The Heart of the Family. Annie Groves

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       SIX

      It was a mistake – everyone was agreed on that – a breathing space, that was all. The bombers were bound to return, and yet there was a lightness of heart as people went about their business, a sense of reprieve even if it was generally acknowledged that it wouldn’t last.

      But it did, and finally, by Sunday morning, after three full nights without a raid, even Sam was cautiously agreeing that maybe there had indeed been a miracle and what was left of the city was safe.

      ‘Mind you, I still think it’s a rum business that Hitler didn’t send the Luftwaffe in to finish us off,’ he told Jean as the family set out for church.

      For once the whole family was together, Luke, like the other soldiers who lived locally, having been given compassionate leave, and Grace being off duty.

      In with her other prayers this morning there would definitely be one thanking God for saving her from having to go begging Vi for a favour, Jean decided fervently, as she paused to check that her family were looking their best.

      The twins must still be growing, she thought, switching her attention from the outer world to her own small family. Their frocks certainly needed letting down. At their age they really shouldn’t be showing quite so much leg, Jean decided with maternal concern, even if their legs were very well shaped. Thank goodness she had asked Mrs Nellis, who had run up their red and white gingham frocks on her machine for them, to put on good hems, disguised with white rickrack braid.

      ‘Lou, that isn’t a dirty mark on the sleeve of your cardigan, is it?’ she demanded, sighing as she saw that it was. ‘Just keep your arm by your side, then,’ she instructed.

      ‘I don’t know if I agree with Mrs Braddock saying that the cinemas should open on a Sunday,’ she told Sam.

      Bessie Braddock, a local councillor, had been quoted in the papers saying that people needed to be able to celebrate and enjoy themselves, and for that reason the cinemas should be allowed to open on Sundays.

      ‘Well, to be fair, she did say that them as don’t approve don’t have to go, and there’s plenty who will want to have a bit of a fun after what’s bin happening,’ Sam responded so tolerantly that even if she hadn’t already done so Jean would have known how much these three nights without bombs had lifted his spirits. Even so, as a mother of daughters still at an impressionable age, Jean felt it necessary to protest.

      ‘Fun on a Sunday?’

      ‘But remember, Mum,’ Luke and Grace chanted together, laughing, ‘there’s a war on.’

      ‘Oh, give over, you two, as if I didn’t know that.’

      It was hard to remain stern, though, when the sun was shining and everyone was in such good spirits and with such good reason.

      No wonder it felt as though the whole city, or those who were left in it, were turning out to give thanks for being spared.

      Grace hung back from the rest of her family deliberately, slipping her arm through Seb’s.

      ‘We are so lucky. I was so afraid, Seb, afraid that something would happen and that you and I would never … But here we are, both still safe and well …’

      ‘And we still haven’t …’ Seb began teasingly, but Grace blushed and laughed and shook her head at him.

      ‘None of that kind of talk now. You know what we agreed.’

      He should have seized his chance whilst he had the opportunity, Seb thought ruefully, but on the other hand Grace was well worth waiting for, even if her passionate response to him earlier in the week had had him lying awake every night since imagining how things might be.

      Good girls didn’t ‘do it’ before marriage, supposedly, only of course sometimes they did, and it was such a long time to wait before Grace would have finished her training and they could get married. And now there was that other matter as well.

      Seb frowned. He had been taken completely by surprise when his commanding officer had sent for him and told him that he was going to be transferred to a new Y Section that was being set up in Whitchurch.

      At first it would just be him and some other trained operatives, but more operatives would join them once they had received their training. The recent news that one of the Enigma machines and its code books had been captured had sent a buzz of elation and excitement through everyone connected with Bletchley Park, where they were working flat out now on the codes.

      Seb had been told that his new post would be a promotion but he acknowledged that he would have been feeling much happier about it if it didn’t mean that he would be moving away from Liverpool and Grace.

      He looked at her. The sunlight caught the curls in her strawberry-blonde hair, and revealed a small dusting of freckles across her nose. She was so pretty, his Grace, with her warm smile and those eyes of hers that reflected the depth of both her emotions and her loyalty. If the months since they had first met at the very beginning of the war, and all that had happened during them had brought a certain gravity and even sometimes sadness to her eyes when she talked of the courage of her patients, then Seb loved her all the more because of it. His Grace was more than a pretty face – much more – and he wouldn’t want to change anything about her.

      His parents loved her, and he knew that when the war was over and the time came for them to make their lives wherever his work took him, Grace would create a comfortable and a happy home for him and their children, even if that meant she had to move away from her own family to whom she was so close. But for all the maturity she had gained since they had first met, today, in her relief after several nights without any bombing raids, and with her joyous smile, she looked so carefree and happy that he didn’t want to spoil that happiness by telling her that he was going to be moved out of Liverpool.

      Grace looked at Seb and smiled warmly at him, increasing his guilt at keeping something so important from her, but this wasn’t the time to tell her. He wanted to wait until they were on their own.

      In front of them, neither Luke nor Katie was smiling.

      ‘Well, I still don’t see why you would want to go and see your parents behind my back and without me,’ Luke was saying, sticking doggedly to the point he had been trying to make ever since Katie had let slip that she was planning a visit to her family.

      ‘It wasn’t like that,’ Katie defended herself unhappily. ‘I’ve already told you how it happened. When I thought that your mum and the twins were going to evacuate to Wallasey I decided I’d СКАЧАТЬ