‘There’s something crackling in here.’
I put out my hand. ‘I’ll take them to wash.’
‘Wait.’ Her old nails dug along the waistband. ‘Something’s been sewn in the seam, look.’
‘Yes, they are crackly.’ Pamela nodded. ‘Mummy said it’s because they’re new. I can do handstands in them.’
My hand was still reaching out towards Mrs Berrow. ‘I’ll take them upstairs. I’ve got sewing scissors in my bedroom.’
Pa … P … Plymouth.
Small, hasty handwriting, in pencil on a piece of greaseproof paper, mostly smudged away. I folded it in my hand and looked out of the window, at a loss. Downstairs the telephone started ringing. I heard Selwyn answering.
Then I remembered the dress. It was nowhere to be seen. I searched under the bed, then turned down the sheet and blankets and found it, crumpled into a grubby ball. Just under the little collar was a square of fraying cotton tacked roughly onto the yoke. I pulled the tacking out and freed the label. The ink was bleeding into the fabric but the words were legible. Pamela Pickering, 34 Newton Road, Plymouth.
Selwyn had finished his call. He was coming up the stairs. ‘Ellen?’
‘In the bedroom, darling.’
The door opened. ‘That was Colonel Daventry. Another bus has arrived.’ Selwyn went into the dressing room. ‘Where’s my scarf? The fog’s vile out there, raw.’
‘Darling, I found these.’
He reappeared, his scarf in one hand. ‘What?’
I held out my hand. He clasped it so that the pieces of greaseproof and cotton were crushed in my fingers. His hands were thin, cool and dry. Had he been a heavier man, a man whose palms were even just occasionally damp, I could never have married him. He pulled his hand away and I let the labels slip from my grasp.
He uncrumpled them, studied them. ‘Thank goodness. We’ve got something to go on, now.’ He put the scraps down on the bed. ‘Listen, I’m off to the village hall. There’s a chance her mother’s come to Upton. She might have found out that Pamela was taken away on the bus.’ He knotted his scarf with a series of brisk tugs. ‘Imagine it. Dashing out of your hotel, frantically looking for your child, and somebody says, “I saw a little girl, madam. Two women took her away on the bus to Upton.” Good God.’
‘I don’t think we can imagine it.’ I turned to face him. ‘The ladies downstairs think she might have left from the bus stops outside the Crown Hotel.’
‘You need to find those two women who put her on the bus. Why don’t you go up to see Lady Brock? She took a great crowd. Didn’t you say they were in the last group? I’m almost sure they’re at Upton Hall, with Lady Brock.’ He spoke hurriedly, crossing the landing ahead of me. ‘We’ll try to ring the police. Though the Colonel tells me you can’t get through to Southampton for love nor money.’
‘We could ring Waltham.’ Our nearest country town, it had a big telephone exchange. ‘I’ll take Pamela with me to Lady Brock. Elizabeth’s got far too much to do.’
‘If you want.’ He gave me a careful, wide smile. ‘Clever of you to find those little clues,’ he said, and led the way downstairs.
Pamela was sitting on the lavatory with Elizabeth in attendance. ‘And after church they gave us a biscuit,’ she was saying, ‘with icing on it, and I bit mine so I could see the biscuit and then the icing on top like a layer of snow. Snow,’ she repeated, rounding her eyes.
Elizabeth turned to me. ‘They’re saying they’re off home.’ She jerked her head towards the sitting room. ‘And there’s not even any water in the taps.’
‘But we only got one biscuit,’ Pamela went on. ‘I kept a piece in my pocket for a long time but then it crumbled up. Can you wipe my bottom? My arms are still too short, Mummy says.’
A slap resounded behind the sitting-room door, followed by a girlish cry of pain and fury. ‘That’s for ladderin my stockings, you little cow,’ said an older, husky voice. ‘I should put you over my knee, never mind how big you are.’
‘The poor devils.’ Elizabeth sighed. ‘But I shan’t mind if they clear off.’
‘Ellen, can you wipe my bottom?’
‘You see the ladies out, Mrs Parr.’ Elizabeth was firm. ‘I’m used to bottoms, with my nieces.’
I stood aside as the file of women came out of the sitting room, the older ladies scrupulously combed and buttoned, the young women’s hair slicked penitently against their scalps. As they passed they thanked me one by one. Phyllis Berrow was the last to leave. She peered over my shoulder at Pamela, who was coming out of the lavatory. ‘Any the wiser, dear?’
‘You were right. There was a piece of greaseproof. I couldn’t read it, but the label in the collar of her dress says Pickering. Of Newton Road, Plymouth.’
She mused. ‘Plymouth, indeed. Plymouth.’ She scrutinized me. ‘Lucky about that other label.’
I nodded. ‘Mrs Pickering was taking no chances.’
‘Would you, with a little sugar plum like that?’
‘I wouldn’t have let go of her hand.’
She smiled. ‘Sometimes you has to. Even if just for a minute. And you shouldn’t be punished for it. Take care, dear.’
‘Good luck, Mrs Berrow. Please come again.’ Which was absurd, as if she was an afternoon-tea visitor.
‘Yes,’ said Pamela. ‘Please come again.’
OUR BOYS TOOK a good look at Pamela, who held my hand tightly under their scrutiny. The two brothers, Jack and Donald, gave her an especially thorough once-over from beneath their fringes. Hawley, being older, was more discreet.
‘Why’s she still here?’ Donald asked me.
‘I’m waiting for Mummy,’ Pamela told him.
Hawley, sharp as a tack, held my gaze.
‘Take your cousins to school, Hawley, please.’
I washed Pamela’s knickers and dress and hung them over the range. She watched me while I rummaged in the chest in the attic. I pulled out a smock my old friend Lucy Horne had given me when I was waiting for the evacuees, before I knew they were all to be boys. The smock was beautifully made by old Mrs Horne, Lucy’s grandmother: I could easily picture Lucy in it, a small, pale, dark-eyed child. I would have liked to take Pamela to the Hornes’ cottage, show them the beneficiary of the smock, but this was unlikely to happen. For reasons I had yet to discover, Lucy hadn’t spoken to me for almost a year.
I sighed. There was nothing I could do about Lucy, especially today. I started to pull the smock over Pamela’s head.
‘This is brushed cotton, Pamela. It’ll keep the warmth next to your body.’
Pamela shut her eyes, and when she opened them again she was a small shepherdess, robed to the ankles. I gave her long socks and my smallest pair of drawers.
‘These are giant’s knickers!’
I pulled the elastic through a gap in the waistband and knotted it at her waist, or rather, the completely circular middle of her little body. ‘They’re like breeches for you.’
She beamed. ‘Mummy will laugh.’
‘Yes, she will. But we might not see her today. Mr Parr’s going to find out where she is. But we might have to wait another day or so.’
The smile