The Girl with the Creel

Dear Dan,

I wasn’t too sure about having Lizann when you wrote and asked me, and I only agreed because you sounded so smitten with her. Now I’ve met her, I can see why. She’s a very nice girl, maybe a bit young for you, which is likely why she turned you down, but John and I will work on her and try to make her understand she’s right for you – for she is right for you, Dan, I’m positive of that. John’s quite taken with her too, but you needn’t worry – I’ll keep my eye on him, ha, ha.

I don’t think she’s done anything about looking for a job yet, she’s been too busy exploring the Gt. Western Road area. It will take her a wee while to settle down, I suppose, and I’ll try to put her off looking for anywhere else to live. We’d be happy to have her for as long as she wants – till she decides to become Mrs Daniel Fordyce? You should wait a few months before you come to see her, though. I’ve the feeling she’d shy off if she thought you were pestering her.

I’ll keep you posted.

Yours, Ella.

Slipping the letter back into the envelope, Dan felt grateful that his sister was taking an interest in the girl he loved. She would be able to persuade Lizann to marry him, if anyone could. As for waiting, he would wait a whole year if he thought she would say yes at the end of it.

From the time she arrived, Lizann had felt quite at home in the Reiths’ house in Great Western Road. It was part of a lovely stretch of tall, well-built granite houses on this long west end street which ran out of the city towards Deeside. There was only a small garden at the front, but a large one at the rear, which Ella’s husband John had lovingly tended for the ten years they had been there. Since the outbreak of war, of course, he’d had to trim down the size of his lawn – now just enough to hold his wife’s four clothes poles – and convert all his flower beds into vegetable patches, as instructed by the Min. of Ag. and Fish, as he scathingly called this special Ministry.

From the street the house looked smaller than the farmhouse at Easter Duncairn. But, having more depth than width, there were almost as many rooms, although they were perhaps not quite so big. Downstairs there were the usual dining-room, living-room and sitting-room (for visitors), plus what Lizann thought at first was a library, but Ella called ‘John’s den’, which was lined with books of all descriptions. Being a teacher of English, John Reith had collected hundreds of classics from Ancient Rome right down to those of the early twentieth century, as well as novels by popular modern writers and even some which he laughingly admitted were lurid romances. ‘I may look an old fuddy-duddy,’ he told Lizann, ‘but I still like a little light relief from the daily grind.’ The kitchen was also on the ground floor, a well-equipped, airy room which the Reiths had obviously converted to their liking bit by bit.

The bathroom was upstairs. ‘Still late Victorian,’ Ella had laughed, when she first showed her lodger round. ‘We’ll get round to changing it when we can afford it. The bath’s too big and though we’re always being told just to use five inches of water, it takes ages to run. Don’t be alarmed at the noise the lavatory makes when you flush it. You’ll get used to it … in fact, I’m quite fond of it myself.’

There were three bedrooms on the same floor, two facing the street and the third, like the bathroom, at the back. ‘I hope you don’t mind me putting you in here,’ Ella said. ‘It is actually quieter than the other two, even if it is next door to the lav.’

‘I don’t mind where I am,’ Lizann murmured. ‘I’m really grateful to you for taking me in.’

She would have been happy to stay there but for one thing: she was afraid that Dan might come to see how she was getting on. She suspected that Ella and John knew she had turned him down, and they might not be so friendly towards her if she refused him again under their roof.

Deciding that finding somewhere else to live was her first priority, she did nothing about looking for a job and devoured the Accommodation Vacant column in the Evening Express every day. Most of them stipulated ‘men sharing’, and she had been in Aberdeen ten days before she saw an item offering, ‘Room suitable for one or two women, non-smokers’, with an address in Rosemount Place. After looking it up in a street map, she set out to walk there the next morning, hoping it was a decent district. She found that Rosemount Place was another long street of sparkling granite buildings – not private houses like Great Western Road, but shops at ground level and tenements above. That was the only difference, because it was every bit as clean and tidy.

When she came to the number she was looking for, she went up to the first floor to ask about the room. The landlady was a small, stoutish woman with hair which looked as if it might have been red at one time but had faded to a sandy-grey. She introduced herself as Mrs Melville and took Lizann into a back room looking down on a long narrow stretch of grass. The rest of the view was constricted to the rears of other tenements, with their drying greens back to back with Mrs Melville’s, and it all looked very peaceful.

On learning that the rent was thirty shillings a week with breakfast and an evening meal, she explained to Mrs Melville that she was out of work meantime, but hoped to find a job in one of the fish houses. ‘Will the smell of fish bother you?’ she asked, warily.

After arranging to take up residence the next day, Lizann paid a week in advance, and returned to Great Western Road to tell Ella Reith that she would be leaving.

‘I’m sorry to hear that. Dan did say you might be looking for digs, but I thought you were happy here.’

‘I am, but … I’m trying to get work in the fish, and you wouldn’t like the smell.’

Astonished that such a lovely young woman would want to work amongst fish, Ella sighed. ‘I don’t think I would. Well, I’m glad you’ve found somewhere to your liking. Where will you be?’

Afraid that Ella might pass her new address to Dan, Lizann said, ‘In a tenement, and the landlady seems really nice.’

She packed her clothes in the evening – still those which had belonged to Adam Laing’s daughter Margaret, but which she hoped to supplement from her wages when she found a job. Next morning she had a glance at the newspaper and saw that a firm in Sinclair Road was looking for experienced fish workers. Not wanting to ask Ella, she waited until she went to her new lodgings, and Mrs Melville gave her detailed directions. ‘We used to have buses and trams both coming down past here – the buses went to the Bay of Nigg and would have taken you almost to the door – but after the war started the Corporation Transport just made them do a shuttle service to Mile End, so we’ve only trams now, and they just go to the Castlegate. You’ll have to come off in Union Street, opposite Woollies, walk down Market Street and carry on past the harbour till you come to Victoria Bridge. That takes you over the Dee into Torry, and I think Sinclair Road’s first on the left.’

Not even stopping to unpack her case, Lizann went out and had only about five minutes to wait for a tramcar. The journey was short and quite pleasant, but when the rails turned into Union Street, she kept her eyes peeled for Woolworth’s store. When she got off she crossed over into Market Street, her spirits lifting as her nose picked up a whiff of the sea, which grew stronger as she went down the hill. She was fascinated to see that the harbour was fenced off by high metal railings – to prevent spies getting anywhere near, she supposed – and she carried on along the outside of the barrier, passing coal boats unloading on the quay and having to watch her feet on the goods railway lines. Wondering if she would be safer on the other side of the street where there was a pavement, she decided against it. She would have to cross back again later and the traffic was quite fierce, with horse-drawn carts holding up impatient lorry drivers who put a spurt on once they managed to get past.

The bustle of the Fish Market amazed her, but she would learn that it was much busier in the early mornings. Coming to another of the docks, thronged with trawlers, she saw a bridge ahead and realized that she had not far to go now. There were several fish houses on Sinclair Road, and as she walked along searching for the one she wanted, and trying not to skid on the brine seeping from the wooden boxes piled up outside them, a nostalgic ache started inside her. Most people would turn up their noses at this awful stink, she thought in amusement, but it was like coming home for her.

There were other applicants for the jobs, but when the manager saw how expertly she gutted what he gave as a test, she was amongst those told to start at eight the following Monday morning. ‘It’s piece-work,’ he explained, ‘so the harder you work, the more wages you’ll get.’

Jenny had been at her lowest ebb ever since the delivery of the telegram from the War Office. She had recovered fairly quickly from the deaths of her mother and father, but she’d had Mick to lean on at the time. She had coped with Hannah’s death although she had given birth just a few hours before, but again, Mick had been there for her. She had seen Elsie Tait breathe her last, which had been something of an anti-climax after the shock of learning how her mother-in-law had met her end. She had thought Mick would help her to get over that, too, when he came home, but he would never come home again … and who would help her to get over losing him?

The Berrys had done their best. Babsie, close on seventy, had stayed with her night and day for over a week, had fed Georgie and wee Lizann when their mother was too grief-stricken to think about their needs, and had even kept them amused to save them bothering her. Jake had appointed himself as messenger, shopping from the lists his wife wrote out and carefully noting the prices so she wouldn’t query the change he brought back. All the neighbours had been good, popping in every day to see if she needed anything, though mainly to check that she was all right.

And she was gradually coming round, Jenny thought, one fine morning. Little pieces of the ice that had imprisoned her heart for so long were beginning to break off. She could actually smile occasionally, speak to people about the war without a spasm of sorrow for her husband making her stop in confused embarrassment. Time was a healer, but not long enough had elapsed yet. Her emotions still seized up when Georgie asked when Daddy would be coming, but, thankfully, she could confine her tears to the solitude of the double bed now.

Someone giving a sharp rap on her door, she went to see which of her neighbours had called, and was quite taken aback to see a stranger, a tall elderly man with silver hair and a fresh complexion that told he wasn’t a seaman of any kind. His clear blue eyes were looking at her apologetically. ‘Yes?’ she asked, wondering what had brought him there.

His face fell. ‘I was hoping to … but I have left it too long. What about Hannah … his wife? Is she still alive?’

Detecting tears in his eyes, Jenny felt a sudden rush of sympathy for him. ‘You’d better come in, Mr …?’

‘Chapman. Robbie Chapman.’ He followed her inside and took the seat she indicated. ‘You are very kind, Mrs …?’

‘Jappy.’ She gave a slight smile. ‘I’m Jenny, Mick’s wife … his widow. His ship was blown up earlier this year. Did you know him?’

‘He was only about a year old last time I was here, but I’m so sorry, Mrs … um, Jenny. How are you coping? Have you any children?’

Robbie Chapman had the knack of establishing instant rapport and Jenny didn’t feel that she was talking to a stranger. ‘Two, a boy and a girl. Lizann, after Mick’s young sister – she hadn’t been born when you were here before – George after her man. He was lost at sea before the war.’

Robbie nodded. ‘Yes, the sea is a cruel master. Was that how Willie Alec died, too?’

Jenny hesitated then said quietly, ‘Yes, her heart stopped suddenly.’ It was the only thing she could say, and it wasn’t a lie. ‘I’ll make a pot of tea, Mr Chapman. You look like you need cheering up.’

He raised grateful eyes. ‘Thank you, my dear, it’s been quite a shock. I was so looking forward to seeing …’ Pausing briefly, he gave a tight smile. ‘Please call me Robbie. Not many people do nowadays.’

He studied the fire until Jenny made the tea, and when she handed him a cup he said, ‘I’d better tell you my story, but first, did Hannah ever show you a sketch of her as a fishwife with a creel on her back?’

About to say no, Jenny recalled the picture which had hung over the kitchen fire at Freuchny Road, though Lizann had never said it was her mother. ‘I’ve seen it,’ she murmured, guardedly, for she couldn’t think what it had to do with anything.

‘I’d known Willie Alec for years, though we were never what you would call pals, and when I heard he’d married a lassie from Portessie, I was pleased for him. He knew I was interested in sketching folk, so when he asked if I’d draw his wife, I thought it would be good practice for me. Besides, I wanted to see the kind of girl he’d chosen. Hannah wasn’t at all happy about being drawn as a fish-wife, but Willie Alec insisted that he wanted a permanent reminder of how she looked the first time he saw her, and she agreed to pose for me.’

Jenny sat enthralled as he told her how he had gone to the Yardie on week nights – as Willie Alec had instructed because he didn’t want to see the sketch until it was finished – how he had fallen in love with his friend’s wife and how he had repressed his feelings in the belief that she was only being friendly with him to please her husband.

‘Of course,’ Robbie continued, ‘something had to give. I was spinning the drawing out as much as I could, and I was pretending to change a few bits one night when Hannah came over and stood close beside me. Well, that finished me. I grabbed hold of her and …’

When he broke off, Jenny had to contain her curiosity. She couldn’t believe that prim Hannah – who according to all sources had never had eyes for anyone but Willie Alec – had let another man kiss her … maybe more? At last she had to ask, ‘Didn’t she tell you to stop?’

‘I think she was too surprised at first. Anyway, her kisses were all the sweeter to me for being forbidden fruit … and then, all of a sudden, she jumped away and started to cry. I apologized for upsetting her and left.’

He regarded Jenny anxiously. ‘That would have been that – I’d have kept away from her – if Willie Alec … he loved the picture, and he asked me to supper every Saturday as a way of paying me. Hannah looked guilty every time I went in, and I don’t know if that’s what made him jealous, or if he could see how I felt about her. Anyway, he managed to hide it till she told him she was going to have another child. He was waiting outside for me when I turned up the next night, and accused me of being the father.’

His listener looked at him as if he had led her up the garden path before, but his smile was frank as he continued, ‘He wouldn’t listen to my denials at first, but I got through to him at last, and I think it made him love her all the more to know she was still so innocent as to believe kisses would make her pregnant. I can only think that my last few kisses had been too passionate for her.’ He grinned now. ‘I suppose you know the kind I mean, Jenny?’

Colouring, she gave a small nod. The first time Mick had given her a French kiss she had worried herself sick till her period started … but Hannah had been a married woman, and according to what Robbie had said, she’d already had Mick. She must have known how babies were made.

Robbie gave a long sigh. ‘Upon my oath, I was never intimate with her. I did manage to convince Willie Alec I was speaking the truth, but he said it would be best if I stopped going to the Yardie. I thought things over long and hard and decided to leave Buckie altogether. I had often fancied my chances as an artist in London so I just packed up and went.’

‘No, though I sometimes thought of coming home to ask her forgiveness for the trouble I caused. I should have known I was playing with fire by being alone with her for an hour or so five nights a week.’

His mournful eyes cleared suddenly, and giving a low chuckle, he said, ‘Ach, you’ll think I’m in my dotage telling you about things that were over and done with more than thirty years ago. I’ve had a good life. I did get married and I loved Dora, but sadly, we had no children.’

Just then, Jake Berry gave a tap and walked in, stopping in dismay when he saw Jenny was not alone. ‘I’m sorry lass. I didna ken you’d a visitor, but Babsie sent me to tell you she’s giving your bairns their dinner. She wanted me to ask you and all, but you’ll …’

‘Tell her thanks, but I’ve got dinner made here, and maybe Robbie’ll help me to eat it.’ Not wanting to be drawn into long explanations as to who Robbie was and perhaps make the Berrys delve into their memories and come up with two and two making five, she said that he had been a friend of her father’s, and Jake went away pleased that she had company.

‘She died nearly six years ago, and I tried not to give myself time to brood about her. I’ve kept busy, and I don’t miss her as much as I did.’

‘Oh, my dear, I’m so sorry. I’m an insensitive brute, but let me pass on some advice I got. I had been a widower for over three months when I met someone I hadn’t seen for a while. He knew of my bereavement but was shocked to see me looking so haggard, and even more shocked that I had shown nothing in the recent art exhibitions. “Get out of the Slough of Despond, Rob,” he scolded me. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself, it does no good. If you can’t face sugary sympathy from friends, however well-meant, look for people who are also needing help. You may find it beneficial for you, too.” What he said made sense, so I offered my services to a club for youngsters in the East End, and I got as much pleasure out of coaching the boys in football as they did.’

He eyed Jenny uncertainly. ‘You are not in the same position as I was, you have two young children to look after, but I think you, too, have sunk into the Slough of Despond. Have you no friends?’

‘As am I,’ he grinned. ‘But you’re an attractive young woman, Jenny, and there must be another man out there who will …’

‘There couldn’t be another man like Mick.’ She stood up resolutely now. ‘But you’re right, I’ll have to give myself a shake and get out and about more. You’re my first new friend, so you’d better help me eat what I made for the dinner.’

During the meal he told her more about the work he had done with the youngsters, and finally admitted that a heart attack had forced him to give it up. ‘The doctor warned me to take things easy, and it was while I was resting one afternoon that I got this deep urge to come home and spend some time with my older sister.’

Jenny couldn’t help noticing that he was still referring to Buckie as home, but she did not remark on it as she stood up to clear away the dirty dishes.

Robbie insisted on drying them and it wasn’t until she was laying them past that he said, ‘I was trying not to ask this in case you think I did have something to do with it, but it’s nothing more than curiosity. You said Mick had a young sister. Was she the baby Willie Alec thought …?’

‘So she’s not … wasn’t there one in between? Perhaps a year and a half younger than Mick?’

‘There was just the two of them that I know of … no! Wait a minute! I nearly forgot! Lizann once said her Auntie Lou told her there was a baby between her and Mick, but I think it was still-born.’

‘Oh, how sad,’ Robbie murmured. ‘You know, when I’d had time to think about it properly, I realized Hannah was just a touch … what should I say? Unstable? Little things I connected long afterwards that showed … but I shouldn’t be saying things like that to you.’

‘You’re right, though. Her sister had always looked out for her, so there must have been something unstable about her all along, and she turned funny when Willie Alec died. Poor Lizann had an awful time with her.’ Jenny paused, recalling the years of suffering she’d had herself.

This was too much for Jenny. Throwing herself into his arms, she wept quietly on his shoulder for some time, and when at last she drew away, embarrassed and ashamed, he said gently, ‘I think you should tell me, my dear. Mick’s death wasn’t the only thing to have upset you. It had been the last straw, the worst of all … yes?’

‘Whenever you like,’ he coaxed, ‘take your time. You’ll feel better when you’ve got it out in the open. It’s easier talking to a stranger, someone who isn’t involved.’

It was easier. Nevertheless, Jenny still took quite a time to tell him – a complicated story going back many years, involving people and events which, although it did not appear so at first, did have some bearing on what happened later. Lizann’s engagement to Peter; her fight to marry George and how she lost both him and their baby on the same day; her mysterious disappearance; Lenny Fyfe’s infatuation with Elsie Tait and the subsequent tragedy.

‘Poor Lenny,’ she murmured here. ‘His mother didn’t know it was his fault Elsie died, and she wrote and told him about it. His commanding officer sent a letter the very next week saying he’d been killed in an accident during his training, but I’m near sure there hadn’t been any accident. I think he committed suicide.’

Jenny told Robbie everything except what Elsie had done to Hannah – that was something she could never divulge to anyone – but he seemed to be most taken up with the subject of the missing Lizann. ‘You should have reported it to the police. They would have done everything in their power to find her.’

‘She gave up her house and took all her belongings with her, and Lou was sure she didn’t want to be found. It wasn’t till Peter’s wife told me what she’d threatened that I realized that’s what had made her run away, and there was what I said as well, though I wasn’t hitting at her at all. She must have been nearly out of her mind.’

‘Over three years. Mick always said she must be happy where she was, and nothing bad could have happened to her or else we’d have heard.’

Robbie nodded slowly. ‘Yes, I suppose you will have to draw comfort from that. Now, Jenny, I have thoroughly enjoyed talking to you, but I had better go, otherwise my sister will think I’ve dropped down dead somewhere. I am rather tired – resurrecting dormant emotions can’t be too good for a man in my condition, but I don’t regret it.’ He stood up and held out his hand. ‘Would you mind if I kept in touch? I want to know how you get on, and if you ever hear from Lizann.’

When both his smooth hands clasped hers, Jenny’s heart ached for him. He was obviously a lonely man and living hundreds of miles away from the place he still considered home. ‘I’d like if we kept in touch,’ she assured him, ‘and, remember, you’re welcome back any time, Robbie.’

She went inside thoughtfully. It had come across quite clearly that he had no real friends down in London, which was most surprising, for he was such a nice man. Maybe he’d been too taken up with his wife and his painting to bother with outsiders. Maybe he’d never really got over what the Jappys had done to him – fancy him still loving Hannah after all these years and coming all this way in the hope of seeing her again. It was very sad. Well, apart from Georgie and wee Lizann, she herself was the only Jappy left, and it was up to her to make things up to him. Once he let her know his address, she would write to him every week.

As Robbie walked away, he couldn’t get over how little the kitchen had changed. He could picture Hannah with the creel on her back standing on the clootie rug in front of the fire to let him sketch her. He had not been entirely truthful with Jenny. After leaving he had sent a letter to Hannah, a letter of hopeful apology, but she hadn’t replied. He had been convinced that Willie Alec had destroyed it without her ever seeing it, but it was possible that she hadn’t wanted to answer. And he should be thankful for that. After all, if she had run away with him to conduct an illicit affair, which is what he had hoped, he would never have left home, would never have made his name as an artist.

Robbie smiled suddenly. The head of a publishing firm had asked him some years ago if he had thought of writing his autobiography. He had said no at the time, but having had the memories of his young manhood so vividly recalled – he had actually felt again the see-sawing of his love for Hannah and his hopes that she might love him, the heartbreak of her rejection which had made him run off to London, the misery of living in poverty until people with influence took notice of his paintings – he realized that the first part of a book was waiting to be written and he was itching to get started. Hannah’s childlike belief that kissing would make her pregnant, even though she had already conceived and given birth to one child, would not be the only element which would make his book different from run-of-the-mill life stories. There was his seafaring background. He would describe how, over the course of two years, his mother had lost her husband and two of her sons to the sea, which was why she had encouraged him in his ambition to be an artist and had kept his early sketches of family and friends. Most of them were still in the attic, according to his sister, who had given up a good job in a Glasgow hospital to nurse their mother in her last illness and now lived in the family home in Cliff Terrace, a spinster, but neither lonely nor sourly old. Unfortunately, the only sketch that would be of any value, the one he still considered his finest because of the love he had felt for his subject, was lost to him. Probably Willie Alec had burnt it to save Hannah being reminded of her folly … poor, naive Hannah!

He had never stopped loving her … but perhaps it had not been love, just nostalgia for his youth. He had loved his Dora as a man, though he had been disappointed that she had not borne him a son to perpetuate his line. Not that he would have cared if it hadn’t been a son …

The next thought to enter Robbie’s mind made him stop with his hand on his heart. A strong pulse was beating in his throat, but he came to the conclusion that it was too momentous a decision to rush. He would have to take time to think it over properly. In fact he might be better not even to mention it to Pearl when he got back, but wait until he had settled down in London again before giving it his full consideration. There was no fool like an old fool, as they said, and having been such a fool in his youth, he had no wish to repeat the degradation of rebuttal.

‘Are you all right?’ Pearl asked anxiously when he went in. ‘I was beginning to worry with you being away so long.’

‘I’m fine, just a bit tired.’ Wondering how much he should tell her, he plumped for absolute honesty. He would go over everything that had been said, however much it might shock her, but there was no need to mention what he had been thinking just before he arrived home.

Having suspected at the time how he had felt about Hannah, Pearl was not shocked at that. It saddened her that Hannah and Willie Alec had died while she was in Glasgow, and George Buchan and Mick Jappy, though she hadn’t known them. She was intrigued by Lizann’s disappearance, and the shock only came when Robbie told her about Elsie Tait’s life and death. ‘I hope Jenny’s not like her?’ she asked, afraid for her brother.

Before her first day was finished, Lizann was on Christian name terms with most of the gutters, who ranged in age from fifteen to sixty. Quite a few had husbands in the forces, and the majority of single girls were younger than she was, but age and marital status made no difference to them. The girl who worked next to her was soon talking to her as if they were old friends. Gladys Wright, red-haired and as thin as a rake, could not be described as pretty, but her bright blue eyes, pert nose and wide mouth gave her an appealing attractiveness.

On the Saturday morning, their half-day, Gladys remarked, ‘You’ve got a wedding ring on. Is your hubby in the services?’

‘I wondered why you never spoke about him. Mine’s a prisoner of war, so God knows how long it’ll be till I see him again. What about coming to the pictures with me tonight?’

‘I’d better wait to see if I can afford it,’ Lizann smiled. ‘I’ve my board to pay before I do anything else.’

When the wages were given out, she was pleasantly surprised. After paying Mrs Melville and laying past what she needed for bus fares, she would have enough to save something for clothes and still have a few shillings to spend. Gladys was delighted when she said she’d love to go to the pictures, and they arranged to meet outside the Capitol.

This was the beginning of a close friendship, and the two young women discovered that they both liked the same kind of films, often coming out of a cinema and walking down the street singing a song from the musical they had just seen. Other people smiled at their infectious gaiety, and the servicemen who tried to date them were turned down nicely.

‘I’m glad to see you so happy,’ Mrs Melville said, when Lizann went in one Saturday night. ‘Have you found a lad?’

‘Gladys and me don’t need lads,’ Lizann smiled. ‘We’ve enough fun on our own.’

‘Aye, but she’ll have her man coming back after the war,’ Mrs Melville pointed out, ‘and you’ll have nobody.’

‘You’re still young, though. I’ve just been a widow for five years and I know how lonely it can be. Just think how you’ll feel by the time you reach sixty, with nobody to bother about you. I’ve got two lassies, but they’re both in England and can’t come to see me very often. That’s why I always take female lodgers.’

‘Gladys’ll still be my friend after her man comes back, and anyway I’ll always have you.’

Sorry now at having pricked Lizann’s happy bubble, her landlady gave a little laugh. ‘Ach, I’ll maybe live till I’m a hundred.’

His hand trembling, Peter laid the letter from his mother-in-law down on the counterpane. Elsie was dead! Mrs Slater had been very careful not to desecrate her daughter’s memory, but he could read between the lines. Why had his wife stayed two nights in Elgin, if not to be with some man or other? She’d been up to her old tricks again, and he felt no sorrow, no jealousy, only relief that he was free of her. She would have left him in any case when he was sent home, a useless wreck with just one leg. But … maybe she’d been notified about that and had walked out on him before he returned. That could be why she left their children with her parents. She had told her mother it was only for two days, but she could lie like a trooper. He had years of experience of that.

Leaning back, he closed his eyes wearily. He had known from the time he went into the Navy that he wouldn’t have her to depend on if he was invalided out, but he’d never thought he would be incapacitated to this extent. Oh, the doctors told him he’d be able to walk again when he had the prosthesis fitted, but he had his doubts about that, so what would happen when he was finally discharged? Would they send him to some home for cripples, where he would be confined until he died of old age?

It would have been better if he’d been lost, like most of his shipmates. He would never forget the agonies of the night the torpedoes hit them. He had been speaking to Mick just minutes before the first one struck, and he’d been horrified at the thought of all the engineers trapped below decks. Then the ship had been blown to pieces by a second, taking half his leg with it. He had still been conscious, just, hanging on grimly to a bunk attached to its wooden surround when the survivors were picked up. He didn’t remember anything after that, not until he came to in a hospital in Gib. The first thing he did was to ask about Mick, and when he learned that his old friend had gone, he nearly went out of his mind and they’d had to keep him under sedation.

Next day the surgeons had amputated a bit more of his leg, and after giving him some time to recover from the shock, he had been sent to this naval hospital in Plymouth. He’d been here for weeks now, but his mail had only just caught up with him: a few letters from Elsie which didn’t tell him anything, and one from her mother – the fateful one.

That night, with everything fresh in his mind, Peter had a fearsome dream, in which Elsie was bobbing around him in the sea and laughing her head off at his attempts to reach a big double bed behind her. Then an aircraft carrier ran them down and her head was floating past him with the eye sockets empty. Screaming and thrashing about, he woke up to find two sick-berth attendants holding him down.

‘Good God, Tait,’ one of them exclaimed, releasing him and wiping the sweat from his own brow. ‘You nearly had my head off then, throwing your arms about like that.’

Peter recoiled at the reference to a head, and muttered, ‘I’m sorry. I’d a nightmare.’

Having to settle some poor devil every night, the other orderly said, ‘That’s okay, pal. We’re used to it.’ He flexed his aching arm muscles.

When the two men walked away, Peter remembered what he and Mick had been talking about in those last few minutes. His dreams of searching for Lizann after the war had gone down with his ship, but at least he could keep the promise he’d made to his best friend … his late friend. Whatever happened, however he would manage to get there, supposing it was in a wheelchair, he would have to go to Buckie to make sure that Jenny was coping without her husband.

With a purpose to his existence now, he was more co-operative with the doctors and attendants, who couldn’t understand what had brought about the change in him.

The afternoon bombing of the harbour area was really frightening, and Lizann was glad that her fellow workers were so used to having to run to an air-raid shelter that they could make fun of it. She certainly didn’t find it funny hearing explosions coming closer and closer, and praying they wouldn’t be killed by a direct hit. But at last the danger was over and they went back to work.

Mrs Melville was full of it that evening. ‘Was anywhere near you hit this time? I was worried with you working so near the docks.’

Lizann tried to allay her fears. ‘We’ve to go to the shelter when the sirens blow, so we’re quite safe.’

‘But there was a good few bombers today, and I mind June 1940, when there was only one, and by gum, he didn’t half do a lot of damage. He hit Hall Russell’s yard, you know, the shipbuilders, and killed over thirty men in the boiler room. Then he started dropping bombs all over the place, till the Spitfires got after him and shot him down at the new skating rink. There was a lot of sore hearts in Aberdeen that day.’

‘I never thought it would be anything like that,’ Lizann murmured. ‘It was awful hearing the explosions, and we were all huddled together. We cheered when the noise died down, for we just thought of ourselves, not the poor people that got it.’

‘You know,’ Mrs Melville said, thoughtfully, ‘you’re not safe working there, Lizann. The Nazis have bases in Norway now, that’s nearer here, so they’ll likely come a lot oftener, and they’ll always be after the harbour.’

‘They’re not scaring me into giving up my job,’ Lizann declared. ‘I’ll take my chances, the same as everybody else there.’

‘Aye, and I suppose it doesn’t really matter where you are, we’re all in the front line now.’

Each time he heard of a raid on Aberdeen, Dan wished that he had tried harder to stop Lizann from going there. If he had known where she lived he would have taken her back to Easter Duncairn by force, if necessary. Ella’s letters, however, made him realize that most of the rumours going round of wholesale damage to the city every day had little foundation, or were greatly exaggerated.

Never completely free of worry for the girl he loved, he did his best to concentrate on the work of the farm, which was much easier since he got the Ferguson tractor, even with several of his men off to the war. He was showing a higher profit than ever before. Most of the vegetables he grew now were sold to shops in the larger towns, and he’d needed some sort of vehicle to make deliveries, but with buying the tractor, all he could afford was a rattly old Ford lorry. Still, it did the job.

Dan was dreading the harvest, but when the time came, all the farmers in the area rallied round to help each other. He thought it strange that it took a war for this to happen, though he felt guilty that it was so. Young Alice, the daughter of his cattleman whom he had hired after Lizann left, had proved her worth by ferrying out what old Meggie and the cooks from the Mains and Wester Duncairn made for the workers, although she and the other maids flirted shamelessly with old men and young boys alike.

Having waited impatiently for months for his artificial limb, Peter was delighted to be told on 20 November that he should have it the next morning, and he pictured himself being on his feet by Christmas.

The reality, however, was a bitter disappointment. The fitting was agony, and when he put his weight on his leg, an excruciating pain shot right up through his body forcing him to sit down again, sweat beading on his brow. ‘I’ll never cope with this,’ he gasped.

The specialist looked at him sympathetically. ‘It’ll take time, but it will get easier. But we’ll leave it today, and the therapist will start working with you tomorrow.’ Kneeling down, he unstrapped the metal leg.

Left alone again, Peter thought it had all been a waste of time and money. He would never walk on that thing. How could anybody expect him to suffer like that for the rest of his life? Then Mick came into his mind. Poor dead Mick. At least he was alive and had a duty to do. He must keep his promise to his friend.

The therapist persevered with him for an hour a day, and in just over a week he mastered the art of taking a few steps using crutches. It took another fortnight of grim persistence, and many falls, for him to hobble about slowly with just one crutch, and he eventually cast that aside, determined to arrive at Jenny’s door under his own steam. He could sort out his own life after he’d sorted out hers.