The Buried Circle - Jenni Mills [154]
Dr Martin Ekwall,
A Turning Circle: The Ritual Year at Avebury,
Hackpen Press
CHAPTER 40
1942
‘I’ve found a nice room in Swindon, Mam,’ I said, ‘and you’ve no need to worry because there hasn’t been a raid for more than a couple of months.’ I was holding her hand; she was too exhausted even to sit up in bed. There were only a couple of other patients in the side ward in the cottage hospital at Marlborough. Mr Keiller had fixed it, bless him; he seemed to know all the right strings to pull.
I hadn’t had to offend Nell’s landlady by turning down the room with the bay window because Nell was still living there. Her fianc was missing in action, so the wedding and her plans to move in with his parents had been postponed. Her landlady recommended me to a woman further along the road, and now I was in lodgings hardly bigger than a boxroom. It had a narrow single bed, a chest of drawers, and instead of a wardrobe, a hook on the back of the door. Her husband worked at the railway yards too, and she had a job at the Plessey factory at the far end of Drove Road; it wasn’t so much the money she wanted but the extra ration book in the house. I rarely saw them, except at mealtimes, and spent all the time I could at the hospital. There was more than enough work to keep me busy.
My mother blinked slowly, and sighed. After a while I realized she was trying to raise her head from the pillow.
‘I got eyes in my head, Frances,’ she whispered. ‘Don’t think you can fool me, like you can your father.’ She paused for an effortful breath. ‘I won’t tell him, though. It would kill him. I know I can trust you to do the right thing.’ Her fingers tightened on mine.
* * *
There wasn’t a soul I could have told what had happened that night. When Mr Cromley buttoned up his air-force-blue trousers and left me in the churchyard, he knew he was safe. War hero: DSO, DFC. Reckon I wasn’t the only girl in the blackout who knew she wouldn’t be believed if she cried rape.
God knows how Mam could tell I’d fallen pregnant, and she was the only one, because I was still thin as a stick. She thought the baby was Davey’s, and she wanted me to shame him into marrying me. But he wasn’t some country simpleton who couldn’t add up. Even if he had been, wouldn’t have been fair on him.
He trundled over in the Baby Austin from the base whenever he could, which was mercifully not often. Colerne was a long way from Swindon, almost to Bath, and flying night-fighters could be cruel tiring, so he was busy nights while I worked days. Easy to fob him off, too, with the excuse that visiting Mam took up all my spare moments. I’d managed to avoid being alone with him much by insisting he brought a pal along so poor unhappy Nell could come out with us, to cheer her up. Davey was so good-hearted he didn’t mind, or if he did, he didn’t show it, so long as I allowed him a kiss at the end of the evening. Nell gave me some odd glances when I fended off her attempts to give us time on our own, but I told her afterwards Davey was always pressing me to go too far. The strange thing was, he wasn’t. Something had changed in him, and sometimes I had the feeling it was him keeping me at arm’s length, rather than the other way round.
I walked out of the hospital doors and onto the sunny forecourt. The Baby Austin was waiting, Davey in the back seat, head back with his forage cap pulled down over his eyes. He woke as soon as I rattled the door handle. ‘You’re tired out,’ I said, opening the passenger door. ‘They must be keeping you busy. Tell you what, drive me straight home and you go back to base for some proper shuteye.’
Davey climbed into the driver’s seat. ‘Don’t fuss. I’m fine.’ He yawned as he fired the engine. ‘Well, all right. I wouldn’t mind grabbing an hour or two before we take off tonight. But let’s stop on the way back, shall we? The afternoon’s too beautiful to waste.’
We drove up to the common overlooking the town, and Davey reversed