My Daughter, My Mother by Annie Murray Read Free Book Online Page B

the blanket . . .’
    ‘Off your own bed?’ Dora Jennings was even more horrified. ‘And you’ve been all the way down there in your state, carrying it? Why in heaven’s name didn’t you send Margaret?’
    Weak as she was, Alice had managed somehow to go out of the yard, make her halting way down the entry and along, leaning against the fronts of the houses every other step, to the pawnshop near the corner. After that she had gone to the bakery, even further along the street.
    She was shaking her head. ‘No, I wanted . . .’ Weak sobs shook her body, which was almost too wasted to cry. Margaret saw Mrs Jennings’ face twist with a mixture of pity and horror. She stroked the almost transparent hand. ‘I had to do summat for ’em. Today . . . Be a mom to ’em. I’ll have to send them . . . It’ll be – the last time . . .’
    Margaret, with the dream-like perceptions of a five-year-old, had made no sense of this at the time. None of it made sense until years later. She didn’t know that for days the lips of the adult world had been busy with the words ‘war’ and ‘evacuation’. Nor did she know yet that she was going to school today, even though it was Saturday. Her mother’s words made no sense, not then. But she did remember Mrs Jennings getting silently to her feet, tears in her kindly eyes, and going round to her mother, bending to embrace her, with Alice’s pinched face cradled against her chest.
    Mom had told her to carry the little bundle with some of the bread in it and a nub of cheese.
    ‘You know what Tommy’s like,’ Mom whispered. Tommy was seven, big for his age and strong, but erratic. Alice couldn’t stop the tears coursing down her cheeks as she sat, buttoning up Margaret’s coat. ‘He’ll drop it or leave it somewhere. You be a big girl now and look after it. And put Peggy in your pocket. There’s a girl.’
    Peggy, Margaret’s doll, was a rough little thing with brown wool hair and clothes made of scraps, sewn over a wooden peg. Her face had been put on with a blotchy fountain pen and was dreadfully smudged, but Margaret adored her.
    And that was the last she remembered of her mother, taking the bundle from her that sunny morning, their rations for the journey tied up in a rag. Mrs Jennings appeared, having made them each a stera bottle – which had previously contained sterilized milk – full of sweet tea.
    ‘Don’t worry about your mother now,’ she told them. ‘I’ll make sure ’er’s all right. And, Tommy, you’re a big boy now. You must look after Margaret.’
    Then Tommy was with her and they were at school, gas masks in boxes over their shoulders. The string chafed her and made her shoulder ache. After that came the train, with them all crowded into carriages.
    The day was hot and very long, the longest she could ever remember. There was no corridor on the train. Margaret was squeezed in next to the window where the sun streamed in, making her face red and hot. Over the other side was Miss Peters, one of the teachers from the school. She was nervous, but kindly, trying to deal single-handed with a carriage full of thirty or so young children. There was pushing and shoving, teasing. One of the girls was sick and the carriage took on a nasty sour smell.
    Now and then Miss Peters thrust her head out of the window to call desperately to the teacher in the next carriage. She got them singing ‘Ten Green Bottles’ and ‘Greensleeves’. The day grew hotter. What had seemed at first like an adventure became exhausting and bewildering.
    Margaret dozed against Tommy’s shoulder until he nudged her awake.
    ‘Let’s ’ave a bit of that bread, Sis.’
    Margaret looked up at him, so glad he was there. If Tommy was with her, everything would be all right. He was a big, handsome-looking boy with brown eyes like hers, but darker hair, like the Old Man’s. She knew Tommy would protect her. Tommy was seven and he had become very grown-up today. He’d said he wouldn’t