When they went down to the village later, Joe walked with them, leaving Violet to give Sarah Jane a bath and put her to bed. They asked Mrs Newton if she’d like to go too, since she’d just trudged up from the village shop, but she’d merely shaken her head and urged them to, ‘Enjoy yourselves!’ as she prepared a footbath for her aching feet. It was long after dark and bitterly cold by then, and the puddles dotted along the farm track had frozen to shining strips of ice.
They walked slowly, for Joe’s sake, and so found the bonfire already well alight by the time they reached the village. People were gathered about the bonfire in hats and scarves, chatting and munching on hot chestnuts, their faces illuminated by the dancing flames.
Tilly soon slipped away to talk to a boy she liked, Joe fell into conversation with a fellow farmer, and Caroline and Grace huddled for warmth near the brazier where the chestnuts were being roasted. The bonfire crackled cheerfully, sparks floating high into the night sky, and someone even let off a series of fireworks, much to the excitement of the local children. A Catherine wheel was pinned to a post and left to spin, spitting out bright sparks in all directions, followed by several noisy rockets that soon had Caroline cringing and covering her ears.
‘Goodness, that hurt my ears.’
‘Me too … I hate loud bangs,’ Grace agreed. ‘Didn’t we get enough of them during the war?’
‘I used to love firework displays when I was a kid.’ Caroline grimaced as another rocket screamed into the sky andexploded in a torrent of colourful sparks. ‘Now they just bring back bad memories.’
Nobody else seemed particularly affected by the bangs of the fireworks. But she reminded herself that Cornwall, and in particular Porthcurno, had not suffered much bombing during the war. Coming from the London area, she still recalled that first terrible year after war was declared, while she was still living at home, not yet having volunteered to join the Women’s Land Army. She’d been an impressionable girl, and the bombing raids had scared her out of her wits, especially after a former schoolfriend and her entire family were killed when a bomb destroyed their home only a few streets away.
That had been her main reason for choosing to sign up for working on the land rather than in a factory. She’d figured there must be less chance of being blown to smithereens in the countryside. The isolation of rural life had come as a severe shock to her at first. Raised in the suburbs, she was used to finding a shop or pub on every corner and people everywhere she looked. It hadn’t been long before she’d fallen in love with the sweeping Cornish scenery and the bracing fresh air.
‘Were you in Liverpool when war broke out?’ Caroline asked.
Grace nodded, looking grim. ‘My dad thought we’d be safe, so far north … Only, the bleedin’ Jerries found us in the end, didn’t they? They came along and flattened the city the next summer. That first wave of bombers … We were all underground, but when we came back up after the all-clear, it was like a scene from hell. Smoke and flames everywhere, and the ground was still hot under our feet.The Germans bombed us for days until the whole city was ablaze.’ She nodded to the bonfire. ‘It was like one long Guy Fawkes night.’
‘How dreadful.’ Caroline slipped a hand through her friend’s arm. ‘Is that why you enlisted in the Women’s Land Army? To get away from the bombing? That’s why I left London,’ she admitted with a shudder. ‘I couldn’t stand it any longer.’
‘No, that’s not why.’ Grace gave a long sigh, shaking her head at the bag of hot chestnuts Caroline was offering her. ‘I wanted to get away, all right. But not from the bombing.’ She shot Caroline a crooked smile. ‘I love my parents … Ronald and Audrey Morgan. Everyone loves them. They’re very nice people. Very nice parents. But, Lord, I couldn’t breathe without having one of them ask how deep.’
‘They were … interfering, you mean?’
‘I’m an only child. Everything they did revolved around me. Don’t get me wrong, it’s lovely, knowing they’ll always be there for me, no matter what.’ Grace rolled her eyes, looking up as another firework exploded in a brilliant shower of greens and reds. ‘But I could never be myself, could I? Because they want me to be one way, and I’m … Well, I’m the other way.’
Caroline held her breath, staring at her raised profile. ‘The other way?’ She blinked. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘Oh, you know parents.’ Grace made a dismissive gesture. ‘They’re always desperate to get you to be more like them, aren’t they? Only I never could be. For a start, I didn’t want to stay in Liverpool. I wanted to get away and see the world. Experience life beyond the “pool”.’ Grace laughed at some private joke, and then shook her head. ‘Anyway, I write homeevery other month. And Mam writes back. We’re not big letter writers in our family, to be honest. It was different when I was afraid they might be getting blown up at any minute. But the war’s over. So what do you really need to say, except I’m well, how are you?’
Caroline understood. ‘I should write home more often too.’ Guiltily, she realised she hadn’t been in touch with her own parents for months, when she’d finally written to tell them about Selina leaving the farm and moving to Bodmin, and how she’d spent a few wonderful days with her friend there, walking on the moors and playing with Selina’s nieces and nephew. ‘Though I write to Selina almost every week.’ She had mentioned Selina a few times to Grace, explaining how she’d been a Land Girl until that summer and that they still kept in touch. ‘But friends are different to family. When it’s a friend, I suppose you have more to say.’
‘You really liked that girl, Selina, didn’t you?’ Grace turned to look at her, her dark eyes intense. ‘It must have been hard for you when she left the farm.’
Caroline gulped, not knowing how to reply to that. ‘Um …’
‘What’s she like?’ Grace pressed her.
‘Nice, I suppose.’
‘That’s not what Tilly said when I asked her. She said Selina had a sharp tongue and was always causing arguments, and that you and she had even driven away one of the other Land Girls once. A girl called Penny. Is that true?’
Caroline’s face felt it was on fire. She stared helplessly at Grace, hunting for the right thing to say. It wasn’t true that she and Selina had driven Penny away. Was it? She knew Penny had left after a spat with Selina, and perhaps she herself hadn’t helped matters by being offhand with Pennytoo, but she certainly hadn’t intended to make her so unhappy that she fled the farm. And what did Tilly know about it, anyway? She hadn’t even joined them when that happened, so she must have taken her account from someone else. Violet Postbridge, perhaps – though the farmer’s wife wasn’t usually one to gossip.
Thankfully, as she began to stammer a response, Joe came over to interrupt the conversation, looking agitated. ‘Grace, them boys over there …’ He pointed with his walking stick. ‘Are they the ones who spoke rudely to you after the Harvest Supper?’
Grace looked surprised before glancing at Caroline, whose blush deepened. She knew Grace had not wished her to share that story with the farmer and his wife. But Violet had a way of winkling information out of people. ‘I really couldn’t say, Mr Postbridge.’
Beyond the bonfire, a group of young lads were clustered together, sharing a bag of hot chestnuts. Caroline told Joe quietly, ‘The tall one in the middle … I’m not sure about the others.’
Joe nodded grimly, but the boys scattered as soon as they saw him coming.
‘I wish you hadn’t said anything to the Postbridges,’ Grace muttered, sinking her hands in her jacket pockets and hunching her shoulders. ‘It’s my business, nobody else’s.’
‘But it’s not your fault they were horrible to you. They can’t be allowed to speak like that,’ Caroline told her, but Grace turned and walked away. She didn’t understand why her friend seemed so determined not to defend herself. But perhaps she just wanted to forget the whole thing.
After the ‘guy’ representing Guy Fawkes, who’d wickedly tried to blow up the King and Parliament back in the seventeenth century, had been thrown on the bonfire, with everyone cheering and applauding as it burned down to ashes, they began the slow walk back home.
