Sheila poured tea into her best china cups, nodding towards the plate on the table. ‘Help yourself to a slice of sponge cake, Margaret,’ she said, perhaps a little gruffly.
It had been a hectic day at the shop, with a delivery arriving late afternoon that had worn out her bad knee, and then she had been cashing up when she’d spotted the figure of her sister looming in the doorway. Now she’d brought out the best tea service from Arnie’s old sideboard, for goodness knows what reason. Her sister wasn’t a best tea service visitor. She was a chipped mug person, assuming she was offered a sip of bloomin’ tea at all.
Sheila gave a gusty sigh and shook her head at her own nonsensical thinking. Ever since she’d agreed to sit down for a brew with Margaret, she’d been regretting that rash decision. Yes, they were kin, but her sister had behaved so badly.
Lily would no doubt return later in the summer for Alice’s wedding, and the fact that Sheila was back in touch with her attacker’s wife would upset the poor girl and cause uproar in the family. And uproar was the last thing Sheila needed right now.
‘Thank you.’ Margaret took a thin slice of sponge cake and nibbled on it. She’d never had as much of an appetite as Sheila, even back when they were kids. No doubt because of that, and her thrifty ways, she wasn’t as broad in the beam as Sheila. ‘Though you called me Maggie when I visited you before.’
‘Eh?’ Sheila covered the teapot with a knitted cosy. ‘Oh, yes … Well, you called me Shee,’ she pointed out. ‘Long time since anyone did that.’
‘Don’t you like it?’
‘I’m a bit long in the tooth now to be anything but plain Sheila,’ she said flatly, and drew out the chair opposite her sister. She’d locked the shop door and put up the closed sign, so there was no danger of them being interrupted. ‘Listen, I know I said you could drop by for a cuppa. But there’s nothing I can do. After what happened with Lily, Violet would be furious if I helped you.’
‘And she’s got good reason,’ Margaret surprised her by saying. ‘I closed my eyes to what Stan was like. I let him get away with—’
‘Don’t!’ Sheila closed her eyes, swallowing. ‘I can’t bear to think of it. My poor granddaughter …’
After a brief silence, Margaret went on more quietly. ‘I didn’t try to help Violet when she took the girls away either. I should have put my foot down, made Stanley give them money towards new lodgings. Or driven her into Penzance, so she could speak to the evacuation housing officer.’ There was a faint flush in Margaret’s cheeks. ‘Instead, I let my own niece walk out of there with those two girls and all their luggage, and not a blessed word said.’
‘Violet did the right thing.’
‘I know she did.’ Margaret paused, peering at her. ‘She’s like you, Sheila. She always does the right thing.’
Sheila picked up her cup of tea, her gaze on the tablecloth. ‘Don’t you go buttering me up, Maggie, like you used to when we was kids and you wanted summat. I ain’t a child no more, and we ain’t proper family now. Not the way that word’s meant.’
Margaret gave a muffled gasp.
Shooting her a glance, Sheila was horrified to see her sister crying. She put down her teacup and sat in shock. Margaret wasn’t the crying sort. She didn’t even cry at funerals.
‘I’m sorry, but I … I’ve got nothing left to my name,’ Margaret choked. ‘If I can’t turn to my own sister … God help me, Shee. Do you need me to beg? Because I will. I’ll get down on my knees right here and beg if I must.’ Margaret was staring at her, tears coursing down her cheeks. ‘If you don’t help me, I might as well be dead.’
For once in her life, Sheila didn’t know what to say.
Two days after Margaret’s disturbing visit, Sheila was still undecided. She knew offering to help her sister would cause no end of ructions with her daughter, but what made her dilemma worse was not feeling able to ask Violet’s advice, for fear of the row that it would cause. She hated feeling like the weight of that decision rested on her shoulders alone …
She was at the vegetable rack, selecting a big leafy cabbage and some broad beans for a posh-spoken lady, picking out the best beans while she chatted about rationing and how strict government regulations were, when she caught a movement out of the corner of her eye.
Turning, she saw a grubby hand reach through the open doorway and grab a large pork pie she’d just unwrapped on the counter, ready for slicing into saleable portions.
‘’Ere, what d’you think you’re doing?’ she gasped.
But the thief had already darted out of the shop, taking the pork pie with him, before she’d even finished her question.
‘Oi!’ Furious, Sheila thrust the paper bag of broad beans at the lady she’d been serving, and hobbled as fast as she could across the shop.
But it was no good. She’d been up and down the cellar steps so frequently in recent weeks, fetching up heavy goods stored down there, that she’d put strain on her gammy knee, which was now hot and achy. It needed a good day’s rest, which was impossible, given how busy the shop was keeping her. Not being as quick on her pins as usual, by the time she was standing in the village street, hands on hips, glaring up and down the hill, there was beggar all sign of her thief.
‘Well, I don’t believe it,’ Sheila puffed angrily, limping back inside. ‘Did you see that? Someone just swiped my pork pie. A great big ’un too. Cost me a pretty penny, that did. The supplier only dropped it off this morning.’ Fuming, she collected the leafy green Savoy cabbage she’d picked out for the lady and carried it to the till, placing it alongside her other purchases. ‘You might expect that kind of carry on in Penzance, but here in Porthcurno?’
‘I couldn’t agree more.’ The customer placed her bag of broad beans on the counter and began rummaging in her plaid-covered shopping basket for her ration book.
‘What am I meant to do now, eh?’ Sheila weighed the broad beans and began stabbing at the heavy metal keys on the till, not paying much attention to what she was doing. She kept seeing that grubby hand reaching in through the door, and wished she’d been quicker and caught the little blighter. ‘I promised the coalman, Bert, a slice of that pork pie for his dinner tonight. He was coming in after work to collect it. Now I’ll have to disappoint him.’
Sheila felt close to tears, and so discombobulated by the whole episode that she tore out the ration coupons very poorly, undercharged the lady for the four off-ration bottles of milk stout she was also buying, and was too flustered to correct her mistake.
‘And I didn’t even get a good look at the little sod,’ she complained, knowing it was no good going to the police with so little information.
‘Didn’t you?’ The well to-do lady, whose name Sheila didn’t know, arched thin eyebrows at her. ‘He’s well known in the village. I’m surprised you didn’t recognise him.’
‘I didn’t bloomin’ see the rascal, he was in and out so fast.’ Sheila frowned. ‘Who is he, then?’
‘Mrs Treedy’s eldest boy, Jack. He’s always been a troublemaker. Got himself thrown out of Sunday School when he was only eight years old, and that’s quite an achievement. Reverend Clewson is a strong believer in compassion and turning the other cheek.’ The lady chewed on her lip. ‘Still, it’s true you can hardly blame the boy.’
‘Oh, can’t I?’ Sheila muttered rebelliously, helping to pack her basket.
‘Mrs Treedy lost her husband in the war and likely has no income beyond her widow’s pension. And with so many children … It’s a shame.’ The woman pursed thin lips. ‘But stealing is not only a crime, it’s a sin. So we can’t be too forgiving, can we?’
Sheila, who wasn’t sure she believed in sin, though she certainly believed in crime, abruptly remembered who this lady was. Another of the vicar’s cronies from the big posh houses beyond the village. She was also a regular churchgoer, unlike Sheila, who rarely bothered with church now that Arnie was no longer there to keep her company. Not that Sheila disapproved of prayers, in the general way, and she loved hymns, belting them out as loud as she could. But all that kneeling in a draughty old church played havoc with her joints.
‘Jack Treedy,’ she repeated bitterly. ‘Yes, I know who you mean, and I’ve seen the lad hanging about the shop. Not buying anything, of course. Just waiting for me to be distracted, so he could dash in and pinch summat.’ Sheila took a deep breath and tried to calm down. It was only a pork pie. But she knew something had to be done about it. Or he’d soon be back for more loot. ‘I’ll have to close the shop and pay a visit to his mother. If I go now, maybe I’ll get me pie back. Assumin’ he ain’t gobbled it already, that is.’
Sending the lady on her way with hurried thanks, Sheila dragged on her hat and cardigan, and then locked up the shop, not even bothering to remove her work apron and clogs, as she didn’t expect this mission to take long.
With a nod to a passing farmer on his tractor, she marched downhill and along the narrow, overgrown lane where a cluster of old cottages crowded together, higgledy-piggledy, out of sight of the main road. She knew from listening to local gossip that the Treedy family lived along that lane, and soon realised she’d tracked down her quarry on spotting two barefoot girls in pinafore dresses playing hopscotch in the dust outside one of the more unkempt, ramshackle cottages.
‘You not at school?’ she asked the older girl sharply, and was given a blank stare before the child ran inside the house, dragging her giggling younger sibling behind her.
‘Mam! Mam!’ the child piped in a high-pitched voice. ‘Visitor for you.’
Mrs Treedy herself appeared in the doorway, smoothing down dishevelled hair, a stricken look on her face as she realised who her ‘visitor’ was.
Yes, missus, Sheila thought crossly, folding her arms across a heaving chest. You may well look scared. Why, the woman was no better than horrid old Fagin in that Dickens story, sending kids out to beg and steal for her.
‘Your boy Jack just stole a pork pie from my shop,’ Sheila said without preamble.
‘Jack?’ Mrs Treedy called over her shoulder, not taking her eyes off Sheila. The boy slunk up behind her in the doorway and she glanced down at him. ‘Mrs Newton says you stole something from her shop. Is that true?’
The boy shrugged, looking away.
‘Go and get it,’ his mother told him, and he disappeared, coming back with Sheila’s pork pie. Her face fell on seeing it. ‘You idiot … Give it back to her.’
A surly look on his face, Jack trudged across the yard to hand back the pie. Sheila took it, saying nothing. She was still angry, but embarrassed now too.
As the boy tried to slip past his mother, Mrs Treedy told him shrilly, ‘Don’t you ever let me catch you stealing again, you hear?’
There was no more to say on the matter. Sheila had her pie back and it looked untouched.
Sheila turned away. But Mrs Treedy hurried after her. ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Newton. You won’t tell the police, will you?’ There was desperation in her voice. ‘Jack … He’s a good lad, at heart. And he was only trying to help me out.’
‘By stealing?’ Sheila stared at her.
There was a high flush in the woman’s cheeks, facing down that stare, and her mouth trembled as she said stiffly, ‘I do my level best to put food on the table every day, to stretch the ration book as far as it’ll go, but me and Jack often have to go without so the little ones can eat. I expect he was hungry, that’s all. And maybe he thought a nice big pie like that one would feed the whole family, with gravy and veg on the side.’ Her gaze dropped hungrily to the pie in Sheila’s hands. ‘He did wrong and he’ll make it up to you, I swear. I’ll send him round to clean the shop windows tomorrow, how’s that?’
Me and Jack often have to go without so the little ones can eat.
Wracked by guilt, horrified at the thought of the widow’s children going hungry while she marched away with her huge pork pie like a trophy, Sheila came to a decision.
She thrust the pie back towards Mrs Treedy. ‘Go on then, take it.’
Stunned, Mrs Treedy gaped. ‘What?’
‘You heard me, love. You can take the pie and welcome. I’ll not have you and your kids go hungry while I’ve a big dinner waiting for me up at the farm.’ She kept holding out the pork pie and eventually Mrs Treedy took it, though the woman still looked doubtful. ‘You can still send your boy round to clean the shop windows though. In return for the pie. That would be much appreciated.’
‘Thank … Thank you.’ Mrs Treedy drew the pie close, sniffing at it in dreamy amazement. ‘Bless you.’
‘Well, enjoy your dinner.’ And with that, Sheila stamped back up the lane and towards her shop. The whole way, she was thinking, what a soft touch I am. Giving away that bloomin’ huge pork pie! I’ll never make my money back on it now. But deep down she knew she’d done the right thing.
What she didn’t understand was why it was necessary. The war was over, wasn’t it? The grief and hardship they’d all suffered during those dark years ought to have come to an end when the soldiers had laid down their arms and the bells had rung out for victory. Instead, it seemed that some people were still struggling to feed themselves and, judging by what she’d seen of Mrs Treedy’s ragged children, to clothe themselves as well.
There was a hill walker with a backpack and stick waiting impatiently outside the shop for it to reopen.
‘It ain’t right,’ she muttered, unlocking the door and glaring at the man. ‘What did our boys die for, eh? So that folk back home could go hungry? It ain’t right, I tell you. This country’s going to the dogs.’
‘Quite so,’ the man stammered, producing a ration book from his backpack. He pointed to the sweet jars behind the counter. ‘Aniseed balls, please. Two ounces. And do you have any pear drops?’