1953

‘When’s Robbie coming, Mom?

‘Oh, Michael,’ Katie said, ‘if you’ve asked me once, you’ve asked me a hundred times already!’ She was busy in the kitchen with Sybil, piling sandwiches onto trays. ‘I told you – everyone’ll be here soon.’

‘There’ll be extra dogs as well,’ Sybil remarked.

‘Will there?’ Katie looked up, a dark curl of hair hanging over her forehead.

‘Well, Joan Lester is inseparable form that Highland Terrier of hers – and Mrs Rogers never goes anywhere without her dog: you know, big black Labrador.’

‘Dogs!’ Michael went off laughing happily. ‘Auntie Agnieska doesn’t like dogs!’

‘Well, your job will be to keep them away from her. And make sure Archie doesn’t lose his temper with them!’ Katie called after him. Archie, rather an elderly dog now, was sometimes short of patience. ‘Go and see if Marek’s all right with the others, will you?’

They were having their own Coronation tea. The big event had been on Tuesday – for which, like so many other householders, Sybil had taken the step of investing in a first-ever television set.

‘It’ll be nice for the children,’ she said, but Katie could see that Sybil was going to enjoy television as well.

They all crowded round for the eleven o’clock service in Westminster Abbey. How exciting it had been to see the young Queen in all her finery! And there had been a little party in the street, but the weather was poor. Sybil had already decided she’d like a get-together, and she and Katie agreed that the following Saturday would be a good opportunity.

‘We’ll just make it tea,’ Sybil said. ‘There’ll be quite a few children, and we can fill everyone up with jelly and cake!’

When the food was ready, Katie went to the back door. Everything was ready: the tables arranged optimistically out there, the cloths pinned at the corners, and all the chairs they could find, plus some borrowed from the Arbuckles. Further down she could see Marek, bent over, holding the hand of their little daughter, Dorothy, who was nearly eighteen months old. Nearby her half-brother Michael, now nine, and her brother Tomas, four, were both clinging to a rope tied from the branch of the tree and trying to swing on it at once.

‘Marek!’ she called, going out towards him. He turned, cupping a hand round his ear.

‘I’m just going up to get changed – they’ll all be here soon. I’ll take Do-do and clean her up too. I suppose she’s been trying to keep up with those two!’

‘It’s hard to stop her,’ Marek laughed. ‘When she wants to do something, she is like a tank!’

Katie laughed, reached up and kissed him, happy to see the contentment in his face. Marek was a complicated man, and sometimes subject to dark moods. She recognized that these could be especially bad on high days and holidays – Christmas and Easter, when he seemed often perversely gloomy. But in the main she had watched him blossom in their love for one another, in the gradual building of a family. And he had helped her blossom, too.