Authors: Margaret Dickinson
Tags: #Fiction, #Sagas, #Historical, #Romance, #20th Century, #General
Jenny's War
For my granddaughter,
Zara Elizabeth Robena Jean
I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life!
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING
One
POPLAR, LONDON, 1 SEPTEMBER 1939
Jenny sat on the battered sofa, shifting herself a little to avoid the spring that poked through the worn fabric. Her gaze was on her mother standing in front of the mottled mirror above the fireplace. ‘You goin’ out again tonight, Mum?’
‘No. Yer uncle Arfer’s coming here an’ I want yer to be nice to him.’ Dot Mercer finished painting the bright red lipstick on to her mouth, fluffed her dyed, brassy hair and turned to face her daughter. ‘There, how do I look?’
‘Very nice,’ Jenny murmured dutifully, absentmindedly scratching her own, rather dirty, blond curls. The contrast between mother and daughter was stark. The child was thin and small for her ten years. Her hair, if washed and cut properly, would have been pretty and there was no denying the beauty of the startling blue eyes in her pinched little face. Bathed and dressed in finery, she could easily have been a carnival princess, but Jenny Mercer would never have that chance.
Dot Mercer was small too, but her figure was shapely and voluptuous. Her clothes were brightly coloured, the hems always two inches too high, the necklines two inches too low. Make-up was plastered thickly on her face, her eyes outlined with black, her lipstick always bright red. ‘Yer can go next door to Elsie’s and play with her lads, but be home at eight and then go straight up to bed. No coming into the sitting room.’ Dot nodded her head towards the front room, where she liked to entertain her guests. Jenny was rarely allowed in there except to pass through it to go out. The door from the street opened directly into Dot’s ‘best room’ and then through that into the kitchen, which the family used most of the time. Beyond that was a scullery with a sink and modern cooker.
Jenny glowered and clenched her teeth. Sitting room? She’s having a laugh. The girl knew only too well that, by then, her mother and the latest ‘uncle’ in a succession of ‘uncles’ would already be in the front bedroom. Jenny would have to creep upstairs to the tiny back bedroom, closing her ears to the sounds coming from her mother’s room.
A loud knocking sounded on the front door.
Dot was suddenly flustered, like a young girl on her first date and not the twenty-seven-year-old who’d had more men in Jenny’s short lifetime than the young girl could count on her fingers. ‘Oh, is that him already? Go on, out the back way.’ She pulled Jenny off the sofa roughly and pushed her towards the back scullery. ‘You look like a scruffy street urchin. I don’t want ’im thinking I can’t look after me own kid.’
They heard the front door being opened and a woman’s voice calling, ‘Hello, anybody home?’
Dot relaxed. ‘Oh, it’s only Elsie.’ She raised her voice. ‘Come on in, Elsie.’
Jenny beamed as their next-door neighbour came into the kitchen. Elsie Hutton was her idea of what a mother should be. She was married – properly married, because Jenny had seen the black and white wedding photo on their mantelpiece – to a hardworking man employed in the nearby East India Dock. Their three sons still lived at home. Ronnie, at fourteen, was now working. The second son, Sammy, was twelve and itching to leave school too. The youngest, Bobby, was a year older than Jenny and her best friend – in fact, her only real friend. They played together, walked to school side by side and it was always to Bobby that Jenny went when Dot’s men friends came round.
Elsie came into the cluttered kitchen. She was small and thin with a careworn face that could break into a warm and loving smile and then her hazel eyes would twinkle with mischief. Her hair was smoothed back from her face into a loose bun at the nape of her neck and no one ever saw Elsie without her apron. Her life was simple; caring for her husband and her sons was all she wanted out of life, hard though at times that life could be. But however tough it got, there was love and laughter in their home and the Hutton family faced life’s difficulties together. And by the look on her face, there was more trouble coming to her door now. ‘Have you ’eard?’
‘’Eard what, Elsie?’ Dot’s mercurial attention was already flitting away again as she turned for yet another reassuring look in the mirror and smiled smugly at the contrast between herself and her drab neighbour. For the umpteenth time, Dot wondered what kept Sid Hutton faithful. Elsie never wore cosmetics, never dressed smartly; even her Sunday best coat had seen better days. It’d probably been second-hand when Elsie had got it, Dot thought uncharitably as she smoothed her new silk dress over her slim waist and shapely hips. She couldn’t wait for Arthur to see her in it. He’d given her the money and told her to get herself something nice. ‘And treat the kid, too. Buy her a pretty frock.’
But all the money he’d given Dot had gone on the dress for herself. It’d been worth it, though. Low cut at the neckline and tight waisted, she knew Arthur wouldn’t complain.
‘About the kids being sent away?’
‘Eh?’ Dot’s head whipped round. Elsie had her full attention now. ‘What yer talkin’ about?’
‘Evacuated. They’re bein’ evacuated.’
‘Elsie, talk English, will yer? I haven’t a clue what you’re on about.’
‘Don’t you ever read the papers or listen to the news on the wireless, Dot?’ Elsie’s patience was wearing thin.
Dot smiled and winked. ‘Got better things to do with my time.’
‘Didn’t you get the list?’
‘List? What list?’
‘We all had a list come round about what the kids should take with ’em.’
‘Don’t remember no list. Anyway, she ain’t got much worth taking on holiday. ’Sides, they’re starting back to school, ain’t they? Summer holidays is over.’
‘’T’ain’t no holiday, Dot,’ Elsie snapped. ‘Kids, old folk’ – she ticked them off on her fingers – ‘and invalids are all going to relatives or to be billeted with folks in the country if they’ll take ’em. And pets too if you’ve got any.’
‘Got a couple of rats in the roof.’ Dot gave a tinkling laugh. ‘I hear ’em every night. I wouldn’t mind gettin’ rid of them beggars.’
Jenny shuddered. Whenever she heard the scuffling above the ceiling in her bedroom, she buried her head beneath the bedclothes. She hated the beady-eyed vermin. And to think they were scampering about just above her.
Dot fluffed her hair again. ‘The country, you say? Sounds like a holiday to me.’
Elsie cast her glance to the ceiling and shook her head. ‘I give up,’ she muttered and turned to go, but it was Jenny’s little voice that halted her. ‘Aunty Elsie, what d’you mean?’
Elsie turned and her expression softened. She liked the little girl, who, she reckoned, had a rough time of it. Oh, Dot was right enough in her way, but Elsie had serious doubts that Dot loved her daughter – really loved her with a proper mother’s unconditional love. Dot had been scarcely more than a child herself when she’d got in the family way. And the father, not much older than Dot, had hopped it, leaving the seventeen-year-old to cope on her own. Elsie didn’t know much about Dot’s background, but she’d picked up snippets from the gossip about her and even from Dot herself when one drink too many had loosened her tongue. Dot had been illegitimate too, brought up by her single mother who’d never married and had drunk herself into an early grave. Talk about history repeating itself, Elsie thought. She hoped the same thing wouldn’t happen to Jenny. Despite her home life – and it was in spite of it – Jenny was a nice kid, a good kid. Oh, she got into mischief, usually alongside Elsie’s own Bobby, but the woman had a soft spot for Jenny. She’d always make time for her, which was more than the girl’s own mother did.
They were both looking at Elsie now, the same question in their eyes. And it was Jenny who voiced it. ‘What do you mean “’vacuated”?’
Elsie sighed, sat down beside Jenny on the lumpy sofa and put her arm round the girl’s shoulders.
‘Listen, darlin’, they reckon there’s going to be a war and that – that our enemy might – well, attack us in some way, so they’re sending all the kids out of the city into the country.’
Jenny’s eyes widened. She’d never been out of London, not even on a day trip. She couldn’t begin to imagine what the countryside would be like. The only fields she’d seen had been in picture books and there were not many of those lying around the Mercer household.
‘Are we all going?’ She glanced up at her mother. ‘You too?’
‘I ain’t going nowhere,’ Dot vowed. ‘What? Leave Arfer to the tender mercies of that trollop at the end of our street? I’ve seen her in her doorway when his car pulls up. Well, she can think again—’
‘Dot,’ Elsie interrupted. ‘This is serious. Just forget your fellers for a minute, will yer?’
Dot glared at her neighbour, but fell silent as Elsie turned her attention back to Jenny. ‘No, darlin’. Not the grown-ups, just you kids.’
‘Is Bobby going?’
‘Well . . .’ Elsie hesitated and bit her lip. ‘I’m not sure. Sid doesn’t want them to go. If there is a war, yer uncle Sid’s going back into the navy an’ he wants the lads to look after me. But,’ Elsie went on, ‘I’m trying to persuade him to let Sammy and Bobby go.’
‘What’s everyone else doing?’ Now Dot was interested. Elsie glanced up sceptically. Was she really thinking of her daughter’s safety or did she think that the girl’s absence would make life so much easier for her and her goings-on? Elsie smiled inwardly. Dot had some surprises coming. If Jenny was evacuated, her mother might well be drafted into war work. But for the moment, Elsie kept that little piece of information to herself. Better to let the child be sent to safety than have Dot keep her here as an excuse to escape work.
‘I don’t want folks thinking I don’t do right by my kid,’ Dot was saying.
Elsie shrugged. ‘Most are going. We’ve to take them to their school in the morning with their clothes, gas mask and a packet of sandwiches for the journey.’
‘Where are they going?’
‘Mum—’ Jenny tried to interrupt.
‘Shut up. I want to know what’s going on.’ Dot turned back to Elsie. ‘It’s a bit sudden, ain’t it? War’s not even certain yet, is it?’
‘Looks like it’s going to happen. That’s what Sid says anyway.’
Dot was thoughtful. Arthur had arrived yesterday rubbing his hands with glee. ‘If there’s a war,’ he’d said, ‘I’ll make a ruddy fortune.’
Dot wasn’t too sure what Arthur Osborne actually did for a living, but he always seemed to have plenty of cash. She’d never enquired too closely how he earned it just so long as he continued to spend it on her. But he didn’t seem worried that there might be a war; he was revelling in the mere thought of it.
‘Right then, you’ll be goin’ an all,’ Dot decided, prodding her forefinger towards her daughter. ‘You’d better get yer things together.’
‘They’ve to have a label sewn on to their coat with their name and the name of their school on,’ Elsie added, getting up. ‘I’d better go and get the boys’ stuff ready, ’cos I reckon Sid’ll let the two youngest go when it comes to it. He’ll not want them here when ’Itler starts dropping his bombs.’
‘Mum—’ Jenny began to wail.
‘Shut up and do as yer told. Go and get packed.’
That’ll take the poor little scrap all of five minutes, Elsie thought as she left her neighbour’s house. At least my lads’ll have clean clothes and decent shoes. We might not be well off and their clothes aren’t new, but they’ll be clean and neat. And by the look of the way the child was scratching her head, Elsie thought, I reckon Jenny’s got nits again.
