The Back of Beyond (14 page)

A small sigh of relief escaped him. ‘Thanks, that means a lot to me. I've really enjoyed our times together, and if I'd been left in Aberdeen … who knows? But you're a lovely person, Lexie, you'll find somebody else.'

He didn't even kiss her goodbye when he left, but held out his hand for her to shake, and she went inside without waiting until his car drove off. Damn him! she thought. He had walked out on her! Like her father! Like Alistair! Well, she wouldn't get serious with any other man, even if he swore on a stack of bibles that he loved her.

Something she had once read came to her now. ‘Love is to man a thing apart, 'tis woman's whole existence.' She probably hadn't got the words exactly right, but their meaning was as true now as it had been when the poet wrote them.

But she would get over Ernie Gammie! Just as she'd got over everyone else who had betrayed her!

Throughout the winter of 1938–39, more and more rumours circulated of unrest in Europe, newsreels in the cinemas showed Hitler's storm troopers marching into this country and that. And overnight, it seemed, grey bloated fish-shapes appeared in the skies over the large cities – barrage balloons to stop enemy aircraft getting through, and anchored to the ground by long cables – and still the British stoically ignored what they knew in their hearts was almost upon them.

*    *    *

Lexie Fraser was fed up – the only folk she ever saw were women buying groceries and odd things like shoe polish and laces, and old men collecting their pensions and getting their supply of XXX Bogey Roll for their stinking pipes. Nothing exciting ever happened.

She had expected to see Alistair Ritchie at his sister's wedding in May, but he hadn't come. Of course, Alice had made excuses for him, saying he'd a wife and two kids to support so he couldn't afford the fare, but he could have, if he'd wanted. Not that Alice had been upset about him not showing up; she'd been so soppy about Sam Guthrie, she wouldn't have noticed if there had been nobody there except the two of them. As it was, it had been a really quiet wedding, no big show, a handful of friends, a sandwich tea in the kitchen at Benview after the kirk service, and that was it.

Even the best man, one of Sam's workmates, hadn't been anything special. She'd offered to put him up for the night, and had made him walk to her house to try to sober him a bit, only because he hadn't been fit to drive back to Aberdeen. He'd been at the sorry-for-himself stage, bewailing the fact that no girl ever stuck to him for long, and she'd been sorely tempted to tell him to try washing himself with Lifebuoy to see if that would get rid of his b.o. And so, although Alice and Sam still teased her about her one-night-stand with what's-his-name, she was still a virgin, a finicky virgin who couldn't find a man to make her heart beat like Alistair had once done, and more recently though less strongly, Ernie Gammie.

Although she often told herself she should have nothing to do with men, she still felt a craving for male company, and after she had got over Ernie letting her down, she had begun to go to any dances that were held within ten miles of Forvit – there was always somebody with a car willing to give her a lift. She had hoped to meet a man who would at least take her out occasionally, but of those who
had
made a date with her, two could only speak about football, motor bikes and engines of any kind, and the rest had just one thing on their minds. They all knew that she lived on her own, and at first, she'd been thrilled when one of them tried it on – Pattie Morton from Bankside, for instance. He was really good-looking, and he'd taken her to the first house of the theatre in Aberdeen one Saturday, and when he took her home she had invited him in without thinking. She had expected him to kiss her so she wasn't upset by that, but she had ended up having to fight him off. She'd decided to refuse if he asked her out a second time, but he hadn't.

But Pattie had been a gentleman compared with Ed Ross.
He
had an old BSA motor bike, and she'd been quite thrilled to be sitting on the pillion with the wind whistling in her ears and whipping against her cheeks. It had been quite an exhilarating experience, but then he went and spoiled it by running off the road and into a wood. She'd hardly got herself seated on the ground when he was on top of her, and she'd a devil of a job to stop his hands – and worse – going where they shouldn't.

‘No wonder you're still an old maid!' he had shouted at her as he jumped on his bike and roared off, leaving her to walk all the way home, like the ill-mannered lout he was.

So she'd been cautious after that, hadn't let any of them see her home. But some were just as bad inside a cinema or theatre, even at the bus terminus, or wherever they thought they would get away with it … but she always managed to stop them. Not a soul asked her out now, once the word had got round.

It did puzzle her sometimes, though. She couldn't understand why she got in such a panic about it, when she wanted to know what it was like, wanted to do it at least once so she would know what other women were speaking about, but the minute she heard the man's breathing quickening, her stomach started to churn with terror and her body went rigid, and if his hand strayed anywhere near the leg of her knickers, she went mad and fought like a tiger.

If only she had somebody to confide in, to help her to get at the root of her problem. Once upon a time, she would have had Alistair Ritchie, not that she could have spoken to him about anything like this, or if Doctor Tom had still been here, he'd have reasoned it out with her. Folk still spoke about how kind he'd been, how he'd listened to everything they had to say.

The shop bell tinkling, Lexie looked up to see Doodie Tough coming in, sidling in would be more like it, she thought, for the woman had a queer way of walking, though there was nothing wrong with her tongue. She could speak till the cows came home and never draw a breath, as the saying went.

‘I'm nae needing much the day, Lexie,' Doodie began, ‘jist a quarter o' back bacon … and cut it thin so it'll be enough for me and Dod and oor Georgie.'

‘Right.' Lexie lifted the bacon joint off its shelf, placed it in the slicing machine and reset the thickness gauge before she turned the handle. ‘And how are you this morning?' She knew that asking would bring forth a whole catalogue of ailments, but it was out before she thought.

‘I'm nae that good the day.' Doodie's face took on a more melancholy expression than normal. ‘My varicose veins are gieing me gyp, my corns are yarking like the very devil wi' the damp weather, and I've come oot in a rash.'

‘I'm sorry to hear that.' Lexie wrapped the sliced bacon in the greaseproof paper she had laid ready. ‘Was it something you ate?'

‘If it was, it come oot o' this shop!' Doodie did not dwell on it, however, and carried on, ‘What's mair, I broke ane o' my false teeth last night eating a caramel, and I thocht it was a nut and swallaed it.'

Hard pressed not to laugh, Lexie gave a sympathetic mumble, then said, ‘Now, was there anything else, Doodie?'

‘A box o' Swan Vestas. Dod likes them best to light his pipe. I tried him wi' a twirl o' paper to use like a taper, you ken, but he wouldna even try it. He's set in his ways, my Dod, and getting worse every day, the thrawn auld bugger.'

She cackled loudly, and knowing that there were few couples in Forvit as close as the Toughs, Lexie laughed along with her while she handed over the matches and counted out the change from the half crown Doodie tendered.

Thankfully, the woman didn't linger, and Lexie was putting the bacon back in place when something niggled at her mind – set off by Doodie Tough's visit, but nothing that she had said today. Lexie had the feeling that it was something she had overheard when she was quite young, something quite important to her now, and she knew she wouldn't get any peace until she did remember.

Chapter 10

The Prime Minister's broadcast was over by the time the Ritchies reached Lee Green on the first Sunday of September, but Alistair had no need to ask the outcome. Peggy looked shocked, Marge was sobbing because Dougal had been mobilized the day before, and Rosie was trying to comfort her. ‘I keep telling you, dear, he won't be in any danger. The regulars'll bear the brunt of the fighting, though I can't really see Adolf tangling with the British Army, not when we beat them last time. It'll all be over in a few months.'

Understanding that his mother-in-law was warning him off the subject, Alistair did not voice any opinion, and the rest of the day passed in forced merriment.

Gwen, however, had sensed something in her husband that made her distinctly uneasy, but she waited until they were on their way home before she asked, ‘I hope you're not thinking of joining up, Alistair?'

He couldn't meet her eyes. ‘Yes I was, if you must know … but Manny depends on me, so I'll stay with him till I'm called up.'

Certain that married men with children wouldn't be conscripted, Gwen said no more. Pushing him to give up the idea of going into the forces might have the opposite effect.

War now a reality, the government was underlining its earlier advice that parents in all major cities should evacuate their children to protect them from air raids, and train loads of poor youngsters, with labels on and carrying square gas mask boxes, had already been whisked away from their tearful mothers.

Gwen couldn't bear the thought of six-year-old Leila and David, newly five, being taken away from her, and she certainly wouldn't go with them and leave Alistair on his own. ‘I don't know what all the fuss is about, anyway,' she told him.

‘They're expecting the Jerries to bomb London,' he explained.

‘So they say,' she sneered, ‘but Hitler's not that stupid.'

‘Dougal said there's nothing surer.'

‘And he's an authority on Hitler, is he?'

‘Alistair says I'm not facing facts,' she told Manny when they were on their usual Wednesday morning walk, much shorter than it used to be on account of his failing legs, and without Leila and David except in the school holidays, ‘but it's an awful decision to have to make – my children, or my husband? What are mothers supposed to do?'

‘The government thinks that all those who live in big cities, and are free to do so, should go to some rural area away from the danger,' the old man answered unwillingly, because he didn't want to lose her company, but he considered that it would be best for her. ‘It is only sensible, hmm? Getting out before the mayhem starts?'

‘You feel sure we'll be bombed?'

‘I would bet my life on it.'

He left Gwen feeling that she was between the devil and the deep blue sea. She couldn't trust her darlings to absolute strangers, as so many other mothers had done, and how could she leave Alistair in Bethnal Green where he might be killed? But there was no real fear of bombs! There couldn't be!

That evening saw the first serious quarrel the Ritchies had ever had, short but bitter.

Alistair set it off by saying he was going to write to Alice. ‘She's got plenty of room to take you and the kids, so you'd better start packing.'

‘I'm not going anywhere!' Gwen declared, eyes dangerously bright.

‘Yes, you are! You're taking Leila and David to Forvit, and you're staying there till the war's over!'

‘I can't see any need … nothing's happening …'

‘Not yet, but it will, and a mother's first thought should be for her children,' Alistair said, brusquely.

‘A wife's place is with her husband,' she snapped.

‘This husband can look after himself.'

‘This wife happens to
want
to be with her husband and children!'

‘Don't be so damned thrawn, woman!'

‘You won't change my mind by flinging your Scottish swear words at me!'

Their voices had been rising steadily, and now Alistair threw his arms up as he roared, ‘I wasn't swearing! I said you were stubborn! And that's exactly what you are! A bloody stubborn woman, with no thought for anybody but her bloody self!'

‘So what's that if it isn't swearing?' Gwen countered, but it was clear that she was on the verge of tears. ‘I wasn't thinking of myself. I was thinking of you. I thought you'd want to have your children here where you could protect them.'

‘I want them, and you, out of harm's way,' he said, but his voice was less harsh.

‘I won't put them away, Alistair, and I can't leave you here on your own. I'd never sleep a wink wondering if you were all right.'

Stumped by her brimming eyes, Alistair caved in, and took her in his arms. ‘I'm sorry for shouting at you, my darling. I know how you must feel, and like you said, nothing's been happening anyway.'

‘Nothing's going to happen! No air raids, no bombs! It was just a silly rumour. A lot of those children who were sent away have come back already. People just panicked, that's all it was.'

Not altogether convinced that she was right, Alistair nevertheless stopped arguing.

However hard she had tried, Lexie Fraser could not grasp the elusive shadow which had flashed too quickly through her mind all those months before, so she had been quite glad, in a funny sort of way, when Mr Chamberlain announced that Britain was at war with Germany. Most conversations in the shop were now centred on how Forvit would be affected, a few sons, or brothers, or boyfriends already having volunteered or been called away as Territorials, so she was quite pleased that her last customer one day was Alice Ritchie, Mrs Sam Guthrie now, of course. They had always been good friends, although there was a three-year gap in their ages.

‘I'd a letter from Alistair yesterday.' Alice eyed the shop-keeper warily.

Years of practice had enabled Lexie to show no emotion at any mention of his name. ‘What's he saying to it, then?' she asked, matter-of-factly.

‘He wants Gwen to come up here with the kids till the war's finished, but she won't hear of it. He's scared London'll be bombed and he wants them to be somewhere safe, so I think they'd a big row. It beats me how she can bear to keep her bairns down there when they could be killed, and I could tell Alistair's not happy about it.'

Lexie didn't really feel up to discussing the problems Alistair Ritchie was having with his wife – she had given up on him years ago – and was relieved when Alice-changed the subject. ‘I'm a bit worried about Sam,' she confided. ‘He's speaking about joining up though I'm trying to talk him out of it.'

‘He'll not be happy if you stop him.'

‘He could surely wait till the baby's born?' Alice sounded quite tearful.

‘You said last week he hadn't touched you since you told him you were expecting, but if he's away for months at a time, think what he'll be like when he's home on leave.'

‘Aye,' murmured Alice, thoughtfully, ‘there's something in that.' Then she burst out laughing. ‘Ach, Lexie Fraser, you're an awful tease, and I still don't want him to go.'

Locking up and going through to the house to make her supper, Lexie mulled over what she had been told. She could understand Alistair's wife not wanting to come away up here, hundreds of miles from her husband, for God knows how long. Any wife would feel the same, and Alistair was being unreasonable to expect it. It was funny the way things turned out, though. At one time, she'd have jumped for joy at the idea that things weren't going smoothly for the Ritchies, that there was every chance of them splitting up, but not any longer. In any case, was there any truth in it?

With absolutely no warning, Lexie's musings were blown apart by what could only be likened to a bolt of lightning, a flash which set free something deep in her memory … but just a few words. She had been standing in the shadows just inside the door of the kirk, she could remember that, waiting for her mother to stop speaking to Bella Ritchie and catch up with her, when she'd heard a snippet of a conversation between three women who hadn't noticed her there.

‘… and they're saying she was taking up wi' him for months afore …'

That was all she could remember, but it had definitely been Doodie Tough's sharp voice. The words had meant nothing to her at the time, but they aroused her curiosity now. Who had been taking up with who? For months before what?

Lexie's appetite had vanished and she got no sleep that night. Like all small villages, Forvit had always spawned gossip, true and imagined, and this titbit could have referred to anybody … even if they seemed unlikely culprits. The woman had obviously had some standing in the community because Doodie's cronies had been standing with their mouths agape and eyes glittering. Funny how things were coming back to her, though it wasn't them she was interested in. It was who was at the centre of the scandal.

Going over all the women who might have fitted the bill – and bearing in mind that she would have been too young at the time to recognize illicit goings-on as such – Lexie could only come up with three candidates – the minister's wife, the doctor's wife, the wife of the banker in Bankside. Two of them could be crossed out straight away, the first would have been too old, the second too fat even then, but Mrs Kincaid, the banker's wife, was a possibility. She was around fifty now, still quite attractive, dark hair shot with grey, always well-dressed and very friendly, spoke to everyone she met.

Had Mrs Kincaid been the scarlet woman? It didn't seem likely. Her husband was a really handsome man, dark eyes that twinkled at everybody, and a straight almost Roman nose. He was well over six feet tall, still as slim as he was when he was younger, still playing golf. No, Mrs Kincaid could be ruled out, as well.

There was nobody else. Her own mother, being the postmaster's wife, could have been classed as a ‘somebody', of course, but she'd never gone out at nights and she would never have had a lover. She had been in poor health for as long as Lexie could remember, which was likely why folk had been so ready to believe ill of her father when he disappeared. She could almost hear them saying that Alec Fraser was a good man, a decent man, but … a man who could turn his back on an ailing wife would be capable of anything, even going off with a lassie young enough to be his daughter.

Her stomach giving a jolting heave, Lexie's thoughts wavered. Had it been him and Nancy Lawrie that Doodie had been speaking about? ‘…
she'd been taking up wi' him afore
…', but if it was her father and Nancy she'd have said, ‘…
he'd
been taking up wi'
her
afore …', for it would have been his name that would have raised people's eyebrows.

Glancing at the little clock at her bedside, Lexie stretched out to flick off the alarm switch. She didn't need it today. She'd have to get up in twenty minutes anyway, and there was no risk of her falling asleep now. Who had the woman been? Young enough to be having an affair, important enough to have made the village tongues wag? Who?

A speck of excitement suddenly took wing inside her, growing in intensity until she felt suffocated by it. Why hadn't she remembered before? The present doctor had come after Tom Birnie went to join his wife in Stirling, which would have been quite late on in 1929, three months at least after her father had gone off – maybe six, because he'd had to get somebody to buy his practice before he could leave.

So! Lexie drew in a long, juddery breath of relief, and let it out slowly. It could be Margaret Birnie! She might have been seeing another man before she left to look after her mother. Doctor Tom was often out all evening, sometimes nearly all night – like he'd been with her mother and her, Lexie recalled – and she'd have had plenty opportunities. She'd been a really pretty woman, they had two cars, and she could easily have driven miles to meet her lover. That was it, thank goodness.

Flinging back the bedclothes, Lexie swung her feet to the floor. Why couldn't she remember what else Doodie had said that long-ago day?