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About the Author

Daisy Styles grew up in Lancashire surrounded by a family and community of strong women. She loved to listen to their stories of life in the cotton mill, in the home, at the pub, on the dancefloor, in the local church, or just what happened to them on the bus going into town. It was from these women, particularly her vibrant mother and Irish grandmother, that Daisy learnt the art of storytelling.

By the same author

The Bomb Girls

The Code Girls

The Bomb Girls’ Secrets

Christmas with the Bomb Girls

The Bomb Girl Brides

The Wartime Midwives

Home Fires and Spitfires

Dedication

For Jon Styles,
my guide to the Lake District, thanks for all
the wonderful memories

1. Mrs Jamie Reid

Walking through Mary Vale’s post-natal ward, Ada stopped in her tracks as she felt her baby changing position inside her womb. Tenderly laying a hand over the swell of her belly, she smiled to herself as she murmured under her breath, ‘You’re lively this morning, little one.’

In just a few months’ time, she herself would be on this very ward, hopefully holding her own baby in her arms. What would it be like? Ada wondered. In the years she had been Senior Staff Nurse at Mary Vale’s Home for Mothers and Babies, she had delivered umpteen babies but never her own. One of the youngest patients, calling out from her bed, broke through Ada’s line of thought.

‘Sister Ada, I’m so sore from the baby feeding. Have you got anything I could use to ease the pain?’

Ada smiled warmly as she approached the girl, who had delivered a mewling little boy into the world in the middle of the night.

‘I’ve got some marvellous cream,’ she announced brightly. ‘Made by a friend of mine who specializes in using only natural products; I always keep a good supply of it,’ she added, as she unlocked the medicine cupboard and reached for a jar of the herbal cream that the chemist in Kendal kept a good stock of. ‘Apply liberally three times a day – it will soon soften those cracked nipples of yours.’

The grateful girl took the cream eagerly. ‘Thanks very much. I think it’s because my little boy fed so much during the night that I’m so sore.’

‘He’s fast asleep now,’ Ada informed her. ‘I left him in Nurse Dora’s good care.’

The girl gave a smile of relief. ‘Dora always knows what the babies want,’ she replied. ‘Whether it’s changing, feeding, cuddling or playing, she senses their little needs right away.’

‘She’s a complete natural, with a heart of gold,’ Ada agreed.

Thinking of what her dear friend and colleague had suffered, the deaths of her twin boys, both lost in active service – one at Dunkirk, the other on a minesweeper in the North Atlantic – brought tears to Ada’s dark-blue eyes. After she suffered a nervous breakdown, it had looked like Nurse Dora Saddleworth would never return to work, but her love of new-born babies and her loyalty to Mary Vale had lured her back. Though now physically half the size of the woman she had been and with hair that had turned pure white almost overnight, Dora was back among them and the Home was a happier place for her presence.

As Ada assisted the young girl, her thoughts drifted to the many other girls she and her devoted colleagues, nuns and nurses alike, had assisted through hard times when nobody wanted to know them. Some poor wretches had just been dumped on the streets; others whisked off to the Home the moment their pregnancy began to show; some came alone and in secret. Rich and poor, educated professionals and ignorant girls who didn’t even know where their babies had come from, they all went to Mary Vale in search of sanctuary. And the generous spirit of the place never failed them. The foundations of the building had been a tenth-century monastery, originally a refuge and stop-off point for pilgrims bound for Furness Abbey. For over nine centuries the ancient house which looked out over the ever-changing face of the vast Irish Sea and the majestic sweep of Morecambe Bay had never failed to provide sanctuary for travellers in need. Ada loved every aspect of it and was especially fond of the view of the valley from the back of the Home. Dotted with sheep farms, the rocky ground steadily rose higher and higher, until it merged into the lower fells of the Lake District, where Ada had spent her honeymoon and later conceived the child that she was carrying.

Buttoning up her nightie after applying the herbal cream, the young girl interrupted Ada’s reverie. ‘Thanks, Sister, that feels much better already.’

‘Don’t forget – three times a day,’ Ada told her patient before she went on her way.

Though now Mrs Jamie Reid, Mary Vale’s Senior Staff Nurse was always referred to as Sister Ada Dale. Thinking of her husband, Ada’s eyes sparkled as she pictured Jamie’s dear face: tawny golden hair that constantly flopped over his brow, bewitching hazel eyes with golden flecks, a firm full mouth, and a strong rangy body that she had grown to adore. How she missed him. The smell of his skin, the warmth of his smile, the pleasure of his soft lips. Married less than a year, they had seen each other only when Jamie was granted leave from the Front Line medical clearing station where he worked. On each visit Jamie had begged that they stay in the farmhouse where they had spent their honeymoon. ‘Darling,’ he had written,

Much as I love Mary Vale, I really don’t want to spend all of my precious leave in a single bed in your nurses’ quarters. I want to be in a room of our own, with a big double bed and a spectacular view of the lakes out of the bedroom window.

So Ada had each time booked them into the old-fashioned farmhouse in the Borrowdale Valley, which she knew for sure had a very big bed and a breath-taking view from the window of Watendlath Tarn and the majestic mountains surrounding it. It was there on his last leave that Jamie had lovingly examined her rapidly changing body. Wriggling in his strong arms, Ada had protested, ‘I’m not one of your patients, Dr Reid.’

Holding her fast, Jamie had kissed her pouting lips. ‘No, you’re my darling wife,’ he had insisted. ‘And I am examining you.’

Lifting Ada’s nightdress over her head, Jamie gazed adoringly at his wife’s beautiful young body before running a cool hand over her growing belly.

‘If you keep your hand there a bit longer, you might feel Baby kick,’ Ada had whispered excitedly.

Sure enough, after waiting patiently, which he was quite happy to do, Jamie thought he felt the lightest flutter of movement.

‘How wonderful,’ he sighed as he kissed her tummy. ‘I’m not surprised you’re pregnant,’ he chuckled. ‘We hardly got out of bed the last time I was home on leave.’ Holding her tight, Jamie murmured, ‘God, I hope I’m here for the birth.’

Though Ada desperately wished for the same thing, she was realistic enough to know that men called up to fight for their country were rarely given leave to return home just for the birth of a child.

Suddenly anxious, Jamie gripped her hands. ‘Darling, what if I don’t get back in time?’ he whispered.

Ada couldn’t stop herself from bursting out laughing. ‘Jamie!’ she cried, as she stopped his questions with a kiss. ‘I’ll be in a maternity hospital, surrounded by trained staff – I’ll be perfectly all right. All that matters,’ she continued with determined optimism, ‘is that you return home as soon as you can to hold your baby and kiss your wife. Now come on,’ she laughed, dragging him from under the warm covers. ‘Let’s have breakfast, then climb Scafell Pike.’

‘SCAFELL PIKE!’ he exclaimed. ‘In your state, young lady?’

‘I’m as fit as a flea!’ Ada giggled, dancing around the room stark naked. ‘Beat you down to breakfast,’ she teased, and she tossed his underpants and trousers into the air.

‘Wild woman!’ Jamie laughed too, as he struggled into his clothes, then crossed the room to open the curtains. ‘Oh, my … what a morning.’

The morning mist had lifted, revealing the tarn like a vast mirror reflecting a stunning duck-egg-blue sky in its still waters. Around the edges of the tarn Muscovy ducks waddled or preened their feathers while Canada geese honked crossly as they chased each other in the shallows. In the tarn, wild trout rose and flipped before landing back in the clear water with a loud plop.

When Ada joined Jamie to share the view, he gently kissed the top of her head. ‘I could stay here forever,’ he murmured.

‘Tell me the names of the mountains,’ she asked as she cuddled closer into him.

With his eyes tracing the grey-green backbone of the hills that undulated away into the distance, Jamie dreamily replied, ‘Grange Fell, High Seat and Ashness Fell.’

‘I want to climb every fell in the Lake District with you,’ Ada whispered.

Looking down at her tummy, Jamie asked, ‘Are you sure about climbing Scafell Pike? It’s difficult walking on the top, scree and ice.’

‘Certain,’ Ada answered with gusto. ‘I want to stand on top of the highest mountain in England and admire the view with my husband.’

2. Interviews

It was obvious to Ada’s friends how upset she was after Jamie’s leave was up and he left to return to his medical team on the Front Line. Sister Theresa, a young postulant and a former patient who simply adored Ada, spoke of her concerns with Sister Mary Paul, the old nun who was both the Home’s cook and housekeeper. Rolling out pastry for half a dozen cheese-and-onion pies in the Home’s big kitchen, Sister Theresa blurted out, ‘Ada looks like she’s been crying all night.’

Sister Mary Paul straightened her stiff back and gave a heavy sigh. ‘The child shouldn’t be running around on the mountaintops in her condition.’

Stepping out of the pantry from where they had just picked up the daily supply of milk for the nursery, Sister Ann and Dora exchanged a smile: they knew how the young postulant and the old nun regularly got into a flat spin over Ada’s health and well-being. Approaching the large kitchen table, Sister Ann, the Home’s Matron, said soothingly, ‘It’s inevitable that Ada will be upset after parting from her husband.’

‘It’s hard to keep smiling and putting on a brave face after saying goodbye to somebody you love,’ Dora added, with a catch in her voice. ‘It might break your heart into a thousand pieces, but it’s not you that’s going off to fight the enemy. The least you can do is send your loved one away with a smile on his face.’

‘Aye, you’re probably right,’ Sister Mary Paul sighed.

Knowing how the old nun liked to fuss, Sister Ann suggested that she might make Ada a hot cup of tea. ‘She’s busy doing some paperwork in her office.’

‘Good idea,’ Mary Paul immediately agreed. ‘I’ll pop along there right away.’

Ada was grateful for the cup of tea that Sister Mary Paul delivered to her, along with thin slices of warm home-made bread spread generously with butter from Mary Vale’s own farm.

‘Thank you, Sister.’ Ada smiled, then sipped the strong hot tea and nibbled the bread. ‘I need to build up my strength before Matron and I select the interviewees for my maternity-leave cover,’ she joked.

‘There’ll be none as good as you,’ Sister Mary Paul answered staunchly.

‘You never know,’ Ada teased. ‘They might be even better.’

Matron, known as Sister Ann in the convent, had initially rejected Ada’s offer of help.

‘You’ve got more than enough to do; I can handle the shortlist myself,’ she had insisted but Ada had remained firm.

‘When I leave Mary Vale to have my baby, I want to go secure in the knowledge that I can trust the person who will replace me.’

Seeing the steely determination in Ada’s steady gaze, Sister Ann conceded. ‘If you put it like that, I have no choice,’ Matron smiled. ‘We’ve had quite a number of applicants,’ she went on to explain. ‘Mostly nurses with little obstetrics experience; I’ve whittled the list down to three candidates.’ She laid three application forms on her desk. ‘They’re all skilled midwives with considerable experience but …’

‘But what?’ Ada enquired.

‘One’s nearing retirement age; another I really liked the sound of, but she has a history of back injuries.’

‘An occupational hazard with midwives,’ Ada pointed out. ‘Who’s the third applicant?’

‘A Sister Edith Mann from Harrogate,’ Matron replied. ‘She has excellent references and is available to start work immediately.’

Early the following week, Matron, Ada and Father Ben, the convent priest who ran all the convent business including the adoption arrangements, interviewed the three candidates whom Matron had shortlisted.

Though Ada took an instant shine to the young midwife with the back problems, she agreed with Matron that they simply couldn’t take the risk of employing her.

‘The last thing we want to do is send the poor girl away with more injuries than she arrived with,’ she remarked.

There was no doubt that Miss Mann was the best person for the job, but there was something about her that niggled. After she had accepted the position, Ada had taken her on a tour of the wards and the delivery room, where she certainly asked all the right questions. Stopping to chat to a few of the patients, Miss Mann seemed friendly enough, though Ada noticed she hurried through the noisy nursery seemingly uninterested in the tiny babies Dora and her team were feeding. After Miss Mann had taken the train back to Harrogate, Dora made exactly the same observation as Ada.

‘Miss Mann is certainly qualified enough, but she’s a bit of a cold fish,’ she said, as she and Ada refilled the nappy buckets with fresh sanitizing liquid. ‘Didn’t talk much or ask many questions, and she showed not the slightest interest in our babies,’ Dora added in a slightly offended voice. ‘I don’t know how anybody with a beating heart could resist those little ones lying there all innocent-like in their cribs.’

Ada nodded. ‘She was a bit detached.’

Dora continued, ‘I wonder how well she’ll go down with the girls; a lot of our residents are the salt-of-the-earth type – Sister Mann was a lot more formal than that.’

Not wanting to stoke any fires, Ada answered diplomatically. ‘She was probably on her best interview behaviour.’

‘Mebbe,’ Dora grunted, lugging the heavy galvanized bucket out of the big ceramic sink. ‘It’ll be hard for anybody to step into your shoes, lady, that’s for sure.’

Ada gave her colleague a reassuring pat on the shoulder. ‘It won’t be forever, dear. Hopefully I’ll quickly recover from the birth and be back with you all in no time.’

Dora, who had suffered too many of life’s hard knocks, didn’t look convinced. ‘Who knows what the future will bring?’

Desperate that Dora shouldn’t fall into the deep depression that she had only so recently beaten, Ada gave a bright smile. ‘You never know,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Now that the Americans have joined forces with us, the war could be over with sooner than we all think.’

Dora threw her a dirty look. ‘They took their time,’ she muttered. ‘It was only the Japanese bombing Pearl Harbor that forced the Yanks to get their finger out.’

Seeing she was going to get nowhere with grumpy Dora, Ada decided positive action was the best way forward. ‘Come on, dear,’ she said, as she hauled her heavy bucket out of the sink too. ‘We’re needed in the nursery – the babies will be screaming the place down by now.’

Just a mention of her darling babies instantly brought a smile to Dora’s face. ‘Best not keep the little lovies waiting,’ she said fondly and hurried to the door.

Walking behind her, Ada recalled how Mary Vale’s babies had saved Dora’s life after her beloved sons had died fighting the enemy; Dora’s tiny, helpless charges in the nursery had given her a reason to go on living, something which Ada repeatedly thanked God for.

3. Sybil Harwood

Sybil Harwood was not in a good mood. Her lover, Brigadier Monty Baldwin, had not been able to get tickets for the cabaret show she had been longing to see, and for which she had bought the most gorgeous, full-length, sleek, Grecian-style dress in shimmering emerald satin that perfectly set off her striking witch-green eyes and long, dark, lustrous hair. Glaring crossly at her reflection in the bevelled dressing-table mirror that matched the other bedroom furniture in her elegant Mayfair flat (on loan from her father since she had been appointed to the War Office), Sybil sighed moodily. In normal circumstances beautiful and thoroughly spoilt Sybil wouldn’t have given Monty Baldwin the time of day. In peacetime she had been a debutante who effortlessly worked all the young men in the room – handsome, titled, rich, witty and educated, Sybil had the pick of the crop. But now, two and a half years into the war, they were all gone, fighting on active service or killed. Though married to the beautiful and very wealthy Lady Veronica Baldwin, the Brigadier was a great one for the ladies. Overweight and full of himself, the Brigadier was a powerful figure both in and out of the War Office. In no time at all after Sybil’s appointment, Monty had set his sights on her small curvy body and glamorous film-star looks. Clever Sybil with a gift for maths and languages had risen effortlessly through the ranks, until she was appointed Monty’s own personal private secretary.

As a senior Army officer, Monty was renowned for his brutally quick decision-making; the same instinct applied when it came to women; Monty always got what he wanted, whatever the cost. It came as little surprise to the department that the philandering Brigadier had wasted no time in getting his pretty private secretary into bed. Sybil had undoubtedly enjoyed the perks that came with becoming Monty’s mistress: the endless social whirl of dining out in the most fashionable restaurants in town (for the rich with connections in high places, rationing hardly impacted), cabaret shows, opening nights at the Drury Lane theatres and ballroom dancing in exclusive West End clubs. Her envious gaze would occasionally drift towards young men on leave, dashing in their smart military uniforms, but ever the realist Sybil knew that in a blink these same young men could be whisked away to the Front Line and never come back. She would stick it out with Monty, at least for the time being.

Everything had been perfectly satisfactory, until Sybil had stupidly fallen pregnant. At first, she had point-blank refused to accept the fact; she had always insisted Monty used condoms, though when drunk and over-needy he could be a fumbling fool and tear the wretched things. After she had missed her third period, Sybil could no longer allow herself to be in denial. Determined to take care of herself, she sought help from a professional with specific skills whom a friend had recommended. After making an appointment Sybil had endured the woman’s ghastly poking down below before she had returned home, where she had been assured bleeding and back pains would soon commence. Unfortunately, neither of these things happened, so Sybil, furiously disappointed, had been forced to accept that she was still carrying a baby that she didn’t want. If there had been any doubts in her mind about keeping the baby, they would have flown out of the window when she announced her predicament to her lover.

‘Jesus Christ Almighty!’ Baldwin had seethed. ‘Do you know what you have done, woman?’

Giving him a cool haughty look, Sybil answered in a steely voice, ‘I think it would be more appropriate to say, do you know what YOU have done?’

Knowing it was true, that he had indeed made a hash of things, caused Monty to bluster even more loudly: ‘You’d bloody well better get rid of it.’

‘I’ve tried that,’ Sybil snapped. ‘It didn’t work.’

Lowering his voice, Monty attempted a more reasonable tone. ‘Now listen here, Veronica puts up with many of my indiscretions, but she would throw everything at me if she thought I might introduce a bastard into the family.’

‘Then you had better make arrangements for me to disappear until the baby is born,’ Sybil retorted.

Turning his back on her, Monty growled as he reached for the whisky decanter.

‘Leave it with me.’

‘I most certainly will,’ she assured him.

The Story Continues on BooksBarbecue!

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