‘Of course not, you must leave her here with us. I rather think she’ll enjoy herself getting to know our latest arrival.’
That was when Hope had learnt that they were acquiring a dog courtesy of Elijah, and mainly for the benefit of their evacuee. She wondered what sort of dog it would be; all they knew was that it had belonged to an elderly man in the village who lived alone and who had just died. Hope had always hankered after owning a dog, but her father had refused to consider the idea. She had been so upset, she had decided to teach him a lesson and run away. After packing a few things into a small canvas bag, along with a hunk of bread she’d taken from the pantry and a bit of cheese wrapped in some greaseproof paper, she’d set off. Her intention was to walk to the station and catch the first train that stopped there, but in the end she only got as far as Clover Wood, having chosen a densely wooded spot as her new home. It had soon grown dark, and her vivid six-year-old imagination conjured up all manner of prowling beasts hiding amongst the trees. She had wanted to go home, to be lying comfortably in her own warm bed, but fear, even when it started to rain, made her incapable of moving. Her father, drenched to the skin, had found her and carried her back wordlessly to Island House. All she could think of was that his terrifying silence, and the fact that his arms seemed to be trembling with rage as he held her tightly, proved just how cross he must be with her.
Now as she recalled the memory, and knowing how panic-stricken she had been when Annelise was missing, she wondered if she had misinterpreted her father’s silence. What if he had been genuinely concerned about her running off and had been unable to articulate his feelings when he’d found her safe and well? Relief affected people differently, and at so young an age she had had no real way of understanding what she had just put her father through.
The illustrations now all carefully wrapped and securely tied with string, Hope retrieved Edmund’s letter from the drawer of her bedside table. Silly to read it through again when she knew perfectly well what it said, and when she had already telephoned the number he’d given her in order to confirm what time to meet and where. But she couldn’t resist it; Edmund wrote so beautifully. As a teenager he’d spoken grandly of one day becoming a poet. His ghastly mother had treated his claim as though he’d professed an interest in pursuing a life of crime. More dutifully, he’d fulfilled her aspiration for him to study medicine, presumably so that she would have a convenient expert on hand to diagnose her many ailments. Just what every hypochondriac mother desired, a doctor for a son! Why, thought Hope, did the good people of this world – people like Dieter – die when a self-obsessed woman like Mildred Flowerday was allowed to live?
As sorry as she felt for Edmund having the mother he did, at least he had been able to escape to London, unlike poor Evelyn, who’d had to make the sacrifice of giving up her teaching job in a prestigious girls’ school and return home to care for that cantankerous mother. A small mercy perhaps that she had just secured a teaching post at the school in the village.
Well, they all had to make sacrifices now that they were at war. And none bigger than the one Otto and Sabine had made in handing Annelise over into Hope’s care. Stanley’s parents, and thousands like them, had also been forced to make a difficult decision.
Hope had written to Otto and Sabine again, the day before war was declared, even though she was sure they wouldn’t receive her letter. She had sent it anyway, wanting to assure them that their precious daughter was perfectly happy and being well cared for here at Island House. She had tried to write a letter to Dieter’s parents, but had given up on the task. What could she possibly say to them? They probably hated her now; saw her as the enemy who had smuggled their granddaughter to England. With the views Gerda and Heinrich held, believing Hitler was a force for good in Germany, it scared Hope to think what lengths they might go to in their loyalty to the Nazis.
Her mood darkening, she changed the direction of her thoughts and contemplated being back in London tomorrow. After delivering the illustrations, she would meet Edmund for lunch, and then go and check on her flat in Belsize Park.
She wanted to believe it would feel good to be back there, but she knew it wouldn’t; it would be a return to a million and one reminders of Dieter, of coping with the pain of knowing he would never again walk through the front door and surprise her with a posy he’d bought from the flower seller on the corner of their street. At least being at Island House, a place where Dieter had never been, she wasn’t haunted by memories of him. But she couldn’t stay here indefinitely; she had to stand on her own two feet, even if it would be extraordinarily difficult.
With her bedroom window open, leaning out to look at the garden in the shadowy darkness of dusk and watching the swallows swooping through the cool September air, Hope knew that to do the best she could for Annelise, staying here, where she had so much help on hand, was the right thing. Why uproot the poor girl yet again – and deliberately put her in harm’s way in London – when she had Mrs Partridge who doted on her, and Florence who was so good with her? Yet it wasn’t the right thing for Hope. She had to prove to herself – and maybe to everybody else – that she could do this alone. Perhaps it was no more than stubborn pride that dictated her desire to leave Island House, having initially thought she would stay, but she could not ignore the feeling that it would be cowardly to remain here. She had to show some backbone.
Romily had suggested that her father would have wanted her to make Island House her home while the world was in such a precarious state, and a part of Hope wanted to believe that was true, that he had summoned his family back here because he had somehow felt there would soon come a time when they would need a place of sanctuary.
There were those who were firmly of the opinion that the war they had just got themselves into would be over by Christmas, and seeing her brother and Evelyn emerging from the boathouse at the other end of the garden, Hope wanted to believe with all her being that that was true.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
December 1939
It was the day before Christmas Eve and the war was far from over. Five British ships and a number of foreign ones had recently been sunk by mines in the North Sea, and the pride of the German fleet, the Graf Spee, trapped by British warships in the South Atlantic near Uruguay, had scuttled herself on a direct order from Hitler. The ship’s captain had shot himself in the head, according to the newspapers. There had even been an attempt to assassinate Hitler.
But for all that, the way some people viewed it the war had hardly got going, and maybe never would, not properly. ‘It’s nothing but a phoney war,’ was what Florence regularly heard in the village.
It seemed the government was forever saying what people couldn’t do and what they couldn’t have – coal and petrol were rationed, and if you didn’t obey the blackout regulations you could go to prison, while old Bert Cox, the ARP warden, would love nothing better than to shoot on sight anyone who let so much as a chink of light show! Every day, as soon as it was dark, around the village he’d go, yelling, ‘Put that light out!’
But it didn’t seem like there was much reason for what they were doing, and to hear the way some folk grumbled, you’d think they were disappointed not to be bombed out of their homes or gunned down in the street. They should think themselves lucky that nothing was happening, in Florence’s opinion.
Many of the evacuees who’d come to the village in September had returned home, despite the government advising against it. Stanley’s mother, who hadn’t written to him once since his arrival, had not requested he should go home. Nor had the boy shown any desire to leave.
After just three months, he bore little resemblance to the lad he’d been when he’d first pitched up. Under Mrs Partridge’s vigilant eye he’d put on weight, got some colour in his cheeks and gained confidence. He was also doing well with his lessons, and every day when he came home from school, he’d sit at the kitchen table with his exercise book and stubby pencil doing the extra work Miss Flowerday set him so he could catch up with the others. Miss Flowerday had guessed that the reason for his reluctance to go to school was because he couldn’t read and write. Well he was getting there now. Florence helped him when she could, as did Miss Romily.
But the real reason for the change for the better in Stanley was down to Bobby, the dog Elijah had given him. They were inseparable and went everywhere together, apart from school, but the minute Stanley was due home in the afternoon, the dog was waiting for him at the end of the drive with his tail wagging. They were out together now, delivering Christmas cards for Miss Romily.
For Florence, Christmas had seemed like it would never come. She had literally been counting the days, willing the day to arrive when she would see Billy again. A private in the Suffolk Regiment, he was home on leave this afternoon, along with Tommy and Elijah, their basic training now over. They’d been based at the barracks in Bury St Edmunds, which was only a thirty-minute train journey away, but with no leave allowed until today, they might just as well have been in Timbuktu.
With each day they had been apart, Florence’s feelings for Billy had deepened, and with each letter he’d written she’d felt she was getting to know him better. His letters had often made her laugh, especially when he wrote about the lads he was training with – ‘a great bunch’ – and what they got up to when they weren’t carrying out drill practice, or learning how to use a Bren gun and anti-tank rifles. The way he told it, being in the army was one big lark, coupled with an impatience to get the job done to show the Hun what he had coming to him.
Florence supposed that sort of bravado was part and parcel of being turned into a soldier, but had it changed Billy? How could it not, as otherwise how would he cope when he did go and fight? He could not remain the same tender-hearted young man he’d been when she’d got to know him. And maybe that would mean he would see her through different eyes; maybe now she would be just a very dull girl to him.
The day Billy had left to start his training, he’d surprised Florence with a silver heart-shaped locket, which he’d told her had belonged to his grandmother. As he’d put it on her, taking forever over fixing the catch on the necklace chain, he’d kissed the nape of her neck, making her shiver. ‘I don’t expect you to feel the same way about me, Flo,’ he’d said, turning her round, ‘but before I go, I want you to know something important. It’s this: I think you’re pretty special.’
‘Well, Mr Billy Know-It-All,’ she’d said, ‘I have news for you. I think you’re pretty special too.’
‘You do?’
‘Don’t sound so surprised. Why wouldn’t I think that?’
‘I can think of half a dozen reasons.’
‘Then I’d advise you to keep them to yourself.’
