Across the Mersey - Annie Groves [43]
‘We’ll be as safe here as anywhere,’ Jean said to him firmly. ‘We’ve got that shelter in the garden, and besides, how can you be expected to help fight a war if you aren’t getting a decent meal to eat and clean clothes to wear? No, Sam, my mind’s made up. We’re staying.’ She paused. ‘I do hope that our Vi doesn’t really mean to send Jack away. I’d have him here rather than let her do that, but of course there’d be a ruckus if I offered.’
They exchanged looks, and then Sam cleared his throat.
‘Aye, poor lad. But he’s their lad, love, and it’s not up to us to interfere.’
‘But, Sam …’
‘I know, love but there’s nothing we can do. You know that.’
Jean straightened her shoulders and poured them each a cup of tea.
‘Do you reckon then that it’s going to be war?’ she asked.
Sam pushed back his chair and stood up, going over to her. Jean stood up as well, her anxiety shadowing her eyes as he put his arm around her and she laid her head on his shoulder.
‘Yes, and there’s no point in me pretending that there isn’t,’ he told her gruffly. ‘You’ve got far too much sense to be teken in by summat like that.’
For a few seconds they simply stood there in silence, Sam’s arm around Jean, and her head resting on his shoulder. Sam could feel her tears seeping through the fabric of his shirt. There was a huge lump in his throat. Jean so rarely cried.
‘At least we’ll have our Luke here with us, not like some families who’ve got to watch their lads going off to fight,’ Sam tried to comfort her.
‘I’m worried about him, Sam,’ she responded. ‘Something’s bothering him. Has he said anything to you?’
‘No, not a word. What do you reckon’s up with him then?’
‘I don’t know,’ Jean admitted.
SIX
Sunday 3 September
The sound of the twins’ muffled giggles had Jean looking along the pew and giving them a warning shake of her head. Dust danced in the long bars of sunlight striking through the high windows and onto the stone floor. She hoped the vicar’s sermon wasn’t going to go on for too long this morning. She’d got a nice piece of beef in the oven and she didn’t want it spoiling, and besides, she needed to sort out what she and the twins were going to wear for Bella’s wedding. A turn-up for the books, that had been and no mistake. And Vi could say what she liked about them getting married fast because there might be a war; it still wouldn’t stop folk putting one and one together and getting three, as the saying went.
From the pew she could see where the Boy Scouts were standing. Jack had told her all about the badges he’d got when she’d seen him at Vi’s. It didn’t seem two minutes ago since their Luke had been marching off proudly in his own Scout’s uniform, his hair slicked down straight.
She’d telephoned Vi yesterday from the telephone box at the end of the road, after the postman had brought the wedding invitation, and she’d been a bit taken aback when Vi had told her that Jack had been evacuated already.
‘His headmaster said we should, since they’ll be closing his school down if there is a war.’
Jean bent her head and said an extra special prayer for her young nephew, and then another one for all those other children who had been sent away from their homes, and for their mothers as well.
In the pew in front of them old Mrs Knowles from round the corner had fallen asleep, her hat coming down over one eye, its feather trembling in time with her snores, which was no doubt the cause of the twins’ mirth, Jean recognised ruefully.
Dutifully Grace tried to concentrate on the vicar’s sermon, but the warm beams of sunshine striking through the Sunday morning torpor of the worshippers, combined with the excitement that was fizzing away inside her, was too much of a temptation, drawing her thoughts outside the church to more exciting things. This time, next week she’d have started her training. She was