Chapter 15
‘Whose writing is it? Can you tell?’ asked Kate. ‘We haven’t heard from Dot in a while.’
‘Don’t think it’s Aunty Dot’s,’ Rose replied. ‘Postmark is the Isle of Wight, though.’
‘Let me see. Hold it up,’ Kate said, squinting to decipher the handwriting.
‘Looks like Ronnie’s writing. I hope that means he’s going to pay us another visit soon.
Well, I’ll have to finish this off now. I want to read the letter.
That’s the pudding done. If you scrape the crumble onto the apple and pop it in the oven, then I’ll clean up my hands and settle down with a cup of tea and read what Ronnie has to say.
Might be more news of his flying lessons. ’
‘I think it’s wonderful that my big brother is going to be a pilot,’ Rose said. ‘I’ve been telling everyone else at school. Beats being a tractor driver any day.’
Kate smiled to herself. She was extremely proud of Ronnie’s achievements.
Who’d have thought that a boy born in a workhouse could have got so far in life?
A tear formed in the corner of her eye. She washed her hands and tucked a strand of grey hair behind her ear.
She had passed her fortieth birthday and, as well as greying hair, she was developing a few aches and pains in her fingers.
Her mother had developed arthritis in her later years and Kate wondered if she would follow her in that regard.
Apart from that, though, she was generally in good health and managed very well with the household duties with the help of the twins.
Rose and Annie were good girls. They were fifteen now and they would soon be making some decisions about their own future lives.
Where did the time go? It seemed only yesterday that she was pushing them along Micklewell High Street in their pram.
It brought a lump to her throat when she thought of the time she had contemplated not going through with the pregnancy.
She poured herself a cup of tea and took down the biscuit tin.
She had a few minutes to herself. Rose had gone to find Annie at a friend’s house and the men wouldn’t be home from work for another hour.
This was a rare quiet time. She broke the seal on the letter and what she read surprised and shocked her.
As she turned to the second sheet and read what an awful time Sarah was going through, her heart ached for her.
No woman should have to suffer such treatment at the hands of a man.
The anger stirred in her at the thought of the protests she had joined as a younger woman with the suffragette movement.
There had been some progress with women’s rights over the years since then, but it was painfully slow and the law did not seem to be there to protect women and children; rather it was still heavily weighted in favour of the man with regard to marital issues.
Ronnie was asking if he could bring Sarah and Anthony to stay with them and that gave a strong indication of his feelings. He so desperately wanted to protect her from her husband, soon to be her ex-husband, she hoped.
She folded the letter neatly and placed it back in the envelope.
She now needed to talk to Albert, Jim and the girls about the prospect of having strangers in the house.
There would be a lot to organise, not the least of which was how they would all sleep.
She was excited, yet at the same time a little nervous.
If and when Sarah’s divorce came through, then it was highly likely they would want to marry.
But he would be committing himself to raising another man’s child.
She calmed herself. No need to be anxious.
Albert had managed it and managed it very well.
There was no need to assume that the child would present difficulties. How history repeated itself!
That evening, Kate was preoccupied with her thoughts.
Several times she dropped stitches in her knitting and needed to unpick.
Her mind was working overtime. There just weren’t enough bedrooms. How best to introduce the idea to Albert and Jim?
What would the girls say? She would talk to them separately.
Best to find out the adults’ opinions first. She waited until the girls were in bed and then decided just to leap in and get it out in the open.
‘I have something I need to talk to you about,’ she said. ‘Now, I want you to listen to everything I have to say first before saying anything. I’ve had a letter from our Ronnie . . .’
She read the letter to them and waited for their response. There was a long pause. Albert was the first to speak.
‘I despise any man who hits his wife,’ Albert said.
‘Just you let him turn up here and I’ll show him the end of my shotgun,’ Jim added. ‘The end that does the serious damage.’
‘I agree with you, Jim,’ Albert said. ‘Of course, we’ll do all we can to help Ronnie, his young woman and her son.’
‘That’s settled then,’ Jim said.
‘I’ll talk to the girls about it in the morning. There will be practicalities to sort out that affect them. The question of bedrooms being one. I’ll write to him immediately and in the meantime, I’ll try to solve the question of how to accommodate them.’