today,” said Kalena, shaking her head. “Let's wait until after Alfie's birthday. We'll tell them tomorrow.”

“All right. I should take the sign down, though, I suppose,” he said as they left the house. He looked down the street toward the sweet shop, which had had a
FOR SALE
sign on it ever since he and his daughter had been dispatched back to London, like redirected post, in 1919. The neighbors all thought it was for show, that the Janá
č
eks would never leave, but they had agreed between them that once the internment was over they would leave England forever and never return. It had just taken this long to sell the shop.

“When will we go?” asked Kalena.

“It will take a couple of weeks for the legal work to be completed. All being well, we should be back in Prague by the end of the month. And that day can't come soon enough as far as I'm concerned.”

“Won't you miss London at all?” she asked, linking arms with him, and he shook his head.

“Why should I miss it?” he asked. “It is not home. It was never home. I thought it was, but I was wrong. If I never see England again, it will be too soon. You feel the same way, don't you?”

Kalena hesitated. She wanted to leave, of course. She had been born in this country and then been treated like an outsider, and she could not forgive them for that. But she remembered that she had been happy before the war, that she had had many friends, the best one of all being Alfie.

“Can you believe that it was eight years ago today that we stood inside this house and lamented the outbreak of the war?” asked Mr. Janá
č
ek, knocking on the Summerfields' front door. “And yet it feels like a hundred years ago, don't you agree? Nothing now is as it was.”
Nussing now is as it vas.
“Everything seems like an illusion to me. I did nothing wrong. And these people have destroyed me. No, we will go back to Prague, you and I. We will be safe there.”

*   *   *

Granny Summerfield stood in the kitchen of number eleven and pressed her finger against the top of the sponge cake that she had baked that morning. It was cool to the touch. She opened the fridge and took out the icing that she had made earlier. Flour, sugar, milk, cream; it still felt strange to her to have such ready access to these things again after so many years of being unable to find them. Not that they were readily available, of course. You had to know where to go and you had to keep “in” with some of the shopkeepers. But still, things were much better than they had been during the war. Things were getting back to normal, and everyone said that this was the war to end all wars; they would never see its like again.

She had always enjoyed baking, and one of the greatest hardships for her during those years had been her inability to prepare her favorite food and share it with the people she loved. She remembered when she was a girl and had first learned how to cook—what an adventure it had seemed! Now, of course, she did more cooking than she ever had before, even though she was getting on a bit. Margie didn't have much time on her hands, what with all the changes that had taken place across the road at number twelve, but she didn't mind; she liked to help out.

She sat down, sure that she had everything ready for the party later, and settled into her armchair for forty winks just as Old Bill Hemperton across the road struck up his gramophone and the first melancholy strings of a new record he'd bought began to play. In the old days, of course, Granny Summerfield would have been across the road like a shot, banging on his door and telling him to turn that racket down, but she didn't do that anymore. Life was too short.

And besides, she quite liked this song.

*   *   *

Margie checked her watch and gasped a little under her breath. She'd been hoping to finish at the hospital at lunchtime in order to get everything ready for Alfie's party, and here it was almost one o'clock already, and no sign of her leaving.

“Nurse Summerfield!”

She turned around and saw Matron walking toward her, her arms swishing back and forth as she strode along.

“Yes, Matron?”

“I know you wanted to go home early today, but I wondered if you might be able to stay a little longer?”

Margie shook her head. “I can't. I would if I could, but it's my son's birthday. I promised I'd be home.”

“Of course, of course,” said Matron, a frown crossing her face. “I wouldn't ask, only…”

Margie sighed. She'd been working at the hospital for five years now and sometimes couldn't quite believe that she had never left after the war. But then she had never thought about leaving. She found the work interesting, and she liked helping people. And things were different now, anyway. It wasn't like the old days, when a married woman going out to work would have been frowned upon. Things were starting to change for the better.

“What's happened?” she asked.

“It's just a young man who's been brought in,” explained Matron. “He's in a bad way, poor fellow. He must have taken a notion last night and did something stupid. He'll survive, certainly, but we're just waiting for his parents to get here. I thought maybe you might sit with him for a while.”

“How old is he?” asked Margie quietly.

“About twenty-seven, I should think.”

Margie nodded. She knew what that meant. “Where is he?”

“He's in St. Agatha's Ward. Bed three. I spoke to his father; he'll be here in half an hour. You can go once he arrives. You don't mind, do you?”

Margie smiled and shook her head. “No,” she said. “No, I don't mind.”

She made her way toward St. Agatha's Ward and went in. It wasn't difficult to see which bed Matron had been referring to. The man was lying on his side, tears streaming down his face. When he saw Margie walking toward him, he pulled his arms out of sight, underneath the blankets, but not before she had glimpsed the tight bandages wrapped around his wrists. She pulled a chair over and glanced up at the name above the bed—Cecil Cratchley—before smiling at him and laying her hand on his shoulder.

“Hello, Cecil,” she said.

The young man blinked a few times but said not a word.

“I'm Nurse Summerfield,” she continued. “I'm going to sit with you for a little while, if that's all right. I think your parents are coming in to see you. And then we're going to take good care of you, all of us here at the hospital, and your mum and dad, and we're going to sort everything out. And before you know it you'll be right as rain again. Do you hear me, Cecil? You're going to be right as rain, and in the future you'll look back on these days and wonder what you were so upset about. Everything, Cecil, is going to be all right.”

And somehow the young man seemed to believe her, because he looked up and gave a little smile as he locked eyes with her. And Margie smiled right back. She was good at this. The truth was, she had finally found something that she was good at.

*   *   *

Mr. Asquith trotted happily along Damley Close, his tail swishing sporadically to keep the flies away. He'd never been thrilled about being attached to a milk float, but a life was a life, and one did what one had to do to get along. And anyway, at least that clown Henry Lyons had been dispatched elsewhere and his pal, his true old pal—where had he been?—was back at the helm. There were worse ways to make a living, he supposed.

The final milk churns were delivered to Damley Close just after one o'clock in the afternoon, and now that the float was empty, Georgie Summerfield began to make the journey back to the dairy, lighting up a cigarette with a half-frown on his face. “Do you know,” he said, “I'm thinking of giving these things up. They can't be much good for you, can they?”

Alfie shrugged. He did a lot of shrugging these days. Margie said it was his age. Georgie didn't mind. He knew that his son was growing older. If that was the worst of it, then they wouldn't have got off too badly.

“Do you remember when you used to beg me to let you ride the float with me, son?” he asked, and Alfie smiled, for this was a good memory.

“And you never used to let me,” he said.

“Well, you were too young,” said Georgie. “The trouble I would have got into! The folks at the dairy would have gone mad if they'd found out, and that's nothing to what your mother would have done. I didn't dare, Alfie! Didn't have the nerve!”

Alfie shook his head and looked across at his father. “You had nerve,” he said quietly. “I know that much, anyway.”

Georgie nodded and slowed down as Joe Patience emerged from the library on the right-hand side of the street. He tooted the horn, and Joe looked up in surprise but gave a wave when he saw Georgie and Alfie seated side by side on the milk float.

“He's doing well for himself these days all the same, isn't he?” said Georgie, waving back. “Every bookshop I pass, there's that book of his in the window. I keep meaning to buy a copy and read it, but I don't think I could concentrate that long.”

“You can borrow my copy if you want,” said Alfie.

“You've read it, then?”

“Yes.”

“And what's it like?”

Alfie smiled. “Dirty,” he said, which made Georgie burst out laughing.

“Maybe I will have a read of it after all,” he said, shaking his head. “Only not a word to your mother, do you hear? What time is it now, anyway?”

Alfie glanced at his watch. “Almost half past one,” he said.

“Perfect,” said Georgie. “We'll get the float back, give Mr. Asquith a wash down, then be home in time to change before the guests arrive.” He whistled through his teeth for a moment. “Thirteen years old,” he mused. “Makes me feel old, that does. I can't believe how grown-up you've become. Are you looking forward to your party?”

Alfie said nothing, and Georgie turned to look at him in surprise.

“You're not, are you? I can see it in your face.”

“It's not that,” said Alfie. “I don't think I really like birthdays, to be honest.”

“What? But everyone likes birthdays!”

“I don't,” said Alfie. “It makes me think of what it was like to be five again. And then what it was like to be six, seven, eight, and nine.”

Georgie nodded and steered Mr. Asquith to the left. “Those days are all in the past now, son,” he said. “We have happy times ahead of us. These last few years have been good, haven't they? I know it took me a while to … well, to get better. But I'm fine these days, aren't I? I'm sleeping, I'm eating, I'm working.”

“You still have nightmares,” said Alfie quietly.

“But not as many as before. Honestly, Alfie, I'm fine. There's nothing for you to worry about. And look, here we are on a fine summer's day, father and son riding the milk float together like you always wanted. It's not a bad life really, is it?”