The Chilbury Ladies' Choir(70)
Tuesday, 6th August, 1940
In the bleak afternoon drizzle, our small, sobbing group huddled outside the old church, chilled and nervous, for Hattie’s funeral, the final switch on dear Hattie’s life. The proper end that was supposed to round the whole thing off, but seemed so contrary and out of place for such a vibrant, warmhearted character.
“It’s just so hard to believe that she isn’t going to come careening around the corner, her usual beaming smile across her face,” Kitty whispered with a loud sniff, and we looked over to the corner where she might appear.
“I feel that she’s with us in spirit,” I replied, clutching baby Rose closer, her little face smiling on this dreadful day that would change her world forever—almost definitely for the worse.
“She doesn’t know her mother’s gone, does she?” Kitty murmured.
“No, and it’ll be a few years till she’s old enough to understand. She’ll never have known Hattie, only Victor and the people who look after her.”
“Who is going to look after her until Victor gets back?” Kitty’s eyes darted from the baby to me.
It was a good question.
Victor’s aunt wrote to say they’re too frail to have Rose. I hadn’t realized they’re in their eighties now. Sadly they couldn’t even make it for the funeral. So Rose has been staying with us—the Colonel and me—at Ivy House for now. I suppose I’ll have to find a home for her, a nice family to foster her.
No one’s heard a thing from Victor for months, although the Colonel had his ship checked, and it seems it is doing all right somewhere in a remote part of the Atlantic. Victor probably hasn’t even heard about Hattie’s death; he might be still in a different reality where his wife and new daughter live happily in their small, snug home, while he is the one facing the bombs, he is the one risking his life so that they may live free. Oh, the wretched irony of it all.
Before the Vicar opened the big church doors for us to enter, he crept out to have a word with me.
“We haven’t any pallbearers,” he whispered hurriedly.
I looked at him, puzzled.
“There are no men to carry the coffin,” he elucidated, coughing to cover his embarrassment. We looked around. A group of mothers and children from Hattie’s school had come, but apart from old Mr. Dawkins and the Brigadier, who was clearly in no mood for carrying coffins, we were all women. The world seemed to fade in front of me. Dear Hattie, who was like a daughter to me, taken from life so early, and we couldn’t even give her a proper funeral.
“Sorry,” the Vicar muttered. “Our usual bearers are at war or in the fields or making bombs. There’s nothing I can do.”
“Everyone’s harried these days,” I said quietly, annoyed that this wretched war is making us too busy for everything. If something needs to be done, it’s up to us women to make do.
And then it dawned on me.
“We will carry the coffin,” I announced.
A sea of faces looked up.
There was a moment of shock, when everyone seemed to look from me to the Vicar, registering the situation.
Then, after a few whispers, a few murmurs, one by one, they all began to step forward; first Kitty, then Mrs. Winthrop and Venetia, Mrs. Gibbs, Mrs. Turner and Mrs. Poultice, then Mrs. B., and soon everyone had silently volunteered.
“The Chilbury Ladies’ Choir will bear the weight,” Mrs. B. declared, taking charge in her usual manner, which for once was useful. “We will carry Hattie, our loyal second soprano, on her final procession.”
As the Vicar led the way into the vestry, I realized I needed someone to hold baby Rose, and after looking around, I knew that I had no choice than to pass her over to the Brigadier.
“Could you hold Rose for a while, please?” I said sharply, bundling her into his arms, and he was surprised into taking the infant, looking down into the blue shawl with a frown over his face. I paused for a moment, wondering whether he registered that this beautiful girl was, if my suspicions were correct, his own child. Might he have felt a shudder of remorse?
“Lead on, Vicar,” Mrs. B. called, and we followed him into the vestry, where we caught our breath at the sorry sight of the coffin, a slim wooden box containing all that was left of our precious Hattie. What was once a vivacious, energetic young woman was now a pile of sad, dead remains without color or life, set inside a still box.
“How are we to lift it?” Mrs. Gibbs asked nervously.
“Everyone who feels strong can take a corner, and the rest of us will fill in around the edges,” Mrs. B. ordered.
The mood became somber as we hoisted our fellow choir member up, at first a little wobbly, but then we straightened up and began to walk out into the entrance hall, waiting for Mrs. Quail to begin the organ processional.
But Mrs. Quail had different ideas.
At the precise moment we stepped out down the aisle, the ponderous introduction of “Abide with Me” began to sound forthright through the old church, the simple and yet poignant tune pouring softly from the organ, urging us to sing as a united front, for Hattie, for Prim, for our small yet resilient community, for our dear, collapsing country.
Abide with me; fast falls the eventide;
The darkness deepens; Lord with me abide.
Thus it was that a shuddering chorus of twelve deeply saddened women, singing at first softly, then more resolutely, advanced slowly down the aisle. We sang as if our lives depended on it, as if our very freedom, our passions and bravery were being called forward to bear witness to the atrocities that were placed before us. We were united and strong, and I knew right there and then that nothing, nothing could ever break the spirit of the Chilbury Ladies’ Choir.