The Shell Seekers

by Rosamunde Pilcher

  “I don’t want it cut off.”

  “Well … make some sort of effort. Try to get the hang of a neat little bun.”

  “Oh. Yes. All right.”

  “Off you go then.”

  She went. “Goodbye.” The door half closed behind her and then opened again. “Ma’am.”

  She was drafted to the Royal Naval Gunnery School, HMS Excellent, at Whale Island. She was a Steward, but, perhaps because she “spoke proper,” was made an Officer’s Steward, which meant that she worked in the Wardroom: laying up tables, serving drinks, telling people they were wanted on the telephone, polishing silver and waiting at meals. As well, before darkness fell, she had to go around all the cabins and do the black-out, knocking on doors, and, if there was someone inside, saying “Permission to darken ship, sir.” She was, in fact, a glorified parlourmaid, and was paid a parlourmaid’s wages, thirty shillings a fortnight. Every two weeks, she had to attend pay parade, lining up until it was time to salute the sour-faced Pay Commander—who looked as though he hated women and probably did—say her name, and be handed the meagre buff envelope.

  Asking permission to darken ship was just part of a whole new language she had had to learn, and she had spent a week at a training depot doing this. A bedroom was a cabin; the floor, the deck; when she went to work, she was going on board; a Make and Mend was a half day; and if you had a row with your friend it was called Parting Brass Rags, but as she didn’t have a friend to have a row with, the occasion to use this seamanlike expression never arose.

  Whale Island really was an island, and you had to cross a bridge to get there, which was quite exciting and made it seem like going on board a ship even if you weren’t. A very long time ago it had started life as a mudbank in the middle of Portsmouth Harbour, but by now was a large and important Naval Training Establishment, with a parade ground and a drill-shed and a church, and jetties, and huge batteries where the men did their training. Administrative offices and accommodation were housed in a lot of neat red brick blocks and buildings. The lower deck quarters were square and plain, like council houses, but the Wardroom was quite grand, a country manor with the football field as its estate.

  The noise was incessant. Bugles blew and pipes sounded and daily orders came crackling out over the Tannoy system. Men in training went everywhere at the double, their boots going thump-thump-thump on the tarmac. On the Parade Ground, Chief Petty Officers screamed themselves into apoplexy at squads of terrified young seamen doing their best to master the complexities of Close Order Drill. Each morning, the ceremony of Captain’s Divisions and Colours took place, with the Royal Marine Band blasting out “Braganza” and “Hearts of Oak.” If you were caught out of doors while the White Ensign climbed the flagpole, you had to face the quarterdeck and stand to attention, saluting, until it was all over.

  The Wrens Quarters, where Penelope was sent to live, were in a requisitioned hotel at the north end of the town. Here, she shared a cabin with five other girls, all sleeping in double-decker bunks. One of the girls had dreadful BO, but as she never washed, this was hardly surprising. The Quarters were two miles from Whale Island, and as no naval transport was provided and there were no buses, Penelope put through a telephone call to Sophie to ask Sophie to send her old school bicycle. Sophie promised to do this. She would put it on a train, and Penelope would duly collect it from Portsmouth Station.

  “And how are you, my darling?”

  “All right.” It was horrible to hear Sophie’s voice and not be with her. “How are you? How’s Papa?”

  “Miss Pawson has taught him to use a stirrup-pump.”

  “And Doris, and the boys?”

  “Ronald has got into the football team. And we think that Clark has measles. And I have snowdrops in the garden.”

  “Already?” She wanted to see them. She wanted to be there. It was horrible to think of them all at Carn Cottage and not to be with them. To think of her own darling private bedroom, with the curtains stirring in the sea breeze and the beams of the lighthouse crossing the walls.

  “Are you happy, my darling?”

  But before Penelope could answer, pip-pip-pip went the telephone and they were cut off. She put the receiver back on the hook and was glad that they had been cut off before she had time to answer, because she wasn’t happy. She was lonely and homesick and bored. She didn’t fit in to this strange new world and feared she never would. She should have become a nurse, or a land-girl, or gone to make munitions—anything, rather than take that dramatic, impulsive decision which had landed her in this dismal, apparently permanent plight.

  The next day was a Thursday. It was February now, still cold, but the sun had shone all day, and at five o’clock Penelope, off duty at last, left the island, saluted the Officer of the Watch, and made her way across the narrow bridge. The tide was high, and Portsdown Hill, in the dying light, looked tantalizingly rural. When her bicycle arrived, she would perhaps be able to go for solitary rides, and find a bit of grass to sit on. As it was, the empty hours of evening stretched ahead, and she wondered if she had enough money to take herself to the cinema.

  A car was coming down the bridge behind her. She went on walking. It slowed down and stopped alongside, a racy little M.G. with the hood folded down.

  “Where are you headed for?”

  For a moment, she could hardly believe he was talking to her. It was the first time any man had, except to say he wanted peas and carrots, or to order a pink gin. But there wasn’t anybody else around, so he had to be. Penelope recognized him. The tall, dark, blue-eyed Sub Lieutenant whose name was Keeling. She knew that he was on his Gunnery Course, because in the Wardroom he wore the gaiters, white flannels and white muffler that were regulation dress for Officers under instruction. But now he was in everyday uniform and looked cheerful and carefree, a man setting out to enjoy himself.

  She said, “The Wrennery.”

  He leaned over and opened the door. “Hop in, then, and I’ll give you a lift.”

  “Are you going that way?”

  “No. But I can do.”

  She got in beside him and slammed the door shut. The little car shot forward, and she had to hold onto her hat.

  “I’ve seen you around, haven’t I? You work in the Wardroom.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Enjoying it?”

  “Not much.”

  “Why did you take the job, then?”

  “I couldn’t do anything else.”

  “Is this your first posting?”

  “Yes. I only joined up a month ago.”

  “How do you like the Navy?”

  He seemed so keen and enthusiastic that she didn’t like to tell him that she hated it. “It’s all right. I’m getting used to it.”

  “Bit like boarding school?”

  “I didn’t go to boarding school, so I wouldn’t know.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Penelope Stern.”

  “I’m Ambrose Keeling.”

  There wasn’t time for very much more. In five minutes they were there, turning through the gates of the Wrens’ Quarters, and stopping with a scrunch of gravel at the doors, which caused the Regulating Petty Officer to glance out of her window with a disapproving frown.

  He switched off the engine, and Penelope said, “Thank you very much,” and reached out to open the door.

  “What are you doing for the rest of the evening?”

  “Nothing, really.”

  “Neither am I. Let’s go and have a drink at the Junior Officers Club.”

  “What … now?”

  “Yes. Now.” His blue eyes danced with amusement. “Is that such a disastrous suggestion?”

  “No … not a bit. It’s just that…” Ratings in uniform were not allowed into Officers’ clubs. “… I’ll have to go and change into plain clothes.” That was another thing she had learned at the Training Depot—to call civilian clothes “plain clothes.” She felt quite proud of herself for remembering all these
rules and regulations.

  “That’s all right. I’ll wait for you.”

  She left him there, in his little car, reaching for a cigarette to while away the time. She went indoors and bolted up the stairs, two at a time, not wanting to waste a moment, terrified that if she took too long, he would lose patience and drive away and never speak to her again.

  In her cabin, she tore off her uniform and slung it across her bunk; washed her face and hands, took the pins from her hair and shook it loose. Brushing it, she revelled in the comforting, familiar weight about her shoulders. It was like being free again, herself again, and she felt her confidence returning. She opened the communal wardrobe and pulled out the dress that Sophie had given her for Christmas, and the ratty old musquash jacket that Aunt Ethel had wanted to give to a jumble sale, but which Penelope had rescued and kept for herself. She found a pair of stockings that was not laddered and her best shoes. She didn’t need a handbag, because she hadn’t any money and she never wore make-up. She ran downstairs again, signed in the Regulating Book, and went out through the door.

  It was nearly dark now, but he was still there, sitting in his little car, and still smoking the same cigarette.

  “I’m sorry I’ve been so long.” Breathlessly, she got back in beside him.

  “Long?” He laughed, stubbed out his cigarette, and tossed it away. “I’ve never known a woman so speedy. I was quite prepared to wait half an hour at least.”

  The fact that he had prepared himself to wait so long for her was both surprising and gratifying. She smiled at him. She had forgotten to put on any scent and hoped that he would not notice the moth-ball smell of Aunt Ethel’s coat.

  “It’s the first time I’ve been out of uniform since I joined up.”

  He started the engine.

  “How does it feel?” he asked.

  “Heavenly.”

  They went to the Junior Officers Club in Southsea, and he led her upstairs and they sat at the bar, and he asked her what she wanted to drink. She wasn’t quite sure what to ask for, so he ordered two gin and oranges, and she didn’t tell him that she had never drunk gin in her life.

  And when the drinks came, they talked, and it was all very easy, and she told him that she lived in Porthkerris and that her father had gone there because he was an artist, but now he didn’t paint any longer, she told him that her mother was French.

  “That explains it,” he said.

  “Explains what?”

  “I don’t know, exactly. Something about you. I noticed you at once. Dark eyes. Dark hair. You look different to all the other Wrens.”

  “I’m about ten feet taller.”

  “It’s not that, though I like tall women. A sort of…” He shrugged, becoming quite Gallic himself. “… je ne sais quoi.” Have you lived in France?”

  “No. I’ve stayed there. One winter we took an apartment in Paris.”

  “Do you speak French?”

  “Of course.”

  “Have you got brothers and sisters?”

  “No.”

  “Me neither.” He told her about himself. He was twenty-one. His father, who had run the family business, which was something to do with publishing, had died when Ambrose was ten. When he left public school, he could have gone into the same publishing firm, but he did not want to spend his life in an office … besides, a war was obviously looming … and so he joined the Royal Navy. His widowed mother lived in a flat in Knightsbridge, in Wilbraham Place, but at the outbreak of war she had abandoned this and gone to stay in a country hotel in a remote corner of Devon.

  “She’s better there, out of London. She’s not very strong, and if the bombing does start, she’d be more of a hindrance than a help.”

  “How long have you been at Whale Island?”

  “A month. Hopefully, I’ve only got another two weeks. Depends on the exams. Gunnery’s my last course. I’ve already got Navigation, Torpedoes, and Signals tucked under my belt, thank God.”

  “Where will you go then?”

  “Divisional School for a final week, and then to sea.”

  They finished their drinks, and he ordered a second round. Then they went into the dining room and had dinner. After dinner, they drove round Southsea for a bit, and then, because she had to report back to Quarters at half past ten, he took her home.

  She said, “Thank you so much,” but the formal words didn’t begin to express the gratitude she felt, not just for the evening they had spent together, but because he had come along just when she needed him most, and now she had a friend and wouldn’t have to feel lonely any longer.

  He said, “You free on Saturday?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ve got tickets for a concert. Would you like to come?”

  “Oh…” She could feel the smile, unstoppable, spreading across her face. “I’d love it.”

  “I’ll pick you up then. About seven. Oh, and Penelope … get a Late Pass.”

  The concert was in Southsea. Anne Zeigler and Webster Booth singing songs like “Only a Rose” and “If You Were the Only Girl in the World.”

  What e’er befall

  I’ll still Recall

  That sunlit mountain side.

  Ambrose held her hand. That night, when he took her back, he parked the car a little way from Quarters, down a quiet lane, and took her in his arms, moth-bally coat and all, and kissed her. It was the first time any man had kissed her, and it took getting used to, but after a bit she got the hang of it and did not find it unpleasant in the very least. Indeed, his closeness, his clean-cut masculinity, the fresh smell of his skin aroused within her a physical response that came as a totally new experience. A stirring, deep inside. A pain that was not a pain.

  “Darling Penelope, you are the most delicious creature.”

  But, over his shoulder, she caught sight of the clock on the dashboard, and saw that it was twenty-five past ten. Reluctantly, she drew back, disentangling herself from his embrace, automatically putting up a hand to tidy her disordered hair.

  She said, “I have to go. I mustn’t be late.”

  He sighed, reluctantly letting her go. “Bloody clock. Bloody time.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Not your fault. We’ll just have to make other plans.”

  “What sort of plans?”

  “I’ve got a short weekend coming up. How about you? Could you get one?”

  “This weekend?”

  “Yes.”

  “I could try.”

  “We could drive up to town. Take in a show. Stay the night.”

  “Oh, what a wonderful idea. I haven’t had any leave yet. I’m sure I could fix it.”

  “The only thing is…” He looked worried. “My mother’s let her flat to some boring Army pongo, so we can’t go there. I suppose I could go to my club, but…”

  It was lovely to be able to solve his problems. “We’ll go to my house.”

  “Your house?”

  Penelope began to laugh. “Not my house in Porthkerris, stupid. My house in London.”

  “You’ve got a house in London?”

  “Yes. In Oakley Street. It’s so easy. I’ve got a key and everything.”

  It was too easy. “Is it your own house?”

  She was still laughing. “Not my very own. It’s Papa’s.”

  “But won’t they mind? Your parents, I mean.”

  “Mind? Why on earth should they mind?”

  He thought of telling her why and then decided against it. A French mother and a father who was an artist. Bohemians. He had never known a Bohemian, but he began to realize that he had met one now.

  “No reason,” he assured her hastily. He could scarcely believe his luck.

  “But you looked so surprised.”

  “Perhaps I was,” he admitted, and then smiled, at his most charming. “But perhaps I must stop being surprised by you. Perhaps I should just accept the fact that nothing you could do would surprise me.”

  “Is that a good thing?”


  “It can’t be bad.”

  He took her back to Quarters then, and they kissed good night and she left him and went in, and so bemused and incapable was she that she forgot to sign the book and had to be called back by the Wren on Regulating Duty, who was in a filthy temper because the young Leading Seaman whom she fancied had taken another girl to the cinema.

  She got the pass and Ambrose laid his plans. A friend … a Lieutenant in the RNVR with enviable connections with the world of theatre … managed to get hold of two tickets for The Dancing Years at the Drury Lane Theatre. He wangled a bit of petrol and borrowed a fiver from another gullible chum. Midday on the following Saturday saw him driving in through the gates of the Wrennery, to draw up before the doorway in a flourish of flying gravel. A Wren happened to be passing, so he told her to be a love and find Wren Stern and tell her that Sub Lieutenant Keeling was ready and waiting. Her eyes goggled a bit at the racy little car and the handsome young officer, but Ambrose was used to being goggled at and dismissed her patent envy and admiration as no more than his due.

  “Nothing you could do would surprise me,” he had told Penelope glibly, but nevertheless, when she finally appeared, it was hard not to be a little astonished, for she wore uniform, carried her old fur jacket and a leather satchel slung over a shoulder, and that was all.

  “Where’s your luggage?” he asked, as she got into the car, bundling the fur down into the space between her feet.

  “Here.” She held up the handbag.

  “That’s your luggage? But we’re going away for the weekend. We’re going to the theatre. You don’t intend wearing that flaming uniform the whole time, do you?”

  “No, of course I don’t. But I’m going home. There are clothes there. I’ll find something to wear.”

  Ambrose thought of his mother, who liked to buy an outfit for every occasion, and then spent two hours getting herself into it.

  “What about a toothbrush?”

  “My toothbrush and my hairbrush are in my bag. That’s all I need. Now, are we going to London, or aren’t we?”

  It was a fine bright day; a day for escaping, for being on holiday, for going off for the weekend with a person you were really fond of. Ambrose took the road that led over Portsdown Hill, and at the top Penelope looked back at Portsmouth and cheerfully said goodbye to it. They went through Purbrook and across the Downs to Petersfield, and at Petersfield they decided that they were hungry, so stopped and went into a pub. Ambrose ordered beer, and a kind woman made them Spam sandwiches, which she served daintily garnished with a sprig of bright yellow cauliflower out of a piccalilli jar.