by Isla Dewar
Izzy thought that was true. ‘I’m dreading the day when they find out. I hope I’m not around when it happens.’
Chapter Seven
Careful, Careful
THE VILLAGE HADN’T changed. The war had hardly touched it. Sunday evening in December, a handful of soldiers sat on the bench in front of the hotel, a noisy cluster of sparrows hopped round the base of the fountain in the square, but really, the place was empty – barely a soul to be seen. No shops were open. Small drifts of smoke spiralled out of chimneys. The Sabbath day and silent as a churchyard; the soldiers spoke in murmurs and even the sparrows were less boisterous than usual.
Not that this meant Izzy’s walk from the bus stop to the manse went unobserved. Though she didn’t notice anybody noticing her, she was self-consciously aware of being spied on. By tomorrow morning, the whole village would know that the minister’s daughter had come home. She knew that was the way of things in a small place. It shouldn’t bother her, but it did.
Living in Skimpton was different. She was an outsider there, not part of the local community, and her comings and goings were of little interest to the people who’d lived there all their lives. They knew that when the war ended, she, and all the others who’d turned up in the village, would disappear.
‘What will you do when the war’s over?’ Elspeth had asked last night. They’d been back in their room at the time. Elspeth had just enjoyed her second bath and had sighed at the softness of the bed and the luxury of clean sheets.
‘Dunno,’ said Izzy. ‘Maybe I’ll get a job as a commercial pilot.’
‘Flying is the future,’ said Elspeth. ‘Everybody will want to fly everywhere.’
Izzy had said that she was sure that when the war ended nobody would want to go anywhere. ‘People will go home and stay home. They’ll want to feel safe. And, if anyone did want to go anywhere, they wouldn’t want it to be in a plane flown by a woman. In fact, I’m sure if a bunch of people were on a plane and they saw a woman in the pilot’s seat, they’d all get off. That’s what they think of women.’
Elspeth said, ‘Nonsense. This is a time of women. We have proven we can do anything men can do. When this war is over, there will be golden opportunities for women.’
‘Golden opportunities to have babies and bake cakes,’ said Izzy. ‘Neither of which I want to do.’
Outside, the night had turned wild. Frenetic music poured from the village hall, the dance band strumming out a few frantic struts before winding up with a slow last waltz. The pubs had closed, drinkers who hadn’t gone to the dance were milling about, shouting.
‘Noisy out there,’ said Izzy.
‘Hectic but not frenzied, a normal Saturday night.’
Izzy asked if there would be a fight.
‘There are fights all the time. The men are miles from home and they miss their families. They let off steam. They fight.’
‘What do you do?’
‘Make a wide berth, a very wide berth.’
Izzy had been glad she was in the hotel and not out there in the night surrounded by men who were a long way from home and letting off steam.
Now, she reached the gates of the manse, always open. She walked up the short drive to the house pondering the business of letting off steam. She decided it was a good thing to do. The male pilots did it often. Sometimes, they were still letting off steam when they came in to work – still a little drunk. Mostly, though, they were hungover. Julia let off steam. Izzy had heard her at it through the bedroom wall – a long moan of pleasure. Claire didn’t. But Izzy got the impression she’d like to. It was time, Izzy decided, to let off some steam, to sow a few wild oats before the war ended and she’d be expected live a safe sensible life.
Meantime, for the next two days, she’d be the good daughter. She’d tell her parents the things they wanted to hear. She’d tell lies.
She stood in the hall and announced herself. ‘Hello, it’s me. I’m home.’ Nothing. She’d been expecting her mother and father to appear in the doorway and gush. She had thought they would run towards her, take her in their arms, kiss her and weep with joy. She went into the kitchen. They were at the table eating supper, listening to the radio and, for a few moments, didn’t notice she was there.
Her father saw her first. He stopped eating, put down his fork and said, ‘What the hell are you doing here?’
Her mother turned, looked astonished and asked her why she hadn’t let them know she was coming. Izzy shrugged and said she’d wanted to surprise them.
‘You should always let us know you’re coming,’ said her mother. ‘We might not have been here. We could have been away somewhere.’
‘Where?’ asked Izzy. This was absurd. Her parents hardly ever went anywhere. Her father went out in the evenings to meetings or to visit parishioners and her mother went to the Women’s Institute, but one of them was always at home.
She took off her coat, hung it on the hook at the back of the door.
‘You’re wearing ordinary clothes. Where’s your uniform?’ her mother wanted to know. ‘I’ve never seen you wear it.’
Izzy said she had left it behind. ‘Mrs Brent is going to give it a clean.’ It was in her bag. She sat at the table, and said that they didn’t seem all that pleased to see her.
‘Of course we’re pleased to see you. It’s lovely to have you here. Just a little bit of a shock. We weren’t expecting you,’ said her mother. She smacked her palms on the table, stood up, ‘I’ll get you something to eat. Really, you should let people know you’re coming.’
She disappeared into the pantry, emerged with two sausages and a potato, started to bustle and complain. ‘You really should tell people in advance that you’re planning a visit. There’s a war on, nobody knows what they’ll be doing any more. They certainly don’t drop in. The days of dropping in are over. Everything is rationed. You can hardly offer someone a decent cup of tea.’
She peeled the potato, chopped it and threw it into a sizzling pan. The sausages were already frying. ‘This will have to do you. I’ll see what I can get at the butcher’s tomorrow. You . . .’
‘. . . should have let you know I was coming,’ said Izzy. ‘I know.’
Her father smiled at her from across the table and asked how she got here.
‘I flew up to Prestwick, then I got the bus. Well, several buses.’ First lie, but only a bit of a lie. She did fly to Prestwick, and she had caught a bus.
He nodded, sighed, said he had to go. ‘Young Christians Bible study this evening, then I have to visit the McKinnons. They got word yesterday that their boy was killed last week.’ He put his hand on Izzy’s shoulder, told her it was good to see her. ‘Nice of you to come all this way. I’ll be back sometime after ten.’ He walked slowly from the room, shoulders slumped.
Izzy heard him heave on his coat before going into his study to collect his Bible and notes for his Bible study class. Then he walked up the hall, sombre steps, and left the manse.
‘He’s not taking this war well,’ said her mother. ‘It’s wearing him down. Barely a week passes without someone in the village losing someone. You just never know who’s going to be next. Your father visits every bereaved family. He’s seen a lot of tears.’ She brought a plate of sausages and chips to the table and put it down in front of Izzy. ‘Still, we don’t have to worry about you. That’s a comfort.’
She took off her apron, hung it on the back of the pantry door. ‘He’s in a spot of bother at the moment. He no longer gives the old hellfire sermons everyone used to love. He talks about compassion and forgiveness. It doesn’t go down well. Last Sunday he said that we had one thing in common with the enemy. There would be tears of sorrow and loss in German homes as well as those within our own shores. Nobody liked that. Some people refused to shake his hand as they left the church. There are whisperings in the village that he’s a conscientious objector. She put her hand to her cheek. ‘I must powder my nose. It’s the Spitfire fund committee night tonight.’ She headed for the door
, stopped. ‘There are scones in the tin in the pantry, tea’s in the pot. Help yourself.’
She bustled out, reappeared ten minutes later, hair combed, face freshly powdered, lips tinted with a thin scraping of Scarlet Rose, the lipstick she’d worn for years. She buttoned her coat. ‘Sorry, darling, but this was the only night everyone was free for the meeting. Still, no need to tell you to make yourself at home – you are home.’ She paused at the door. ‘I’ve left fresh sheets on your bed. You’ll have to make it up yourself.’
She went out, walked up the hall, turned and came back again. ‘And I probably won’t be here when you get up in the morning. I work three days a week at the cottage hospital. They’re short-staffed with the war. Nurses away at military hospitals.’
‘You’re a nurse?’ asked Izzy.
‘Don’t be daft. I help out. Clean the wards, serve tea and such. Just doing my bit.’ She left again shouting as she headed for the front door, ‘I’d like to have been a nurse. If I had my time again, it’s what I’d do.’
When she was younger, being alone in the house had been high on Izzy’s list of favourite things. She’d wander the rooms, revelling in the freedom of having nobody to check on her doings. She’d turn up the wireless, rummage through the drawers in her parents’ bedroom, poke about in cupboards and read the vast tome Everything Within that was kept discreetly hidden in the bottom of her father’s wardrobe. It had advice on worming pets, cleaning windows, clearing blocked drains, making mustard poultices to relieve bronchitis, treating wasp stings, getting rid of nasty teacup rings on tables. It covered every aspect of modern life. Though none of these things interested Izzy. She limited herself to the three paragraphs offering handy hints to the newly wed couple on page 344, headed ‘Sexual Intercourse, a Vital Aid to a Happy Marriage’. When she was ten, these paragraphs had fascinated and alarmed her. If she had to do that, she had decided, she was definitely never going to get married. These days, she felt differently. She still wasn’t keen on marriage, but sexual intercourse was no longer alarming.
This evening, she didn’t find the prospect of being alone as alluring as she had when she was ten. The house was ominously cold and empty, silent, except for the serious ticking of the grandfather clock in the hall. She finished her supper, washed and dried the dishes, then found the scones in the tin with the picture of two Highland cows on the lid and took out two. She ate them with plum jam. And thought about her mother.
It hadn’t ever occurred to Izzy that her mother was a person. She’d been Mum – the face behind the large lunch-time puddings, the one who wiped away tears, the ironer of clothes, the general all-round fixer of things. She was just there.
Sometimes she’d be singing along with the wireless, and sometimes her face would be drenched with worry. Nobody called her Joan or even Mrs Macleod. She was always the Minister’s Wife. She was a woman defined by her role in the community. It came to Izzy that her mother had never been happy.
Happiness had never been an issue in the household. It was never discussed. It was just assumed that if someone was good, worked hard, prayed, obeyed the law, led a noble, upstanding life, then happiness would follow. Now, Izzy doubted this. She had met a group of women who were truly, sometimes even riotously, happy – the pilots she worked with. They all had one thing in common – no matter what anybody said, or thought, even if they disapproved, they did what they wanted to do. They were free in a way that Izzy had never thought possible.
The next day passed quietly. Izzy explored the woods where she’d played as a child. She visited favourite haunts – the huge rock by the stream, the trees she’d climbed and the ivy-covered fallen tree where she’d asked God for a sign that he existed. She sat on it, but didn’t ask for any more signs. She didn’t need them, she no longer believed.
It was after four when her mother and father returned home. Her father had spent the afternoon at the local school, eating lunch with the pupils, then watching their Christmas nativity play. She had gone from the cottage hospital to the village hall where she had helped make up parcels to be sent to soldiers serving abroad. They’d walked back to the manse together, moving up the street slowly, stopping to chat to people they met on the way. It was one of Hamish’s favourite things to do. It was important, he said often, to be seen out and about in the community. To be a friendly presence, always ready for a bit of small talk, always interested in the folk around them. Their lives are our lives and our lives are their lives, that’s the way of things. No secrets.
Joan put on her apron and set about making supper. She chased Izzy and Hamish from the kitchen. ‘Can’t be doing with people getting under my feet when I’m cooking.’ The two sheepishly left her to it.
In the hall, Hamish put his hand on Izzy’s shoulder and suggested they have a little chat. Izzy thought he was going to invite her into his study as he had done when she was a child and quiz her on her faith. But no, he suggested a stroll round the garden. ‘We’ve dug up the flower beds, grow our own potatoes, cabbage and Brussels sprouts. Fruit in summer – strawberries, raspberries, blackcurrants. Do it all myself.’
There wasn’t really much to see. It was December, the ground was frosted hard and it was getting dark. First stars appearing in the sky. ‘Venus,’ said her father, pointing to the heavens, ‘star of the evening this time of year.’ They stopped on the brick path, looked at the patch of ground that once held a dense growth of poppies, pansies and campanula, and considered the rows of Brussels sprouts. ‘Fresh winter vegetables,’ said Hamish. ‘Healthy food straight from the earth.’
Izzy agreed.
He put his hands in his pockets, turned to her and asked if she was behaving herself.
‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I’m too busy to do anything else.’
‘It’s a pity you can’t be home for Christmas. It’s a time for families to be together.’
‘True,’ said Izzy. ‘But I can’t get the time off. Perhaps you should write to Hitler and tell him how inconvenient this war is for everybody. We all want to be home for Christmas.’
He laughed. ‘Talking of coming home, which bus did you come on?’
‘The one from Perth. I got a train from Glasgow, then the bus. Why?’
‘You were seen getting off the one that came from Inverness going towards Perth. Southbound.’
‘Was I?’ said Izzy. ‘Who saw me?’ She noticed her voice had slipped up an octave. She was feigning indignation. She was sounding like a liar.
‘Just one of the teachers at the school,’ he said. ‘She lives beside the bus stop. She said she saw you. Said it must be nice to have you home.’
‘Well, I don’t care what she thinks she saw. I know which bus I got off. And, by the way, it’s nice to be home.’
Hamish said it was nice to have her here, no matter which bus brought her. He pointed to the area beyond the sprouts and said he was going to put peas in there next year. ‘I’ll be sitting on the doorstep shelling them in the sunshine. That’s a happy thing to do.’
‘Yes,’ said Izzy. ‘Are you happy? I mean, apart from when you’re shelling peas in the sunshine. Generally, in your life, are you happy?’
He snorted. ‘Happiness is not something I pursue. Goodness is what interests me.’
Izzy looked at him. Hands deep in his pockets, leaning back and gazing at the darkening sky, he was nodding, agreeing with himself.
‘Is that why you said what you did about tears in German homes?’
‘I said what I think must be true. Young men are dying and their families are in tears. I fear there will be repercussions. I’ve been told that one or two people have written to the head of the Church of Scotland, accusing me of being a German sympathiser.’
‘And you’re not,’ said Izzy.
‘Of course I’m not.’ Then, he asked, ‘Are you happy?’
‘Right now, yes. Absolutely, almost deliriously so. I love my job. I love my life.’
‘Careful, careful,’ he said. ‘I’d be very worried abou
t that kind of happiness. It can make you careless. It could all come tumbling down around you. Don’t give in to it.’
‘Why not? What’s wrong with being happy?’
‘Nobody is happy,’ he said. ‘Only fools delude themselves that they are. There is contentment, I’ll give you that. But it can only be reached by living a life of goodness and honesty.’ He turned to her, bathed her in his graceful stare, the look he gave people when he was gifting them with his wisdom.
Izzy said, ‘Well, now, honesty . . .’ If it was honesty they were discussing, she could give him honesty. Now was the moment to tell him all her truths.
But then the singing started. It filled the air, voices, harmonies – choir practice at the church – ‘Oh, Come All Ye Faithful’. ‘. . . Joyful and triumphant . . .’ they sang. A soft wind brought sweet drifts of wood smoke and above them Venus shone in an indigo sky.
Enraptured, Hamish sighed, rocked on his heels and said, ‘Perfect, perfect. It doesn’t get better than this.’ He smiled at Izzy. ‘I read your letter from Allan.’
Izzy said she’d guessed that.
‘I disapproved at first. Then I thought about it. All those young men dying, some of them only nineteen or twenty, not even started on their lives. Never to know what job they’d end up doing, who they’d marry. Never even having enjoyed proper intimacy.’
Izzy held her breath, she wasn’t sure she liked the way this conversation was going.
‘You did a good thing, Izzy,’ Hamish said.
‘I thought you’d hate me for doing that. I had sex with a man I wasn’t married to. You’ve always said that was a sin,’ said Izzy.
‘I suspect this war has made me revise my opinions on sinning,’ said Hamish. ‘And I’ll never hate you. Not ever.’ He put his arm round her, sniffed the air. ‘I smell supper.’
