LITMIR.BIZ

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       Two

      As Connie staggered through the front gate of Belvedere Nurseries with her suitcase two months later, the dog opened one eye. He was lying across the path, snoozing in the early July sunshine. A mongrel, he had a black and white coat, a feathered tail and more than a touch of the sheepdog about him. When her father had bought him as a pup for her thirteenth birthday, they were told that he was a Border collie, cross retriever but his legs were too short and his mouth lopsided. Connie didn’t care what he looked like; she had loved Pip at first sight. ‘You always did go for the underdog,’ Ga had mumbled in disgust when they brought him home. As soon as the puppy was placed on the mat, he peed a never-ending stream, never once taking his coal black eyes from the old lady’s face. Hiding her smile, Connie knew that like her, Pip had a rebellious streak and they became inseparable. Later on, it was Pip who helped her get over the loss of her father and her brother Kenneth going away like that. She took him for long walks and unloaded her brokenness onto him. When she sat on the grass to cry, he would lick her tears away and wag his tail in sympathy. Although she was careful to obey Ga and never mention ‘that business’, Pip seemed to understand exactly how she was feeling. Pip was her adored companion until she was nineteen years old and joined the WAAFs and he had never quite forgiven her for leaving home. As the gate clicked shut behind her, Connie called out, ‘Here, boy. Here, Pip.’

      He rose to his feet, yawned, stretched lazily and she noticed that he was getting quite a few grey hairs around his muzzle. He was nine years old, much more than that in doggie years. She watched him turn around and walk ahead of her to the front door where he waited. When she got to him, Connie reached down and patted his side before ringing the doorbell. ‘Silly old dog,’ she said softly.

      As the door opened and her mother stood on the step, Pip came to life, panting and jumping in the small porchway like a thing demented. ‘Connie!’ Gwen laughed as Pip’s joyful barks obviously delighted her. ‘What a wonderful homecoming Pip is giving you.’

      ‘Warm welcome my eye,’ Connie laughed. ‘He hasn’t even come to my call. He’s doing all that jumping about for your benefit.’

      Her mother smiled uncertainly. ‘Well, come on in, darling, let me look at you. I like your new hair.’

      ‘They’re called Victory curls,’ said Connie patting the back of her head. ‘I have to curl them up with Kirby grips every night and wear a scarf in bed but I think it looks quite nice.’

      ‘It certainly does,’ her mother enthused.

      Gwen Craig was small with high cheekbones and an oval face. Her hair was still dark but Connie could see a few grey hairs and she had tired eyes. It alarmed her to see that her mother had lost weight. Her clothes positively hung on her. Gwen had married Connie’s father Jim Dixon in 1919 when she was only eighteen and bore him two children, Kenneth, now twenty-three, and Connie aged twenty-one. 1936 was an eventful year. First she’d had Pip, then soon after their father had died after a long illness, and Kenneth had left home abruptly. Her father’s illness had sapped them of all their money and because they were living in a tithed cottage, Gwen and Connie would have been homeless if Ga hadn’t come to the rescue. In exchange for housework, Gwen and Connie moved in with her in her small cottage in the same village. A couple of years later, and much to Connie’s surprise, Gwen had married Clifford Craig, a man she had thought was only a nodding acquaintance. Their union had produced Mandy now aged six and the exact image of her mother. Gwen held out her arms and, dropping her case on the mat, Connie went to her.

      Behind her, a commanding voice boomed out of the sitting room. ‘Gwen? Is that Constance?’

      Connie grinned and ignoring her great aunt’s calls, she deliberately stayed in her mother’s warm embrace for several more minutes. ‘It’s sooo good to see you, Mum.’

      ‘And you too,’ said Gwen. ‘Where’s Emmett? I half expected him to be with you.’

      Connie shook her head. ‘I’m not with him anymore, Mum.’

      Her mother looked concerned.

      ‘It’s all right,’ Connie said quickly. ‘It wasn’t very serious and we lost touch soon after VE Day.’

      ‘I’m sorry,’ said Gwen shaking her head sadly. ‘I thought he seemed like a good man.’

      Connie couldn’t argue with that. She had wanted Emmett to get in touch again but it never happened. She had eventually written to his last known address only to have her letter returned to her unopened. Someone had written in the top left-hand corner, ‘Unknown at this address’. Connie had been upset, of course, but what could she do? She had cried. She had gone over and over their last date in her mind, Saturday night at the pictures followed by a fish and chip supper on a park bench, but there was nothing to say why he hadn’t contacted her again. Maybe his mother had taken a turn for the worse, or, perish the thought, maybe she had died. Connie had no idea where she lived so there was little point in fretting about it. ‘Well, it’s all over now,’ she said again.

      ‘If that’s you, Constance,’ Ga called imperiously, ‘come in here where I can see you.’

      Gwen kissed her daughter and let her go, the two of them rolling their eyes in sympathetic unison.

      ‘Come on,’ her mother smiled, ‘or we’ll never hear the last of it.’

      Connie advanced but her mother caught her arm. ‘Shoes.’

      Connie bent to unlace her shoes. Pip watched her and Connie patted his side again.

      ‘You certainly fooled Mum,’ she whispered, ‘but you don’t fool me. We’ll go for a walk later, okay?’ Ignoring her, the dog yawned in a bored way and sauntered towards the kitchen where he flopped into his basket.

      ‘Hello Ga,’ Connie said cheerfully as she walked into the sitting room.

      ‘What took you so long?’ said Ga, feigning her disapproval. ‘And what were you whispering about out there?’

      ‘Mum was asking me about Emmett, that’s all,’ said Connie, ‘and I was explaining that it’s all off.’

      Connie kissed her proffered cheek. ‘I can’t say I’m sorry,’ she said into Connie’s neck. ‘I didn’t really take to him.’

      Olive Dixon was a formidable woman. She was solidly built with spade-like hands from working the small market garden, which brought in the lion’s share of the family income. Unlike most women of her age, her sunburnt face was relatively free of wrinkles and she wore her steel grey hair piled on the top of her head in a flat squashed bun.

      ‘What the devil have you done to your hair?’ she frowned.

      ‘Don’t you like it?’ said Connie.

      ‘Indeed I do not,’ said Ga. ‘With all those silly curls you look like something out of a Greek tragedy.’

      Connie chose to ignore her. Usually when Olive said jump, everybody said, how high. Ever since Gwen and Connie had come to live with her after Jim Dixon died, she had quickly established herself as the undoubted head of the family. When Clifford and Gwen married in 1938, he had tried to exert his authority, but at a mere five feet, Olive towered over everybody by the sheer force of her personality. They had moved from Patching to Goring to make a completely new start but because Ga had bought the Belvedere Nurseries and the house they all lived in, Gwen and Clifford were expected to run everything, while she remained firmly in charge.

      ‘I’ll get the tea,’ said Gwen, leaving the room.

      Ga was sitting at her beloved writing bureau and Connie noticed for the first time that her right leg was raised up on a pouf. Her knee was very swollen.

      ‘Ouch, that looks painful,’ said Connie reaching out.

      ‘Don’t touch it!’ Olive cried. ‘I’m waiting for Peninnah Cooper.’

      Connie took in her breath.

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