Pam Weaver - A Mother’s Gift

Never mind, next Saturday was going to be wonderful. She’d got eighteen pounds, four shillings and eleven pence saved upstairs, and that was quite apart from what she had in her Post Office savings book. She could take a couple of quid and buy all the kiddies an ice cream.

The washing up finished, Dottie picked up the bowl to throw the dirty water onto the garden.

‘Coo-ee, coo-ee.’ Ann Pearce was leaning over the garden fence.

Dottie’s heart sank as the full horror of last night came flooding back. What did Ann want? She was smiling. What was she going to say?

Dottie tried to appear unruffled. ‘Lovely day.’

‘Smashing,’ said Ann. She noted Ann’s lank and greasy hair, fastened to the side of her head with a large hairslide. Dottie thought it a pity that she didn’t make more of herself. She wondered if she should offer to give her one of those new Sta Set Magicurls like the one Mary had tried a few months ago. It only cost ninepence and it was really successful. Ann was an attractive woman but it seemed she had given up on herself. Dottie supposed it must be because Ann had lost everything when her husband came home almost two years after the war had ended. There was an ugly scene and both Ann’s husband and the man she was living with had cleared off.

Ann raised an eyebrow. ‘Having a good day today?’

‘Er … yes, thanks,’ said Dottie, slightly flustered.

Ann smiled. ‘How did the wedding go?’

Dottie felt uneasy. She didn’t want this conversation to continue. If Reg came out and saw her talking to Ann, she’d never hear the last of it. ‘Excuse me,’ she said. ‘I think I can hear Reg calling.’

‘Before you go,’ Ann called after her. Her smile was too bright, too eager. Dottie’s stomach churned. ‘I don’t like to ask, but I seem to have run out of money for the gas.’

Dottie relaxed. This was the first time Ann had ever actually asked her for anything directly. Usually, Dottie had to resort to subterfuge to offer her a helping hand.

‘I wonder if you could help me out,’ she’d said to Ann on more than one occasion. ‘I seem to have made far too much casserole for just the two of us. Reg would go mad if he thought I’d was wasting good food, but he doesn’t care to have the same meal two nights running.’

Grudgingly, and only to ‘do her a favour’, Ann would take the dish, making sure to return it, clean, when Reg was at work. For the sake of her pride, Dottie couldn’t do it very often. It wasn’t like Ann to actually ask for something.

‘I meant to have got some change when I went down the village yesterday,’ Ann went on, ‘but I clean forgot all about it when I bumped into Doctor Fitzgerald. It was such a struggle getting away from him. Well, you know how it is.’

Dottie could feel her face begin to flame.

‘So,’ Ann continued, ‘if you could spare a few shillings for the gas …’

The sun went behind a cloud. ‘Yes,’ said Dottie weakly. ‘How much do you need?’

‘Ten bob would do nicely,’ said Ann.

Dottie turned to go inside. ‘I’ll just get my handbag. Ten bob, d’you say?’

Ann nodded. ‘That’ll do … for now.’

Saturday August 25 was indeed what the papers called ‘a scorcher’. When the lorry arrived outside Dottie’s cottage, the back of it had been transformed by an assortment of blankets and cushions. Mary was perched on top of a pillow laid on a crate of beer and fizzy pop, looking every bit the carnival queen. Tom sat at her feet while all around them the kids were bursting with excitement. Billy had a firm hold on little Christopher and Mary was cradling Connie on her lap. Susan and Maureen sat side by side next to their mother.

‘Don’t you look lovely, hen,’ Mary said as Dottie came down the path carrying a big bag. ‘You’d better sit here in the cab with that pretty dress on.’

‘What, this old thing?’ laughed Dottie, although in truth she was wearing her sundress for the first time. A friend had given her the material because it was too pink. The sleeveless bodice was tight, and she had made a belt to wear at the top of its calf-length full skirt. Luckily she’d been able to match it with some other pink material with tiny white daisies to make a small bolero top.

‘You’re so good with a needle,’ said Mary. ‘Me, I’m hopeless.’

Reg nudged Dottie’s arm. ‘I can’t sit in the back, love,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid if they can’t shove up and make room for me on the seat, I shan’t be going.’ He lowered his voice for Dottie’s ears only. ‘You know I couldn’t face the back of a lorry, not after what happened during the war.’

‘Of course not, dear,’ she smiled. ‘You sit next to Peaches, I’m quite happy at the back with Mary and the children.’

She watched as Peaches, dressed in a voluptuous tent-like dress to hide her bump, pulled Gary onto what was left of her lap and Reg, his Brylcreemed hair flopping attractively over one eye, climbed in beside her. Gary looked a little pale and he was complaining a bit.

‘I’m not so sure we should be taking him,’ said Peaches.

‘He’ll be as right as ninepence when he’s down on the beach,’ said Jack.

Dottie walked around the back and, grabbing hold of Tom’s hand, clambered over the side of the lorry. ‘Poor little Gary still doesn’t seem very happy,’ she said as she sat next to Mary. ‘What’s the matter with him?’

‘Peaches reckons he’s got a bit of a cold,’ said Mary, shaking her head. ‘He’s been like it since Saturday.’ And turning to one of her children, she said sharply, ‘Put your arm in Susan. If you hit something while we’re moving you’ll do yourself a mischief.’

Maureen had gravitated to Dottie’s lap. It felt good holding her. Dottie enveloped her in her arms, enjoying the feel of her warm little body and the faint vinegar smell of her shiny clean hair, soft as down next to her cheek. The old yearning flooded over her again. If only she could have a child of her own …

‘I love you, Auntie Dottie,’ Maureen lisped.

‘And I love you too, darling,’ said Dottie with feeling.

The drive to Littlehampton was very pleasant. They all sang silly songs, ‘Ten green bottles, hanging on the wall, Ten green bottles, hanging on the wall, and if one green bottle should accidentl’y fall … there’ll be nine green bottles hanging on the wall,’ was one and the other was ‘There was ten in the bed and the little one said, ‘Roll over, rollover.’ So they all rolled over and one fell out, there was nine in the bed and the little one said …’ and they clung to each other, laughing whenever Jack took a corner fast.

Forty-five minutes later, they pulled up on the seafront. Tom was the first to jump down. He helped Mary and the kids and then lifted Dottie down. Everybody, except Reg, grabbed a bag and they made their way onto the sand. The warm weather and the Carnival had brought everyone out. The beach was already very crowded. In fact it was difficult to find a stretch of sand big enough for all of them to be together, but eventually they did and luckily it was fairly near the promenade. Dottie pointed out the toilets beyond. ‘Handy for the kids,’ said Mary, giving her a nudge.

Tom and Jack brought some deckchairs down and the adults made themselves comfortable. As for the children, they couldn’t wait to get into the water. Mary stripped them down to their little ruched bathing costumes and knitted swimming trunks and let them go. ‘Make sure you look after them,’ she told Billy.

Knowing they’d soon get bored, Dottie went up top and bought six buckets and spades from the kiosk along the promenade. The children were thrilled to bits.

‘You shouldn’t have spent all that money, hen,’ Mary scolded. ‘They must have cost you a fortune.’