After the Storm Read Online Free PDF Page A

and forefinger, into the dark of the oven. The door clanged shut and carefully she slotted the latch home.
    The earlier satisfaction had vanished and her arms ached with a weariness that seeped throughout her body and emptied her mind of even her nervousness. She pulled her coat from the back of the chair and slumped into its clammy heaviness and sat looking round a kitchen which was, from now on, her own. She felt no elation.
    It would all have been so different but for the war. Then she would have married Barney and had Tom. Done things the right way round, her mother had hurled when Barney had died, and soon after his son was born. Look at the mess she had just made of a room she had spent hours cleaning and polishing; what a talent she had for little messes; and yes, her mother had said that too. Her hands lay throbbing one upon the other and the harsh pain of the tightening burn across the softness of her upper arm was almost a comfort. It was something which belonged to her and on which she could focus. She had been burned before and knew the course of the pain and that was all she wanted to know at this moment. Her head hung to one side and she lifted her shoulder to rub her cheek and that caress was better than none.
    Barney Grant had been a strong young pitman but how gently he had led her to the slopes of the slag after he had arrived home on leave. She pressed her cheek closer now, deepinto the cotton of her blouse and she could feel the heat of her skin and she remembered the smell and the feel of the body of her man.
    Again and again they had promised that they were different, that lovers who opened their mouths to one another and knew such pleasure in one another could not be touched by war, by death. But his eyes were deep with thoughts that were his own, that he would not share and later he had cried and worried for her in case there should be a bairn, my bonny wee lass he had whispered.
    She had laughed then because next week they were to marry and no God would defy her love. And he had nodded and kissed her hand fit for bloody diamonds he had said again.
    They had all been recalled the next day in a rush for the next big push. His mates had told her he had felt nothing but she knew it had been raining, raining, raining because that’s what the papers had said of Ypres and he hated the rain on his face.
    He wasn’t found for days. Wipers was such a stupid name for a grave she thought and wished she could have cleaned the mud from his eyes and carried him home, warmed him and, in time, shown him his son.
    She stared dully at the fire. Here she was then, living in the same house where she had worked since she was 14 but now it was to be with a man who had today given her a name and a family, not just a job. She should be grateful but her scream for Barney sounded so real that she snapped upright and could not tell whether it had pierced the air or just her mind. The fire was solid red now, God knew how much time had passed, she must be mad to sit as though life was a holiday. She pressed her fingers to her forehead, nervous at the thought of Archie coming home before all this was straight, but she had to fetch Tom, she was already late.
    Betsy straightened her coat, drew the latch and the cold of the early evening caught her again. It cooled her even as it caught in her throat and she reached for the bairn’s blanket. He’d need it over his face in this chill, then she’d just have to be back in time for them to arrive. Yes, that was it, be quick and there was nothing to worry about she urged herself, thinking as she went that he was such a cold one there was no knowing how he would take a mistake. God, she thought as she undid the gate, what I wouldn’t give for a cup of tea.
    Archie led the way up the four steps and fumbled for the keyhole.
    ‘The shop is over there,’ he told them over his shoulder and Annie nodded though all she could see were dark forbidding shapes in the dim light. She grasped the