An Unsuitable Mother. Sheelagh Kelly

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      ‘Well, it hasn’t put you off your meal,’ reproved an amazed Joyson, breaking the serious atmosphere, having been studying Nell’s gluttonous attack on the suet dumplings that Beata had left on the edge of her plate. ‘By you can eat like a horse!’

      Suddenly aware that everyone else at the table was eyeing her in fun, Nell reddened and paused in her lusty consumption. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend anyone … I’m just ravenous with all that hard work.’

      ‘You eat all you like, love.’ Between sips of tea, Beata stuck up for her.

      ‘Yes, you jolly well deserve it,’ chipped in Lavinia, backed by her sister.

      ‘I’m glad to see them go, I never could stand suet.’ Beata shuddered and grimaced.

      ‘What did you order dumplings for, then?’ countered Joyson.

      ‘Because I wanted the stew that came with them,’ retorted Beata. ‘If that’s all right with you?’ She and Nell had been looking forward to this hearty meal, which could be had for only a shilling – including a pudding – and had attempted to sneak off by themselves. They had not minded Frenchy and the younger Nurse Green and even the Ashton girls tagging along, but Joyson was bad enough at work without having to suffer her at meal breaks. ‘Eh, she’d argue with her own reflection, she would,’ came her assertion to the others.

      ‘I ’ate zem too,’ declared the attractive Frenchy. ‘I ’ate all Angleesh fud.’

      Joyson turned on her. ‘What will you be having for your Christmas dinner, then? frogs’ legs and snails, I suppose?’

      Whilst Frenchy struggled for a reply, the questioner was criticised by Green, though not for her xenophobic assumption. ‘Heaven help us, Joy, it’s over a month away!’

      ‘Whatever it is, it’ll be a damned sight better than t’other Christmas I spent with Uncle Teddy,’ quoted Beata. ‘Pork ribs and cabbage – eh, he were that tight he’d make Scrooge look like Good King Wenceslas.’

      ‘Never mind, you’ll be able to buy yourself something tasty with all these extra three and sixpences you’re getting,’ said Green. The auxiliaries had lately received a rise.

      ‘Well, all I want for Christmas is to see some action.’ Feeling self-conscious at being the only one left eating, Nell had laid down her cutlery and now sat back with a look of frustration. ‘It’s so annoying being all dressed up and nowhere to go.’

      How she was to regret those words! For at half past eight that same evening, just as she was relaxing into a steamy bath, fantasising over Billy, her mother banged frantically on the door.

      ‘Eleanor, your debut is nigh!’

      Having shot upright, sluicing water from one end of the bath to the other and onto the black and white lino, Nell remained there for a second, suspended by shock and clutching the wedding ring that hung from her neck. ‘Oh, Mother – what was that?’

      ‘They’ve sent a messenger! You’ve to get to Leeman Road straight away – don’t waste the water, leave it in for your father!’

      Launching herself from the bath, a dripping Nell began rapidly to dry herself, stumbling and hopping over the putting on of her clothes, which clung to her still-damp limbs and much hindered her dressing. But it was all so exciting – she was needed at last!

      ‘Have you any petrol at all in the car, Father?’ came her breathless query upon rushing downstairs, clothes all awry.

      ‘I don’t want to waste it. You can borrow my bike, though!’ he offered.

      First came dismay – she was hopeless at balancing on two wheels – but then, ‘Needs must!’ Nell put on her hat and coat, and, with her father striding ahead to ensure the lights were turned off before opening the outer door, she hurried in his wake. Plunged into darkness, she held back whilst Wilfred tugged the awful contraption from the shed.

      Hardly able to see what she was doing, trying to cope with the over-large vehicle, Nell had to stand on tiptoe to accommodate its crossbar, and swerved all over the road as she fought to work the pedals, ‘Don’t wait up for me, I may be all night!’

      ‘A key! You’ll need a key!’ Thelma scuttled to fetch one, then raced to put it in Nell’s pocket, causing yet more delay. But, eventually, with a helpful shove from her father, Nell somehow mobilised herself in ungainly fashion towards town.

      With the traffic lights out of use and no policeman about, there was no option but to grit her teeth and hope for the best at junctions, and go careering into the black beyond, often forced to judder to an abrupt standstill by using her foot as a brake when a car almost flattened her, and nearly keeling over in the process. Only after a great many mishaps along the way did she get the hang of it, and finally sailed triumphantly into the sidings at Leeman Road, there to be met by a shadowy figure with a stopwatch.

      A shielded torch was quickly flashed on and off in order for Sister Barber to read the time. ‘You’ll have to do better than this when it’s the real thing, Nurse Spottiswood!’ Once again there was disapprobation on the pretty freckled face, before it vanished into darkness.

      Attempting to disentangle her leg from the crossbar, Nell tottered and almost capsized again. ‘You mean … we’re not going anywhere?’ Her voice and expression told that she could scarcely believe this.

      ‘No, this is just a dummy run to see how quickly we can be mustered in an emergency – and I have to say it’s found us wanting,’ Sister Barber added sternly to those other murky figures already assembled, all equally as dismayed as Nell. ‘Very well, you can go home now.’

      ‘To a cold bath?’ muttered a displeased Nell to her friends, out of earshot of Sister, as she fought to heft her father’s bike in the opposite direction and head off through the dark. ‘Thank you very much, I don’t think!’

      ‘Bath on a Tuesday?’ Beata called after her in amazement. ‘By, you’re posh!’

      A couple of days after the test run Nell was able to laugh about it with the others, and to use it as a source of jollification for Billy. Since telling him about her tour of the city pubs to follow the Bedpan Swingsters, his letters to her had been quite tense, expressing the fear that she might be snatched from him by another soldier. As a result, she had immediately refrained from going again. He would be much happier to hear that her only company that Thursday evening would be the sensible Beata, with whom she had arranged to go to the pictures.

      But, ‘I’m a bit reluctant to divulge where I’ll be, in case they spoil it again,’ she whispered to Beata now, as, after a day of keeping the train clean and making more unused dressings, they put on their coats to leave work.

      ‘I’m buggered if I’m telling them,’ replied her friend more stringently. ‘See you outside the Regal at seven!’

      Laughing, Nell went home.

      After a bite to eat and a change of clothing, Nell attempted to collect enough mascara for an application, scraping the little brush into every corner of its box, but all it produced was beige spit. Well, that was that. Unable to obtain more, she rummaged in the cupboard that still held a few childhood toys and brought СКАЧАТЬ