The Victory Garden(56)

“A little strained, if you want to know,” Emily replied. “My parents still make it clear that they do not approve of my disobeying them.”

“So what will happen when this assignment concludes?” Miss Foster-Blake asked. “Will you return home and be the dutiful daughter?”

“I . . . I’m not sure yet,” Emily replied. “I am not sure what I am going to do.”

“I know, Emily,” the woman said quietly.

Emily looked up in horror.

“Alice told me,” she went on, “and before you blame Alice, it was I who confronted her and wheedled the truth out of her. I suspected, you see. I’ve seen girls in your condition before. Those early morning rushes to the lavatory. That time you fainted.”

Emily sat silent.

“I want you to know that I am not judging you. God knows you loved the young man. He intended to marry you. And so many young women have found themselves in your condition. I only want to help, Emily.”

Emily looked up in surprise. The tone was so unlike the brisk sergeant-major demeanour she associated with Miss Foster-Blake. “I don’t know what to do,” she said.

“Did you tell your parents?”

“Fortunately no. They were talking about a girl of our acquaintance who finds herself in a similar condition, and their vitriol about her made it quite clear how my news would be received. They’d never forgive me.”

“So what do you propose to do?”

“I have no idea.” She stared down at her hands. “Absolutely no idea.”

“Then maybe I can help,” Miss Foster-Blake said. “I have a friend who is on the board of governors of a home for girls like you. It’s in Somerset, in the hills, away from everywhere. And it’s run by nuns. You can keep working here as long as we are in operation and then go there until the child is born.”

“And what happens to my baby?” Emily asked.

“The nuns will find a suitable adoptive family for it. You can return home and nobody will ever know.”

“But you don’t understand,” Emily said. “I am not going to give up my baby. I loved Robbie Kerr, and this child will be all I have left of him. I don’t care what it takes or what I have to do, but I am not going to give it up.”

“But, my dear, please think logically. You have your whole life ahead of you. Such a bright future. What can you do if you are hampered by a child? How will you pay to feed it? Who will look after it when you work, and work you most certainly will.”

“I don’t know,” Emily said. “I don’t know anything except I will not give it up. On the train back here, I wondered if I should go out to Australia. Maybe Robbie’s parents would like to meet their grandson, and might welcome me, too.”

“And if they don’t? If they don’t accept the child is their son’s?”

“Then I find myself some kind of employment in Australia. I can say I’m a war widow there.”

“You certainly can’t travel in your condition,” Miss Foster-Blake said. “And how will you pay for your ticket?”

“I brought my good pieces of jewellery with me,” Emily said. “I can sell those if I have to.”

“I urge you to think this through carefully. Society is not kind to unmarried mothers. You don’t have friends or relatives who might take you in?”

“My school friends have either married or are volunteering themselves. My best friend is a nurse in France.” She hesitated, wondering how Clarissa would accept her news. Surely Clarissa would not be shocked, after all she’d seen and been through. “Apart from that, it was always my parents’ friends. And no relatives, apart from aged great-aunts who would be just as disapproving as my parents.”

“Then at least you should go to St Bridget’s home until the child is born. After that, you will have some serious decisions to make. I can’t say that I envy you.”

Emily stood up. “I thank you for your concern,” she said, “and for trying to help, but I have to think this through for myself. I’ll let you know what I decide.” In the doorway, she turned back. “And please, I’d rather the other women didn’t know.”

“Of course not,” Miss Foster-Blake said. “It’s up to you to tell them when you are ready. But I think you’ll find they are all on your side.”

She went to her bedroom and climbed on to her upper bunk, where she sat, hugging her knees. Should she write to Robbie’s parents? Would they want to know about Robbie’s child? He had said he was telling his mother about her, but what exactly had he said? What if they thought she was just some girl he’d met, pleasant but not one he particularly cared about, and with no proof that the child was his? And as Miss Foster-Blake had said, she certainly couldn’t face that long sea journey alone in her condition, not knowing what might lie at the end. She’d wait until the baby was born, she decided, and then send Robbie’s parents a photograph. The absurdity of this struck her—that she should somehow have the money to have a photograph taken.

She was about to lie down when she noticed a letter on her pillow from Clarissa. She tore it open and read swiftly down the page.

You would expect that things might be winding down, now that the German operation has moved to the south and there is the last big push, but we are as busy as ever with an outbreak of influenza. The Spanish flu, they are calling it, and it is particularly aggressive. Grown men, healthy men catch this flu and are dead in a couple of days. The doctors are bewildered, and there seems to be little we can do to save these patients. I pray to God that it doesn’t reach England.