His Diamond Bride (15 page)

He laid his face against her for a moment, then raised it and said gently, ‘I'll make you a cup of tea.'

He hurried away, taking the letter with him and leaving her smiling. There was joy to be found in his words, his all-embracing acceptance of her as the hope of his life. She tried to ignore a faint niggling disappointment that his affection seemed to lack the other dimension that would have meant so much. He'd turned to her as a refuge from horrors, something she knew was common to many men who'd been involved in fighting. It was more than she might have expected and if it wasn't what she'd hoped for, so what? With the years stretching out ahead of them, it was time to be realistic.

Wasn't it?

 

Gradually the war news became more hopeful. Mark was still in touch with many of his pilot friends, and they passed on information not yet available to the rest of the world. In September 1943, allied troops had landed in southern Italy. In January 1944, more troops reached Italy in what became known as the Anzio landings. Their progress was slowed
down by fierce resistance, but they overcame it. Hope was in the air.

Then came February, when a few days became known as ‘Big Week' as the allied air forces stormed across Europe. The three of them listened to the nightly radio bulletins and Dee tried to read Mark's face, wondering if he felt excluded from what was turning into a triumph. But the smile he turned on her was always warm and tender, and his hand would reach out to touch her stomach gently.

Both Joe and Mark watched Dee like guard dogs. If there was a job to be done away from home it was always Joe who took it, and even he announced that he would soon refuse them.

‘This is the last one until it's all over,' he announced one morning, buttoning up his jacket.

‘Dad,' she protested, laughing, ‘nothing's going to happen for a few weeks.'

‘And I'm going to be here when it does. 'Bye darling. Take care.'

She settled down for a pleasant day's sewing, but within an hour she knew she'd been wrong about nothing happening. Pain started tearing through her, growing greater and greater. She screamed and Mark came hurrying in from the garage.

All the way to the hospital she tried to stay hopeful. Her moment was coming. A few hours of suffering and she would see Mark hold their child in his arms, their eyes would meet in a moment of perfect understanding and the bond between them would be sealed as never before.

But, as they reached the hospital and she was wheeled away, she knew that something was badly wrong. The pain was agonising in the wrong way; blood was flowing out of her body in a terrifying river.

‘He's dead,' she whispered. ‘My baby is dead.'

‘We're giving you a blood transfusion,' the sister said. ‘Don't give up hope yet.'

But Dee was a nurse. She knew the truth.

‘No,' she moaned. ‘Oh, dear God,
no!
'

Mark had married her for this baby, hoping to find a haven for his tormented heart. Now she was letting him down.

‘No,' she whispered. ‘No—please, save my baby.'

Then everything was dark.

For Mark, waiting in a corridor, time dragged with painful slowness. At last a middle-aged nurse emerged, sympathetic when she saw him.

‘It's gone wrong, hasn't it?' he asked in a shaking voice. He wasn't sure how he knew, but he'd picked something up from Dee's tension, without understanding it.

‘I'm afraid the baby was born dead,' the nurse said.

He closed his eyes, leaning back against the wall, his heart aching for his wife. She was suffering so much, with nothing to show for it.

‘But she's going to be all right, isn't she?' he asked huskily.

In the silence that followed he felt terror rise in him.
‘She's going to be all right!'
he almost shouted.

‘Mr Sellon, I have to be honest with you. Your wife has lost a lot of blood. We're doing our best, but things may not go well. I think you should be prepared.'

‘No!'
he said fiercely. ‘That's not going to happen. I won't let it. You don't understand. She won't go away—because she never does—when I need her—she's always there—' He was breathing hard, as though he'd been running. ‘I want to see her.'

‘Of course.' The nurse stood back to let him pass.

At first he couldn't believe that the woman lying on the bed was Dee. His Dee was always full of life and vitality, but this woman lay as still as death, her breathing coming so faintly that it was almost noiseless.

‘Darling, wake up,' he said urgently. ‘Look at me, talk to me.'

There was no response, no sound, no movement, and that frightened him more than anything. In all the time they had known each other, never had she refused him anything, save the time when she'd broken their engagement. And that had been the greatest misfortune of his life. Now she was refusing him again, and the spectre of the future made him recoil in dread.

‘You've got to listen,' he said urgently. ‘I know you can hear me because—' He stopped as he heard himself saying words he didn't understand. How did he know this? And yet he did know. Somewhere, far back in his mind, he could hear a voice saying, ‘I know you're asleep but maybe you can hear me, somewhere deep inside you… I do hope so because there's so much I want you to understand.'

Once he'd heard those words and they had summoned him back from a dark place. Now they were his only hope.

‘Can you hear me?' he asked, echoing the words in his memory. ‘Can my voice reach deep inside you? Please hear me. There's so much I want you to understand.

‘I've never told you of my love because I didn't know how, but I must tell you now because it may be my last chance. I think I loved you from the start. Remember how easily we could talk? That's why I couldn't commit to Sylvia. She was beautiful but you had something special about you, although I didn't properly understand.

‘I was a young idiot, full of self-importance, thinking I was entitled to everything I wanted, especially girls. And all the time this feeling was growing in me but I couldn't let myself admit the truth. It mattered too much.
You
mattered.

‘I was glad when we decided to pretend to be a couple because I wanted you to be my girl. So why didn't I ask you? Because I was shy, and that's the truth. There, laugh at me. I deserve it. I was a fool. If I hadn't been, I'd never have lost you. I went out on the town to convince myself that I was still in charge, free of you, when the truth was I could never
be free. And you threw my stupidity back in my face, as you had every right to do.'

Mark laid his head down on Dee's breast. ‘Speak to me,' he begged. ‘Come back to me. I love you with all my heart. I'll never love anyone else.'

As he spoke, a door opened inside his mind and he knew that these words, too, were not his own, but had been said to him, long ago. He hadn't recognised her love until this moment, but it was as true now as then, deeper with the depth of suffering, and his own love reached out in response.

Everything that mattered to him had come from the woman who lay in his arms, who would slip away if he couldn't prevent it. He did the only thing that was in his power, laying his lips on hers, sending her a silent message of warmth and love.

‘Can you feel my love reaching out to you?' he murmured, repeating what he now knew to be her words to him long ago. ‘It's yours if you want it.'

For a long moment he held his breath, letting it out slowly as her eyes opened.

‘It was you, wasn't it?' he whispered. ‘You came to me in the hospital when I was dying, and you turned me back. Now I'm here to do the same for you.'

‘Is it true?' she murmured. ‘Is it really true?'

‘It's true, my darling, more true than I can ever say. You're the one, the only one. You always have been. Do you remember how you ordered me to get well, saying you were a bully? Well, so am I.' He gave a shaky smile. ‘Woman, your husband is ordering you to get well and love him for ever.'

‘Then I must,' she said.

‘Is that a promise?'

‘It's a promise.'

‘I'll hold you to it.'

Suddenly her smile was stronger. ‘Did I ever break a promise to you yet?'

He shook his head and spoke sombrely. ‘I love you, my wife. It took me too long to say it, but now I'll be saying it every moment of all the years ahead. I love you. I love you.'

 

The months that followed were a mixture of grief and joy—grief for our dead child, joy that we had found each other at last. Everything was sweet and familiar, my darling, yet everything was new.

You became a little more possessive, always checking to see that I was all right. People used to say to me, ‘Doesn't he suffocate you? Isn't it annoying?' But it wasn't annoying. It was lovely being needed.

I remember 6th June which became known as D-Day, the start of the Normandy landings, when the allied army invaded the Continent again, this time in France. Now the final victory was in view. The war didn't end officially until the following year but D-Day was the beginning of the end, and people sensed it, pouring into the streets to sing and hold hands, looking to the future with glad hearts.

We were there, too, standing with our arms about each other, trying to rejoice with the others. I was determined to put a brave face on it for your sake, but when I glanced up I found you looking down at me with an expression of such love and concern that I felt closer to you than ever before. That night my happiness had nothing to do with the looming end of the war. It came from knowing that I came first with you.

For a while we feared that I couldn't have another baby, and I'll never forget how tenderly you assured me that you didn't care about that, as long as you had me. But then we found I was pregnant again, and before long we had Lilian. The following year Terry joined us. You wouldn't admit how proud you were to have a son. People were just beginning to talk about women's lib and you didn't want to appear old-fashioned. So you tried to seem casual, but I knew you
were bursting with pride and I had a little laugh—secretly, of course.

But no happiness is ever untroubled. The following year Polly was born and it seemed we could ask for no more. She was your favourite. According to Dad, it was because she looked like me. When she died suddenly, just before her first birthday, I thought you, too, would die. I believe you wanted to, although you never said so. We didn't talk about it, just held each other in silence, night after night.

Your health improved. You got much of your strength back and Dad made you a partner in the garage. As he got older he eased off a bit, doing less mechanical work and helping to look after the children so that I was able to go back to work at the hospital. You didn't like my working. In those days a wife and mother was supposed to stay at home, but you said I must do whatever I thought right.

I think it helped that Mr Royce had got married to a beautiful girl twenty years his junior.

Once I'd started work you never mentioned it, never complained, even helped in the house to make my life easier. People who'd known you before the war were astonished. ‘You should have seen him back then,' they'd say. ‘You'd never have thought he'd turn out like this.'

If you had a fault it was that you were always losing things. How many times did I hear you cry, ‘Dee, where's my—?' Heavens, but you were the untidiest man in the world! Still are, come to that.

For a while there were five of us in that little house and it was very crowded, but we were happy, and when Dad died we really missed him. We watched our children grow up and make their own lives, and then we were alone for the first time.

Some parents are devastated when their young fly the nest, but you said it was like being newlyweds. We were in our fifties by then, but you were right.

What a time we had! We got quite exhausted. We thought of having a honeymoon, because we hadn't had one the first time, but in the end we just locked the doors and had a honeymoon at home.

Then, in a strange way, we became parents again. Lilian gave birth to Pippa just when she was getting ready to go back to work, and she was glad when we offered to help out. We cared for Pippa part-time until she started school. And when she was a teenager we took her in because she and Lilian couldn't live in the same house without squabbling. And now it's a joy to have her here, our extra ‘daughter', caring for us and understanding us better than anyone else.

I told her about having our ‘honeymoon' at home, and she was scandalised. She thinks it's not a honeymoon unless you go away and we should have taken that trip to Brighton that we once talked about. Perhaps she's right. Is it too late? We've done everything else, could we still manage that, too? Oh, yes, let's do it. Let's have one last wonderful fling!

 

‘Are you crazy?' Lilian demanded.

‘No, they're crazy,' Pippa laughed. ‘And why shouldn't they be?'

‘Brighton? At their age?'

‘They won't do anything energetic, just sit in the sun. I'll be there to take care of them, and I'll bring them home safely. Promise.'

A week later she drove Mark and Dee to the seaside resort in a trip that was planned to be as similar as possible to the one they would have taken years before. They stayed in a tiny bed and breakfast near the seafront and spent each day strolling gently along the promenade, or sitting in deckchairs on the beach. At these times Pippa moved away far enough to give them privacy, but always kept them in sight in case they needed her.

‘I really envy you two,' she said once, when she'd just
finished making them comfortable. ‘The way you are together—it's wonderful.'