by MARY HOCKING
‘How old would Katia be?’ he asked.
‘Fifteen, sixteen?’ Ben was hazy. Katia kept Alice company; if it hadn’t been for that, he would have accepted her as eighteen.
‘Ripe,’ Angus said. ‘Wouldn’t you say?’
It would not have been at all Ben’s way of saying it. He wondered how much experience Angus really had of women. ‘Katia is just a kid,’ he said. Emotionally, he did not think she was any more developed than Alice. ‘Now, what about Alice? She’d make you a splendid wife when she grows up.’
‘Alice? The plump one? You can’t be serious.’
As they drew nearer to Shepherd’s Bush, Angus began to talk about politics. He said he was thinking of joining the Communist Party, and mentioned a Cambridge don who had greatly influenced him. Ben, bored, did not listen, and as Angus was really rehearsing for his encounter with his father, he did not notice Ben’s lack of attention. They parted company outside the Drummonds’ house, Ben refusing an invitation to come in. He was going to a party at the Vaseyelins. Jacov had urged him to come early, because he was uneasy about the propriety of having a farewell party for Guy which consisted of himself, Guy and Louise.
‘I would not wish to do anything of which Mr Fairley would not approve,’ Jacov had said.
‘That’s going to narrow your life quite a bit,’ Ben had told him.
Ben turned into Pratts Farm Road. The gardeners were out, planting, staking, hoeing. Ben did not understand this urge to play some part in the cycle of the seasons, but he felt within himself the movement of a force over which he had no control. He decided to call on the Fairleys before going to the party. Jacov had asked him to bring a girl with him. There were several he might have asked, all pretty enough but none as lively as Louise. So he had come alone. He looked towards the Vaseyelins’ house. ‘In a few years, when she’s thickened a bit, she’ll have a jaw like her mother’s,’ he muttered. There were yellow and white crocuses in the Fairleys’ flower borders, and the path was spattered with pink blossoms blown from a prunus in an adjacent garden. As he walked towards the house a breeze stirred, idly floating a scent of hidden bloom more sweet for being untraceable.
Claire opened the front door. ‘There’s just me,’ she said, and he was to understand from her voice the tragedy of this. ‘Mummy’s upstairs washing her hair and Alice has gone with Daddy to the vet.’ Her face came apart as she spoke; tears rolled down her cheeks and she sat on the stairs, hugging her grief. ‘Rumpus has been run over.’
Ben sat beside her. ‘But he wasn’t killed?’ He could not imagine it would have taken both Alice and Mr Fairley to present the vet with the remains. In any case, a burial in the garden would surely have been more the way the Fairleys would handle this sort of event.
‘He hurt his paw. And the motor cycle went into a tree and the man had blood all over his head.’ She brightened as she recollected the latter.
The accident to the dog scarcely explained the passionate tears. ‘And how’s yourself?’ Ben asked. ‘No hurt paw, head unbloodied?’
The face crumpled again, her whole body knotted up as if she had cramp. ‘I went in next door to tell them about Rumpus. They’re having a party . . . for Guy . . . because he’s going away.’
‘Oh yes?’
Slowly, it all came out. As she left the house she had met Mrs Vaseyelin on her way to catch the Number 12 bus at The Askew Arms. Mrs Vaseyelin had told her that the back door was open, so she had gone round the side of the house and let herself in. There had been no one in the hall, but the cellar door was ajar and she could hear voices. Ben could imagine how intrigued she must have been by this party, how she must have longed for a sight of it. She had stood at the top of the stairs, probably aware that she was not wanted, plucking up courage just to go down a few steps. There was candlelight and laughter. She had the temerity to cast a shadow. Guy had come to see who was there. He had been angry. He had told her she was spying and Louise had shouted, ‘Send her packing, she’s an awful little tell-tale!’ A bad case of guilty conscience, Ben thought.
‘I wasn’t spying, I wasn’t,’ she sobbed.
He put his arm round her. Her little dignity had been badly bruised, but it was worse than that. He could see the episode had those recurrent elements of a bad dream: the moment when it is too late to turn back, the unbelievable about to happen, the being caught in forbidden territory. He was sorry for Claire, but not displeased to be given good cause for anger. ‘Forget about them. What would you most like to do? Tell me.’
She stared at him. It was a March evening, getting dusk; her mother was washing her hair; her dog was injured; and the older folk she so admired had turned on her. What was there to do? Then, suddenly, comfort came to her, warm and crisp, dripping with good sweet syrup. ‘You said you could make waffles!’
A minute later when Judith came downstairs with a towel round her head, Ben was alone in the hall. ‘Oh dear, I do hope that dog will be all right,’ she said softly. ‘I don’t think the paw is bad, but it’s the shock with a puppy.’
‘Mongrels are pretty tough.’
‘Mummy, Mummy!’ Claire called urgently from the kitchen. ‘Ben is going to make waffles!’
He looked uncertainly at Judith, but she was grateful for the diversion. They went into the kitchen.
Half an hour later the stretcher party arrived. The dog was wrapped in a shawl and dressed in a doll’s nightdress; a bonnet was tied round its head and only its long, brown nose could be seen.
‘The vet said we couldn’t have done better than to keep him warm like this,’ Stanley Fairley explained fiercely as though Ben had challenged his care of the dog. ‘He says he has a good chance of surviving.’ He went to the wicker basket and laid the dog gently in it.
‘Old Mr Ainsworth sent Mrs Peachey in with a little brandy “for the shock”,’ Judith said. ‘Should we, do you think?’
‘I don’t see why not. Rumpus hasn’t signed the pledge, has he?’
Rumpus drank the brandy and hot milk from a spoon, flicked his tongue appreciatively around his jaws, curled up and went to sleep.
The Fairleys settled down to eat waffles in the kitchen. Alice had had her hair cut and she had water-waved it.
‘It makes you look different,’ Ben told her.
‘She brought it back with her,’ Claire said. ‘You should have seen how much there was of it.’
Later Ben and Mr Fairley went into the sitting-room for a talk while Judith and the girls washed up and kept an eye on Rumpus.
‘What do you think about the stand of the Confessional Church?’ Mr Fairley demanded. Ten more pastors had been arrested. Ben said he could not understand why more people did not stand up to Hitler.
Outside, it was dark and there were lights in the houses across the road. Ben wondered whether Jacov had been in the cellar when Claire ventured down the stairs. If so, why did it have to be Guy who sent her packing?
Mr Fairley said that the pastors had been sent to a concentration camp at Sachsenburg.
‘That makes me savage,’ Ben said.
‘Some of these stories may be exaggerated, of course.’
‘I doubt that.’ There was no charity in Ben’s soul.
Louise came in soon after nine. Her mother said, ‘You’re early.’
‘I told you I wouldn’t be late.’ She turned away as she spoke and saw Ben standing in the doorway. Her eyes met his with a look of triumph.
Chapter Sixteen
It was fine and the temperatures were in the seventies for the Jubilee on 6 May. On the wireless it was reported that thousands had spent the night sleeping along the route of the Royal Procession.
Mr Fairley said they would take a tube train from Shepherd’s Bush and go up to the City which, historically, would he the most interesting place to be. ‘You will be able to see the King’s carriage held up at Temple Bar. The sovereign cannot cross the City boundaries except by permission of the Lord Mayor. A great thing, a very great thing! You should be proud to live i
n a country with such a tradition.’
Alice said she could not travel by tube.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I can’t travel in a tube train. That’s all. I just can’t.’
She was adamant. When it became apparent that her objection, however unreasonable, was genuine, they decided to take a Number 12 bus to Trafalgar Square and hope to catch another bus to the City. Claire objected that she wanted to be in the Park and Mr Fairley said testily, ‘Nothing of any historical significance will be enacted in the Park, there will just be a lot of shouting and singing and pageantry’ – which was exactly what Claire wanted.
When all was finally settled, Louise said she was not coming. ‘I couldn’t stand about all that long.’
‘There may never be another day like this in your lifetime.’
‘That will be all right with me,’ she said crossly.
As they were getting ready in their bedroom, Mr Fairley said to Judith, ‘Why is it that nowadays we can never go out together as a family? It wasn’t like this when they were young.’
‘Because they were young.’
‘Is she really unwell, or is she going to stay at home and moon about Guy all day?’
‘Both, I expect.’
When they reached Trafalgar Square the crowds were so dense there seemed little hope of catching another bus. They made their way towards St James’s Park to join the crowds lining The Mall, The air was still fresh in the park and a breeze stirred the flags and pennants. People were singing ‘Mademoiselle from Armentières’ and Stanley Fairley, reconciled to the loss of historical significance, joined in.
There were policemen on horseback controlling the crowds near the Duke of York steps. One grey horse nuzzled a woman’s neck and she squeaked in alarm. The policeman turned the horse’s head away. ‘The lady doesn’t want you eating her hat!’
‘The Drummonds are going to a party in a restaurant,’ Alice said. ‘I’d much rather be here.’
‘Heather’s going to a street party.’
Stanley Fairley said, ‘I thought Heather and her family were all republicans.’
‘They’re having a street party, anyway, and a banner saying, “Lousy but loyal”.’
‘They’re good sorts.’ Stanley Fairley looked around at the crowd. He had criticized the money spent on the celebrations, but now that he saw the sincere affection displayed by so many ordinary people he was moved, and thought that the King too was a good sort – not overburdened with intelligence perhaps, but a good, bluff old man.
They descended the steps with difficulty and eased themselves in the direction of The Mall. The crowd was good-natured and at first slow progress was possible, though Claire kept wailing that they would never see anything. When at last they had established a reasonably good position, a woman behind began to push. There was little to be gained by pushing forward, and Stanley and Judith stood their ground, refusing in their turn to push the people in front. She was a big, dark woman with protruding black eyes, dressed in a black woollen frock and wearing a close black hat. Even had it not been for all this blackness, her bad manners would have betrayed her as a foreigner. Stanley Fairley identified her as a typical French madame, a formidable manager with a sense of business as sharp as her elbows. There was in such types a marriage of greed and anarchy, qualities which must not be allowed to triumph over the gentler Anglo-Saxon virtues of tolerance and discipline, especially on this of all occasions. Judith, who did not like being pushed about by other women, was equally determined. Alice and Claire, in whom the school had instilled the principles of good citizenship, closed ranks with their parents. An unspoken war was declared between the English and the foreign woman. So intense did the combat become that the Fairleys did not notice the great crescendo of cheering. The monarch made his way down The Mall, the Fairleys being rewarded with a belated glimpse of his plumed helmet and a rather better view of Mr Ramsay MacDonald and Miss Ishbel MacDonald.
Now, the foreign woman was forgotten. Long after the royal procession had passed beneath the Admiralty Arch people were shouting and waving. In a sense, the King’s celebration was their celebration, a celebration of having come through difficult years together. Strangers linked arms and sang ‘Keep the Home Fires Burning’ and ‘Tipperary’. For these few hours they were members of an enormous family, and their spirits soared with their voices. Mr Fairley told the girls that in other countries when the police lined the streets they did not face the processional route but turned outward to watch the crowd. ‘You will never see that in this country.’ Alice felt tears of pride in her eyes. In fact, in the park it was the Navy which was lining the route. The sailors looked very young. ‘They will remember this as long as they live,’ Stanley Fairley said; at which one of the sailors removed his cap and was neatly sick in it.
‘What will happen to him?’ Claire asked anxiously as a petty officer set in motion the ritual departure of the offender.
‘Court martialled, I should hope! They’re not made of the stuff they used to be.’
They sat in St James’s Park and ate sandwiches and fed the ducks. Then they walked through to Parliament Square and saw the House of Commons, festooned with flags and flowers. Alice and Claire wanted to stay to see the floodlighting but their parents said this would make too long a day of it, and anyway, they must be home in time to hear the King speak on the wireless at eight o’clock.
They walked for an hour by the river, which was crowded with boats noisily hooting sirens; even the old tugs and barges were gaily decorated. In front of President, a man was playing a banjo and singing ‘Shenandoah’, and the rather sad melody followed them as they turned and made their way back to the park. The crowd was larger than ever now as people headed towards Buckingham Palace. Alice and Claire, tired, did not insist on seeing the Royal Family come out on the balcony, although Claire said half-heartedly that she would have liked to see the beacons lit on the hills around London.
They were all tired when they got home. It was twenty to eight. The girls wanted supper and Stanley Fairley wanted to listen to the King. Rumpus was pounding hysterically on the kitchen door. Judith went into the kitchen to prepare the meal, and Claire was dispatched to take Rumpus for a walk ‘at least as far as the double oak’.
Alice went up the stairs. It was cool and shadowy in the house, but outside the sun was still shining and through the landing window she could see the lilac, its blooms pale now, because the tree was old. In his study, her father was singing, ‘Oh Shenandoah, I love your daughter, away you rolling river . . .’ He had left the door ajar, perhaps in the expectation that his family would decide to join him. Alice tiptoed past quickly and went along the corridor towards her sister’s bedroom. She wondered why Louise had not come down to greet them, but allowed her curiosity to be diverted by the linen cupboard whence came a familiar smell. Her mother had been making saffron cake and the big bowl was on the floor. The mixture had risen and Alice, seized by an irresistible childish urge, guiltily scooped a little from the edge and licked her finger. Immediately she had a strange sensation of having opened not the linen cupboard but an Aladdin’s cavern in which were miraculously stored all the smells and tastes of her childhood; cinnamon and candied peel being stirred into the Christmas pudding, peardrops acid on the tongue, aniseed balls – bringing a picture of Claire with one stuck up her nostril – the earthy smell of the outside lavatory in her Sussex grandparents’ house mingled with the evening scent of stocks in their garden and, very faint and far away, the slightly peppery smell of sprigs of broom which she and Claire had once put under their pillows in the belief that their wishes would come true as they slept. What was it they had wished for? As she tried to recall, so the scents faded. She lingered for a moment or two, reluctant to move, and then walked down the corridor, sucking her finger.
When she went into her sister’s bedroom, Louise was sitting on the ottoman by the window, looking out into the street, and she did not turn her head or say, ‘Did you have a good
day?’ Alice told her they had had a good day. Louise looked at her as though she had forgotten where they had been, or what day it was. Alice had never seen her look like that before: Louise had always been the one who knew exactly where she was and what could be expected of the day, whether pocket money, skating at Richmond, or scripture with Miss Blaize.
Alice said, ‘Is the pain bad, Lou?’
‘I haven’t got the curse, Alice.’
Alice stood still and sturdy, rather, Louise thought, as if she was defending goal at lacrosse. She said, ‘Perhaps you’ve got the date wrong.’
Louise shook her head. ‘I haven’t had it since the beginning of March and I’m very regular.’
Alice just stood there. Louise wondered if she would have to help each one of her family over this difficult threshold. ‘You know what that means, don’t you?’
Alice was the first person she had told and she watched with interest while Alice made herself accept it. How intent and serious she looked, pondering it is she pondered homework which stretched beyond her accustomed horizon. Next, Louise thought, I shall watch my mother; then my father. There was no doubt in her mind as to the order in which it must happen: the weight of their father’s shock would be borne by all of them.
When Alice did not know what to make of something, she stored it away inside herself, unlike Claire who spat it out immediately. Now, when she spoke, she sounded gravely in possession of the situation. ‘Lou! How awful these last weeks must have been for you. Why didn’t you tell me?’ Then, perhaps feeling she had come too quickly to this, she tried to turn aside. ‘But it can’t be, surely? Monica Pilgrim only has a period every six months.’
‘I’m not Monica Pilgrim!’ Louise’s eyes flashed with scorn and it seemed for a moment that the mention of Monica Pilgrim would make her turn from Alice in disgust. Her emotions fluctuated so turbulently she could barely keep a hold on them, and disgust was replaced by a mixture of passion and pride. ‘I knew at once. I felt it in my breasts, you see. Some women do. And now . . .’ She touched her belly and suddenly her face crumpled, ‘I’m sick, oh, so sick! I can’t keep it from Mother now this has started.’
