The House of Women Page 9

  ‘Did they?’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  For a moment Peggy felt herself on the defensive, and she said, ‘Well, how could they? Why was that? Dad’s been there for years and Mr Brooker’s comparatively new.’

  He turned from her. ‘Well, you’re not the only one that doesn’t like your dad. Anyway, what’s that lovely smell?’ He now pointed to the oven, and she said, ‘It’s a casserole.’

  ‘I’m hungry.’

  She immediately set about getting the dish out of the oven. She heaped his plate full with the stew and placed only a small portion on her own. And she could not help but feel satisfaction as she watched him eat. ‘Is it all right?’ she asked.

  He raised his eyes and said with emphasis, ‘Lovely. Lovely. You can cook.’

  ‘Mam did most of it,’ she confessed. ‘Well, she showed me how to do it with the herbs and things.’

  ‘Is there any left?’

  ‘A little.’ She scooped the remainder of the stew onto his plate, saying as she did so, ‘You want to leave a bit of room for the apple pie.’

  When the meal was finished and he was sitting back in his chair she said, ‘Do you want to go to the pictures?’

  After letting out a long breath, he replied, ‘Yes and no. Quite candidly I feel too full and tired to move. Anyway, I’d bet you a shilling, within five minutes of getting in I’d slip off the seat and lie on my back, because I seem to spend my life now lying on my back.’

  She laughed, then said, ‘I’m not particular either. Anyway I feel we should be here in case Dad comes back and starts anything.’

  ‘Huh! What could we do? What could I do? Stand up to him, hit him?’

  She laughed again. ‘Well, you could have a try,’ she said.

  He sighed as he said, ‘He’s an old man.’ Then he added, ‘I’d like to finish that drawing of the car.’

  ‘Oh, go ahead.’

  So it was that Lizzie, coming over an hour later, saw for the first time his drawing of a car with a model draped across the bonnet. But what intrigued her more was the border, which was made up of smaller drawings of all the pieces that went to make an engine.

  Lizzie was now looking over his shoulder. ‘I didn’t know you could draw like that,’ she said. ‘And you’ve shown all the odds and ends. You’re a quick learner.’

  ‘Well, it was the only thing I was good at at school. Likely I would have taken it further had I stayed on.’

  ‘Now if that was in colour it would make a nice poster, especially with a caption.’

  He looked up at her and said brightly, ‘Yes. Yes, it would, wouldn’t it?’ as if this very idea hadn’t come to him two nights ago, about both the poster and the caption.

  Turning to Peggy now, she said, ‘He’s back. He went straight upstairs. He’s had nothing to eat that I know of.’

  ‘Well, Mam, you wouldn’t expect him to come down into the dining room, would you?’

  ‘Yes, I would. Knowing him, I would. There have been rows before, but he’s always liked his food.’

  ‘What do you think he’ll do?’

  ‘As I said before, dear, you know as much about that as I do. Whatever he does it will be to please himself, you can be sure of that; what he terms the right course. Anyway, we can only wait and see.’

  Nine

  Lizzie couldn’t understand it. Acceptance in no way matched her husband’s character; yet on the Monday he went to the works as if nothing untoward had happened. All day she had waited for a phone call from Henry to say that her husband had smashed up the showrooms. But he had returned shortly after five and eaten his dinner. Years ago she had arranged that they had their dinner sharp at six; he would have had only a light lunch at a nearby café at noon. Afterwards he went to the Boys’ Club. He had for years done two evenings a week at the Boys’ Club, Mondays and Fridays. She could never understand why, of all the hobbies and pursuits he could have taken up, he should give his spare time to a group of boys, but especially these who were mostly from Bog’s End and would be a rowdy crew. He had never been fond of children. She knew he could have done without having even a daughter, and he had certainly seen to it over the years that she herself did not fall pregnant again.

  By the end of the week her fears had subsided, for he was still acting normally; at least he was keeping to character. She had quizzed Andrew as to how the staff viewed his attitude, and he had said that at least those in the workshop felt he had obviously decided to make the best of a bad job, and that he must have thought it a bad job when Mr Brooker had picked Joe Stanhope to take his place in the running of the Works. But then, as everybody knew, Joe had been there a long time and been head of the workshop and what he didn’t know about cars wasn’t worth learning.

  Her husband had taken all this without any show of retaliation. There was something wrong somewhere. It was this feeling of wanting to find out more that caused her, on the Friday night, to pay her first visit to Henry’s cottage.

  It was getting dusk when she left the house, but she knew her way, for she had made it her business in the daylight to find out where it lay. And now, having left her car in the lane, she knocked on the door.

  It was some time before it was opened; and there he was in his shirt-sleeves. He was standing with his back to the light of the room and so she couldn’t see the expression on his face, but his voice told her of his pleasure when he said, ‘Oh, my dear, come in. Come in,’ and his two hands drew her immediately into a long room.

  ‘I’ve just finished washing up,’ he said. ‘Fries seem easy until you’ve got to tackle the greasy dishes. Sit down. Sit down. Come to the fire.’

  He led her down the room towards a large, stone, open fireplace where a log fire was burning. ‘I’ve just lit it,’ he said. ‘It’s the first time this year, but it was turning cold. I love a log fire.’ He kept talking as he pressed her down onto the cushions of a large wicker couch. Then, dropping down onto the edge of it, his hands still holding hers, he said, ‘Oh, my dear. I’m…I’m delighted to see you. But how did you find your way? It’s nearly dark.’

  She spoke for the first time, saying, ‘I…I did some detective work during the week.’

  They were looking at each other in silence; then the realisation of her intention straight away brought them clinging tightly together, their mouths hungry to express their feelings. When it was over they lay, their cheeks against the cushion, their glances holding tight. And he said softly, ‘I’ve got to say it out aloud: I love you, Lizzie. I never thought I’d say that to a woman ever again in my life; but I do, I love you.’

  She put her hand up and touched his cheek. There was a light stubble on it. She did not say now, ‘And I love you, Henry,’ but ‘How old are you?’

  He smiled as he said, ‘Forty-two and I’m sticking to that right to the very last day, because I’ll be forty-three next month. I’m over the hill.’

  Her head still on the cushion, she turned her face away from his and her voice had a dreamy note in it as she said, ‘I’m thirty-five and I’ve never known love. I had a girlish idea of it, but was soon disillusioned. I know now, though, that I love you, and have loved you for the past two years’—she brought her face back to look at him again—‘and I’ll go on loving you no matter what happens in the future.’

  Quietly now they enfolded each other and presently, her head on his shoulder, she murmured, ‘I wanted to see you so badly, but I also wanted to know what’s happening at the works. His reaction is not natural. When he came back last Friday night and Gran told him she had given you the post, he could have killed her. Really; really, he could have killed her. I heard him yelling before I entered the house. He had Mother and Peggy terrified. It was an awful scene, and when he stormed out of the house I thought such was his rage that he would commit suicide or something. But no; he came back quietly. And that’s been his attitude since. How has he been to you?’ She raised her head now and looked at him, and he said, ‘Polite. Stiffly polite. I know the whole shop
expected high jinks, especially when I showed my face in the showrooms. But they were disappointed. Yes. Yes’—he nodded at her—‘they were really disappointed. They were looking for a showdown because, you know, he’s not popular. Never has been. But there, some of the men don’t like me either. They don’t like my methods. They could get round Mr Cartwright, in a way; but as is also the way, he left most of the dirty work to me: he made the bullets and I had to fire them; so it was natural that everybody didn’t love me. And some will love me less from now on, because there are one or two slackers in that company and it’s usually the slackers that have light fingers and cause staff unrest in other ways. In the main, they are a good crowd and the majority are with me. But I don’t think one of them would have been with Len. In the first place, you see, they think he got the position he’s in now only through marrying you. Anyway, let’s forget about him, the works, everything else, except us. What are we going to do?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ve got a strange feeling. It’s as if I’m waiting for something to happen, something that he’s going to make happen.’

  ‘There we go again. Come on’—he pulled her up from the couch—‘and let me show you my abode. Now this’—he waved his arm from side to side—‘isn’t a bad little room, is it?’

  ‘It’s lovely, and so big.’

  ‘Well, come and see the rest.’

  The door at the far end led into the dining room. When he switched on the light she saw it was about half as big as their dining room but well furnished. ‘And off here,’ he said, opening another door, ‘is the kitchen. Both these rooms look onto the back garden and the hills beyond. It’s a very pleasant view in the daylight.’

  She was surprised by the modern appearance of the kitchen and she said so: ‘It’s beautifully equipped.’

  ‘I had it done out’—he paused—‘oh, some four years ago.’ And she knew he had been about to say, ‘just before Jane died.’

  ‘And off here,’ he went on, ‘is a walk-in pantry.’ He switched on another light. ‘And next to it a coalhouse and woodshed, all modern conveniences. And a cloakroom. I would have liked that nearer the front door but there was no place to put it. At one time I was going to have a glass verandah all along the back here, like a long sun room. I’ll still do it, I think. But now for upstairs.’

  The staircase was made of teak, open and uncarpeted, and the landing was quite large for the size of the house. Four doors led off it. The first he opened led into a good-size bathroom, much more modern, she saw immediately, than the one they had back home, for the walls were covered in pale blue tiles.

  The first bedroom he showed her was of ordinary size, one which would take a single bed and a bedroom suite. But when he opened the door to the main bedroom she was surprised, not only at the size of it, but at the furnishings and colours. It was definitely a woman’s room. The carpet was a dull green, the curtains pink, the bedspread matching them. The bedroom suite was modern, cream with gilt handles, the dressing table being large with three mirrors. There were two easy chairs, upholstered in scarlet Dralon, as was the oblong box at the foot of the bed. She took all this in whilst he pulled the curtains on the two windows; then he turned to her and, on a short laugh, said, ‘I keep the place tidy but I’m not much hand at polishing, as you likely noticed downstairs. A duster, yes.’ He was standing in front of her now and asking quietly, ‘Do you like it; I mean, the whole house?’

  ‘I think it’s lovely. Your wife had good taste.’

  ‘Yes’—he nodded—‘she had good taste.’

  The tone of his voice seemed to speak of his loss and she felt a strong pang of jealousy, only to ask herself, why? His wife was dead and she was here and he needed her as she needed him.

  When he asked now, ‘Are you in a hurry to get back?’ she shook her head, then said softly, ‘Not for a while.’

  He put his hands on her shoulders and looked into her face, but neither of them spoke; then gently he turned her around and unzipped her dress.

  Ten

  ‘Can you remember what you felt like, Auntie May, when you were carrying Charlie?’

  May lay back in the deckchair, put her hands behind her head and looked up into the cloudless sky. ‘It seems so far away I can’t remember ever carrying him. I…I think he just popped in from somewhere.’ She turned a laughing face towards Peggy, who was sitting in another deckchair, and she, matching her tone, laughed and said, ‘He must have given you a surprise, then. Had he his guitar with him?’

  They laughed together; then May said musingly, ‘I think I sang most of the time right up to the end.’

  ‘It’s the end I’m afraid of. I asked Mam, but she won’t talk about it. She just said, “Oh, when the time comes you’ll take it in your stride.” I thought that was funny.’

  ‘Well, she’s right, it’s all natural. And when you once hold your baby you forget about…well, everything. And you’re looking forward to it, aren’t you, the baby coming?’

  ‘Yes; yes, I am.’

  ‘Is Andrew?’

  ‘He doesn’t talk about it. I think he’s more interested in his poster at the present moment, and it’s good.’ She nodded at May. ‘And he’s tickled to death that Great-Gran is having it enlarged and printed for the showroom. He gets on with Great-Gran. Funny that, isn’t it, Auntie May? Dad never could.’

  ‘Does he speak to you now?’

  ‘He never opens his mouth to me; but then, he hardly opens his mouth to anybody now, not even to bawl. Gran says not getting the manager’s job has knocked the stuffing out of him. Yet, I don’t know; I cannot imagine him taking this business lying down, not after the way he went for Great-Gran that night when she broke the news to him.’

  ‘There’s one thing I think you can be thankful for, lass, and that is Andrew’s in another department, right away from him. Has he spoken to Andrew yet?’

  ‘Oh no, not a word.’

  ‘He’s an odd man. Anyway, what about a cup of tea? But why tea in this heat, I don’t know. Would you rather have a lemonade?’

  ‘No; tea, please.’

  As May pulled herself to her feet, Peggy said, ‘Talking of speaking or not speaking, Charlie barely opens his mouth to me these days, either. He’s so polite I can hardly recognise him.’

  ‘Oh, he’s the same indoors,’ May lied quickly; ‘hardly get a word out of him. He spends most of his time twanging the strings on that bit of wood. But I must say he’s coming on like a house on fire under Mr Reynolds. He still goes to him twice a week, pays for the second lesson out of his pocket money. He’s got it bad.’

  After May left her, Peggy sat staring ahead. She couldn’t really understand why she should be so hurt about Charlie and his changed attitude towards her; they had always been so pally.

  The gate’s clicking made her turn her head, and she saw her mother entering the garden; and Lizzie called out, ‘This is what you do with your afternoons, then, is it? I wondered where you had got to. I’ve been over twice.’

  ‘Oh, I haven’t been here long. I must have been in the wood; it’s cool in there.’

  Lizzie let herself down onto the wooden seat attached to the elm tree that gave shade to the two deckchairs, thinking, Well, why didn’t she stay in the wood. She’s never away from this end.

  She knew she was becoming jealous of May; but she couldn’t help it, for more than ever now she was wishing to be closer to her daughter, even though she realised she seemed to be growing further away from her. Between them now was Andrew as well as May and Frank and Charlie. Why couldn’t she have fallen for Charlie? Charlie, of course, would never have got her into trouble as Andrew had. She still wasn’t sure of Andrew. He was so pleasant and seemingly so grateful for his new way of life. Even her grandmother treated him now as if he hadn’t disgraced her great-grandchild, but had brought some benefit to her in some way. She was certainly taken with him.

  ‘Hello, there. Oh, I’ll get another cup. Isn’t it a scorcher! Sit where you are,’ May added as Li
zzie rose to her feet.

  ‘I just popped over to see if you’ve got any wool in your scrap bag, this shade. I only need about half an ounce; in fact, not that; it’s just to do the sewing up. I finished the coat.’

  ‘Good lord! Mam; that’s quick; you only started it at the weekend,’ Peggy said.

  ‘Well, it isn’t all that big, is it? And yet it will be too large for a first coat.’

  ‘And you’re sticking to pink,’ May said. ‘Well, my bet’s still on blue. And look you!’ she stabbed a finger at Peggy. ‘The only way to settle this is to bring forth two. You understand?’

  ‘Oh, Auntie May, be quiet!’

  ‘Well, you never know. My goodness, how do they manage with three, four, and even five? When Charlie came along I thought I would go round the bend just trying to manage two, one of them already six years old.’

  Lizzie looked at her daughter and her friend: they were laughing together, they looked close; it was they who could have been mother and daughter. She felt outside of everything and everyone. Yet she shouldn’t; she should be feeling on top of the world now that she had Henry. Yet, the more she saw of Henry, the more they loved, the more frightened she became. What if anyone were to see her? What if it leaked out? Just imagine if her grandmother got to know, even her mother. And what about Len? Yes, what about him? She never thought she would feel guilt with regard to him, but she did, because there was one thing she had come to know: she wasn’t cut out for liaisons. There had never been any scandal in the family and scandals outside it were carried on by…that kind of person, someone to be ignored, even shunned. But Len was a man she had come to despise, a man who had no real love for her; passion, yes, even lust. That was another thing she’d had to fight. She recalled the times when she would look at him across the breakfast table and hear him talking to her mother and Peggy in his big way while she wondered if they had any idea of what had taken place the night before or even that morning…