There’s Always Tomorrow Read Online Free PDF Page A

puzzled.
    ‘Never saw him before,’ said Vince. ‘Smart, though. In a suit.’ He handed her a letter.
    ‘Oh, it’s for me!’ she cried, eagerly tearing open the letter.
    The letter was from her dearest friend, Sylvie. The tramp and Vince forgotten, Dottie walked indoors, reading it as she went. Sylvie was asking to come and stay for a few days when Michael Gilbert from the farm got married. Dottie had already written to tell Sylvie that Mary and Peaches and the other ex-Land Girls would be coming. Michael and Freda’s wedding, scheduled for three weeks time, might not be half so grand as the stuffy affair Mariah Fitzgerald was laying on for her daughter today, but it would be much more fun. Sylvie said how much she was looking forward to meeting up with everybody at the wedding. Dottie smiled. She was looking forward to it too. It would just like old times.
     
     
    I can’t believe that the war’s been over for five and half years, Sylvie wrote. This will be a golden opportunity to get together again. I never stop thinking about you all and the fun we had on the farm and all that blinking hard work!
    Dottie laughed out loud when she read that. While everyone else had been slogging their guts out in the fields, Sylvie spent most of her time sloping off for a kip in the barn.
    Write and tell me all about Freda, Sylvie wrote. What’s she like? How old is she? How did they meet? Oh, Dottie, I can’t imagine our little Michael all grown up.’
    Dottie felt exactly the same way. Although there was only two years’ difference in their ages, Michael still seemed a lot younger. Freda, his bride to be, was only eighteen. Dottie didn’t know where they’d met but they had made their wedding plans very quickly; Dottie suspected that Freda might already be pregnant.
    Dottie sighed. Sylvie led such a glamorous life with all those parties and important people she met, but she’d have to pick her moment to ask Reg if she could stay and that wouldn’t be easy. She knew only too well how Reg felt about her. ‘Snobby, stuck-up bitch,’ he’d say.
    Dottie glanced up at the clock. 8.30. Time to go. She shoved Sylvie’s letter into her apron pocket to read again later then, humming softly to herself, she put a couple of slices of cold beef on a plate with some bread and pickles and put it in the meat safe for Reg’s dinner.
    Just to be on the safe side, she propped Reg’s letter in front of the teapot on the table alongside her own hastily scribbled note – Dinner in meat safe – so that he couldn’t miss it. Then she packed her black dress and white apron into her shopping bag and set off for the big house.

Three
     
    Mary Prior’s niece sighed. ‘Nobody’s coming yet.’
    ‘Good,’ said Dottie happily. ‘It must be time to put the kettle on, Elsie.’
    Peaches and Mary sat down at the table.
    The wedding reception was being held in the marquee on Dr Fitzgerald’s lawn. Caterers from some posh hotel in Brighton had handled all the food, but the women in the kitchen had been kept busy with unpacking and washing up the hired plates and glasses. Dottie had asked her next-door neighbour, Ann Pearce, to help out but she couldn’t find anyone to look after the kids.
    Dottie looked around contentedly. She loved being with her friends and nothing pleased her more than helping to make a day special for someone.
    The wedding itself was at 2pm, and once the bride had set off for the church some of them took the opportunity to pop back home. Peaches had wanted to check that her little boy, Gary, was all right with his gran. Mary wanted to get her husband, Tom, some dinner and she took Elsie with her. Dottie stayed at the house: after last night’s fiasco, she wasn’t going to leave anything to chance.
    As soon as the wedding party returned from the church, the waiters began handing round the drinks and some little fiddly bits they called hors d’oeuvres . Until everyone went into the marquee for the meal, Peaches and