The Anniversary

by Ann Swinfen

  And I do think Frances might have come down yesterday to give me a hand.

  The voice inside Irina's head was so indignant she could almost hear it in the room.

  She could surely have cancelled that bit of teaching she does, they wouldn't have minded. It's not as if it is a real job. People are so inconsiderate. And Katya looked dreadful when she arrived last night. Why ever does Frances allow her to wear those appalling clothes? I would never have allowed her to dress like that.

  Briefly, she recalled those disgusting short skirts of the sixties. But Frances was married by then. She would marry Giles, and much good it has done her. Though I will say his new show has been a real laugh. Quite made me forget my sciatica for half an hour.

  That marquee. It looks awfully complicated. I hope the boys can manage it. There could easily be rain. Not that it is a marquee really. Just something the Scouts use at their summer camp, but it was kind of Mr Peters to lend it to us. Mother has no idea, really. How did she suppose we could afford a real marquee? This isn't pre-Revolutionary Russia, I ask you.

  Dreading the day ahead of her, Irina climbed slowly out of bed.

  * * *

  Frances had left Ross-on-Wye behind her. It was fully morning now, and the Black Mountains stood out clearly on her left as she headed north through Herefordshire. The cloud cover was thinning out. It might be a sunny day after all. Oh, I hope so, thought Frances, for Natasha's sake.

  Only five more miles to St Martins. She was nearly home.

  Chapter 2

  Irina Appleton sat at the kitchen table, cradling the mug of tea Mabel had made for her. She much preferred tea out of a proper cup and saucer, but thought it wiser not to object, this morning.

  'I've been up since six,' said Mabel happily, hurrying across the kitchen with her clipboard and ticking off some items on the master plan she had pinned to the community's kitchen notice board. 'So much to do, so much to do. I don't know how we're going to be ready in time.'

  Her cropped grey hair flickered from almost black to almost white as she moved in and out of the weak sunshine shafting through the window.

  'Have you had any breakfast?' Irina asked. 'It's going to be a long day. You'd better have something.'

  'No time for breakfast,' said Mabel. 'Now, Irina dear, if you could just shift a wee bit, along to the end of the table, it will give me more room . . .'

  'Yes, of course.' Irina picked up her mug and moved to the chair at the far end of the table, noticing absently as she sat down that its rush seat had reached the point of no return. Hadn't she heard something about a new man in the village who could do that kind of thing? She leaned on her hand. Really, she did think she was beginning to get one of her heads.

  'Sorry!' said Mabel, leaning across her to lift baking tins out of a cupboard. 'I'll just set these out for Sally and Olga. They thought they'd work together in here. They've divided up all the cooking between them. Of course I would just love to have the time to make some of my famous quiches, but I'm so busy seeing to everything . . .'

  The clatter of the tins was dreadful. I'm probably coming down with one of my migraines, thought Irina. Mabel is a good friend, and a really excellent person, but I do wish she wouldn't chatter so much.

  I wish I could get Irina out of here, thought Mabel. She will be under my feet all morning, getting in the way. It's not as if I could delegate anything to her, she would just get in a muddle, or leave it half done. You would think that a daughter of Natasha's would have inherited some of her mother's talents.

  Rubbing her temples, now definitely throbbing, Irina watched Mabel set out the tins and stoke the Edwardian cast-iron range with coke.

  The back door was pushed open with a muddy Wellington boot. Gregor staggered in, carrying a large cardboard box filled with vegetables. Irina could see the fronded tops of carrots and three or four big lettuces.

  'Morning,' said Gregor. 'Where do you want these, Mabel?'

  'In the scullery, please. Oh, Gregor, your boots!'

  'Sorry. I stamped off what I could, but it's been drizzling in the night. Ground's dampish. But it looks as though the clouds are blowing away now. I'll sweep up the mud in a minute.'

  He disappeared into the scullery.

  * * *

  We have been asked if we will take in some refugees for the duration. A Polish family – mother, father and little boy. Mother, of course, says yes at once, although the house is still almost derelict.

  'They will be the first new members to join the St Martins community. This is good. They must come to us at once.'

  It is May, 1944, and Irina has been at St Martins for a week, working like a skivvy and wondering whether it is really worth it. She had to get Hugh and Frances away from the bombing in London, but could not bear to send them off into the unknown like the other evacuees. You couldn't know what sort of a family they might end up with, perhaps really dreadful people, with disgusting table manners and an earth closet in the garden. You heard such tales. And already Hugh, who is five, has started running off to play with any child he meets in the street. So unsuitable. Frances is an easier child, but she follows her brother around no matter where he goes and thinks everything he does is wonderful.

  Now Mother and Father have inherited this ramshackle place from some old childless uncle of Father's that I've never even heard of. When Mother offered us a home for the duration I had no idea there would be nothing but primitive plumbing and no electricity. And pigeons nesting in the upstairs rooms. And rats and cockroaches everywhere.

  Irina shudders. Her hands are raw with scrubbing down the kitchen and scullery.

  What is worse, Mother didn't say a word in her letter about this 'community' they have set up. They have always had these odd, foreign, artistic friends, but at least in London they used to go home at night. Most of the time. I hated it when I was a child. I know the other girls at school laughed at us, and at the way Mother dressed – like an actress. But now eight or ten of these awful people seem to have been invited to live here too. In fact, I think she invited them before she invited us. They have set up some sort of a trust, and it looks as though they will be here permanently. Well, I can put up with it until the war is over and William comes home, then you won't see me for dust.

  Mabel Owens is scrubbing potatoes at that dreadful sink.

  On the whole, it was a good idea to bring her. Luckily she'd just finished her teacher training when the house where she boarded was bombed. It seemed providential – just the week before we came down to Herefordshire. She's a hard worker, I'll say that for her, and she is good with the children. She can make herself useful around the place for the summer, until she gets a teaching post and somewhere of her own to live. And help keep an eye on the children. This place is a nightmare, with that open well, and broken glass everywhere from old greenhouses and cold frames.

  That must be the billeting officer at the back door, bringing the refugee family. I'm glad to see he understands the proper place for them. What peculiar people! As thin as scarecrows and dressed like them too. The coat the man is wearing was quite good cloth at one time, but it's full of holes now. Probably his master gave it to him when he was throwing it away. The woman looks consumptive. Oh Lord, I hope she isn't carrying TB. What large, dark eyes that boy has. He doesn't look – well – normal, somehow. Perhaps he is a bit . . . How tiresome of Mother. She knows I brought Hugh and Frances here to protect them from just that kind of thing.

  The man claims to be a count or some such. What nonsense. He needn't think we will be taken in by that. I wonder whether he knows that Mother is really a Russian princess, and thinks he can impress her? Mother, of course, is speaking Polish to them, so I can't understand a word they are saying.

  * * *

  Gregor looks about cautiously. The house reminds him a little of home, but it is not very clean and the garden is horrible, choked with weeds and overgrown bushes where anything might be hiding. He remembers home very clearly, although he was so small when
the Germans came and they had to run away into the woods. There is a woman with a round shiny face at the sink. That is probably the cook. And the woman with the cross face sitting by the table – he cannot imagine who she can be. She does not seem to be doing any work, but why is she sitting in the kitchen? Perhaps she is a lady's maid. And neither of the women curtsy to Mama and Papa as the servants used to do at home. But he does not know if this in done in England. He has been here two months now, living in a camp, but this is the first time he has been inside an English house.

  The strange language washes over his head. The man who has brought them talks a lot, and says something about Papa. Count Baranowski, he says. Countess. Gregor. Now there is another lady coming in, with fair hair piled up on her head. She is laughing and holding out her arms. This is certainly the lady, the Russian lady. Gregor pokes the stone-flagged floor with his boot, which is too tight. He doesn't like the Russians any more than the Germans, but Mama says they are our friends now.

  He looks at the lady suspiciously from under his thick black eyebrows, eyebrows which he can see if he frowns hard. He can see them now. She is kissing Mama and Papa. She is speaking Polish!

  'Oh my dears,' she says warmly, 'I am so glad to welcome you to St Martins. We are still in a muddle here, but you are home now. This is your home, as much as it is mine.'

  Mama is crying, but she is smiling too.

  Then the lady kneels down by Gregor, and puts her arms around him. She doesn't say anything, but she hugs him tight. She smells nice, like the ladies who used to come to dinner parties and balls at home. Gregor is crying into the lady's dress, making it all wet. He is ashamed of himself.

  * * *

  'I think it might turn out fine after all,' said Gregor, prising off his boots and putting them outside on the step. He spoke with the soft broad vowels of the Herefordshire-Wales border country.

  He fetched a dustpan and brush from a cupboard under the sink and began sweeping up the clods of earth from the floor. His big, bony hands were ingrained around the fingernails and in the creases of the knuckles with fine white stone dust, and he handled the brush as delicately as his chisels.

  'I thought I might get Nicholas to help me wheel my Venus Rampant out on to the lawn for the party. We could hang a tray of refreshments round her neck, like those girls in the cinema. Make her work for her keep, see.'

  'Really, Gregor!' said Irina crossly. The least he could do was to take his sculpture seriously. That Venus had been commissioned by a Texan with more money than sense, in her opinion. It might look all right in its ultimate home, some hi-tech mansion, she supposed, all marble and art treasures and security guards, but it simply would not do in the middle of St Martins' lawn. Certainly not with children about.

  Gregor looked up at her sideways under his eyebrows from where he was kneeling in front of the scullery door.

  'We could drape a shawl around her juicier bits, if that's what's bothering you, Irina.'

  The quirk of his grin was hidden by the corner of the table as he watched the red slowly creeping up her neck. He loved taking the mickey out of Irina. She always rose to it, then struggled conscientiously to keep her temper like a lady. He had no intention of moving the Venus. It would need a fork-lift truck.

  'Now, Gregor,' said Mabel briskly, 'stop talking daft and get yourself out from under my feet. Unless you want some breakfast.'

  Gregor had minimal cooking facilities in the rooms he had made his own, over the old stable he used as a studio, but he often forgot to buy food or cook meals. When hungry, he would go and pull a few carrots or broad beans from the communal vegetable garden and walk up and down outside eating them raw. Although Mabel treated him with firmness, she could never quite forget the ravenous waif he had once been. About half the time he sat down in the main kitchen with whoever happened to be eating there.

  'I wouldn't say no.' Gregor shook the dirt outside the back door and put the dustpan and brush away. 'But you get on with whatever it is you're doing. I'll make myself a good rib-sticking fry-up.' He opened the fridge and began pulling out eggs and bacon. 'What about you, Irina? Bit of fried bread? Bacon?'

  Irina pulled a woebegone face. 'No thank you. I think I'm getting one of my migraines. I couldn't face a thing.'

  Mabel, seizing her chance, said consolingly, 'Oh, you poor dear! Why don't you just go back to bed for a bit? You know you'll never shake it off unless you lie down in the dark for an hour or two. I'll come and see how you are when it's time to get William up.'

  'I think perhaps I just might,' said Irina, allowing her voice to tremble a little, bravely. She put her mug on the draining board and left the kitchen with the air of a martyr going to certain punishment.

  'Was that my fault?' asked Gregor, contrite, throwing food lavishly into the frying-pan. The bacon sizzled, and its tempting aroma filled the kitchen.

  'Oh no, she really can't cope with today. She'll be glad of an excuse to lie low for a while. Well, perhaps I will just have a bit of bacon. Fried bread? I shouldn't really – they say now that it's so bad for you – but perhaps just half a piece. And an egg. Yes, that would be lovely.'

  * * *

  Katya dressed with care. The trick was to arrange the layers so that all of them could be seen. This meant that you had to start with the longer garments and work your way upwards and outwards. She pulled jeans on first, then discarded them in a corner and tried leggings instead. That was better. She could wear her long black skirt over them, and it would add another layer.

  On top she wore a greyish sleeveless man's T-shirt that hung down to her knees, about a foot shorter than her skirt. Then a black, collarless, long-sleeved man's shirt, half buttoned. Then a shorter shirt, open. Then a long sleeveless waistcoat. Then a funny sort of short coat with big baggy pockets, another of her Oxfam buys, which the woman had said was a poacher's jacket. She pushed her feet into her football boots. They were heavy and uncomfortable, but they made a terrific noise when she banged up and down the shoddy staircase in Reading. Here at St Martins the stone spiral of the tower did not resound to them at all, while the wide oak treads of the main staircase leading up to her room gave only a faint tolerant thud.

  I wonder if Tony will let me go with him to meet his girlfriend at the station. What will this one be like? He sounded quite serious about her when we were driving down yesterday. If I don't like her, I'll have to think of some way to get rid of her. Thank goodness Nick's Sally is OK. Pretty cool. And I suppose Paul is all right, though he's a bit of a bore. I wonder if Anya will bring her Greek fella or not? Maybe he's about to join the ranks of her ex's. She didn't sound as though she wanted to bring him, but Natasha was pretty firm on the phone last night.

  Katya kicked aside some clothes and a canvas bag so that she could open the door, and ran down the stairs towards the smell of frying bacon.

  * * *

  Frances pulled the car round off the main drive and into the stableyard, parking near the coach-house door that served as the main entrance to the part of St Martins where her elder son Nicholas and his wife Sally lived with their three children. Curtains still drawn. If Sally (as she suspected) had been saddled with most of the cooking, they ought to be getting up soon. At a tiny window high in the gable a curtain twitched and Chrissie's sleepy face peered out.

  'Hi, Granny.'

  'Hi yourself. Aren't you lazy people up yet?'

  'I am,' Chrissie pointed out, rather hurt. 'Are you going to have breakfast in the big kitchen? Can I come too?'

  'If you're quick.'

  The face disappeared, and by the time Frances had unloaded her suitcase and some cardboard cartons from the boot, Chrissie was letting herself out of the door, none too quietly.

  'Ssh!' said Frances.

  'Well, they ought to be up. It's the party today.'

  'I know. Do you think you could help me carry these boxes? Heavens, darling, you're still in your pyjamas!'

  'It doesn't matter. It's not raining or anything.'

  Ch
rissie seized the largest box and began to carry it across to the back door. 'What's inside?'

  'Food for the party. Cakes, and biscuits, and two of those salmon pastry roll-ups you like, and some other things. Careful, darling. Keep it the right way up.'

  As Chrissie was struggling to open the door without dropping the box, it was opened from within and Gregor scooped Chrissie, carton and all, inside. He smiled at Frances over her head.

  'Hello there. You must have started before dawn!'

  * * *

  Natasha says we have to be kind to this funny boy who has come to St Martins. But I don't like him. He's bigger than Hugh and me, but he can't say anything except nonsense words, like a silly nursery rhyme. I think he's stupid. He just stands around at the edge of the garden, watching us. This is where Hugh and I live. We don't want him. I hope he goes away soon.

  * * *

  Chrissie edged past Gregor carefully, with the box hugged to her chest. As Frances paused on the doorstep, he could see the low early sun catching the curve of her hair against her cheek and bringing out the polish like dark mahogany, which was hidden as soon as she stepped into the dim kitchen.

  * * *

  It is the summer of 1957. There is a dance in the village hall, and we are all going – Frances and Hugh and I, and that Latvian girl Olga who came last month. Since Frances and Hugh are brother and sister, I suppose you could say that he is going with Olga and I am going with Frances. But it probably won't work out like that. Hugh and Frances will dance with each other, because I dance like a bear, and I shall be stuck with Olga, who is boring and plain and four years older than I am.