The Red Cross Orphans, page 1
The Red Cross Orphans
Glynis Peters
One More Chapter
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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2021
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Copyright © Glynis Peters 2021
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Cover design by Lucy Bennett © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2021
Cover photographs: © Mark Owen/Trevillion Images (background) and © Lee Avison/Arcangel Images (children)
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Glynis Peters asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
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A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library
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This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
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Source ISBN: 9780008492380
Ebook Edition © November 2021 ISBN: 9780008492373
Version: 2021-08-06
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Acknowledgments
Thank you for reading…
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About the Author
Also by Glynis Peters
One More Chapter...
About the Publisher
To Lynda Lane, a fan and loyal reader of my books.
We formed a friendship which I will always treasure. Your passing during the pandemic saddened me. RIP you ‘crafty’ lady.
Chapter One
September 1940
‘Bye Auntie Lil. Oh, don’t cry. Come here, silly bean,’ Kitty Pattison said.
Her stomach lurched as she pulled her aunt in for one last hug before she left home. The home she’d lived in for all her twenty years. This was not an easy parting. Her five-foot-nothing aunt’s plump arms gripped tightly around Kitty’s midriff and Kitty kissed the top of her head. Words were no longer required; the hugs expressed the love they shared. The mother figure, who’d taken her in when Kitty was orphaned after a ferryboat disaster took her parents and baby brother from her when she was four, adored her and received Kitty’s undying love in return.
At five feet nine inches tall, Kitty towered a good nine inches over the woman who had encouraged her to join the Red Cross, and then retracted her enthusiastic claims when she found Kitty was to be moved to Birmingham for further training. News of the enemy’s relentless bombing attacks around Britain heightened her concerns.
‘Don’t ever not come home for want of a bob or two for the train fare. Do you hear me? Promise? Telephone the grocery shop with your message and we’ll get the ticket sent to you. You hear me? All those miles between us, I can’t bear it.’
Closing her eyes to the sound of her aunt’s muffled tears, Kitty squeezed her tightly.
‘I promise. It will be all right, auntie. At least it’s not another country.’
Kitty’s journey meant she would be near on two hundred miles away from her home town of Parkeston, near the Essex port of Harwich, but, determined to support her country, Kitty tried not to allow her voice to give away the knotted-gut anxiety she experienced deep inside. Emotion after emotion punched out messages, intensifying with each moment she waited before stepping outside the door.
They fought her each time she tried to suppress them; the sadness of parting, along with a fear of failure, and the guilt-drenched ones suggesting she stay home, continue to be a good foster-daughter doting on her middle-aged guardians. She tried to ignore the one which told her she was selfish, but no sooner had Kitty suppressed it, the thought welled up and tugged at her heartstrings once again. The world might be at war, but Kitty had battles of her own to fight. The sense she would always be beholden to the couple who had taken her in during the worst time in her life often played on her mind, but she knew part of winning a war was not to give in at the first battle.
Lillian Pattison argued day and night that Kitty should withdraw her voluntary aid application, and tried to persuade her to find something worthwhile to do closer to home. Her aunt had caved when she realised she could not persuade her niece to give up her desire to fulfil a dream, and voluntary first aid would pave the way for her to qualify as a trained nurse further down the line. Today, Kitty staved off the guilt and blasted any negative thoughts from her mind. This was the time to prove to herself she was able to cope alone. Her aunt and uncle were overprotective, which under the circumstances was understandable, but Kitty couldn’t remain a girl – she was a young woman with much to learn.
Kitty’s uncle Frank, her father’s brother, walked into the kitchen,
‘Hello, Lil off again?’ he said, giving Kitty a smile.
He stood behind her aunt, his voice huskier than normal as he held back his true feelings. He puffed and sucked on his pipe. Kitty noticed a twitch shimmy down the right-hand side of his face, an emotional habit Kitty often witnessed during times when he became stressed or upset. Kitty leaned forward and gave him a gentle kiss on the cheek. She had his side of the family’s genes when it came to their tall and trim athletic build, chestnut hair, and grey-blue eyes. Eyes which glistened when he turned to look at her, framed with damp lashes. Kitty watched her uncle struggle with her decision to leave.
‘Why they are sending you to the middle of England when there are places to be filled in this area is beyond me. Got everything?’ he asked, glancing around the room.
‘Yes, uncle. You know Lil, she’s panic-packed for me. I’ve even got a kitchen sink in there,’ Kitty said, and pointed to his old kitbag sitting to the right of the back door.
‘You take care of that lot. It cost me a week’s wages,’ her uncle teased.
Kitty sent a wide smile his way. Despite his teasing she was aware he wasn’t referring to his kitbag from when he had served in the British forces. Her new uniform and shoes had cost him a lot more than a week’s wage.
Every payday, her uncle had taken great pride in placing funds into her savings jar, a project she’d undertaken since she’d seen the poster recruiting Red Cross nursing trainees.
Her meagre wages from washing up at the local holiday camp – a temporary base given over for the Kindertransport children – would never have purchased the many dresses, aprons and caps she needed, plus her living allowance for the years she volunteered.
Her uncle had found her the job for the year leading up to her leaving. The place had been transformed into a refugee camp for the children whilst she worked there, and when on duty Kitty witnessed the sadness of the young Jewish refugees brought to the town from Germany via Holland. The first group of children had arrived the previous December, and they had made Kitty look at her life a little closer. She intended to leave her family willingly, but these little ones had been sent away by parents for their own protection, not knowing if they’d ever meet again, and it made Kitty want to do more than just work in the kitchen washing their dishes. At the end of each working day, she read to them, despite knowing many couldn’t understand a word. She would hold them close when they cried, and whisper words of comfort, just as Lil had when Kitty was missing her own parents. One of the matrons there told her she had a kind heart and that she definitely had a future in caring for others. She had pushed Kitty to recognise what she could offer others, and now the day had arrived to prove herself.
‘Time to go,’ she said, and embraced Lil and her uncle once again.
‘Be safe, Kitty. Come home to us when you can,’ her aunt said, sniffling back a river-flow of tears.
Her uncle puffed even harder on his pipe, his hands gripping it so tightly his knuckles turned white. The
With one last glimpse around the kitchen, Kitty walked through into the front room and stepped out into Hamilton Street – the place where she’d played as a child, gathered with schoolfriends after chores, and celebrated many community moments with the other forty-plus families who lived in the small, terraced railway houses. She would always be grateful to her aunt and uncle for moving into the house. It made sense; her uncle had stepped into her father’s job on the quay, and the house was reallocated to them, plus it was a place they felt Kitty needed to remain for stability, with the school a few feet away at the end of the street.
Residents stood or sat on their polished steps, waiting to cheer her on her way. Much as they’d waved other children away to war, or mourned their deaths together, just as they had supported her family when her cousin died in June during the Dunkirk evacuation. Once again, guilt tried to force her to retreat back indoors, to stay at her aunt’s side so she would never suffer a bout of nervous depression alone. Kitty’s uncle always withdrew into his own black silence whenever her aunt’s mood slid into uncontrollable sobs and wailing. Both drew upon Kitty’s strength to see them through, and it often took its toll, but Kitty never complained. Forever the dutiful niece.
Two doors down, the matriarch of the street, known as Widow Johnson, sat as she always did, upon a small stool, legs akimbo, hair bound by a headscarf turban, whilst she peeled potatoes, her stern voice berating the young children for taunting each other as they ran back and forth across the road playing What’s the Time Mr Wolf. The woman muttered as she offered Kitty a farewell smile and handed her an apple.
‘For the journey,’ she said. ‘Don’t rush back ’omesick. Get away, girl. Make a life. She’ll suffocate you. We’ll take care of them. You do your bit, poke that ’itler with a stick, but make sure you come ’ome in one piece when you do come back. God bless you, gal.’ Her head bobbed back down to the task in hand as if she’d never spoken. The twang in her tone and classic dropped h, defined her as Harwich born and bred. Like many in the parish, her family were original residents, a solid community of friends and fighters, whose present aim was to rid the country of an enemy destroying their next generation.
A bemused Kitty continued walking to the end of the road, grateful for a dry day, which meant she’d not sit on a train for hours in a damp outfit, and that her chestnut hair stayed in its neat curls. The little ones of the street ran around her shouting good luck in happy voices; some cried and begged her not to leave. To them she was family: the big sister some never had; their babysitter when Mummy went to work in the uniform factory or on the land. Kitty turned, gave a final wave, and tried to ignore the welling tears as she entered the shortcut to the station, avoiding the feral cats protecting their kittens. Walking across the small no-man’s land, Kitty felt a twinge of sadness. She’d played there as a child, and now her childhood was behind her and only war and the unknown lay ahead. What she’d give to play hide-and-seek with her cousin once again, or sit on a large rock pretending they were on a desert island and eat sticky sandwiches made by their grandmother. She gave herself a shake and a telling off for focusing on the past. Now was time to head forward towards the station with no regrets.
The train for London pulled alongside the platform and, with one last glance behind her, Kitty climbed onboard. A few sailors brushed too close as she eased her way along the corridor in the hope of finding a seat in one of the compartments, but with one withering look from Kitty they soon got the message and made way for her. She found a seat beside an elderly woman and a small child. The little boy she recognised from playing with the refugee children where she’d worked. His mother was part of the housekeeping team.
‘Hello, Gerald.’
The boy gave her a toothless grin.
‘My goodness, you’ve lost another one.’
His head nodded with great enthusiasm, and the woman beside him laughed.
‘You know this ruffian, I take it?’ she asked.
Kitty smiled at her. ‘I certainly do. I work… worked, in the same place as his mummy.’
The woman held out her hand, ‘I’m his gran, Christine’s mother. He’s coming to stay with me in Gloucestershire for a while, to give her a break – isn’t that right, Gerry?’ She ruffled the boy’s hair, and he gave her a loving smile in return and clambered on her knee.
‘Grandma lives on a farm.’
His grandmother gave a slight shake of her head. ‘It’s a smallholding, nothing so glamorous as a farm, but it needs another working pair of hands and this little man volunteered to come and feed the chickens.’
Gerald grinned and Kitty thought him one of the lucky ones. His new home as an evacuee was a place where he’d thrive and be loved; she’d witnessed the many children from her small community leave for unfamiliar towns to live with strangers hundreds of miles away. With a sudden jolt of nerves as the train puffed its way towards London, she realised her own journey to an unknown home amongst strangers had begun.
Chapter Two
Standing on the concourse, Kitty looked around the busy station. Her skin tingled both with fear and excitement, and her clammy hands gripped the handles of her kitbag until her knuckles could no longer find another shade of white.
For a brief moment she thought back to her uncle and his attempt to hold back his sadness and fear that morning. Kitty shook off the image and braced her shoulders. This was a moment to remember, a time to make him proud. She was standing in the city of London and had made the first part of her journey intact; now she needed to find her connection for Birmingham. A panic set in. Where was she to pick up her connection? Where was her paper with the details? How did she get to the next station?
As she watched people stride by with confidence, Kitty’s insecurities rose. If she couldn’t manoeuvre from A to B, how on earth was she going to find courage enough to care for the wounded? A trickle of sweat meandered down the back of her neck and cooled as it journeyed beyond her collar. She dropped the bag to the floor and bent with her hands supporting her on her knees. Fainting was not an option.
‘Pull yourself together, Katherine Pattison. This is not you; you are organised and in control.’ Kitty muttered the words mantra-like until her pounding heart settled to a natural beat and her breath eased from a choke to normal. She stood upright and tugged her luggage close. She pulled out the paperwork giving guidance to her final destination.
First, she needed to head for King’s Cross station. ‘Excuse me,’ she called out to a uniformed guard.
‘What can I do for you, young lady?’
‘King’s Cross. How do I get to the station from here please?’
With a slow, exaggerated swing of his head from side to side, the man frowned. ‘You’ll have to walk it today. Just under an hour but a straight walk from here. Underground out of action. Lucky it’s not raining. Exit that way.’
