After the War is Over Read Online Free

called for her, but she was busy and promised to be along in a minute. Oh, and don’t ask her about going to London, poor thing. She’s had to give up on the idea and look after her mam and the house instead.’
    ‘But that’s not fair!’ Iris was outraged. She knew how much Nell had wanted to go to London. She had grown very fond of both girls, but Nell was such a vulnerable young woman, easily hurt. In her unquestioning willingness to help, she was often taken for a fool. Iris had always felt the need to protect her. She could imagine how easy it would have been to persuade the girl that her duty lay in Liverpool, not London.
    A waitress came, and Iris ordered a pot of tea for three and three scones. ‘Do you have butter?’ she enquired.
    ‘I’m sorry, madam, but we only have margarine.’
    ‘Then can we have jam as well, please. It’ll disguise the taste,’ she said to Maggie when the waitress had gone. ‘I can’t stand margarine.’
    ‘Even before it was rationed, we only had butter on Sundays,’ Maggie told her. She smiled. ‘We’re not dead posh like you.’
    Iris rolled her eyes. ‘That was very tactless of me. I’m sorry.’
    ‘It’s all right,’ Maggie said generously.
    ‘But it really is about time we were able to get butter again. The war’s been over for more than seven months, yet rationing is as tight as it’s ever been. Same with so many other things. I couldn’t buy a lipstick anywhere in town yesterday. Not one of the big shops had any in stock, nor did they have cologne for my husband, apart from in Woolies, where it costs sixpence a bottle and can’t be any good. Oh, look, here’s Nell now.’
    In contrast to her friend, Nell almost crept into the café. Her eyes were downcast when she joined them at the table. ‘Hello, Iris,’ she whispered.
    ‘Hello, love.’ Iris seized her hand and squeezed it. ‘How are you?’
    ‘All right.’ She raised her eyes and they looked terribly sad.
    ‘I’ve been thinking, why don’t both of you come round one day before Christmas for afternoon tea?’ She had already bought them presents: boxes of handkerchiefs embroidered with a flower in the corner – there’d only been three boxes left in Owen Owen’s and she’d bought the third for Constance. ‘Have you found a job yet, Maggie?’
    ‘No. I thought I’d start looking for work in the new year. It was me dad’s idea. He said I deserved a bit of a holiday first.’
    ‘My husband said more or less the same. I’m not going back to being his receptionist until January. My mother-in-law has been doing it in my place and she doesn’t mind sticking it out for another week or so. And you, Nell love?’ she asked. ‘What are you up to?’ The girl looked as if she’d died a little since Iris had last seen her.
    ‘I’ve put off going to London for a while and I’m helping at home instead. In fact, that’s where I should be, home, like. I told me dad I wouldn’t long. And I’ve got shopping to do, we’re out of bread.’ She jumped up and almost ran out of the café.
    Iris gasped. ‘But she hasn’t touched her tea or scone!’
    ‘I’ll pop in and see her later,’ Maggie promised. ‘I’ll make sure we come to your house, and she’s coming to ours on Christmas Day when we’re having a party. Me mam’s sister’ll be there and some of me dad’s friends from work. And our Ryan’s bringing his new girlfriend. I’ve invited Nell. If she doesn’t come, I’ll go to their house and drag her there.’
    It was then that Iris made up her mind that she had to do something about Nell.
    Iris couldn’t stand Tom’s brother, Frank. The two men couldn’t have been more different, in either body or brain. Tall and sharply thin, Frank had dark, piercing eyes and an eternally bitter expression on his long face. Iris wouldn’t have wanted him for her doctor. After dinner on Christmas Day, he denounced the planned introduction of a National Health Service in the strongest possible