Sarah Armstrong is the author of The Insect Rosary and The Devil in the Snow. Her short stories have been published in magazines and anthologies, and she teaches undergraduate and postgraduate creative writing with the Open University. Sarah lives in Colchester with her husband and four children.
Also by Sarah Armstrong
The Insect Rosary
The Devil in the Snow
First published in Great Britain by
Sandstone Press Ltd
Dochcarty Road
Dingwall
Ross-shire
iv15 9ug
Scotland
www.sandstonepress.com
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored or transmitted in any form without the express
written permission of the publisher.
Copyright © Sarah Armstrong 2018
Editor: Moira Forsyth
The moral right of Sarah Armstrong to be recognised as the
author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
The publisher acknowledges subsidy from
Creative Scotland towards publication of this volume.
ISBN: 978-1-912240-46-3
ISBNe: 978-1-912240-47-0
Cover design by Mark Swan
ebook Compilation by Iolaire Typography, Newtonmore
To Mum and Dad
thank you for all those books
Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you. Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our laws connive at them? Could they be perpetrated without being known, in a country like this, where social and literary intercourse is on such a footing, where every man is surrounded by a neighbourhood of voluntary spies, and where roads and newspapers lay everything open?
Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey
Contents
Title Page
1972
1
2
1973
3
4
5
"We Run" by E.V. MANN
6
7
8
9
10
"Cherry Stones" by E.V. MANN
11
12
13
14
15
"Always Been There" by E.V. MANN
16
17
18
19
20
"Running" by E.V. MANN
21
22
23
24
25
"Space" by E.V. MANN
26
27
28
29
30
"Metro" by E.V. MANN
31
32
1974
33
"Cliff Pirate" by E.V. MANN
Acknowledgements
1972
1
I still had about twenty leaflets to hand out from my twenty-five. Harriet was walking up to people, asking them, ‘Fancy smashing the patriarchy today?’ She wasn’t getting rid of many either, but she was getting attention. Not good attention, like people agreeing that they were benefiting from a rigged system, but we hadn’t expected that. We weren’t so persuasive, yet.
I loitered quietly by the gate, hoping to sneak the paper into the hands of men passing before they realised what it was. They just rolled their bicycles right past me.
‘Equality for all!’ shouted Harriet.
‘Oh, do stop screeching,’ said one of the passing men, flapping his college scarf at her.
Jack, Harriet’s boyfriend, had moved from the shade of the gate to the patch of sun before the avenue of trees. It looked marginally warmer there. He was holding his leaflets awkwardly at his side, and I felt a pang of sympathy. He hadn’t been eager but, when we discussed it in the pub, he’d agreed. We knew he’d agreed for Harriet, but no one had made him.
We’d already been moved on from Trinity Street, and the rear entrance by the River Cam had seemed a good idea, but the porter was already walking up and down behind the cream stone gate, keeping an eye on us. He adjusted his bowler hat every time he tipped it to a student walking through. It looked like he was waiting for someone to move us on again. It was a bright, clear day, but chilly, and I was hoping we’d be sent away fairly soon so I could warm up.
There were fewer people coming down the Avenue from the Cam now, but a couple, dressed rather more warmly than us, were walking together. I hoped they were important visitors and Trinity would be forced to explain to them why women weren’t allowed to study there. I held up my leaflet, hoping they would at least read it: Stop Economic and Sexist Exploitation. The woman pulled out a camera from her handbag and took a photo of the gate. Tourists. I sighed.
Harriet came over to me and beckoned Jack. ‘It’s dead round here.’ She flicked through her papers. ‘Shall we go back to Trinity Street? We could give them out to shoppers, just to get rid of them.’
My fingers were stiff and I could see hers were red with cold. Jack had folded his leaflets into his pocket and put his hands in the opposite sleeves.
‘I’m pretty cold,’ I said. ‘Maybe we could get a cup of tea first.’
Jack nodded. ‘Great idea.’
‘Oh,’ Harriet said. ‘Look.’
I turned. There were two policemen talking to the porter, and then they looked at us.
‘Run!’ shouted Harriet, and we ran down the Avenue, across the Cam and halfway around South Paddock before we realised we weren’t being followed. We stopped and Jack laughed nervously.
‘Pub?’ said Harriet. I’m not sure who was more relieved, me or Jack. Harriet took our leaflets and put them in the next bin we passed. ‘When we see the others,’ she said, ‘the others who didn’t bother to turn up, we need to tell them how great it was.’
I looked at Jack. He smiled.
‘We’ll come up with a story.’ Harriet took Jack’s hand. ‘But the police are going to chase us in that version.’
A few days later, Mr Anderson was just closing the gates as I got back to Girton, and he asked me to wait before handing me a letter from the college. I got back to my room where there was a note pinned to my door saying that my father would be here at 9 a.m. That was odd, and I had a tutorial at that time. It had to be a mistake, but it was too late to phone home and check.
I sat on the bed, too tired to take my shoes off. My books were open, unread, and my essay unwritten. I tried to work out what time I’d have to get up to give it a decent go. It would be another embarrassingly rushed job, even if I finished it. Another pep talk with Dr Faulkner. My cheeks flushed at the thought of it.
I bent over to undo my laces. I had to find my gloves, wherever they’d ended up. I hope they were in here. The magazine was still on the floor, folded to the article about the Angry Brigade I’d shared with Harriet.
‘That’s exactly what everyone needs to do,’ she’d said.
I frowned. ‘Bomb people?’
‘No, protest what’s important. We spend so much time talking, but who cares about that? Look at what they say. Fascism and oppression do need to be smashed. Don’t they?’
I nodded.
‘We all need to look at what is around us, identify what we don’t like and act to change it.’
To be honest, handing out leaflets sounded so tame after that I was pleased to do it.
I lay back on the bed, then remembered th
e letter in my hand. I ripped it open, read it and sat up. My heart was beating as it had when we’d run from Trinity. I read it again. I had been sent down. My protests outside Trinity for their ban on female students had brought Cambridge University into disrepute, it seemed, and after the previous warnings they had no choice.
The letter fell to the floor as I looked around the room. My books, my unfinished essay, my life all had to be packed up.
I had to go home.
2
I had been ignoring the calls from downstairs for too long, it seemed. Someone was coming. I heard the swish of carpet as the door opened, and pushed my face into the pillow. A cold hand sneaked under the sheet and grabbed my ankle. I screamed, sitting up.
‘Kit, you arse. When did you get here?’
He jumped onto the bed and lay down next to me. ‘Hours ago, darling. Your mother sent me up.’
I lay back next to him. ‘Did she tell you?’
‘Yes, but David had already told me the unvarnished version. Hers was a little more polished.’
I threw one hand over my forehead with a dramatic sob. ‘And now I’m trapped here, back home, forever.’
‘A sad spinster.’ He pouted his lips, which always looked bee-stung without this added effect.
‘And you a confirmed bachelor.’
‘Perfect for each other.’ He kissed my forehead and smiled. I stroked the hair from his eyes. He’d let it grow, just a little, and it suited him. I snuggled into his armpit.
‘You’re as bony as ever,’ I said.
The birds which had woken me were silent now. The room was bright through the pale floral curtains. I could hear David opening drawers in the room next to mine and, downstairs, my mother was on the phone, ordering a delivery of coal.
‘I know what day it is. I know that there are a lot of deliveries, but I want mine before three. If it’s any later, I won’t see the mess they’ve made until the morning. I remember last time, you know.’
‘They dropped some dust outside the coal bunker and then it rained,’ I whispered. ‘She swears the stain never came off the stone.’
‘Poor Peg.’ Kit whispered. ‘It’s a hard life without staff.’
‘They both insisted on a whole ten days off this year. I hope you’re ready for defrosted offerings tonight.’
‘Can’t we eat at the pub?’ Kit smiled. ‘No, maybe not. I’ll survive.’ He sat up. ‘But what are we going to do with you, Martha?’
I pulled the sheet over my face again, and he teased it off.
‘Darling, you’ve been in bed for three weeks as far as I hear. It’s time to get up, get dressed and start looking ahead. New year, new plan, new everything.’
He pulled the rest of the sheet off and took my hand, holding it until I was standing.
‘I’ve messed it all up,’ I said.
‘I know. But it will be the making of you.’ He kept hold of my hand, kissed my cheek and squeezed my fingers. ‘Don’t make me come back in here, Martha. I’ll go and put the kettle on for you and Peg.’
I sniggered. ‘She’ll catch you calling her that one day.’
‘She loves me. The second son she never had.’ He paused in the doorway. ‘Ten minutes and I’ll be back.’
He closed the door. I opened the suitcase and took the last of my clean clothes out. Time to do a wash, and accept that I wasn’t a student any more.
In the kitchen, Ma was defrosting an apple pie Cook had left in the freezer. The last of the turkey had been mixed with coronation sauce. Same as every New Year’s Eve that I could ever remember, turkey sandwiches, apple pie and champagne, but each time with a little less excitement about the coming year.
I put my washing in the new machine and tipped the powder in. I hesitated as I looked at the range of programmes, but Ma came across and selected one before pressing the button.
‘Christopher made you tea, and you can have your breakfast for lunch,’ Ma said, and pointed to a plate with two pieces of curling toast.
‘Can I fry an egg to go with it?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Can you?’
I grimaced at her little grammar joke and took my toast to the table. Frying an egg would just mean a fuss about the pan, the mood she was in. Ma lifted my mug to wipe the table with a cloth, and began to wash up some plates.
‘How long is Kit down for?’ I asked.
‘Christopher is going back to London tomorrow, I believe. He’s driving David too.’
So, I’d be alone with the parents again. I took a bite of toast, rigid with cold butter, and put it on top of the range to warm up while I tried to chew through my mouthful, aided with sips of tea. I flicked through the Radio Times to see what films were on later. David and I would work out when to distract Pa from the television, and what was safe. I noticed I’d thankfully missed most of the National Folk Ballet of Korea, but there was a second ballet later.
‘I wish they were staying longer,’ I said.
‘You need to stop worrying about other people and concentrate on sorting yourself out. And stop reading the television guide. You’ll have to get a job, Martha,’ she said, not bothering to look away from the washing up. ‘You won’t be spending the rest of your life in bed.’
‘I know, but I couldn’t look over Christmas, could I? I’ll go into London next week and sign up at some agencies.’
‘You don’t think you should look around here?’
‘The pub?’
She turned around to tut at me, and went back to the plates. ‘The school. David’s old school. You managed a whole year and a term in Cambridge. You must have learned something.’
‘I didn’t learn how to teach.’
‘You don’t need a qualification to teach in a private school, Martha. You could do something useful.’
‘But I don’t want—’
‘Daddy has already spoken to Mr Arnold, so it’s all settled.’
I stood up and put my empty mug at the side of the sink. She looked at me in a way which showed she was tired of looking at me.
‘Ma, I don’t want to stay here.’
‘Martha, if you are going to act like a badly-behaved child and throw away every advantage you’ve ever been gifted, then we will keep you where we can see you.’
‘I’ve been punished. I’ve left university and I won’t get my degree. I don’t need to be watched.’
She threw the dishcloth onto the side. ‘It was in the newspaper, that ridiculous protest. You can’t change things by going around shouting about them. You will not make a fool of us again.’
‘But I wasn’t charged with anything. I’m not a criminal, and things do need to change.’
Ma took a step towards me and grabbed my shoulders. ‘You’re so childish. We have saved you from yourself, and now you do what we say.’
I staggered away to the table and sat down again.
‘I need to know what is happening with my friends. I need to phone them.’
‘No, no phone calls, no contact. You need to move forward, and you’ve proven you choose friends very poorly.’
‘Harriet has my number from before. If she calls, can I speak to her?’
‘No one has called. No one.’ People had been calling. There had been so many ‘wrong numbers’, according to Ma, that I began to wonder if they ever had real phone calls. Ma lowered herself into the chair next to mine and grabbed my hand. ‘I don’t know, and I don’t care, why you did it. We did what we could for you, Martha, and you can’t say you’ve been hard done by. We all need to move forward. This is very important to us, and you can’t say we haven’t allowed you leeway to make choices. But now you have to promise that you won’t contact anyone from Cambridge. All right?’
There were tears in her eyes, very unlike her. It disturbed me. I nodded.
‘You can concentrate on getting a job and we’ll make sure that you meet the right kind of person. People that aren’t going to make things difficult for Pa.’
She cleared her throat,
stood up and walked back to the sink. Pa, who did who knows what, at GCHQ. Government Communications Headquarters. My life had been full of warnings not to embarrass him and, by default, the whole government.
‘Why don’t you find David and Christopher, see what they’re up to?’
I left the room and leaned against the wall in the hallway. For weeks I’d been home and, until now, they’d avoided talking about why I was here, just exchanging looks of miserable resignation.
There was a cough from the stairs. Kit was sitting about halfway up, the light shining through the window behind him.
‘We could grab a drink before the pub closes,’ he said. ‘What do you think?’
They’d called last orders just as we arrived, so Kit went straight to the bar and came back to the table with three halves.
‘That’s a bit sensible for you,’ I said. ‘Halves?’
‘I’m pacing myself,’ he said. ‘It’s going to be a long night.’
‘You didn’t get a better offer than us for New Year?’
Kit looked out of the window. ‘I got many offers, but not with such old friends.’ He pointed out of the window to the grey streets. ‘And such terrible weather.’
‘Ah,’ said David, putting his arm around Kit’s shoulder. ‘And we love you too.’
Kit sighed. ‘It’s important to remember one’s roots.’ He picked David’s hand from his shoulder and dropped it on the table. ‘And I have my first foreign posting coming up, so I had to choose carefully.’
The Wolves of Leninsky Prospekt Page 1
