Sisters at War Read online

  Cissie turned, and came to her. ‘Uncle Eddie said you’d be in a tizz about it.’ She took Bryony’s good hand in hers. ‘He said to tell you you’re to keep doing them exercises, and you’ll be ready when you’re needed. ’E said to tell you that . . .’ She stopped and took out a piece of paper. ‘I wrote it down, because I can, almost with the right spelling. He helped me just a little. He said, “Our boys will hold”.’ She looked up, her face puzzled. ‘I don’t know what they’ll ’old, though. Anyway, he said to tell you he’ll be on the case. But April’s got the case, so I ain’t a clue what he means.’

  April smiled and lifted the case off the bed. ‘Right, we can explain that on our way home, but now, come on, you two troublemakers. Have a check around, Bee, in case I’ve missed anything.’

  Bryony checked the cupboard and drawers while the other two waited. April said, ‘I think Eric’s missing Adam so wanted to do the shelter for us after he heard Eddie telling us he thinks we’ll be bombed before long. Eddie thinks they’ll possibly target the ports and harbours, the Channel, and certainly the cities, and heaven knows what else.’

  Cissie yelled, ‘Eric said we must be like the Boy Scouts, prepared.’ She laughed and then skipped down the ward, waving at the patients, who called their farewells to her, and to Bryony.

  ‘Fly well,’ one of them told her. ‘We want to see you in your uniform when it happens.’

  ‘You’ll be home before then, but I’ll see you all in the pub in six months, and maybe I’ll be in uniform. Stranger things have happened.’

  Bryony was in a pale blue cotton skirt, a white blouse, sandals and a dark blue jacket. In one pocket was the note from Adam, the one written on the back of the receipt. He would still be out escorting the convoy, so there’d been nothing else from him. Well, why should there be? They’d had a row, when he’d done his best to help her collect Hannah.

  They caught the bus, at Bryony’s insistence. ‘I don’t need a taxi. What I need is to get back to normal.’

  Dan tipped his cap as she clambered on. ‘And here she is, the wounded warrior. How the hell you carried up the water can with a broken arm, I will never know, Bryony Miller, and your hair will grow. Bit like a boy right now, but don’t let that worry you.’ The passengers applauded, April grimaced. ‘Like a boy indeed, never heard such rubbish.’ Bryony laughed and sat down with a thump, her energy expended. Every jolt hurt but she kept her smile in place.

  Cissie sat beside her, April behind, with the case next to her. It seemed for ever before the bus approached their stop, which still meant a walk of fifty yards before the entrance to Combe Lodge. Instead, Dan drove right past and drew to a halt at the entrance. ‘Special dispensation today,’ he said. ‘Out you get, carefully now, then toddle off and sit yourself down with a nice cuppa. Always strange when you’re first out of hospital, or so the missus says. Says it rather a lot, but then she’s in hospital a lot. Tummy trouble, poor soul.’

  Bryony kissed him. ‘You’re a pal. Give Myrtle my love.’

  He whispered, ‘Take it slow, no one expects miracles. Get it one hundred per cent, or you won’t get into the air and do your bit.’

  She nodded.

  They walked up the drive, the gravel crunching, and the occasional stone being flicked into the beds either side, in which there were asters and stocks still in bloom, and weeds. The couch grass was way out of hand. The roses were doing well, though. ‘Anne’s been deadheading, and I’ve clipped the box hedge, but the weeds have taken on a life of their own. Sorry, darling.’ April tucked her hand in Bryony’s good arm.

  ‘April, you do so much. Don’t be daft.’ Ahead of her Combe Lodge beckoned, gleaming and white, and dear. She was home.

  Cissie gripped her skirt. ‘I likes coming up the drive. The Lodge sort of opens its arms, don’t it, Bee?’

  ‘Doesn’t it,’ she corrected automatically.

  ‘Doesn’t it, Bee?’ Cissie repeated, and leaned into her. ‘Now it will feel like home, but it will be more like ’ome, sorry, home, when Uncle Eddie is here, and Adam.’ She was off again, skipping ahead.

  April walked beside her, ‘Welcome home, dearest Bee.’

  ‘I still have to fetch Hannah.’

  ‘Don’t let your mind play on that, not yet. Later. You’re no good to anyone until you’re well.’

  After a lunch prepared and shared by Anne and Catherine, who looked as though they would pop at any moment, Bryony sat on a sunbed on the terrace while Cissie played with her new evacuee friend. Agnes had been collected by her mother and carted to Bristol, where she had an aunt, but Pearl had arrived from Luton and, if anything, these two girls were even closer.

  Over to the left of the terrace and twenty yards distant Eric Maudsley was digging out the base for the Anderson, the sun gleaming on his blond hair which was longer than her own, but then most people’s hair was. He stopped and yanked off his shirt, then began again, his muscles rippling as he dug out the earth. He had situated the shelter on a slight slope. ‘Why have you chosen there?’ she called.

  Eric rested on his spade. ‘I’m going to dig a trench, to funnel the run-off around the shelter. If I don’t, the inside will get flooded. I also want it on the slope with the rise above it, so it’s not so obvious from the air. We can put turf on the corrugated iron roof. It’ll be a good disguise.’

  She grinned. ‘You’re wasted, you should be in the Sappers.’

  He shrugged. ‘I tried, but with my club foot they turned me down. I’ll have another go, though. It doesn’t do to give up. How’s Adam getting on?’

  ‘He seems to be all right. I haven’t heard, which is good news.’

  Eric began digging again. ‘Yep, that it is.’

  She touched the note in her pocket.

  By the end of the week the shelter was finished, but Eric came to Combe Lodge anyway, strolling up the drive, whistling, his hands in his pockets as she weeded the bed along the drive. ‘Thought you wouldn’t be sitting still for long, Bee.’

  He squatted beside her as she grinned at him. She was kneeling on a rubber mat, but the gravel still pressed through her overalls into her knees. He said, ‘Let me give you a hand.’

  ‘Ah, but do you know the difference between a flower and a weed?’

  ‘Teach me.’

  She gave him her hand fork and pointed to the couch grass. ‘Its roots are deep and we need every bit out, or it will just keep spreading.’

  He laughed softly. ‘Could be Hitler you’re talking about.’

  She shook her head. ‘If only it could be solved that easily.’

  It was he who shook his head this time, plunging in the fork as Bryony took up a trowel. She had sharpened the edge, because when she gardened, she took no prisoners. ‘We had enough rain last night to soften the soil, Eric. It’ll be easy.’

  He muttered, as he dug out a clump of couch grass. ‘This weeding may be, but it’ll be a bloody tough battle now the Germans are gunning for us. Thought they might not come and be content with the Continent. What’s this, Bee?’ He pointed at the remnants of a forget-me-not.

  ‘Dig it up, it will have seeded for next year.’

  They dug in silence, except for the birdsong. Sometimes the war didn’t seem real to Bryony. It was so calm here, so much as it had always been, like the hub of a wheel with everything else whirling around it.

  She pushed down hard on the trowel, levering up the earth and grass, putting it on the pile she was building. She tossed the trowel down and, one handed, shook the soil off the roots she had accumulated, before throwing them in the trug which stood between her and Eric. The ground was friable where they had been working. ‘So have you heard any more about the Sappers?’

  ‘It’s pointless, so I’m trying for the motor pool. I can mend anything that chugs. But I’ve more work in the meantime, digging out and erecting shelters. And Tommy Martin wants his old boat overhauling while it’s out of the water.’ Eric squatted back on his heels, and checked his watch. ‘Enough, Bee. April ga
ve orders you were only to slog away for an hour at a time. You must have been at it for far longer.’

  He stood, and then leaned down, pulling her up by her good arm, taking her trowel and dropping it into the trug. It was completely full of couch grass now, and he carried it as he walked alongside her to the terrace, where April had tea ready. On the tray was a cup for Eric. Bryony looked from one to the other. ‘Oh I see, Eric, you’ve been allotted the minder position.’

  Eric said, ‘Oh stop your mithering. Sit down and behave yourself, for goodness’ sake.’ It was like having Adam here. She laughed suddenly as he sat alongside her on another sunbed. ‘This is the life,’ he murmured, leaning back and shutting his eyes.

  ‘Don’t you need to do Tommy’s boat?’

  ‘Yes, starting tomorrow, so I’ll be along later in the day. But your babysitter will be here. We must get this garden under control, and look—’ He pointed towards the herbaceous beds, and the box hedges around the herb garden. ‘Lots to do.’

  She shaded her eyes with her hand. ‘Not sure we can afford you, Eric.’

  He turned his head. ‘I like to keep busy, so it’s not for money. We’re friends, and I’m sure you’d scrape a few barnacles off the bum of a boat for me.’ She pulled a face.

  He laughed. ‘Got to keep you under control, Bryony Miller, or you’ll go doing something daft and set yourself back.’

  The weather was good and for the next week or so they worked on the garden most afternoons, extending the time daily, and by the evenings Bryony was too tired to wonder if Adam would telephone. What’s more, her good arm was regaining its strength, and so, too, her legs which had spent far too many days up on a bed. She was tanned, and had an increasing appetite.

  On Friday 9 August they were clearing elder from the area near the cottage. Bryony was swearing quietly to herself, checking repeatedly that she had every bit of the pernicious white root, even the tiny hairy bits, when Anne came rushing to find her. Eric was digging with the big fork, heaving another load out for her to pick through but leaned on the fork as Anne looked from one to the other, breathing heavily. ‘It’s Catherine, she’s been in labour for a few hours and wouldn’t let me get anyone because she said it would take for ever, or so the midwife said. But Bryony, I think . . . Well . . .’

  There was a desperate shout from the cottage. ‘Anne! . . . Anne!’

  Bryony’s mind went blank. April? Where was she? She swung round, then remembered she was in Exmouth and Cissie was with Pearl’s foster mother. Eric sprang up. ‘I’ll call the doctor, shall I?’

  ‘I tried the midwife, there was no reply,’ Anne said, before waddling back to Catherine, calling, ‘I’m coming. For God’s sake, Bryony, shift your arse, and come and help me.’

  Bryony scrabbled to her feet and, holding her arm, started towards the cottage. She called back to Eric, who was setting out for the Lodge, ‘Come back, use the cottage telephone, I’ve only got one arm so I can’t do much.’

  He spun, lost balance, regained it. Bryony had forgotten about his built-up boot. ‘Sorry,’ he said, the panic showing. He headed towards her. She didn’t wait but continued, half running in spite of the pain. She entered the cottage, hurrying through the living room and up the wooden stairs, then back down, and into the kitchen, where belatedly she heaved off her wellington boots. ‘Clean hands,’ she muttered to herself. Eric was in his socks, limping because one leg was shorter than the other. He at least had had the presence of mind to leave his dirty boots outside and was now searching for the telephone. ‘Where is the damned thing? I’m going to try the midwife again. We can’t deliver a baby, Bee.’

  Anne called from upstairs, ‘The number is by the telephone, which is on the window seat. Bryony, come on.’

  Bryony ran the tap, then looked helplessly at her filthy hands. ‘Eric, I need you to wash my hands.’ She could feel her own panic matching his. A baby? One hand? And what did she know about babies?

  Eric dropped the receiver back on the rest. ‘No one there. I’ll try the doctor in a minute.’ He hurried into the kitchen and took her hand, reached for the nail brush, held both under the tap, and scrubbed. Water splashed them both. He flung down the nail brush, turned off the tap, and dried her hand. ‘There you go. I’ll phone, then wash mine, and don’t we boil water or something?’

  She yelled over her shoulder as she headed for the stairs, ‘I think so, but I don’t know what for.’

  Anne called from upstairs, ‘I’ve already put the kettle on the hotplate. Bryony, get up here, it’s coming.’

  Eric and she looked at one another. ‘Telephone, then come.’

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Yes, you have to.’

  She rushed upstairs. In the cottage’s spare room Catherine was pacing.

  Anne muttered, ‘Why not get on the bed?’

  ‘Because it bloody hurts, that’s why. This is better,’ Catherine groaned, leaning over, gripping the end board of the bed.

  Bryony shouted, ‘Get on the bed now, or how can we catch it?’

  She grabbed Catherine’s arm, while Anne yanked back the eiderdown. Eric stood in the doorway, appalled. ‘Help me. Be my other hand,’ Bryony said to him, over Catherine’s groans.

  To Anne, who was wincing, she said, ‘Get towels. We’ll need to wrap the baby.’ Eric came to hold Catherine’s other arm. ‘Come on now, lass. Hop on to the bed, there’s a good girl.’

  Catherine muttered through clenched teeth, ‘I’m not bloody hopping anywhere, and I’m never going to be anybody’s good girl, ever again. Men. Bloody men. Do you hear me?’ The last was shouted, into Eric’s face.

  ‘Loud and clear,’ he said. ‘The whole of Devon’s heard you.’ His voice was shaking.

  They got her on to the bed, she slumped across it, her lower legs hanging over the edge. Anne brought towels, then groaned and bent over herself. ‘Oh, God,’ Bryony said. ‘You too?’ The kettle was shrieking.

  ‘Go and turn it off,’ Anne ordered Eric, who looked relieved and dashed out.

  ‘Then come back, d’you hear? We’ll need everyone.’ Bryony was panting as though she’d run a mile while Anne sat in the armchair near the window, blowing in and out.

  As Catherine’s contractions seemed to pause, Eric returned, and Anne gasped, ‘Did you get hold of the midwife?’

  ‘Some woman answered. She’s on another case, they both are, so I rang the doctor again too, and he’s on his way, his receptionist said.’

  Catherine’s face was beaded with sweat, Anne was up on her feet. ‘It’s gone,’ she said. ‘The pain’s gone. It was just backache from hurrying.’

  Eric looked at Bryony, but then Catherine groaned, putting her legs up. Eric had to help rip her knickers off, while Anne stood with them. She said, ‘We need to look and see what’s happening.’

  Eric moved to the window. ‘I’ll keep a look out, but not sure there’s much point. I’d have heard if the doctor had arrived.’

  Catherine shrieked, ‘Not there, you idiot. Me.’

  Bee and Anne laughed, while Eric shook his head. ‘That’s your job, Bee.’ He was pale and sweating, and sat down quite suddenly on the dressing-table chair.

  She snapped, ‘Get up, you’re not the one having a baby, these two are. Imagine she’s a boat engine and you’re trying to get a piston sorted.’

  Catherine started laughing. ‘Don’t tell him that, he’ll get a ruddy wrench.’

  The sun was streaming in through the window. They heard an aircraft above. Eric said, ‘That’s all we need, a bomb.’

  Catherine gave a deep groan, and Bryony made herself take a long breath in, and then out. Where had she seen this before, the heaving, the moaning? She patted Catherine’s knee and it came to her – Uncle Thomas’s farm, that’s it, the cows, the sheep. ‘Don’t cut the cord,’ she said. ‘Whatever we do, we mustn’t cut the cord. Anne, it’s you and me, with Eric as a last resort.’ But Anne had left her and was panting on the easy chair. Bryony said, ‘That’s all right, Anne. Y
ou’ll be fine. Really, it’s all right, you too, Catherine.’

  She was telling herself as much as them. ‘So, it’ll have to be just us, Eric.’

  He nodded, grimly, from the dressing table, and limped across to stand beside her. Bryony said, ‘Catherine, I can see the baby’s head, or I think it is. When you feel a contraction, you push.’

  Catherine muttered, ‘What do you mean, you think?’

  But then she groaned, and pushed, and the head began to come out, then stalled. There was another contraction almost immediately, and then the head was out, and then there was another long grunt, more than a groan and full of effort, and now the shoulders appeared, and the whole of the body, in a great slurp and gush of water. ‘Oh God,’ groaned Eric.

  ‘Stop fussing,’ Bryony shouted, reaching for towels off the end of the bed and handing him one. ‘Be ready to cuddle the baby in this when the afterbirth comes out. Just look at the baby, not at anything else. I can’t have you fussing.’

  ‘Crikey, Bee, you’re so bossy.’

  The baby cried now, and they both stopped and looked. ‘Perhaps you should just put the towel over him,’ Bryony said, suddenly uncertain. The baby had cried and she knew that was good, and she knew, too, that all this was very real and she actually didn’t know what she should do.

  ‘It’s a boy,’ Eric said, ‘And his little feet are perfect. Did you hear that, Catherine? He’s perfect, lucky little blighter.’

  Catherine groaned again, and this time it was the afterbirth, and the baby was still crying so Eric rubbed him, and Bryony and he stared at one another. Panic was rising again.

  Anne was standing by the window, half bent over.

  ‘Oh God, what if Anne...?’ Eric almost shouted. Then, ‘I’m just going to wrap him up, that’s what I’m going to do.’ He did so, and sat close, his hand on the baby, staring at him, hushing him, while Bryony used a towel to pat Catherine’s forehead, telling her she was so clever, and the baby was very lovely. ‘Check for blood,’ she told Eric.

  He shook his head. ‘No, you do that.’ His voice was absolutely firm, and she did, and all seemed well. Catherine turned on her side. ‘I want to see him.’