by Allie Burns
A pile of books, propped against the dining room wall opposite, nudged the gilt-edged frame of a new painting. It was a murky seascape, the chunky grey clouds mirrored by a choppy, insipid chalky sea. Painted on the horizon, just off centre was a tall-masted clipper, in its shadow a smaller rowing boat atop a white-crested swell, two small figures rowing against a force they’d never master.
‘Do you think you should write to William? Tell him what’s happened?’
Natalie frowned and studied the inscription on the bottom right-hand corner of the painting. With Mrs Mulberry’s new-world wealth it could well be the work of an artist of note. And yet, pencilled on to the wall beneath it, was a four- or five-word illegible scrap written by one of the Mulberrys. As if to say, you might paint this, but look what I can think.
Delphi clasped the back of her neck with the arm she rested on the table. Her eyes listed and for a second her head dropped to her chest and then snapped back again. She strained her neck back and stared at the ceiling, her jaw tight with intent. Natalie lowered her cutlery.
‘What?’ Delphi smiled. ‘I’m fine. You don’t need to add me to your worries.’
Natalie swallowed her mouthful of duck and forked at another roast potato, a discreet eye on her friend. The dining-room door swung open and Jack strode in. He winked and grabbed a plate from the dresser and then filled it with the spread Cook had put out.
‘I thought you were out on the town?’ Delphi said.
‘Came back early, thought I’d make a start on packing.’
‘My little brother. All grown up!’ she teased.
He took a seat at the opposite end of the walnut table and casually lobbed a potato down its length. It hit Delphi on the side of the head before bouncing on to the wooden floor and splitting to reveal its fluffy, powdery insides just as the dining-room door opened again and their parents came in.
Delphi had already picked a handful of French beans and tried to flick them with her fork, but they didn’t even make it to halfway up the table.
Then another potato arced above Jack to burst behind him at Mrs Mulberry’s court shoes. The rounded waistcoated figure of the esteemed politician and lecturer Mr Mulberry was at her shoulder. Dressed in a misshapen reed-green linen suit and a box hat on her head, Mrs Mulberry looked from the potato on the floor to the straggle of beans in the middle of the table.
‘Children!’ she said. ‘Really!’
‘You’re back early,’ said Delphi as Mrs Mulberry turned the wireless down to a murmur.
‘The men got out the port after dinner,’ Mr Mulberry said in his broad Yorkshire accent. ‘Your mother took a stand. You think they’d have learned by now.’
‘It was so tedious,’ Mrs Mulberry added in her gentle transatlantic drawl. ‘Without shutting me in a room with the women.’ She performed a shudder. ‘How’s your health tonight, my dear?’
‘Fine.’ She poured herself more wine as Natalie set her knife and fork at midnight and checked her watch.
‘I hope you’re going to encourage Delphi to give up these nonsensical ideas of dancing around her bedroom to jazz music in the nude?’ Mrs Mulberry asked her.
‘It’s called airing, Mother, and it’s very liberating,’ she quipped.
‘I don’t think poor Mrs Brindley found it liberating when she came in to change your bed sheets. She got the shock of her life.’ She shook her head. ‘What do you think, Natalie dear? You don’t indulge in this sort of thing too, do you?’
Natalie’s eyes widened at the thought of it.
‘Of course she doesn’t, Mother. She’s remaining steadfastly loyal to the old system that booted both of us out.’
‘Even with my new-world sensibilities, I think the Women’s League work sounds rather frivolous. I hear the founder got some of her ideas from India of all places,’ Mrs Mulberry continued.
‘It’s great fun,’ Delphi insisted.
‘But where’s the science, eh Natalie?’
Natalie nodded, but said nothing. She didn’t really feel much like defending the establishment, despite what Delphi might say.
‘Apart from the segregation, how was your dinner?’ Jack asked, changing the conversation.
Mr Mulberry unplugged his pipe from his mouth. ‘There were some of us politicians from the population committee. It’s a pressing issue, now more than ever. Another war threatens us and the Empire’s population is depleted and not in good shape at all. We need Natalie and her ilk to get them shipshape.’
‘I’d love to do my bit too,’ Delphi said.
‘You’re not well enough, dear.’ Mrs Mulberry pressed her lips together. ‘You attempted the best teacher training and your health let you down.’
Delphi threw her napkin in a heap on the table, pushed her plate away and left the room.
‘Rest, rest and more rest. That’s what the specialist said.’ Mrs Mulberry’s words chased her down the corridor.
‘Do you think she reads too many novels?’ Mr Mulberry asked Natalie and Jack. ‘They say it can send a woman deranged.’ Without waiting for an answer he followed after his wife.
The room was filled with the sounds of cutlery scraping bone china and the odd car engine as it shifted its tone at the corner of the square.
They both jumped when the bedroom door above thudded shut. She stole a glance at Jack as he sliced his last French bean into quarters, the tip of his tongue poking out as he moved the knife, but she wasn’t quick enough to look away when he glanced up and caught her watching him. She smiled, broke eye contact quickly. As his attention turned back to his plate she was drawn to watch him again. The asymmetrical dimple in his cheek flashed on and off as he chewed. Setting his knife and fork down, he finally spoke.
‘Would you care to join me for a cigarette in the square?’
*
She sat on the square garden’s only bench. He was next to her, leaning on the black railings. She took a proffered cigarette, stifled her cough as she exhaled, and watched the smoke unfurl against the chilly evening’s black canvas.
‘We’ve got to get her away from this miserable existence,’ he said.
She pulled her cardigan close. She considered again the idea of she and Delphi sharing lodgings. There must be another way. An arrangement that gave them both their independence.
Jack tipped his head back and looked up at the stars.
‘Mother has got more controlling with age, I swear.’ The amber tip of his cigarette glowed as he tugged on it, his exhalation more of a sigh than a puff.
Two yellow headlamps shone on them as a car swung around the square and off out the other side towards Tottenham Court Road.
‘I don’t know how Delphi stays so cheerful, day after day,’ she replied. ‘But I worry that once she’s free, she’ll find that the real thing holding her back is her health.’
‘Haven’t you two got some agreement to support one another’s careers?’
She nodded, point taken. He was right. She didn’t sound very supportive. But I am being realistic.
‘There will be opportunities down on the coast. For both of you.’
‘Such as?’
‘Work at the Lido.’
‘For both of us?’
‘I expect so. It will be lively down there. Besides, I’ll be in charge. They were keen to have me once they knew I was a high-board diver. They said I’d draw in the crowds.’
‘What could I do?’
‘They won’t have seen your teaching methods and Delphi has learnt lots from the League. I think you’ll take the coast by storm.’
She straightened her back, a tower of ash building up on the now forgotten cigarette. ‘Teaching swimming perhaps?’
‘Perhaps.’ He abandoned the stargazing. ‘Think about it, Natty.’ He tossed the cigarette to the ground and crushed it with his heel. ‘It beats hanging around here pining for a life you no longer have. And it would be kinda fun to have you around.’ He winked, the extended American vowels slipping into his accent. The
re was something else in his tone, aside from the accent, that made her search his face for clues. He held her gaze for a few seconds longer than he ought and then winked.
He stopped at the gate, laughed and shook his head.
‘She’s at it again.’
In the light of her window – the curtains wide open – Delphi was giving herself an airing. It was another one of the Women’s League’s crackpot ideas, which as far as Natalie could make out simply involved airing the skin by dancing around one’s bedroom to jazz music, in the nude, and in Delphi’s case with her curtains open.
‘She thinks she’s Isadora Duncan,’ Natalie said, and they both laughed at that, but what had happened to Duncan in the end wasn’t funny at all.
Perhaps Delphi and Jack were both right. He made everything sound possible. Whatever she hoped she might achieve by hanging around London would surely be outweighed by seeing Delphi enjoy some freedom? The two of them could join forces at the coast. No one would speculate or gossip about their friendship. They could at last really support one another’s careers.
Chapter Six
Back dive
To overcome the feeling that the head will be injured, curve backwards as far as possible, and spring up, thus diving further out.
‘You’re awfully quiet, Natty.’
Natalie rubbed the pads of her fingers across her forehead.
‘Sorry, but it feels like someone is hammering inside my skull,’ she explained. She couldn’t hope to match Delphi’s ebullience.
She was wedged against the train window of their compartment by a portly man with a wheezy chest and a runny nose. Opposite, sandwiched into the seats beside Delphi, was the man’s wife, who periodically slapped the tops of the heads of the two young boys beside her. The whole family shared the same raspy cough that made her tense up when they battered the air with it.
The commotion kept snapping her thoughts in two, and it was getting worse the longer the journey went on.
She wiped a porthole of fresh condensation clear from the window to reveal the fields as they spun past. Then it was all gone as they entered a tunnel. The steady rumble from the tracks jumped inside to fill the compartment. The darkness illuminated Natalie’s own reflection in the glass. She was confronted with puffy eyes, an upturned horseshoe for a mouth and lines that hadn’t been there a week ago. Her soul reflected in her face. But some things were better unseen. She felt it acutely enough; she didn’t need to see it too. She broke away from her own gaze, not wanting to see any more.
The volume of conversation inside the compartment had risen to compete with the intensified sound of the tunnel, and it all clashed inside Natalie’s aching head.
Eventually, they emerged from the darkness and the volume dropped, but the familiar fields were gone. Instead, they travelled through a steep-sided escarpment lined with sycamore trees that hid the scenery.
The wheezy man leant across her.
‘Mind if I…?’ he asked in a gravelly voice, before lowering the window to let in a drizzle-filled breeze, which slapped Natalie about the face and forced off her beret.
Delphi hid her giggle in her gloved hand. Meanwhile, Natalie continued to face the wind head on so the wife wouldn’t catch her laughing with Delphi.
‘Who’ll be the first to see the sea then?’ the man asked the boys, who abandoned their game of knuckles to dash to the window. The tallest of the two made it there first. Natalie tugged her foot out from beneath the boy’s shoe and gave the suitcase between her legs a reassuring touch. His mouth open, the boy closed his eyes and chomped blissfully at the breeze as it channelled in through the window. The little one pulled at his brother’s long shorts and then climbed through his legs and forced his way in between his brother and the window. No matter how worried she was, seeing the boys’ complete abandonment to the sea air touched her and made her smile.
The mother flipped open her compact and adjusted her hair in rhythm with the jigging compartment.
‘You girls off on your holidays, are you?’ She stopped to cough. ‘Where’re you staying?’
Natalie had been too busy speculating about Jack’s job offer to think about hotels. She’d left it all to Delphi. Conversation soon sparked between Delphi and the woman, who it turned out came with her family to St Darlstone every year. She was full of suggestions for things to do and before long the two women settled into a comfortable chatter like old friends. Natalie massaged her temples.
Then the atmosphere changed. Passengers began to reach for coats and hats and scraped luggage down from the racks above. Expectation grew and as the hubbub travelled down the carriage from other compartments, Natalie felt the anticipation bubble in her stomach.
Sounds reached them of a baby crying, a mother hollering at her child. The man in their compartment collapsed into a coughing fit, bent double while his wife slapped his back.
The train curved around in a ‘c’, past rows of tall, cream and garishly cheery houses dotted with some blue, pink and yellow. All stood proud on the town’s many hills, like teeth on a gum. Eventually, they pulled into the long platform.
She peered out of the window for clues about the sort of place Delphi had brought her, hoping to see what the people were like, but all she saw were the thin white signs that told her it was the end of the line – St Darlstone. And she couldn’t see much beyond that because after clear skies the whole way from London, this last little scrap of land had been reclaimed by the sea and was shrouded in mist.
The train came to a stop and every bank holiday day-tripper on the train stood up at the same time.
Delphi linked Natalie’s arm as they waited for the family to gather their belongings.
‘It’s exciting, isn’t it?’ Delphi said. ‘Here’s to freedom at last.’
‘Freedom at last,’ Natalie chimed, ducking as the youngest boy swung his fishing net around behind his head. The mother apologised and cuffed her son on top of his blond hair. Natalie recoiled as the two boys spluttered, thankful to their mother when she reminded them to put their hands up.
‘Here we are then, Natty.’ Delphi squeezed her friend close and winked as they stepped off the train.
A gang of seagulls screeched unseen in the mist over the top of the platform. The drizzle battered their faces.
‘What a welcome,’ Natalie said, feeling her anticipation subside in the face of this heavy dose of reality. Although the cool, thick cloak did help to numb her aching head. The air was sharper than it had been in London and the salt stippled her skin.
The bank holiday crowds were a seething mass of elbows and cases that jostled into her and slowed her to tiny steps.
‘Let’s go straight to the Lido and see Jack,’ Natalie said.
‘Straight away? What about our cases? I think you’re going to love the hotel. I can’t wait for you to see it.’
She’d love it more once she’d spoken to Jack and agreed on her hours and pay and she knew when she was starting work. He’d been in post two weeks now, but he’d only written one short letter home to Delphi. He’d not mentioned the classes to her. He’d said the Lido was wonderful: ‘Diving all day, every day.’ Mrs Mulberry had rolled her eyes when she’d heard that. His boss, he’d said, was anything but wonderful.
‘He’s going to be busy setting up for the gala,’ Delphi replied. ‘There’s plenty of time.’
Just as they reached the ticket inspector at the gate the two boys from the train knocked into Delphi and sent her stumbling back a few steps. Natalie steadied her and paused, watching to see what effect the shock would have. The mother stopped to check Delphi was all right too.
‘Come on, come on,’ a man barked at them as he pushed past.
‘Look.’ Delphi laughed and pointed towards the two young boys as they ran through the gates, coughing as they scampered. The ticket inspector yelled after them, ‘Stop those scallywags.’
From behind Natalie’s shoulder, their father proffered his own ticket ready for inspection.
‘Fare’s too dear for the whole family,’ he explained with a snag in his throat once they were out of the inspector’s earshot. ‘Train companies ask too much of us factory workers. Our union have negotiated us all a week’s holiday fully paid. I’m not complaining about that, but we don’t even get a subsidy, you know.’ He tipped the corner of his hat. ‘Excuse us.’
Barking into his handkerchief, his wife on his arm, he wished them both a good holiday and then disappeared into the crowd after his boys. Such brazen dishonesty, but his family deserved a holiday as much as the next, she thought.
They followed the May Day crowds out of the station and up the hill. The sea mist hung so low that Natalie couldn’t see anything much beyond the crowd. Buildings appeared out of nowhere as they drew close to them.
‘Oh dear, how embarrassing for them.’ Delphi ran down the hill, giving chase to a tin of peaches that had rolled out of the coughing family’s suitcase. The couple were on their hands and knees in the road stuffing back into their case what looked to be a week’s food supply: Lyle’s syrup, cans of condensed milk, pineapple chunks, jam and three-quarters of a loaf. There seemed to be no space inside for their clothes.
‘Let me help.’ Natalie stepped in, but the woman thanked her and told her not to worry about them. She did as she was told. She wasn’t Vice Principal here; she didn’t have to try to put everything right.
The houses and blocks of flats that grew out of the sea mist were all white with curvy fronts and mint-green roofs. Attractive, but nothing compared to what she saw from the promenade. She stopped still, dropped her bag to her feet.
Barely distinguishable from the clouds and mist, stretched out between the ground and the sky, was a strip of limey-grey, churning sea. A fishing boat about a third of the way out threw up spray at its stern. Behind it she couldn’t see any sign of land on the horizon. It really was as if she’d travelled to the end of the earth. But it turned out that where the earth ended something enormous, enigmatic and inviting began. She couldn’t take her eyes off it, but she couldn’t stop still for long either as the crowd carried them both down the hill towards the white concrete building on the right.
