Wartime Family

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Authors: Lizzie Lane
long.’
    The three of them fell to an uneasy silence, but it didn’t last long.
    ‘Well! Better get going,’ said Patrick, slapping his thighs as he got to his feet. ‘If we don’t get a move on, them cowboys will have shot all the Indians before we’ve even got there.’
    Alone at last, Mary Anne let the sewing slip into her lap. Resting her head back, she closed her eyes and remembered how it had been in the Great War, the one they were beginning to call the First World War, because this, sadly, had turned into the second.
    In her quieter moments like these, her thoughts went back to Edward, her first boyfriend. They too had felt that terrible urgency, the need to experience all life had to offer just in case it was about to end. For Edward it had ended at Cambrai. For her it had meant finding herself pregnant, ‘disgraced’. Sent away before her time came, she had cried herself to sleep on her pillow night after night, wishing she and Edward had married first, but wishing most of all that he’d come back.
    The child had been adopted. Her parents had dealt with all the details, but still there were rumours. Only a hastily arranged marriage would restore her respectability. She didn’t find out until much later that Henry Randall had been paid to marry her. And at first they’d been happy. He’d worshipped her and nothing she could do was wrong. Trusting him to be magnanimous, she’d told him all about her secret sin, but his reaction was the opposite of what she’d expected. Overnight the caring husband turned into a jealous, cruel monster. The pedestal he’d put her on was pulled out from under her. Even so, she’d endured her punishment – for that’s how she’d regarded it. She’d lived for her children – that was, until Michael came along.
    She shook herself out of these maudlin memories, and took herself to bed for some much-needed rest. In the morning, she took the skirt she had mended over to the Red Cross shop. Gertrude immediately found a hanger for it and slid it on to a nail along with a few other skirts.
    ‘You’ve done a nice job of that, dear. I’m sure some needy soul will snap it up,’ said a joyful Gertrude, her voice reverberating around the crowded counters. ‘Now, I’ve got a nice coat here that could do with altering …’
    Huffing and puffing, she heaved a leopard-skin coat on to the counter. ‘It’s too long and a bit old fashioned. I thought that perhaps you could cut off the bottom and make it into a three-quarter length, and then make a pillbox hat with what you’ve cut off. I’m sure you can do it. Here!’
    Before she had a chance to protest, the coat was almost plonked into her arms. ‘I can’t,’ said Mary Anne.
    ‘Can’t?’
Gertrude snapped, her face smothered in frown lines.
    Mary Anne sighed. ‘I’m afraid I haven’t anywhere to live at present and I do have to spend some time finding somewhere. Perhaps then …’
    Gertrude Palmer looked astounded, as though Mary Anne had slapped her on both sides of her face.
    ‘Do you have a husband?’
    Mary Anne found herself blushing. ‘He’s away serving with his regiment …’ Her voice melted away. Michael had impressed on her that she mustn’t go into too much detail about the fact that he worked as a translator, translating messages from German into English. He’d been born in England but raised in Germany. His mother and stepfather were presently in a camp on the Isle of Man. But that was another of their secrets and best not mentioned.
    Mrs Palmer had small, shrewd eyes. Like a knife they cut right through to the crux of a matter. ‘So where are you staying at present?’
    ‘In a room above the Lord Nelson, but it’s only for two days. My daughter’s on leave, you see.’ She stroked the fur flat. ‘It’s lovely though. I’m sure it would make a matching hat and coat, but …’ She shrugged her shoulders. ‘Finding suitable accommodation is very difficult.’
    ‘Nonsense!’
    The sharp

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