Emma's Secret

  ‘I’d prefer to tell him myself when the time is right,’ Emma replied.

  ‘You are going to tell Daisy who her father is, was, I mean, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes, when she’s older. She’s only fifteen, Elizabeth. Sometimes I think you forget that.’

  ‘Well she seems a lot older, perhaps because she was always with you and Paul, and never with children her own age.’

  ‘That’s silly, she was with you and Robin a great deal of the time.’

  ‘But we were away at school…latterly, anyway.’

  ‘That’s true. And of course I will tell her, how could you ever think I wouldn’t? Any child would be proud to claim Paul McGill as their father.’

  ‘I am,’ Elizabeth said, and squeezed her mother’s hand. ‘He was so good to us…Robin feels the same way.’

  ‘Yes…’ Emma’s voice trailed off, and she put the beaker down on the bedside table, leant back against the mound of pillows, closing her eyes.

  Elizabeth now fell silent, and so did Emma, and mother and daughter were lost, for a while, in their own thoughts. It was Elizabeth who broke the silence between them when she said, ‘I think Edwina is being rather beastly, the way she is hiding herself away in the bogs of Ireland, incommunicado. I do think she could have brought her husband to meet us, and brought the baby over, too. After all, you’re the child’s grandmother. Don’t you agree, Mummy?’

  ‘It would have been nice, Elizabeth, but Edwina’s rather angry these days, and most especially with me. I don’t think we’ll be seeing her soon, I really don’t.’

  ‘It’s her loss, and she’s such a fool. I don’t think she has a right to be angry. You’ve been a wonderful mother to all of us. We’ve been lucky.’

  ‘I’m glad you think that, darling.’

  ‘Why did Paul kill himself?’

  The question, coming out of the blue, shocked Emma, threw her, and it took her a few moments to recover. ‘This is the first time you’ve ever admitted you knew that…I thought you all believed Paul had died of his injuries.’

  ‘Not really, Mummy.’

  ‘He knew he wouldn’t have long to live…’ Emma began. ‘There was no way to treat him. He would have died of kidney failure in a few months…he knew he couldn’t get back here in time to see us. I suppose he wanted to take control of his life again…his destiny.’

  ‘I see.’

  Emma was silent, thinking about Paul’s last letter, wondering if she should show it to Elizabeth. She was a married woman now, and living with the dangers of war, and much more grown-up than she had been even a few months ago. And yet Emma hesitated. The letter was so very personal, meant for her eyes only. And perhaps one day for Daisy’s. No, she would not get it out of the casket. Not yet, not tonight…

  But much later, when she was alone, Emma got out of bed and went to her dressing room. She unlocked the fruitwood-and-silver casket which stood on a chest and took out the letter which had arrived from Australia just after Paul’s death. Then she returned to the bedroom.

  Sitting down on the bed, she took the letter out of its envelope and read it again, as she had read it so many times before:

  My dearest darling Emma:

  You are my life. I cannot live without my life. But I cannot live with you. And so I must end my miserable existence, for there is no future for us together now. Lest you think my suicide an act of weakness, let me reassure you that it is not. It is an act of strength and of will, for committing it I gratefully take back that control over myself which I have lost in the past few months. It is a final act of power over my own fate.

  It is the only way out for me, my love, and I will die with your name on my lips, the image of you before my eyes, my love for you secure in my heart always. We have been lucky, Emma. We have had so many good years together and shared so much, and the happy memories are alive in me, as I know they are in you, and will be as long as you live. I thank you for giving me the best years of my life.

  I did not send for you because I did not want you to be tied to a helpless cripple, if only for a few months at the most. Perhaps I was wrong. On the other hand, I want you to remember me as I was, and not what I have become since the accident. Pride? Maybe. But try to understand my reasons, and try, my darling, to find it in your heart to forgive me.

  I have great faith in you, my dearest Emma. You are not faint of heart. You are strong and dauntless, and you will go on courageously. You must. For there is our child to consider. She is the embodiment of our love, and I know you will cherish and care for her, and bring her up to be as brave and as stalwart and as loving as you are yourself. I give her into your trust, my darling.

  By the time you receive this I will be dead. But I will live on in Daisy. She is your future now, my Emma. And mine.

  I love you with all my heart and soul and mind, and I pray to God that one day we will be reunited in Eternity.

  I kiss you, my darling.

  Paul

  Emma sat for a moment, holding the letter in her hands…such small hands, Paul had always said to her. The tears rolled down her cheeks, and she thought her heart was breaking once again. But deep within herself she knew she had been correct to read yet again his last letter to her. It had reminded her of her duty to Daisy, and to her other children as well. And it had also reminded her of the stuff she was made of: steel.

  Once she had returned the letter to the casket, locked it, and pocketed the silver key, Emma went to the desk in a corner of her bedroom. After sitting down, she took out her diary and opened the page for 18 June 1940.

  She made a short entry:

  The, Prime Minister spoke tonight. He reiterated that France has fallen, and warned us that the Battle of Britain is about to begin. We cannot allow ourselves to be broken by Hitler. We must not be defeated. Those were the sentiments he expressed. And so we must be courageous, stalwart, dauntless. Paul’s last letter to me reminded me of that when I re-read it tonight. We must draw on our inner resources. We cannot fail or we are lost. Churchill will show us the way. I have faith in him.

  My beautiful Elizabeth moved back home, so that we can share our loneliness, help each other in these difficult times. She is a good daughter. I am lucky to have her. I have decided Daisy must stay at boarding school. She is safer in the country. Winston and Frank came to supper. What would I do without my legal and loving brothers? We must pull together now that we are about to be invaded.

  Emma closed the diary and put it away. Then she went to bed. But she did not sleep. Her mind was too preoccupied with thoughts of the days ahead, and the plans she would have to make for her family, her employees and the stores themselves. Everyone and everything had to be protected. The defence of Britain was about to begin.

  She tossed and turned all night, and only fell asleep finally as dawn broke.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  ‘Come on, Glynnis, we’d better make a run for it!’ Emma cried. ‘They’re going to start dropping their bombs any minute.’ As she spoke Emma rushed across Belgrave Square, making for her house on the far corner.

  Glynnis followed in her wake, her high heels clattering against the pavement as she raced to catch up, all the while marvelling at Emma Harte’s fast sprint across the square. Her boss was quite extraordinary.

  The sirens were wailing, warning them of an imminent air raid, but in fact the Luftwaffe was already immediately overhead, the planes roaring across the skies of London on one of their daylight raids.

  The ARP warden on the corner caught sight of them both, and shouted out, ‘Hurry up, Mrs. Harte! Go inside as quick as you can. Get down in your cellar! It’s the safest place.’

  ‘We will, Norman, you can be sure of that,’ Emma called back. ‘And if you need to shelter, please come and join us.’

  ‘Right, I will, Mrs. H.’ The warden indicated that they should be quick, waving his hands at them, shooing them on, before turning away, his attention suddenly caught elsewhere.

  Glynnis hurried after Emma
up the steps of the house and through the front door, closing it behind her. They both stood for a moment in the grand marble entrance foyer, catching their breath.

  ‘I think we made it just in time,’ Emma muttered at the sound of a loud explosion not far away, and then the shattering of glass. A split second later there were several more explosions and Emma and Glynnis exchanged apprehensive looks. ‘They’ve made several hits,’ Emma said, shaking her head, looking alarmed. ‘But so far they’ve managed to miss us. Keep your fingers crossed.’

  The entrance foyer was devoid of furniture, except for an ornate French console table set against a side wall under a French gilded mirror, and a French Louis XV bench on the opposite wall. A crystal chandelier hung from the slightly domed ceiling, and a grand curving staircase led up to Emma’s maisonette.

  Aside from the front door, there was only one other door in the foyer, and this was set in the wall underneath the staircase. Emma now hurried to this door, opened it and went down a steep flight of steps. Glynnis followed; the stairs led them to the small hallway of Paul’s bachelor flat.

  ‘From here we take the lift to the cellar,’ Emma said, and beckoned to Glynnis. Together the two women rode down to the basement; when the lift stopped they stepped out into Paul McGill’s extensive, well-stocked wine cellar.

  Glancing at the walls and walls of wine racks, Emma said, with a small sigh, ‘I think I’d better have my brothers come for some of this. It’s all vintage, much of it very rare. I’d much rather they and their friends drank it than have the Germans drop bombs on it. Now…we go through this arch, Glynnis, and here we are in the air-raid shelter.’

  ‘Is that you, Mrs. Harte?’ a voice called out nervously, echoing hollowly in the vaulted cellar, and all of a sudden there was Grace peering at them from behind a pillar.

  ‘Yes, it’s me, Grace. I have Glynnis with me.’ Emma hurried through into the new air-raid shelter, which had recently been built by Blackie O’Neill. It was completely reinforced using steel girders and concrete-and-steel pillars; sandbags had been stacked against all of the walls as an extra precaution. ‘Are you alone?’ Emma asked, looking at Grace.

  ‘Yes, Mrs. H. Wot’ appened is this. Mrs. Coddington never come in today. The docks was bombed again last night, ma’am, and parts of the East End, and ‘er sister Ethel’s gone and got bombed out. So she went to ’elp her,’ the maid explained. ‘She phoned, but you was gone…to the shop.’ Stepping aside, so that Emma could walk over to the desk she had recently brought down to the cellar, Grace continued, ‘Cook’ll be in tomorrow, so she said, ma’am.’

  ‘I understand, and I do hope her sister’s family is all right. Nobody’s been hurt, have they?’ Emma asked anxiously.

  ‘No, her sister was there with their mother, and they’re both all right, Mrs. H. Ethel’s five sons are in the army, the navy and the air force, and her two daughters, Flossie and Violet, are in the land army, so they wasn’t there to be ’urt, was they?’

  ‘That’s true, Grace. That’s one family which is truly doing its bit for the war effort! Most commendable. Goodness, yes!’ Emma glanced around and, turning to Glynnis, she said, ‘It’s not too bad down here, you know.’

  ‘I think it’s very nice, Mrs. Harte,’ Glynnis responded swiftly, ‘Air-raid shelters are usually sort of…dismal. Certainly this is a lot more comfortable than those Anderson shelters everyone’s building in their back gardens. My Da has copied the neighbours’, and now we have one too. Mum’s quite chuffed about it.’ Surveying the cellar a little more thoroughly, Glynnis sat down in a chair, and added, ‘You’ve certainly thought of everything. A primus stove for cooking and boiling a kettle. Electric fires for the winter months, plenty of chairs, a rug underfoot, and lots of blankets and pillows.’

  ‘I’ve also ordered a number of camp beds,’ Emma told her.

  ‘And there’s a big stock of tinned stuff,’ Grace interjected in a proud voice. ‘Baked beans, sardines, red salmon, corned beef, Spam, tomato soup, and a lot of candles, just in case the lights go.’

  ‘Did you get a first-aid box?’ Glynnis asked, glancing across at Emma who was already sitting behind the rather ugly, very utilitarian desk.

  ‘Yes, we have a couple down here, but perhaps I’d better order some more. You never know.’

  ‘I’ll make a note of it,’ Glynnis murmured, and took out a shorthand pad.

  In her usual businesslike way, Emma now concentrated on her work. She took a stack of papers out of her briefcase and was soon absorbed in them.

  Grace picked up the ladies magazine she had been reading before, and Glynnis pulled out her knitting; she was making a khaki scarf, her second in a week.

  The two young women focused on what they were doing, knowing better than to waste their time with idle chatter in front of Emma Harte. In any case, they did not dare say a word to each other when she was working.

  As she knitted, Glynnis thought about the war, wondering when it was really going to end. Mrs. Harte had told her it would last for quite a few years, and although she hoped Emma was wrong, Glynnis believed her boss was probably right. Emma was a genius when it came to everything else, so how could she be wrong about the duration of war?

  The Battle of Britain had begun in June, just after France had fallen, but so far not a lot had happened. The bombing raids had been rather sporadic, and during June and July the whole country had been working hard to ensure the safety of Britain. People were building air-raid shelters in their gardens, reinforcing their cellars, piling sandbags around their shelters and in front of exposed entrances. Candles were bought up in case of electrical shortages; tinned food was stacked up in homes from Dover to the Hebrides. People thought of everything they might need in emergencies and went out and bought it if it was available. Already there were shortages. Gas masks were issued to every citizen, and many people made sure they had tin helmets to protect themselves from falling rubble.

  Not many civilians had been killed thus far, either in June or July, but in August the figures had started to rise as the Luftwaffe stepped up its efforts, flying in from its northern French bases to bomb London and the surrounding counties of Kent, Surrey and Sussex. Hitler’s aim was to destroy the RAF, now Britain’s only real defence, both in the air and on the ground, and also to demolish the factories where the production of Hurricanes, Spitfires and bombers was already in full swing. Daylight raids such as the one today had been relatively infrequent, the German air force preferring to bomb the British Isles at night under cover of dark.

  But things had begun to change, and Emma kept telling anyone that would listen that things were going to get worse. And in the next few days she was to be proved right.

  After two and a half hours the all-clear siren sounded; even though they were sitting in the cellar under the house they heard it, albeit somewhat faintly, when it went off.

  ‘That’s it!’ Emma exclaimed, and immediately put her papers back in the briefcase. ‘We’d better go up and see what the damage is. Glynnis, Grace, come along.’

  Emma was relieved that her house had not been hit, and she was fairly certain that Belgrave Square remained undamaged. Nonetheless, it was with trepidation that she opened the front door and looked out. She was pleasantly surprised to see that the square was entirely intact, although the air was acrid and filled with smoke, and there was the sound of falling rubble from the streets beyond. Obviously many buildings nearby had been heavily bombed.

  ‘I’d better phone Harte’s,’ Emma said to Glynnis as she stepped back inside and closed the front door. She hurried upstairs to the maisonette and made for her den; within seconds she was talking to the operator at the store. ‘It’s Mrs. Harte, Gertie. Is everything all right?’

  ‘Oh yes, Mrs. Harte. The Jerries missed us this time, thank God.’

  ‘I’m glad to hear it. I’ll see you on Monday. Have a nice weekend, and a safe one, hopefully.’

  ‘Thanks, Mrs. Harte, and the same to you.’ Emma turned to Glynnis, who h
ad followed her into the small room she used as an office, and nodded her head. ‘The store’s still standing, and that’s a plus. But there must be an awful lot of damage out there, especially on the docks.’

  ‘Yes, and perhaps some of the factories were hit. We know the Germans are hell-bent on destroying them, slowing down the production of planes,’ Glynnis reminded her quietly, looking as worried and concerned as Emma.

  ‘I wonder if there is anything we can do to help?’ Emma murmured, but before Glynnis could answer, the phone rang. Emma, who was sitting at the desk, picked it up. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hello, Emma, it’s Jane.’

  ‘Jane darling, how are you? I hope everything’s all right with you. You haven’t been bombed, have you?’

  ‘No, no, fortunately we’ve escaped again, thank goodness. But Bill just heard that the docks and the East End have taken a terrible beating. Horrendous. Seemingly there’s a massive clean-up starting, but he thinks those poor people are going to need help tomorrow.’

  ‘What about right now?’ Emma asked swiftly.

  ‘I believe they’re going into the tube stations soon to take shelter for the night, and the Red Cross, the St John’s Ambulance Brigade and several other agencies are doing quite a lot. But I can’t help thinking about tomorrow. It’s Sunday, and it seems to me they will need food.’

  ‘Jane, you’re right! And I’m on board, if that’s what you were going to ask.’

  ‘Well, yes, I was, Emma. I’m going to start making sandwiches tonight, and I thought you could do the same.’

  ‘Of course, but we’ll need more than sandwiches. I’ll phone Harte’s and have the manager of the food halls bring over a few hampers of food. Now, what time are you setting off tomorrow? And where should I go?’

  ‘I’ll come around at nine o’clock in the car, and Tomkins can follow me. We’ll be going to the East End. And Emma, thank you for this. You’re a good woman.’