An American soldier was standing by the window chewing gum. He gave a slow smile.
“All right, son, I’ll pass it.”
He took the basket off the rack and put it half on Hannah’s knees and half on the skinny knees of the woman with her rights. It would have seemed an accident, only as he turned away to loll back against the window he gave Sorrel and Mark a very meaning wink.
That wink somehow cheered things up. A world where grown-up people could do funny things like that could not be as depressing as it had looked a few minutes ago.
Hannah, quite disregarding her next-door neighbour, opened the basket. The woman with her rights spoke as if each word was a cherry-stone she was spitting out.
“Do you mind moving that basket on to your own knees.”
Hannah beamed at her as if she were being nice.
“I’m sorry, I’m sure, but fixed like we are it’s hard to know whose knee is whose.” The rest of the people in the carriage, because of too little space and too much tobacco smoke, had been half asleep. Now, as if Hannah’s voice was the breakfast gong, they all sat up and looked interested. Hannah was pleased; she liked conversation to be general. She drew everybody in with a glance. “We had an early breakfast and we’re a bit low-spirited. Nothing like something to eat as a cure for that.”
In her basket Hannah had egg and cress sandwiches, and in a little box some chocolate biscuits. Eggs were not a surprise because at the vicarage they had kept hens, but chocolate biscuits!
The sight of real egg and chocolate biscuits both at the same minute excited the other passengers so much that in no time they were talking like old friends. Of course the conversation was mostly food, but food was what grown-up people liked talking about, so that was all right; anyway the general buzz made a cheerful atmosphere, and that, together with eating, made Sorrel and Mark feel a lot better, and the finish to feeling better was put by the American soldier. Like a conjurer pulling a rabbit out of a hat, he suddenly produced three enormous sweets out of his pocket and gave them one each. Sorrel was worried about taking them.
“Are you sure you can spare them?” she asked anxiously. “I mean, as big as this they must be a lot of your ration.”
The soldier did not seem to be a man who said a lot.
“Forget it.”
It was when the American’s sweet was in their mouths and they could not speak that Hannah had her talk with a nice-looking woman in tweeds. It began by the woman asking where they were going and Hannah not only told her, but told her all the other things, starting with their mother and going through the Channel Islands, their father and then grandfather, finishing with who their grandmother was. The woman was interested and asked about schools. Hannah explained about Ferntree and Wilton House. The woman shook her head and said “bad luck,” and then she said:
“Changing about is a nuisance, especially if there were any thought of scholarships later on.”
“I never heard talk of that,” said Hannah.
The tweed woman leant forward and smiled at Sorrel and Mark.
“Just as well. It’s so easy to miss a chance by shifting about at the wrong age.”
The conversation about education finished there and shifted to the baby of the woman in the corner, but it did not finish in Sorrel’s mind. “It’s so easy to miss a chance.” Did grandmother know that Mark was going into the Navy? Mr. Pinker, headmaster of Wilton House, had known. Had he been teaching Mark thinking of his entrance exam.? Of course Mark would not be the right age to go in for his examinations yet, but how awful if he ought to be being specially prepared. Daddy had written to Mr. Pinker and he knew all about it, but would the new London school? Sorrel looked at Mark and saw he had either not listened to the tweed woman or was not interested, he was placidly sucking and playing with an indiarubber band. She looked at Holly, but of course Holly was not bothering, she was far too young; in fact, in spite of the smallness of her piece of seat, she seemed to be nearly asleep, though she was still enough awake to suck at her sweet. Sorrel looked at Hannah. Hannah was an angel, but not the person to understand about examinations. She looked on education in the same way as she looked upon food rationing, something the Government insisted on and therefore you had to do, but she did not think personally education was important except perhaps reading, writing and being able to add and, if put to it, subtract.
It is queer how all in a minute you can understand what growing up means. Sorrel did not look very grown-up, she was small for her age. She was wearing a rather short cotton frock. She usually had bare legs, but to travel in she was wearing white socks and her brown school walking shoes. Looking at her you might have made a guess that she was ten and not a person who was going to be twelve in April. But at that minute inside she was far more than her age. Grandfather was dead, Daddy was a prisoner in the hands of the Japs, at least that was what she was going to believe; Hannah was grand for most things, but not everything, and Mark and Holly were still too young to feel responsible. It was up to her to take a little of her father’s place. Of course grandmother might be absolutely perfect, one of those sort of grown-up people who always did sensible things without any fuss, but then she might not. She pushed her sweet into her cheek and turned to Mark.
“When we get to grandmother’s, if you and Holly don’t like things awfully, you will tell me, won’t you?”
Mark had been thinking of catapults; he came back to the train with a jump. Sorrel had to repeat what she had said. He fixed puzzled eyes on her.
“What sort of things?”
Sorrel wished she had not said anything, it was so difficult to explain.
“Just things. I mean, I want you to know I’m there.”
Mark thought she was being idiotic.
“Of course you’ll be there; where else would you be?” He went back to thinking about catapults.
CHAPTER III
NUMBER 14
They drove to grandmother’s in a taxi. The children stared out of the windows. After Martins London seemed a busy place. Buses dashing everywhere and crowds of people on the pavements. They asked Hannah every sort of question because she had once been to London for the day and so they thought she ought to know all about it. Where was Madame Tussaud’s? Where was The Tower? Where was Westminster Abbey? Where was the Zoo? Hannah had no idea where any of these places were, but neither had she any intention of admitting it. She looked out of the window with a thoughtful, pulling-things-out-of-her-memory expression, and said: “We’re not so far now.” As the station they had arrived at was Paddington and they were making for a square near Sloane Street they never went anywhere near any of the places, but by the time the taxi stopped they were all too full of interest in what they were seeing to remember what they had not seen.
No. 14, Ponsonby Square, London, S.W.I, was the address. Ponsonby Square was not a square really, only three sides of one. Tall grey houses all attached to each other, all alike, all built in the reign of Queen Victoria, when houses were long and thin and people expected their servants to live underground in basements, and not to mind carrying water and coals and other heavy things up five flights of stairs. Number 14 looked as if it was the only house in its bit of the square that was being lived in. Number 11 had been blown away by a bomb and nothing was left of it but different-coloured walls and some mantelpieces, which were part of the wall of Number 10, and some more wallpapers and a piece of staircase and a door, which were part of the wall of Number 12. The other houses within sight looked rather battered, and some had lost bits of themselves and it was clear no one lived in them, for they had large E’s painted on the doors. Even if the children had not guessed that meant empty, the rusty petrol tins of emergency water on the doorsteps would have told them, for nobody surely would live in a house with a petrol tin standing just where you were bound to fall over it every time you came out.
The children’s schools were in the country and they had only been in little towns and had not seen much bomb damage before, and
never deserted houses which people had been forced to leave in a hurry. Hannah was busy with the taxi-driver and they had not for a moment her sensible, comforting way of looking at things to help them. They stood staring round with horror written all over their faces.
“People can’t live here,” said Mark. “It’s much too nasty.”
Sorrel had her eyes on the space which had been Number 11.
“How queer to think that once had a door and windows and people coming in and out.”
Holly began to cry.
“I don’t like it. I want to go back to Martins. It’s all so dirty here.”
Hannah swung round from the pile of luggage she and the driver were counting.
“What’s all this about?” She glanced at Number 14 and along the square. If, to her country eyes, it seemed as depressing as it did to the children not a sign of it showed on her face. She beamed as if the houses were old friends. “Proper old-fashioned, isn’t it? Go on, Mark, ring the bell; I can do with a nice cup of tea if you can’t.”
It was queer how Hannah changed things. As she said “proper old-fashioned” the square seemed different. It was just as shabby, the petrol tins were just as rusty, the white-painted E’s on the doors just as queer, but instead of it all seeming rather sinister it became curious.
It was when Mark was on the steps ringing the bell that he noticed the garden.
“Look,” he said, “a garden!”
Sorrel was mopping and tidying Holly’s face, so she did not turn at once, but when she did she felt a shiver of pleasure run all through her. The garden had once been shut in with railings, but the railings had been taken away to make munitions, and the trees of the garden were sticking out over the pavement and, though there were a proper gate and path a little way down the square, it was clear you could push in anywhere. Through the trees there were patches of colour, the mauves and purples of Michaelmas daisies, the pinks and reds of roses.
“Look, Holly,” she said, “a proper garden. Now there’s nothing to cry about, is there?”
The taxi-driver, who was unstrapping their big box, looked at Sorrel over his shoulder.
“You’re right there, it’s a proper garden. Me and my mate we often slips in there for a smoke after our dinner. Lovely it is inside. Flowers and all. Ought to see it in the spring, proper picture it is.”
“Who does it belong to?” Sorrel asked.
The taxi-driver laughed.
“Well, the people in this square rightly, I suppose. I hear they pays to keep it up, but they aren’t here and the rails is gone, so there’s no ’arm done when you has a nice sit down and a smoke.”
Sorrel looked at the others.
“The people in the square! That’s us. Fancy us having a garden in London!”
They heard steps inside the house. Hannah, who had just brought up two of the suitcases, looked in a nervous way at each of the children.
“Sorrel, keep hold of Holly’s hand. You all look as if you’d come off a train, but I daresay your Granny will understand you started out looking nice.”
There was the sound of a rusty key being turned and the clank of a heavy chain and the door was thrown open. In the doorway stood a little, thin, grey-haired woman with the biggest smile any of them had ever seen.
Mark remembered his manners. He lifted his cap.
“How do you do? Are you our grandmother?”
The woman laughed. Not a gentle laugh to fit her size but a great rolling sound as if she enjoyed it so much she did not care if it tore her to bits.
“Your Granny! No. Bless the boy, you’ll be the death of me! Your Granny! No, indeed, I’m Alice. Buckingham Palace to you.”
Sorrel held out her right hand.
“How d’you do? I’m Sorrel.”
Alice took her hand and pulled her into the hall, then she turned her to face the light. She gave her a kiss.
“So you’re Sorrel. Why, you’re the living image of Miss Addie.”
Mark was shocked.
“Do you mean our mother? Sorrel can’t be, our mother was a great beauty.”
Alice kissed him.
“Not always she wasn’t. Not when she was your sister’s age and popping in and out of our dressing-room driving us mad with her tricks, she was the spitting image of Sorrel then.” She knelt down by Holly and hugged her and then turned her to the light. “I don’t know who you’re like. Maybe there’s something of your Granny, but she never had curls. Hair like a pikestaff we’ve always had.” She caught hold of one of Mark’s hands and drew him to her. “Well, there’s no doubt what family you belong to. You’re the spitting image of your Uncle Henry, and he’s the spitting image of old Sir Joshua, if the portrait of the old man doesn’t lie.”
Mark’s eyes screwed up at the corners when he was cross. He drew himself up to look as tall as possible.
“If you are at all interested I’m exactly like my father, and he was exactly like his grandfather, who was an admiral. We know that he was an admiral because there was a picture of him in the dining-room in the vicarage.”
Alice rolled out another laugh.
“Well, I’m not going to quarrel, but you have a look at the picture of Sir Joshua sometime, and one afternoon we’ll go and see your uncle on the pictures and then we’ll see who’s right.”
Sorrel had wandered up the passage having a look round. She came hurrying back at Alice’s last words.
“Have we an uncle on the pictures?”
Alice seemed startled. She opened her mouth and then closed it, and then opened it again.
“Didn’t you know Henry Warren was your uncle?”
Sorrel could see that Alice thought they must have heard of Henry Warren; she spoke gently as she did not want to seem rude to her uncle.
“We didn’t know we had an Uncle Henry, so of course we didn’t know if he acted for the films. As a matter of fact we haven’t been to any films since the war. Except ‘Pinocchio’ when Daddy had leave.”
“And that ‘Wizard of Oz,’” Mark reminded her.
“We don’t go to films at school,” Sorrel explained, “because of infection, and there wasn’t a cinema in Martins.”
Hannah and the taxi-driver had the luggage in the hall. Alice examined it. She looked in a friendly way at Hannah.
“You and I can manage that. If the box is too heavy you can unpack it down here.” She waited while Hannah paid the driver, then she took Holly’s hand. “Come on, follow us up the old apples and pears.” She saw Holly’s face was puzzled. “Stairs to you. You’ll get used to me in time.”
It was a queer house, grand in a way, but shabby. There was a thick purple carpet all up the stairs but it was getting very worn in places. Half-way up to the first floor there was an alcove with plants in it; this had stiff yellow satin curtains in front of it, but the satin was full of dust and in places was torn. All up the stairs were framed advertisements of old plays, yellow and queerly printed. Some of them had their glass cracked. In the top passage, where were their bedrooms, there was an enormous velvet sofa with a piece of brocade thrown over it. Alice kept up a running commentary on what they were passing.
“Those curtains were in the drawing-room set of ever so comic a comedy. This carpet was used in the front of the house when Sir Joshua had the Georgian Theatre. They’re going off a bit now, of course, but they must have been ever so nice in his day. Some of these play bills were cracked when the bomb got Number 11. This sofa was in a season we did of that Ibsen. Proper old whited sepulchre it is now. Got a hole in the velvet you could put a big drum in. That’s why I keep the brocade there; that brocade was a bit of our third-act dress in a play by Somerset Maugham.” She opened a door and her voice softened. “This room is for Sorrel. It was Miss Addie’s.”
Sorrel went in first. It was the queerest feeling. “It was Miss Addie’s.” Her mother’s room. Somehow, although her father was always talking about their mother she had never come as alive before. In Guernsey everything had been as she had
planned it, but it was grown-up planning. This room was the room of a girl, someone of about the same age as herself. Sorrel walked round. Unconsciously she walked on tiptoe. It was a pretty room. A white wooden bed with a powder-blue eider-down. Tied to the bed head was a felt doll with wide skirts and silk thread plaits. Lying on the eider-down was a pillowcase made like a large white cat. There were blue shiny chintz curtains and the dressing-table had the same chintz frilled round it. On the dressing-table there were silver dressing-table things with “Addie” written on the backs. There was a white chest of drawers and a white cupboard. The carpet was blue, with pink flowers. By the bed on a white table was a white bedside lamp and, propped against it, a green frog. On the mantelpiece were fourteen wooden bears, ranging from a very big bear to a tiny one. There was only one picture; it was of a cornfield. In the corner there was a bookcase. Sorrel knelt down by it. Three whole rows of plays. A Bible. A dictionary. There were a lot of books Sorrel had never heard of, but, as well, there were several old favourites, “Little Women,” “Little Lord Fauntleroy,” “David Copperfield,” a very nice “Alice in Wonderland,” and, as well, some baby books, all the Beatrix Potters and Little Black Sambo. Hannah and Alice were talking in the doorway. Sorrel waited for a pause and then broke in.
“This is just as if my mother had only just left it.”
Alice came to the top of the bed.
“So it is very near. We sent her clothes on, of course, and we sent her toilet things. That lot there are what she had as a child. Of course, when she was here you could hardly see the walls for photographs; you know what theatricals are.”
“What happened to the photographs?” Mark asked.
Alice seemed flustered by the question. She tried twice to answer it, and then she spoke more to Hannah than to the children.
“We acted very foolish, no saying we didn’t. Destroyed a lot of things when we lost our temper.”
Hannah seemed to be tired of the subject of photographs. Her voice was brisk.
“Well, Sorrel isn’t the only one who has to sleep tonight; where’s the rest of us going?”
Theatre Shoes Page 2
