There was an awkward pause – the first in the whole conversation.
Harry said, ‘And – and what about you? How have you been? You said you were a typist.’
‘Yes, in a girls’ school in Durham. I work in the office, typing up letters and telephoning the parents to tell them Beryl’s feeling unwell. It’s an awful bore.’
‘And I suppose you have a new chap now?’
It was said casually, but she could see that he was anything but casual.
‘I don’t actually,’ she said, as calmly as she could. ‘I haven’t had anything like that in a long time. Not since you went to France.’
She watched him take in this information. He had always been terrible at hiding his feelings.
‘Oh!’ he said. Then a smile spread over his face. ‘Oh...’
‘And you?’ she said. ‘It’s been nearly three years, surely – I mean, I have read novels, I know that soldiers – Well...’
And I didn’t reply to that letter.
‘Oh, well.’ He looked awkward.
He had another girl. Of course he did. There were so few young men left now, and one as – well, as eligible as Harry – of course he had another girl.
‘When you didn’t – I – well, I confess I was rather cut up about it, and –’
She said hurriedly, ‘Oh no, of course. That’s wonderful, Harry. I’m very happy for you, you deserve every – every—’
‘Oh!’ He was – was he laughing ? ‘No, it wasn’t... I’m not... it was nothing like that!’
‘Then what... ?’
‘Well –’ A glance at Ernest, his fair head still bent over The Magnet. ‘Look here, it was just – well, I was rather upset and there was a VAD girl – it wasn’t anything, honour bright.’
It wasn’t anything. Had he – had they? She couldn’t ask. But the thought suddenly blinded her with misery. Lovely Harry Singer moving easily through the world like a scythe through corn, leaving girls behind him like... like... baby fieldmice torn from their nests? Perhaps not. Something like that anyway. Lovely Harry Singer – he wasn’t lovely at all, if he could say ‘It wasn’t anything,’ about that.
‘I say!’ Something of this must be showing on her face. ‘Really, it wasn’t – wasn’t anything worth talking about. She never meant anything to me—’
‘Never meant anything to you!’ She was suddenly furious. ‘It’s all right for you to say that – disappearing off to your fancy uncle’s farm. What about her?’
‘Now, look here—’
‘You’re all the same, all of you! You can do whatever you like and nobody gives a fig! It’s the women who have to live with it when you’re gone!’
‘Good Lord!’ He was looking at her like she was a lunatic. ‘I just took the girl dancing a couple of times! I didn’t break her heart! If we’re going to talk about disappearing, what about you? Nine months I’ve been home, and you haven’t so much as written! I thought you must be engaged to another chap and couldn’t face telling me! And now you tell me it isn’t that – so what is it, Margot? Because I haven’t got a bloody clue!’
He was really angry. She couldn’t remember ever seeing him like this before. She stared, shocked. His face was flushed and furious. His chest was heaving. She suddenly, shockingly, wanted nothing more than to kiss him, full on the lips.
‘I can’t!’ she said. ‘I wish I could, but I can’t – not here—’ She looked across at Ernest, who had lowered The Magnet and was looking at them in amazement. ‘And I couldn’t – not in a letter either.’
His mouth was moving. She wondered what he was thinking. Did he – had he guessed ? It seemed so clear to her, but perhaps it was like reading a murder mystery, like one of the Sexton Blake stories. The solution was always so obvious, the second time you read it...
‘What the devil?’ he said.
Obviously not.
She was nearly crying.
‘I’m sorry!’ she cried. ‘I’m so sorry!’
He moved towards her.
‘Look here – I didn’t...’
But all of a sudden, she couldn’t bear it. The sympathy in his eyes, and what would he think if he knew the truth.
‘Oh, don’t!’ she cried. She pushed past him, rushing across the hall and up the stairs, while he stood gaping in astonishment.
Four Weeks
He’d been hers for four weeks.
Four weeks in the home. A warm body, sleeping on her stomach like a little monkey.
They’d kept the babies in another room from the mothers, wheeling them in when it was time to feed, wheeling them out again afterwards. But James had known who she was. She was sure of it. Could babies hear things from inside the womb? Could they recognise their mother’s voice when they came out into the world? He had stirred when she spoke to him, in a way he hadn’t for the nurses. She could make him stop crying when nobody else could. He had known her.
Had he missed her when she’d gone? Did he think she’d abandoned him?
He was perfection. Perfect face. Perfect eyes, perfect tiny, soft, red hands and feet. Perfect smooth cheeks and tiny, perfect eyelashes.
Somewhere, there was another Margot who had raised him herself. Who had scooped him up in her arms and walked out of the door, who was living in a little house, just James and herself. Paying the rent by... but here Margot’s imagination ran out. Taking in washing? Sewing shirts? They were despised by the world, but they did not care, because they had each other.
Somewhere, there was another Margot, who had waited until marriage like a good girl should, and had delivered her first-born in her marital bed and loved him best of all for the rest of his life.
She hadn’t known it would be like this.
She hadn’t known you could love something like that. It hadn’t been rational. It had come from nowhere, this animal urge to protect him, to be near him. It wasn’t love exactly – it didn’t feel like love. It felt like something beyond her, outside of her, something she wasn’t able to control.
It had frightened her, a little.
He was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.
She didn’t think she would be able to give him away. When it came down to it, she had been sure she would change her mind and refuse to sign the papers. Letting him go would be an abomination against nature and against the Will of God. She wouldn’t allow it to happen.
But she had.
The Married Lady at Home
Mary and George lived at the very end of a row of terraced stone houses. It was a respectable street on the edge of the village, the stone flags and the windows well-scrubbed, but Mary’s curtains were threadbare, and though her window was cheerful with a Christmas tree and paper-chains, the decorations were clearly Woolworth’s finest. Though not quite four o’clock, the sun was already setting in the sky, a dull reddish glow through the low clouds. The lamplighter was making his way down the street. Smoke was rising from the chimney-pots and on the street corner, a gaggle of small boys were playing cricket against the gable-end.