by Juliet West
She chewed the inside of her cheek so that her mouth looked all lopsided. ‘But wouldn’t the blackshirts help with all that? Open up better opportunities? The corporate state . . .’
‘It’s persuasive, I know,’ he said. ‘It all sounds perfect. But I think it’s a kind of trap. The corporate state is just another con to keep poor people in their place.’
‘It makes sense, though.’
‘That’s the point. Any argument can make sense if you don’t question it, if you’re blind to everything else. All these years I’ve been listening to my mother, accepting her pronouncements. I know she’s a good person at heart, a kind person, but she’s got this thing, you see, about Mosley. She’s indoctrinated, and it’s made her blind. She’ll overlook the bad bits, because she only wants to see the good.’
He told Hazel it was because of his uncle Jack, killed in France at the age of eighteen. Jack had been dead longer than he’d been alive, but still his mum grieved. She came at politics from one angle and one angle only. War. Mosley could get along with the German fascists and the Italians for that matter, would never pick a fight with them. Only Mosley could keep the country from another war.
‘So your mother is frightened for you? She doesn’t want you to be a soldier.’
‘That’s about it.’
‘She sounds perfectly dear.’
‘Hmmm. You can decide when you meet her.’
‘And what about your father?’
‘Oh, he likes to humour her. I’m not convinced Dad really believes it any more than I do.’
He stopped speaking, regretting the turn that the conversation was taking. Hazel would ask him about his parents’ jobs now. He didn’t want to tell her that his dad used to be foreman of a biscuit factory, that he was laid off and now the only work he could get was the odd day unloading crates at his mate’s market stall, and that his mum kept them afloat with her cleaning job at the jeweller’s in Blackheath. If he spouted all that it would open Hazel’s eyes to the gulf that lay between them. There might be only so much truth she could take.
But Hazel didn’t ask any more about his family. She smiled and kissed his cheek. ‘I expect you think we’re very rich,’ she said.
He didn’t reply, just looked out of the summer-house window into the expanse of the garden beyond.
‘We’re almost broke, according to my mother. I don’t suppose we’ll be able to live here much longer. What Mother wants is to sell up and move to our London flat. It’s a wonderful flat, by the British Museum. It’s let at the moment, so they’d have to get the tenants out. I heard her telling Charles. She hates Aldwick, says she always has. Father persuaded her to move here.’
‘Charles?’
Hazel paused for a moment. She let go of Tom’s hand and reached for the cigarette packet. ‘Mother’s lover.’
‘What’s he like?’
Hazel frowned. ‘I hardly know.’
They had walked out onto the path together. He put his arms around her and drew her close, so that the curls on top of her head nestled below his nose. She smelt of geranium petals, velvety and clean. For several minutes they embraced, unspeaking, her body soft against his. It felt somehow as if her body was his, and that his own heart had swollen outside of itself, melded with her heart, and he knew that this was what was meant by love.
‘Catch!’ The scream of his teammates came just in time. He threw his head back to see the rounders ball dropping from the sky. It thumped into his hands and he lobbed it to the fielder on last base, ignoring the pain where the ball had thwacked the scabbed-over cut. Lucia gave a shriek of frustration at being caught out.
Clouds rolled darkly overhead. He prayed the rain would hold off and they’d be able to walk to the cornfield as planned. She’d told him about the sycamore tree in the centre, the mice that scurried around the crops, the larks and lapwings and buntings that nested all around.
It was almost six. She wasn’t coming. Why wasn’t she coming?
The wood was alive with creaks and snaps, and the stream plashed over green-slimed rocks, stagnating in a pool of frothy scum where the water had collected behind a fallen bough. Crouching against the smooth trunk of a young ash, he picked up a stick and drew patterns in the dust.
It had never occurred to him that she might not come.
His mouth was dry and he wondered whether the water in the stream was safe to drink. He didn’t like the look of it. The scum was a peculiar shade, as if the stream was an oozing wet wound.
He touched his shoulder beneath his shirt and felt the mark where her teeth had broken his skin.
Hands drilled into pockets, he wandered into Aldwick village and decided to meet his mum and dad at the pub after all. Tom went into the lounge bar and there they both were, sitting at a table next to the unlit fire. A buddleia flower was pinned to his mum’s cardigan, drooping on the shelf of her bosom.
He bent and gave her a kiss on her cheek. Her skin was loose and pillowy, fuzzy with down. She smelt of aniseed and carbolic but there was something else he hadn’t noticed before. An image of his dead great-aunt came to mind. That was it. She smelt of old ladies.
‘This is nice,’ she beamed. ‘The three of us together.’
‘A pint?’ asked his dad, delving into his trouser pocket for his wallet.
‘Thanks, Dad.’
‘Sit yourself down, then.’ Bea patted the space next to her on the upholstered bench. ‘How did you get on with Fred?’
‘What?’
‘Your birdwatching.’
‘Oh, all right. Saw some magpies in the woods.’
Her face clouded. ‘It wasn’t just the one?’
‘No, two.’
‘Smashing. Two for joy!’
Tom ran his fingers through his windblown hair.
‘What’s this?’ she cried, reaching for his left hand. ‘What have you been up to?’
‘Caught it on a branch.’
‘You’re too old for climbing trees, Tom. Remember what I told you about the Dixons’ lad?’
‘All right, Mum. I’m not a baby.’
‘Stop fussing, Bea.’ His dad handed the pint to Tom. ‘There you go, son. Your good health.’
By the third sherry Bea’s face had reddened to the shade of an autumn apple. She started to reminisce, and his dad joined in too, and the pair of them were jollier than he’d ever known them to be. ‘Do you remember, Harold,’ she said, ‘when Tom was two and we took him to the zoo at Regent’s Park? He wasn’t a blind bit interested in the animals. Elephants, zebras, lions – he couldn’t give a monkey’s. And then we were walking to the toilets and he saw a sparrow hopping around by a bin. The excitement! “Birdie,” he yelled.’
Tom did his best to laugh along with them. It was nice, sitting here – the pint had helped calm him – but a tangled feeling still swirled in his stomach, the fear that Hazel had played him for a fool.
The pub door banged open and his mum stared for a moment at whoever it was. Colour ebbed from her cheeks. She picked up her schooner and put it to her mouth, holding it there for too long, as if her arm was stuck in that position. His dad didn’t seem to notice; he was drawing on his pipe, sucking to get it going, and the smoke trailed around his head in a bluish mist. Tom turned to look at the newcomers. A tall man wearing a panama hat leaned with one elbow on the bar. Next to him stood a woman in flared trousers and a strange belt of dangling pom-poms. She had red hair and painted lips. He supposed she was the kind of person that people described as striking, but Tom felt a kind of pity for her because she was getting old – forty at least – and her get-up was faintly ridiculous. Perhaps that’s why his mother had stared.
Bea put down the glass and now she was fiddling in her bag.
‘You all right, Mum?’ Tom asked.
‘Let’s get going,’ she said, pulling out a handkerchief. ‘Shouldn’t have had that last drink. I’ve come over woozy.’
As they left, Tom heard the pom-pom woman talking in a loud voice. ‘Perfec
tly marvellous,’ she said as she walked towards the table under the window. ‘Warm gin and no ice.’ The man laughed and pulled out a chair for her. She winced as the legs scraped across the flagstone floor. ‘Just a quick one,’ he said. ‘Here’s how!’ They clinked glasses.
Outside, his mum pulled her cardigan tighter, stretching it over her curves. The wind had an edge to it now, choppy and damp. She shivered.
Harold gave Bea a pat on the back. ‘Happy birthday, Mother.’
‘Yes . . . thank you,’ she muttered, and hurried along the pavement.
The lads were playing poker in the tent. Tom joined in for a while, but he couldn’t keep his mind on the game. He put his cards down and reached for his towel.
‘Going for a shower,’ he said.
Fred looked disgusted. ‘Again? You had a shower yesterday, didn’t you?’
Tom threw his towel at Fred. ‘Some of us have standards to keep,’ he said. ‘Clean living, that’s what the movement’s all about, isn’t it?’
With a snigger Jim leaped to his feet and did the blackshirt salute. ‘Hail, Mosley!’ he said, bringing his heels together so that his bare ankles cracked.
When Tom got back from the shower block, Beggsy was lying on the groundsheet, rolling something between his thumb and forefinger.
‘All right, pansy?’ he said to Tom. He flicked his fingers and a hard green acorn struck Tom on the side of his head. ‘Soaped yourself up nice and clean, have you?’
‘Fuck off, Beggs.’
‘Ooooh!’ Beggsy propped himself up on his elbows. ‘The pansy bites back.’ He stood, took off his trousers, patted his chest and belched loudly. ‘Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m ready for some shut-eye.’ Beggsy flopped onto his mattress, feet hanging off the end of the creaking steel frame.
‘Wouldn’t mind turning in either,’ said Jim. They put out the candles and Tom lay in the darkness, watching a brown speckled moth crawl and flutter around the canvas, trying to escape towards a light which burned in a neighbouring tent. When the light died the moth opened its wings, spread them against the canvas and grew still. Tom waited another half-hour, slid his haversack from under the camp bed and stepped out into the night.
He jogged along Stoney Stile Lane and then slowed to a walk when he reached the parade of shops. Hazel wouldn’t be impressed if he turned up sweaty, especially after he’d gone to the bother of a shower.
There would be a good reason why she hadn’t met him in the woods. She’d be waiting for him now, ready to explain. And if she wasn’t there in the summer house, she would have found some way to let him know. A note stuffed into a crevice in the flint wall, perhaps. A coded sign on the summer-house door.
On the beach he opened his haversack and took out the uniform. It was creased after being stuffed into such a small bag, but Hazel wouldn’t notice in the blackness of this night. Muffled booms of thunder sounded across the Channel, and a cold wind sliced his hair. On the horizon, a bank of light flared. At last, the storm was coming. His pulse quickened at the prospect.
Swiftly he dressed in the black shirt and trousers, threaded the wide leather belt through the loops and fastened the steel buckle. He traced his fingers over the ridges of the emblem embossed in the centre. The fasces of imperial Rome; a symbol of strength through unity. Strength through unity – it was a good motto, he had to admit. He’d be strong with Hazel, that was for sure.
When the lightning flashed again the buckle shone, and the fasces seemed to rise up from the shadow. He bowed his head for a moment. This was the last time he would wear the uniform. He’d never march again, not as a fascist. He’d tell his mother next week, once they were back in Lewisham. And after work one day he’d find Bill Cork and they’d have a proper debate. He was ready, now, to make up his own mind.
But this last time was for Hazel. It would amuse her, he thought. And then she would peel the uniform away, and she would see him as he truly was.
His hair was still damp from the shower and he ran his fingers through it, pushing the long strands back from his forehead. The wind dropped and the clammy air seemed to smother him, to cling to his face. It began to rain. He licked his lips and tasted salt.
15
The weather was wild tonight. At the window the curtains swayed, and every now and then a whirling leaf flung itself against the pane. Between gusts Hazel could hear strong waves breaking, the suck of pebbles in the undertow. She opened the window and leaned out, her elbows grazing the salt-specked ledge. On the horizon the lights of a ship winked and she imagined the world beyond the horizon; a house on the other side of the Channel where some other girl might be standing, staring north. Hazel felt suddenly insignificant, a pinprick in the world, no more important than this grain of sand digging into her elbow.
‘Hazel?’
She turned to see her mother standing at the door.
‘Why aren’t you in bed?’
‘I’m not tired.’
‘Well, I am. This headache simply won’t budge.’ Francine stepped further into the room and shut the door, leaning back on the handle as if it were a crutch keeping her upright. ‘Darling, please don’t sulk. I thought you’d enjoy the surprise.’
‘I was about to go out, that was all.’
‘To meet Bronny, you said. And she could very easily have come along with us for the drive. Why you wouldn’t call round for her I can’t imagine.’
‘She gets motor sick.’
Francine sighed. ‘You can see Bronny tomorrow. We’re heading back to London first thing. I must say it’s a rum affair when you’re not welcome in your own home . . .’ Her voice trailed away as she slipped from the room.
Later, when Hazel went to the bathroom, she saw Charles on the landing. He wore a towel around his midriff and his chest was bare. Charles nodded and said goodnight. She half smiled, hugging her arms around the too-tight nightie and wishing she’d worn her dressing gown.
The storm would not matter. The gods would be with her once more and Tom would appear. Downstairs, her heart began to hammer as she slid open the bolts at the back door. She stepped onto the terrace, the wind lashing her face and snatching at her hair. A black shape slid from the bushes and she almost cried out. Only a cat. It ran across the lawn, then sprang up over the neighbour’s wall.
As she opened the summer-house door a flash of lightning froze the night, and she blinked at the shapes made strange by the storm. She stepped inside and knelt at the tea chest, pulled the book and her cigarettes from their hiding place under the pile of old newspapers and magazines. Rain began to strike the windows. She’d wait as long as she had to. Thunder did not scare her.
Another lightning flash blazed as she lit a cigarette. She stared hard at the garden wall but he was not there and when the lightning died the night seemed black as hell. She drew on the cigarette, hungry for its glow. At last there was a shift in the darkness, a thud on the ground. The door opened.
‘Hazel,’ he said, but her breath came too fast and she could not reply. She dropped the cigarette in the ashtray and let the book fall to the floor. A half-remembered instruction called from its pages: she must not throw herself at him – Lovers, beware! – and yet it was impossible not to step closer, to reach out for him, to press her mouth against his.
He was wearing his uniform. The steel edge of the belt buckle was sharp and cold. Underneath, his skin was warm.
PART TWO
16
London, 1936
She was not in the mood for drumming. It was a warm evening and there was no air in the hall. The red curtains were closed against the setting September sun, filling the room with a rich drowsy light. Hazel looked down at the parquet flooring. There were damp patches where the bugle players had cleared their instruments of spit, and little dents where Mrs Dunn sometimes banged down her standard in frustration at their mistakes. Mrs Dunn was hard on them but she was a good leader and her pride was infectious. When a rehearsal went well, she brought out a tin of humbugs and told them to t
ake two.
They played through the march again and this time they were perfect – even Winnie with her overenthusiastic cymbals – and Mrs Dunn beamed. ‘Wonderful, ladies,’ she said. ‘You’ll be the talk of next month’s parade. Let’s make O.M. proud!’ She looked towards the portrait that hung at the far end of the hall above a trestle table. Hazel half expected Mrs Dunn to genuflect before the image, to bless herself with – what? – the sign of the circle and flash?
Next to Sir Oswald’s portrait hung a picture of the old king. So solid and real: hard to believe he was gone. But Edward would be a good king, they all agreed on that. Very modern in his thinking, and he seemed to have some sympathy with the movement. Lucia had been to a cocktail party at his mistress’s home in Cumberland Terrace. Mrs Simpson had complimented Lucia on her beaded peach dress and they had chatted for a short while on the merits of Schiaparelli over Chanel. Lucia told Hazel that Mrs Simpson had remarkably thin wrists, which was a sign of good breeding, whatever your thoughts on divorce.
Hazel lifted the strap of the side drum from her shoulder and rubbed at her skin where the leather had dug in.
‘Coming for a drink?’ asked Winnie.
It was decent of her to ask, and Hazel was tempted. Winnie was good fun. For one thing she was a great mimic, and had Mrs Dunn to a tee: the Yorkshire accent, the thrust of her chin and her habit of repeating, Put some oomph into it, lass. Ooomph! But Lucia didn’t like Winnie, called her the ‘shop girl’ on account of her job at the Army & Navy.
‘Well then, fancy coming?’
‘Not tonight,’ said Hazel.
‘Going back to your flat?’
‘Yes. I could do with an early night.’
