Meet Me Under the Clock

by Annie Murray

  ‘That was bostin!’ Audrey said, going to join her. ‘As they say, where I come from.’

  Dorrie’s brow crinkled. ‘You what?’

  ‘Black Country for “wonderful”!’

  Dorrie smiled. ‘I love it up here. Let’s stop for a bit, shall we?’

  The gate looked over a field of barley, which stretched gently downhill to dark trees at the field boundary. It seemed very quiet suddenly, with only the breeze sending whispering waves through the ripening crop.

  ‘It’s so lovely,’ Audrey said, breathing in the warm, barley-scented air. ‘And you can see for miles.’

  ‘Let’s go in.’ Dorrie got off the bike. ‘We can just leave these by the gate.’

  There was a grassy verge along the edge of the field. Sitting down on it, they could just see over the barley and down the slope of the field. A small plane laboured across the hazy sky and, afterwards, the place seemed even quieter. Audrey could hear birds in the hedge, a bee droning past. Then a burst of birdsong came from somewhere high, an insistent little cry. She looked up, but could not see anything.

  ‘What on earth’s that?’ she said.

  ‘It’s a lark. They hover right up high. Haven’t you heard one before?’

  ‘I don’t think we have many larks in Birmingham.’

  Dorrie gave a vague smile. She was sitting with her arms wrapped round her knees. She seemed suddenly far away. Audrey felt shut out from her thoughts and wanted to bring her back.

  ‘Have you always biked out here?’ she asked.

  Dorrie raised her head. ‘Yes, lots. It’s freedom. Home’s always felt hemmed in. They’re all right really – my people, I mean. But since Piers died . . .’ She shook her head and trailed off into silence. For a few moments she gazed across the field and her eyes narrowed. Then she said, ‘Sometimes I think I’d like to go and live in America. They don’t have all this class nonsense. Not like here, anyway.’

  ‘I thought you wanted to live in London.’

  Dorrie looked round at her, serious suddenly. ‘I do. Yes.’ She inched closer. ‘Oh, Aud – when the war’s over, let’s do it. Let’s set up in London and be different from all this! Shall we? Are you game for that, too?’

  Audrey felt excitement flare in her. London, a new, different life – and with Dorrie! It was all she wanted, she realized. The two of them, like adventurers together, exploring the world, doing new things, different from everything they had ever known. For a second she thought of Sylvia. It was terrible, what had happened, but thank goodness she wasn’t going to marry stodgy old Ian. Other things might be possible for her as well.

  ‘Yes! Shall we?’ She looked hungrily at Dorrie. ‘Can we? God, d’you think it’ll ever be over?’

  ‘Of course it will.’ Dorrie was looking deep into her eyes, and Audrey was taken aback by her intensity. She felt herself washed along in Dorrie’s passion for everything. She had never met anyone like this woman before. All she wanted was to be with her, to make a life – nothing else seemed to matter. Inside she felt emotions swelling, her heart beating hard. Nothing seemed quite real. She was acutely conscious of Dorrie’s physical closeness, of the swell of her breasts under the white cotton, her eyes, her lips, the by-now-familiar, salty, wonderful smell of her.

  For a moment they sat with their eyes locked together. Without looking away, Dorrie slowly, as if fearfully, put her arm round Audrey’s back and lay it across her shoulders, its weight at first light and tentative and then, as Audrey did not react, she rested it more definitely. Neither of them spoke. Audrey could feel herself breathing very lightly, as if not to disturb something shy and delicate in the air around them. Her heart thudded. As Dorrie moved closer, still not taking her gaze away, she knew they were going to kiss and that it was what she wanted. She could not think about the name that anyone else might give to what was happening. She knew that she felt desire; that Dorrie was the only person she had ever felt this for; that she was going to kiss her back.

  Dorrie’s full lips met hers, and a moment later they were lying back in the grass in each other’s arms. Audrey could hear little urgent sounds of desire as they kissed, and wasn’t sure which of them was making these noises as their hands moved over each other’s bodies. She only knew that she had never felt or been touched like this before, and that this, and Dorrie, were all she desired. As they held each other, she felt Dorrie’s body begin to shake, and realized she was sobbing so hard that there was scarcely any sound.

  ‘Dorrie?’ Audrey moved onto one elbow to look down into her face, full of concern and tenderness. Dorrie’s face was pink and contorted, as if with pain. Audrey gently wiped her wet cheeks with her fingers. ‘Don’t cry,’ she whispered. ‘Why are you crying?’

  ‘Because I’m not alone any more,’ Dorrie murmured. ‘I’m so happy – I can’t believe it. With you.’ She buried her head in Audrey’s shoulder, and Audrey held her, very gently, as she wept again.

  Mrs Cooper had managed to get hold of a chicken and, with Susan’s help, made a nice meal to celebrate Dorrie’s visit home. The four of them sat round the table that evening, and Audrey warmed a bit more to Dorrie’s mother. She was more relaxed and talkative by the evening. Mr Cooper was friendly in a clipped, distant way. Audrey felt that she could not imagine ever having a real conversation with him. He fired little questions at her – What did her father do? Had it bad up in Birmingham, had they? – without paying much attention to the answers.

  One of the questions was, however, ‘Got a man-friend then, have you?’

  ‘Well,’ Audrey said. ‘No. Well, I did have. But he was at Cardington with us and he’s been posted quite far away for further training. So we write, but I hardly ever see him at the moment.’

  Mrs Cooper looked at her with sympathy and approval. ‘This terrible war,’ she said. ‘But you’ll be together one day, I’m sure. Would you like a few more peas?’

  Dorrie was looking at Audrey across the table in a wide-eyed, innocent way.

  ‘Audrey’s a great one for the boys,’ she said. Audrey felt the toe of Dorrie’s shoe press against her shin as she spoke and avoided looking at her.

  ‘Quite right,’ Mr Cooper said, as if for something to say.

  The feeling that none of this was quite real came over Audrey again. She was just floating her way through it, like a dream. But it was a dream that included Dorrie, and that was what mattered.

  The weather changed that night, the stifling mugginess building all evening until the storm broke after they had all gone to bed. When they went up, Dorrie whispered, ‘See you later’ to Audrey. Audrey lay waiting in a suspense of excitement and strangeness. Under cover of the growling thunder, Dorrie crept up to the attic room and into Audrey’s bed. They did not speak about what was happening. It was as if to name anything would have been to break the spell of their stay. With little whispers and stifled laughter, they kissed and explored each other’s bodies, just a little. They were hesitant and careful with each other. Mostly they lay pressed together in each other’s warmth, whispering and laughing. Audrey felt soaked in wonder and pleasure, a sense of being utterly in the right place.

  The next day was the first really fine one in a long time and they spent as much time outside as they could. Dorrie gave some time to her mother in the morning. Mrs Cooper stopped home from church to be with her, and Audrey stayed in the attic and left them to talk in peace. But after lunch the two girls set off on the bikes and explored again, taking to the wild, more isolated tracks out in the country.

  ‘I always think of all this as mine,’ Dorrie said, as they paused again at a high vantage point. ‘I’ve explored it so much. And not many people come up here.’ She stood looking across the undulating land, her hair blown back from her face. Audrey watched, enchanted, full of a mixture of passion and tenderness that made her legs feel weak. My Dorrie, she thought. Lovely Dorrie Cooper. And she had a moment’s daydream of the two of them sharing a flat in London, both going out doing jobs. What jobs? She had no i
dea. But it would be daring and new and good.

  ‘To think of those vile Germans marching across all this,’ Dorrie said fiercely. ‘With their tanks and their boots, and all that revolting shouting they do. Never. They must never be allowed anywhere near.’

  Audrey laid her bike on the ground and went up behind Dorrie, putting her hands round her waist. She nuzzled against Dorrie’s moist neck, her cheek against Dorrie’s hair. She knew that what she felt for Dorrie was desire, but it was not something she felt able to give a name to. It was as if it was something separate entirely from what she might have done with a man. She just followed her strong, overwhelming instincts, without naming or questioning them.

  Dorrie made a small sound and twisted round in Audrey’s arms.

  ‘Come into the field,’ she said.

  They lay side-by-side, arms entwined, looking at the puffy clouds moving across the blue. Dorrie said, ‘I love you, Audrey. God, I do!’

  Audrey kissed Dorrie’s peachy cheek. ‘Love you too, Dor. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.’

  Dorrie turned her head. ‘D’you mean that?’

  ‘Course. You’re my mate. What else?’

  Dorrie seemed reassured. She squeezed Audrey tightly. ‘I’ve found you, my girl. Found you at last. It means everything to me.’ She looked round at Audrey with wide eyes. ‘It takes someone brave,’ she said. ‘Not everyone’s as brave as you.’

  On the way back to the camp, on the train, they sat with Dorrie’s WAAF jacket folded casually on her lap, to hide the fact that for almost all the journey they were holding each other’s hands.

  Thirty-Four

  Sylvia slipped out of the house that afternoon, shutting the front door quietly behind her. She patted the pocket of her raincoat to make sure she had the letter with her. The summer had mostly been a washout, and though it was dry at the moment, she took the coat in case of another storm.

  It was her day off and she waited until Mom was outside hanging the washing before she slipped away. She could not face any more of Mom’s concerned questions about where she was going or how she was. Being in the house made her feel so sad and oppressed that she just had to walk and walk and tire herself. Scarcely thinking about where she was going, she turned in the direction of Moseley village.

  It was a month since Ian and Kitty had taken off and much of that time she had spent in a numb state, going through the motions of life. There was nothing much that her family or friends could say to comfort her. Even Froggy noticed and kept making remarks like, ‘Eh, you’re wasting away. You need some meat on yer bones if you’re gunna do this job!’ and ‘Eh, give us a smile, wench!’ Elsie, Gina and the others were kind, realizing Sylvia would just need time to get over it.

  At first she had been unable to believe or accept what had happened. For days she thought it must be a mistake and that Kitty would come back, smiling in her lovely way and saying there had been another explanation altogether for their disappearance. Sylvia knew really that this was a hollow hope. What other reason could there possibly be? But at first she just could not believe it of Kitty or Ian. How could she have been so blind, when they were deceiving her, right in front of her eyes?

  It was about a fortnight later when Dad came in from work, his expression grim, and opened up the day’s Evening Mail on the table.

  ‘Pauline, come and look at this. Sylv,’ he added in a careful, apologetic tone, ‘you’d better look too.’

  They all leaned over the column about Josiah Barratt.

  ‘Are you sure that’s the same man, Ted?’ Pauline asked.

  ‘That’s what the wench said – Barratt & Stone. I’m certain. How did she think she was going to get away with that: pretending her old man was dead?’

  ‘Well, she did get away with it, didn’t she?’ Sylvia said. An acid taste rose in her mouth as she read the piece about Josiah Barratt’s death. Kitty’s actions had shaken her to the core. Never, in her sheltered life, had she imagined anyone could be so deceitful. ‘We all believed her.’

  ‘What sort of a person would make up a thing like that?’ Pauline said, staring at the paper, still half-disbelieving. ‘I even offered to go with her to his funeral – no wonder she didn’t want me to!’

  Her father closed the paper. ‘The wench must be warped in the head,’ he said. ‘That’s all I can think. ‘You know: bats in the belfry. But if I could get my hands on her, after what she did to you, Sylv . . .’ He threw the paper onto the sideboard. ‘The deceiving little bint.’

  Jack was utterly outraged on Sylvia’s behalf and kept pronouncing phrases such as ‘Perfidious woman!’ and ‘Treachery!’ but Sylvia could see that under his clever-clever pose, he was very angry and shaken at the way Kitty had taken them all in. He even came up to her, once or twice, and silently wrapped his arms around her.

  But there was nothing anyone could do to ease her misery and the double sense of betrayal. She had been so badly hurt and, on top of that, there was all the embarrassment of having to cancel the wedding. Mrs Westley was mortified and, strangely, Sylvia liked her better now than at any other time. It was too late now, though, for that to make any difference.

  The worst part was feeling so alone, as if part of her had been cut away. She missed being engaged, being part of a couple and all that meant. It meant feeling wanted and attractive, instead of rejected and worthless. Her future and all her hopeful plans of a home of her own, of grown-up life and babies, had been taken away. She found herself often in bitter tears. But despite all her family’s care for her, the feeling that everyone had their eye on her to see if she was beginning to ‘get over it’ got on her nerves. It was such a relief to be alone.

  When she had been walking for a time she found herself at the entrance to a churchyard in Moseley. On impulse she pushed open the wooden gate. It was very quiet inside, with no one about. The grass needed cutting; it was long and lush after all the rain. Sylvia walked past the church, along a path between the graves and yew trees, until she saw a secluded spot under a tree at the far end, beside an ivy-covered wall. She took her coat off and laid it on the ground to sit on. Looking up into the branches, she saw to her surprise that it was hanging with small, ripening apples. It seemed strange, but nice to have a tree blooming with fruit near the graves.

  She sat for a moment, hugging her knees and taking in the calming peace of the place. She could hear small birds and the rattling call of a rook. Clouds passed swiftly across the sun. A breeze stirred the leaves. Sylvia reached into her pocket and lit up a cigarette. She never used to smoke, but everyone smoked these days. The cigarette was soothing, and the old building and the graves around her made her concerns seem less terrible, more just a part of the long sweep of time. She wondered about the people buried close by. What joys and calamities had made them either laugh or weep?

  As that terrible month had passed, she began to single out particular feelings from among the swamping misery. One feeling surprised her now – an emotion that she could barely admit to. Sitting here, staring at the lichen-covered grave of a young woman called Mary Jane Friar, who had died in 1897, she knew that the feeling was relief. She did not have to marry Ian. She did not have to spend her life trying to keep up with him, to prove herself in some way. It was very hard to admit, but she had never felt Ian’s equal. He was older, cleverer – he assumed, at least. Sylvia’s lack of confidence allowed him to think of himself as superior. She had always felt as if she was about to let him down, and all the while let him think himself above her. It was all rather tiring.

  Now that she hadn’t seen him for several weeks, and had become more used to the loss of his physical closeness, she could feel other emotions that she had always pushed into the background. There had been a pressure from him: Be what I need you to be. Be the woman I need – pretty, ornamental and a bit dim – to make me look impressive as a man.

  Sylvia stared across the lush graveyard. She could see now that the trouble had started when she went to work for the
railway and had become – in Ian’s eyes – less of a woman. It was not just that she wore trousers and boots. She had gained other things: confidence, strength and a real feeling of being part of it all. Ian had not liked the fact that she was developing a mind of her own.

  Sylvia stubbed out the cigarette and picked a buttercup that was growing in the grass. She stared into its golden-yellow depths.

  ‘You wanted someone like Kitty, who’d simper all over you,’ she whispered. ‘Who would build you up. But sooner or later you’re going to find out what she’s really like, heaven help you!’

  She placed the flower down and reached into her coat pocket, finding a treasured object there. She was filled with a sudden, reassuring feeling of warmth and excitement.

  Soon after Ian left, Sylvia had bowed to pressure from her mother and written a brief letter to Laurie Gould. What was the harm? she thought. It took her mind off things for a short while, especially as writing was still quite an effort for her. But at least Laurie was one person who understood this. She did not tell him what had happened, not then. She just wrote a bit about her job and said that everyone was all right. She tried to reassure him about his mother. ‘Your Mom’s getting out more now,’ she had told him:

  My Mom and yours, and another few ladies, have set up a knitting circle. Some of them are in the WVS and they sell things in the shop. But it’s mainly so they’ve all got a chance to meet and have a natter. They take it in turns to go to each other’s houses, and when they came here it all sounded very cheerful. Paul goes along too and gets lots of fuss made of him. Mrs Simmonds is teaching him to knit – so far he’s got a yellow scarf about an inch long and he keeps going round showing it to everyone!

  It was not much of a letter, she thought, but she had done all she could.

  Laurie must have replied almost the same day he received it. He told her he had been selected to be a navigator and was training at the Air Observer’s School near Toronto. He chatted about his pals and some of the new things he’d learned and about the warm welcome some of the Canadians had given them. He had been to local homes for meals and been treated royally. Everyone was so kind and friendly. He said he liked Canada and would even think of living there, after the war was over. ‘Sometimes I just think all of it’s quite mad,’ he wrote: