As the lowering, ash-grey skies of winter lifted and the buds of spring hazed green about the bare, pen-drawn line of twig and branch, Molly felt herself improving with every day. The brightness had returned to her face, her step was brisk again. She went back to Richmond and Co. and was greeted with pleasant fussiness by Mr Vassal and a cool lack of enthusiasm by Owen Jenkins, whose attitude conveyed with no doubt whatsoever that her weakness in falling prey to illness simply confirmed his original poor opinion of her.
But not even Owen Jenkins could depress her now. The weeks flew by, the year advanced, the sun rose higher and days lengthened. No longer did she leave home in bleak darkness and return long after night had again closed in on the world; spring drew fresh green from the earth, painted a high, pale sky. And for Molly, a country child who had seen the blazing beauty of every season many times over in the bright hills and soft valleys of Ireland, no season had ever seemed as lovely as this city spring which in truth barely changed the physical face of the world in which she now lived, but which for her sang in the air and in her own blood with equal vigour. She felt herself alive and happy, as if she had emerged herself from the earth into sunshine, as had the spring flowers.
Sundays lit the week like a beacon; and after the first few weeks she was too honest to try to pretend that it was simply her delight in the company of the whole Benton clan that made these days so precious. It was the possibility of seeing Harry, of being near him, watching him, arguing, laughing. Not that she did not love them all. Her affection for Sarah would never waver, she looked on her as a mother; Nancy was a friend whose companionship she cherished; Edward with his cherub’s face and mischief of the devil in his eyes she loved dearly. Charley treated her as he did Nancy, with a warm and sometimes patronizing brotherliness – he was courting now and his attention was for the moment concentrated wholly upon a young lady who did not, unfortunately, appear to be over-impressed by it. Only Jack seemed a little reserved with her, and Molly found herself wondering if he approved of her as wholeheartedly as the rest of the family seemed to; for though his quiet smile and few words were never less than civil, of all of them he was the only one in whose company she sometimes felt a little awkward and ill-at-ease, an outsider again, although she was certain this was never his intention. Catching the intense blue of his eyes upon her she once or twice wondered if Harry had spoken of what she had told him of Danny and Sean, if, perhaps, Jack misunderstood and in his capacity as head of the family he saw in her a threat. She hoped not.
She never mentioned her family at all, and no one questioned her; in fact as week followed week the thought of them dimmed and she discovered that even the aching memory of Sean was easing, as the bright colour fades from a pressed flower. She felt it happening, and after a while understood why; Harry again. She faced the thought squarely and finally on a Sunday morning in April when she had arrived at the Bentons’ to discover that Harry had stayed with a friend overnight and would not be coming home at all that day. She was totally unprepared for the way in which the light seemed to seep from the day at the thought of the long hours without him. There had been other times when he had been out, and when he was at home he did not always spend his time with her; but on those other occasions that he had been expected home she had, half-unconsciously, been able to listen for his returning step, his lifted, laughing voice, and then simply to know that he was there had been enough. To discover his absence unexpectedly and to endure it for the whole day was like a physical blow; a complete week, a lifetime to wait before she would see him again. The strength of her own disappointment astonished her.
That afternoon as she walked with Nancy through the April gardens of West Ham Park she was singularly quiet, but as it happened, the customarily observant Nancy noticed nothing. Nor for her part did the quite frequently unobservant Molly notice that her friend had little to say – although later, when the time came for Molly to walk to the bus stop to catch the evening bus home she was startled from her own preoccupation when Nancy excused herself from walking with her, as was their habit, on the grounds that she was going to church. Molly opened her mouth to question this unusual circumstance, then noticing Sarah’s raised and expressive eyebrows and Charley’s smothered grin, to say nothing of the defensive colour that had risen in Nancy’s fine-boned face, she shut it again, unwilling to embarrass the other girl.
That evening Molly sat for a long time in her bow window watching the sun as it dropped in a glow of apricot from the sky and she admitted at last to herself that her feelings for Harry were neither purely friendly nor in the least brotherly. As the short evening spent its light and darkness shadowed the streets below she tried to bring to sensible order emotions that were an absurd tangle of elation and desperate misgiving. She could no longer deny the enormous physical attraction that Harry exerted upon her. She could call to mind now, as clearly as if he were in the room, the texture of his skin and hair, which always made her want to reach and touch it, the set of his head on the wide, strong column of his neck, the strength of sweeping bone beneath the dark skin, the bright arrogant blue of his eyes within the shadowed, almost girlish lashes. Even his flaws for her simply enhanced his attraction; his mouth, a little too hard, a little too selfish, the sudden, flaring temper that reminded her so much of her own father – as did the occasional self-centred blindness that made him seemingly unaware of the feelings of others. What mattered beyond the warmth of his smile, the light-muscled strength of his body? She was surprised at how much she knew of him; the way he moved, the way he sat, the various tones of his voice, all were stored in some mysterious memory of which until now she had been hardly aware herself. Above all she was astonished at her own reactions to the thought of him, at the restless stirring of her nerves, the until-now unknown feeling of physical weakness that swept her. Nothing she had felt for Sean had been like this; his presence had been a comfort, a reassurance and a promise for the future; there had been no spark of danger, no hurt, no threat of harm as somehow she sensed in Harry. In him was a restlessness that would not be stilled by love; of all things, Molly was certain of that As night slipped unnoticed through the window and filled the room about her with shifting dark, Molly brooded upon the almost obsessive excitement in Harry’s voice when he had spoken of his friend the Fenian; she remembered the usually shaded and often lazy eyes wide and lit with intolerable excitement in that split moment before her own distress had reached him as she spoke of the deaths of Danny and Sean. She could have found Harry’s like at any clandestine meeting of her father’s. Not so beautiful, perhaps, and hardened by vastly different circumstance, but the same, and she knew it. She pulled a wry face at the irony, and shifted in her chair, suddenly aware of stiffening muscles and a chill in the air. It was full dark now, and becoming cold; her fire had died to glowing embers.
She drew the curtains, pulled back the bedclothes and began to step from her clothes, folding them carefully as she always did, shivering as the cold air crept to her skin. Down to her drawers and corset she reached for her voluminous nightdress. The flash of her movement in the mirror caught her eye; she stood for a moment, the nightdress in her hand. Faintly she could see her own reflection, white skin, white clothes, wide eyes silvered by the dying fireglow. Almost without volition she dropped the nightgown back onto the bed and walked without taking her eyes from her reflection to the long mirror, where, slowly and deliberately, she unlaced the corset, stepped out of the drawers and stood naked in the dim light, staring at herself, a fierce excitement rising in her, warming her chilled skin as she stared at the stranger in the bloodily fire-lit glass.
The stranger stared defiantly back.
For moments she stood so before, shivering and with sudden angry movements, she dragged her nightdress over her head and hurried into the cold bed.
It was a couple of weeks later, during the planning of the promised outing to Epping Forest, that Nancy’s secret came out.
It was early May. The weather had warmed and settled and Charley announced triumphantly that he had arranged with a friend to borrow a horse and cart that would carry all of them and a picnic to the glades of Epping the following Sunday.
“The Forest!” Edward’s eyes looked as if he had seen a vision of heaven. “All day?”
“That’s right, our kid,” Charley said, swinging him round with easy strength. “Coming?”
“Mind the lamp, Charley,” said his mother mildly. “You’ll brain the child. And how many mouths am I supposed to be feeding on this famous day out?”
Charley sat Edward on the table, perched beside him, counting off on his fingers.
“Well, there’s you and our kid, Nancy and Molly, Jack and Harry, me, Bill’ll have to come of course, since it’s his cart and—” he paused.
“And?” his mother asked, smiling.
“Well, I did wonder if Annie’d like to come—” Charley’s patient courtship of Annie Melhurst had over the past couple of weeks finally shown some signs of success. His not altogether altruistic motives for organizing a day in the wilds of Epping Forest dawned on them all at about the same moment and there were several broad grins in evidence.
“Not that you’ve asked her yet?” asked Sarah, straightfaced and innocent.
“As a matter of fact – I did – well, mention it to her—”
“And?”
He grinned. “Count her in. Wait till you meet her, Mam, you’ll love her.”
“So that’s—” Sarah counted “—nine?”
“That’s right.”
“I hope it’s a big cart.”
“Big enough to take another half a dozen. Anyone want to invite anyone else?” The question was casual.
“I might.” Nancy’s voice, very small, drew every eye in the room to its bright-faced owner. “That is, I don’t know if he’ll—”
“He?” Harry was staring at her in astonishment. “He who?”
“He who she’s been going to church with every Sunday, thickhead,” Charley was shouting with laughter. “Hell, Harry, you’re blind as a bat sometimes. He who walks her home from work and leaves her at the corner so that he doesn’t have to face her wild brothers. He who—”
“Charley, that’ll do.” Sarah’s eyes were sympathetic upon her daughter’s unusually rosy face. “I don’t hear anyone tormenting you about your Annie. What do you think, Nance? Would he like to come?”
“He might. I’d like to ask him. I’ve been meaning to bring him home, but it’s difficult; he’s rather shy, and—” She looked at Charley, who snorted and was silenced by a glance from his mother.
“Well, I think you’re right, this seems as good a chance as any for him to meet us all, if he can stand it. So that’s ten, with Nancy’s young man. Let’s hope the sun shines.”
Molly smiled absently, her eyes upon Harry as he leaned forward teasingly to his sister. A day, a whole day in the forest. What did it matter if the sun shone or not?
As it happened the sun did shine, spasmodically, but enough to deck the day in brightness and to further lift spirits that were already flying like kites in a spring wind. They gathered at the door, waiting for the cart: Molly, Sarah, Edward, Jack, Harry, Nancy and her young man, two enormous picnic baskets and a pile of cushions and blankets. Charley had already left to collect the cart, his friend Bill and his even more important friend Annie. Edward was beside himself with excitement; he talked incessantly of Charley’s promise that he should ride on the driver’s bench with Bill, dashed backwards and forwards from the doorway getting under everyone’s feet, waving enough of an assortment of bats and balls to stock a shop. Molly smiled at him, herself aglow with happy excitement. She had lived on penny pies for a week and on the proceeds had bought herself a new straw boater decorated with a wide scarlet band and a bunch of shining cherries, and the unrestrained approval of the assembled Bentons – especially Harry’s – as she had walked through the door with the early summer sunshine had given this special day the right start. Nancy too had a boater, hers garlanded with marguerites, the same flower that she wore in the lapel of her dark blue jacket She looked more soft and feminine than Molly had ever seen her; she had done her often somewhat severe hair differently and her cheeks were flushed becomingly. As they stood at the door Molly took the chance covertly to study the young man who was the obvious cause of her friend’s transformation. Joe Taylor had surprised Molly when she had first met him; the immediate impression he gave was of cold and rather humourless severity. He was slight-built and had a thin, regularly featured, rather handsome face. He rarely spoke, had a somewhat forbidding smile, and Molly could not rid herself of the feeling that although he was with the excited group in no way was he a part of it, that he viewed the proceedings as frivolous and lacking in dignity. Then she shrugged her hasty judgement aside. It was hardly fair to jump to such conclusions; the Bentons could be a little overwhelming under calmer circumstances than these.
“They’re here! Here they are.” Edward’s shriek echoed and re-echoed down a street lit with scudding sunlight and drifting cloud-shadow. Around the corner plodded a great black-and-white carthorse with enormous silk-fringed hooves and a mane gaily plaited with ribbons exactly the colour of the cherries on Molly’s new hat. Behind him rolled the cart, a wide farm wagon brightly painted with fruit and vegetables, the flat platform sides overhanging the wheels, the driver’s bench high in the front over the body of the cart. Three grinning figures were perched on the bench: the driver – who could only be Bill, an enormous figure in flat cloth cap and a jacket of the loudest check Molly had ever seen – and Charley, who had his arm around the waist of a girl as tall and thin as a bean stick and who had a face like a flower and a mop of bright red hair.
“Well, well,” Harry said softly, admiration in his voice and in his eyes as he looked at Annie Melhurst. “Looks as if our Charley’s done it this time. That ’un’ll keep him in order right enough.”
When the cart had rolled to a halt outside the door, there was a flurry of introductions and squeals of excitement. Charley swung tall Annie as if she had been a child down from the driving bench and sat her in the corner of one of the two long benches that had been set along the sides of the cart, then vaulted down to join her. He reached a huge hand and hauled Nancy up beside him, nodded in friendly fashion to Joe, who with neat and economical movements swung himself over the tail of the wagon and settled himself straight-backed next to Nancy on the end of the bench. Jack had already set Edward beside the driver and before he climbed up beside the child he lifted Molly onto the other bench in the corner opposite Annie and helped Harry to steady Sarah as she climbed a little stiffly into the cart. Then up came the baskets, the blankets and the cushions which were distributed amongst the passengers to stuff down between themselves and the hard wooden sides of the cart. Harry was the last to swing aboard, pulling up and fastening the tail of the cart behind him before he settled himself next to Molly. He wriggled for a moment, as if in discomfort, put his hand behind him and with apparently enormous effort brought out a huge turnip which he looked at with comically astonished eyes.
“Tell you what, Bill—” Harry said to the driver, who turned, grinning, “—I’m damned glad you’re not a fishmonger.”
The roars of laughter that greeted this were out of all proportion to the joke. Jack, smiling, turned from his perch on the driving bench, counted heads and baskets, asked “All set?” then waved a hand. “Off we go.”
As the cart jerked into motion Harry reached a casual, steadying arm around Molly’s shoulders. Ignoring Nancy’s knowing, happy eyes, Molly smiled.
The day stretched ahead of them like a promise.
They rode laughing through the streets to London’s forest, following unknowing in the wake of lords and ladies, kings and queens, huntsmen of bygone days; and no company before them could have been gayer. Talking, laughing, even sometimes singing, they made their swaying way through streets that became less familiar as they moved further from home, their merriment drawing smiling glances from passers-by. Even Joe Taylor unbent enough, Molly noticed, to pass a civil word with Harry; and as for Charley’s Annie, by the time they had gone a mile they all felt as if they had known her all their lives. She had the readiest tongue that Molly had ever heard, and a down-to-earth wit and infectious laugh that was impossible to resist. Charley beamed, obviously gratified, his arm around Annie’s shoulders, unable to get a word in edgewise and loving every moment of it.
When they finally reached Epping there was a lively argument as to how far into the forest they should venture, and where to stop. In the end Bill guided the creaking wagon down a rutted track and a little way into the woodlands before rolling to a halt in a fair-sized glade unoccupied by any other Sunday picnickers.
Their voices died and even Annie’s laughter was muted for a moment. Above the lacework of fresh leaves the sunlit white clouds raced across a watercolour sky. The grass was soft and lush and a little damp; in the near distance a sea of gentlest blue lapped to the roots of the ancient trees; bluebells, thousands of them, scenting the air and easing dust-filled eyes with their colour.
“It’s lovely! Oh, it’s lovely,” Nancy said very softly.
“Right, everyone,” Harry said briskly, “Let’s get ourselves sorted. Come on, Moll, down you come. Hand the basket out, Mam—”
In no time they had established themselves beneath the wide-spreading branches of an oak tree, the blankets laid out, cushions scattered, the baskets hidden on the shady side of the tree. Sarah set herself comfortably, her back to the tree, and reached for her knitting.
“That’s me settled. You youngsters do what you like – back here to eat at one.”
“Cricket!” Edward swung his bat around his head, to the imminent peril of anyone near him, “Come on, our Jack, you promised. Bill, too—”
“Let’s all play.” It was Annie, her pretty face alight with mischief. “There’s plenty of room.” She looked at Charley, who had opened his mouth to speak. “We can go for a walk later, Charley,” she said equably, reading his mind like a printed page. “After lunch. The kid wants to play cricket.”
They played cricket, or rather their own particular version of the game, for nearly two hours. Except for Joe, who was out first bowl and declined to bat again, the male members of the party could not resist showing their prowess and the ball flew skittering through leaves and branches, bouncing off trees, losing itself wilfully in brambles and nettle patches. The girls, refusing with one voice to have a partner run for them, lifted hobbling skirts and ran like hares between the makeshift stumps. Edward, in his element, made up the rules as he went along, was out three times before he finally and with reluctance relinquished the bat. Their voices echoed through the woodland like children’s, and Sarah, watching them, smiled.
At last, still laughing and dishevelled, they threw themselves down beneath the tree where Sarah had laid the picnic and tucked into cold meat and cheese, pickles and hunks of buttered bread as if they had not eaten for a week – which, in Molly’s case, thanks to the now-abandoned boater, was not far from the truth. They washed down the feast with cider and lemonade and then, the edge taken from their appetites, nibbled at cakes and fruit, enjoying the dappled sunshine as it glittered down through the canopy of branches above them.
“Why does food always taste so much better out of doors?” Nancy leaned against a log, her eyes closed. On the other side of the tablecloth Bill, Jack and Charley were engaged in their own conversation.
Annie plucked at a blade of grass. “Because you don’t have to do the washing up afterwards,” she said absently, one ear tuned to the men’s conversation, the beginnings of a frown on her expressive face. “What’re you nattering about over there?”
They did not hear her.
“—and the only way to prevent that—” said Bill, smacking a huge fist into his open hand, “—is to organize. Charley’s right there, you know, Jack. If it wasn’t for the dock unions you wouldn’t have—”
“What!” Annie was on her feet in a trice and marching with a flash of petticoat on the three reclining forms. “What’s that? Unions? I should think so!” She buried a none-too-gentle hand in Charley’s mass of hair and pulled. “You wanted a walk? We’ll go for a walk. Now.” Charley scrambled painfully to his feet, willy-nilly. She poked him in the chest with a long bony finger. “Unions indeed? On a day like this? Let me tell you, Charley Benton, that if you take me on there’ll be less of this Union lark!”
Bill smothered an explosion of laughter. Charley kicked him.
“Come on,” Annie said, smiling like an angel, and took his arm, laughing into his reddened face, “let’s see if the trees look the same on the other side of that path—”
As the others, smiling, watched their retreating backs through the trees Joe Taylor cleared his throat awkwardly. “I thought,” he said formally to Sarah, “that, if you wouldn’t mind, Nancy and I might also—?” he looked to the spot where Annie and Charley had disappeared; Annie’s laughter still drifted back to them through the dim reaches of the woodland.
“Of course, lad. Off you go.” Sarah reached comfortably for her knitting.
As he and Nancy left Jack stirred.
“Coming to find that bird’s nest, our kid?” Edward, cake in hand, scrambled to his feet. Jack’s eyes moved to Molly. “Would you like to come with us?”
Molly was caught. “I—” she stammered, not looking at Harry, “I – think perhaps—” in the silence the birds sang very loud, “—perhaps I ought to stay and help your mother clear away the picnic—?”
“Rubbish.” A strong hand caught hers, lifted her to her feet. Harry’s eyes gleamed in sunlight. “I thought you said you wanted to pick some bluebells?”
“I—” she hadn’t mentioned the bluebells. “Yes, I did, but—” Her heart was pounding.
“Well, come on, then. Mam won’t mind, will you Mam?”
Sarah, smiling, shook her head.
Hairy bent and picked up the discarded boater. “You’ll have to put this on, though. You can’t go buying a hat like this and not wear it.” He settled it on her head, laughed as it bounced on her massed, coal-black curls. “The prettiest hat for the prettiest girl.” He was warm and vital as the afternoon itself, his hand in hers was the happiest thing she had ever known. “If we aren’t back in three days,” he said solemnly to his mother, “send for Sergeant McIntosh.”
“You behave yourself.”
“I always do. Don’t I?” He drew Molly towards the path that ran into the woods in the opposite direction from that taken by the others. “Well, almost always.”
If Molly could have stopped the world she would have done it at the moment when the voices of their companions died behind them and the forest sounds – the birdsong, the rustle of their slow footsteps in last year’s leaves were the only things to be heard. She had not dared to hope, had almost forcibly stopped herself from thinking about the possibility of such a situation: herself and Harry wandering alone through the sweet-smelling early summer’s afternoon.
He bent his head to look at her.
“You’re very quiet. You aren’t mad with me, are you?”
“Mad?” The thought had not crossed her mind.
“For telling fibs about the bluebells. For making you come with me—?”
“Oh, no.” She did not care how eager she sounded, could not anyway prevent it. “I wanted to. I just didn’t want—” she stopped.
“—to go bird’s nesting with Jack.” In the shadows beneath the trees his skin stood very dark against the white of his shirt, the blue of his eyes.
She ducked her head, flushing. “That’s right. ’Tis awful of me I suppose.” As always in times of stress the Irish in her voice sang louder than usual.
“Awful?” He laid an arm across her shoulders, pulled her to him as they walked; her curly head did not reach his chin. “I don’t think so—”
They strolled in silence down the forest paths, each extraordinarily aware of the other, of the still beauty of the woodlands, pierced by the shafting gold of sunlight.
“’Tis a miracle,” said Molly at last, her quiet voice a shout in the still air, “that such a place should exist so very close to London—” she turned and tilted her head to look at him, almost unaware that they had stopped walking.
He did not answer; his eyes, very serious, were on her pale, upturned face; with the slightest pressure of his arm he turned her to face him. As he bent to her mouth she reached eagerly upon tiptoe to him. His lips were as she had imagined them: hard and warm and sharply demanding.
Then as suddenly as they had come together they stepped apart, Harry still holding her hands. Above them in the branches a bird sang, piercingly sweet; someone, far in the distance, called.
“Molly,” he said and smiled, white teeth against brown, smooth skin. “Dear little Irish Molly—” There was excitement in his eyes, painful urgency in his hands. She moved to him again, metal to a magnet.
Unnoticed the small straw hat fell into the bluebells, the bright cherries winking in the sun.
When, with the dipping sun painting the laced treetops with fire, they returned some time later to the picnic spot, they were guided by challenging voices. Everyone was there, and to Molly’s relief too absorbed in a heated discussion to throw more than a cursory glance in the newcomers’ direction as they joined the group, though it seemed to Molly that Jack’s piercing gaze seemed for a moment longer than most to rest upon her wild hair and heightened colour, the grass-stained boater she carried in her hand, before he returned to the fray.
“Do you really believe, then, that these Boers could defeat the British Army?” The question was more interested than outraged. “With no properly organized army of their own? The newspapers call them a rabble—”
“The newspapers are wrong.” Joe Taylor’s well-modulated voice was calm. “The Boers might be bull-headed but they aren’t stupid and they aren’t cowards. They are convinced they have been wronged, and they believe that God fights beside them.”
Charley, lying on a blanket with his head in Annie’s lap and a tall stalk of grass between his lips, laughed. “Seems to me I’ve heard that before. Fat lot of good it’ll do them when the bullets start to whistle.”
Joe took no notice of the interruption. “And if they are forced to fight,” he continued earnestly, “they’ll be fighting for their homes, their families, their land, their survival as a nation – at least that’s what they believe. And they’re probably right. That’ll mean a sight more than cannons and fancy uniforms.”
Nancy reached up a hand and drew Molly down beside her; Harry squatted on his heels behind them, his face suddenly intent and frowning.
“Joe’s brother’s just come back from South Africa,” Nancy whispered. “He’s a missionary there. He thinks there’s going to be a war—”
Bill rolled onto his stomach, plucking at the tufts of grass. “Hellfire, you’re surely not serious? There isn’t an army in the world could beat the British at the moment. Look at India—”
“—the Sudan—” Jack put in.
“—Aldershot—” Charley said, grinning, and was rewarded by a sharp clip with a bluebell from Annie.
“They aren’t an army.” Joe’s voice held the patience of a man talking to children. “They don’t pretend to be an army. They are just men, like you and me; husbands, fathers, brothers, who have been pushed too far, men who have a tradition of self-reliance, self-defence. They are hard men, they have to be for the life they lead; their commandos won’t be easily defeated. They have pride and courage.”
“And we don’t?” Harry’s sudden voice was raw with anger, jarring amongst the reasonable tones of the others. Nancy and Molly turned with one movement to look at him. Colour burned on his cheekbones. He was looking at Joe Taylor with anger sparking every line of his face. “Is that what you’re trying to say? Well, let’s wait and see about that. I’ll tell you this for nothing. If those bloody Dutch farmers attack the British settlers they’ll regret it. They won’t know what’s hit them.” There was an awkward silence. Joe, whatever his opinions, was a family guest; Harry’s angry tone had verged on the insulting.
Joe said deprecatingly, “I’m not saying they’re braver. I’m saying that they know the country, that it is, after all, their home, they will be fighting literally on their own doorsteps.”
Jack nodded. “That’d make a difference, I grant you. But they’re on their own, Joe, aren’t they? They’ve no one to call on for any kind of help. They wouldn’t stand a chance, surely? Don’t they know that? When you think of our manpower—”
“Joe obviously thinks,” said Harry, his voice hard, “that the British Army won’t be able to deal with a few ragged-arsed Dutch farm boys. Does the government know this, Joe? P’raps you should offer them your services?”
The tone was too much for Nancy. “Perhaps you should, since you know so much about it,” she flashed angrily.
He eyed her stonily. “And perhaps I will.”
“What do I have to do,” asked Annie mildly, “to break up this bun-fight? Throw a fit?” She moved her legs and tipped Charley onto the grass. “If you must argue about something why don’t you argue about something sensible, like who gets the last of the cider?”
“No argument,” said Bill, the jug in his hand, “I do.”
Charley, still rolling, grabbed his legs. “That’s what you think.” As Bill tried to kick Charley off, Annie leaned forward and grabbed the jug neatly, sat hugging it and laughing as the other two rolled over and over in the grass.
Molly looked at Harry. He pulled a self-conscious and apologetic face and lifted his shoulders in a shrug, his quick temper dying; but the light of battle was still in his eyes. Molly sighed.
Nancy said, anger still in her, “What makes you so damn patriotic all at once?”
“That’ll do, Nance.” Jack’s voice was easy. “It’s not worth fighting about.”
Charley and Bill were still wrestling, only half-laughing; a flailing bundle of arms and legs, they rolled back and forth across the clearing, a danger to anyone or anything within yards of them.
“Right.” Still holding the cider jug Annie unfolded her long body and stood up. “That’ll do, I think.” And marching up to the wrestlers she poured the dregs of the cider indiscriminately over both of them. The ensuing pandemonium restored everyone’s good temper and by the time, in the dying evening light, they had packed up and climbed once more aboard the cart, the high words and talk of war had apparently been forgotten.
They were quiet on the journey home, their high spirits muted by tiredness. Edward rode in the wagon this time, his head in Sarah’s lap, asleep almost before they were out of the forest. Annie leaned into Charley’s shoulder, humming, her eyes soft on the child’s sleeping face. Nancy and Joe sat in quiet conversation, they might have been alone together. Molly sat close by Harry, the nearness and warmth of his body lighting her senses. She did not need to look at him. Everything about him was printed indelibly within her; she knew every line of his body, every expression on his face. As they settled for the journey he pulled her to him, drew her head to his shoulder. She caught Nancy’s smiling eyes and grinned back. As full darkness overtook them she felt his firm, stroking fingers on her neck, ached to turn her head and kiss him.
The trip was too short by hours; she could have stayed all night just so, ignoring the hard bench and the jolting of the cart, aware only of the man beside her. They went home by way of Upton Park; Jack directed Bill to Linsey Grove and they rolled to a gentle halt outside number twenty-six. Stiffly Molly sat up, careful not to disturb small Edward; soft goodnights and thank yous were spoken. Harry swung himself down from the cart and lifted her lightly after him. They stood by the gate for a moment, acutely aware of the others’ watching eyes.
“Goodnight, little Molly.”
She smiled, aching. Wasn’t he going to kiss her?
“I’ll see you next week.”
She nodded. In the downstairs window of the house a curtain twitched. With a swift movement he bent and dropped a light kiss on her cheek before turning and vaulting back onto the wagon.
“Off we go, Bill.”
She watched them move off into the darkness. As she turned at last and walked up the path, the street door opened.
“Did you have a nice day?” She could not see Sam’s face in the darkness. His voice was quiet.
“Lovely, thank you.” Her cheeks burned from the sun, her shoulders and back ached agonizingly from the jolting of the cart, her mouth felt bruised.
“Would you like a cup of tea?”
Oh Sam, Sam, you and your tea…! “No, thank you. I’m very tired.” Next Sunday seemed a full month away. But it would come.
With echoes of the day still singing in her bones she wearily climbed the stairs to her bed.