Free On a Clear Day by Anne Doughty Page A

could see Ellie’s fair head bent towards Clare’s dark one and Clare listening with that intent look she always wore when she was taking in every word. But Ellie was gone, her child was without a mother, and she, Polly, couldn’t even give her the time she needed, never mind a room, or a place to play, or even a few toys to replace all those she had lost.
    Polly wept.
    ‘Don’t cry, Auntie Polly. I’ll stay if you want me to,’ said Clare quickly, as she threw her arms round the sobbing figure. ‘I could help you hem the dress for the fat lady and when Ronnie comes back he’ll show me where everything goes and we can both tidy up for you. And I can answer the phone if you tell me what to say.’
    Polly hugged her tightly, lost for any words to speak and for any way to resolve the conflict in her mind. This dear child had brought her something she thought she had lost forever when Ellie died. While she was near, Ellie would not be gone fromher. But even as the thought came to her, she saw that she couldn’t begin to give the child what she needed to so she could begin to heal her own loss.
    ‘Don’t cry, Auntie Polly. Mummy would hate to see you cry.’
    ‘You’re quite right, Clare. I’m a silly old auntie,’ Polly replied, sniffing and wiping her eyes.
    ‘No, you’re not. You’ve been so kind. You’re a lovely auntie and Mummy always said I was lucky to have you. Would you like a cup of tea? I know how to put the kettle on, I saw Uncle Jimmy doing it.’
    ‘But that’s Polly’s job,’ her aunt replied, managing a weak smile.
    Clare laughed and jumped up from the edge of the bed. She began to sing ‘Polly put the kettle on, Polly put the kettle on, Polly put the kettle on, and let’s have tea.’
    It was one of the first nursery rhymes Mummy had taught her and every time they read it or sang it she would remind her that her Auntie Polly was really called Margaret, but because when they were all little she was always putting the kettle on she’d got nicknamed Polly and now no one ever called her anything else.
    They made tea together and sat drinking it in the quiet sitting room. For an hour or more no one called, the telephone didn’t ring and neither Uncle Jimmy, nor Davy, nor Eddy arrived back.Polly and Clare talked about many things, Polly’s childhood, her sisters, especially Ellie, about going off to Canada with Uncle Jimmy in a big ship, so big you could go for a walk, or go shopping just as if you were on dry land.
    Clare’s eyes rounded in delight as Polly described her first winter in Canada, driving in a sleigh with real jingling bells, just like the song, and rugs to wrap yourself in and the swish of the runners over the snow. She took it all in and asked question after question, wanting to know every little detail of Polly’s Christmas treats, the presents she had and the decorations she put up in their tiny apartment.
    For a little space of time for both the child and the woman, the pain of loss and loneliness was comforted and eased. But it was not healed.

CHAPTER FIVE
    Clare tried, she really tried, to like the school that Ronnie had once attended. But actually, she hated it. It seemed such a noisy place with buses and lorries rushing past outside and crowds of children pushing and shoving in the corridors. Worst of all her, class teacher was a young man who waved his arms and shouted at them if they didn’t put up their hands the very moment he asked a question.
    Some of the children made fun of the way she talked and called her ‘La-di-da.’ She’d never heard the expression before and didn’t know what it meant but she knew it wasn’t a very hopeful sign that she might make friends with these rowdy children. She wondered what Miss Slater would say if she saw them elbowing their way into the queue for the lavatory or the canteen. But Miss Slater was far away in Armagh and it looked as if she would never see her again.
    Every time Clare thought about her home, her school