Chapter 24

The following day Helen refused her aunt's suggestion to put off going up into the attic. ‘We need a fire if we're to sit in here,' she insisted. ‘And I won't forgive myself if you come down with another cold.'

‘Suit yourself, but we'll need to put the little one somewhere safe while we're going through the bits you bring down.'

Relieved her aunt wasn't going to argue, Helen said, ‘I'll carry Bobby upstairs and pop him in his cot, then if you wait at the bottom of the ladder, I'll hand what I find down to you. You can have a good look at it all and decide what to keep and what to use. I can put back anything you want to save until after the war.'

She saw a fleeting moment of doubt cross her aunt's face but didn't acknowledge it. Her mind went to Tony in jail and then to Richard still waiting for her reply. Where was he stationed? she wondered. An icy feeling washed through her. Was he even still alive? Helen's heart raced. With all that was going on, was she right not to reply to him? How would she feel to discover he had been killed and then have to live with the knowledge that he died never knowing about their son? As hard as it had been for her, she needed to do what she believed to be right. She would try to send a telegram to him tomorrow.

‘Is something the matter, Helen? You've been quiet since Babs left. Is she all right?'

Her aunt was very perceptive and would sense if she was lying, but Babs's secret wasn't hers to share. ‘She's just worried about something, Aunty.' Determined to remain as positive as possible, Helen added, ‘I'm excited to see what's stored up there.'

‘I suppose I am, too, now that you mention it.'

Twenty minutes later, after a sneezing fit and hysterics when a large spider ran across one of the rafters in front of her, the last of the boxes had been carried into her aunt's bedroom. They decided not to waste time and energy carrying the boxes downstairs to the living room only to have to bring some of them back up again to store away.

Helen hoped her aunt wasn't too attached to items that might keep their fire going for a while.

‘Let's see what we have in here, shall we?' Sylvia said, when Helen placed the first box in front of the dressing-table stool where she was sitting. ‘There's nothing wooden in here,' she reported, handing folded sheets and sweaters for Helen to take. ‘But these moth-eaten sheets will make smaller ones for Bobby's cot and for dusters.'

Helen added, ‘And I can unravel these sweaters and try to knit a few things for us. Some hats and scarves,' she said when her aunt gave her a doubtful smile. ‘You can make the more intricate items.'

The second box was more rewarding. ‘Look.' Her aunt held up several photo frames, then a pair of wooden candlesticks. ‘These are perfect for the fire.'

‘Take these for us to look through one evening.' She handed Helen three photo albums.

Helen took them, unsure whether she was ready to reminisce about happy summer holidays with her family. The prospect of seeing photographs of their smiling faces, her parents smartly dressed on the beach, she and her brother enjoying cornets topped with creamy Jersey ice cream, made her miss them terribly.

‘These old books have been half eaten by something, so we may as well burn them too.

It wasn't perfect, but at least they had found some useful items, Helen thought with satisfaction.

Her aunt began coughing.

‘I think we have enough for now,' Helen said, wanting to close everything up and get her aunt away from the dust and chill coming down from the attic. ‘I'll take the boxes we've looked through back up and close the trapdoor.' When her aunt began to protest, she added, ‘And you need to get to bed. I can see you're tired and you need to rest.'

Helen was surprised when her aunt didn't argue and suspected it was because she had been hiding how unwell she was feeling. The thought troubled Helen and she hoped she was wrong.