Fallen Skies Read online

  April, come she will,

  May she will sing all day,

  June she will change her tune,

  July she will fly,

  August go she must.

  Lily sat up, clasping her knees, to listen.

  “Sing it again!” she commanded.

  This time she joined in with him, her clear steady voice hesitating around the tune and stumbling on the words.

  “Again,” she said when they had finished. “Please, Stephen. It’s so pretty.”

  He sang it again with her, watching her mouth shaping the words and the unwavering concentration on her face. She was very young still. He thought of Marjorie and Sarah at his mother’s tea party with their affectations and tricks. Lily was like a child beside them. Like a child or like a woman of extraordinary purity. As if she lived in a different country altogether from post-war England with its greed and compromise. She was like the other girl, when he first saw her in Belgium, a simple girl who worked on the land and knew only the seasons and crops. A girl who trotted her donkey cart past a line of silent marching men and looked at them with pity in her eyes.

  “I’ve got it,” Lily said. She gestured him to be quiet and then sang the song through to him. “Is that right?” she asked.

  Stephen felt his heart move inside him as if it had been frozen and dead for years.

  “Oh, Lily, I do love you so,” he said.

  And Lily, with the sun on her back, too content to demur, reached forward and put her hand to his cheek in a gesture that silenced and caressed him, at once.

  • • •

  On the drive home Stephen hesitated about asking permission to visit Lily in Southampton or elsewhere on tour. But Lily’s smiling contentment throughout the long sunny day had made him more confident.

  “I should like to visit Lily next week, while she is in Southampton,” he said, speaking across her to Mrs. Pears. “I have to go to Southampton for business on Wednesday. If you would give your permission I should like to take Lily out to dinner and take her back to her lodgings later.”

  He watched for the slight movement which was Lily’s nudge and her nod. Mrs. Pears hesitated. “Lily’s still very young, Captain Winters,” she said. “I don’t want her talked about. Girls gossip and there’s more gossip talked in the theatre than you would imagine. I think it’s perhaps better for Lily if she goes home with the other girls after the show.”

  “Oh, Ma!” Lily remonstrated.

  Helen Pears shook her head, addressed herself to Stephen. “I don’t want to make one rule for you and a different one for everyone else,” she said frankly. “Lily’s bound to get asked. The answer should always be the same. She doesn’t go out to dinner without me. If I can’t be there, then she can’t go.”

  Lily hunched her shoulders but she did not appeal against her mother’s decision.

  “What about taking her out for tea, between the shows? As I have done in Portsmouth?” Stephen asked. He could feel his anger rising that Helen Pears should stand between him and Lily. Like all women, he thought, very quick to sacrifice someone else for their own ends.

  Helen nodded. “If it is not inconvenient for you when you are working,” she said. “Lily may certainly go out to tea with you in Southampton.”

  Lily peeped a smile at him from under her hat. “On Wednesday?” she asked.

  “Wednesday,” he said.

  • • •

  “You keep Captain Winters at arm’s length,” Helen observed to Lily as she watched the Argyll drive off from the upstairs sitting room window. “He’s very much in love with you. And if he asks you out to dinner again, you remember I said no.”

  “He’s nice though,” Lily said. “He’s nice to take us out like that. I haven’t had such a lovely day ever, I don’t think. And did you see the china? And the teapot? It was solid silver, wasn’t it?”

  Helen nodded. She had felt the weight of the pot as she had repacked the hamper.

  “Plenty of money there,” she observed. “But not for you. You don’t have to marry, you don’t have to make a choice for years. You can be free, Lily, with your talent. You’ve got your career ahead of you and all sorts of opportunities.”

  Lily came away from the window, immediately diverted. “I wonder what Charlie has in mind for a new act,” she said. “Has he told you?”

  Helen shook her head. “No,” she said. “But you can do what he says. He’s got a wonderful eye. He’ll go far. I heard some gossip when I was waiting for you the other day that he’s applied for the post of musical director at the Kings Theatre, Southsea. A proper theatre—not just music hall. That’d be a big step for him! I wouldn’t be surprised if he got it either.”

  Lily nodded. “He can play anything,” she said proudly. “If you just sing it to him once he can play it straight away. I’m going to sing him the cuckoo song. I think it’s really pretty.”

  “Cuckoo song!” Helen said indulgently. “You’d better get yourself packed for tomorrow. I’ll make us some supper. I’ve got some nice ham in the shop which won’t last another day. I’ve got some biscuits and tea for you to take with you. Don’t forget to eat properly, Lil. And your washing is on the landing, all ironed.”

  Lily moved to the door and stopped to put her arms around her mother. “Will you be all right without me?” she asked. “You’ve never had to manage without me before.”

  Helen patted her on the back. “I’ll be fine,” she said. “It’s a big start for you. I’d rather see you do it than anything else in the world. I wouldn’t stand in your way, Lil. You go off and I’ll be proud of you.” She hugged her daughter tight for a moment, and quickly blinked the tears from her eyes before she let her go so Lily would not see what it was costing her. Lily was her creation, made of finer stuff than the other children of their street. Every spare penny had been poured into Lily’s singing, into Lily’s dancing, into her elocution. It was only sense, now that the girl had her chance, for her mother to send her out to the wider world, and be proud. But it was only natural that she should feel deeply bereft, as if Lily were still her baby taken from her too early.

  She gave Lily a little push. But the girl hesitated at the door. “D’you think Charlie Smith likes me? I mean as a girl, not just as a singer?”

  Helen looked at her daughter. “It doesn’t matter, does it? He’s really old, according to you. As old as Captain Winters. And injured in the war too.”

  Lily nodded, unconvinced.

  “You can go out to dinner with him, if he asks you, while you’re on tour,” Helen said. “You’d be perfectly safe with him, Lily.”

  “Because he’s not in love with me and Stephen is?”

  “Something like that,” Helen said. “And he knows the line.”

  “I like him awfully,” Lily confided.

  Helen smiled. “I know,” she said. “He’s a good friend to you, Lily, you wouldn’t have got this far without his help. You keep him as a friend and bide your time. You’ve got years ahead of you for love.”

  8

  HELEN DID NOT GO WITH LILY TO THE STATION. She ordered a cab for her and waved her off from the shop doorway. There were customers in the shop and they had no time for any farewell more than a hurried peck on the cheek.

  “Write to me if you need me,” Lily said hastily as her mother thrust her into the cab. “You know I’ll come home if you need me.”

  “Stuff and nonsense,” Helen said brusquely. “You go and have a lovely time, Lily. Be sure you eat properly and get enough sleep.” She slammed the car door. “And remember what I said—no dinners out.”

  Lily nodded and waved, turning around to watch her mother’s indomitable figure recede as the car drove away. Helen stood in the road, her arm raised, waving and waving until the cab was out of sight. Then she wiped her face roughly on her white apron and strode back into the shop. “Who’s next?” she said crossly. “And there’s no credit, so don’t ask for it.”

  Lily, gripping her handbag tightly on her lap, wi