Chapter 56
Beryl’s sister was called Olive. She was a taller, thinner and more angular version of Mabel’s rescuer and did not seem at all put out by a stranger coming to stay. In fact, both women seemed to find it a relief that there was someone else to ease the obvious tension between them.
‘Do you have brothers or sisters?’ asked Olive as she led her to a pretty room in the eaves of the cottage. There was a blue-and-pink chintz bedspread, a pink rug, a sweet little dressing table and, of course, the standard blackout curtains.
‘I used to have a baby sister,’ said Mabel quietly. ‘She was killed along with my mother when a bomb fell on our house in London.’
Olive gasped. ‘Oh love, I’m so sorry.’
‘I just keep thinking of Cook’s sister in Penzance,’ said Mabel tearfully.
‘Was that who Lady Clarissa had arranged for you to stay with?’
She nodded.
‘It’s tragic,’ said Olive with tears in her eyes.
Fortunately, Beryl’s sister was sensitive enough not to ask any more questions. Instead, she took a towel out of a pine chest of drawers and showed her where the bathroom was. ‘We take it in turns. There’s a chamber pot under the bed.’
Mabel thought briefly of the five large bathrooms in the Old Rectory, which had been icy cold in winter.
‘Thank you. I cannot believe you’ve been kind enough to take in a stranger.’
‘It’s what we do in the war,’ Olive replied.
‘That’s what your sister told me.’
‘We are more alike than we sometimes care to admit. Now you need a rest after your journey.’ She looked at Mabel’s tummy. ‘That little one needs it as much as you.’
‘Do you have children?’
‘Sadly not, but …’ her sentence drifted off, unfinished, before she shook her head.
‘Anyway, I don’t know what you need in the way of clothes but there are some spare clean dresses in the wardrobe that might fit you for a while.
If you want something washed, please let me know.
You will be safe here, Mabel.’ She hesitated before continuing.
‘Mousehole is a warm, friendly place but people talk, as in any small village. You haven’t mentioned the father, and we don’t want to pry but shall we tell people that your husband is away in the navy? ’
Mabel hesitated.
‘No need to say any more, dear. However, you’ll need a ring to prevent questions. We’ll find you one from our mother’s old jewellery box.’
Mabel was too choked to speak.
‘You won’t be the first to have a child out of wedlock,’ said Olive quietly, ‘and you won’t be the last. Now do get some rest.’
But Mabel couldn’t sleep. Tiptoeing out onto the landing, she heard voices below her in the little sitting room.
‘How could you have brought her here? To me, of all people?’
‘What else could I do, Olive? The girl was destitute.’
‘But what if something goes wrong again?’
‘We’ll just have to make sure that it doesn’t.’
Mabel was terrified. What mustn’t happen again?
Perhaps she shouldn’t have been so rash in accepting a stranger’s invitation. ‘I must leave now,’ Mabel told herself. If necessary, she’d sleep in a bus shelter. Tiptoeing down the stairs, she discovered the front door was locked, with no sign of a key.
Her chest tightened with panic, and that light flutter in her stomach returned. ‘Please look after me,’ it seemed to say.
Not knowing what else to do, she padded back up the stairs to her room and stared out at the sea, glinting in the moonlight.
Somewhere out there was Papa. There might not have been a letter from him yet, but she prayed that there would be soon.
In the meantime, she had to be grateful that the Red Cross had managed to trace him to a camp.
Somewhere out there, too, was Antonio. Please may he be safe.
‘And now I have you,’ she whispered, stroking her rippling stomach. ‘Soon, we will all be reunited. Until then, it’s just us. Sleep tight, little one. In the morning, I’ll find a way for us to escape.’
After much tossing and turning, Mabel finally fell into a deep sleep in which she dreamed that she and Antonio were walking through a field. She was carrying their babe, and he had his arm around her shoulders.
The next thing she knew, Beryl was peering over her face. Mabel jumped.
‘Sorry, love. Did I startle you? I just wanted to check you were all right. When you’re ready, come down for some breakfast.’
It would be too difficult to leave now, with everyone up.
Besides, her stomach was rumbling; she needed to eat for the sake of the baby.
Mabel went downstairs nervously to find a small table beautifully laid with pretty blue-and-yellow floral china and a lace tablecloth.
The sisters were sitting opposite one another, the air tight, as if Mabel had interrupted an argument.
‘My sister says you need to let your former employer know that you’re here safely,’ said Beryl.
‘My employer?’
‘Didn’t you say it was Lady Clarissa at the Old Rectory near Sidmouth?’
‘Yes, of course. Thank you.’
‘I don’t have a telephone,’ said Olive, ‘but if you write a note, I can give you a stamp. You can hand it in at the post office. It’s just over on the sea front.’
‘Thank you,’ said Mabel, jumping at the chance to leave without raising suspicion. She would catch a bus or a train back to Exeter, but then what?
‘You can tell Lady Clarissa that you’ll stay here until you have the baby, and beyond if you wish.’
‘But –’
‘No buts. We insist.’
Mabel went upstairs to write. As she did so, the baby fluttered again. The idea of sleeping in a bus shelter with her unborn child now seemed irresponsible. Perhaps she could ask her aunt to collect her instead.
Dear Aunt,
You will have heard of the terrible bombing in Penzance by now. Please give my condolences to Cook.
Two sisters have given me shelter but I do not trust them. One talks of why I’ve been brought to her ‘of all people’ and I fear that she has done something wrong in her past. Please come and get me. This is my address …
She wrote a brief note to Cook, giving the same details, in case she had news of Antonio. Then she set off for the post office.
‘Ah, you’re the young lady staying with Olive Fish,’ said the jolly woman behind the counter.
‘Yes,’ she said, hoping she wouldn’t be engaged in conversation.
‘You’ll be doing Miss Olive a favour – and Beryl too. They’ve never been the same since Kitty went.’
‘Kitty?’
‘Didn’t they tell you?’
The woman took on the air of someone about to impart a tasty titbit of gossip.
‘Kitty was their little sister. Shortly before the war, she was engaged to be married but her gentleman friend broke it off. She’d got into the family way by then and they tried to keep it quiet.
Olive had just finished training as a midwife so it was planned they would deliver her at home.
Unfortunately, things went wrong and both baby and mother died. ’
Mabel gasped. ‘How dreadful!’
‘The doctor said he should have been called beforehand, but Olive had wanted to prove her skills as a midwife. She hasn’t practised since.
It’s why the two sisters haven’t been getting on so well.
When we heard that Beryl was coming to stay, we hoped the war might bring them back together. They’re good souls.’
So that’s what Olive had meant by ‘to me of all people’. The thought of staying in a house where a baby had died felt like a bad omen.
Maybe she should speak to her aunt – it would be quicker than the letter she’d just sent. ‘Is there a telephone I could use here, please?’
‘Only for emergencies, I’m afraid, love.’
‘This is an emergency,’ she faltered.
‘Is it now?’ The postmistress seemed to study her for a minute and then something gave in her eyes. ‘Very well. The phone’s in the back.’
Surrounded by piles of tins and boxes of apples, Mabel lifted the receiver and gave the operator her aunt’s number.
She expected Cook or maybe Frannie to pick it up but instead she heard her aunt’s crisp, well-modulated voice.
‘Aunt Clarissa. It’s me, Mabel. I have to be quick as I’m using someone else’s telephone. Did you know that Cook’s sister was killed in the bombing raid in Penzance?’
‘Oh, Mabel. That’s dreadful.’ Her aunt seemed genuinely shocked. So the news hadn’t reached them yet.
‘A woman on the train has taken me in. I’m staying with her sister, Olive Fish, somewhere near Penzance, a place called Mousehole.’
‘Do they know you’re my niece?’
‘No. I told them that I worked for you as a maid.’
‘Good.’ Her aunt’s voice grew thoughtful. ‘Send me their names and address –’
‘I already have done. I posted you a letter just now.’
‘Please don’t interrupt. It’s so vulgar. Tell them that I will send them money for your food and keep, as your concerned former employer. But on no account tell them of our blood connection. It would ruin my standing in society if this were to get out.’
Clarissa didn’t even attempt to hide the disgust in her voice.
‘But I don’t feel right staying here,’ pleaded Mabel. ‘Olive was a midwife and it all went wrong when she delivered their younger sister. She says the doctor will come to me when it’s my time but supposing he doesn’t?’
‘Now listen to me,’ said her aunt sharply, as if she was standing in front of her in real life, waggling her finger. ‘Girls like you who get into trouble have no choice. You will stay where you are and save us all from shame.’
‘Antonio will marry me when he receives my message.’
‘You mean the note you left with Cook?’ There was a snorting sound. ‘I caught her red-handed and took it away.’
‘But Antonio won’t know what’s happened!’ Mabel cried.
‘He certainly won’t. In fact, I have had words with the camp commander, explaining that one of his men had become too familiar with a girl in the village. Of course, he was shocked. Your lover has been moved to a different camp. He won’t bother us any longer.’
‘Where has he gone?’
‘I have no idea and I do not care. It’s for your own good. The fewer people who know, the better.’
‘But what will happen when the baby’s born?’
‘We’ll sort that out when the time comes. Now, I’ve got a bridge afternoon to organize. Goodbye.’