Read Online The Second-last Woman in England by Maggie Joel - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Maggie Joel
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was the sort of Bible that must have been in a family for generations though not in the Corbett family. The Corbett family Bible, a green-covered one that had resided on the sideboard and was placed on the table each Sunday morning and on other important occasions, had perished along with the Corbett family on that fateful Sunday morning in 1945.
It was odd what had survived. Along with Mum’s navy shoes, the small case contained a china horse that had once belonged to Gladys, Jean’s younger sister. And wrapped around the horse was a length of yellow ribbon, tattered at one end, that her youngest sister, Nerys, had once worn in her hair. And beside that was a tobacco tin with a dented yellow lid showing a sailor in a jersey and a peaked cap and within which Dad had kept not tobacco, but quotations from the Bible. Now the tin contained two green buttons which Edward, aged six, had been wearing on his cardigan that far-off Sunday morning. Of Bertie, five years old and last in the family, there was nothing to show that he had ever existed at all.
Jean lifted the items from the case and laid them ceremoniously side by side on the bed, then looking around she settled on a place on the floor beneath the window. She closed her case and laid it there, placing each item on it. Then she stood back to survey her arrangement. Yes, that was right. That was how things should be. Lastly she picked up the Bible and laid it on the pillow near where her head would lie.
There would be an apt quote for this moment, Dad could always find it, sometimes without even having to look it up, but Jean couldn’t think of one. Eventually she settled on ‘So we may boldly say: The Lord is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?’ which was from Hebrews 13 and was good if you felt lonely.
A bell tolled in the still morning air, an urgent single note over and over. And from further away, perhaps carried by a slight breeze, other bells were tolling, this time a peal competently rung in a steady rhythm. It was Sunday morning and the Wallises would be going to church. It was unlikely the family attended Chapel, more likely a Church of England church, but there would be a chapel of some kind in the district, she felt certain. Perhaps Mrs Wallis would let her go there sometimes instead of to their own church.
Casting caution to the wind she tackled the catch on the window and, with only a brief tussle, it loosened and she was able to ease the window open. It was warm outside, much warmer than when she had made her journey across London this morning from Mrs McIlwraith’s.
Jean gazed out over the rooftops and at the silent and empty lawn of the private garden opposite. It looked so inviting, that large stretch of grass and the flower beds with their sprinkling of late-blooming yellow, pink and cream roses, and yet no one seemed to admire them. The whole street was silent and empty and, yes, it was a Sunday but even on a Sunday Malacca Row had been a bustle of activity, everyone in their Sunday best and Mum calling out not to dirty your clothes. But here no one called to anyone. No one even left their house.
Then a man did come down the street, a young man in a light-coloured and creased linen suit who walked with a long stride, not quite a swagger but close to it. He stopped at the padlocked gate and looked to left and right then hopped right over it and into the garden.
Good, thought Jean, because it was stupid having railings around a garden to stop folk getting in. Like having a lock on the church door.
The sun, which until that moment had bathed the whole street in glorious late-summer sunshine, was at that moment obscured by a solitary and very dark cloud. It was as though the day had abruptly ended and at the same moment Jean realised this was the young man she had seen in the garden yesterday, sitting on the bench. She stepped back from the window though it seemed unlikely the man would look up and notice her—and what did it
It was odd what had survived. Along with Mum’s navy shoes, the small case contained a china horse that had once belonged to Gladys, Jean’s younger sister. And wrapped around the horse was a length of yellow ribbon, tattered at one end, that her youngest sister, Nerys, had once worn in her hair. And beside that was a tobacco tin with a dented yellow lid showing a sailor in a jersey and a peaked cap and within which Dad had kept not tobacco, but quotations from the Bible. Now the tin contained two green buttons which Edward, aged six, had been wearing on his cardigan that far-off Sunday morning. Of Bertie, five years old and last in the family, there was nothing to show that he had ever existed at all.
Jean lifted the items from the case and laid them ceremoniously side by side on the bed, then looking around she settled on a place on the floor beneath the window. She closed her case and laid it there, placing each item on it. Then she stood back to survey her arrangement. Yes, that was right. That was how things should be. Lastly she picked up the Bible and laid it on the pillow near where her head would lie.
There would be an apt quote for this moment, Dad could always find it, sometimes without even having to look it up, but Jean couldn’t think of one. Eventually she settled on ‘So we may boldly say: The Lord is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?’ which was from Hebrews 13 and was good if you felt lonely.
A bell tolled in the still morning air, an urgent single note over and over. And from further away, perhaps carried by a slight breeze, other bells were tolling, this time a peal competently rung in a steady rhythm. It was Sunday morning and the Wallises would be going to church. It was unlikely the family attended Chapel, more likely a Church of England church, but there would be a chapel of some kind in the district, she felt certain. Perhaps Mrs Wallis would let her go there sometimes instead of to their own church.
Casting caution to the wind she tackled the catch on the window and, with only a brief tussle, it loosened and she was able to ease the window open. It was warm outside, much warmer than when she had made her journey across London this morning from Mrs McIlwraith’s.
Jean gazed out over the rooftops and at the silent and empty lawn of the private garden opposite. It looked so inviting, that large stretch of grass and the flower beds with their sprinkling of late-blooming yellow, pink and cream roses, and yet no one seemed to admire them. The whole street was silent and empty and, yes, it was a Sunday but even on a Sunday Malacca Row had been a bustle of activity, everyone in their Sunday best and Mum calling out not to dirty your clothes. But here no one called to anyone. No one even left their house.
Then a man did come down the street, a young man in a light-coloured and creased linen suit who walked with a long stride, not quite a swagger but close to it. He stopped at the padlocked gate and looked to left and right then hopped right over it and into the garden.
Good, thought Jean, because it was stupid having railings around a garden to stop folk getting in. Like having a lock on the church door.
The sun, which until that moment had bathed the whole street in glorious late-summer sunshine, was at that moment obscured by a solitary and very dark cloud. It was as though the day had abruptly ended and at the same moment Jean realised this was the young man she had seen in the garden yesterday, sitting on the bench. She stepped back from the window though it seemed unlikely the man would look up and notice her—and what did it
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