Wartime Sweethearts (13 page)

‘It’ll definitely be faggots. They use fewer onions.’

Ruby made no comment and besides Mary was interested to see what the other parcel contained. Like the offal it was wrapped up in newspaper. She hoped it wasn’t more of the same.

Her face lit up. ‘Belly of pork! I’ll roast it with apple sauce and a splash of cider for tomorrow night’s dinner. What do you think?’

‘Unless you want to save it for the weekend,’ Ruby responded without any great enthusiasm.

Mary heard the off-handedness in her sister’s voice and turned to look at her.

Ruby was stacking the wicker bread trays to one end of the shelves. There were about a dozen loaves left and being someone who abhorred waste, she thought about telling her father that he’d baked too much. On reflection she remembered that the boy, who worked in the kitchen of the big house in Willsbridge, hadn’t arrived yet. He usually cycled over on his bicycle every morning to collect fresh bread for the family and servants who lived at Willsbridge House.

Reassured that every loaf would be sold, she returned her thoughts to when and how to cook the belly of pork. ‘We could stuff it with apples and sultanas.’

‘For the weekend?’

Recalling what Frances had said about the importance of belonging to a family, Mary thought about it only briefly. ‘No,’ she replied, her tone sombre. ‘I think the sooner we have a family dinner together the better.’

On hearing the tone of her sister’s voice, Ruby stopped what she was doing. Up until now she had been only half listening, immersed in the conversation she had just had with her father once Charlie had headed for the WC. Mention of having a family dinner together pulled her up short.

‘Charlie says he won’t go until he’s got to.’

Mary grabbed the mix of offal, wrapping it in the newspaper before it slithered away. ‘It won’t be up to him. I wonder how long he’s got before he’s called up.’

The two girls fell silent, each with their own thoughts. Ruby was wondering how long it would be before she could join up. A quick glance at Mary and she decided her sister was worrying about Charlie. It certainly wasn’t about a sweetheart. Mary had never had a sweetheart, nobody who had lasted more than one night.

In her mind Mary was seeing a rugged figure wearing the blue uniform of RAF Bomber Command, striding across to a waiting aircraft. His address was hidden inside her jewellery box along with some pearls that had once belonged to her mother and other trinkets.

Just after he’d left, she’d knocked on the door of Stratham House and explained her intentions. Mrs Hicks hadn’t been surprised; in fact, she’d looked very pleased that Mary wanted to write to her nephew.

‘He’s got friends over here, but no sweethearts,’ Mrs Hicks had confided.

Mary had been tempted to ask whether he had any sweethearts in Canada, but hadn’t had the nerve. And was that what she wanted to be, a potential sweetheart? It seemed Mrs Hicks thought so.

Ruby ran her hands over the tissue paper they used to wrap the bread, fiddling with those corners that refused to lie flat. She was thoughtful and regretful that her brother had to go away. Her father would be upset.

‘Mrs Martin says that Ronnie is excused active service on account of the farm. She said that it’s a reserved occupation,’ said Mary.

‘So’s making bread,’ Ruby replied tartly.

‘Lucky that Dad’s got us. We can both bake. He’ll be depending on us, though I wish …’ Mary’s voice faded away.

‘What?’

She met Ruby’s look then quickly turned away. She hadn’t told her about her decision to write to Michael Dangerfield.

Finally, she said, ‘I just wish things were different. That’s all.’

‘So do I.’

Wisps of hair clung to the sweat glistening on Ruby’s face. She looked tired and Mary knew she hadn’t slept well; she’d heard her tossing and turning during the night, sighing as if the cares of the world rested on her shoulders.

‘What is it, Rube?’

Ruby’s eyelids flickered as though she’d been wakened from a deep sleep. Her wide pink lips, so like Mary’s own, puckered in and out. Mary found her own lips mimicking the movements of her sister’s lips. When her sister worried, she worried too.

Ruby came to stand next to her sister, folding her arms and resting her backside against the counter.

‘I’m still surprised at what Dad said. He hates Gareth Stead.’

Mary grunted in agreement. Their father hated Gareth Stead almost as much as he did Melvyn Chance, the village postmaster, who used to be a member of Sir Oswald Mosley’s black shirts. Rumour had it that he’d resigned only last week.

‘Then it’s just as well you won’t be marrying him. Just imagine, father and husband at each other’s throats all the time; a miniature war in your own home!’

Ruby grinned but it didn’t last. ‘The trouble was, Mary, that for a split second I really considered letting him go marching down to the Apple Tree, grab Gareth by the throat and drag him into the church where me and the vicar would be waiting, though I don’t know how you get a man to say yes to getting married when he doesn’t want to.’

Mary had to agree that the whole idea was quite preposterous. ‘Perhaps he’d take Joe Long with him. A man with a shotgun can be very persuasive!’

Ruby’s laughter lit up her face and Mary joined her, her laughing face mirroring that of her sister.

‘I’ve been a fool, Mary, but there’s still a tiny part of me that can’t let go, but it is changing. I dreamed last night that I was behind the bar pulling a pint, but instead of serving it to the customer, I poured it over Gareth’s head.’

‘I’m glad to hear it. What happened next?’

Ruby frowned. ‘I made a list of all the things I would like to do to him. None of them were very nice. I think rolling him in pig manure and attacking him with a pitchfork were on there.’

‘I think that means you’re well and truly over him.’ Though what would I know? Mary thought to herself. I’ve never been in love. Michael Dangerfield came instantly to mind, but she pushed those thoughts away.

She opened the wooden drawer that served as a till and began counting the takings. Most of it was in coin: farthings, ha’pennies, threepenny bits, silver sixpences, shillings and pence. She piled the florins and half crowns in separate heaps. There was only one ten-shilling note.

Ruby pouted her bright red lips and tossed her head. ‘I think I am over him. In fact I quite like the thought of doing all those things to him. Do you think that’s normal?’

‘Who’s to say what’s normal?’

A saying suddenly sprang into Mary’s mind. Hell hath no fury as a woman scorned. Another familiar one was about there being a thin line between love and hate. She knew how aggrieved her sister had been by Gareth’s behaviour. Now she wondered how far her sister’s hate might take her.

A gang of men suddenly came barging into the shop setting the iron bell above the door jangling, their loud voices introducing themselves as the men responsible for the delivery of Anderson shelters.

Their arrival necessitated Mary putting the money back in the till. There was no knowing whether they would have the correct change for whatever they might purchase.

‘Second phase,’ said one of them, as if that might mean something.

The shelters were named after the government minister responsible for their distribution. They were little more than archways of galvanised steel, designed to sit in a pit in the ground and be covered by sandbags which in turn were covered in soil.

One of the men leaned on the counter, looked at Ruby and winked. ‘I’m a man in need,’ he said to her.

No stranger to dealing with cheeky men she tossed her head and asked him what he wanted.

‘Something nice. You’ll do for starters.’

‘Less of your sauce! And get your dirty elbow off my counter.’

‘You got one yet, love? An Anderson shelter. You got one ’ave ya?’ The man who asked her appeared to be their leader.

Ruby said that she hadn’t. ‘Don’t know that we want one, all that grubbing about in the dirt.’

‘I expect you’ll get one,’ their leader said, his eyes twinkling, ‘they’re easy enough to put up, but if you ladies happen to be unattached and ’ave a bit of difficulty doing it, I’m sure one of us ’ere is willing to come along and show you ’ow it’s done! We can all get dirty together!’

There was a lot of raucous laughter among the orders for Cornish pasties, bread pudding and apple pies, which were all swiftly disappearing, the shelves becoming bare.

Mary recommended pies once there were no pasties left and currant buns once the bread pudding had all disappeared.

It wasn’t the first time they’d made bread pudding, though it was the first time they’d had it on sale. Made from stale bread, currants, candied peel, sugar and lard with a dash of cinnamon, its aroma alone, even cold, was enough to get the taste buds going.

Both girls watched the shelves empty with an air of satisfaction. Filled shelves looked good, but empty ones were a sign of success.

‘Thank goodness for Anderson shelters,’ Mary whispered to her sister.

‘I’ll have to make some more pastry,’ Ruby whispered back. She much preferred making pastry than bread, but seeing as most women in the village made their own anyway, she could only make pies and pasties in small batches, selling to those who couldn’t or wouldn’t bake, people passing by or men having to fend for themselves.

‘Lots more apple pies,’ Mary murmured back. ‘Thank goodness we had a mild spring.’

This spring the blossom hadn’t been blown from the apple, plum and pear trees. Spring had been followed by a warm summer so by September the gnarled branches were heavy with fruit.

‘Are all those shelters for Oldland Common?’ Ruby asked them once she’d told them not to be so saucy and not to shout.

The man who appeared to be their leader replied that they were not. He had a merry face and a pale blond beard verging on white. ‘This is just our mustering area. The lists are being brought out by some chinless wonder from the county council. Once we ’ave them, we deliver to other places, like Warmley, Willsbridge and Frampton Cotterell.’

A ginger-haired man sighed with pleasure into the contents of his brown paper bag. ‘Beats the cheese sandwiches my old woman gave me.’

‘Tell the truth, Bert,’ said one of his colleagues already biting into the golden crust of a Cornish pasty. ‘We all ate our lunch by ten o’clock. Starving we was.’

By the time they had all been served and marched off, some already devouring their purchases at breakneck speed, it was midday and time to close. Not that there was much time to rest, the day being taken up with other things both in the bakery and in the general run of things.

Bread was baked every day except Sunday, but the shop only stayed open until midday. The afternoon was the time to clean up, cool the ovens to proving heat and make a fresh batch of dough. The dough would be left to prove until early evening when they would all give a hand in kneading it again, the dough becoming warm and spongy the more air was forced in.

There was a knack to dividing it up into even sections, a skilled baker portioning by hand without the aid of a scale. Cottage loaf, split tin, and crusty cobs, they were all measured out by hand, everyone kneading the dough until the very feel of it was like something living, something about to be born. Then it had to be laid by for a second overnight proving.

Once the dough was made, the afternoon was given over to housework, reading, sewing while listening to the wireless or whatever else anyone wanted to do.

Stan Sweet was spending more time planting, sowing and figuring out ways to get more from his garden.

‘Being able to feed ourselves from what we grow is going to be more important than ever from now on,’ he’d proclaimed.

He’d brought in some of the fruits of his labours, bunches of carrots swilled off under the tap, green beans and leeks.

Ruby was entrusted with the job of sterilising the jars and preparing the vegetables for bottling. Most of it would be boiled for three minutes before being blanched in cold water and then boiled for an hour. The runner beans he’d brought in would be stored in layers between salt.

‘Once the shop’s closed,’ he added.

Hands on hips, Ruby sighed as she surveyed her father’s harvest. ‘That’s a lot of vegetables,’ she said to him. ‘It’ll take me all afternoon.’

He was in the act of taking his pipe out into the garden, liking a smoke after a good bit of gardening, but turned and frowned at her comment. ‘Are you complaining?’

‘No, Dad. I was just thinking how lucky it was that we had a decent summer.’ Ruby winked at her sister.

‘Do you need a hand?’ asked Mary.

‘No. I can manage. The afternoon will fly by.’

Mary noted the hint of sarcasm in her voice before the old bell on the shop door clanged loudly to tell them that a customer had entered.

It occurred to Mary that since the village fete, her sister was more willing to do jobs alone. It was as though she were trying to prove that she was quite capable without her sister being around.

At one time Mary would have insisted on helping in the bottling process, but she was burning with the need to run upstairs, retrieve Michael Dangerfield’s address from her jewellery box and write to him. She had a writing pad and envelopes. She also had a stamp.

She was determined to write, not as a sweetheart because she was not. Just to be friendly. That was what she told herself.

However, she didn’t want anyone else to know. All she needed to keep her secret safe was for everybody else to be otherwise engaged.

Her chance came around mid-afternoon. Dough making finished, Charlie their brother was off that afternoon up to Perrotts’ Farm with the Perrott boys, Martin and John, pressing this year’s apple crop to produce cider while sampling last year’s brew. ‘Just in case it’s gone off,’ he’d said laughingly. He said the same every year.

Mary watched from the kitchen window as he strode off up the garden path, whistling something saucy. She didn’t know all the words, but knew they were more than a little risqué. Her brother wouldn’t be back until teatime.

Leaving her sister to the bottling, Mary crept upstairs, saying she had a bit of a headache and wanted a lie down. After glancing at the alarm clock at the side of the bed, she decided she had about an hour before Frances came home from school, flouncing into the bedroom, flinging her satchel on to the bed, then flouncing out again once she’d asked what was for tea.