Fallen Skies Read online

  Stephen closed the door behind him and leaned back against it. “Lily,” he whispered.

  7

  MIKE, THE SM AT THE PALAIS MUSIC HALL, was quieter and more morose than ever at the close of the second week in Southsea. He would work all night loading the scenery, the props and all the costumes into the big lorry which would drive to Southampton and unload at the Southampton Palais, ready for the show to open on Monday night, and then he would be responsible for the whole company on tour.

  Lily watched the girls packing their make-up and their bags, their lucky charms and their dried flowers with a sense of excitement. “What’s Southampton Palais like?” she asked Madge, who was the only one who had worked the tour before.

  “Same as this one. Except there are sinks in the dressing rooms which is nice. And sometimes if they forget and leave the boiler on, there’s hot water to wash in. Digs are all right too, if we go to the same ones. The landlady is a good sort. Bit of a sport. She used to be an actress in her younger days, there are pictures of her all over the house. She’ll turn a blind eye if you’re late in. And if she takes a fancy to you, she’ll let you sit in her front room and you can have visitors.”

  “No-one’s going to visit me at Southampton,” Lily said unwarily.

  “What’s happened to the Captain in his big car then?” Madge demanded. “Did he try it on?”

  The entire dressing room fell silent and everyone looked at Lily. “No, he didn’t!” she said indignantly. “He wouldn’t do such a thing.” She felt the need to defend Stephen against mass female suspicion. “He’s just . . . busy,” she said lamely. “He’s a lawyer, you know. He works in his family’s law firm. They’ve been lawyers for four generations. And he’s very busy right now.”

  Susie said something under her breath and the girl next to her laughed.

  Helena put her arm around Lily’s shoulder and gave her a hug. “Plenty more fish in the sea,” she said. “And the big ones are always the hardest to catch.”

  “I didn’t try and catch him!” Lily said indignantly. “And if I’d wanted to catch him . . .”

  “You what?” Susie asked. “If you’d wanted him—what then?”

  “I could have had him,” Lily said lamely.

  There was a ripple of sceptical amusement.

  “Never mind,” Helena said again. “Better luck next time, eh, Lil?”

  Lily nodded; there was no point trying to convince them that Stephen had proposed and been rebuffed. But as she packed her comb and the little pot of hair cream which Charlie had given her into her vanity bag, she could not resist imagining the uproar it would have caused if she had strolled into the dressing room with a large diamond on her finger and the news that she was to be Mrs. Stephen Winters. Lily smiled at the thought. They would have screamed the place down and Sylvia de Charmante would have died of envy.

  It would have been fun to be engaged to Stephen. Not married of course; but it would have been fun to be engaged. He would certainly have bought her a large diamond ring. It would have been nice to have been taken out to dinner from the Southampton lodging house in the big grey car and see the curtains twitch as the girls watched her drive away. It was tiring to walk to the tram stop at the end of the day. The Argyll had been comfortable, and the dinners had been fun, and Stephen had been very pleasant when he had held her hand in the darkness and smiled at her.

  But the kiss on the beach had been shocking. And Lily’s pride as well as her youth had recoiled from Stephen’s declaration that he was prepared to make her his wife. She threw in her flannel and her towel and slammed the dressing case shut.

  “I’m packed,” she said.

  “See you Monday!” Madge called. “Town station, ten o’clock, Monday morning. Don’t be late!”

  “I won’t! See you then!” Lily called.

  Stephen was at the stage door with a bouquet of creamy golden roses. Helen Pears was waiting discreetly halfway down the alley.

  “I couldn’t let you go away like that,” Stephen said. His face was anxious, he looked like a boy in trouble, not an experienced older man.

  Lily took the flowers automatically and said nothing.

  “I’m sorry,” Stephen said. “I startled you. I startled myself actually! I like you awfully, Lily, and I’d like you to consider being my wife. I’d do my best to make you very happy. I’d give you everything you want, you know. I’d like you just to give it a thought. Don’t say ‘no’ outright.”

  Lily started walking towards her mother, her arms full of roses. “I don’t think I can,” she said.

  “Leave it for a while then. Put it out of your mind. It was an idea of mine but you’re probably right, you’re too young to be thinking of marriage. We’ll be friends, shall we, Lily? Like we were before?”

  Helen Pears was beside them, glancing from her daughter’s face to Stephen’s anxious expression.

  “Captain Winters?” she said coolly.

  Stephen glanced at her. “I’ve made a bit of a fool of myself, Mrs. Pears,” he said. “I asked Lily to marry me and of course, she’s too young to be thinking of such things yet. I like her awfully, you see, and I just thought I’d ask. But if she wants, and if you permit, we’ll consider ourselves friends again. Just friends.”

  “It’s up to Lily,” Mrs. Pears said gently. “She’s much too young to marry and she’s got her career to think of as well.”

  “Oh yes, her career,” Stephen said dismissively. “But can we be friends again, Lily?”

  Lily’s good nature was too strong to withstand Stephen’s anxious look. And besides, the Argyll was waiting, and the roses were nice. The girls would be coming out of the stage door at any moment and then they would see who had failed to land a big catch. It would be fun if Stephen drove over to Southampton and took her out for dinner and anyway, Coventry was holding open the door and smiling at her, as if he was pleased to see her again. And there was nothing creepy about Coventry at all—she had imagined that. Charlie Smith had said that Stephen was no older than him; and Charlie Smith was certainly not too old.

  “All right!” Lily said. “I’d like that.” She freed one hand from holding the roses and held it out to Stephen. “We’ll be friends again.”

  Stephen shook her hand firmly, as if she were a young clerk at his office. “That’s grand,” he said. “And now—would you like a farewell dinner, Mrs. Pears? Lily? To say goodbye to the Queens Hotel before you conquer the south of England?”

  Lily glanced at her mother and then nodded. “Divine!” she said, using Sylvia de Charmante’s favourite word of praise. “Too, too divine!”

  • • •

  Stephen called for her at the grocery shop on Sunday morning. Mrs. Pears had agreed that they might all go out for a picnic. Coventry had a large hamper in the boot of the Argyll, and a spirit stove, a tea kettle, a silver teapot, and a complete tea service.

  “On a Sunday, darling?” Muriel had asked her son. “Such an odd day for a picnic. I don’t think it’s quite the thing.”

  “She’s going away tomorrow, Mother, if she doesn’t come now I don’t know when she’ll be free again. And I’ve longed for a picnic in the country for weeks. The forecast is good for tomorrow. And if you don’t tell anyone—who’s to know?”

  Muriel had sighed and said nothing more. The tea party to introduce Stephen to young women of his own class had been a total failure. He had hated them all. And Muriel, watching them over her tea cup as they postured and preened, had hated them too. Marjorie had obviously studied the magazines to learn how to be a Modern Girl and was both shocking and vulgar. Sarah had been sickeningly sentimental. Stephen, trapped on the sofa between two versions of post-war womanhood, had looked uncomfortable—even angry. He must wonder, Muriel thought, what it was all for—those long two and a half years away—when he comes home and finds girls like Marjorie and Sarah as the best that Portsmouth can offer, his father a cripple, and the house silent with grief. She sighed.

  She was still grieving f