Winter on the Mersey(71)
Tommy beamed from ear to ear. ‘Okey doke. What about you, Danny?’
‘Me?’ Danny held his hands wide. ‘You aren’t expecting me to make a cake as well, are you, Tommy?’
Just as he said this, the back door opened, and Sarah stepped through, balancing a wide box on her hip. ‘I heard that, Danny Callaghan. Kitty, did you warn him?’
Kitty smiled conspiratorially. ‘Didn’t have time.’
Danny turned. ‘What do you mean, Kitty? What have you got in store for me?’
Sarah put the box on the table with a thump. ‘Sprouts, Danny.’
He gave her an amazed look and she grinned back, her eyes twinkling.
‘What am I meant to do with them?’ He looked into the box. ‘There must be hundreds of them!’
Kitty laughed out loud. ‘Now come on, Danny. You’re always telling me how well you managed when you were on your own, and you didn’t always rely on Sarah here. So we thought you could help out with the vegetables. Your job is to prepare the sprouts.’
For a moment he looked dismayed, but then he rallied, as he could see he had no way of saving face other than by accepting. Besides, if Sarah and Kitty were ganging up on him, it was pointless to try to resist.
‘All right,’ he said grudgingly. ‘You’ll have to show me what to do though.’
‘Kitty will do that,’ said Sarah. ‘I’ve got to get back to Mam. I’m peeling the carrots. Don’t forget to save the box, though – Mam keeps them for protecting her vegetable beds.’ With that she swung out of the back door.
Stepping outside into the cool, fresh morning air, Sarah congratulated herself on not falling apart at the first sight of Danny for what felt like half a lifetime. He was still as handsome as she remembered, and as warm and funny, and she knew her heart was beating faster even as she’d good-humouredly mocked him. Whether his was doing the same, she just couldn’t tell.
‘We did it!’ Rita gave her mother a hug. ‘Mam, you managed it. Thank you.’
‘It was a team effort, so it’s thanks to everybody,’ said Dolly happily, pushing a grey curl behind her ear. She knew Rita had really wanted her first Christmas with Ellen to be spent in their own home, and with Jack there, but he hadn’t been able to get leave. He’d brought them plenty of rum on his last visit, and he’d persuaded a comrade from the Fleet Air Arm who had been lucky enough to come home for Christmas to come round with extra rum and presents for the children, but obviously it wasn’t the same as having him there. Still, she could see Rita had had a good time, and to be honest Dolly had been glad of the use of Rita’s kitchen, not to mention the extra pairs of hands. They would never have been able to make enough roast potatoes otherwise.
Dolly sighed contentedly. They’d squeezed as many people as possible round the kitchen table, extended with side tables and whatever else they could find of the right height. Somehow they had all fitted in. At some point they were going to have to work out who owned which plates and cutlery, as lots of items had been borrowed as well, but that could keep. She didn’t intend to move from her chair until she absolutely had to.
‘Sit down, Violet, and take the weight off your feet,’ she called across to her daughter-in-law, who was rising in a cumbersome fashion. ‘You’ve done enough. We wouldn’t have had any parsnips if it hadn’t been for you peeling and chopping them all.’
Violet gave her a smile, but it was mixed with a grimace. ‘I’ll just stretch my legs a bit. I’m more comfortable when I stand at the moment, for some reason.’ She heaved herself fully to her feet and slowly went to stand against the sideboard.
Rita went across and stood with her. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked quietly.
‘Oh, yes,’ said Violet at once.
Rita looked at her dubiously. She could see that wasn’t completely true, but recognised that Violet didn’t want to make a fuss. She remembered what her own last few weeks of pregnancy had been like and sympathised. Little Ellen was lying in a corner, in an improvised cot made of a drawer from the back kitchen, lined with knitted blankets, fast asleep in the middle of all the noise and chatter. Soon Violet would have her own baby, and she knew how deeply her friend had longed for this. She just had to get through the next few weeks.
‘Would you like a glass of water?’ she said.
‘Oh, no, don’t worry about me. I’ll get it. It might be a bit cooler out in the back kitchen,’ Violet said hastily, obviously not wanting to draw attention to herself.
Rita gazed around the room, which Pop had decorated with branches of holly he’d found on his rounds. There were home-made paper chains, which Violet had laboured over with Georgie, who was just old enough to help out. He and Nancy were here, as old Mrs Kerrigan had apparently said she couldn’t begin to think about celebrating Christmas when her poor Sid was still a POW. Nancy had complained that this was no reason to deny Georgie his fun and had joined her own mother’s party instead. Rita had to admit that Nancy was glowing, unusually cheerful and agreeable, her cheeks rosy with the warmth of the room, her hair beautifully styled and shining. Long may it last, she thought. Although, knowing Nancy as she did, her angelic mood meant there was probably something going on behind the scenes.
There was a rise of chatter from the far end of the room, where Pop was shaking his head. ‘Oh, go on,’ Sarah was saying, and it looked as if others were agreeing with her.