At the Break of Day

by Margaret Graham

  That night she didn’t sleep at all. The next day when she walked home from work, there were no lighted trees in the windows, no people on skis and horse-drawn sleighs, no sparkling snow. There was nothing of the excitement she had known in Lower Falls for Lee, who was looking out into the street, his face pressed against the window. It wouldn’t goddamn do.

  At home there was a small piece of fatty bacon to boil along with carrots and potatoes. She did this but didn’t talk. She poured Grandpa’s tea, smiled at Norah and then went in to Maisie, wrapping Lee up warmly, taking the pushchair, going to the market, talking to Jack who nodded and asked Ollie to mind the stall.

  They went by bus up West, and walked down the streets where there were some decorations, but not many and no Christmas lights. They saw the tree in Trafalgar Square, a gift from the Norwegians, then went into an Oxford Street store, up in the lift, Lee looking, laughing, touching, until they reached the grotto.

  They queued, Jack’s arm about her waist, holding the folded pushchair with his free hand. She held Lee, kissing his face. His skin was soft and warmer now than it had been in the street. He pulled her hair and she laughed.

  ‘You should have kept your plaits,’ Jack said. ‘He could have swung on those.’

  He leaned the pushchair against his leg, and took Lee from her, holding him up, turning him round in the air, laughing as he laughed, dropping him down against his chest, blowing on his neck.

  ‘I love him,’ he said, looking at Rosie.

  She nodded. ‘Silent Night’ was playing on the gramophone. The record was scratched but it didn’t matter. She wanted Lee to see and feel the magic as she had done because it would help her own grief this Christmas; her first away from Frank and Nancy.

  She told Jack of the sleighs, the Christmas tree they had put up in the front garden, the garlands that hung on every wall and from every ceiling. She told him of the trams which had flattened the nickels she and Sandra had laid on the tracks when they were eleven. Jack blew again on Lee’s neck, then bent and kissed her cheek.

  Lee cried when Father Christmas took him on his knee in the dimly lit grotto, but Jack dropped down beside him and the crying stopped. The present was wrapped in red paper and Lee tore at it as they left. It was a wooden car. Blue and red, with wheels which spun.

  Rosie remembered the bald tyres which Frank had heaped into the boot of the car during the war in case the worn ones he was using punctured. There were no new ones available.

  There were plenty now, though, and new cars too, but here, in England, new cars were to be sold abroad to help the national debt and people patched up their old ones and made do. In America they were pitching into a boom, Frank said. Over here they were trying to pay for the war which had bled them dry.

  ‘I don’t mind queuing. I don’t mind being rationed, or being cold,’ Rosie said as they walked back down Oxford Street. ‘It’s time I had my share of that. But I wanted Lee to see another world, just for tonight.’

  That night she slept, at least for a while.

  On 23 December Jack called as she was settling Grandpa by the fire, his newspaper on his lap, his Woolworths glasses catching the light from the flames. The coal was wet, hissing and smoking. As Jack came in she put a sheet of newspaper to the fireplace.

  ‘Leave the door open for a moment, Jack. Let’s get a bit of a draught.’ She held the paper with her fingertips as the fire roared suddenly, blazing red, browning the paper, which she snatched away, the heat hurting her face.

  ‘That’s great.’

  She dug into the coals with the poker.

  ‘There you are, Grandpa, that’s a bit better.’ She turned to Jack. ‘Are we going up the Palais?’

  She was reaching for her gloves, catching the coat which Jack tossed to her from the back of the chair.

  Jack looked at Grandpa and winked. ‘What d’you think, Grandpa? Shall we go up the Palais? D’you reckon this girl could take a change?’

  Grandpa looked at Rosie. He rubbed his hands together, then picked up the paper. ‘I expect she can. It sounded a good idea when Maisie told me.’ He looked over the top at Rosie. ‘Just put the guard up, there’s a good girl, and don’t hurry back.’

  Rosie looked from one to the other. The guard was warm, she pushed it up against the fireplace, pulling the hearth rug well back.

  ‘What are you two goons talking about? What’s wrong with the Palais? It’s the special Christmas night.’

  She was pulling her coat on now. The buckle was cold as she threaded the belt through. Jack pulled up her collar.

  ‘Keep that up, it’s cold enough to freeze the balls off that monkey in Elm Street.’ He pushed her towards the front door. ‘Bye, Grandpa,’ he called. ‘Be good. And if you can’t be good be careful.’

  Rosie heard Grandpa laugh and said, ‘If I’d said that he’d have lathered me.’

  Jack marched through the yard, past the hard-pruned roses, out down the alley to the Tube station where people were rushing, their faces pinched. Rosie was tired, cold. Presents had arrived from Frank and Nancy for them all this morning. She had asked Norah what she had sent to the doctor and his wife in Somerset. What had they sent her?

  Nothing, Norah had replied. They have their own children. There was nothing in it for me. Everything will go to the kids. All they offered was college, like yours did. I don’t want that, too much hard work. Why keep in touch?

  Rosie told Jack now what her sister had said.

  ‘I don’t know why she can’t love or why she’s so bitter,’ she added.

  Jack shrugged. ‘She always has been. When will you realise that? Nothing will change her. It’s in her bones. She’s just getting more like your grandma every day. Nothing is ever enough. Nothing is ever right, but I think she misses your grandma too. It was always the two of them against you and your grandpa.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s made her more spiteful. Maybe she’ll change when she gets a boyfriend, someone of her own.’

  The Tube train lurched and swayed through the tunnels and Jack held her hand. He never wore gloves.

  ‘I’m hot,’ she said, removing her own, because she wanted to feel his skin against hers.

  ‘Nearly there,’ Jack said, standing up as the train stopped in Bond Street station.

  ‘Nearly where?’ she asked as she was pulled along behind him, still holding his hand but jostled now by the crowds surging up from the train into the evening air.

  ‘Nearly reached your Christmas treat,’ Jack said, turning and grinning at her as they reached the pavement, slowing until she was up with him. ‘You’ve been looking as though you’ve been hurting, deep inside. Can’t have that, can we?’

  He wasn’t looking at her as he said this. His cheeks had flushed. ‘Thought this might help. You gave Lee a treat. This is yours.’

  They were south of Oxford Street now, in Soho. They were strolling along with many others and Jack told her that Soho had been the hunting cry of the Duke of Monmouth and that he had built a rather ‘super’ house on one side of Soho Square.

  Rosie laughed. ‘This is my treat, is it? A guided tour of Soho?’ She dug him in the ribs.

  ‘That’s right, but there’s more, my dear girl. Just you wait and see.’

  They were walking past an accordionist who held his cap between his teeth. There were two sixpences in it. Jack gave him another and then they turned into a pub, past two tarts who stood either side of the door.

  ‘Not tonight, ladies,’ Jack said.

  ‘Too young anyway, ducks,’ the blonde with black roots called back. Rosie flushed but Jack laughed.

  Inside it was dimly lit but warm … There were sailors at the far end, sitting with civilians, all men.

  Jack ordered a beer and a ginger beer for Rosie. Rosie stood back in case they were thrown out because they were too young. Jack was grinning, chatting, and he was served with a beer after all. Charm the bloody birds out of the trees, Rosie echoed the woman in the market.

  She moved towards the end wher
e the sailors sat, and Jack pulled her back as he sipped the froth and edged her towards a table nearer the other end.

  ‘That’s a pick-up,’ he said, nodding towards the sailors.

  Rosie looked again. ‘But they’re all men.’

  Jack smiled and leaned his head back against the dark wood panelling.

  Rosie looked at her own drink. ‘I haven’t seen this in the States,’ was all she said.

  ‘Or this.’ Jack nudged her, pointing to the onion seller who wore his strings of onions over his shoulder. One woman sneaked up behind and cut a single one off, disappearing into the crowd. No one said anything.

  Rosie remembered the cherries she had put over her ears in Frank’s back garden. Rich red shiny earrings and they would be having Christmas over there without her.

  They finished their drinks and moved out past the tarts again.

  ‘A little older but not enough,’ the blonde said again, rubbing her shoe up the back of her leg. ‘It’s a bit bloody cold.’

  ‘You’re right there,’ Jack said, steering Rosie past them, strolling with her along the street. The restaurants were busy, holly hung from the ceilings and the white-bibbed waiters looked like the dippers which flew in bursts around the hop-yards. Rosie felt the tears gather in her throat because it was dark and cold and she was a long way from Lower Falls, a long way from Herefordshire.

  It was further on that she heard the cornet, wailing up from the basement of a house just ahead of them, and then another and another and it was like the brownstones, though here, this time, the buildings weren’t empty and dead. Here, close to her home, there was jazz.

  She said nothing, just clutched at Jack’s arm as they stood on the pavement, hearing Dixieland, New Orleans, hearing the drums. It was ‘Take Your Tomorrow’. Pure Bix, pure gold breathing life into the streets, and into her mind. She looked at Jack, his head bent towards her, watching her face carefully.

  ‘Does it make it better, little Rosie?’ he asked, his voice quiet.

  She reached up and kissed his cheek because she couldn’t speak. He drew her towards him and this time their kiss was not soft and gentle, but filled with an excitement which left them both breathless, both awkward, until Jack turned towards the steps leading down to the door.

  ‘You coming then?’

  Inside it was dim and smoky. Rosie sat at a table near an opening which led to a counter where Jack bought coffee and rolls. Rosie watched as he put sugar in using the spoon which was chained to the counter. She wanted to hold the kiss in her mind but the music was surging and as Jack joined her she sat back and listened, feeling the heat of summer, hearing the jazz across the lawn. Seeing the faded, empty New York brownstones. But here, in England, they were not empty, and she was sitting with Jack, breathing in the rhythm once again.

  All evening they sat as the trumpet played that deliberately impure tone which distinguishes jazz from straight playing.

  ‘He’s using his lips,’ Jack said quietly.

  ‘No he’s not, he’s half-valving.’ But then she saw that he wasn’t. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘You win.’

  ‘I like the banjo, it’s cleaner than the guitar.’

  ‘No, it’s not. Charlie Christian showed us that.’ Rosie pointed towards the guitar player. ‘See, that guy’s using his fingertips to strike the strings as well as stop them. How about that for a clean note.’

  ‘How about that for a know-it-all.’ Jack was leaning towards her and they laughed together quietly while the music played and all pain ebbed away. They kissed, lightly, but they were older tonight, closer tonight.

  They listened to the trumpet’s break, tapping the table with their hands as the player improvised and the others in the band fell silent. He was good, a young man with long hair, and then the rest came in. Jack picked at the wax which had clumped around the candle which stood in a jam jar. ‘Duke Ellington is right not to like improvisation. He plans everything, you know.’

  Rosie looked at the candle. They had used candles to burn the bed bugs from creases in the mattresses when they were young. They had used candles for the Christmas table in Lower Falls but it didn’t hurt to think of that here. She picked at some wax herself. It was slightly warm. She rolled it into a ball. Looked at the band again. Did they play to a written arrangement or to one made familiar by use?

  ‘Their improvisation works though,’ she said as the band broke for a coffee.

  ‘Yes, you’re right, but it can turn into a right mess. Like your shorthand when I read to you too fast.’

  Rosie sipped her coffee. It was cold but it didn’t matter. ‘What about you?’ she said. ‘What about your plans. Will it always be the stall? Once you were going to be an artist.’

  Jack sat back, tipping the chair, resting it against the wall. ‘Don’t know. Me art’s not good enough. Not much point sorting anything out. Not yet anyway.’ He turned round to look at the band. The trumpet player was standing near them, talking to a girl with long black hair.

  Rosie drank the last of her coffee. It was bitter at the bottom.

  ‘Why not? What’s stopping you?’

  Jack turned and smiled. ‘Look, you had a good schooling. We had very little. Just mornings and then it was bloody chaos. All the evacuees in the one large school hall.’ He leaned forward taking her hand. ‘It’s not that though. Got to do me National Service, haven’t I? Not worth starting anything until then.’

  She had forgotten about that. Forgotten that he would be going away for eighteen months. It was too long. She couldn’t bear to be without him. She squeezed the wax, looking at that, not at him. ‘When?’

  ‘Not until I’m eighteen. There’s loads of time. Bit more than a year when you work it out.’

  The band were playing again and she looked at him as he sat four-square on his chair again, his hands slapping on his thighs in time to the beat, and then he turned to her.

  ‘I’ll fix something up afterwards, like everyone does.’

  They didn’t leave the club until eleven p.m. and then travelled home, talking and laughing because tonight had been filled with music, with talk, with gently held hands. The kiss he gave her at the back yard gate was soft again but as he held her there was excitement too.

  She slept that night with scarcely any dreams, only one about a silent brownstone house that turned into a noisy jazz-filled Soho basement. She woke in the morning and scratched the frost from the window. The cold didn’t matter because they were young and the war was over. Their lives were just beginning and they had a year before he had to go and that was a long time. Besides it was Christmas Eve.

  Maisie cooked the turkey in her kitchen on Christmas morning and Rosie helped Jack to carry the table from Grandpa’s house and they all ate together, pulling home-made crackers, drinking beer that Ollie had ‘found’. They ate tinned peaches and tinned ham for tea and Grandpa raised his cup of tea.

  ‘To Frank and Nancy, God bless them.’

  Yes, God bless them, Rosie thought, thinking of the stockings which had hung at the mantelpiece last year, the turkey, the Christmas lights, the smell of spruce throughout the house. The wine, the liqueurs, the guests, the warmth, the skiing in the afternoon, and the ache wasn’t as sharp, and she knew it was because of the jazz, and Jack.

  She fingered the light woollen scarf which Nancy had sent. It was warm draped around her shoulders and she barely felt the draught coming from the ill-fitting windows and the gaps in the doors. All the houses were the same after the blast of the bombs which had rocked and cracked the buildings.

  She looked across the table which she had helped Maisie to set for tea and smiled at Jack. His bed was down here now, moved from the boxroom to make room for Lee. Rosie wished he hadn’t moved, she wished she could still hear him shut the door, sink into bed, cough. Lee climbed on to her knee now and she hugged him, rubbing her face into his neck, making him laugh, making herself laugh.

  ‘That’s a nice scent,’ she said as Maisie leaned over her shoulder to put a toast
soldier into Lee’s mouth. ‘What is it?’

  ‘You should know, you gave it to me,’ Maisie said, turning from the table quickly, moving towards the sink. Ollie stopped eating his Christmas cake, looked at Rosie and then his wife. He dropped his knife and the noise was sharp in the sudden silence. Maisie’s back was still and Ollie’s face was dark again as it had been before the hops were picked.

  Rosie looked at Jack. His face was tense, his eyes wary, pained.

  She turned to Maisie and laughed. ‘I’d forgotten. It’s Evening in Paris. It’s nice, isn’t it? I’ve got some myself at home.’ She poured another cup of tea for Ollie. ‘Drink up, Ollie, that cake of Nancy’s is pretty dry.’

  He looked from her to Maisie, his eyes guarded, his thoughts elsewhere.

  ‘Don’t make those bloody crumbs,’ he said to Lee.

  Rosie looked at Norah. ‘Did you like your Californian Poppy? Maybe I should have bought you the French one too.’ Norah wasn’t listening, she was reading the book of women’s love stories which Maisie had given her.

  Ollie was relaxing again now with his cake and tea and Maisie brought Lee another toast finger, smiling at him, at Jack, at Ollie, at Rosie. But Rosie looked into the fire instead because she knew the perfume was not Evening in Paris. But she saw that her words had taken the anxiety from Jack’s face.

  CHAPTER 6

  January 1947 brought bitter cold and a letter from Nancy.

  Lower Falls

  January 1st

  My dearest Rosie,

  We were so very pleased with your presents and the good wishes from your Grandpop. Please give ours to your family for a happy and safe New Year.

  I say safe because Frank is getting real uptight. He’s been seeing bogeymen in the woodpile ever since Churchill’s Iron Curtain speech at Fulton, Missouri. He sees East Europe falling under the Communists and Truman’s Government getting real upset about it. Thinks they’ll have bad dreams about the Reds sweeping over here too.