Shipyard Girls in Love Read online

  A sense of déjà vu passed over Gloria as she recalled Jack saying almost the exact same words to her before he left for America.

  ‘God!’ Jack sounded exasperated. ‘Why do I feel I’ve said all of this before?’

  Gloria let out a sad laugh. ‘Because you have said it all before. In this very church. Just days before you left for America.’

  Jack had been determined to tell Miriam that he was leaving her, but Gloria had persuaded him to wait until he returned. She’d known nothing could get in the way of him going to America. He’d been chosen to be part of a special mission to help set up production of a new cargo vessel, the Liberty ship. Cheap to construct and mass-produced by the Yanks, it was to be bought by the British to replace the growing number of ships being torpedoed by German U-boats. His duty to his country came first, their love second.

  Jack put his hands on his head. ‘There’s a part of me that can vaguely recall us being here before I left. But is that because you told me that we used to meet here or because I really can remember?’

  ‘Perhaps a bit of both,’ Gloria said.

  Jack took hold of Gloria’s hand. It felt frozen.

  ‘This is madness. It’s bitter cold. And here we are meeting up like two teenagers with nowhere else to go. I want us to go to Miriam and tell her the truth. I don’t like all this lying and deceit!’

  Gloria felt herself panic – she needed more time. They needed more time. She had worked out the practicalities – and the consequences – of revealing their love, and their love child, to the rest of the world and the future did not look at all rosy.

  ‘Apart from everything else,’ Gloria argued, ‘we’ve got to think about how we’re going to live once everything’s out in the open. It goes without saying that we’ll both be chucked out of the yard, and I can guarantee from that moment onwards no one else will go near us with a bargepole. Miriam – and more so her father – will make sure of that. They’ve got the power to make certain that happens, which means we’ll have nothing. We won’t be able to even keep a roof over our heads and we’ll also have a little baby to look after.’

  ‘We’ll survive,’ Jack said, simply.

  There was a part of Gloria that agreed with Jack. They would survive. She had felt that on the day of the christening when Jack had stood by her side with baby Hope in his arms. She’d known then that the road ahead was going to be rocky, but they had a foundation of love and could deal with anything life threw at them.

  Her real concern – and one she didn’t want to tell Jack about yet – was the reaction of Vinnie once he learnt the truth. Jack was what she would call ‘all man’ but he was no fighter. She’d rarely seen him lose his temper. Vinnie, she knew for certain, would batter him to within an inch of his life, if not more.

  ‘Please, Jack,’ Gloria squeezed his hand hard, ‘just keep shtum for now. Just for the next few weeks. Until we’ve worked out a proper plan of action. And give yourself a little more time to recover – hopefully get more of your memory back.’

  Jack looked at Gloria and knew he couldn’t go against her wishes. He knew they had to be unified.

  ‘All right,’ he agreed. ‘You win – this time.’ He put his arms around her shoulders and pulled her towards him. He loved the feeling of them being close. ‘Now, enough arguing. Tell me how Hope’s doing.’

  Gloria looked up at him and gave him a quick kiss. She was relieved he had capitulated. For now, at least.

  ‘Well, Hope’s being spoilt rotten, as always, by Bel and Agnes.’

  Jack smiled. That was one thing he didn’t have to worry about. His daughter was in good hands.

  As they sat there for the next twenty minutes, Gloria talked to Jack about everything and anything she could think of that would help paint a picture of his past life. She regaled him with the story of how they’d first met down by the quayside when he had helped her up after she’d fallen flat on her face, having slipped on the icy cobbles.

  ‘Eee,’ Gloria said, starting to laugh at the memory, ‘we laughed and laughed at my rather spectacular fall – and how I somehow managed not to upend the basket I was carrying.’

  Jack chuckled, enjoying the story, even if he couldn’t remember.

  ‘Anyway,’ Gloria continued, ‘you were a proper gentleman, even then, and insisted on carrying my basket and walking me home. We chatted away and I’ll never forget the feeling that I’d known you all my life.’

  ‘So, I must have been, what, fifteen … sixteen?’ Jack asked.

  ‘You were just days away from your fifteenth birthday, and a year into your apprenticeship. I used to wait for you outside the gates after work,’ Gloria said, smiling at the memory. ‘Sometimes, when you were working overtime, you’d sneak me in and, oh, you were so proud of where you worked and the job you were doing.’

  ‘Still am,’ Jack said thoughtfully.

  ‘The funny thing is,’ Gloria reflected, ‘I understand it now more than I ever did. I think I might even love the place as much as you do.’ She laughed. ‘Which is madness, really. I mean, who would love working bloody hard, all hours, in all weathers?’

  Jack gave Gloria a cuddle and chuckled.

  ‘Aye, gluttons for punishment. The both of us.’

  ‘Ah, darling, you look chilled to the bone,’ Miriam said as she hurried to greet Jack as he came through the front door.

  ‘And,’ she said, looking down at her dainty gold Rotary watch, ‘you’re late. I hope they’re not overworking you at Crown’s?’

  Miriam took Jack’s face in her hands and kissed him gently on the lips. She had purposely not had a drink. She had slipped a little lately and drifted back to her old routine of having a gin and tonic in the late afternoon. She didn’t want Jack thinking he was married to a lush; besides, something told her that she needed her wits about her at the moment. For over a week now Jack had insisted he sleep in the spare room, claiming he was not sleeping well and didn’t want to disturb her. There was no reason to disbelieve him, but whenever she had been up during the night, she’d heard him snoring and he’d sounded like he was out for the count.

  ‘No, no,’ Jack reassured her, ‘they’re not overworking me. It’s all hands on deck at the moment.’

  ‘I know, darling. And I know, as everyone keeps saying, “there’s a war on”, as if we could possibly forget, but you have more than done your bit. It’s time to think of yourself now. I don’t want you working yourself to the bone.’

  As Miriam took his hand into her own, Jack felt crippled by guilt.

  Guilt that he had been with Gloria and not working himself into the ground as Miriam clearly thought.

  Guilt that Miriam was being so loving, so caring, so concerned about him, unaware that he loved another woman and would soon be leaving this house – this life – to be with her.

  Jack knew logically that Miriam had committed the most terrible deceits, but he too was being duplicitous.

  As they walked down the tiled hallway and through the breakfast room, Miriam continued to hold his hand, and he could smell the faint trail of perfume as she walked ahead of him.

  ‘Mrs Westley!’ Miriam’s voice sang out as they entered the large kitchen at the back of the house. ‘I’m giving you tonight off!’

  The cook turned around with a look of astonishment on her face. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had an evening free from Miriam’s unrelenting culinary demands.

  ‘Jack and I,’ Miriam said with a little light-hearted laugh, ‘are going to rough it tonight! I’m going to raid the pantry and my darling husband and I are going to eat it here – in your lovely, warm kitchen. I think we’ve both had enough of stuffy, boring dinner parties for a while.’

  Mrs Westley’s mouth slackened in sheer amazement at what she was hearing, but she didn’t need telling twice and was already untying the back of her apron.

  ‘Well, Mrs Crawford,’ the cook said. ‘That sounds like a wonderful idea. There’s some of Mr Crawford’s favourite stew on the
stove. Just needs heating up. And there’s a fresh batch of bread in the pantry. Just come out the oven.’

  Miriam looked over at the big pot of stew and inwardly grimaced. She had never got used to Jack’s taste in food. He would take a pie or a pan of stew over any kind of cordon bleu cooking that he might be offered.

  ‘That’s perfect.’ Miriam looked over to Jack and noticed his face had relaxed. She’d been right. She’d been wearing him out with too many parties and posh social dos. He was drifting away from her and she needed to reel him back in. And if that meant forcing down a bowl of Mrs Westley’s poor man’s gruel that Jack loved so much, then so be it.

  She was so close to finally having the husband she wanted, if that meant sacrificing the occasional dinner party and eating the occasional ladle of slop in this wretched kitchen, then she’d do it.

  ‘Night, Mrs Westley.’ Jack waved the cook goodbye as she hurried out the back door.

  With the cook gone, the house suddenly felt quiet.

  ‘I’ll get us our drinks.’ Jack stood up and left to go to the cabinet in the drawing room.

  ‘Ah, darling, that’d be perfect,’ Miriam said. The thought of a gin and tonic made the meal all the more bearable. Now she just had to get Jack back into the marital bed.

  Perhaps tonight would be the perfect time.

  After finishing their supper in the kitchen, Miriam suggested they go and relax in the front living room, where they could put the gas fire on and have a nightcap.

  Jack’s feelings of guilt had continued to plague him as they had chatted, and he had tried to push them away as he asked Miriam about their past. Still, it had been so good to simply relax and eat in the kitchen instead of being served by Mrs Westley in the dining room or, worse still, being subjected to another dinner party.

  When the clock chimed nine times, Jack made to push himself out of the comfy leather armchair he had been sitting in for the past half-hour.

  ‘Well, I think I’m going to hit the sack,’ he said, stifling a yawn.

  ‘Just one more nightcap,’ Miriam said, walking over to the drinks cabinet.

  Jack looked up to see Miriam was already pulling the cork stopper out of the bottle of Glenfiddich she was holding. She was pouring it before he had time to answer.

  ‘Have you read the lovely letter that Margaret sent?’ Miriam pointed to the coffee table where a thick white sheet of concertinaed paper lay.

  As Miriam watched Jack leaning over to get the letter, she quickly slid her hand in her skirt pocket and took out one of her ‘reds’, a shiny, jewel-like capsule that the doctor had prescribed as a sleeping draught. Keeping her eyes glued on Jack, she split the small torpedo-shaped capsule open, before quickly glancing down and emptying the white powder into the tumbler of whisky.

  Swishing the amber-coloured spirit around in the glass, and checking that the fine powder had totally dissolved, she walked around the cabinet and handed Jack his drink.

  Returning to mix her own, she watched as Jack automatically raised the glass to his lips while he read her sister-in-law’s note. It had annoyed Miriam in the past that Jack always gulped back his drink, just as he always ate as though someone was going to come and snatch his plate off him; over the years she had tried unsuccessfully to change what she saw as his working-class manners, but tonight she was glad of them.

  ‘It sounds like they enjoyed having Helen to stay, doesn’t it?’ Miriam fluffed the cushion on the soft leather armchair next to Jack and sat down.

  She watched with quiet pleasure as Jack took another large swig of his drink.

  ‘Who wouldn’t?’ Jack said. ‘She’s a joy to have around. And such a bright spark. I’m surprised they didn’t try and keep her there!’

  Miriam had to bite her tongue.

  God, the man’s got no idea, she thought bitchily. Men, in her opinion, were as thick as two short planks when it came to their daughters. It didn’t matter what they did, or what they were really like, fathers seemed to have some kind of innate blind spot when it came to their little princesses.

  ‘She seems happy to be back,’ Miriam said, looking across at Jack and seeing that his attention was fixed on the flickering flames of the gas fire; her ‘red’ was doing its work faster than expected.

  ‘Darling, you look shattered.’ She forced her voice to sound genuinely caring.

  Jack turned his face to his wife but his eyelids were heavy and he was struggling to keep them open.

  ‘See, I told you you’ve been overdoing it.’ Miriam was up and out of her chair in a flash, suddenly worried that Jack would pass out there and then.

  ‘Come on,’ she said, linking her arm with his and gently pulling him out of the armchair.

  Jack acquiesced and stood up, staggering a little as they walked towards the living-room door. He could feel Miriam guide him up the stairs and when he automatically started to head to the back bedroom, he felt a slight pull to his right.

  ‘I think you should sleep in our bed tonight,’ Miriam whispered into his ear, as she guided him along the landing and into her large, high-ceilinged bedroom at the front of the house. She had told Mrs Westley to get a little fire going and although it was now dwindling, the room was lovely and warm.

  ‘God, Miriam, I don’t think I’ve ever …’ Jack stopped talking as he slumped onto the bed. ‘… felt this … tired … in my life.’

  Miriam started to unbutton his shirt. She had just managed to free his arms from the sleeves when he fell back onto the soft, thick mattress.

  Miriam looked at Jack. His eyes were now completely closed. This was not the scenario she had hoped for, but at least she’d managed to get him into her bed. It was a minor victory.

  ‘Sssor …’ Jack was now slurring badly.

  ‘What’s that, darling?’ Miriam spoke softly into his ear.

  ‘Ssssorry,’ Jack managed to say.

  ‘What have you got to be sorry for, silly billy?’

  ‘H-hope …’ Jack managed to get the word out.

  ‘Hope? What do you “hope”, Jack?’

  But Jack was out for the count before he could answer his wife. He was snoring by the time she had tugged off his trousers and managed to get him under the freshly laundered sheets.

  Five minutes later, Miriam was sitting up in the bed, listening to Jack’s heavy breathing getting louder by the minute. She had just taken one of her reds, so she knew she would be out like a light in no time and undisturbed by anything, least of all Jack’s snoring.

  As she shuffled down in the bed and turned off her side lamp, she snuggled up to Jack and placed one of his arms around her, as if he was giving her a cuddle.

  Miriam started thinking about the evening and how Jack seemed to be asking a lot of questions about their past. She’d heard from Helen that Arthur had made a reappearance – the interfering old has-been – and when she’d questioned Jack about it over the meal she’d forced down, it was clear that the pair of them had met up a few times this past week.

  Miriam started to feel the warmth and relaxation that her reds gifted her, although her mind didn’t feel quite so at ease.

  Why hadn’t Jack told her before that he’d been meeting up for cosy little chats with the old man?

  And she’d felt more than a little antsy when Jack had asked her more questions about how they’d met. At one point she’d felt as though he was grilling her. She’d said as much, albeit in a jokey way, and Jack had apologised. Had looked truly sorry. Even a smidgen guilty. He’d stopped then and told her it was just that he was so desperate to get his memory back it made him a little impatient and frustrated.

  Don’t be so paranoid, Miriam reprimanded herself as she felt the first wave of chemically induced sleep start to wash over her. It was natural that Jack wanted to try and remember his past.

  She just had to make damn sure that he didn’t, that it remained embedded deep in the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, and that the version he did have ingrained in his mind was a version of the past t
hat she had either created or censored.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Monday 8 December 1941

  As Polly stomped across the yard to the rest of the women welders, she was waving the morning edition of the Daily Mirror in her hand.

  ‘Have you heard?’ she demanded as she reached the women, who were all huddled around their metal drum fire. They had moved it nearer to the platers’ shed to protect them from the vicious winds coming in from the North Sea.

  Dorothy, Angie and Martha looked at Polly, but kept their hands over the warmth of the blazing coals.

  ‘Look!’ She had to raise her voice to be heard above the blustering winds. ‘The Japs have bombed the Yanks!’ As she reached the women she held out the front page of the paper and read out the headline: ‘“Japanese Bomb US Naval Bases in the Pacific”!’

  ‘Blimey, who needs the BBC when you’ve got Pol,’ Angie joked.

  ‘God! This is serious stuff,’ Dorothy said, looking at Angie and then to Martha, who also clearly had no idea what Polly was going on about. Dorothy took the paper off Polly and quickly read the front-page article.

  ‘Well, this is a turn-up for the books. I can’t believe they’ve done that!’

  ‘I know!’ Polly said, pulling her flask out of her holdall and unscrewing the top.

  ‘Says they’re gonna declare war on Japan.’

  ‘Will one of you explain to Angie and me what’s happened?’ Martha interrupted.

  Dorothy looked up at Martha and then back at the newspaper.

  ‘Well, it says here,’ Dorothy began, then started reading, ‘“Japan last night started the war in the Pacific by bombing the United States naval and air bases in Manila, in the Philippines, the Hawaiian base at Pearl Harbour …” It says that the attack happened while a couple of Japanese diplomats were trying to negotiate a “farce” of a peace settlement—’

  ‘Why was it a “farce”?’ Angie asked.

  ‘Because,’ Polly interrupted, ‘they obviously had no intention of trying to keep the peace as they’d already planned this attack.’