The War Widows (21 page)

Ana stared at the jam jar of precious olive oil, green and golden, shining before her. She sniffed the top and smiled. The kitchen table was laden for the feast: potatoes and boiled eggs, sardines and anchovies, chopped dried herbs, the best they could find.

The rabbits were seared in a pan. The pickled onions and shallots was pierced with a few cloves. She had begged a tin of plum tomatoes, bay leaves and some of Maria’s rough wine. As it all bubbled away the aromas drifted into her nostrils. She could see Mama’s cooking pot on the fire simmering. It was as near as she could get to home and it was enough. Everyone kept coming in to sniff the air and taste the juices.

The yoghurt wasn’t quite set. In desperation they had added rennet to make a sort of junket, with orange juice and bottled raspberries, and it had turned out quite delicious. Lily contributed butter to make some
pastry balls, dipped in fat with honey topping. They kept disappearing as fast as she made them until she shooed everyone out of her domain.

It was funny that she didn’t mind doing all the work while Susan did the fancy bits. Su had found them special guests but she would get all the praise for her food. Lily held everything together like sticking plaster. They were a good team.

Yet in her mind’s eye was the field where the rabbits were kept and the overgrown lines of rotting vegetables lying neglected. She wanted to dig and grow things again, feel the earth between her fingers. The back garden was too small, but Billy’s field was the place. Somehow she would make herself a garden and grow all the things her heart yearned for, and no one was going to stop her just because she was a woman.

They waited nervously for the first guests to arrive and everyone was introduced with a small glass of Christmas sherry that Mother had been hoarding, a peace offering for her cowardice. Maria’s gift of a bottle of Italian wine, alongside Susan’s bottle, soon loosened the shyness and conversation flowed so that the room was filled with noisy chatter and no one noticed how late it was getting.

Lily dressed with care in her winter woollen dress with cross-over lapels. It was in a saxe blue that complimented her eyes. It was sad that her family chose to miss a rare treat. There was even a scoop each of best vanilla ice cream, which Maria had carried here on the bus, wrapped up in thick newspaper.

Lily wondered if Walt would change his mind and join them, but in truth she was quite relieved when he didn’t arrive. All girls together was turning out to be much more fun.

Diana Unsworth arrived with a hunk of best
Lancashire Tasty, which must have used up all her rations for weeks to come.

‘One of the advantages of being a good doctor’s daughter is we’re always getting gifts left on our doorsteps and no questions asked,’ she offered.

Queenie Quigley brought a large box of pre-war chocolates in a heart-shaped box, and everyone stared at them in amazement.

‘Where did you get those?’ sighed Diana, rolling her eyes and licking her lips in anticipation. For a proper English lady she was turning out to be good fun.

‘Ask me no questions and I tell you no lies, me ducks,’ winked Queenie. ‘Let’s just say I relieved old man Lavaroni, him being a diabetic, of an embarrassing gift from a grateful client for services rendered.’ She nodded and winked again. ‘I may only wash the heads and sweep the cuttings, but let’s put it this way: a certain star treading the boards of the King’s Theatre, even as I speak, is not quite the gentleman he appears, and not quite as young as his black hair would suggest. My lips are sealed but the proof is here.’ There was dye still clinging to her fingertips. ‘We had to open the shop at midnight so his secret might not be revealed.’

Queenie and her husband, Arthur, came north after being blitzed out of their house in Kent, evacuated with their children for the duration and somehow they had never got round to going back. She’d taken to Grimbleton, finding her niche doing even more jobs than Maria.

Gianni Lavaroni’s Hair Salon was the classy establishment favoured by the theatricals, and the old man
was taking on a new barber. ‘He’s got one of them POWs from Macaroni Camp starting soon, now they’re being released from prison. This chap jumps off a lorry, walks in and asks for a job. Old Lavaroni can’t resist cheap labour-I should know,’ she laughed. ‘He takes the lad on there and then. I shall send him down to you for his lunches, Maria,’ she winked.

‘You will do no such thing,’ Maria snapped. ‘My brothers no like prisoners of war. No like mixing with lazy Italian scum.’

‘The war’s over now,’ Ana said gently.

‘You tell that to Angelo and Toni, with poor Marco still in bed,’ Maria replied bitterly. If only he would grow stronger, but the least effort tired him out. He was shrinking before her eyes.

They were all used to seeing lorries full of prisoners, in their funny uniforms with circles on their backs, going out to the farms and working on the road repairs. The Italians were always singing and shouting and whistling after a pretty pair of legs.

Lily looked around and smiled, contented by this rich company, such an unlikely roomful of guests, another motley bunch of liquorice allsorts. It was worthy of a photo line-up if only there was film in the box Brownie camera.

Queenie and Maria were dark and spicy, loud and sharp-edged. Maria’s cheeks were flushed with wine. Her delight at being given a feast was worth all their efforts. Then there was quiet Eva, with chocolate-brown-coloured skin and fine cheekbones. How gracefully she sat, observing everyone with interest.

Ana was wearing a bright emerald spotted blouse, made up from remnants from a market stall, which set off her coiled red hair. She was flushed with the success of her dishes.

Diana was wearing a bright coconut-pink knitted jumper with intricate lacy stitches, which set off her rose complexion and blonde curls. She sat like a mannequin, straight-backed.

She and Lily were the same age but had never socialised together because Diana went to Harrogate Ladies’ College and then joined the FANY in the war. She was a perfect lady, a good listener who asked questions of them all, interested, but saying very little about herself whilst encouraging Eva to join in as best she could.

Eva was full of her work at Grimbleton General and the shortages of staff and the new National Health Service to come, and how many of their staff came from overseas as refugees. She was hoping to go back to South Africa once she had completed her training.

Ana was listening intently and told them about her voluntary work with the Red Cross in Crete. She lifted her glass and smiled across the table.

‘Yámas! Cheers.’

‘Yámas, Billy Eckersley!’ Lily replied.

‘Thank you, Lily. Without your rabbit friend we are stuck.’ They toasted Allotment Billy for his services.

‘
Yámas
, thank you, Maria, for many happy Sundays,’ added Susan, raising her glass too. She was wearing her best silk striped
longyi
in silver and black as a traditional touch. Her ruby earrings glittered in the light
and she looked like the wrapper from a blackcurrant liquorice sweet.

‘To Maria, and Marco, may he get well soon,’ they toasted.
‘Yámas?’

‘Bottoms up! Let’s have a singsong,’ said Queenie, jumping onto the piano stool. ‘I’ll have you know I’m going to be playing for the new dancing school if I can fit it round my afternoon shift.’

‘Not so loud then, Daw Esme is sick,’ Susan whispered with alarm, not wanting to cause any trouble.

‘Don’t be minding her,’ Lily shouted back. ‘It’ll do her good to hear a bit of fun. She likes a bit of a singsong and if you put some ballet music in it, she’ll think it classy. Classy, she can stand. It’s marching bands she can’t abide since our Freddie went.’ There was a pause. ‘Well, you know how it is with the war, memories.’

Maria bent her head, thinking of Marco, back on the ward, fighting for breath, and the handsome soldier who was sent to war and came back a cripple. If she had not come here tonight, she would have sat alone in the flat. Nonna was taking Rosa home and to church tomorrow morning.

Diana thought of the lines of shrouds she had ticked off, the nurses caught in the blast of gunfire, the mess parties, the concert shows and the smell of the desert air. How far away all that was now. Why had she come back? Grimbleton was so damp and predictable, but tonight it was turning out to be fun.

Su had never seen the room sparkle as it did tonight, firelight and fresh flowers, pretty things and dresses and smiling faces, rubies, pearls, bangles. The room had come
alive and it was all her doing. Thank you, she thought, seeing the little bowl of offerings and the Bible.

They stood around the piano, singing songs from the shows while Queenie rattled the tinny keyboard with gusto: ‘If You Were the Only Girl in the World’.

‘Let’s dance, come, I show you…’ shouted Ana, springing to life, gathering them all in a circle, raising her hands in the air, circling around the table in time to the music, laughing, her curls shimmering in the firelight. ‘See, this is how we dance in Crete.’

They linked arms and circled and laughed as they kicked their legs and folded them across in a pattern, round and round until Lily was dizzy.

Then there was a rattle of the door in the hall and the sound of the other Winstanleys returning home from their evenings out. Was it really that time, already?

Lily scuttled to the door, not wanting any unpleasantness to spoil their fun.

‘You decided to stay, then?’ said Ivy, taking off her felt hat and sniffing the air. ‘You can hear the racket in the street, and the curtains still open for all to see.’

‘What a grand do you’ve missed. Ana and Susan did us proud, a proper feast with cheese and then chocolates. What a treat! Now we’re having a bit of a dance.’

At the mention of chocolates, Ivy made for the door. ‘Is it still going on? I hope you saved some for us, seeing as it’s
our
electric and gas you’re using up.’ She peered round the door with a look of amazement. ‘I hope you didn’t wake our Neville with that racket? You were right, Levi, it’s a right League of Nations in there, even a
darkie sitting at the table…The house reeks of olive oil and garlic…a right olive oil club they’ve got here.’

‘Come in, Ivy,’ shouted Ana, drunk with the excitement of good company. ‘Come and join the dancing.’

Ivy was in the room like a shot, looking down at the disarray of plates and glasses. ‘They’re all drunk, and Lil’s made herself right at home with Mother’s best china, I see,’ she sneered.

‘Keep your hair on. Mother said it was the least we could do, seeing how many there would be of them and how few of us,’ Lily replied with a hard edge to her voice. That woman had more neck than a giraffe, trying to muscle in on their party food like a vulture at a carcass.

‘Let me introduce you to our guests, This is my sister-in-law, Ivy, and my brother, Levi,’ she offered, going round the table slowly so that Ivy would catch every name. ‘Maria Santini from Italy, Queenie Quigley, late of Kent, Eva Matin from Cape Town, South Africa, and Diana Unsworth from Green Lane. I’m sure you recognise
her
name.’ She couldn’t resist making the point and the last name hovered in the air with promise.

‘Diana Unsworth? What, Dr Unsworth’s daughter?’ whispered Ivy, all of a quiver. ‘How nice to meet you…I did not realise you would be coming.’ She turned to Levi who was hovering in the hall, half whispering with embarrassment, ‘Mind your P’s and Q’s, one of the Unsworths is here!’ The shine of her saccharine smile fooled no one.

‘Of course, we had a prior engagement otherwise we’d have
loved
to join you all,’ she minced, sitting
down in Susan’s empty chair, stretching across for the chocolates, disappointed to see that there were only wrappers left.

Lily smiled. It served her right to miss the treats. It was worth all the washing-up and clearing-away just to see that look of disappointment on her puckered lips. The box was empty and the wine all drunk.

It hit midnight but no one wanted to leave, and when they did, everyone promised to meet up again for another supper. Ivy and Levi soon disappeared, leaving the three women to clear away the debris.

Ana surveyed the table with relish, wine and cigarette smoke, all the pleasures of a feast. Her belly was full and her heart content. It was good to entertain strangers and welcome them into the home. In Crete it was the custom to give the guests the best of all you had, however little.

She fingered the leftovers with a smile. If only Aliki and Stelios, could see how women could entertain as well as men, cook and drink, dress up, gossip and dance. These were not the smells of home but friendship and kindness smelled the same in any country. She thought of that old saying about friendship: we have shared bread and salt together, joy and sorrow.

Joy there had been in abundance, but the sorrow of their secrets lay heavy on her heart. Only when the truth was shared about Freddie would true friendships ever begin.

But it was enough for tonight, she sighed as she crept into the attic.

‘It was good tonight,’ she whispered to Su as she climbed into her narrow little bed. ‘Good to be giving, not always taking charity…yes?’

There was no reply but Su lay smiling in her sleep. One thing was certain: women may be made for men, but women together could have just as good a time. She was already looking forward to the next gathering.

‘No more carols on the piano, Lil, they’re giving me one of my heads,’ shouted Esme, who hated Christmas with a fervour bordering on obsession. But it was no use pretending as the weeks were ticked off to the festivities that the season could be ignored any longer. ‘Nothing jolly this year, not after all our sorrows. It wouldn’t be right to be giddy.’

‘There’s never been a giddy Christmas in this house, and certainly not after Dad or Freddie. But we’ve kiddies to think of now. I know how you feel but we have to do something for their sakes.’ Lily was hoping for dinner in the dining room with the fire lit and a few token decorations, a proper Christmas tree on display, a bird and all the trimmings. ‘Freddie wouldn’t begrudge us cheering up his children, now, would he?’