Free Poppy Day by Annie Murray Page A

thought. I ought to do this all the time, silly old woman I am.
    Stepping into the first shop was a relief though. As if she’d been washed up on a rock. She felt her body relax, and only realized then that she’d been clenching her teeth hard.
    But then she saw one of her neighbours from down the road was just turning from buying her bread as Olive’s turn came.
    ‘Mrs Beeston, ain’t it?’ the woman said, not troubling to keep her voice down. ‘Don’t see yer about much – yer been bad or summat?’
    Olive’s jaw tightened again. Mind your own cowing business! a madwoman’s voice shrieked in her head. Don’t go nosing into my business, yer upstart busybody you!
    She forced a tight smile. ‘My daughter likes to do the shopping as a rule.’ She turned away. ‘I’ll ’ave a large cottage and a bag o’ cobs, ta.’
    She moved carefully from shop to shop for what she wanted: tins of Handy Brand milk, a quarter of Typhoo Tipps, a pound of cheap mince, onions, spuds and carrots off the Bull Ring. They slung them straight into her carrier for her. Triumphant, she gathered up her purchases and headed across towards Digbeth. Straight home and get the kettle on. She could leave Ronny with Agatha a bit longer and have a morning’s peace. She’d done it! It had only taken breaking the habit . . .
    A tram was lumbering down the road and she glanced to one side, half looking at it. There was an advertisement for Hudson’s Soap plastered along the side of it. She was none too keen on trams passing too close to her. All those faces behind the glass staring down at her. Made her prickle all over. She avoided looking at the windows, and the tram rattled past.
    And then she saw it, across the street. Her insides gave a violent lurch of shock so that for a moment she thought she was going to be sick right there in the gutter. Among all those people milling along there, that face turned towards her. The face she lived her life in dread of seeing, eyes staring straight at her from under the brim of a black hat . . . It happened in a second and Olive spun round, pressing herself against the sooty wall of St Martin’s. After a moment she turned back, searching the crowd, but there were so many hats, so many people in drab clothes, and her eyesight was not all it might be. She dropped her bag and onions rolled out across the pavement. A woman stooped and helped her pick them up.
    She almost fell through her front door, her face wet with perspiration, hands trembling so that she could barely unbutton her coat. She put the kettle on the hob and sank down at the table, panting as if she’d run all the way home.
    Everything led back to that house. That room where she’d been found. They’d come towards her, approaching her slowly as if she was diseased or dangerous, leading her away by the hand . . . away . . .
    ‘Oh God in heaven,’ she whimpered. ‘Oh Louisa . . .’
    She sat for a long time, staring across the room. Steam gushed unheeded from the kettle’s spout.
    ‘We’ve got to move on.’
    Polly was greeted by these words as she got in from work that night. Olive was huddled up in the little room which seemed very dark after the light evening.
    Polly put her bag down, looking round for Jess or Sis. ‘Where are the others?’
    ‘Jess ain’t back. Sis’s round at Enid’s.’
    Carefully, Polly said, ‘What’s ’appened, Mom?’
    ‘I saw ’er.’
    ‘Saw who?’ Polly sat down at the table, rubbing her hands over her pale face. ‘What’re yer talking about?’
    ‘I went up the Bull Ring. I ’ad to get . . .’
    ‘You went up the shops?’ Polly sat up, smiling. ‘Did yer manage by yerself? That’s really good, Mom, ain’t it. Yer could get out more now . . .’
    ‘But I saw – this woman. Lived round Saltley when Louisa and me lived with yer Dad . . .’ Polly could hear the tightly strung emotion in her mother’s voice. Olive couldn’t seem to stop talking, thoughts which had been pressing in on her