Free Trust Me by Lesley Pearse Page A

was as pale as her face, flat and toneless.
    ‘’E couldn’t, sweetheart, not yet. But ‘e’s coming to talk to you later today, maybe ‘e’ll know something then.’
    ‘Why does he want to talk to me?’
    ‘Well, because you were there,’ Maud said with a shrug. ‘’E’ll want to know what you ‘eard and saw.’
    ‘I only heard them shouting for a little bit, then the noise of her going down the stairs,’ Dulcie said, her voice dropping to a whisper.
    ‘What were they shouting about?’ Maud asked. ‘Can you tell me?’
    Dulcie dropped her head. ‘If I say it, it might make things worse for Daddy.’
    Maud felt her stomach turn over. What had the child heard?
    ‘Suppose you tell me what you think you ‘eard,’ she said, patting Dulcie on the hand. ‘Telling me don’t count for anything. Maybe you was ‘alf asleep and got it all wrong.’
    Dulcie’s head came up slowly. ‘I don’t think so, Granny, it keeps on going round in my head.’
    She told what she’d heard all in one gulp, starting from the bit about the court, her mum saying May wasn’t his child, and then on to how Dad roared at her and the sort of scuffling she heard when he screamed Get out or I’ll kill you, then finishing with the noise her mum made as she fell down the stairs.
    Maud was severely shaken. She knew if Dulcie was to say all that to the policeman, Reg was as good as hanged. But how could she ask a child to lie? That wasn’t right either.
    ‘Granny!’ Dulcie exclaimed when the old lady didn’t reply immediately. ‘Are you worried that it makes Daddy sound bad?’
    Maud nodded. ‘But I know ‘e ain’t,’ she said. ‘I threatened to kill your grandfather many a time, but I wouldn’t ‘ave done it.’
    ‘Shall I tell the policeman I woke because they were shouting but I didn’t know what they said?’
    Maud just looked at her. ‘I can’t tell you what to do,’ she said wearily. ‘But maybe it would be better if you forgot what you think you ‘eard. That ain’t the same as lying, love. Yer dad’s an ‘onest man, ‘e’ll tell the truth about what went on.’
    ‘He told me it was an accident and that she just fell. He said whatever people said I was to believe that.’
    ‘Then you must believe it, because it will be true,’ Maud said.
    ‘What did Mum mean about May not being his child?’ Dulcie asked, looking perplexed.
    Maud forced a laugh. ‘Well, that was plain silliness, she just wanted to get ‘is goat. ‘Course May’s ‘is, look at the pair of you, like two peas in a pod. Now, why don’t yer go in the parlour by the fire, there’s some comics in there. I’ll get us some breakfast.’
    Maud sat for a while thinking after Dulcie had gone into the other room. It was the bit about May not being Reg’s child which was eating into her, for she had always suspected that might be the case. Reg had only got leave twice in 1941, first in February, just after Anne moved out of her father’s house to New Cross, and then again in October. May was born in early May, named for the month too. Anne claimed she was early, but Maud was too long in the tooth to believe an eight-month pregnancy could result in a seven-and-a-half-pound baby.
    But she’d never said a word, not even to Anne. Reg loved that baby from the first time he held her, and she couldn’t bring herself to cause her son any pain. As it happened, May was so like Dulcie that it would never cross anyone’s mind to doubt they were full sisters. Silently she cursed Anne for her revelation, for that would certainly have been enough to push Reg over the edge. He had always idolized May, often making more of her than he did of Dulcie because she was such a little show-off with her giggling and chatting. The trouble was, this was going to be like a sodding time-bomb. Dulcie didn’t understand about how babies were made yet, she probably still imagined the doctor brought them along in his bag. But one day when she did know what was what,