17
SAM
February–March
At the beginning of February, the weather changed. There was a brutal cold snap, which went on and on for weeks. The ground was hard as iron and the air was so cold it bit into your lungs when you breathed. Ruby’s father got sick again, and a lot of the guys got sick at the camp, too, so many that the medical bay was overrun and the whole place echoed with the sound of their hacking coughs.
‘Goddamn,’ Jimmy wheezed as we hustled along the beach one morning at the beginning of March, weighed down by our packs and guns. He wasn’t long out of the sick bay himself, and still looked pale. ‘If this is winter in England, it can goddamn keep it.’
‘You can say that again,’ I grumbled. So far, I’d been lucky and escaped whatever it was that was going round, but every headache or tickle in my throat had me worrying I’d be next. I was worried about Ruby, too. Because of her pa, I hadn’t seen her in two weeks. Was she all right?
That Sunday we were finally able to meet up again. When I got to the lodge, Ruby was already there, bundled up in her coat and scarf as she dozed on the sofa with the blanket pulled over her. She woke when I walked in, looking disorientated. ‘Oh, Sam,’ she said. ‘Sorry. I just sat down for a moment – I didn’t mean to fall asleep.’
‘You’ll freeze to death!’ I said, hurrying to light the paraffin heater. It was as cold in here as it was outside, our breath making clouds of white vapour in the air.
‘Well, if I do, at least I’ll be able to get some sleep,’ she said, sounding bitter. I lit the lamp too and saw how white and drawn she was, purple shadows under her eyes.
‘Hey, don’t say that!’ I sat down beside her, drew her into my arms and kissed her. ‘Are you OK?’
She didn’t answer me. As I brushed a strand of hair out of her face, I saw her eyes were brimming with tears.
My stomach clenched. ‘Your pa – is he—?’
‘Oh, he’s getting better now, no thanks to her.’ Ruby sniffed fiercely, and took the handkerchief I offered her. ‘She hasn’t lifted a finger to help look after him, even though she’s his mother. She says it’s vital she gets her rest because she’s so busy with all her volunteering work for the WVS and the Red Cross. Meanwhile I’m up all night, every night, taking Father hot water and his medicine and fresh pyjamas, and changing his sheets. It doesn’t seem to occur to her that I might need some rest too!’
‘Miserable old witch,’ I said. ‘Who the hell does she think she is?’ Not for the first time, I found myself wishing I could wave a magic wand and change things for Ruby – take her far away from here and from that hideous grandma of hers.
She must have been thinking along the same lines, because suddenly she said, ‘One day it won’t be like this. I’ll have a place of my own, and I’ll stay in bed until eleven o’clock in the morning if I want to.’
‘What sort of place do you want?’ I said, trying to keep my voice light. I reached for my cigarettes and lit one, then settled down beside her more comfortably, trying to get warm.
‘I don’t know… something modern, not like that damp old cottage,’ she said. ‘Red-brick, with a little wooden fence outside, and lilac and rose bushes in the garden. There’d be blue-and-white check curtains at the window, the wireless would always be on and oh! I’d have to have at least two dogs – I can’t have my own here because they make Father wheeze – and I’d be somewhere with a view of the sea… Not Bartonford, though.’
‘You can have any sort of house you like, and as many dogs as we can fit in it,’ I said, gently winding her hair through my fingers, and then my heart leapt, because she’d been talking about her house and I’d said we without even thinking about it. But she went on as if she hadn’t even noticed.
‘I’d paint the kitchen green – no, yellow, so it always looks sunny. And I’d have a proper bathroom, inside. And a study full of books, with a big, squashy armchair next to the fireplace and a little table with a typewriter on it next to the window, where I can sit and look out at the view when I’m wondering what to write next.’ She gazed up at me, smiling. ‘What about you? If you could have any sort of house at all, what would it be like?’
That one you just described sounds pretty good to me, I wanted to say, but I wasn’t quite brave enough.
I dragged on my cigarette, blowing a stream of smoke into the air. ‘I dunno,’ I said. ‘Somewhere out in the country, but not like Kirk’s farm. I guess it would be a bit like yours, actually – a house with a view of the sea, where Meggie can run around and Ma can have a garden and a place to sit and read, like she used to.’
‘That sounds wonderful,’ Ruby said.
I didn’t answer. I was thinking about the house, imagining not just Ma and Meggie there but Ruby too…
Was it even possible? I hadn’t thought much about what would happen after the war ended; my only plan had been to join the army and make enough money to get Ma and Meggie away from Kirk someday. How I’d actually manage that, I still had no idea. And I hadn’t factored meeting a girl into my plans at all, never mind one who lived a whole ocean away.
And what if you don’t make it through the war?a nagging little voice in my head spoke up. What then? What will happen to them – to Meggie, and Ma, and Ruby?
‘You look very serious,’ Ruby said, breaking into my thoughts. ‘What are you thinking about?’
‘Oh – nothing much.’ I couldn’t find the right words to tell her.
She snuggled into my chest and murmured something else, so quiet I didn’t think I’d heard her right at first. ‘Hmm?’ I said.
She looked up at me. ‘I love you, Sam Archer.’
I felt a jolt go through me. ‘I love you too,’ I said, burying my face in her hair.
Somehow, I’d make this work. I had to.