Cover

Part One

One

LINCOLNSHIRE, JANUARY 1953

‘So this is ya bastard.’

Ella Hilton scowled at the old woman standing in the doorway, hands on hips, looking down at her. Beside her, she heard her mother draw in a deep breath and the hand, resting on her shoulder, stiffened as Kate snapped back, ‘Well, if that’s the way you greet your granddaughter the first time you meet her, Mam, we’ll turn right round and be off back the way we came.’

Shocked, Ella gaped up at her mother; Kate Hilton rarely lost her temper, but she was angry now.

The woman still stood there, barring their way into the house. ‘I told you ten years ago I didn’t want you here, or ya bastard, and I still don’t. Nothing’s changed.’

The young girl clenched her fists. Even at ten years old, Ella knew what the name meant; she had heard it often enough shouted after her in the playground.

‘Oh I see,’ Kate was saying. ‘So I can’t even come back for my grandad’s funeral? Well, Mam, no one’s going to stop me; not even you. We’ll stay at Rookery Farm . . .’

‘With the Elands? You’ll do no such thing. I’ll not have you staying there – with them.’

Ella felt the anger drain out of her mother now as Kate said, sadly, ‘The family feud still going on, is it? Can’t you ever forget or forgive anyone, Mam?’

With a sniff, the older woman turned away. Sighing, her mother gave Ella a gentle push, but the girl held on to the door frame, refusing to enter. ‘No, Mum,’ she whispered. ‘Let’s go home. I don’t like it here and . . .’ Her wide eyes followed the rigid back of the woman and the unspoken words hung in the air, ‘. . . and I don’t like her.’

Kate, once more the gentle mother Ella knew, said, ‘It’s all right. Come along,’ and she urged the reluctant child through the back scullery and into the warm kitchen of the farmhouse.

‘Sit in the chair near the range, Ella, and warm your hands. Poor child’s perished,’ Kate explained. ‘The train was freezing. I thought me dad might have met us at the station.’

The woman thumped her rolling pin down on to the pastry. ‘Ya dad’s too busy with the ploughing to be meeting trains.’

Ella perched herself on the wooden seat of the spindly chair at one side of the huge black range. Logs crackled in the grate and the kettle on the hob gently puffed steam from its spout. The warmth hit her cold cheeks, making them burn. Flexing her white fingers, she stretched out her hands towards the glow. Tiredness swept over her in waves; like the waves she had heard distantly as they had walked along the lonely lane following the line of sand-dunes all the way from the town to this remote farmhouse.

They had walked for miles, it seemed to Ella, whose legs had begun to grow tired. ‘Can’t we wait for a bus, Mum?’

Kate had smiled. ‘You’d wait a long time, love. They don’t come out this far.’

‘No buses!’ the girl had exclaimed, her skipping stilled for a horrified moment. To their right the fields, brown and flat, stretched westwards as far as the distant horizon with only a lonely farm, or a line of trees here and there, to break the monotony.

Then Ella was skipping again, taking little running jumps and stretching her neck, trying to see over the sand-dunes. ‘Where’s the sea, Mum? You said we were coming to the seaside. I’ve never seen the sea.’

‘Beyond the dunes and across the marsh, love,’ Kate had answered, waving her hand absently to the left. ‘You can go and look at it later.’

Now, sitting in the kitchen that must once have been her mother’s home, Ella looked about her at the peg rug on the hearth, the brick walls painted red, the pots and pans lining the shelves and a ham hanging from a hook in the ceiling. Then her gaze came back to the woman standing behind the scrubbed table peeling and coring apples and laying the slices in a pastry-lined, circular tin.

Ella studied her. So this woman, who had called her that dreadful name, was her grandmother.

Although old in the girl’s eyes, Esther Godfrey’s hair was thick and still a luxuriant auburn colour though there were strands of grey at her temples. It was piled high on the top of her head and two combs thrust into its thickness held it in place. Only the curls on her forehead and escaping tendrils softened the severe style. Her skin, though tanned through working outside in all weathers, was smooth and remarkably unlined for a grandmother. The woman’s green eyes glanced up briefly and for a moment met Ella’s blue gaze. ‘Dun’t stare, Missy. It’s rude. And stop kicking ya Grandpa’s chair; ya’ll scratch it.’

Unflinching, Ella glared back, deliberately widening her eyes but she stopped swinging her legs; not in obedience but because it was Grandpa Godfrey’s chair. Ella loved her Grandpa Godfrey. He visited them in Lincoln three or four times a year and had done so for as long as Ella could remember, but her grandmother had never once come with him. Ella had known about her, of course; had listened as Kate always asked, ‘How’s me Mam?’ but the young girl knew too that her mother and her grandmother had quarrelled years ago. Now, today, she had witnessed for herself the depth of bitterness between them. Ella put her head on one side and stared at Esther Godfrey, pondering what could possibly have caused a quarrel so dreadful that a mother did not ever want to see her daughter? The girl’s gaze flickered towards Kate and for one awful moment Ella imagined how devastated she would feel if, for some reason, she were never to see her own mother again.

Her grandmother’s voice interrupted her wandering thoughts. ‘Wipe ya chin, Missy. Ya’ve got summat on ya face. Just here . . .’ The woman touched her own cheek, leaving a dab of flour.

Ella stuck out her chin, thrusting the tiny port-wine stain on her left jawline towards the woman. ‘It’s a birthmark. I can’t rub it off.’

Kate’s voice came softly. ‘Don’t you remember, Mam?’

For a moment the older woman looked startled and stared at Kate, her mouth slightly open. She glanced back, just once, at Ella and then dropped her gaze.

‘Can I mash a pot of tea, Mam?’ Kate said, as if trying to change the subject. ‘I’m parched. We’ve had nothing since leaving Lincoln.’

Esther’s shoulders lifted in a shrug. ‘Ya know where everything is,’ she said, neither granting permission nor withholding it.

‘Is he – is he still here?’ Kate asked as she moved between the shelves along one wall and the table, laying cups and saucers and spooning tea into the brown pot. Esther nodded and jerked her head towards a door leading out of the kitchen further into the house.

‘In his room,’ was her only reply.

Seeing Kate move towards the door, Ella jumped up.

‘No, love, you stay here . . .’

‘I’m coming with you . . .’ she began.

‘Do as ya mother tells ya,’ the older woman snapped, but Ella took no notice and moved towards her mother.

‘It’s all right, Mam,’ Kate said swiftly. ‘She can come with me.’

‘Lid’s off,’ Esther said bluntly, mystifying the young girl even more. Ella watched her mother’s eyes widen and saw her swallow hard, hesitating for a moment, but then she took Ella’s hand, opened the door and together they stepped out of the kitchen and into a living room.

Heavy blue velvet curtains shut out most of the light and Ella had only a shadowy impression of dark, solid furniture and the gleam of fleshy green leaves on a plant standing in a blue and white pot on the plush-clothed table. Not wanting to disturb the solemn tick of the grandfather clock in one corner, the girl found herself tiptoeing across the room and into the small hall beyond.

Immediately before them was another door, but Kate paused, her hand on the knob, and looked down again at Ella. ‘You wait here love, just a minute ’til I see how he looks.’

Her mother opened the door and disappeared into the room leaving Ella standing in the cold, dingy hall. She stood first on one foot then on the other. The minutes passed and Ella became impatient. She pressed her ear to the door but she couldn’t hear anything. Holding her breath, Ella slowly pushed the door open.

In the centre of the room was a black iron bedstead with a black and white striped mattress. There were no bedclothes on the bed and on top of the bare mattress lay a coffin with brass handles. The lid stood on its end against the wall and her mother was leaning over the coffin almost as if she were talking to someone.

Ella bit her lip, her whispered ‘Mum!’ echoing in the silent room. When Kate half-turned round, Ella saw, with a shock, that there were tears in her eyes. Although Kate brushed them away quickly with the back of her hand, the child-like gesture disconcerted the young girl. Ella tiptoed into the room. ‘What’s the matter, Mum?’ she whispered.

Her mother put out her arm to draw her closer. ‘Don’t be frightened, love. He looks real peaceful.’

‘Let me see.’

‘I don’t think . . .’ Kate began.

‘Please, Mum.’

As her mother lifted her up, Ella looked down at the man lying in the coffin. ‘Is that your grandad?’ she whispered.

Pressing her lips together, Kate nodded.

Like a figure lying on a cathedral tomb, smooth and marble cold, his hands rested upon his chest, fingers curling in natural repose. He was dressed in a long, white nightshirt, his head on an embroidered pillow.

Ella shuddered. ‘Let me down . . .’ and her mother’s hold loosened and Ella was standing on the floor again, the silent, lifeless figure gone from her view.

‘Go back to Nannie,’ her mother said absently. ‘I’ll be back in a minute.’

Determined not to go back into the kitchen without her mother, Ella waited in the hall. She glanced up the narrow stairs and then began to climb, pausing to listen every time a step creaked. She reached the top and stood on the tiny landing between two doors. Glancing just once over her shoulder, she lifted the latch, pushed open the door to her left and stepped into what was obviously her grandparents’ bedroom, for in the corner on a stand was Grandpa Godfrey’s best Sunday suit.

Like the rooms downstairs, the furniture was old, but solid and lovingly polished to a rich dark mahogany colour. A picture of the Virgin and Child was the only ornament on the stark, white walls. Ella ran her fingers along the multicoloured patchwork quilt covering the iron bedstead and her feet made no sound on the thick peg rug at the side of the bed. In the far corner, a green-patterned bowl, huge jug and soap-dish stood on a marble washstand.

Ella’s darting glance came to rest on a line of silver-framed photographs on the pink-painted mantelpiece above the fire-grate. She tiptoed forward and bent closer to look at them. One was of a little girl with long flowing hair; that must be her own mother, Kate, as a child. She knew now, since meeting Esther Godfrey, that Kate had inherited her hair colouring from her own mother, but where did Ella’s own colour come from then?

‘Such a pretty strawberry blonde,’ the hairdresser always said as she trimmed Ella’s tightly curling hair. ‘But I do wish you’d let her grow it a bit longer, Kate. It’s so pretty . . .’

‘It’s not my fault,’ Kate would laugh. ‘There I was thinking I’d get a little girl I could dress up in pretty dresses with long, golden curls, a bit like Alice in Wonderland, and what do I get . . .?’ By this time Ella would be laughing with her mother, knowing what was coming next but knowing, too, that it was gentle, loving teasing. ‘A tomboy with short hair who’d spend her life in trousers and shorts given half a chance.’

Ella’s wandering thoughts came back to the pictures in front of her. There was another of a young woman in a uniform. That was definitely her mother, because Ella knew she had been in the WAAFs in the last war. Kate’s two best friends from those days – Mavis and Isobel – still visited them quite often and they were Ella’s godmothers too.

Another photograph showed a small child with straight, mousey hair and a sulky face. Perhaps that was her mother’s younger sister, Lilian. Ella couldn’t be sure, for her aunt lived away and they had never met.

The last photograph stood at the very back of the shelf, half-obscured by a letter propped in front of it. Curious, Ella pushed the envelope to one side and found herself looking at a fading, sepia photograph of a young man in uniform. He was standing stiffly, as if he was hardly daring to breathe and in his eyes there was a look of – not exactly fear, Ella decided, he just looked sort of – lost. The girl frowned thoughtfully and put her head on one side, pondering. He looked strangely familiar, but she knew it wasn’t her Grandpa Godfrey as a young man because the man in the photograph had black curly hair and dark eyes whereas Jonathan Godfrey had fair hair, turning grey now. He was not very tall either, certainly not as tall as Grandpa . . .

‘What are you doing in here, Missy? Nosing into things that dun’t concern ya?’

The voice made her jump and she swivelled round to see her grandmother standing in the doorway. Ella had been so intent upon the family pictures that she had not heard footsteps mounting the stairs.

The excuse came easily to her lips for although it had not been the initial reason she had ventured upstairs, it was now the truth. ‘I wanted the lav, Nannie. I can’t find it.’

The woman gave a snort of laughter. ‘We dun’t have such fancy things as an indoor lav in the country, Missy. It’s outside.’

‘So’s ours at home. It’s across the back yard,’ Ella said and began to cross towards her grandmother and the door, making no apology for having been caught in Esther’s bedroom.

‘And dun’t call me “Nannie”’ Esther said. ‘Meks me sound like a goat. You call me Grannie.’

Ella stared at her and then suddenly the young girl’s face broke into an impish grin. Her blue eyes danced with mischief. ‘All right – Gran.’

It was a half-way concession without being complete capitulation.

Her grandmother’s green eyes flashed fire. ‘Grannie.’

Boldly, the girl’s gaze never faltered. ‘Gran,’ she said, calmly but decisively.

The battle of wills had begun.

Two

Her grandmother’s strong fingers were digging into Ella’s shoulder as she found herself being propelled down the narrow stairs, through the living room, kitchen and scullery and out of the back door. Turning to the right towards smaller brick buildings attached to the main house, they passed one door and came to a second. Esther flung this open.

It was nothing like the lav across the yard back home in Lincoln. There, it was a proper flush toilet with a chain to pull; here, it was a wooden bench fitted against the wall with a hole in the centre. Dangling from a hook on the wall a loop of string held squares of neatly torn newspaper. Ella wrinkled her nose at the sour smell in the gloomy, confined space, the only light coming from the draughty gaps above and below the wooden door. Perched on the seat, her feet swinging above the rough-set cobbles of the floor, Ella shuddered and was glad to jump down, yank up her knickers and push open the door. It crashed back against the brick wall.

‘What are you doing, child? Ya’ll have the door off its hinges.’

Blinking in the sudden light, Ella saw her grandmother coming across the yard from the barn. The girl breathed deeply in the fresh air. ‘It pongs in there.’

Esther sucked her tongue against her teeth in a sound of exasperation and pointed towards the back door. ‘Into the scullery with you and wash ya hands.’

Pushing up the sleeves of her jumper, Ella frowned. In the deep sink there was a white, enamel bowl and on the window-sill, a dish and soap. But where were the taps? To the side of the sink, there was a huge sort of spout and a big handle, but there were no taps.

Ella opened her mouth and shouted, ‘Mum. Mum!’

But it was her grandmother who appeared again in the doorway to the kitchen. ‘Now what’s the matter?’

‘Where are the taps?’

They glared at each other once more. ‘Taps? What do ya think this is? A posh hotel? Work the pump, child.’

Ella blinked. Pump? What on earth did this old woman mean? What pump?

‘Dear, oh dear. What has your mother been doing? Dun’t you know anything?’

Impatiently, the woman pushed past Ella and grasped the big handle. She worked it up and down and water splashed from the spout into the bowl. ‘There, see how to do it?’

The girl said nothing, but plunged her hands into the bowl, only to pull them out again quickly.

‘Ugh! It’s cold.’ She twisted her head round and looked up at her grandmother resentfully.

‘Course it’s cold. None of ya namby-pamby ways here, Missy. We always wash in cold water, night and morning.’

Thinking with longing of the steaming hot water gushing from the taps at home, Ella stared up at her grandmother. ‘You don’t bath in cold water, do you?’ she asked incredulously, although she was beginning to think that anything might be possible in this place.

‘Bath night’s on a Friday night in a tin bath on the hearth in the kitchen. Every drop of hot water comes from the side boiler in the range.’

Ella gawped at her again, trying to imagine bathing in the kitchen in front of the fire instead of in the white enamelled bath at home.

‘It seems,’ Esther Godfrey remarked drily, ‘that you’ve been spoilt by city life, Missy. You’ve a lot to learn . . .’

‘I don’t think I want . . .’ Ella began and then the sound of hob-nailed boots in the yard made her glance out of the scullery window. Suddenly everything was all right, for coming across the yard was someone she knew – knew very well – and loved dearly.

‘Grandpa. Grandpa!’ she cried, and, shaking the icy droplets from her hands, she ran out of the back door.

‘Just a minute,’ her grandmother began, ‘you haven’t finished washing your hands properly . . .’

But Ella was gone, scampering across the yard towards the tall man whose blue eyes crinkled with laughter when he saw her. Knowing her grandmother must still be watching, Ella flung her arms wide in greeting, inviting him to catch her and swing her up into his arms.

‘My, you’re getting a big girl,’ Jonathan Godfrey said, pretending to puff and pant under her weight.

Casting a sly glance back towards where her grandmother stood, hands on hips, watching, Ella wound her arms around her grandfather’s neck and pressed her cheek close to his bristly face. Seeing the frown on her grandmother’s face, Ella was triumphant.

‘Have you given Kate her letter, Esther?’ Grandpa Godfrey said as he pulled off his cap, unwound the long woollen scarf from his neck and kissed Kate’s cheek in greeting.

‘Letter? For me?’

Ella saw her mother’s puzzled expression. ‘Why should a letter for me come here? I haven’t lived here for years.’

With a work-worn hand, the purple veins standing out against the tanned skin, he swept back the untidy lock of greying hair that fell across his forehead and shrugged. ‘Well, it did. Last week. I was going to send it on to you, but knowing you’d be coming for the funeral . . . Where is it, Esther?’

‘On the mantelpiece in me bedroom.’

A few moments later Jonathan was handing it to Kate.

‘Who’s it from, Mum?’

‘I . . .’ Her mother’s fingers were trembling. She was staring, mesmerized, at the envelope in her hand.

‘Open it, Mum,’ Ella urged, hopping up and down. ‘Who’s it from?’

‘Be still, child. Leave ya mother be . . .’ her grandmother began.

‘Come outside with me, Ella,’ Grandpa Godfrey said.

‘But I want to know . . .’

‘Come along. Put your coat on.’ Though his voice was gentle, his hand on her shoulder was firm and would allow no argument. ‘We’ll go and feed the pigs.’

‘Mum . . .?’ Ella began again, but her mother was not listening. Instead Kate was now hurrying towards the door leading into the privacy of the living room, everyone else in the kitchen forgotten . . .

‘Where are we going, Mum? Are we going home now?’

The Story Continues on BooksBarbecue!

Enjoyed this preview? ❤️ Do not stop here!

Read the complete book free online → 🔗

Continue reading now on BooksBarbecue and discover every page!

Love reading? Bookmark BooksBarbecue.com for more amazing books!

Happy Reading!