The Novels of Beryl Bainbridge Volume 1

by Beryl Bainbridge

  On our arrival Georgie instructed Dr Potter to buy me a pony. She’s white with a black patch on her rump; if startled, a blue vein stands out on her forehead. Docile animals are very like children. When I stroke her neck, the skin soft as velvet—

  Georgie has never seen me ride, being always too busy, but yesterday he promised to come with me up into the hills above the lake. An hour before we were due to depart he went missing. He was in the hospital tent, of course, itemising medicines and jotting things down in a ledger. He has no assistant and complains of the amount of reports he has to submit to the office of the Inspector General. He could have said he was sad not to accompany me, but he didn’t. He simply shouted over his shoulder, ‘You go, Myrtle. I can’t possibly get away.’

  Dr Potter would have come with me if I’d let him, in spite of being an indifferent horseman and against exercise. I’m fond of him, but used to living mostly in his head he’s poor company when forced outside. His frequent quotations concerning death, first spouted in a dead language and then laboriously translated, become wearisome. They’re interesting as far as words go, and if we were sitting in a drawing room among fools I’d be the first to think him clever. Here, in the midst of the newly dead, his references to ancient massacres merely irritate. I suppose he scuttles into the past to escape the awful present.

  ‘Mrs Yardley has agreed to ride with me,’ I told him. ‘And besides, you’re not comfortable in the heat.’

  ‘True, true,’ he said, though he looked put out.

  The sun being particularly fierce that morning, I begged to borrow his hat – to mollify him. Which it did. ‘Take it, my dear girl,’ he cried, tearing it from his head. I had no intention of wearing it longer than it took him to reach the shade of his tent.

  Mrs Yardley and her colonel are billeted in the town, but spend their days in camp. I’ve grown to like her. Sometimes she swears, especially when newly bitten. She has several flea bites on her face, one on the end of her nose, yet remains good-humoured. She was on the stage, posing in operatic tableaux, and makes no secret of it, any more than she disguises the nature of her liaison with the colonel. I doubt she knows how much we have in common, although, owing to the incident with silly Mr Naughton, she has tried several times to sound me out in regard to background. As yet, I haven’t taken her into my confidence, but may do so when I know her better.

  We both do what we can in the way of relieving hardship and agree that the wives and followers of the ordinary soldiers, some with children howling at their skirts, are more capable of fending for themselves than the ‘ladies’ among us. I keep telling Master … keep telling Georgie … that it’s foolish to question the common soldier as to the looseness of his bowels, the condition being quite normal among those accustomed to eating food gone bad. I reminded him of Mrs O’Gorman’s tale of her sister’s family in Liverpool, who, finding the carcass of a long-drowned pig in the estuary mud, dragged it home and devoured it half raw. Result – as Dr Potter might say – full bellies for once.

  Quite early on into our trek to the hills, Mrs Yardley began to probe; I reckon the colonel was behind it, he being acquainted with military gossip.

  ‘Miss Hardy,’ she said, ‘I hear that Mr Naughton, on returning home, took to his bed. Apparently news of his exploits had run before him. He’s now in financial trouble, due to neglect of his business.’

  ‘I didn’t know him very well,’ I replied, ‘but I’m sorry to hear it. Being without money is painful.’

  ‘I thought you knew him in Liverpool,’ she said.

  ‘Not at all. We met on board ship … and again in Constantinople. He was kind enough to help me back to the hotel after I’d turned faint in the street.’

  ‘On account of the heat,’ she said, still probing.

  ‘Certainly not. It was the fault of the dogs—’

  ‘Of course,’ she cried. ‘Beatrice told me. You were set upon—’

  ‘I wasn’t,’ I said. ‘A pet belonging to my … my brother’s children was torn apart in front of me.’ Just the mention of my darlings brought tears to my eyes.

  ‘How distressing,’ Mrs Yardley wailed, and sounded as if she meant it.

  We skirted the river and passed a number of women washing clothes, their arms burnt brown from the sun. Close by, the Bulgarian provision men who supply the camp with meat were hacking at slaughtered sheep and flinging the bloody guts into the water. The women seemed happy enough, laughing and shouting as they rub-a-dub-dubbed. A small boy lay on his stomach, dipping a bucket. When full it was too heavy to heave out and he was forced to tip it sideways. After dashing some of the contents to his lips, he staggered off in the direction of the tents.

  ‘I have never felt the need for children,’ Mrs Yardley said. ‘Which is just as well, seeing as I have never conceived.’

  ‘Neither has Beatrice,’ I confided. ‘Though it’s not for want of Dr Potter trying.’ At which we both smirked, it being a risqué remark and one I would never have made to a woman other than my companion.

  Thinking of such intimate things filled my head with pictures – Georgie fetching me from school in Southport and my seizing of his hand on the journey home – Georgie escorting Annie to a supper party in a hotel down by the docks, myself trailing behind, the early moon above, the lanterns lit in the rigging of the ships and my breast so full of innocent joy that I bit my lip for fear I squealed aloud. Not quite innocent—

  ‘Damnation,’ shouted Mrs Yardley, slapping her hand furiously against her throat.

  I advised her to cut a cross in the nip, with her fingernail. Georgie says it disperses the irritation. Insects don’t bother with me. Possibly I was so infested as a child that I’m now immune.

  Soon the path led directly through a wood sweet with bird-song and the drone of bees. Mrs Yardley said it reminded her of being in church, without the inconvenience of having to kneel down—

  It was at Mr Hardy’s funeral that I was first in a church with Master … with Georgie … albeit in the opposite aisle and twelve rows behind. Lolly lent me her hat. Mrs Hardy sat between Beatrice and the gentleman who’d been shot at by Lord Cardigan. Nobody heaved with tears save for Georgie, although I admit I watched no other shoulders but his. Mrs Hardy carried a handkerchief and never used it. Some people only weep inside, which I think wasteful—

  ‘Why do they find me so delectable?’ complained Mrs Yardley, flapping her hands as the gnats swarmed about her head.

  We rode in single file and shortly passed two young men, bare-chested in the sun-dappled shade, one sitting with his back to the trunk of a tree, the other sprawled upon the ground, arms covering his face, bright hair bunched against the brown earth. Both were lazily humming, their scarlet jackets dangling from the branches above. Hearing the soft plodding of the horses’ hooves, the seated man opened his eyes and nodded respectfully; he had the rosy cheeks and snub nose of a country boy, and his lap was heaped with wild cherries.

  Once out of the wood we began to climb higher. Mrs Yardley, scratching at her cheek, asked what I would rather be doing at this moment in time. From her disgruntled tone it was obvious she had suddenly thought of a million superior ways of filling the hours.

  ‘Why, just this,’ I replied. ‘One should always seize the present … there is nothing else available.’ I wasn’t being truthful; I would have wished Georgie at my side.

  Presently the path widened and we saw in the distance a little whitewashed house beside a square of vineyard. I was all for making a detour to avoid coming too close. ‘There’ll be dogs,’ I warned. Mrs Yardley didn’t appear to have heard me and trotted on regardless.

  Sure enough, we had advanced but a little way when the air was shattered by a deep and awesome howl; Mrs Yardley’s horse stopped dead in its tracks. An animal the size of a small calf and much emaciated appeared round the side of the house and tore towards us, followed by a smaller creature, black all over and running on three legs.

  ‘Don’t move,’ I called out to Mrs Ya
rdley, though indeed, the slither of claws on the stony path and the ferocious barking that rent the luminous day had turned her to stone in the saddle. Fortunately the horses stood firm, being no doubt used to such alarms. Some six yards away, the dogs halted, tongues lolling. I concentrated on the larger of the two, forcing myself to gaze into its hateful eyes; whining, it lay down, ears flattened to its mean and bony skull. Mrs Yardley was whimpering, but not loudly enough to provoke an assault.

  After what seemed like hours a bow-legged man emerged from the vineyard and whistled off the brutes. Approaching, he beckoned us forward. We were led past the house to a courtyard beyond, where a woman squatted in the dust pummelling a lump of dough. Fawning, the man urged us to dismount and gestured towards a rickety table. Half a dozen children, some crawling, materialised as though by magic and began to pluck at our clothes.

  Mrs Yardley was trembling; a pin-prick of blood stood out on her cheek.

  ‘Forgive me,’ she said. ‘I should have listened to you.’

  ‘Think of what to give them,’ I urged. ‘Have you money?’

  ‘Money,’ she said. ‘Why do we need money?’

  ‘In return for hospitality,’ I said, vexed. ‘Nothing is for free in this world.’

  The man set before us two small bowls and a pitcher of milk. The children got under his feet and he kicked out, scattering them squawking and fluttering, chicken-like, into the corners of the yard.

  ‘Pig,’ I exclaimed, though I was careful to smile. I thought it was no wonder the smaller dog had a leg missing.

  Mrs Yardley was staring down at the jug, at the insects floating atop the milk. ‘You must drink it,’ I told her. ‘If you don’t they’ll only bring us something worse.’

  ‘At least they’re past biting,’ she said and gamely drank.

  The woman slapped the circle of dough on to a flat stone; she pointed at the sun, then patted her stomach, indicating the bread would be good to eat when baked. As she lifted her arm her gown fell back and there was an infant stuck to her breast, scalp springing with hair the colour of tar.

  ‘Think,’ I urged Mrs Yardley. ‘Think what we can give them.’ I myself had nothing, save a handkerchief at my wrist, mislaid by Georgie; she, a silk scarf at her throat.

  All at once a curious giggling sound came from somewhere close to the vineyard wall. The bow-legged man swaggered off, and shortly returned carrying a struggling goat which he dropped on to its feet on the table. The children surged forward.

  ‘If he’s going to cut its throat in front of us,’ Mrs Yardley promised, ‘I shall scream.’

  The goat had an aristocratic head and golden eyes; its front legs quivered. The woman left her baking and ran to stand beside it. Uttering one querulous bleat, the goat gave birth. Mrs Yardley jerked back in shock, a frill of milk edging her open mouth. Raking the amniotic slime from the kid’s head, the woman blew into its nostrils, then gathered it up in her arms. A tiny fist poked from her bodice and waved beside a cloven hoof. Crossing the yard the woman flopped the infant goat down in the sun, alongside the rising bread.

  Mrs Yardley offered up her scarf. She said the colonel had bought it for her, but it was worth parting with just to get away. She was no longer trembling and appeared quite recovered from her scare with the dogs. I reckon birth lifts the spirits, however lowly the species, life being so portentous.

  We rode for an hour or more, climbing steadily towards the high ridge of trees that spread in a blue fuzz against the pale tent of the sky. According to Mrs Yardley, a huge bird circled above us and she wondered if it was an eagle. I couldn’t help her; city bred, the only bird I knew of for sure was a pigeon. Besides, I was near blind in the dazzle of the sun and regretted not bringing Dr Potter’s hat.

  ‘Harry is very fond of birds,’ Mrs Yardley said, speaking of her colonel. ‘He shoots them in Norfolk.’

  She wanted to talk about him, and did so, at length. She had met him five years before, in the street where her dressmaker lived. He had raised his hat as she passed, and when she turned round to look after him he too had turned to watch her go. ‘Then, a week later,’ she said, ‘I met him again, at tea in the house of a friend. Hardly a word passed between us, but when we looked at one another our hands shook …’ She broke off and shot me a sidelong glance out of blue and vacant eyes – to judge if I was receptive.

  ‘How romantic,’ I said, obligingly.

  ‘He escorted me home. We didn’t touch … not then. We just gazed … then he called on me the next morning and simply said, “This was meant to be,” and so it began.’

  I remained silent, unable to think of a sufficiently suitable response. I didn’t believe her for one moment – I mean, about their not touching that first afternoon. Women always want such things to sound less hasty than they generally are; I suppose it’s because hesitation makes fornication seem less sinful.

  ‘I find him middling handsome,’ she went on. ‘I like his chestnut hair and the set of his chin. Of course, you’ve noticed his beard, which is the colour of honey—’

  ‘Of course—’

  ‘As for the shine in his hazel eyes … one can’t fail to notice the twinkle.’

  ‘I fear I’m short-sighted,’ I said.

  Beyond his looks, Mrs Yardley appreciated the way he treated her as an equal, except in matters of physical endurance. ‘We are after all,’ she opined, ‘weaker than men and it’s no use pretending otherwise.’

  ‘Some men,’ I corrected.

  ‘We talk for hours at a stretch. I am never bored by his conversation. That’s unusual, isn’t it?’

  ‘Very,’ I said. Dr Potter holds that speech was invented to conceal thought, but I kept that to myself. Georgie’s not one for talking, at least, not to me. Nor would I wish to be his equal, for then I might find him wanting.

  Last week the colonel had celebrated his fortieth birthday. They’d dined in the best hotel in Varna. Poor Harry had drunk a little too much wine and his manservant had to help him on to his horse—

  Fearing she was referring too much to herself – my expression was possibly not as animated as she would have wished – she asked if I was to have a birthday in the near future.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m not even sure how old I am. Nineteen, perhaps … but the date is unknown.’

  ‘Good heavens,’ she exclaimed. ‘Why ever not?’

  ‘My past is shrouded in mystery.’

  ‘Good heavens,’ she said again, and fell silent.

  We had brought with us bread and fruit, and, arriving on the summit of the hills and refreshed by the faintest whisper of a breeze, dismounted and sat on the grass. Below lay the curve of Galata Point, the tents of the 3rd division, small as butterfly wings, quivering beneath the angle of the cliffs. A squad of toy soldiers drilled up and down before the glossy sea. William Rimmer is rumoured to be encamped at the Point, though as yet he and Georgie haven’t met. Whenever he visited the house in Blackberry Lane he looked straight through me, and he kept Georgie up all night. Mrs O’Gorman used to whip me to be rid of passion, but it hasn’t worked. I detested William Rimmer and still do.

  ‘I don’t mean to pry,’ Mrs Yardley said, though indeed she did, ‘but in repose you often look sad. Is it to do with your past … or that business at Constantinople?’

  ‘Neither,’ I told her. ‘I have a sad face. It’s the way I am on the outside. Inside, I assure you I’m quite happy.’ I was beginning to find her tedious, and pretended to doze off in the sun.

  We rode back, giving the house by the vineyard a wide berth. It took longer, but Mrs Yardley vowed she would rather ride through a swamp riddled with snakes than confront again those hounds of hell. ‘That baby,’ she shuddered, ‘with hair like the quills of a porcupine. That new-born goat sleek with scum … that milk tasting of rancid cheese—’

  We came at last to the trail that led into the woods above the lake. It was now past midday and we quickened our pace so as to be out of the glare. Ahead, the scarlet jackets blazed a
mid the leaves. A single beam of sunlight pierced the branches, framing in shimmering silver the outline of a man standing in the middle of the path. As we drew nearer he made no attempt to step out of our way and we were forced to rein in the horses. He stood with arms wrapped about himself, as though he was cold, and stared past us. Following the direction of his petrified gaze, I swivelled in the saddle and looked behind. The country boy still sat with his back to the tree, only now the pink had quite gone from his cheeks and his skin was mottled, like meat lain too long on the slab. He hadn’t eaten all the cherries; flies crawled along his fingers and buzzed at his mouth.

  There’s a sameness about death that makes the emotions stiffen – which is for the best, else one would be uselessly crying the day long. It’s why Georgie often seems insensitive to other people’s feelings. Dealing with the dying, one must either blunt the senses or go mad.

  The soldier wouldn’t come with us, or speak. He and the dead boy stared at each other. We told him we’d send someone back to help carry the body down to the camp. He didn’t seem to hear, just stood there, hugging himself. Mrs Yardley jerked the jackets from the trees and covered that purple face from view. It made no difference; the birds kept on singing and the men went on staring.

  Mrs Yardley wept as we continued on our way. I was thinking of a fable I’d read about a monk who every evening heard the song of a nightingale. He asked permission to go and find the bird, but the Abbot said it was not for man to listen so closely to the voice of God. One night the monk crept from his cell, entered the forest and listened for an hour to the glorious outpouring of melody. He returned to find fifty years had passed in his absence and there remained but one member of the order alive to recognise him, the rest lying buried beneath the swaying poplar trees. I considered telling Mrs Yardley the story, to take her out of herself, but suddenly grew confused as to its meaning. Was it joy that had made the years fly, or was the monk being punished for disobedience?

  When we came out of the woods I was weeping too, for I had pushed out the monk and fitted myself into the fable, and fifty years had passed since we’d set off that morning. I looked below, at the glitter of the lake and the spread of white tents, and dwelt on how bitter life would be if someone other than Georgie was left to remember me. Then I thought of him old, his hair grown white and me still a girl, and all that love I’d given him rotting like the cherries on the dead soldier’s lap.