Cathy Sharp - The Little Runaways

‘You must promise to have tea with me every day, at least until you get your room back,’ Beatrice said when Nan came to visit her the next morning. ‘I told you that you would have your own sitting room when I took over here – and I feel guilty about turning you out for that pair.’

‘Don’t make a fuss, Beatrice.’ Nan smiled comfortably. ‘We have a perfectly adequate staff room I can share and I like chatting to the younger ones. I’ve known you too many years to make a fuss over something like this – besides, what else could you have done?’

‘I should have insisted on splitting them up, as they ought to be. It isn’t natural for a girl of that age to be sleeping in the same room as her brother.’

‘I dare say there are thousands of them sleeping top to toe all over the country. Most families cannot afford the luxury of separate beds for the children, let alone separate rooms. My mother had five children and two bedrooms; we kids had to crowd into one room, but at least we were all girls. Two of my sisters died of scarlet fever when they were eleven and ten, and my eldest sister caught diphtheria when she worked at the Infirmary and died of it when she was seventeen. There’s only Geraldine and me left now and she lives down in Dorset. Apart from a Christmas card, I haven’t heard from her in years – but I don’t think our upbringing did us any harm.’

‘I know you’re right. In a perfect world – but I doubt we shall ever have that, Nan.’

‘Perhaps one day things will change. They will build lots of lovely houses with electric, modern bathrooms and enough bedrooms for a family …’

‘And if they do a lot of the tenants won’t be able to afford the rent, unless the Government pays out money to keep them.’ Beatrice smiled wryly. ‘How are you anyway? Have you heard anything positive from Maisie?’

‘No,’ Nan sighed. ‘We don’t have much luck, you and I, do we?’

‘Not with our private lives. You should go down there – insist on talking to her. She’s your child, Nan, and you have a right to at least talk to her.’

‘I tried that last year and the Abbess told me I was wasting my time. She was very kind and understanding, but said Maisie needed privacy to recover and heal – but she didn’t call her by her name, of course. She’s known as Mary there.’

‘You’ve never known why she suddenly took it into her head to go off and enter a convent?’

‘She didn’t speak to me for years after I found her living rough with those tramps under the arches, but on her eighteenth birthday she told me that she had to find peace, and that she had to be away from me. I’ve never understood why she blamed me for what that brute did to her.’ Nan closed her eyes in remembered grief. ‘I can’t believe I was such a fool – but he was kind to us and I was missing Sam.’

‘You shouldn’t take all the blame, Nan. Why didn’t Maisie tell you when it began? She knew it was wrong, but she didn’t give you a chance to help her.’

‘Perhaps she tried and I didn’t listen. I remember being tired and feeling unwell a lot back then. I suppose I was lost in my grief over Sam and Archie.’ Nan shook her head. ‘I shouldn’t talk about it, it only upsets me.’

‘My fault. I know how you feel – but if I had a chance to make amends … It is too late for me, Nan, but not for you. Don’t ever give up. Maisie is alive and one day she might need you again. I needed the protection of the convent when I made my vows and I dare say Maisie did too, but she is very young. You should let her know that she can return to her home if she needs to. Not every nun remains a nun for the rest of her life. There is a chance that Maisie will change her mind one day.’

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