Page 8 of A Good Mother
Robin uncrossed and re-crossed her legs so her ankles wouldn’t swell and listened to Martha who’d found her outburst very amusing. Martha said that back in her day, in the fifties when she was the landlady at The Carters, she’d heard it all and nothing shocked her. Robin therefore had permission to turn the air blue if it made her feel better.
This made Robin smile. She could picture her silent friend so clearly, thanks to a black-and-white photograph on the wall of the village pub, a kind of rogues’ gallery of landlords past and present.
It was such a strange thing, that a snapshot taken in the fifties could have such an impact and had kick-started a friendship borne from a mutual understanding of loneliness. It was their special story, the tale of Martha and Robin.
CHAPTERSIX
They’d met at a wake.If you could call talking to a photograph actually meeting someone, but it would turn out to be a lasting friendship of mutual respect, albeit one-sided and from the grave.
Edmund had conducted his first funeral since moving to Buddington, and they’d both shown willing and accepted the invitation to The Carters for the wake. Nowadays they’d call it a PR exercise whereas back then it was called being polite and paying your respects to the outgoing, celestial-bound headmaster of St Mary’s Primary.
They’d been in Buddington a matter of weeks. Robin was eight months pregnant at the time, missing her parents and very lonely. In between making a home of the dismal vicarage, she hadn’t had time to make new friends, not ones of her own age or whom she’d chosen herself.
The only people she’d come into contact with were the parishioners on the church committee and making pleasantries as she shopped in the Co-op, so Robin spent much of the day alone, lost in thought as she paddled her way through homesickness. She wasn’t about to drown exactly, but on really bad days she swore she could feel the water lapping at her knees and that had worried her.
Edmund had been busy shaking hands and commiserating while Robin occupied herself with the paintings and photographs on the wall. The moment Robin clapped eyes on the lone landlady, and read the name plate below, the hairs on the back of her neck prickled.
Martha had been the proprietor from 1931 to 1952 and her cheery smile beamed from the frame, her laughing eyes crinkled at the corner so her crow’s feet rested on the bone of her cheeks.
When a voice by her side interrupted Robin, she turned and looked down onto the kindly face of a mourner. ‘That’s my Aunty Martha, on my old dad’s side. My names Hilda, by the way, and I know you’re Robin. Pleasure to meet you at last. Shame it’s under these circumstances, though.’ Hilda gave a jerk of the head towards the grieving family who were sipping tea at a table in the corner.
Robin accepted the dainty handshake and smiled, glad of someone to talk to at last. ‘Pleasure to meet you, too, Hilda.’ Turning her gaze to the photograph she delved a little. ‘Your aunt looks like a lovely lady… do you remember her by any chance?’ Robin was being tactful because her companion couldn’t possibly be a day under seventy.
‘Oh yes, like I last saw her yesterday. Had a tough time did Aunty Martha, leaving her family in London to move up here with my uncle Jack. They met at a wedding, a second cousin I believe. She missed her old mum like mad, she did. But her and Uncle Jack were in love, and she was determined to make a go of it, the pub and married life. Took to running this place like a duck to water she did, always wore the pants my mum said. An independent woman before her time, I reckon.’
Something inside Robin’s heart twanged, knowing precisely how it felt, to miss your mother. Not the independent woman part. ‘Oh, that’s sad. I miss my mother so much especially with a baby on the way.’
She rested her hand protectively on her stomach as Hilda smiled at the bump then chatted on.
‘And then there was the war, that’s what broke her in the end, so my dad used to say.’
Dread swept over Robin and for a second she hadn’t wanted to ask the obvious, but she did, totally invested in Martha by then. ‘Why, what happened in the war?’
A sigh, a wistful look and the hint of a tear preceded the answer. ‘Her parents and younger sister were killed in the Blitz, while her Jack and only son, my cousin Tommy, were away fighting. Shouldn’t have been allowed in my opinion, father and son sent off to war like that, Hitler, or no Hitler.
‘On the day they left the whole village gathered on the green to wave the menfolk off. They all went together, even my dad, but my uncle and cousin never came back. Nearly killed Aunty Martha, it did. My mum reckoned Martha wanted to die, to be with them both and in the end she got her wish, I suppose.’
Robin was clutching her neck, something she did when she was anxious or shocked, and her cheeks were aflame, another subconscious reaction that always left her even more flustered. ‘Why, what happened?’ Robin looked at the photo. ‘She looks so happy in the picture.’
‘Agh, well, that’s the thing, isn’t it? Nobody knows what’s really going on inside folks’ heads, or what pain hides behind their eyes. From what I know she struggled to keep going, putting on a brave face for her customers when Jack and Tom went to war. Then afterwards, when she’d lost them both, Martha carried on as best she could, hiding her grief, putting one foot in front of the other for seven long years. Then one night, there was a terrible accident.’ Hilda paused and moved closer, lowering her voice a notch.
‘The last time she saw her boys was the day she waved them off from the green, where the cenotaph is now. My mum said she’d often find Martha there, sitting on the bench late at night, a bit worse for wear, if you get my drift.’
Robin nodded.
‘Well anyway, after a few too many gins, Martha often told my mum that she was waiting for her boys and that one day, Jack and Tommy would come back for her… poor bugger. That’s why she sat there, watching the road for ghosts. The night she died; she must have gone over there after the pub closed.’
Robin suspected and dreaded what came next.
‘The coroner’s report said it was a tragic accident, that she tripped and fell, landed face down in the pond and drowned. The milkman spotted her the next morning. There was a rumour, and mind you take no notice if you hear it, that Aunty Martha took her own life. But I don’t believe that. Some did, busybodies and the churchy lot,’ Hilda paused, as though realising her mistake, ‘sorry, dear, but I speak as I find. No offence meant.’
Robin felt her lips twitch, amused by Hilda’s faux pas. ‘None taken, I promise.’
‘It was still a crime back then, to take your own life and a sin in the eyes of the church. But thankfully the Reverend at the time was a nice chap, had a good heart and was a regular here at the pub and he stood her corner. Wouldn’t listen to all that sinner nonsense and didn’t believe Martha had taken her own life so made sure she got a nice service and burial up at St Mary’s. Otherwise, she’d have ended up on the other side of the wall, with all of them sinners from the old days.’
Silence fell on Robin and Hilda as they stared at Martha. The only sound came from the mourners, respectful murmurs honouring the deceased, china cups clinking on saucers and the odd out-of-place ripple of laughter.
Robin sighed. ‘That’s such a sad story, but I’m so glad that the vicar stood up for her. Has she any family buried close by, at the church?’
