Daisy's Wars (36 page)

She didn’t say anything.

‘You don’t make conversation easy, do you?’

‘Well, we didn’t exactly choose each other,’ Daisy murmured, sipping her drink and looking around in time-honoured fashion. ‘I mean, you’re just doing your duty,
aren’t you?’

‘Well, actually, that’s not entirely true,’ he smiled. ‘I had been tipped off, then I had a look and said, “That one’s definitely for me,” and pulled
rank.’

‘Oh God, another awful chat-up line,’ Daisy groaned. She wasn’t sure if he was laughing at her or with her, but either way she wished he would stop.

‘I suppose you’ve heard a great many?’ he said, looking her up and down.

‘Look,’ Daisy said quietly, ‘don’t try that one either, I don’t succumb to flattery. And for your information, the dress and the diamonds are borrowed. If
they’re not back by midnight I’ll be standing here in my WAAF uniform.’

‘Clothes and jewellery are just the outside trappings,’ he said. ‘I’m judging what’s underneath.’

‘If you’re being filthy you may well get this drink over your head,’ she sighed. ‘I’ve heard more crude chat-ups than you have; I can see them coming.’

‘My, but you’re touchy,’ he chuckled. ‘I was talking about the person, actually, not the body, though now you’ve drawn my attention to it—’

‘I did not draw your attention to it!’ she said firmly. ‘And what are you, psychic or something? How do you know about “the person”?’

‘Our first row!’ he said delightedly, spinning on his heels with delight.

Daisy glared at him. ‘I don’t think this is exactly a meeting of minds. Why don’t we split up and perhaps we’ll meet people we can get on with? That way the evening
won’t be totally wasted.’

‘On the contrary,’ he said brightly, ‘I’m loving it so far, and no one else will dare come near you. I told you, I pulled rank.’

Then he guided her to the middle of the floor and danced with her.

‘I’m not dancing,’ she said pointedly.

‘Yes you are,’ he grinned. ‘Look – you’re doing it now.’

‘I’m not, you’re pulling me about!’

‘You sound so childish!’ he laughed, whirling her round. ‘Now be a good girl and dance properly or you’ll fall down in your borrowed dress and everyone will laugh at you,
me included. And if you
are
a good girl and behave yourself, I’ll let you dance one dance with a young buck later.’

‘I’ll dance with whoever I want to dance with!’ she said angrily.

‘Yes,’ he smiled, ‘but only if I let you.’

The whole evening he stuck by her, a cheerful, good-natured if annoying presence. He brought her food, carried drinks to her and talked even when she refused to reply.

‘You haven’t asked about
me
,’ he said.

‘There’s a message there,’ she replied, raising her eyebrows.

‘Peter Bradley—’ he started.

‘Yes, you said.’

‘Oh, good! You remembered! Aged fifty-one, widowed, two daughters, nineteen and seventeen – you’ll meet them later – on the board of directors of Morris Motors and
various other bits and pieces—’

‘—and you bother girls young enough to be your daughter. There’s a name for men like you.’

‘You
are
fun, Daisy!’

‘Or are you one of those guys who likes boys better and surrounds himself with the most gorgeous females to put people off the track?’ she said, in an attempt to insult him.

He looked thoughtful. ‘No,’ he said eventually, and grinned.

‘Took your time answering, though, didn’t you?’

‘Well, you strike me as the kind of young woman who needs an honest answer, Daisy, so I considered it carefully before I answered,’ he said seriously.

‘Is there
anything
I can do to dislodge you?’ she demanded.

‘Don’t think so,’ he said, shaking his head almost mournfully. ‘I’m afraid you’re stuck with me.’ He looked at her amiably while she glared back at him.
‘What’s the fastest marriage proposal you’ve ever had, Daisy?’ he asked, smiling down happily at her.

‘Oh,
please!
’

‘I mean it!’

‘Yes, that’s the trouble, you probably do.’ She looked at him. He thought he was in full control, so she decided to sort him out. ‘Just for the record,’ she said,
‘the fastest proposal I ever had was from a pilot of a Lanc.’

‘Oh, those boys proposed to everyone,’ Peter said dismissively, reaching for her glass.

‘He was about twenty and his plane was shot to hell, all the crew dead and he knew he wouldn’t make it either. I was on duty in the tower, you see, he was on my earphones, and he
asked me if I’d marry him if he made it home and survived.’

‘And what did you say?’ he asked.

‘I said I would.’

‘And did you?’

‘No,’ she said calmly. ‘The line went dead and he was never seen again.’

There was silence for a moment, then, ‘That was a rotten story,’ he said quietly.

‘You asked the question.’

‘And you play dirty.’

‘You asked for that, too.’

‘Maybe you’re not a very nice girl.’

‘I think that’s a wise judgement.’

‘Poisonous, even.’

‘You said it.’

‘I think it’s my duty to marry you, to keep you from poisoning some nice boy, though.’ He beamed down at her. ‘Good try, Daisy!’ he said happily. ‘We’re
going to have such fun together!’

It was one of the worst evenings of her life, and yet he reminded her of someone.

When she reached Rose Cottage the next day a bouquet of red roses was waiting for her, and so was Mar, full of excitement.

‘Who are they from? Who are they from?’ she demanded, dancing up and down.

‘You know very well who they’re from, you silly old mare!’ Par shouted from the sitting room. ‘You read the bloody card!’

Daisy knew who they were from, too. She didn’t need to read the card, and put the roses straight in the bin.

‘Daisy!’ Mar whispered very loudly. ‘Red roses!’

‘From an idiot,’ Daisy said wearily.

‘Peter’s not an idiot!’

‘Oh, you know him?’

‘Well of course we do, we move in the same circles, my dear, God help us. He’s a little odd, I’ll admit—’

‘Odd!’

‘Kind of strange at times, granted.’

‘Mar, listen to me, the man’s an
idiot
!’ Daisy laughed, throwing her arms round Mar and looking into her eyes.

‘But Daisy, you don’t know enough about him.’

‘I know all I ever want to know, believe me!’ Daisy said, heading for her room.

‘He and his wife had such a happy marriage,’ Mar persisted at her heels, ‘and the girls are so lovely – did you meet them?’

‘No, he threatened to introduce them, but I made sure he didn’t.’

‘She died in the Blitz, you know, his wife. She was staying at their London flat, terribly sad. I said to Par. “He’ll never live without her,” and for a while you could
see the sadness in his eyes, but he’s pulled himself together wonderfully. Lovely man, Daisy, strange, but lovely.’ Mar’s voice sounded almost reproachful. ‘I know
there’s an age gap, but you’re mature beyond your years and I’m sure your people will love him when they come back.’

Daisy spun round to face her. ‘You set this up, didn’t you?’ she accused Mar.

‘Daisy! As if I would!’

‘You set the whole thing up!’

From the sitting room she heard Par laughing. ‘Found out, you silly old mare. I told you she was too smart not to guess!’

‘Shut up, you old goat!’ Mar yelled back. ‘Daisy, it wasn’t like—’

‘The invitation, everything, you set it up! I couldn’t understand why I’d been invited, but you arranged it so that I would meet that, that
idiot
! Mar, how could
you?’

‘Well, you are two of my favourite people, you and Peter,’ Mar said sheepishly, ‘and as I say, you’ve always been older than your years and he’s always been younger
than his, so I just thought, well, who knows? And if you can’t interfere in the lives of your friends, well, I mean, darling, what’s the point of having them?’

‘He’s not younger than his years, Mar, the man is an idiot! How many times do I have to say it? He ruined the entire night for me, pulling me about the dance floor, laughing so
loudly that he had everybody staring at us. And I couldn’t get away from him, he was like a leech!’

Mar was chuckling fondly. ‘That certainly sounds like Peter,’ she said. ‘I’m so glad you two hit it off!’

‘Mar!’ Daisy said in exasperation, then she turned and made her way upstairs. Her reaction had been too strong because Mar had mentioned her people and their supposed return any day
now, and she had had to divert attention. There had been so many opportunities to explain about ‘her people’, and that had been another one, but once again she let it pass. She kept
saying to herself that she didn’t know why she did this, but deep down she did. She didn’t want to open that door and think about them. There was too much stored up there, her entire
life until she had joined up and reinvented herself. If she looked behind that door, who knew where it could lead? Lying to Mar, even by omission, made her feel guilty, but she was only resting for
a while at Rose Cottage. Soon she would decide what to do with her life and move on and Mar need never know.

What to do with her life, now there was a question, and she had no answer. The more she thought about it the less sense it all made. One thing she did know, though: she had no intention of being
found a nice, safe man, and certainly not a nice, safe
old
man. Nor an idiot.

20

The next day Daisy returned to Rose Cottage after a day spent wandering round the farm on the estate and going for one of her lone walks down the lanes. It was springtime, a
time of renewal, when the buds were on the trees and birds were building nests. All around her was the wonderful feeling of growth. She had lain down under a tree and fallen asleep in the grass,
something she was doing a lot these days, now that she was finally free of night shifts and living too closely with other people. Space suddenly meant so much to her, and silence, except that it
made her sleepy.

There was a sports car in the driveway when she arrived back, probably some former Fly Boy trying to make sense of civilian life, she thought, aware that she wasn’t looking her best. Her
hair was tousled, her cheeks red and her eyes still heavy with sleep – and there
he
was, in the sitting room, Peter Bradley, with his back to her, thankfully.

She saw him out of the corner of her eye and instantly decided not to turn her head and officially see him. Instead she moved very quietly along the passageway to the kitchen and went up the
back stairs to her room. Then she lay on her bed and thought how intolerable the whole thing was, this man, this
old
man, chasing after her. The thing was sick and he had no right. Mar had
at least encouraged him, probably even invited him, and she had no right, either.

No, that was going a bit far, it was Mar’s house after all, she had every right to invite into it whoever she wanted, even weird eccentrics and oddities, but that didn’t mean Daisy
had to get involved with them. She didn’t want this, didn’t want romance or closeness or love, the very thought of involvement made her feel queasy.

There had to be a way out. No one had seen her coming in, so if she could get out again they wouldn’t know she had come back. She kept the light out and in the early nightfall packed a few
things in a bag, wrote a note for Mar saying she’d popped off to meet up with one of the girls and would be back in a couple of days. Then she crept downstairs, listening for voices and
footsteps, looking around furtively every few moments.

‘Going somewhere nice?’ a voice said pleasantly from behind her. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, did I make you jump? I was in my room, changing for dinner.’

She felt like a child caught sneaking out without permission, but tried for all the calmness and coolness in her repertoire. ‘I was going off to spend a couple of days with a
friend,’ she said.

‘Oh, I see,’ Peter smiled, walking downstairs with her. ‘Female, I hope?’

‘That has nothing whatsoever to do with you,’ she replied primly.

‘Well, it has, really, Daisy, as well you know,’ he teased. ‘I won’t stand for lovers, I’m not one of these moral liberals.’

He walked in front of her to the bottom of the stairs then turned to face her. Standing on the second step her eyes were level with his.

‘I would think it very cruel if you were to hurt me like that, Daisy,’ he said solemnly, then he turned and went into the sitting room, leaving her standing there, perplexed.

There was the mass sound of various voices from the sitting room, then Mar came bounding out and found her where Peter had left her. ‘You’re not going
now
?’ she
demanded. ‘I mean, Daisy, my darling, you can meet your friend tomorrow. Surely you can have dinner with us?’

‘Mar,’ Daisy said, putting her arms loosely around Mar’s neck and looking into her eyes, ‘stop this, please. I can’t take it, honestly. I can’t. When
I’m under pressure I run, I can’t help it, and I don’t want him or anyone. I have my reasons, Mar.’

‘Daisy, my darling girl,’ Mar said, reaching up and smoothing Daisy’s hair from her face. ‘It’s only dinner, it isn’t white slavery.’

And so Daisy stayed. She had gone back upstairs, bathed, changed into one of Dotty’s gowns and joined Mar, Par, a selection of friends and neighbours, and Peter, of course. She kept her
eyes away from him at all times, as she had once done with someone else at this very table, but she could feel his on her and had to fight the urge to get up from the table and run. Then her eyes
filled as she thought of that first time she had been to Rose Cottage and had avoided Frank Moran all evening.

She was acting true to form, she mused, whenever there was anything she felt as a threat, she killed it with rudeness and took to her heels. It was, as she had told Mar, what she did. The
slightest hint of closeness overwhelmed her, so she ran, just as she had kept running until Frank was nearly dead, and then she had lost him.

She had no idea if Dotty had been right about hearing being the last thing to go, or if Frank had heard her as he lay dying, but during those last days and nights she’d told him how much
she regretted running and wished she could turn the clock back. It was too late, but maybe that was why she had told him. If he had lived she probably wouldn’t have said a word, she would
have chosen safety and silence. At twenty-five years old she still couldn’t face any kind of closeness, not closeness with men at any rate, and so she was alone and that was how she would
stay.