Jenny's War Read online

  Jenny ran a short distance and then slowed to a walking pace, realizing she wasn’t sure that she was going in the right direction for the station. She heard footsteps and glanced behind her to see that the man who’d come to fetch her was following her. He was tall and broad shouldered and his long strides were catching her up easily. As he neared her, she could see that he was very smartly dressed, but not in a flashy way like Arthur. He was wearing a grey suit with a waistcoat. He looked a right toff, yet he was bothering to chase after her. His dark brown hair, flecked with grey, was brushed back smoothly from his face. To the young girl, he looked old, but a little voice inside her whispered: He does look nice. Nevertheless, he’d more than likely want her to take a bath, so she made herself scowl and set her little mouth in a grim, determined line.

  Jenny had reached a corner in the road and didn’t know which way to go. She stopped and waited for him to approach her. He stood for a moment, about a yard away, looking down at her and smiling. ‘Hello, there.’ His voice was deep and gentle. ‘You’re Jenny, aren’t you?’

  He squatted down on his haunches, so that his face was level – perhaps even a little lower – than hers. It made her feel safer, as if he was really trying not to frighten her by looming over her. But Jenny had met men like him before amongst the ‘uncles’. All sweetness and light one minute and bringing presents and the next giving her a cuff round the ear if she was in the way. She didn’t trust any of their smarmy ways.

  Beyond him, she saw the woman who’d come with him walking towards them. With a sudden movement, Jenny turned away and stepped into the road but the man caught hold of her arm and even though she screamed loudly and kicked out at his shins, he refused to let go.

  ‘You’ll get run over, love. Calm down. I’m not going to hurt you. But you must look where you’re going.’

  Now the woman had reached them. She was smiling, yet the girl could see the worry in her eyes. Dark, violet eyes. Jenny had never seen anyone with eyes that colour. They were beautiful and her shining black hair was drawn back into a chignon at the back of her head and yet a profusion of curls and waves surrounded her face. Her clothes, too, were perhaps not fashionable – not like the ones Dot wore – but they were well cut and looked expensive. She’d been right; these folks were toffs.

  ‘Jenny, if you’re going back to London,’ the woman was saying in a soft voice, ‘haven’t you forgotten a couple of things?’

  Jenny stopped struggling and stared up at her. ‘What?’

  ‘For one thing, you must take your gas mask and for another – what about Teddy? You surely weren’t going to leave him, were you?’

  Jenny stood very still. Bert. How could she have forgotten Bert? And her clothes. Her mum’d tan the hide off her if she arrived back home with none of her belongings and besides, they didn’t want her there. They wouldn’t be pleased to see her back. Not like Aunty Elsie if Bobby and Sammy went back home . . .

  The man’s voice interrupted her thoughts. ‘If you promise me not to run into the road without looking both ways, I’ll let go.’

  Jenny nodded. Then she looked up into the kind face of the woman. Against her will, she was intrigued by these two people. Why on earth did toffs like them want to take in a dirty little urchin like her?

  ‘His name’s Bert,’ Jenny muttered in answer to the woman’s question. ‘I’d better get him. And me gas mask.’

  ‘And what about the train fare? Have you any money?’

  ‘Don’t need no money. We come on the train an’ didn’t ’ave ter pay.’

  ‘I think that was special, because the train was bringing you all to the country. But if you choose to go back without the others, you’ll have to pay.’

  Jenny felt tears prickle her eyelids and, against her will, her lower lip trembled. She dropped her head so that they wouldn’t see how lost and afraid she felt. There was no one she could turn to. Even Miss Chisholm had gone back to London the previous day. How she wished she’d known; she’d have gone with her. Though she doubted the teacher would have allowed it.

  The woman was squatting down in front of her now and speaking in a soft voice. ‘Tell you what, how about you come home with us for a day or two? If you really don’t like it, then we’ll pay for your train fare back home.’

  Jenny looked up, meeting the dark eyes. ‘Promise?’

  ‘Well, I don’t think your mum’ll want you to go back to the city when she’s sent you here to be safe, but if you’re really so unhappy, then—’

  ‘Don’t think mi mum’d be bothered. She’s got a fancy man an’ I was in the way.’

  ‘Oh – oh, I see.’ After a moment, the woman stood up and held out her hand. ‘You come with us, Jenny. Give us a try, eh? Maybe you’d like to stay with us for a little while and then we’ll see, eh?’

  Jenny thought for a moment. She realized now escape was impossible, at least for the moment. She wasn’t going to be able to get home. She couldn’t run away and – worst of all – she wasn’t going to escape having the bath and hair washing they all seemed to want her to have. But at least if she went with this couple, she wouldn’t be sent back to those dreadful old women or anyone like them. ‘All right, missis. I’ll give it a go, but if I don’t like it . . .’

  ‘Then I promise we’ll take you back to London ourselves and talk to your mum. All right?’

  Jenny nodded and put her grubby paw into the woman’s outstretched hand.

  Eight

  They walked through the streets of the little market town, Jenny still holding the woman’s hand and clutching Bert to her chest. The man carried Jenny’s meagre possessions.

  ‘My name’s Charlotte and this is Miles.’

  Jenny twisted her head to look up at the woman walking beside her. ‘Don’t I call you Mr and Mrs something?’

  The woman chuckled. ‘No, Charlotte and Miles will be fine.’

  ‘Not even Aunty or Uncle? I’ve had lots of uncles,’ Jenny confided. ‘That’s what I ’ave to call me muvver’s fancy men.’

  Jenny felt Charlotte’s hand tremble slightly in hers and she looked up sharply to see if the woman was laughing at her. But Charlotte was biting her lip and there were tears in her eyes. ‘No,’ her voice was husky, ‘just – just Charlotte and Miles.’

  They were walking away from the town centre now along a road where the houses were not built so close together. Jenny glanced around her nervously. She was used to narrow streets and row after row of terraced houses, not the wide open spaces of the countryside. The sky looked huge and it frightened her. They reached some gates leading up a driveway to a large house with smooth lawns in front of it. Beyond the house the flat land stretched towards a line of low hills. And she could hear a strange rushing sound that ebbed and flowed, but she had no idea what it was. Jenny stared at the huge house in front of her. For a moment, she forgot her fears. ‘Cor! Is this where you live?’

  ‘Yes,’ Miles said, coming to stand beside her. ‘Welcome to Ravensfleet Manor, Jenny. We do want you to stay with us and we’ll do everything we can to make you happy.’

  The girl glanced about her and then pulled her hand away from Charlotte’s. Still clutching her teddy, she ran towards the steps leading up to the front door. She climbed them and then stood close to the front door until they reached her.

  ‘Here we are, then,’ Miles said, opening the door and ushering her inside.

  Jenny had never been inside such a big house. The front door opened into a large hallway with rooms leading off on each side. Directly in front of them was a wide staircase.

  ‘Now, I’ll take you up to your room,’ Charlotte said. ‘It’s right next door to our bedroom, so if you want anything in the night, you only have to shout. All right?’

  Jenny nodded, her blue eyes wide with wonderment as she gazed around her. She felt a little safer indoors, but it was still very big. Paintings lined the walls of the hall and there were even more on the landing. There were several landscapes, but the ones which intrigued Jenny
were portraits. She stopped in front of one. ‘That’s ’im, ain’t it?’

  ‘Miles? Yes.’

  Jenny stared at it, studying it carefully. Even her young and inexperienced eye could see that the painting was magnificent. She moved away slowly, but the picture still held her gaze.

  ‘This is your bedroom while you’re with us,’ Charlotte said encouragingly as she opened the door into a room decorated in pink with flowered curtains and a bedspread to match. ‘Shall we hang your clothes in the wardrobe?’

  ‘I’ll do it,’ Jenny said quickly. She didn’t want this nice woman turning her nose up at the tatty clothes.

  Charlotte nodded. ‘All right. Come downstairs when you’re ready. Oh, let me show you the bathroom.’

  Jenny stood by the bed and hugged Bert even closer. ‘I don’t want a barf.’

  ‘Oh, not just now, but I thought you might need to know where everything is. Come along.’

  The girl followed Charlotte reluctantly and eyed the deep, white bath with apprehension. In a small voice she said, ‘I s’pose I’ll have to ’ave a barf, won’t I?’

  ‘I’d like you to, Jenny. But don’t worry about it. Maybe tonight, eh, just before you go to bed?’

  Jenny didn’t answer; she just frowned and her little face hardened as she schemed how she could avoid it. The water would be so deep in that big bath, she’d drown. She knew she would. And nobody would care. Not her mum, not Arthur. Maybe Bobby, but there was no one else she could think of who would miss her that much.

  ‘Now, we’ll go down and get you some lunch. Are you hungry?’

  Jenny nodded, bringing Charlotte’s attention to the child’s dirty hair and the woman hid a shudder as she imagined what lurked beneath those greasy curls.

  Downstairs, Charlotte went towards a door leading off the hall near the front door and opened it. ‘Miles, we’re just going to have lunch. I thought we’d have it in the kitchen.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ Jenny heard the man say, ‘I’ll come too.’

  He emerged from the room and smiled down at her. ‘How are you settling in? Do you like your bedroom?’

  Jenny nodded again and, still clutching Bert, she followed them through another door that led from the hall towards the kitchen.

  ‘Mrs Beddows – this is our house guest for the next few weeks.’ Miles made the introductions. ‘At least, we hope she’s going to stay with us. Mrs Beddows is our cook, Jenny. And Kitty over there near the range is our maid. And the tall gentleman over there in the dark suit is Wilkins. I’m not quite sure what his title is, but he’s an invaluable member of the household.’ Wilkins looked very sedate and rather worried, Jenny thought. ‘And then there’s Brewster who is the chauffeur – ’

  The child looked up at him with innocent eyes. ‘You’ve got servants? Like the King ’as?’

  There was a brief silence and then everyone laughed. ‘No, no,’ Miles said. ‘They work for us, yes, just like the men on the estate do too, but we don’t call them servants. They’re our friends’ – he chuckled – ‘at least, I hope they are.’

  ‘What’s a ’state?’

  ‘The Ravensfleet Estate is most of the land around here. We have three tenant farmers and then there’s Home Farm, which I run. Well, Ben does now. And then there’s Buckthorn Farm on the flat land between Ravensfleet and the sea. But that’s not part of my estate. Mr Crawford, Charlotte’s father, owns that.’

  ‘Who’s Ben?’

  ‘My son. My middle son. I’ve got three. Philip – he’s the eldest. He’s a lawyer in London. Then there’s Ben, and Georgie’s the youngest.’

  ‘Will Georgie play wiv me?’

  Miles laughed. ‘He might, but he’s a bit older than you.’

  ‘How old?’

  ‘He’s nineteen.’

  Jenny wrinkled her nose in disgust. ‘Oh, that’s old. He won’t want to play with the likes of me.’

  ‘He might,’ Charlotte said softly. ‘You’ll like Georgie, Jenny. He’s—’

  Jenny glanced up at her. Charlotte had a catch in her voice and though she couldn’t understand it, couldn’t have rationalized it and put it into words, even the young child understood that there was something very special about this woman’s youngest son. ‘He’s very kind and great fun.’

  She saw the man and the woman exchange a glance and wondered at the concern that showed plainly in both their faces.

  ‘Kitty’ll serve lunch in the dining room,’ the cook was saying. ‘It’s all ready.’

  ‘No, no, we’ll have it in here, if that’s all right with you, Mrs Beddows.’

  Mrs Beddows’s face showed her surprise, but she merely nodded and began to clear the kitchen table.

  ‘I’ll set it, Mrs Beddows,’ Charlotte said, going to a dresser at the side of the kitchen and pulling out a white tablecloth. The three women, Charlotte, Mrs Beddows and Kitty, bustled about the kitchen setting the table and dishing up the food. But in only a few minutes they were all sitting around the table. Miles carved the joint of meat and Mrs Beddows served the vegetables, pouring rich, thick gravy over it all before setting a plateful in front of Jenny.

  ‘I haven’t given you too much, lovey, until we find out what your appetite’s like,’ she said. ‘But you can always ask for seconds in this house.’

  Jenny blinked and gazed up at the woman. ‘What we ’avin’ Sunday dinner today for? It’s Tuesday.’

  ‘Well,’ the cook explained as she sat down in her own chair and picked up her knife and fork, ‘we usually have a light lunch. But today – when Mrs Thornton told me you were coming – well, I thought I’d do a nice hot meal for you. Make you feel welcome. Usually, we have dinner in the evening. And that’s a cooked meal like this.’

  Jenny picked up her knife and fork and stabbed at the piece of meat and then sawed at it with her knife, expecting it to be tough to cut through. But her knife slid easily through the thin slice of beef and when she chewed it, it seemed almost to melt in her mouth.

  ‘Actually, don’t Lincolnshire folk call their midday meal dinner, and it’s tea in the late afternoon, isn’t it?’ Miles said.

  ‘That’s right, sir,’ Kitty, who was Lincolnshire born and bred, agreed. ‘And then it’s supper if you want a snack just ’afore bedtime.’

  ‘You don’t arf talk funny,’ Jenny said.

  ‘So do you,’ Kitty countered, but she was smiling as she said it.

  Jenny giggled and said in her cockney accent, ‘You’re ’avin’ a giraffe.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘A giraffe. A laugh.’

  Kitty laughed too and answered in broad Lincolnshire dialect. ‘Aye, an’ I reckon you’m as wakken as a rat, young ’un.’

  Jenny’s smile disappeared. ‘You callin’ me a rat?’ she accused.

  ‘No, no.’ Kitty flushed with embarrassment. ‘I’d never do that, duck. No, it’s one of our sayings. It means you’re as sharp as a rat. You know, clever. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—’

  ‘’Ave you got rats here? In the house?’

  ‘Not here,’ Miles said gently. ‘On the farm, yes. But Ben has a little dog that’s a very good little ratter. He catches them.’

  ‘We could do wi’ ’im at home. We’ve got two in our roof. I ’ate ’em.’ As she stuffed more food into her mouth, she was aware of the grown-ups exchanging glances.

  As they were finishing the first course and Mrs Beddows was serving the pudding, the back door opened and a young man stepped into the kitchen.

  ‘Leave your boots outside, Master Ben, if you don’t mind.’

  Ben – with dark brown hair and soft brown eyes – smiled sheepishly and disappeared for a moment, returning wearing just his thick socks. He padded to the kitchen sink and washed his hands before sitting down at the table. He glanced across at Jenny and smiled. ‘Hello.’

  Jenny didn’t answer but just stared at him.

  ‘This is Jenny. She’s come to stay with us for a while,’ Charlotte explained. ‘She’s from London.’
r />   ‘Oh yes. I heard about children coming here from the cities.’

  ‘Jenny – this is Ben.’

  ‘I’ll show you around the farm sometime, if you’d like,’ he offered, but still there was no response.

  Jenny dropped her eyes lest the young man – in fact, all of them – should see in them that she had no idea what a farm was. She’d seen pictures, but she’d never visited a real farm. And, so far, she wasn’t sure she wanted to go outside any more. The flat landscape and the huge skies were scary for the city child.

  During the afternoon, Charlotte showed Jenny the nursery on the first floor next door to the room where she was to sleep.

  The girl gazed wide-eyed at the toys, books and games on the shelves and in the cupboards. In the centre of the room stood a rocking horse and in one corner stood a beautiful doll’s house. The whole front opened in two doors, revealing tiny furniture and the family of dolls looking rather as if they were just waiting for someone to play with them.

  ‘You can play with all the toys and if there’s anything you need, Jenny, you only have to say.’

  The girl looked up at her sceptically. ‘What do I have to do for it?’

  Charlotte blinked and looked puzzled. ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘At home, if I gets a treat – sweets or anything – I have to stay in me room or go to the pictures with Bobby. You know, stay out o’ the way.’

  Charlotte stared at the child and shook her head slowly. Huskily, she said, ‘You don’t have to do anything. We just want you to be happy here and if there’s something you want, we’ll do our best to get it for you.’

  Jenny’s chin trembled. ‘I want to know where Bobby and Sammy’ve gone.’

  ‘Who are they?’ Charlotte asked gently.

  ‘Me friends. They live next door to us. Me an’ Bobby play together.’

  ‘Did they come on the train with you?’

  ‘Yeah, but we got to a station and we all had to get off, but then they got back on the train and we got on another one that brought us here. I – I don’t know where they went.’