‘I shouldn’t wonder if there isn’t a letter from Drew soon, telling us he’s got a ship. I’ve written a couple of letters but I’m not posting them until we get his new address. He’ll be safer at sea, Mother, to my way of thinking. Plymouth has taken more than its fair share of the air raids.’
‘You could be right.’ Helen brightened visibly. ‘I think I’ll write to him, too.’
‘You do that, dearest. Tell him all the nice things. He likes hearing about Rowangarth.’ Home Farm starting the corn harvest, Jack Catchpole’s anger at the newly-appeared molehills on the front lawn; Tilda bottling Victoria plums to store for winter puddings, Tom’s bitch having a fine litter of puppies. ‘I wouldn’t mention the letter that came for Daisy this morning, though. She’ll want to tell Drew about that herself.’
‘Mm. And it mightn’t be about her medical, you know. Maybe it’s to tell her they’ve got enough Wrens for the time being.’
‘You could well be right.’
Julia felt unease as she watched her mother walk away; not so straight, now, her steps slow and unsteady sometimes.
Dearest lovely Mother. Once you were so beautiful, so sure and brave. War took your sons from you yet you never wavered; you cared for the entire village, were always there to comfort when the death telegrams came.
We all leaned on you, drew strength from you. You were like a safe haven. You saw to it that the old always had logs to burn in winter and that no one went entirely hungry.
Yet now you are old yourself and have been called on to face another war and what I’ll do when you leave us, what Rowangarth and the whole of Holdenby will do, I don’t dare think.
And, Mother, Daisy will have to go, sooner or later. We’ve got a long, terrible time ahead of us. We are on our own now, and women are going to have to help fight the war, whether we like it or not …
Daisy said, ‘Hi, each!’ looked up at the mantelpiece as she always did, faltered for just a second, then said, ‘Well, what d’ya know? A letter from His Majesty.’
‘Open it, love.’ Alice could wait no longer. It had lain there all day, tormenting her so much that she had thought – only for a moment, mind – of taking the kettle to it and steaming it open.
‘Albion Street, Leeds,’ Daisy studied the stereotyped form. ‘That’s where I’m to go. On the twenty-ninth of August, at half-past three.’
‘Two weeks away,’ Alice frowned.
‘So it is. If the date isn’t convenient I’m to let them know at once, reusing the envelope and the enclosed label,’ she grinned. ‘There’s economy for you!’
‘It isn’t funny,’ Alice snapped, more than ever agitated now she knew that what she had feared all day was fact. ‘And what do they mean – if it isn’t convenient?’
‘My period, I suppose. But I’ll be all right.’
‘Daisy!’ Such talk, in front of her father!
‘What’s the matter, Mam – doesn’t Dada know about the birds and the bees?’
‘That’ll do, lass.’ Impudent young miss! Tom fought to keep the smile from his lips. ‘What’s Keth got to say for himself, then?’
‘Don’t ask.’ Daisy took a knife from the table, carefully opening the envelope. ‘That’s between me and him – oooh, Mam, he’s looking at rings! What do I want, he says.’
‘Rings! I’d have thought he’d have better things to do with his money than send a ring that’ll likely end up torpedoed at the bottom of the Atlantic!’
‘Well, since he’s asking, I think I’d like a sapphire. It would go with my brooch.’
Would match the daisy-shaped brooch Aunt Julia had given her the day she was christened; petals of sapphires with a pearl at its centre. So valuable that she still had to ask Mam’s permission to wear it.
‘Your brooch, Daisy Dwerryhouse, would keep me in housekeeping for five years! Now where is Keth to find the money to match sapphires like those, will you tell me?’
‘Don’t know, Mam.’ He still hadn’t told anyone what his job was all about. ‘But he said he’s got money in the bank now. You should be pleased for him when he’s had to live from hand to mouth most of his life – and had to take the Kentucky Suttons’ charity.’
‘Charity! You call saving Bas Sutton’s life charity?’ Alice lifted the potato pan from the stove top, walking with it to the yard to strain the water over the cobbles. Scalding saltwater killed the weeds, she insisted.
‘Daisy love, don’t rile your mother. She’s all on edge these days and that letter of yours hasn’t helped.’
‘Sorry, Dada.’ She was at once contrite. ‘I’m not exactly pleased about it myself. But there’s no going back now and at least it’ll be better than working in a snobby shop. It’ll help pass the time, I suppose, till Keth gets home. Anything I can do to help?’ she asked as Alice returned.
‘Please. Be a love and get the plates out of the oven.’
‘Smells good. Stew, is it?’
‘I suppose so, though it’s more gravy than meat.’
Daisy sent her mother a smile across the table, realizing for the umpteenth time since the day she had filled in that application how much she was going to miss her if – when – her call-up papers came. She had such wonderful parents, such a lovely happy home; why, why had she been so stupid, so impulsive?
Because there’s a war on, answered her conscience, and because you care very much about England and this precious, one-horse dump you live in. And because Drew has already gone to war and the sooner you do your bit, Daisy Dwerryhouse, to help win that war, the sooner Keth will be home.
More selfish, really, than patriotic she admitted with ruthless honesty.
‘I think, Mam,’ she said softly, ‘that I really would like a sapphire engagement ring. But I’ll tell Keth that if he gets one he’s not to risk sending it.’
‘You do that, love.’ Alice was outwardly calm again. ‘Like I said, we wouldn’t want it to be sunk.’
Already the greedy Atlantic had claimed too much, a lot of which could never be replaced. The lives of young seamen, for instance …
‘There’s one from Drew, Mother!’ Julia ripped open the envelope which, instead of a postage stamp, bore the red frank and scribbled initials of the censor. ‘He’s got a ship at last. Listen – I’ll read it to you.
‘Dearest Mother and Gran,
‘When you get this I’ll be en route to my ship. I won’t give you the name for obvious reasons because this is to let you know we’ll be stooging around, sweeping mines.
‘I’ll be based in home waters so I should get leave pretty regularly – at least they aren’t sending me foreign. I’ll let you have my official address when I get there.
‘Just to let you know I’ll soon be doing some seatime, and glad to be out of barracks.
‘In great haste, take care,
‘Drew.
‘Well now, isn’t that good news, dearest?’
‘Yes, but why hasn’t he told us which ship?’
‘Because he couldn’t. He’s let us know he’s been drafted to a minesweeper based in home waters. If he’d given us the ship’s name, too, the censor would have cut it out of his letter.’
‘Censors! Such an invasion of privacy!’ Helen said crossly. ‘I’d be ashamed