Chapter 22
‘Are you ready?’ Charlie murmured later that day, when he and Bobby arrived at Moorside for their family dinner. The time had come, finally, to share their big news.
Bobby didn’t know if she was or not. It felt strange that soon, everyone would know about Marmaduke. She was filled with worry about how the family would react when she revealed not only her pregnancy, but the sneaky way in which she had endeavoured to conceal it.
‘I suppose so,’ she whispered back. ‘Let’s go in. We’re a little late.’
In the kitchen, they found everyone already seated around the table: her father; Lil and Tony, with Annie in her high chair between them; Captain Parry and his daughters; and Reg of course, with Mary at the oven checking on the joint.
The sound of merry chatter instantly made Bobby feel better.
Everyone seemed in good spirits after today’s happy event.
Bobby wondered how they were actually supposed to announce their news. Ought she to bang her fork against her glass, as people did at weddings? She would feel so foolish. Perhaps she should leave it to Charlie.
‘Well, you’re here at last,’ Mary said as they each took a seat. ‘In that case, I can start serving up.’
‘Just a moment. Before we eat, there’s something I’d like to tell you all.’
Bobby glanced at Charlie in surprise. It wasn’t him who had spoken. It was Captain Parry, seeming to snatch the words right from their mouths.
Mary frowned. ‘Everything all right, George?’
The captain looked rather bashful. ‘Um, yes. I only wished all of you to know, before anyone else, that Miss Simpson and I… well, the fact is we’re engaged to be married. She did me the honour of agreeing to be my wife this afternoon.’
This was met by a shocked silence. Of course Bobby had known George was considering a proposal, but she hadn’t expected it to happen quite so soon.
He and Miss Simpson had barely been walking out five weeks.
Quick engagements weren’t unusual in wartime, but Captain Parry seemed such a sensible, cautious man.
The silence was broken by Lilian.
‘Congratulations, George,’ she said, smiling warmly. ‘She’s a wonderful girl. Every happiness to you both.’
This seemed to break through the collective daze, and a moment later Reg and Rob were slapping George on the back while everyone offered their congratulations.
‘You ought to have said summat, Ginger,’ Reg said. ‘I’d have got a bottle in to toast the happy news.’
Florrie, however, was staring at her father in horror.
‘You’re not really going to marry her, are you?’ she asked in a disgusted tone.
George rested a hand on her shoulder. ‘Now, Florrie, don’t be that way. You’ll like her ever so much when you know her better.’
The child’s lip wobbled.
‘I won’t let you,’ she said. ‘I won’t, so… there.’
Jess, who looked no happier about the situation, nodded in agreement. ‘Nor me either. We’ll… we’ll run away if you marry her. I bet you’ll be sorry then.’
‘I’m afraid it isn’t up to the two of you who I marry,’ their father said sternly. ‘We’ll talk about it at home.’
‘If you loved us then you wouldn’t marry no one without asking us,’ Florrie said, the tremble in her lip becoming more violent. ‘And you wouldn’t want to replace our ma with someone like her. That’s cruel, and it’s wrong and… and I’ll hate you forever.’
‘Florence Parry, I know you don’t mean that,’ Mary said, frowning. ‘You mind how you speak to your father.’
‘I do. I mean it more than anything. And I won’t let him, I won’t!’
Sobbing, Florrie ran from the table. They heard her thundering upstairs a moment later. Jessie looked like she might follow, but a look from Mary kept her in her chair. The younger child had always been more concerned about pleasing the grown-ups than her more wilful sister.
Captain Parry sighed. ‘I’ll go after her. I am sorry, Mary. I didn’t expect her to take on like this.’
‘Let me go, George,’ Lilian said quietly.
‘If you think that’s best. She’ll be more likely to listen to you or Mary than to me at the moment, I think.’
‘She’ll be in the attic,’ Mary said. ‘Would you rather I went, Lilian?’
‘I think she might listen to me, if I take the baby to her,’ Lilian said. ‘You serve up, Mary. I won’t be long, I hope.’
She took the smiling Annie from her high chair and disappeared.
By the time Mary had served them all, Lilian had reappeared with Annie against her hip and Florrie beside her. The little girl looked pale, but she was no longer crying.
‘Florrie has something she would like to say,’ Lil told them.
Florrie sniffed. ‘Sorry if I ruined dinner, Mary. And Dad, I’m sorry I said I’d hate you forever. I won’t really.’
The captain couldn’t help smiling. ‘Well that’s certainly a relief.’
‘But I wish you didn’t want to get married though.’
He drew her to him and planted a kiss on her curls. ‘We’ll talk about it at home, all right, sweetheart? Let’s have no more tears now, when Mary has been kind enough to cook dinner especially because you asked her to.’
‘All right.’
Lilian passed the girl a handkerchief before sitting down, and Florrie blew her nose.
‘Well!’ Mary said cheerily, in an attempt to shift the lingering awkwardness. ‘Another wedding on the horizon, and only just back from one. I’ll barely have time to press Reg’s suit.’
Bobby gave Charlie a significant look. He nodded, and opened his mouth to speak. But before he could do so, Rob cleared his throat.
‘Happen you’ll need to press it sooner than you think, Mary,’ he said, turning red. ‘I, um… I’ve a little summat to tell all of ye as well.’
Bobby blinked at him. She had forgotten her father had said he’d let everyone know about his plan to move out of the cow house today. But what did he mean about suits?
‘What is it, Rob?’ Mary asked.
‘Well, the fact of it is, I’ll be flitting next month. Not far, like. We’ve taken a little place on the beck. But anyhow, we’d like all of you to be there, although it won’t be much. At our age, we thought summat quiet would be best.’
‘Dad, what are you talking about?’ Lilian asked.
Rob rubbed his neck. ‘When I told you and your sister I’d a mate from t’ pub I was aiming to set up home with… that’s true enough, but I didn’t quite tell you all of it. Anyhow, now she’s given me a yes I can come clean.’
Lilian frowned. ‘She?’
‘Oh my goodness!’ Bobby said, the penny dropping. ‘Dad, you’re not saying… not Mrs Hobbes?’
‘Aye, well, she’s a fine old girl, and we rub along well together.
I hope you’d never think I was trying to replace your mam, but at my time o’ life…
I’d like to spend what’s left of it wi’ someone I can look after, and someone as can look after me.
’ His neck was starting to look rather sore under constant rubbing.
‘So, um, I asked and she said yes. That’s about all there is to it.
The wedding’s booked at the registry in Skipton for three weeks’ time. ’
‘Three weeks!’
Bobby didn’t know whether to be pleased or to run sobbing from the room as Florrie had done. She was so surprised, she didn’t know what to feel.
It was Charlie who recovered first, breaking the second stunned silence of the afternoon. He leaned across the table to shake his father-in-law’s hand.
‘Every happiness, Rob,’ he said. ‘I won’t think of it as losing a father-in-law so much as gaining a goose.’
Rob smiled. ‘Aye, it’ll be an experience sharing a home wi’ that pet of hers. Still, she’s worth it for all her funny ways.’
Tony looked rather thrilled, which Bobby assumed had more to do with no longer having to share a home with his father-in-law than her dad’s news. He shook Rob’s hand heartily.
‘We’ll miss you, old man,’ he said.
Rob laughed. ‘Like heck you will.’ He glanced from Bobby to Lil. ‘And what do you pair have to say about it?’
‘Well, I mean… congratulations,’ Lil said, planting a bewildered kiss on his cheek. ‘Every happiness and all that. But I wish you’d told us sooner, Dad. Three weeks isn’t long to plan a wedding.’
‘Oh, it’s plenty for a couple of old fogies like us. We’ve been talking about setting up home for months, but Maim wouldn’t commit till she’d squared it with Her Ladyship. I told her I’d be ready with the licence as soon as she gave me the nod.’
Bobby finally recovered enough to smile at him. ‘You sly thing. So that’s what’s had you in a good mood the last few months, is it? I wondered what could be putting the grin on your face.’
‘You approve then?’
‘You could knock me down with a feather but yes, I’ve always liked Maimie Hobbes. Does Topsy know?’
‘Not yet. Maim’s breaking the news now.’
The rest of the family chimed in with congratulations, and Rob was beaming by the time they settled down to eat.
Bobby was so knocked for six that she was halfway through her meal before she remembered that she, too, had some news to break at what was turning into a highly eventful family dinner.
The thought seemed to occur to Charlie at the same time.
‘When?’ he murmured.
‘Wait till everyone’s eaten,’ she whispered back.
Bobby hoped that by the time everyone had finished their puddings, they would have recovered enough from the previous bombshells to be ready for one more.
‘Well, shall we gents go into the parlour for a smoke and leave the girls to have a gossip?’ Reg asked when everyone had cleared their plates.
‘I feel like we’ve all been too much surprised to chip in with the required amount of back-slapping and hand-shaking, but there’s plenty of time to set that right. It’s only a shame we’ve got no cigars.’
‘Happy to donate a few fags from my supply,’ Tony said.
Mary shook her head. ‘Oh no you don’t, Tony Scott. I’ve just got that ceiling clean. If you boys want to smoke those smelly Egyptian things, you can do it outside.’
Bobby nudged Charlie before the family began to disperse.
‘Yes. Right.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Um, Bobby and I are expecting a baby.’
She shook her head at him. ‘You couldn’t have built up to it a bit more?’