Octavia's War

by Beryl Kingston

  Private Ben Hardy, of the 7th tank brigade, who was home on leave for ten days and at something of a loose end, rounded the bend just as she lifted the plum to her mouth and was dazzled by the sight of her. In the few love-struck moments while his brain was still functioning he knew she was the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen in his life. Then he realised that he was walking straight towards her and that if he didn’t watch out he would bump into her. He side-stepped just as she looked up and tried to get out of his way and for several seconds they stepped and swerved to avoid one another, both moving in the same direction as though they were performing some complicated dance. Then he tried to lunge away from her just as she too was moving and they collided, flailing arm to far-too-solid shoulder. As she stumbled, the plums fell from the bag and rolled towards the canal.

  The sight of good food going to waste was more than she could bear. ‘You clumsy oaf!’ she shouted at him. ‘You great big silly stupid clumsy oaf! Look what you’ve done. Those are my plums!’

  He was bewitched. Bereft of the power of speech but utterly bewitched. He fell to his khaki knees and began to scrabble about at the water’s edge catching as many of the plums as he could and stashing them in his cap, wincing as yet another one plopped into the canal, while those lovely brown arms and those gorgeous legs flashed in and out of his line of vision. Finally, when the last plum had been caught, he sat back on his heels and offered her the capful. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said.

  Her face was furious. ‘And so you should be,’ she said, taking the cap and transferring her plums to the paper bag.

  ‘I caught most of them,’ he said, but she was already walking away, those long legs striding, that long hair golden in the green.

  There were three little girls in school frocks walking towards her along the tow path and, as he watched, she stopped and spoke to them. They were gazing at her in admiration, as well they might, and after a few minutes she offered them some of her plums, wiping them on her skirt before she handed them over. What luck! She must be a teacher or something. If he could find out the name of their school he could see her again.

  He sat on a fallen tree trunk by the side of the path, hooked his cigarettes from the breast pocket of his tunic and lit one to give himself a reason for loitering. Then when the girls drew up alongside him, eating their plums, he said good afternoon and remarked that it was a lovely day.

  They agreed that it was.

  He took a drag on the cigarette. ‘Those plums look good,’ he said.

  They agreed about that too.

  ‘Was that your teacher?’ he asked. ‘The young lady who gave them to you.’

  That provoked giggles. ‘Oh no,’ the tallest girl said. ‘Our teachers aren’t like that. They’re all old. Really old. Out of the ark, some of them. That’s Lizzie Meriton. She’s a prefect.’ And she spoke the words with awe.

  ‘She looks nice.’

  ‘She is,’ the girl said. ‘Ever so nice. We’re in her house.’

  ‘Come on, Iris,’ the smallest girl said, looking a bit anxious, ‘or we shall be late for supper.’

  ‘Can’t have that,’ he said, smiling, and he stood up and walked away from them. Well, you’ve got her name, he told himself happily, and you know she’s a prefect at a school where they wear blue checked frocks, so that must be either a private school or a grammar. They’re not Woking Girls. I do know that. I’ll bet they’re evacuees. Those kids sounded like Londoners to me. I’ll ask Aunt Min. She’ll know which one it is. There can’t be many. Then I’ll buy her some more plums and give them to her when I see her again. There was no doubt in his mind that he would see her again. It was just a matter of a little detective work. And hadn’t he always wanted to be a detective? Lizzie Meriton, he thought, savouring her name. You’re the girl of my dreams.

  * * *

  At that moment, the girl of his dreams was sitting opposite her father in the respectable dining room of the Albion Hotel, with her grubby bag of plums on the white tablecloth in front of her – to the barely concealed annoyance of the waitresses – and a terrible scowl on her face. After working everything out, even down to what sort of dresses she ought to wear at his parties, and thinking of all the things she could talk to him about in the evenings, he’d come straight in to this dining room, sat himself down and told her he wasn’t going to be in London at all during the summer. She was appalled.

  ‘I thought I was going to stay with you and look after you,’ she said. ‘I thought it was all arranged.’

  Tommy recognised that he’d told her badly. It had sounded perfectly reasonable while he was speaking but it seemed to have gone wrong somehow. ‘I’m sorry about that, little one,’ he said in his most affectionate voice. ‘But that’s the war for you. Can’t be helped. Marching orders and all that sort of thing.’

  Lizzie wasn’t impressed by marching orders. ‘Well, I think it’s ridiculous,’ she said crossly. ‘They can’t expect you to work all through the summer. Nobody does. Don’t they have any consideration for you? Couldn’t you do it some other time?’

  ‘No, I couldn’t,’ Tommy said. ‘It’s an Anglo–American conference and it has to be now because that’s what Mr Churchill wants.’ Then he realised that he was being indiscreet and hastened to warn her not to talk about it. ‘It’s hush-hush, so you mustn’t say a word about it to anyone. Careless talk and all that sort of thing. I know it’s not convenient but it could make a difference to the war.’

  She shrugged her shoulders. ‘Oh, well then I must put up with it.’

  ‘That’s my girl,’ he said. ‘Now, what would you like for tea? Do you fancy some scones?’

  Disappointment – and a surfeit of plums – had taken away her appetite. ‘I’m not hungry thanks,’ she said. ‘I ought to be getting back. Thank you for coming down to see me.’

  Her stiff formality hurt him more than her anger had done. ‘I’m really sorry about this, little one,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, well,’ she said. ‘That’s the war for you.’ And she stood up, picked up her bag of plums, walked round the table to kiss his cheek and left him.

  One of the waitresses appeared at his elbow. ‘Is the young lady not staying to tea?’ she asked.

  ‘The young lady has got to get back to school,’ he told her, ‘and I’m afraid I can’t stay either.’ He looked at his watch to convince her. ‘I’ve got an appointment.’

  She gave the proper answer, ‘Very good, sir,’ looked pointedly at the crumpled tablecloth and walked away from him.

  He left her a tip – at least she’d been polite – and drove to Ridgeway as fast as he dared. He needed to see Tavy. Now. This minute. It was probably childish and she would probably take him to task for handling this badly but that’s what he needed. Besides, he had a present for her. Two, if you counted the holiday. He might not be too good at handling his daughter. He had to face that. Daughters could be tricky. Everybody said so. But it was different with Tavy. Oh, come on you fool, he said, glaring at an old man doddering along on a bicycle, you’re blocking the road and I’ve got things to do.

  Lizzie was in a bad mood too. She walked back to Downview at a furious pace, making stray dogs bark and scattering a flock of scavenging pigeons into clattering alarm. So much for feeling sorry for people, she thought. So much for trying to help them. They don’t thank you for it. Well, I shall know better next time. She felt as if she’d been deserted. For Pa, of all people, to turn down her offer. It was hideous. I offered out of the kindness of my heart, she thought, kicking a stone out of her way, and this is what I get for it.

  By the time she reached Downview she was hot and sweaty but she’d walked a lot of her bad temper away. Wait till I tell Poppy and Mary, she thought. They’ll be horrified. She was quite looking forward to it. There was nobody about in the grounds, although Smithie’s bicycle was propped against the wall and there was a soldier waiting by the porch. They’re all indoors getting ready for supper, she thought, and strode towards the door to join them. A
nd the soldier turned his head and began to walk towards her, smiling as if he knew her.

  ‘Replacement plums,’ he said, holding out a paper bag.

  ‘What?’

  ‘To make amends for the ones I knocked in the canal.’

  Oh, good heavens. It was the oaf. ‘You didn’t have to do that,’ she said.

  ‘I did,’ he insisted, holding the bag nearer. ‘I knocked them in the canal, which I wouldn’t have done for worlds. So this is to say sorry.’

  ‘That’s very kind of you,’ Lizzie said. Now that she was looking at him she could see that he was really quite handsome, tall and slim, like her brothers, and with a certain pride about him that reminded her of her brothers too, especially when they were in uniform. He was wearing his cap on his shoulder so she could see that he had a lot of thick, dark hair – and very brown eyes – and a lovely mouth, wide and full-lipped, exactly the sort of mouth that she and Poppy had decided would be the best for kissing. And here it was, smiling at her. Good gracious heavens.

  ‘I was wondering,’ the handsome mouth was saying, ‘if you’d like to come to the pictures with me. There’s a James Cagney on at the Ritz. It’s supposed to be good.’

  ‘What time’s it on?’ she asked. ‘Only I’ve got to go in and have supper.’

  ‘Do you have to? Have supper I mean.’

  ‘I shall starve if I don’t.’

  ‘I tell you what,’ he said, ‘why don’t we have fish and chips? There’s a very good fish and chip shop down my way. Then you wouldn’t starve and we could go to the second house.’

  She made up her mind at once. Pa could reject her all he wanted. She would go out with this young man. ‘I’ll have to just nip in and tell my friend I might be late,’ she said, ‘and get a coat or something.’

  He was beaming at her. ‘Take your plums,’ he said.

  Over cod and two penn’orth, which they ate out of the newspaper as they walked along the road and which was much better than the beans on toast she’d have got at Downview and much, much better than Pa’s ridiculous scones, she asked him how he’d managed to find her.

  ‘I’m a detective,’ he said.

  She was impressed. ‘I didn’t know they had detectives in the army.’

  ‘They don’t,’ he said. ‘In the army I drive a tank. But I like a bit of detective work when I can get it.’

  ‘So how did you do it this time?’

  ‘Actually, I asked my Aunt Min,’ he said honestly. ‘She’s lived here for years so there’s not much about the local schools she doesn’t know and when I told her your summer uniform was blue check, she said Roehampton Secondary at once. Roehampton Secondary evacuated to Woking Girls. So I went to Woking Girls and a girl there said try Barricane House, which had to be in Barricane Road, which it was, and they said you’d be having supper here. Piece of cake.’

  It was jolly flattering to be hunted down so assiduously. She picked up a chip and ate it slowly, savouring the flavour and thinking of some way she could answer him. ‘But how did you know I was at school?’ she asked. ‘I’m not in uniform. Do I look that young?’

  ‘I asked the little girls,’ he told her.

  ‘What little girls?’

  ‘The ones you talked to on the towpath. They told me your name and what a lovely prefect you are and everything.’

  ‘I shall have words to say to them,’ she said, pretending to be stern. Oh, this was fun.

  And so was the picture, although Jimmy Cagney was pretty silly, but it was nice to be sitting in the darkness with this handsome stranger beside her, feeling immensely grown-up and smoking cigarettes openly instead of dodging off behind the bike sheds. I wonder what Pa would say if he could see me now, she thought, and it occurred to her that he might well be cross. And that made the evening better than ever.

  Her father was eating steak and onion pie that had been made with the two tins of steak he’d brought down with him as this week’s contribution to the feast, and was regaling his listeners with tales of the various conferences he’d had to attend and telling them how complicated it had been to arrange them.

  ‘Take the one I’ve got to work on in a week or two,’ he said. ‘All very hush-hush so you mustn’t breathe a word. They want it to be on neutral ground, not in our country and not in theirs, and not in a country that could be compromised by hosting it. You’ve no idea how difficult that makes things. I’m beginning to think we shall have to hold it at sea.’

  ‘Very good idea,’ Octavia said. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because it would be a gift for the U-boats.’

  ‘Not if it was being held on a ship belonging to the biggest “neutral” power and sailing in their home waters. They would hardly want to provoke them into war, now would they?’

  ‘You should be working in the Foreign Office,’ he told her.

  ‘Pass,’ she said, laughing at him. ‘I’ve got quite enough to do running a school.’

  She’d made a perfect opening for him. ‘You should take a holiday,’ he said. ‘Shouldn’t she, Em?’

  ‘That’s what I keep telling her,’ Em told him. ‘But no. She must keep on and on. She never listens to what I say.’

  ‘I’ll bet you haven’t had a holiday since before the war,’ Tommy said, as if the idea had just occurred to him.

  ‘Well, no,’ Octavia admitted. ‘But people don’t take holidays in war time.’

  ‘I do,’ he said. ‘In fact I’m going to take one when this conference is over. In the West Indies. Why don’t you come with me?’

  ‘I couldn’t do that.’ Could she?

  ‘Why not? I’ll bet half your pupils go back to London in August. Or more. They do, don’t they?’

  ‘Well, yes.’

  ‘Very well, then. Take a holiday. You’d love the Caribbean.’

  ‘Oh Aunt,’ Edith said. ‘The Caribbean! I mean, think of it. That’s a once in a lifetime place. I’d go like a shot if it was me.’

  ‘I tell you what, Edith,’ Tommy said, grinning at her. ‘I’ll take your aunt out after dinner and put pressure on her and get her to say yes. How would that be?’

  ‘Highly unlikely,’ Octavia warned.

  ‘Who’s for more pie?’ Emmeline said. ‘We can’t have it going to waste.’

  Lizzie and Ben strolled out of the smoke-filled fug of the Ritz into a moonlit evening. The road was crowded with picture-goers, smoking and chattering and laughing, but above them the sky was an infinite dark blue sea, speckled with shining stars, where the full moon shone like a battered paper lantern. Lizzie gazed at it as she walked and thought how romantic it was. She could almost hear the violins playing.

  ‘It’s early yet,’ Ben said, ‘and it’s a lovely night. You don’t have to go straight back do you?’

  ‘Well, yes,’ she said, ‘I do really. Matron’ll be looking out for me.’

  Oh,’ he said, his face falling. ‘Just for a few more minutes?’

  She thought about it, knowing she ought to say no and go straight home. But she didn’t want to do either and it was just about possible to stay. Miss Henry would think she was out with her father and he’d brought her back very late sometimes. ‘Oh all right then, yes,’ she said. ‘But not for long, mind.’

  So they walked to Horsell Common, which they had entirely to themselves.

  It was wonderfully peaceful out there under the stars, strolling along the narrow pathways between the jagged shapes of the gorse bushes and the heather, listening to the swoosh of the pines and the occasional distant sounds from the town – a bicycle bell chirruping, two voices calling to one another, a car revving up. Neither of them said anything until they’d reached the top of a short rise and could see the dip where the sand pits were.

  ‘That’s where the Martians landed,’ Ben said.

  ‘I know,’ she told him. ‘I’ve read it.’

  ‘We had to do it for General Schools,’ he said. ‘That and Hardy. Funny sort of mixture.’

  ‘We did Hardy too,’ she said. ‘Th
e Return of the Native. Which one did you do?’

  ‘Mayor of Casterbidge.’

  So he’s a grammar school boy, she thought. ‘Was that Woking Boys?’

  ‘For my sins.’

  ‘We were evacuated to Woking Girls.’

  ‘I know. I told you.’

  ‘Pretty daft, really,’ she said. ‘We were much too big to fit into five little huts.’

  ‘That’s what my aunt said.’

  The path had narrowed so much that they were walking side by side and almost close enough to touch. She decided to find out a bit more about him. ‘Do you live in Woking or are you just visiting?’

  ‘I live here.’

  ‘Have you always?’

  ‘No,’ he said, looking at her. ‘I came here when my Mum died. Dad buggered off and me and my brother came to live with Aunt Min.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t mean to pry.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ he told her easily. ‘These things happen. It was all a long time ago. Anyway, Aunt Min took us in and we’ve been here ever since.’

  She was uncomfortable, feeling that she’d said the wrong thing and, now that it had been said, she couldn’t think of a way to put it right. To make matters worse the path was now so narrow they were walking in single file and she couldn’t see his face.

  ‘What about you?’ he asked, looking at her over his shoulder. ‘Where do you live? When you’re not being evacuated, I mean.’

  ‘Wimbledon. Up by the Common.’

  ‘Sounds nice.’

  ‘Yes. It is rather,’ she said and added, feeling she had to explain her affluence, ‘my father works for the Foreign Office. Actually, I was going to go home for the holiday and look after him. We had it all arranged and now he’s off to some stupid conference somewhere and I can’t go.’