Christmas with the Queen

Chapter 22 Olive

Chapter 22

Olive

London, December 1953

C hristmas carols rang through the crisp afternoon air as I darted out of the tube station and ran along Bedford Street, sidestepping people who seemed to be in no rush at all. I’d promised Lucy I wouldn’t be late for her nativity play, and I already was. Of all the traditions December brought, the school nativity was among those I enjoyed the most. Finally, I rounded the corner and sprinted toward the church hall.

Gasping, I pulled the door open and skittered inside, bringing a blast of cold air and a swirl of dry leaves with me. Several people tutted. Others shushed me. I made my way to an empty seat at the end of a row toward the front, sat down, and tried to steady my breathing so that I didn’t sound like a steam train.

“Just in time,” the woman beside me whispered. “They had a bit of a delay. One of the shepherds got stage fright.”

I stifled a laugh as the curtains were pulled back to reveal Joseph, a heavily cushion-pregnant Mary, and a rather tattered-looking toy donkey. Lucy was an angel. She’d told me she wouldn’t be on stage until “the shepherdy bit.”

As I settled in to wait for her big moment, I glanced around at the other parents—mothers mostly—waiting for their own children to make an appearance. For once, I didn’t feel out of place without a husband by my side. The sad truth was that many women in the church hall had lost their husbands during the war, meaning that many of the children on stage didn’t have a father watching, or waiting at home. It was only the circumstances of my past that separated me from these other women.

“And lo! The Angel Gabriel appeared.”

There she was. My angel.

I leaned forward in my seat. “That’s my daughter,” I said to the woman beside me. Tears pricked my eyes as I watched my beautiful girl, arms spread wide in her bedsheet angelic robes, a halo of golden tinsel around her head. She waved as she spotted me, before she remembered that angels weren’t supposed to do that and returned to her stiff pose.

“And that’s my young lad beside her,” the woman replied. “The tall one at the back. His father would have been so proud. Thick as thieves they were before the war stole him from us.” She turned to me. “Doesn’t get any easier without them, does it.”

I looked at her a moment before shaking my head. “No, it doesn’t.”

My heart ached to acknowledge the truth: that Lucy had never known the proud gaze of her daddy. My thoughts turned to Jack as I tried to imagine him beside me, but the image didn’t fit, didn’t work. Just like me and Jack had never worked. He and I were the opposite of a happily-ever-after fairytale. We were a terminal case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I took a deep breath as all the angels gathered at the front of the stage to sing their rendition of “Jingle Bells.” My heart soared with love for Lucy as she sang her heart out. She didn’t have a father to admire her, but she had a mother who loved her more than she would ever know.

By the time we got home, we were both exhausted. After tea, when Lucy was settled in bed with a book, I joined my father in the sitting room. I leaned back against the cushions and closed my eyes.

“How was our angel?” he asked. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be there, love. Can’t seem to kick this bloody awful cold.”

“It’s fine, Dad. She was brilliant. Word-perfect, which is more than can be said for Joseph who forgot all his lines, and the shepherd who dropped his lamb.”

He laughed. “Don’t suppose your mother made it along?”

I shook my head.

My mother was at Auntie Jean’s, taking a few days “away from it all.” She’d been at Auntie Jean’s a lot over the last year. Neither of my parents wanted to discuss it, but it was obvious that their marriage was far from a happy one. There was no question of them getting a divorce—my mother couldn’t cope with the scandal it would cause, not to mention all the legal upheaval—but it was also clear that they couldn’t go on forever with my mother disappearing sporadically.

“Can I do anything?” I asked. “To help?”

He shook his head, got up, and turned on the television set he’d bought to watch the coronation that summer. I knew that was his way of telling me he didn’t want to talk about it, or her.

“I’ll make a pot of tea,” I said and gave him a reassuring kiss on the cheek.

He reached for my hand and held it a moment—his way of letting me know he was grateful. “Mrs. Butler dropped in some Christmas cake.”

I groaned. Our neighbor, Mrs. Butler, was renowned for her Christmas cakes, and for all the wrong reasons.

“It’s as dry as dust,” my father called as I busied myself in our little kitchen. “Approach with caution! I nearly choked when I had a slice earlier.”

I laughed to myself. All the silly little habits and traditions of the friends and neighbors I’d grown up with were as reassuringly unchanged as the crown jewels. There was something comforting in things staying the same. Change wasn’t always for the better.

After we’d shared the pot of tea, and watched an episode of The Good Old Days , I went upstairs to check on Lucy.

She was busy with her Queen Elizabeth II scrapbook, pasting in the latest pictures from the royal tour.

“Can we look at the map, Mummy?” she said. “See where the queen is now.”

Lucy’s latest obsession was the Commonwealth tour. We kept track of all the countries the queen had visited, and where she was going next. They were doing a project on it at school, not that Lucy needed any extra encouragement. I found it fascinating myself, not least because of the state-of-the-art Marconi radio and sound equipment SS Gothic had been kitted out with especially for the tour. There were twice-daily dispatches to keep the news desks at home up to date, and even occasional live broadcasts, which I’d had to endure the agony of listening to while wishing things were different and that it was me reporting on the latest state function.

“Look. I found another piece at work today, about the coronation,” I said. “I thought you might like to add it to your scrapbook, if there’s room.”

It was a piece I’d written for Bullen to record as a headline broadcast for the coronation special—a series of programs about the historic event. Revived by a stint at the Sussex coast, Bullen had triumphantly returned to work just in time for the coronation. I, on the other hand, had been assigned a small job reporting on a local woman who’d dedicated an entire room in her house to the coronation and had decorated it in memorabilia produced for the occasion. The whole thing had given me a migraine.

In the end, the pieces I’d produced after my visits to Sandringham last year had counted for little. As Tom Harding had warned, my second piece on the Christmas message was too late to broadcast, although he’d at least offered to keep it on file for another year. Since then, I’d found myself assigned to the “and finally” items deemed too frivolous for serious reporters like Bullen or Maguire: the latest time-saving electrical appliance, a lost cat reunited with its owner after ten years, a heartwarming story of a helpful schoolchild.

Lucy flicked through her scrapbook. “I don’t think there’s space to add anything else about the coronation. Will you read it to me instead? Pretend you’re reading it out on the wireless, like you will one day!”

I was used to the little tricks Lucy used to delay her bedtime. I glanced at my watch. “It’s getting late.”

“Pleeeeease, Mummy. I was a very good angel today, wasn’t I?”

I smiled and tucked a loose curl behind her ear as I sat on the end of her bed. “You were the best angel. I’ll read it once. But then, straight to sleep.” I cleared my throat. “AN OCCASION FIT FOR A QUEEN—Olive Carter reports for the BBC.”

Lucy laughed as I substituted Bullen’s byline for my own.

I carried on. “ History was made today as our new monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, was crowned in a dazzling ceremony at Westminster Abbey. Over three thousand dignitaries from across the Commonwealth were seated inside the abbey, with millions of ordinary people able to watch the historic events unfold on television sets around the world. It is estimated that the dress weighs around eleven pounds. The coronation necklace is one that was commissioned by Queen Victoria. Our young princess looked every inch Elizabeth Regina as the mighty Prince Edward crown was placed on her head by the Archbishop of Canterbury in a most solemn moment. Back in the stateroom of Buckingham Palace, the guests were served an eight-course banquet, prepared by the talented chefs of the royal kitchens. Even the corgis were treated to the very best chicken and steak. On a day that saw the happy news that the British expedition party in Nepal have successfully reached the summit of Mount Everest, it seems fitting that our young queen begins her reign as our new monarch. No doubt she, too, carries a sense of embarking on a challenging expedition into uncharted territories. We wish you well, ma’am, in your own endeavors to reach the summit. God save the queen. ”

I had read the piece and listened to Bullen’s recording of it so many times that I almost knew it by heart. I found his pieces so dull and predictable. I’d started rewriting them with a fresher, more feminine slant, and left the alternative pieces on Tom’s desk. I’d written an alternative coronation piece, focusing on the detail of the dress. I read it out now to Lucy.

“ Despite the rain and drab skies, she was a vision of calm composure in her coronation gown that took eight months to make and was the eighth of nine designs proposed by Norman Hartnell, Her Majesty’s preferred designer. The gown is made from duchesse satin and embellished in gold, silver, and pastel thread with motifs of the four national emblems, and emblems of the dominions of which she is now monarch. The intricate embroidery is arranged in scalloped graduated tiers. Gold beads, diamanté crystals, and seed pearls have also been added and shimmer in the lights of the television cameras, carefully positioned all around the abbey to ensure that every moment of the ceremony is captured and beamed around the world to an anticipated audience of some three hundred million viewers. ”

“Did the dress really take eight months to make?” Lucy asked.

“Yes. All that time. Imagine!”

“And she’ll never wear it again?”

“Never. Isn’t that silly!”

“If I had a dress that pretty I would wear it every day!”

Tom had at least admitted that my detail on the dress, and on the impact of television in bringing the event into people’s homes, were interesting perspectives and ones that Charlie hadn’t fully considered. I’d pointed out that this was because Charlie was a man and only saw things from a man’s point of view, which had been fine when reporting on a king, but not when reporting on a queen. Mr. Harding had conceded that I had a point but had also emphasized that changing the opinions of people like Charlie Bullen wasn’t something that could happen overnight.

It had been hard to watch Charlie stride back into his role. He hadn’t once asked me about being at Sandringham, although I could tell he was dying to know how I’d ended up having a private audience with the queen to advise her on the delivery of her speech. He’d been reporting on the royal family for thirty years and had never had such a personal encounter with the reigning monarch. But, of course, it was Boring Bullen who’d been dispatched as part of the BBC team covering the Commonwealth tour.

While he was halfway across the world, I was stuck at Broadcasting House. Tom Harding knew that I would have loved a place among the press team on the ship, but he also knew that I couldn’t have gone, even if the opportunity had arisen. It was one thing to ask my parents to mind Lucy for a few hours when I went to the pictures with Rosie, but it would have been out of the question to leave her for six whole months—even though that was precisely what the queen had done, leaving her young children behind with the nanny. Lucy was growing up fast—too fast—and I didn’t want to miss a minute of it.

Tom Harding had promised me he would find me something else to make up for it, but so far, the best he’d been able to offer was a small legacy piece on last December’s deadly smog and the government’s promises to bring in a national air pollution law. At least it was a step up from reporting on the latest domestic appliances.

I kissed Lucy on the cheek and tucked the bedsheets around her. “Now, get to sleep, you. Remember Father Christmas is watching for good girls and boys.”

She squeezed her eyes shut tight.

Heart full of love, I went to my bedroom and pulled an old shoebox out from beneath the bed. It was covered in dust, and full of memories, some of which I didn’t want to stir up. I removed the lid and took everything out: Lucy’s baby things, a few special letters and trinkets, postcards from my parents’ holidays in Rhyl and the Cotswolds. And there, at the bottom, the photograph I’d kept all these years. A snapshot taken on the night we’d celebrated Victory in Europe. An impromptu party on Primrose Hill. Old friends, and new. On my left, with his arm draped casually around my shoulders, was Peter Hall. On my right, a bottle of champagne raised in joyful celebration, Jack Devereux.

I turned the photograph over: 8th May, 1945. Victory!

Working on the Great Smog piece had sent my thoughts straying back to this time last year, and especially to when I’d bumped into Jack at Sandringham and learned of Andrea’s tragic accident. I’d returned his lighter straight after Christmas, along with a note to thank him for the recipe, posting them to Mrs. Leonard at Sandringham House and asking her to forward it to him, if she knew where he was.

A note of thanks had arrived two months later, via Broadcasting House. I took it from the envelope now, and read it again. Dear Olive, Thank you for returning the lighter. It seems we are quite a couple of magpies, finding each other’s shiny things! It means a great deal to me, so I am very thankful, even though it took me all this time to say so. I’ve been busier than you can imagine in my new job at Buckingham Palace (yes, I accepted). You mentioned that the shrimp and grits hadn’t gone well when you’d tried to cook it, so I’ve enclosed a simpler recipe for a spiced tomato soup. Hopefully this one will be more successful! J.

I couldn’t help being a little disappointed by his response—no invitation to meet; not even a cursory kiss at the end of the note—and it irritated me that I still cared. Jack was an itch I couldn’t scratch. A stone in my shoe. Impossible to ignore and yet ever-present. But despite a few exchanged letters and the few recipes he’d sent on, it seemed we were destined to always circle around each other, moving in orbit, rather than toward each other. That was how it had always been with me and Jack. How it would always be.

Which was why I hadn’t told him about Lucy. It was too risky; too complicated. Apart from the fact that he was still grieving for Andrea, his job didn’t exactly allow for domestic harmony. Lucy and I were doing just fine, and the last thing Jack needed was another emotional bombshell. So I put him away, packed him into the shoebox of memories I kept beneath the bed, and tried to forget all about him.