Sweet Memories of You (Beach View Boarding House) (19 page)

‘I’m sorry, Peg,’ he said quietly. ‘I just accepted that she was safe and happy with you, so I didn’t worry about her.’ He finally met her gaze. ‘I promised her mother that I would look after her, but I’ve let her down, haven’t I?’

‘Not let her down – just not been there quite as often as you should have been.’ Peggy patted his arm. ‘But I’m sure you’ll remember to write more often from now on.’

He nodded, his gaze drifting towards the cellar steps and the sound of the motorbike engine. ‘You can be sure of that, Peggy,’ he said gruffly. ‘She’s a good kid, and I won’t let her down again, I promise.’

‘I’m glad that’s settled. I didn’t want to spoil your leave, but I felt I had to say something.’

‘And you were right to do so, Peggy. I’m just rather ashamed that it was necessary to remind me.’

‘Don’t take it too hard, Jack. It’s not easy being a parent these days.’ Peggy handed him two cups of tea. ‘Why don’t you take these down to drink with Rita while you both mess about with that bike? I’m off into town in a minute, so I won’t see you until this evening.’ She smiled up at his doleful expression. ‘Cheer up, Jack,’ she said brightly. ‘Worse things happen at sea.’

Ron didn’t head for the Anchor as he’d first intended, but walked along the twitten which ran between the back gardens of the terraces. He plodded purposefully up the steep hill as Harvey raced ahead of him, nose to the ground, tail windmilling as he followed the scents of rabbits, field mice and voles.

Ron was a bit disgruntled that Peggy hadn’t seemed to take the painful injury to his thumb seriously, but he knew that fresh air and sunshine would soon put him in a better mood. The wind was cold, but the sun was low in the sky and very bright, making the dew sparkle on the grass. He continued walking until he’d reached the top of the cliffs that overlooked the town, and then stood for a moment in quiet contemplation.

Cliffehaven had been scarred by war, the familiar streets and once elegant promenade now interspersed with gaping bomb sites and the skeletons of houses, hotels and shops. The factory estate lay in the drifting shadows of barrage balloons, and ugly barbed wire and shipping traps marred the beauty of the seafront and the bay.

Ron looked down to the shingle beach which had been laid with mines right to the low-water mark, and remembered the years when he’d accompanied his father on the family fishing boat as part of Cliffehaven’s large fleet. They had been the good years, when the catches were plentiful, work was readily available and there was money to spend. On his father’s passing, Ron had continued the family tradition and taken over with his own sons, Jim and Frank.

He lit his pipe, dug his hands into the deep pockets of his poacher’s coat and stared out across the sparkling waters of the English Channel. The First World War had intervened, but the Reilly men had survived when so many of their comrades had not, and Ron had hoped things would return to normal. But Jim had given up the fishing and turned his back on the engineering training he’d had from the Army to become a projectionist at the local cinema, and on Ron’s retirement, Frank had taken over. Now they were in the midst of another war, and things would never be the same again.

Ron bit down on his pipe stem as he trudged past the hilltop gun emplacements, down the rolling slope and then along to where the chalk cliff jutted out over the tiny shingled cove of Tamarisk Bay.

He looked down to the row of five little wooden houses set on a grassy bank at the end of the rutted track which wound its way to the shore from the main road at the top of the cliffs. The end house was where Frank and Pauline had set up home to raise their family so many years before, and in the summer the tamarisk on the bank would be a rippling sea of pink fronds amid the bright yellow gorse and wild grasses. And as the different seasons passed the shingle would become a garden of rock samphire, sea campion and kale, yellow horned poppies and starry clover.

Now the houses were mostly abandoned and instead of the flowers, there were clumps of black, foul-smelling oil entangled in the flotsam and jetsam of downed aircraft and sunken ships – and the lonely beached hulk of Frank’s fishing boat.

Ron regarded the boat, wondering if Frank would ever sail her again now that two of his three sons had been consigned to watery graves somewhere in the Atlantic. ‘To be sure, I’d not have the heart for it,’ he muttered.

He stood there for a long moment, remembering the times he’d carried those boys on his shoulders as he’d tramped the hills, and taught them how to make purse nets, to train and care for ferrets, sneak up on an unsuspecting pheasant, tickle trout, catch eels and skin rabbits. They were the days of sunshine, of hope that there would never be another war. Now Brendon was the only survivor.

Ron sighed deeply. Following his brothers’ tragic deaths in 1941, Brendon had been reassigned by the Royal Naval Reserve from the minesweepers to the London docks, which could be just as dangerous as the Atlantic, and his mother Pauline clung to the desperate hope that he would come through unscathed.

Ron’s gaze shifted to the line of washing that flapped in the wind. Pauline had refused Peggy’s offer to come and live with them until Frank was demobbed, preferring instead to stay in the house that still resonated with the memories of happier times. He’d visited often to make sure she was coping, and although she’d worried them all at the depths of her grieving, she’d somehow found a way of dealing with it – just as everyone did in the end.

He headed away from the cliff edge towards the ruins of the old farmhouse and barns. The farmer and his family had been relocated to Scotland and the Army had requisitioned it to use as target practice for their new recruits before they’d finally abandoned it, but it still offered shelter from the elements.

Ron settled down on a fallen rafter and relit his pipe, aware that the time had come to read and fully absorb the contents of Jim’s airgraph. Despite its small size, it had felt heavy in his trouser pocket – a dark reminder that the war touched them all, and that time and distance brought little comfort to already troubled hearts.

Drawing it from his pocket, he watched Harvey charge about in the pursuit of something hiding in a clump of gorse. His gaze drifted to the sweeping valley below, where the forest and fields of the Cliffe estate sprawled behind the high wire fences that had brought his poaching expeditions to an end.

He gave a sigh and let his gaze follow the country lane which meandered alongside the serried ruts of good, dark earth where spring crops were beginning to flourish, towards the distant steeple which rose above the trees and huddled roofs of the tiny hamlet where Martin and Anne had bought a cottage. They’d lived in it for less than a year before Anne left for the safety of Somerset with their baby Rose Margaret; now Martin lived with the other airman at Cliffe aerodrome and the cottage had been rented out.

Ron knew he’d been merely putting off the moment, so he took a deep breath and drew the letter from its envelope. Jim’s writing was cramped, but Ron’s eyesight was good and in the bright sunlight it was easy to decipher.

Da
,

I hope you’re well, and that Harvey is behaving. Peg wrote and told me about your medal and I’m guessing you probably caused a scene at the Town Hall. I wish I could have been there to cheer you on. The heat and humidity here is unbearable, and we’re all being eaten alive by mosquitoes. I’m one mass of bites but have so far managed to escape malaria, but Ernie’s down with dysentery and it’s frightening how quickly a big, strong man can be reduced to a shivering skeleton. The hospital’s wicked, with bad food, lack of staff and no proper sanitation. The men are expected to lie on straw mattresses on the floor and then virtually left there to either recover or die. It’s particularly bad for those with rot-gut as they’re left to roll about in agony in their own mess for hours. The fact that any of them survives is a miracle, and I fear for Ernie. On top of all that we’ve got some of the deadliest snakes to contend with here, and I found one curled up in my bed. I killed it, and now we all go on a nightly hunt for the buggers.

We’ve had a bit of excitement over the last week which I haven’t told Peggy about. A large force of Jap bombers attacked us, which resulted in numerous fires and a lot of casualties. The ack-ack brought down two of the blighters, and the RAF brought down seven, but one of our fighters was shot down. Turns out the Japs are trying to make a big push across the border, so we’re all on standby to get at them or get out. Their soldiers are now less than forty miles away from our HQ, and all the civilians in the town have been evacuated. If I don’t make it out of here, Da, look after Peg and the wains for me and never let them forget that I love you all.

Jim.

Ron’s eyes misted. ‘God love you, son,’ he murmured. He struck a match and the flame caught the edge of the letter and swiftly devoured it. As the charred fragments flew away with the wind, Ron could only pray that the hotter winds of India would blow mercifully on his son and bring him home safe and unharmed.

Peggy had strapped Daisy into her pram and left Jack and Rita to their noisy efforts with the motorbike. Cordelia had decided to keep her hearing aid off, and was happily ensconced in her favourite chair by the kitchen fire with a new library book. She’d assured Peggy she was quite capable of preparing the vegetables for tea, and was planning to make a corned beef sandwich for her lunch.

The sun was bright but the wind was cold, so, having completed her shopping, Peggy kept up a brisk pace as she went along Camden Road and turned up into the High Street. Passing the Home and Colonial, she waved to Ted, and felt the usual pang of regret when she saw the remains of the cinema where Jim used to work. She headed on up towards the station and the humpbacked bridge.

‘Hello, Stan,’ she said cheerfully as she saw the portly stationmaster sitting outside the Nissen hut which now served as his ticket office. ‘You’re looking very well.’

He rose from his seat and tipped his hat. ‘That’s because I am well, Peggy,’ he said with a beaming smile as he gently pinched Daisy’s cheek and chucked her under the chin. ‘And how are you?’

‘I’m fine,’ she replied. ‘I got two letters from Jim today, Ron has finally fixed my window frames, and Daisy has yet to have one of her tantrums.’ She eyed the straining buttons on his uniform jacket, and the plump, rosy cheeks that almost hid his eyes when he smiled. ‘I see Ethel is still feeding you up, Stan,’ she teased. ‘I don’t know how she manages on the ration.’

Stan tapped the side of his nose. ‘She’s got a mate who’s working as a land girl on one of the farms and they’ve come to an arrangement,’ he said quietly. ‘In exchange for extra butter, eggs and cheese, Ethel does all their mending and goes over once a week to clean their billet.’

‘Good for her,’ said Peggy without rancour. ‘Well, I’d better be off. I want to catch Ivy when she comes off her shift.’

‘Before you go,’ he said quickly, ‘there’s a bit of news that isn’t public knowledge yet.’

Peggy was immediately intrigued, for she loved a bit of gossip. ‘Don’t tell me you and Ethel are thinking of getting hitched, Stan. She’s still got a husband somewhere, you know.’

He waved his hand impatiently. ‘No, no, Peggy. It’s Ethel’s Ruby. She and Mike have got engaged.’

‘Oh, Stan, that’s wonderful news. When’s the wedding?’

His ruddy face became gloomy. ‘There’s the rub, Peg. What with him being Canadian, it’s going to involve an enormous amount of paperwork to get permission from his commanding officer – and from the Home Office. So it might take a while.’ His expression brightened. ‘But there’s to be a party soon, and Ruby’s already got your name at the top of the invitation list.’

Peggy loved it when romance was in the air – especially when it involved someone like little Ruby and her young Canadian soldier. ‘Give her my love and congratulations, Stan,’ she said happily. ‘And tell her to come and visit. We haven’t seen enough of her or of Ethel since they went to live in the bungalow.’

‘I’ll do that, Peg.’ He pulled out his pocket watch and checked the time. ‘The eleven o’clock is due any minute, I’d better get on.’

Peggy’s step was light as she pushed the pram up the steep hill towards the dairy and the factory estate. Ruby had come to live at Beach View when she’d escaped her brute of a husband back in Bow. Since his death, she’d found work and a comfortable home here in Cliffehaven with her mother Ethel, and had fallen in love with Mike Taylor, who’d been blinded in one eye during the disastrous raid on Dieppe. There had been a time when Ruby had feared he’d be released from the Army and sent back to Canada, but the powers that be decided he’d be useful working here in admin, so things had worked out very well for both of them.

The sun suddenly seemed brighter and the wind less chill as Peggy tramped up the hill in a glow of happiness. Everything would be just perfect if Ethel could get free of her bully of a second husband and make an honest man out of Stan, for he’d been a widower for too long, and a man as kind-hearted as him deserved to have someone lovely to share his golden years.

Peggy reached the factory gates and kept a sharp eye out for Ivy as the men and women poured out after their night shift. They’d been working since eleven the night before, so it was hardly surprising that they were all in a hurry to get home.

She spotted Ivy amongst a group of other girls and took a moment to watch her. Ivy was small and as thin as a sparrow. Her unruly brown hair was partially covered by a headscarf knotted above her forehead, and she wore filthy dungarees that looked several sizes too big, heavy boots, a check shirt and a coat which had obviously been made from a tartan blanket. She looked tired and her little face was yellow-tinged and grubby, but there was still an energy about her, even after the long hours she’d just put in.

‘Hello, Peggy,’ she called as she came through the gate. ‘What are you doing up ’ere?’ She stepped out of reach as Peggy went to hug her. ‘I wouldn’t,’ she warned. ‘I’m covered in muck and bits of bullet, and you’ll get your lovely coat all dirty.’