The Sea Gate

by Jane Johnson

  Winnie dug her in the ribs. ‘Sit up straight!’ she hissed. ‘And pay attention.’

  Mary, sitting ramrod-straight with her carroty hair tucked behind her ears, gave her a smug smile.

  I am paying attention, Olivia thought but did not say. Just not to the bloody vicar. She crossed her legs and felt the cool silk whisper to her inner thighs.

  The other POWs consisted of two German mariners picked up after their destroyer was sunk in the Channel and an Italian music teacher interned when his country had entered the war, no doubt for the crime of teaching young ladies from Truro to play the piano badly. The rest of the congregation consisted of those who were left when the young and fit went off to war or – like Olivia’s mother – to bolster the war effort in London: the older people of the community, the local children, and the evacuees sent down here from upcountry to avoid the bombs. Conspicuous by their absence were the Jewish children repatriated from London: a temporary synagogue had been set up for them in the church hall, but anyway, Sunday was not their holy day, but Saturday, which they called the Sabbath. They had proved a useful resource for Olivia, who had gleaned all sorts of snippets of useful information about London from them: where the Penzance train came into, how to get to Threadneedle Street, which parks you might pitch a tent in. Because she had a plan. Or as she liked to think of it, A Plan.

  Back in her room after a lunch of mutton and boiled potatoes Olivia counted her coins out, her brow furrowed in fierce concentration. A small pile of shillings, a stack of sixpences, a tower of thruppenny bits, a handful of pennies and ha’pennies. It wasn’t just the cost of getting to London by train (one-way ticket only, of course) but a matter of surviving once she got there, and she was nearing her self-imposed financial goal.

  For the past few weeks she’d been taking commissions for a few pennies here and there, but it added up. She had drawn Mrs Scoble’s terrier for her, and the Hicks baby for Lily to send to her husband; one of the chaps manning the lookout had paid her a whole shilling to do a sketch of him to send to his sweetheart in Norfolk (‘It’s more romantic, more personal, like, than a photograph.’). Jeannie Blewett had paid her to draw her two boys in their navy uniforms before they were deployed. But this afternoon’s sketching would be for her own pleasure.

  She made her way through the potato fields that ran along the coast, slipping down through the quillets and into the woods below Kemyel Farm to scramble through gorse thickets and stands of hazel and privet, whose flowers smelled like warmed plasticine in the sun, till she reached the little boulder beach where she rolled her shirt up under her brassiere to allow the sea breeze to daringly caress her skin, and watched the clouds drifting across the sky. Taking her drawing charcoal and sketchpad out of her rucksack, she closed her eyes for a long moment to recapture her subject and then set about the task she had been looking forward to all these hours.

  How long she sat there drawing and dreaming she could not say. She lost herself in her creation, using a fine edge for the detail, smudging the shadows to soften the skin texture. She embellished the reality, filling in detail to suit her own imagination of the exotic stranger, imbuing him with qualities from the stories she best loved. Truth was not, in this case, her quest as it was with the portraits she did on commission, when the subject had to look exactly the way they did in life, or at least in photographs; now she let her unconscious mind guide her hand. The Dark Man was subtly transformed from the slight, rather shy prisoner who went about his tasks at the farm with quiet acceptance, to an exiled Arabian prince, a Saracen warrior like the one in Sir Walter Scott’s The Talisman. By the time she had finished she was half in love with the face she had conjured and the clouds piled up on the horizon were stained by the sunset, her limbs were chilled and her bottom was decidedly numb.

  Olivia got to her feet and shook some life back into her legs. She was going to be in fearful trouble, skipping out on her chores for so long. She had better pick some blackberries to eat on the way back: she was sure to be confined to her room with no tea. She took a last lingering look at her sketchbook prince, then stowed her art materials in her rucksack.

  And that was when she heard it, a series of low crumping noises – like far-off detonations, one after another, away to the east. Shading her eyes against the sun’s dying light, Olivia gazed out across the bay. Spirals of dark smoke rose like trembling towers over the town.

  They were bombing Penzance! The Germans were bombing Penzance! Why on earth would they do such a thing? Plymouth – sixty-odd miles away on the county’s border with Devon, had been bombed many times, but Plymouth was one of the country’s key naval bases. There was nothing of strategic importance in Penzance – just houses and shops and banks and down on the promenade hotels where people went to tea dances. Outraged, she slung her rucksack over her shoulder and ploughed a path back up through the woods, panting hard by the time she reached the top of the first potato field.

  Another crump, much louder, made her breastbone judder, and looking back towards Porth Enys she saw a great plume of water surge up near the island, then another, and then a plane banked hard and seemed to be coming right at her, far too low: a roaring monster trailing a churning black wake of smoke. She turned her head to watch it till her neck ached; then it was past, and she saw a tiny parachute, like a seed from a dandelion clock, white against the darkening sky.

  The impact as the plane hit rumbled through the ground, through the dark soil and the tubers and roots and leaves of the potato plants nearing their second cropping and into the soles of her feet, travelled up her leg bones and spine into the very heart of her, as with the land she absorbed the crash.

  Until that moment, the war had seemed theoretical to Olivia – one of Daddy’s tales, or something you heard about on the wireless; a distant conflict with limited direct effect upon Cornwall, let alone Porth Enys. But this was war: here and now. She stood with her heart beating fiercely. Then she was off and running, her feet kicking up the earth as she cut a straight line through the crop to the top of the hill.

  As Olivia crested the rise she could see the blaze of the crashed plane two fields over, sending great columns of black smoke up like beacons from hell. By the time she reached the crash site it seemed as if the whole of Treharrow Farm was there: Farmer Roberts and his son Leo, Tom Madron and Jimmy Blewett and Jack Scoble, armed with spades and hoes and shotguns, some of the POWs; a gaggle of Land Girls; Jago arriving on the chugging Fordson with Jem and Nipper Martin. The farm dogs bounced around yapping wildly, keeping well away from the heat of the downed aircraft.

  ‘Get back, get back!’ Jago roared. ‘The bombs will explode.’

  ‘I saw it drop its bombs on the island,’ Olivia called out, breathless from her climb. ‘And I saw someone eject with a parachute!’

  This caused great consternation. Mr Trembath, head of the Home Guard, and two of his men arrived at a run and were left to control the growing crowd around the hulk of the German plane, which had come to rest, or been stopped by, one of the ancient Swingate standing stones. It seemed far larger now that it was on the ground than it had in the sky. Through the flames and choking smoke Olivia could just make out flickers of the black-and-white cross near its tail fin, and seeing the Nazi symbol right here in front of her in a potato field half a mile from her home made her shiver.

  ‘Messerschmitt 264,’ Jimmy announced with some authority.

  ‘Nah, it’s a Stuka – see, it’s got Junkers engines,’ said Leo, pointing.

  ‘How come you know so much? Secret Jerry, are you?’

  They almost came to blows until Farmer Roberts grabbed his son by the arm, and took off with him and Jago on the tractor at dangerous speed so that it lurched precariously over the uneven ground, then disappeared from view.

  Night was falling by the time the local constable and a contingent of uniformed men arrived to disperse the crowd, but by then there was really nothing to see, though Jem Sparrow swore he had seen a man looking out at him from the wrec
k of the plane. ‘His face was like a skull! And his eye sockets were full of flames.’

  One of the Land Girls burst into tears, but Olivia was intrigued. ‘Did you really?’

  Jem looked sheepish. ‘Might have done.’

  She met Marjorie and Beryl in the lane. ‘What’s going on?’ Beryl asked, and Olivia told them the bare details, and watched their expressions shade from horror to fascination. Beryl was desperate to know more, but Marjorie took Olivia firmly by the arm, her nails digging into the flesh. ‘You’re in big trouble,’ she told Olivia with grim pleasure. ‘Mrs Ogden is in a complete bate. You were supposed to be helping her with the floors.’

  ‘But Sunday’s a day of rest,’ Olivia said with mock piousness.

  ‘The devil makes work for idle hands, that’s what Winnie said,’ Beryl added.

  Olivia was unrepentant. She had seen an enemy, an actual German, floating above Kemyel Hill. The knowledge thrilled her. War had come to Porth Enys and she was the sole witness. She took her punishment from Winnie meekly when it came and went to her room, her spirits buoyed by her secret knowledge. Lying in her narrow bed, her blood beating around her body, she slipped her hand between her thighs and rocked quietly back and forth against her slippery fingers, visions of a dark prince in her head.

  9

  ‘IS MISSUS IN?’

  For a brief moment Olivia felt a combination of annoyance and amusement, then she registered that Bert Blewett was holding a telegram discreetly at his side, and her knees started to tremble.

  ‘Who’s it for?’

  ‘Mrs Ogden. Is she in?’

  Olivia experienced a wave of relief like a warm wash through her innards, but a blink later doubt set in. If something had happened to her parents might the telegram still not be addressed to Winnie as the only actual adult at the address? Better grasp the nettle. ‘I’ll go and get her.’

  Winnie was in the scullery, giving her daughter a wash in the copper tub. Mary stood as naked and skinny as a shorn lamb. She fixed the intruder with a chilly gaze. Olivia could swear she changed her eye colour at will, like a cat. ‘Out of here!’ Winnie flicked a soap-laden hand at her. ‘Give the girl some privacy.’

  Olivia moved to the doorway and turned her back. ‘The postman—’

  ‘Out!’

  ‘—a telegram.’

  There was a long beat of silence followed by a splash as the bar of Wright’s Coal Tar soap fell from Winnie’s hand, then the housekeeper pushed a towel into Olivia’s hands. ‘Finish her bath and get her dry.’

  Olivia flipped the towel around Mary’s shoulders with a hissed, ‘Stay there!’ and ran back down the corridor to make sure she didn’t miss anything. It was very quiet in the hall: no one was saying a word, but she could just see Winnie reading the bit of paper the postman had given her.

  Please, God, don’t let it be Daddy, Olivia prayed wildly; then, feeling guilty, Or Mummy, either.

  Winnie scanned the contents of the telegram for a final time then stowed it in the pocket of her apron. Bert was still lingering on the doorstep. ‘If you want to reply, it’s nine words for sixpence.’

  ‘You can say “Up on train tomorrow, Winnie”. That’s five, I’ll expect change,’ Winnie said crisply, dropping a coin into his hand.

  He jotted the message down, grumpily conceded her a couple of coins, then tipped his cap and trotted back down the path. Winnie stood there for a long moment, staring out into the grey morning, before shutting the door after him.

  Olivia, frustrated at this withholding of information, scooted back down the corridor, only to find Mary standing at the scullery door shivering dramatically. Grabbing her more firmly by her thin shoulders than was strictly necessary, Olivia steered her back inside and started rubbing her fiercely.

  ‘Ow, you’re hurting me!’ Mary wriggled under Olivia’s rough attentions, looking pleadingly at her mother as she entered the room. ‘Olivia left me and I got cooooold,’ she whined.

  But for once her complaint went unremarked. Winnie took the towel from Olivia and absent-mindedly dried her daughter. ‘I’ll have to leave Mary with you,’ she said after a while. ‘My mother is very ill.’

  Olivia, who had been about to protest vehemently, closed her mouth. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, but she was relieved the bad news had nothing to do with her parents.

  Mary pulled at her mother’s arm. ‘I want to go with you!’

  ‘An old woman’s deathbed is no place for a child.’

  ‘But Olivia’s horrible to me!’

  Winnie gave her a little shake. ‘You must be a proper grown-up girl, Rosemary, and do whatever Olivia tells you. Now, take your things upstairs and let me think. Olivia, get her dressed, will you?’

  For once Olivia did not talk back. Up in the nursery, the child became stiff and uncooperative, bending her arms at awkward angles as Olivia tried to put her cardigan on. ‘I hate you!’

  ‘Well, I hate you too, so we’re even.’

  She was ridiculously strong for a five-year-old. Olivia was sweating by the time they had finished. The idea of Winnie going away was a joyous thing but the euphoria was easily counterbalanced by the responsibility of having to take care of Mary. I shall bloody well lock her in the cellar if she plays me up, she thought savagely. It was a tempting prospect, but she knew she wouldn’t. Mary would probably manage to get the sea door open and go stumbling off down the smuggler’s passage to drown, and just think how much how much trouble that would cause.

  *

  The next morning the weather matched Olivia’s mood as she watched Winnie make her way down the steps to the lane where Jago waited in the lovely Standard Flying 8, little puffs of smoke emanating from the car’s exhaust. Poor old girl, Olivia thought, neglected for so long and then made to go out on such a rotten day. An idea occurred to her. It might not be The Plan, but as consolations went, it was a plan. Imbued with sudden energy, she ran to the kitchen and washed up the breakfast things, leaving them to drain as she was never usually allowed to do. Then she locked a protesting Mary in her bedroom, pulled on her mackintosh and sou’wester, filled her pockets with what she needed and made her way up through the woodland at the rear of the house to the small barn they used as a garage. She did not have long to wait before Jago returned.

  ‘Did you catch the train all right?’

  Jago wound the window down and regarded her curiously. ‘Aye.’

  ‘I thought I’d save you the walk down to the house,’ Olivia said brightly, raindrops dripping off the brim of her sou’wester. ‘I’ll take the starting handle and put it back in its box. You know, to keep it out of the hands of the enemy, like the Ministry says.’

  Jago parked the car and gave it and the key to the garage over reluctantly. Olivia smiled sweetly. No doubt they both had the same idea. She waited till he disappeared up the lane to the farm before doubling back to the garage, opening its creaky old doors wide. The Flying 8 sat there, its long dark bonnet as warm as the belly of a slumbering animal – a dragon, she thought, alarmingly huge. Could she even remember how to start it? She climbed in, feeling the heat of Jago lingering in the hard leather of the driver’s seat, assured herself that the handbrake was on and that it was out of gear. Then she pulled on the start cord, expecting it to rumble to life, but nothing happened. Bother. She got out and walked to the front of the car, feeling rather awed by its waterfall grille and shiny louvres, and dragged from her memory her father’s careful instructions about not getting her thumb caught as she cranked the starting handle, turning it good and hard twice and feeling for the sweet point before giving the handle a firm extra swing… Her heart beat wildly as the engine caught with a fearful roar. She half-expected it to emit a bolt of fire.

  Tremulously, she drove the car out onto the gritted lane, made a shaky ten-point turn to get it facing in the right direction, and went chugging off down the long hill, the Flying 8 picking up speed as the incline increased, then the road swept in a long parabola down past the farm cottages and Carn Dh
u, where a contingent of soldiers was billeted. She kept her foot on the brake all the way down into the village, where the streets got narrow and things got a lot more tricky, especially if you met anyone coming the other way. But her luck was in: people were saving their fuel for emergencies. She parked on the road by the chapel above the old quay and got out, feeling at once trembly with nerves and triumphant. A wild scheme came into her mind. She could drive herself to London! But reality smothered this mad idea before it could grow legs and run away with itself. Of course she couldn’t. It was hundreds of miles to the capital and such a journey – even if she could negotiate it – would use every drop of fuel stashed in the stonehouse. Also, her parents would quite simply kill her.