The Daisy Club (35 page)

Of course that advice had been given to help all of them out of a tight social spot. And looking around the simple farmhouse kitchen, the round, red faces, the serious expression of Madame, now seated at the top of her table, Aurelia was quite sure that appreciating the non-existent flowers would not get her very far, on the other hand, charm might be just what was wanted.

‘It is such a beautiful thing to be back in Normandy,' she began. ‘The place where I have my happiest memories.'

At that moment there was a thundering on the stout oak front door. Aurelia half-rose from her seat. The three men and Madame remained still and seated, and then their host leaned forward.

‘Take off your shoes, Mademoiselle, and follow me.'

Aurelia did as she was told, and he led her through a door to an anteroom, quickly followed by the other two men. The three of them then shifted what appeared to be a flagstone of immense proportions, and pointed to Aurelia to climb down the steps to the hay store below.

‘Hide well behind the hay,' one of them whispered, as she clambered down into the darkness, even as they quickly stripped off to their underwear, and Madame likewise, and hoofed up the stairs to the rooms above, where they lay down, Madame having whisked the glasses off the table, and tidied away every suggestion of a repast.

There was more hammering on the door, and eventually one of the top windows in the farmhouse opened and a voice called down.

‘What is it, at this time of night? I have a gun, if you are a robber, I have a gun.'

Aurelia had always suffered from claustrophobia, but never more than at the moment when they pulled the stone into place above her, and she had to fight her way through what seemed like a sea of hay to the back of the cellar. She lay underneath it, frightened to death, her heart beating so fast that she felt that it must very soon explode.

She must have slept long hours, for she finally woke to the sound of an unusually educated voice speaking French. Either that, or the thin streak of light coming from the tiny window half-buried in the ground must have penetrated her covering of hay, because she found herself moving towards the tiny inset glass and staring up at the dawning scene above her.

The men were in the farmyard, and they were laughing and smoking with a tall man, well-dressed, too well-dressed for the countryside. His outfit stood out strangely against the coarse clothes of the farmers. The educated voice belonged to the man, but it wasn't that which froze Aurelia's blood, it was the fact that she knew his face, but where she knew it from, she could not at first say. And then it came to her exactly where she had last seen that slightly florid, self-satisfied, handsome – but finally unattractive – face. It had been at Twistleton Court.

The owner of the face had come down to visit Laura. Aurelia remembered him now, only too well, because he had felt her bottom in a beastly way, and had he not been Laura's father, she would have kicked him in the whatsits, or slapped him across his horridly handsome face.

Aurelia leaned back. She knew now that she had had it. She was sure of this because she had already known that the Hambletons were traitors, known it from being in Special Operations Executive, but never thought to come across them in Normandy, of all places. They were meant to be in the South of France. Meant to be – what did meant to be mean when there was a war on? What was
meant to be
when it was at home?

And the worst of it was, she rapidly realised, the worst of it was that her farmer friends were his friends, so quite briefly, and not to put too fine a point on it – she had actually
had
it, and little grey matter though she might have, even she could recognise that she was done for.

She started to slip her hand down to the place where she had hidden her pill, when something stopped her.

One of the farmers had taken out a gun, and was pointing it at Arthur Hambleton, and not in a nice way. (Come to think of it,
could
you point a gun at someone in a nice way?) And the others were still smiling at him, but they were leading him towards an old van, and stuffing him into it.

Aurelia stared. The van started, and as it was the oldest-looking van you had ever seen, that was something of a miracle. One of the farmers climbed in the back after Hambleton, leaving another to drive off, while her host, the one she had imagined to be her friend – and who still could be – walked slowly back towards the house, smiling.

Freddie stopped sobbing, and looked up briefly at Branscombe.

‘Stiff upper lip, Miss Freddie, stiff upper lip,' the face above her with its eyepatch and sad expression said. ‘It's the only way we'll get through this – stiff upper lip.'

Freddie mopped her eyes with a tea towel.

‘My upper lip has gone soggy, Branscombe. Nothing to be done, I know there isn't, just nothing to be done—'

A long forceful, silent shudder ran through her young body, and her normally buoyant expression seemed to have fled, so much so that her grief seemed forever set to stay.

‘Something has to be done, Miss Freddie. Miss Jean's having her –
ahem
– I think the
ahem
is on its way into this world, and it's snowing, hard. We'll never get through to the hospital at this rate, really we won't, unless we act fast, and pretty fast at that.'

Freddie frowned up at Branscombe. What was he saying? Aunt Jessie and Blossom had been wiped out, and he was muttering about Jean. What was it he was saying? At that moment Jean gave an involuntary gasp, and Freddie looked round to see Alec leading the poor girl to the old kitchen armchair with its squashy faded Liberty-print cushions, and its air of always waiting to receive someone.

She stood up. She had to pull herself together, get into uniform, go back into the fray. No time to cry, no time to do anything except get on with whatever her life dictated she should get on with. She moved over to the chair where Jean was now seated. Freddie's eyes were sore, and her lips were still trembling with the effort not to go on crying. She felt ashamed at breaking down, and at the same time ashamed that she was ashamed. Why shouldn't she cry for Aunt Jessie and darling old Blossom? What was it about war that meant you were not allowed to cry? And yet. And yet she knew it was just not done. Crying took up too much time, took up too much energy. If she saw her, Aunt Jessie would turn away, embarrassed, and if Blossom saw her, she would look appalled. She would say something like, ‘
Not snivelling, are you, Freddie dear? Mustn't snivel. Bad for the troops
.'

Jean gasped. The sound seemed to ring through the kitchen, and Branscombe and Alec found themselves standing in a little ring around the old kitchen chair as Freddie, now changed, bolted back down to the kitchen.

‘Oh God, Jean, you've only started!' Freddie stated, rather too obviously for everyone else present. She threw back her long plait of brown hair, and stared down at Jean, trying to suppress an overwhelming urge to shout at her, ‘
You can't have it now! Not when I have just heard about Aunt Jessie and Blossom. You can't start it now, it's just not – fair
.'

But when was life fair, and why should it be fair to her?

She leaned forward, and taking the tea towel, she carefully wiped Jean's forehead with it, then went to the kitchen tap and wrung it through with fresh cold water.

‘Don't worry, kid,' she said, suddenly putting on a perfectly terrible American accent. ‘We'll get through this together, see if we don't.'

Jean looked up at her and tried to smile.

‘No need to take me to hospital just yet, eh?'

Freddie shook her head, placing careful hands on Jean's stomach.

‘Well, love,' she said, now giving a passable imitation of one of the ward sisters. ‘If it was me, I think I'd get my skates on! Come on, chuck! No harm done to get you to the hospital, and then if things are not too busy, they can give you the once-over, and if things are just how they should be, send you right home with us!'

The truth was that Freddie was using different voices simply to hide the fact that she was petrified. She had stood by, helping to deliver a number of evacuee mothers, poor souls who had been sent from one hospital to another, until they finally ended up at Wychford, for want of anywhere else to go. Alone and terrified, the poor young women had always been so far from home that there was never anyone to visit them, or indeed take any interest in them, or their babies. Each time the babies she had attended had arrived normally, so normally that she could now feel, from placing tender hands on Jean's stomach, that her baby was by no means the right way up. Little that she knew of childbirth, she did at least know that feet first was not a way to arrive in this world.

Freddie knew she could deliver a baby normally, she also knew she was not capable of coping with a breech birth. She had heard that obstetricians, even very capable nurses, had managed to turn babies, but that once the mother's water was broken, it was impossible.

‘Come on, kid!' Freddie smiled. ‘Time for us to get into the car and make for Wychford and the hospital.'

‘Just put me in a cow byre, I can have it in the straw,' Jean said, protesting as Freddie and Branscombe pulled her to her feet.

Branscombe turned to Alec and muttered, ‘Fetch a spade, a blanket, a bottle of water, and a bottle of brandy, and bring them to the car.'

The car. That was all they had now. One car, one set of tyres, one set of brakes, one can of petrol left, until Monday. One can was enough until Monday, enough to get them to the hospital. Branscombe's mouth tightened as he thought of all the ruddy receptacles, all the Kilner jars, and God alone knew what, that he had filled with wretched petrol, and how it had all come in so useful, and yet, now, when he really needed it, he had only one can left.

If one thing happened to stop them on their journey, would the car start up again? What if the brakes gave? Oh, shut up, he told himself sharply, as he helped to wrap Miss Jean in a large pink woollen blanket. Shut up and don't trouble trouble until trouble troubles you, see? He had got through the Great War, he was going to get through to the hospital, and if the baby insisted on arriving – well, Miss Freddie was a nurse, wasn't she? Except. He glanced over at Miss Freddie. Except Miss Freddie had just had the most dreadful shock, well, they all had – but there was something else about that pretty face with its tiny rounded chin, and its bright, albeit at that moment reddened, eyes that gave him cause to worry. Miss Freddie and he, well, they had developed a kind of telepathy, which happened with troops in the trenches, with cooks in a kitchen, and with two people trying to cope with a large house, and a great many and very varied sets of personalities, all with their own different demands. This meant that he and Miss Freddie could look at each other and know, without speaking, what the other was thinking. It was just a fact. Now the fact was that Miss Freddie was not looking at him, so he knew that she did not want him to know something, that she was hiding something. Branscombe's heart sank. Heaven only knew what it was, but he had the feeling that all was not well with Miss Jean.

The car made its careful way, Branscombe driving, Alec sitting up beside him through the narrow country roads. Leaving Twistleton was not as easy as it used to be. Now they were stopped by guards, and had to show their identity cards.

‘Jean's left hers behind!'

‘Can't let you through, I'm afraid.'

‘I can vouch for her. I've lived here all my life,' Freddie protested from the back of the car.

‘No, sorry, miss, rules is rules.' The snow was piling on top of the guard's cap as he peered through the window at Branscombe.

Branscombe stared up at him, infuriated, and then he pushed the car door open, careful to keep the engine running, and stood up outside. Pointing at the back seat he said, trying to control his temper, ‘That girl in the back is about to have a baby. Now, do you want to deliver it, or do you want the hospital to deliver it?'

‘Sorry, sir, so sorry. Of course.'

The soldier waved them through, looking appalled.

‘Identity cards! They'll be asking for them for unborn babies soon, they will. They'll be asking for them for unborn babies.'

Jean gasped again, this time clinging to Freddie, her hands digging into Freddie's clothes, holding them tightly.

‘Oh God, oh God!'

‘Don't worry, kid, we'll be there soon.'

Alec glanced at Branscombe, who was driving as fast as he dared.

They both knew that ‘soon' was a little bit optimistic. Alec also knew from Branscombe's expression that he would probably rather be back in the trenches than driving a young woman in childbirth through a snowstorm to a hospital that suddenly seemed to all of them to be a thousand miles away.

Jean gave another gasp, and then another, and then the gasp seemed to be turning more to a scream, and Alec wished to God he could get out of the car and run off, as he had done when his mother was having his brothers. But he couldn't.

‘I don't think we're going to get through, not without you walking in front and digging a path for us, Alec,' Branscombe muttered.

In the back, Jean looked up through pain-filled eyes at Freddie.

‘Will you look after my baby for me, Freddie?' she asked in a pitiful voice. ‘Will you look after him?'

Freddie shook her head.

‘No, I will not,' she said in firm tones, as Branscombe stopped the car to let Alec get out and fetch the spade from the boot to clear the deepening snow. ‘No, I will not: you're its mother, his mother, or her mother. You will look after him or her, not me.' Freddie wiped Jean's sweat-filled forehead tenderly.