by Juliet West
At the junction of Commercial Road and Salmon Lane a huge crowd roiled around the pavements. Tom stopped, remembering that Mosley had planned to speak at Salmon Lane during the parade. It amused him to think of the blackshirts stuck waiting all that time, only to find that their dear leader hadn’t managed a single step of his promised march through the East End. Those fascists would be looking for trouble now, Tom was sure of that. He could hear his lot chanting – ‘They did not pass!’ – the sound of drums and the blare of a loudhailer. It was tempting to join the celebrations. He stopped at the street corner, then thought again of Petra and her poppy-seed cake. He ought to get back to Bill’s, no point taking risks. They might be worrying about him, and that couldn’t be good for Petra in her condition.
Bill had a shiner swelling around his right eye. ‘Walloped with a baton,’ he said, flinching as Petra dabbed wet cotton wool on the bruise.
‘Just a little witch hazel,’ said Petra. ‘You have any battle wounds, Tom?’
Tom held out his hands. Petra tutted and motioned for him to sit on the stool next to Bill. A cold draught snaked under the scullery door, but his chair was near the copper and the heat from the fire warmed his legs. Petra filled a bowl with hot water and told Tom to soak his hands. When they were clean, he held them out again for her to inspect. She patted them dry with a small towel, and smeared a yellow ointment into the cuts. ‘Magia,’ she said. ‘It will soon heal.’ She paused and narrowed her eyes. ‘What is this?’ She traced a finger along the jagged scar on his left palm, the skin still raised and pink.
‘I cut it at the beach last year. Down in Sussex.’
Bill looked over. ‘That would have been in your fascist days, eh, Tommy? Mosley’s seaside camp, was it?’
Tom tried to smile. He was used to the teasing, but after all these months it was beginning to irk. ‘Something like that. It was just an accident, climbing a wall.’
‘Looks like they branded you,’ said Bill. He took hold of Tom’s hand and angled it towards the window. ‘It’s the shape of a lightning bolt. Uncanny.’
‘It was just an accident, I told you.’ Tom pulled his hand away.
‘Leave the boy alone,’ said Petra. She ruffled Tom’s hair. ‘You know that’s all in his past. He can’t be helping what he was born to.’ She sat down on Bill’s lap and he put his arms around her pregnant belly.
Tom stood up and said in any case he ought to be getting home.
‘Take care, Tommy,’ called Petra, her soft voice following him as he slipped out into the darkening yard.
As he walked to the Tube, the scar began to itch. Tom tried to ignore it, kept his hands drilled into his pockets, but once he was on the train he opened his palm and scratched the skin hard. The cut had never completely healed; sometimes it woke him at night, hot and prickly, and he couldn’t touch it without thinking of Hazel and what he had lost. Where was she now, he wondered? Still living in that big house by the sea? Perhaps she’d spent this summer enticing a whole procession of unsuspecting fellows over her garden wall. The thought sparked a needle of pain, and he scratched the scar harder. Then again she might have moved back to the Bloomsbury flat she’d mentioned, in which case she’d be living the high life, evenings spent up west with her rich friends. Whenever Tom went on a delivery near the British Museum he told himself to keep his head down, focus on the pavement and the job in hand. But still he found himself looking up into the windows of those red-brick mansion blocks, imagining Hazel behind the glass, gazing out with a cigarette in her hand. Perhaps even scanning the streets for a glimpse of him . . .
Well, there was no use imagining. Hazel had lied about loving him, and that was that. You were better off with a straightforward girl like Jillie Smith, someone from your own class who wouldn’t let you down.
Lewisham already. He scrambled off the train and slammed shut the carriage door. It was dark now and a mist was lurking. He fancied a pint but first he’d put in an appearance at home. No doubt his mum would be going spare, wondering where on earth he’d got to.
18
‘I thought I heard the door,’ said Edith, hurrying into the hall. She looked at Hazel and attempted a smile. ‘Thank heavens you’re back. I’ve been listening to the wireless. Was it very frightening?’
The hallway was stuffy and still smelt of fresh paint. ‘It wasn’t the best afternoon,’ said Hazel. ‘Everything all right here?’
They walked through into the kitchen. Jasmin was sitting in her high chair, chewing on a crust of bread. She smiled and kicked her legs against the footrest. One knitted sock was on the floor; the other dangled from her pink toes.
‘She’s been a darling,’ said Edith. ‘I took her to Kensington Gardens, and after lunch she had a long nap. We’ve just finished tea. Poached egg on toast. I hope it was OK. I’m not much of a cook.’
Hazel lifted Jasmin from the seat. ‘Thank you. It’s so good of you.’ She sat down with the baby on her lap, pressed her nose to Jasmin’s soft hair and felt a wave of calm. ‘Have you heard from Lucia?’
‘She called in, then dashed out again. Everyone at HQ’s trying to make the best of it. Mosley spoke in Westminster and there was a terrific crowd. She reckons this will do more good than harm.’
‘Oh? The Reds seem cock-a-hoop.’
‘They would, wouldn’t they? But ordinary people will be outraged when they find out how the protestors behaved. Lashing out at the police like that to stop a perfectly peaceful march. Anyway, Lucia will tell you all about it. She’ll be back any minute, I should think.’ Edith picked up a bracelet from the kitchen windowsill and fastened the clasp. ‘If you don’t mind, I’d better go. Starting to get foggy out there.’
Jasmin began to cry immediately Edith left. It was always the same. At the nursery, Mrs Allen often said what a lovely baby Jasmin was, so bonny and placid. When Edith or Lucia looked after her, she was always a darling. Not that Lucia looked after her very often. Not once, in fact, these last few weeks.
Hazel carried Jasmin into the bathroom and lay her on a towel, then reached up to jiggle the washing line that hung from the ceiling. The sight of swaying laundry generally distracted Jasmin, but this evening she rolled onto her side and began to cry harder, trying to reach a rubber ball that was wedged under the cabinet. Hazel lit the geyser over the bath, then gave Jasmin the ball. Quickly she hurried out into the narrow WC next to the bathroom, almost weeping with relief because she’d been desperate for what seemed like hours. When she went back into the bathroom, she found that Jasmin had somehow crammed the ball in her mouth. Her lips were stretched back wide, and the ball glistened shiny black above her tongue.
‘No, Jasmin. No!’ Hazel snatched Jasmin from the floor, tilted her forwards and whacked her on the back. The ball flew out, bounced once and rolled away. Jasmin began to scream.
Hazel tried comforting her, but she only screamed harder. With a free arm, she twisted on the hot tap and Jasmin quietened for a while at the sound of running water. When Hazel lifted her into the bath she cheered up, smiling and babbling, splashing the water with flattened palms. She could almost sit on her own but Hazel kept a hand on her back, and with the other hand she washed Jasmin with a sponge, squeezing fat drips of water onto her skin. Would it always be this hard, she wondered? She was doing her best, but she was so very tired.
She imagined what it might be like for other mothers, mothers with nannies and doting grandparents. Mothers with husbands. And again she heard the voice in the shop doorway, remembered the rush of relief when she thought Tom had appeared to save her. Stupid, stupid. What if the man had been Tom? Tom wouldn’t want her, even if she wanted him. Which she didn’t. She didn’t want any man. She knew about men now, knew about power, and she knew that Mr van de Velde was wrong. Equality between the sexes? What an impossible, ridiculous idea.
19
Francine did not usually take a newspaper, but this morning she walked to the newsagent’s after breakfast to buy The Times and the Guardian, as well as t
he Daily Mirror, which she tucked inside the broadsheets. It really was an unpleasant shop – a wonder Mr Arnold managed to keep any custom. The acid tang of his sweat lingered on her cashmere scarf even as she walked home.
The blackshirt business still baffled Francine. This fanatic who’d befriended Hazel – Lucia – she must have mesmerized Hazel somehow, infected her with unsavoury views. She had exploited Hazel when she was vulnerable; lured her to London just when she, Francine, had found a way to resolve the difficulty. And now there had been this shocking melee in the East End, and for all Francine knew Hazel was injured or traumatized, but she had no way of contacting her.
Francine leafed through The Times, stopping to read the full report on page nine. Pictures of police officers wielding batons, crowds fleeing. She scanned the faces for a glimpse of Hazel, but it seemed that most of those under attack were counter-demonstrators, anti-fascists who’d built barricades to keep the blackshirts out.
Not to know where her own daughter was living – it was preposterous. There had been just two postcards from Hazel in the three months since she went to London, both of them bland with assurances that she was safe and well. When I feel ready for visitors, she had written in the second, I’ll send you my address. Visitors? Since when did one’s mother count as a visitor?
On the day that Hazel disappeared, Francine had gone to the police station in Bognor, clutching the letter that had been left on the kitchen table. The sergeant listened sympathetically but he hadn’t been any help. ‘She’s sure to come round soon,’ he said. ‘Seventeen, did you say? Perfectly old enough to travel to London and stay with a friend. Modern times, Mrs Alexander, like them or not. The fact is, no crime has been committed.’ Francine hadn’t mentioned anything to the sergeant about the child. Would that have made him more sympathetic, or less? He was an older man with Edwardian whiskers. If he knew there was a baby involved, he would probably lose interest completely; in fact he might even deliver a lecture on the loose morals of post-war society.
Francine still felt a glimmer of embarrassment when she remembered the manner of the revelation. It had been the end of December, and she was in the kitchen with Mrs Waite, finalizing the menu for the New Year’s Eve party they had decided, on a whim, to throw. Paul was back from Paris, and they’d invited friends down from London, along with a few of the least boring couples from Aldwick Bay. Christmas with Paul had been a surprising success; Francine had begun to wonder whether the marriage – or some semblance of marriage – might be salvaged after all.
The proposed menu was adventurous, given the limits of Mrs Waite’s capabilities: anchovy eggs, smoked salmon canapés, cheese aigrettes and stuffed mushrooms. Afterwards there would be profiteroles and madeleines and coconut ice – a favourite of Hazel’s.
Francine looked down at the list and shook her head. ‘Perhaps we shouldn’t have the coconut ice,’ she said. ‘Hazel will eat the lot and she really can’t afford to put on any more weight. I wonder whether she ought to go on a diet. Could you bear that in mind, Mrs Waite? After the party, I mean.’
Mrs Waite pressed the pencil point hard into the notepad. She kept her eyes fixed on the list. ‘Oh?’ she said. Her cheeks flushed and she seemed unaccountably ill at ease.
‘Nothing radical,’ added Francine. ‘But perhaps less pastry, fewer puddings? I believe there’s a slimming section in one of my magazines. I’ll cut out the recipes.’
Mrs Waite shifted in her seat and bit her lip. ‘It might not be my cooking, Mrs Alexander,’ she said. There was a grim edge to her voice.
‘Yes, I know Hazel likes to buy sweets now and then.’
‘Not the sweets.’
Francine stared, perplexed. ‘You think she’s ill?’
‘Not ill exactly. In a . . . certain condition.’
There was a beat of silence, broken only by the call of a tawny owl in the trees outside. Francine put her hand to her mouth, then quickly removed it. She stood up, the chair legs rocking on the terracotta-tiled floor.
‘She was mixing with some funny characters last summer, Mrs Alexander, if you don’t mind me saying.’ Mrs Waite didn’t pause to establish whether or not Francine minded. She rushed on breathlessly, almost tripping over her words, as if the information had been festering inside her, clamouring to get out. ‘My friend Ciss saw her at a blackshirt meeting at the theatre, last July I believe it was, when you were in London with Mr Lassiter. Knew it was her – recognized the ribbon on your white hat. And then I could have sworn I heard her speaking to someone, a young man’s voice it was, late at night, after midnight, down at the bottom of the garden. Then there was the business of Bronwen . . .’
‘Bronwen?’
‘That same week Hazel said she was out with her, to the cinema, and another day for a picnic, but I bumped into the Vaughans’ cook and she told me the whole family was away. Grandmother was ailing.’
‘Why on earth didn’t you tell me at the time?’
‘I did think about it, Mrs Alexander. Tell you the truth I worried myself silly. But the girl was sixteen. I decided it was a bit of mischievousness that would blow over. I never dreamed . . . this!’
Mrs Waite’s eyes filled with tears and Francine hadn’t the heart to reprimand her. It wasn’t the woman’s fault in any case. She was a housekeeper, wasn’t she? She’d never been hired as a nanny.
‘Thank you, Mrs Waite,’ said Francine. ‘Please do not speak of this to anyone.’ She paused. ‘Especially not to Mr Alexander. I’d be most grateful.’
Mrs Waite nodded and blew her nose as Francine turned and left the kitchen. She stood in the winter-cool hallway and looped a hand around the banister, wondering how she could have been such an idiot, to have missed what was in front of her. Well, she wasn’t the only dimwit. She was quite sure Paul had no idea either. He’d made a passing remark, Isn’t Hazel filling out? – something along those lines – but there was no concern in his voice, only a sense of surprise at the change in his little girl.
Paul didn’t know, and he mustn’t know. She could only imagine his disapproval and quite possibly his fury. And of course the blame would be laid at her door. He’d say she’d been a neglectful mother, disappearing to London to see her lover. Oh yes, it would be all Francine’s fault, and then the rapprochement would disintegrate, and the word ‘divorce’ would be back on his lips.
Francine climbed the stairs and stood outside Hazel’s bedroom door. She was playing music on the portable gramophone that Paul had given her for Christmas, but instead of the Bach and Schubert that had come with the gift, she’d taken his American records from downstairs. The mournful chords of ‘Death Sting Me Blues’ made Francine’s heart sink.
She looked at her watch. Just after five. It wasn’t too early for a drink, especially at this time of year when one could start before lunch and no one would pass comment. A small brandy, for the shock. She went downstairs again, passing the closed door of the study where Paul was checking through the accounts. In the dining room she opened the drinks cabinet and took out the Rémy Martin. She poured half a glass, sipping at first, then gulping the last mouthfuls.
The music had finished and Hazel’s room was silent. Francine knocked lightly and opened the door. She still hadn’t decided how she felt. She was surprised, yes, and she supposed she ought to be angry. She felt sorry for Hazel, too. And now, with the warming rush of the brandy, she couldn’t deny that a small part of her was actually rather impressed.
Hazel was standing at the gramophone, winding the handle. Her blouse was loosely tucked and her skirt hung low on her hips, as if the top button was undone. Francine sat on the bed.
‘What is it?’ asked Hazel.
‘Sit down.’ She patted the eiderdown. ‘I think we should have a talk.’
Hazel’s face crumpled instantly. She pulled a handkerchief from her cardigan pocket and covered her eyes.
‘You don’t have to say anything,’ said Francine. ‘I’ve guessed.’
Hazel nodded and a sob h
eaved from her throat. She collapsed onto the bed, flopping sideways so that her head sank into the pillows.
Francine did her best to keep her voice gentle and delicate. ‘And the father?’ she asked.
Hazel cried harder and shook her head. Francine decided she wouldn’t press for his name. They’d get to the truth. It couldn’t really have happened last summer, could it, as Mrs Waite had suggested? She couldn’t have been pregnant all this time, she wasn’t nearly big enough. Francine thought of the Nielsen brothers who had both danced with Hazel at the harvest social. Guy Nielsen was the sort of young man who could charm a naive girl into bed. Yes, Guy Nielsen was the father, she felt absolutely convinced. Would he marry her? He worked at a solicitor’s firm in Chichester. There could be worse fates for Hazel. Then again it would be a pity for her to marry so young, a provincial bride at seventeen. Everyone would guess the reason, and though Francine herself could shrug off the scandal, Hazel might find it trying. In which case . . . there might still be time to do something about this baby.
Francine reached across to the glass of water on Hazel’s bedside table. ‘Have a little sip, darling,’ she said. ‘We can’t sort this out until you calm down.’ She patted Hazel’s back as she took the glass and began to drink. ‘Good girl. Now, you should have waited, of course, but I’ll spare you the lecture. We just have to set about solving the problem. When did it happen, do you know?’
Hazel blotted her eyes with the handkerchief and nodded. ‘Summer. July.’
‘Ah.’
Not the harvest dance, then. Was it safe to have an operation, five months along? One of Flick’s friends had tried at around the same mark, and it hadn’t ended well. Perhaps Charles’s friend Veronica Cutler might be able to help? This was her field, after all.
