by Anna Hope
He isn’t wearing an evening suit. His shirt is creased and he looks tired. But it is him all right. And now that he is in front of her she cannot speak.
“Have you come here to cause trouble, then?” he says with half a smile.
“I—” She shakes her head; her mouth is dry. “I don’t think so, no.”
“Pity.” He straightens up and drains his drink. “Could do with some trouble. Dead in here tonight.”
She follows his gaze. He’s right. Even the band look bored.
He leans his weight on the table. “Shall we get some air? I’ve been here for hours …” he says, shaking his head. “Waiting for you.”
“But—you said—in your note—you said to come at ten.”
“Did I?” He picks up his coat and pulls it on with a distracted air. “Well, then … I was wrong.”
The ground shifts beneath her.
Wrong about the time?
Or wrong to ask me to come?
They walk up the stairs, and she can feel him, close behind her, leaning on the rail. She avoids the doorman’s gaze, but Ed salutes him and calls him “Sergeant” as they leave, and then they are alone together, standing in the dark on the street outside. There’s a silence, the fizz of a match. A ghostly voice, half-singing—“While you’ve a Lucifer …”—and then his face, distorted, lit from below. “Want one?” The sound of a cigarette clamped between his teeth.
“No, thank you.”
He is drunk. Of course he is. He has been in there all afternoon, and now he is drunk.
Her heart stumbles. She should go.
He shakes out his match, and it falls to the ground with a tiny clatter. “Nice night,” he says, as the end of his cigarette flares red.
Hettie looks up at the sky. It is a nice night, though she hadn’t noticed before; the air is clean and damp with the memory of recent rain. High ragged clouds frame the moon.
“Fancy a walk? Could do with a walk. Been cooped up in there for hours, waiting for you.”
She’s not dressed for a walk. She’s dressed for dancing. She’ll be cold, and the dress and her new hair—her whole new self—will go to waste.
“Hate that horrible club.”
“All right,” she says, eventually, because really, what else is there to say? And it is safer, probably, in a way, to be outside.
They leave the dark side street and head back onto the Charing Cross Road, which is still alive with the lights of restaurants and theaters. Ed walks quickly, as though he were in a hurry, and she has to take long strides to keep up, but when they reach the entrance to the tube he stops and turns to her. “Listen,” he says, “I can’t be bothered with all of this. Can you?”
It is as though he has slapped her. “I’m sorry.” She shakes her head. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“All of the preliminaries. All of the nonsense you have to get through. I mean … really. Can you?”
“I don’t understand.”
“The stuff that keeps us separate. Don’t you think for once, we should all just … tell the truth? Say what we bloody well mean?”
She is silent, heart pounding.
“Sorry,” he says, throwing his cigarette away and watching it go. “I’ve just had a bit of an … odd day.” He runs his hands through his hair and lights another cigarette immediately. “Can I ask you something?” he says. “Can we make a pact? Just for tonight? Not to say anything to each other that isn’t honest? Can we do that? Please?”
“Yes.”
“All right.” He nods. “So, I’m going to say something first. And then it’s your turn.”
Hettie feels as though she is on one of those rides at the funfair that you long to get on—and then give you the familiar queasy fear in your stomach as they start to spin, and you wonder why you wanted to get on them after all.
“You remind me of someone I once met,” he says. “And ever since I saw you, that night at the club, I’ve wanted to kiss you.”
She is spinning.
“Can I kiss you now?” he says. “Please? Because I can’t think of a better time.”
He steps toward her and she closes her eyes as he tilts her mouth to his. He tastes of whiskey. It is a lovely, gentle kiss.
“Thank you,” he says quietly, as he pulls away.
When she opens her eyes he is staring at her, but his expression is softer, as though something has left him. “Now you say something,” he says. “Something true. I only want to hear true things.”
She’s not sure she’s ready to speak yet, with this mouth that has been kissed by this man. Really, what she wants is to be kissed again. She tries to think, but her thoughts are all jumbled and “I—don’t know,” she says, shaking her head.
“That,” he says, stepping back, pointing.
“What?”
“That thing you stopped yourself from saying. Just then. That thing. Tell me that.”
Hettie swallows. “All right . … I was going to say that I liked what you said, about blowing things up.”
“Oh, God.” Ed shakes his head. “You must think I’m barmy.”
She thinks of Fred, thinning himself to nothingness, sitting in their father’s chair, of the terrible sounds that leak from him at night. Of her mother, furious and alone, turning in and in and in.. “No—”she says, “I think—I want to blow things up, too.”
He throws his head back and laughs. “Thank you for that.” Then he claps his hands, looking around him. “Bloody cold out here, isn’t it?”
She hadn’t noticed, but it is. The streets are thinner now, too. The crowds appear to have gone home.
“I need a drink. Fancy a drink? I know somewhere not far from here.” He smiles, sheepish suddenly. “Well it’s my flat, actually, if we’re being honest. Which we are. How would you like to have a drink at my flat?”
When she hesitates, he holds his hands up. It is the same odd gesture he made in the club on Saturday night. As though he were unarmed.
“I promise you,” he says. “I’m a very honorable man.”
The floor stretches, dark paneled, smelling of polish and old, expensive wood.
He is rich, then.
Hettie stands on the limit of the parquet, as though on the edge of a deep, chill lake. His flat is vast. Five of her mother’s Hammersmith living rooms could fit easily inside.
Ed makes his way about the room, turning on lights. “Hope you don’t mind. Been in that damn foxhole all afternoon.” He looks over to her. “Come and stand over here. Give me a minute and I’ll warm the place up.”
He seems different now he is inside: steadier, less drunk.
She steps over to the fire, where he has bent, adding coal from a scuttle in the hearth. Beside the fireplace, a door to another room is open. She can just see the corner of a bed.
A man. A girl. A bed.
“Right,” he says when the fire is finally roused. He moves to a low table where glass-stoppered bottles catch the light. “I’ve got … whiskey, gin, and . … vodka!” He lifts a bottle filled with clear liquid and turns to her. “Ever tried vodka before?”
“No.” She’s never heard of it, but doesn’t like to say.
“All anarchists should know their vodka. Know what they’re doing, those Russians. Let’s have a vodka, then.” Humming, he turns back to the cabinet, takes out two glasses, and pours.
Hettie holds her hands to the fire. On the mantelpiece stand two photographs. One is of Ed, serious in uniform. The other picture is very different: here he is younger, his hair longer, wearing a cricket sweater. Beside him is a beautiful young woman, looking straight at the camera and laughing. Hettie feels a small contraction in her chest.
“My sister.” Ed comes up behind her, gesturing with his glass.
“Oh.” Her chest releases as he hands her the drink: clear liquid, ic
e.
“Probably about the last time I saw her smile.” He takes a swig, rocking on his heels, staring at the photograph. “She’s bloody miserable. All the time. You got any?”
“Any what?”
“Brothers? Sisters?”
“Oh. One brother.” She tries a sip of her vodka. It is cold and clean.
“And is he bloody miserable, too?”
She laughs. “Actually, yes, I think he is.”
He lights a cigarette and offers one to her. “Did he serve, then?”
“Yes,” she leans in to his light.
“Whereabouts?”
“In France.”
“Know where?”
She racks her brains but cannot remember if he has ever told her. Even during the war, they never spoke about France. She feels terrible suddenly. She ought to know this, oughtn’t she? But Ed just nods.
“Here.” He puts down his drink. “You look as if you’re about to run away. Let me help you with your coat.”
He takes it from her and puts it over the edge of a chair. And now, finally, when she had almost forgotten she was wearing it, the dress is revealed. The fabric shushes as it falls back into place. The sequins catch and glitter in the low light, and she can feel her skin flush in the heat; acres of it, it seems, are suddenly exposed.
“Goodness,” he says.
She pulls off her hat and holds it in front of her dress. When she finally looks up at him, his expression is confounded.
“You cut your hair,” he says.
“Yes.”
“Why’d you do that?” His voice is oddly flat.
“Because”—she puts her hand to the tapering point at the back of her neck—“I wanted to. I’ve been wanting to for ages, and I …” She trails off. Behind her the fire crackles and spits.
There’s a pause, and then “It looks nice,” he says, in that same dull tone.
You’re lying.
“That’s not true,” she says, heart thudding.
“I’m sorry?”
For a moment she sees something in him, anger? A quick flash and then it is gone.
“You said—before,” she says. “You said we wouldn’t say anything that wasn’t true.”
“Very good.” He points his cigarette at her. “You’re right. I did. But you’re wrong. It is true. You look beautiful. I’m just—”
“You’re just what?” It is as though he is twisting her insides.
“Nothing.” He turns away, throwing his cigarette on to the fire. “Don’t pay any attention to me.”
She laughs. It sounds harsh, and hurt.
“Here.” He rummages in his pockets and takes out a small round cardboard box. “I’ve got some of this. Know what it is?” His tone is coaxing, soft.
She has no idea.
“It’s snow,” he says. When she still doesn’t respond, he walks away, over to a sofa in front of a low wooden table. “Come and sit by me.”
She stays where she is, watching as he pours a small mound of white powder onto the chessboard and rakes out two long lines.
“This’ll liven me up a bit. Make me better company, I promise.” He brings a small silver tube from his pocket. “Here.” He holds it out toward her. “You should try first.”
She has a vague memory of a story. Something from the papers. Two years ago; a girl. An actress. Found dead in her bedroom in the West End.
“Go on. You might like it. You never know.”
She crosses the floor toward him. “Can you die from it?”
He looks amused. “I suppose you could, if you took enough. But people die all the time, don’t they? Of all sorts of silly things.”
Who is allowed to think like this? To say things like this? To take things so lightly?
Not her.
Not her mother, or her father or her brother, or the people at the Palais. Not anyone she knows. Not even Di. They are all too busy holding themselves in, not stepping on the cracks, not looking left or right in case the world collapses around their ears.
She sits on the edge of the sofa. “How do I do it, then?”
“You sniff.”
“Sniff?”
“Here, I’ll show you.” He leans down and, passing the tube up one of the lines, he sniffs, and the powder disappears. Then he touches his nostril with his thumb. “You have to keep going,” he says. “Keep it continuous.”
Hettie takes the tube from him, her heart racing. She bends over the table, puts one finger over the other nostril, and does the same. It hits her hard, burning the back of her throat. “Gosh.” She comes back up, her eyes stinging, half of her share still there on the board.
“Have some vodka.” Ed pushes her glass toward her, bending down and finishing the rest off.
She does as he suggests. The combination is pepperish and strong.
He sits back up. “It’s like the bloody grave in here. We should have some music!” He jumps to his feet and goes over to a cabinet in the corner of the room. For the first time she sees he has a beautiful Victrola, the kind that she and Di dream of, all dark wood and glossy gold handles. “What do you like?” he says, winding it up.
“Um—”
“Wait! I forgot. I’ve got something for you, yesterday.” He takes a record from the cupboard beneath. “The Original Dixies!” he says, straightening up, holding it up like a trophy.
“No … ? Really?!”
“They made a record when they were over here, when they were resident at the Palais. Didn’t you know?”
She crosses the floor, and he puts the sleeve in her hands. The Dixies are all there on the cover, Nick LaRocca in the middle, grinning, trumpet in hand. It is like seeing an old friend. And suddenly she feels better about everything; suddenly the night is full of promise again. “That’s killing!” she says, grinning up at him, passing the record back.
“It certainly is.” He slides it from its sleeve, balances the disc on his middle finger, and, bending forward, winds the Victrola a couple more times.
The green baize spins. He puts the glossy disc on top and lowers the arm. There’s a burst of static on shellac, and then the unmistakable sound of Nick LaRocca’s tumbling trumpet fills the room.
Hettie laughs out loud. She can’t help it. Something is jumping through her, asking for release. That powder. That drink. She’s going to have to move.
“Give me a hand,” says Ed. “Quickly, help me move this.” They lift the low table, carry it to the side of the room, and then get down on their hands and knees and roll the carpet away. Now the floor stretches, polished, gleaming, and they come to face each other, and to the unmistakable sounds of “Tiger Rag” they dance: wildly, crazily, and the small part of Hettie that is aware knows, as she dances, that this is what the people at Dalton’s felt; that this is what she has been searching for, that this is what it feels like to be free, beyond yourself, to move as though you just don’t care. When the number is over they stand, still holding on to each other, laughing, catching their breath.
“Damned fast,” says Ed, shaking his head.
“They played it even faster live.”
He gazes at her, a smile on his lips. “There aren’t many, you know. Not many girls are interested in music. Not many know jazz.”
I could introduce you to ten, at the Palais alone.
“I love it,” she says.
The record scratches into the silence between them.
“You really are most awfully lovely, you know. Do you know?” He leans toward her again, and this time, when they kiss, it is different; it is charged and hard and full of intent.
“Come here,” he says, pulling away from her, taking her wrist. “Will you come in here with me?”
Day 4
. . . . . . . . . . . .
Wednesday, November 10, 1920
&nbs
p; Tangled in her blankets, Evelyn struggles to sit. She is hot and terribly thirsty. She soon sees why: last night she must have gone to sleep in her clothes. She is lying crossways over the mattress, and her pillow has somehow migrated south to the space between her legs. She sits and curses, pulling her cardigan off over her head, leaving only her jersey and her knickers on, stumbles to her feet and out into the corridor. Doreen’s door is ajar. She pauses outside and listens. Silence. She didn’t hear her come home last night; she must have spent the night with the man.
They’ll be getting married before long; she can see it now.
In the unlit kitchen the taps whine in protest before giving up and shuddering forth water. She fills a glass and drinks it greedily down, takes the kettle from the stove, fills it, and puts it on the range, then pulls the curtains aside so she can see the sky. There’s an almost full moon ahead, shaded very lightly away at the top, hanging over the clustered chimney stacks that march east toward Camden Town. She stares out at it, arms wrapped around her chest, hazy from sleep. Behind her comes the quiet shhh of the kettle as it rouses the water inside.
Is the moon waxing or waning? She used to know such things. At the beginning of the war, when Fraser was still alive, she would often wake at this time, late in the night but long before the morning, at two or three o’clock, her nightdress stuck to her body with sweat. It was difficult then, in the blackout, to have a light after dark, and she couldn’t distract herself by reading, so the only thing that eased the feeling would be to come in here, put a kettle on the stove, open the curtains, and look out at the sky. Distance contracted in the small hours before dawn, and if the night were a clear one she would look for the moon.
I am becoming pagan, Fraser wrote, that first winter. Here, in this muddy brown monotony, where blood’s the only colored thing. There is no God here, only the moon and the sky.
And so I have made a pact with the moon. On clear nights she will bring me to you.
There’s a soft call from the street below. Evelyn watches the milk cart travel around the corner, coming to a halt beneath the gaslight on the other side of the road. The dray stamps as its breath streams white into the air. Her eyes light on the window of the terrace opposite, the one belonging to the man in the wheelchair. Looking at it now, blank, unreadable, its curtains shut tight, it’s as though she imagined that alcohol fug of yesterday afternoon.
