Alfred and Emily Read online

And perhaps not.

  ‘How did we do it?’ my father might demand of my mother, looking back at his youthful self. ‘Good God, when I think…’

  ‘God knows,’ says my mother, sighing. ‘I was never tired in those days.’

  Emily, Sister McVeagh at the Royal Free, loved her work.

  ‘A bit of a martinet, but she was always fair.’ This was Daisy, who was working her way along a different itinerary.

  Emily played tennis with schoolfriends to whom she was writing in her old age: ‘Do you remember…’

  She worked hard at her piano and took her finals in that time. The examiners told her she could have a career as a concert pianist if she wanted. She played the organ for services at All Souls, a fashionable church in Langham Place. She played concerts, recitals, and for social events at the hospital, even for nurses’ dances. A good sport, was Sister Emily McVeagh.

  During those years a message came from her stepmother that she thought her father would like to see her.

  Not from her father himself, though.

  Emily went to lunch at her old home. Perhaps she went more than once.

  ‘But I never forgave him, never, never,’ she would insist, eyes flashing, her hands in fists.

  What would ‘forgiving’ him have meant, from a daughter who had disobeyed him, was independent, doing very well, surely an ornament to him, the family – everyone?

  ‘Father, thank you, I owe you so much.’ Yes?

  Well she certainly did owe him a lot.

  ‘Without you I never would have…’

  Possibly true.

  But she couldn’t forget those early years as a nurse. ‘It was so hard, it was so difficult’ – and she was not talking about the sheer hard labour of the beginning nurse’s life.

  ‘I was so hungry. We all were. I couldn’t even afford to buy a decent pocket handkerchief,’ she appealed, tears in her eyes. ‘The pay was so bad. I couldn’t even buy a pair of gloves,’ said my mother, to a girl who was usually out in the bush somewhere, dusty bare legs in veldschoen, in a frock run up from a reduced dress length from the store, with scratched hands, because the sitting hen didn’t like being handled, or I had been climbing over a barbed-wire fence. Gloves!

  ‘I couldn’t buy some nice gloves. Even a tiny bit of an allowance…a little pocket money.’

  When my mother went into Banket on mail days, she wore a proper hat, its ribbon always kept new and smart, white gloves that had little buttons, and her shoes were polished. In her handbag was a fresh white linen handkerchief. Her dress would be the ‘tailored’ dress that all the women of the district wore for special occasions. She could have walked down the main street of any big city.

  But would she have taken an allowance from her father? I think not.

  Emily didn’t like dancing much, concerts and the theatre were what she liked, but Daisy asked Alfred up to a Christmas dance for the senior nurses, and there he danced all evening with one Betsy Somers. She was a small, plump girl with fair hair in curls and little ringlets, and cheeks that mottled easily when it was hot. Knowing people pointed out to each other that Betsy was very similar to Mrs. Lane.

  Getting married – now that was a big step, surely?

  Mr. Redway was a kind man and Alfred earned a good bit more than a labourer, but it wasn’t enough to marry on. And he could hardly ask Betsy to live in the Redways’ house.

  That Alfred was going up to London as often as he could to see a nurse became known, and Mr. Redway said to Alfred that he would accompany him to the top field to look at the new cowshed.

  Alfred wondered what was coming: probably Bert’s drinking.

  The Redways’ house had once been the manager’s house for a large estate that had done badly and was divided and sold. As well as the Redways’ house there were a lot of cottages, of various kinds and sizes, which had in them the labourers and their families. To the side of the top field was a little wood, where Mr. Redway stood with Alfred and said he planned to build a fair-sized house just there. ‘Of course,’ said Mr. Redway, ‘Bert could live in it, but I’d rather he was at home.’ Alfred understood. His conversations with Mr. Redway were like this: most things left unsaid. Bert was a fair old trouble, these days, and Alfred could not be expected to live with him and look after him. ‘If you want to get wed,’ said Mr. Redway, ‘you can have the house, and I’ll see you right.’ Here, what could have been said was something on the lines of, ‘I wish you were our son, Alfred. I could leave the farm to you, without a moment’s worry about it. But you aren’t, and so we must make the best of it. If Bert were thinking of getting married, then…but he doesn’t seem to have plans.’ Aloud: ‘Betsy Somers, hey? Isn’t that a Kentish family? Why don’t you bring her down for the weekend? Perhaps for our annual do. Does Betsy like cricket?’

  ‘I hope so,’ said Alfred, laughing. ‘She’s going to have a bad time of it if she doesn’t.’

  That was how Alfred’s future was decided. And Alfred liked to think of Betsy sitting in a chair beside Mrs. Lane, watching him play.

  And what had not been said aloud? ‘You must see we want to look her over. Is she going to fit in with us?’ And so it goes always with a well-settled community when a son is bringing in a bride. Will she become one of us?

  ‘Are you going to want thatch or slates for the roof?’ said Mr. Redway.

  ‘Slates,’ said Alfred. ‘Better for fire.’

  He would ask Betsy to marry him, when the house was done, but there was no hurry. He thought he probably loved her, but his life as a bachelor was really so very pleasant. And then Fate took a decided turn. He was up in London, and actually in the girls’ flat, having supper, when a pain in his side felled him groaning to the floor. They were walking distance from the Royal Free. Daisy ran to the hospital and brought porters and a stretcher while Emily was taking Alfred to the front door. Off he was whisked to an operating theatre, just in time to save his life. His appendix had burst. He was in hospital long enough for him to decide that, yes, he really did love Betsy. They were engaged to marry. Meanwhile, Emily McVeagh announced her engagement to Dr. Martin-White from Cardiology. There was a small party, in the office of Sister McVeagh’s ward. Alfred was there, on crutches, in a corner, watching, with Daisy. Betsy was on duty somewhere.

  ‘He looks a really nice chap,’ approved Alfred to Daisy.

  Dr. Martin-White was very different from the people Alfred was surrounded by most days, all farmers, labourers, country people. He was tallish, perhaps too thin, with a hesitant manner, as if he felt he presumed, with a thoughtful, sensitive face.

  This happened in 1916.

  In life, my father’s appendix burst just before the battle of the Somme, saving him from being killed with the rest of his company. He was sent back to the trenches where shrapnel in his right leg saved him from the battle of Passchendaele. ‘A pretty lucky thing,’ he might say. But, later, ‘That is, if you set so much store on being alive.’

  Now things moved fast. Betsy said she would not mind missing the last year of her training, if that meant she could marry her Alfred now. Alfred, who had imagined getting married at a quite comfortable time ahead, heard Betsy say she could not bear to be separated from him, and found himself agreeing with her. ‘Why wait?’ she said, and then so did he. But where were they going to live? Their house was nowhere near being finished. So, after all, that meant they would start married life in the Redways’ house. And meant, too, that the looking-over of Betsy could not be postponed. ‘Of course they have to give me a good looking-over,’ she said, confident that this would go well: Betsy knew people liked her, so why not the Redways? But Alfred was more concerned that Mrs. Lane should meet her, and at once. If Mrs. Lane did not approve, then…Would he be prepared to give up Betsy? The question did actually present itself to Alfred, and forcefully. No, he wouldn’t. And that was how Alfred learned that Betsy was indeed essential to him.

  No one need have worried. Mrs. Lane, expecting her favourite Alfred’s chosen, stoo
d by her window, waiting. At the gate stood a plump fair girl ‘all of a tremble’, as Mrs. Lane described it to Alfred. Mrs. Lane ran down to the gate and embraced Betsy. ‘Oh, welcome, dear Betsy,’ crooned Alfred’s other mother. (‘She’s been more a mother to me than my own ever was.’)

  The women wept in each other’s arms and Mrs. Lane told Alfred he was a lucky man. ‘She’s lovely, Alfred. Oh, well done.’

  At the Redways, at once a difficulty. Bert came in from the pub because Alfred’s fiancée was coming to supper, and he took to her at once, but showed it by teasing and needling, sometimes not very pleasantly, because he was half tight.

  She stood up to him well, while her soon-to-be ‘father-in-law and mother-in-law’ watched silently, and gave her good marks.

  Bert said to Alfred that he was a lucky dog.

  And when the Allied Bank’s annual beanfeast came around again, Betsy was sitting beside Mrs. Lane under the oak tree, applauding when Mrs. Lane indicated she should. There was a pretty good crowd that afternoon, because Alfred Tayler was there, and for the first time Betsy saw her Alfred in his element.

  There were two celebrations for Alfred and Betsy’s marriage, one a real wedding in Kent, where Alfred was surprised to find he was part of a large and amiable family. He would always like other people’s families better than his own. Emily did not go – she was busy with her new home. Daisy went, and Mrs. Lane. There was to be another party for the two, to be given by Mrs. Lane, when the harvest was in. Meanwhile an invitation arrived to Emily McVeagh’s wedding, for Betsy and Alfred. It was a large, elegant invitation on card as fine as best china, and it stood on the breakfast table at the Redways’, and at the sight of it Bert took off into a rage. He had been bad since Betsy came, drinking more, and unpredictably emotional about everything. ‘Just you look at that,’ he jeered. ‘And who the hell does Emily McVeagh think she is? Lady Muck, that’s what she is.’

  Now Bert had not much noticed Emily before, probably he had scarcely known who she was. Now he went on, ‘Marrying in that church, is she? And I suppose you are going to trot off like a good little girl to the wedding.’

  Betsy said equably, ‘Bert, I’ve known Emily for years. I was a probationer in her ward. I was under her for my training. she was good to me. Some of those sisters were real bullies, so I was lucky to get her.’

  ‘Sister McVeagh into Lady Muck,’ shouted Bert. And he bowed clumsily, where he sat, a sort of obeisance, knocking over the toast in its rack.

  ‘Steady on,’ said Mr. Redway. ‘I liked Emily McVeagh. She used to visit Mary Lane.’

  ‘Well, she won’t be coming now,’ said Bert. ‘She’ll be too grand for that. St Bartholomew bloody Church, and the reception at the Savoy.’ And he grabbed the invitation, apparently about to tear it.

  Betsy took it from him, and said, ‘Bert, Emily is my friend. Please remember that.’

  ‘Remember it!’ shouted Bert. ‘I expect you’ll be reminding us often enough of your grand friends.’

  Here Mrs. Redway, who kept a sick headache in store for such occasions, rose to her feet, murmuring, ‘My head…’ and left the room.

  ‘That’s enough, Bert,’ said Mr. Redway.

  ‘And I suppose Alfred won’t be grand enough for you now,’ said Bert.

  And Betsy, who was usually good for much worse ‘teasing’ from Bert, burst into tears and went to the bedroom.

  Mr. Redway was white with anger. ‘I’ve never been more ashamed…’ And he walked out.

  Alfred said, ‘And now, Bert, it’s time you stopped all this.’ He was probably thinking that ‘all’ included his drinking. But Bert was not drunk. He had, however, reached that stage when a glass of water or a cup of tea could trigger off the drunkenness of the night before.

  ‘I’m getting tired of it, Bert. When it comes to making Betsy cry, then that’s enough.’

  ‘But I was only teasing,’ said Bert, really upset, both by his father’s going, and by Alfred. ‘I was just joking, that was all.’

  ‘I don’t know how often these days I have to comfort Betsy when she cries because of you.’

  ‘You’re making a fuss about nothing,’ blustered Bert.

  ‘Bert, if you can’t stop goading Betsy I’m going to take her to live at the Lanes’ until our house is done.’

  ‘You can’t do that…you wouldn’t do that…’ And now Bert was really shaken.

  ‘Yes, I will,’ said Alfred. ‘Listen, Bert, just listen…’ And Alfred leaned forward, grabbed Bert by the shoulders, to make him listen. ‘Betsy is my wife,’ said Alfred. ‘She has to come first.’

  Bert, shocked, was ready to cry himself. ‘But, Alfred, you wouldn’t…you couldn’t.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Alfred.

  ‘But it’s not as bad as that,’ said Bert. ‘It’s simply not…’

  ‘You make her cry and I have to tell her you don’t mean it, but now it’s enough.’

  ‘But I love Betsy,’ said Bert. ‘I don’t make her cry, I just tease her a little.’

  ‘Well,’ said Alfred, looking Bert hard in the face, ‘and I love her, and she’s my wife.’

  Bert said, ‘But you’ve only known her a little while.’ And then, because of the absurdity of it, he went red and said, ‘I’ll say I’m sorry,’ and he rushed to the bedroom Betsy had taken refuge in, knocked, and ran in. Betsy was crying on her bed.

  ‘Betsy,’ Bert shouted at her. ‘Betsy, I’m sorry. I’m a clumsy brute. I’m so sorry, Betsy.’

  Alfred waited a few minutes, then pushed the door open. Bert was kneeling on the floor by Betsy, his head on her lap. It looked as if he might be asleep. Betsy gestured, ‘Rescue me…’ And Alfred went to Bert, lifted him, saying, ‘Now, come on, old son, that’s enough.’ And he put his arm around Bert and steered him out of the room.

  ‘Thank you,’ he heard from Betsy, as the two left.

  Betsy and Daisy were to be bridesmaids at Emily’s wedding, and today was the day Betsy was to go up to London for a rehearsal and to fit her dress.

  She was to go with Mrs. Lane, who was matron of honour.

  Soon Betsy came out of the room, dressed for London, and the two men were still at the breakfast table.

  She did not look at Bert, but said to Alfred, ‘I’m leaving now. Perhaps you had better not come.’ Bert had been weeping, the sick, self-pitying tears of the alcoholic: it looked as if Alfred had been giving him a real talking-to.

  Alfred had been going to London with her: Betsy, Alfred and Mrs. Lane, a festive little party.

  Outside the house Mr. Redway was standing, apparently waiting for her.

  ‘I’ll go with you,’ he said.

  Betsy and her father-in-law proceeded up the path, which soon became a muddy lane.

  When they reached the rutted mud, Mr. Redway said, ‘Hold on, I’ll carry you across.’ He put a large arm around the girl and lifted her, not only for the ten yards or so of the bad part, but until there was no mud. He set Betsy down gently and said, ‘Don’t mind Bert. He’s not so bad, really. And I think your Alfred will sort him out.’

  Betsy was grateful, and said, ‘Thank you. I’m silly to get so upset.’

  Meanwhile Bert had said to Alfred, ‘You are going to stay with me? You aren’t going to London?’

  ‘No, I’m staying with you,’ said Alfred. But he was wondering how much of this kind of adapting to Bert’s weaknesses he must expect in the future.

  ‘Come on, let’s go and have a look at the corn, Bert.’

  Bert did not again mention Emily, or the wedding. Alfred would have gone with Betsy to London for the occasion, but when the day came he again said to Bert that he would not go: he would stay. Mr. Redway observed this and said, ‘It’s good of you, Alfred.’ And he too went to where Alfred and Betsy’s house was being built. Bert, Alfred and Mr. Redway stood watching the builders, making suggestions, and Bert said suddenly, ‘Betsy looked very nice in that dress.’

  ‘But that’s not what she’ll wear for the wedding,’ said
Alfred.

  Bert seemed to be about to explode again, in anger, reproach, accusation.

  Mr. Redway said, ‘Just think, Bert. What’s all this about? Emily McVeagh is getting wed. That’s it. That’s all.’

  And that was why Alfred never got to Emily’s wedding.

  But the trouble was, if Emily had wed, Bert had not. More than once people had teased him that he was on his way to the altar, but then it all came to nothing. He took to doing his courting where his family and Alfred could not see, but last week, a girl he really did like, when he was taking her home from a dance, saw him fall down, and then watched him being very sick. She told him this was not how she visualized her future – Alfred knew about it, but not the parents, and Bert begged him not to tell them.

  ‘They’ve been going on at me about getting married, but you don’t seem to find it difficult.’

  Now he had followed Betsy with his eyes, smiled when he looked at her, not knowing that he did, and Betsy told Alfred, ‘He’s just like Rover.’ This was Mr. Redway’s big black dog, which adored her.

  Then Betsy was being sick, and pregnant, and the doctor began joking that she must be having twins. She was large very early, and now it was a question of whether the house would be ready in time for the birth.

  ‘I hope it will be. We don’t have room here for a child,’ moaned Mrs. Redway, as if Bert had not been brought up in what was a pretty sizeable house.

  When Bert returned in the evenings, drunk, Betsy scolded him, and he made excuses, and then one morning, entering the kitchen for breakfast, he had a scarlet weal on his cheek: apparently he did not know it. And now Betsy, seeing it, began to cry and said, ‘Oh, Bert, you have to stop, you must,’ while Bert dabbed at his cheek and succeeded in springing the blood, which ran. Betsy ran around to staunch the blood with her napkin while he joked and said it was worthwhile getting a bit of a scar, as she fussed over him.

  ‘It’s not funny, Bert,’ she said. ‘I’ve seen this before, with my cousin Edward. He was a drunk like you and he wouldn’t stop and then he left the haycart brakes off and the cart ran back and killed him.’