The music they had heard, dimly, lower down the path, was louder as they got over the top of Scoop Hill. There were roundabouts and swings, coconut shies, a Punch and Judy, stalls selling lemonade, a rifle range. Beyond the fairground, towards the further edge of the hill were the brightly painted gypsy caravans.
Mary was awestruck by the transformation of the barren stretch of grass and fern. She was struck by the noise, the bright colours of the roundabouts, especially the wooden horses, with their white coats, black spots and red reins. She was impressed, but frightened, by the gypsies themselves – the long sallow faces, the black drooping hair and the bright, long skirts of the women, the swarthy looks and bold stances of the strong gypsy men. One of them, she saw, actually wore gold earrings in his ears. And she thought she would die if she did not have a ride on one of the white horses, going round and round with the music.
“There’s a lot here have never heard of the call-up,” she heard Rabbity Jim mutter to Mrs Gates as they stood by the rifle range, watching a tall gypsy keep his hand in by firing at playing cards pinned up at the end of it. The prizes, Mary saw, were pottery dogs and dancing ladies in red and black Spanish dresses.
“What’s a call-up?” Mary said clearly.
“Be quiet if you’re staying with us,” Mrs Gates said sharply. The gypsy grinned round at Rabbity Jim. Jack glared at him. They were in the same trade really – poaching, picking up a country living.
Threatened with dismissal, Mary took Mrs Gates’s hand. She had slipped away from Isabel Allaun, and Tom and Charlie, recognizing that Lady Allaun’s response to the fair might be chilling and knowing that she would not have any fun going round with Tom and Charlie. After the Christmas holiday they had not reappeared. They had spent the Easter holidays at Charlie’s house and had only arrived at Allaun Towers a few days before, in the freshly-polished Bentley. Ever since, Mary had been waiting for trouble. She did not know that after her threats to tell Lady Allaun about them and Tom’s difficulty in explaining the festering bite-mark to the matron of the school, they had tacitly agreed to leave her alone. Next time, they thought, there could be even worse trouble. But Mary, on her side, felt utterly unprotected. Mrs Gates had not defended her. She was still not sure if Isabel Allaun had heard her, that afternoon in the passageway. Being a child Mary could accept the fact of things heard but not understood, facts deliberately ignored and half-truths told, but her nature ran counter to ambiguity. Her fragmentary memories of life in Meakin Street did not include evasions and wilful ignorance – just Ivy noticing all too plainly that Sid was drunk, and accusing him loudly, just rows about the rent and embraces exchanged. Tact, discretion and blind eyes turned were not part of the Meakin Street experience – and even if she had totally forgotten all of it her brother Jack, hater of secrets and hypocrisy, even at ten years of age, would have been a perpetual reminder. However, on that day, the day of the fair, she forgot all this, dodged Tom and Charlie and sank into the bliss of the rides, the lemonade, the blue sky and the organ playing “Show Me the Way to Go Home” and “Just a Song at Twilight.” The local people jostled, chatted and threw coconuts at plywood models of Hitler and Goring in order to win a plate with the King and Queen’s heads on it. They rode on the merry-go-round, ducked into a tent to see the bearded lady, the mermaid or the fortune teller, drank gritty lemonade and, if they were young enough, put their arms round each other, giggled and gave each other pinches.
Mary spotted Jackie moving round and round and up and down to the tune of “Roll Out the Barrel.” He looked blissful. When it stopped she ran up, got on the horse beside him, gave the man her sixpence and, holding on tight, swooped up and down beside him, seeing Mrs Gates and Rabbity Jim and Isabel Allaun and all the village faces – postman, baker, one of the school-teachers, all blurring and going past her, as if in a dream. She caught the eye of the brawny gypsy in the middle of the merry-go-round, lost him again on the upswing and so went round and round and up and down until – whoops – her little white sunhat fell off and lay, looking like a dinner plate on the dusty grass. Then she began to slip and fell on the neck of the horse, grabbing it but still feeling herself slipping sideways until, luckily, the horses slowed and finally stopped. “Ooh,” she said. “Ooh – I feel all dizzy. I nearly fell off.” Then, as Mrs Gates came up carrying her hat she said, “Can I have another go – Mrs Gates, please.”
“In a minute,” said Mrs Gates, helping her off the roundabout. Tom was scrambling on. He gave her a malicious stare from his pale blue eyes. Mary quickly took Mrs Gates’s hand and said, “In a minute, then.” They bought lemonade from a tall gypsy woman. She, too, had gold hoops through her ears. “Have you got holes in your ears?” Mary asked.
“I have that,” said the woman. She gave Mary a funny look and Mrs Gates dragged her away. “Why are you pulling me?” whined Mary.
“They steal blonde babies,” hissed Mrs Gates. “They leave their own in the cradle.”
“I’m not a baby,” said Mary. “I’m too big to steal.”
“Too cheeky, as well,” said Mrs Gates.
They bumped into Isabel Allaun, who looked embarrassed at being caught ducking out of the fortune teller’s tent.
“So silly, really,” she said. “Still, they do tell you the most extraordinary things about yourself – not surprising, I suppose. They pick up all the local gossip as they travel.” She moved on and then turned back. “Benson’s got the car down at the end of the lane,” she said. “Do you two want to come back with us?”
“Oh, no,” said Mary. “I want another go on the merry-go-round. Can we stay?” she asked Mrs Gates.
“Let her stay, Lou,” said the gypsy woman, coming out of her tent.
Mrs Gates looked at her sharply, upset by this use of her Christian name. Mary stared at the gypsy woman. She wore a long, coloured skirt, a coloured blouse and a patterned scarf round her head, with tails on it which went down to her shoulders. Her hair was long and black. She felt somehow warm, from a distance, as if you were standing close to the fire on a cold day. The big gypsy man by the coconut shy was, she noticed, staring at them. Were the gypsies going to steal her away? She felt she wouldn’t mind going off with this woman, with her bright clothes and the gold rings in her ears, especially in a caravan with a horse to pull it.
“You’ll have to walk all the way home,” warned Mrs Gates. Tom and Charlie came up then and stood by Lady Allaun.
“I don’t mind,” she said quickly.
“I’ll hold you to that when you start complaining,” Mrs Gates told her.
Lady Allaun, Tom and Charlie walked away. She heard Tom saying, “It’s not much of a fair, really, is it?” But Mary couldn’t agree: she was so happy she gave a little skip.
“You’ll be wanting your fortunes told,” the gypsy woman stated flatly. She was not young but her face was unlined. The black hair framed an oval face and large, dark eyes.
“Well – maybe, gypsy,” said Mrs Gates.
“You’ll regret it if you don’t,” the gypsy said.
“Wait for me, Mary,” said Mrs Gates suddenly, and, with the speed of a watched alcoholic getting into a pub, she ducked through the flap of the gypsy’s tent.
Mary, disappointed of her ride, stood bored outside the tent in the grit. Jackie came up, luckily, and paid for another ride on the merry-go-round.
The big gypsy man who ran the merry-go-round did not tell them to get off at the end of the ride. He winked at Jack and said, “You and your sister are good for another go – yes?”
Jack winked back and said, “Thanks, mate.” Mary stared at him and wondered how it was that he always knew what to do. After that, she thought she had better go and stand outside the tent again. Mrs Gates had been a long time. Some of the grown-ups and their children were drifting away downhill, towards their tea. The children turned back often, to catch the last sounds of the music. At the same time the older children and young people, left unattended at the fair, began to shout and run between the si
deshows. The hilltop began to look more itself – there was the grass, the buttercups and the fern growing between the stationary caravans. There were times, as Mary stood outside the tent, when it seemed the noise, the music of the barrel-organ and the merry-go-round ceased for seconds on end.
Mrs Gates put her head out of the tent and said, “Mary – Mary! You’re to come in, the lady says.”
Mary came out of her dream and said, “What!” in alarm. She could see darkness inside, and the dim figure of a woman sitting bent over a table. She was not sure this was what she wanted.
“Mary! Hurry up!” Mrs Gates said urgently. “The lady’s asked for you special.” Her voice sounded rather as it did when Lady Allaun was in one of her bad moods, demanding the impossible and ready to burst out in a rage if she did not get it. This hardened Mary’s attitude. “I don’t want to go in the tent – it’s dark,” she said obstinately.
Mrs Gates repeated the gypsy’s words, “‘Get the little girl with the golden hair who is like your daughter but not your daughter, like a child of the house but not a child of the house.’ Fancy that – I’d told her nothing about you. Now, come in – she’ll tell you your fortune and not charge a penny, that’s what she said.” Mrs Gates’s country accent had grown stronger as it did when she was tired or excited. Mary did not like her in this exalted mood. It scared her. So did the dark tent. She did not want her fortune told, whatever that was. She heard a voice speaking from within the tent. Mrs Gates turned her head to hear. She said to Mary, “She asks will you meet her by her caravan?”
“Oh, yes,” said Mary, pleased by the idea of getting close to one of the caravans and perhaps seeing inside. Some of them had chimneys on the top so there must be a little fireplace.
“Come on then,” said Mrs Gates, emerging from the tent and taking her by the hand. They walked behind the tent and over to the caravans, which stood close to the edge of the hill. “I wonder why she wants to see you,” Mrs Gates said as they went along. “You just a little girl, too. Fetch the little fair girl to me, she said – and never set eyes on you before –”
“Lady Allaun went in there before,” remarked Mary. “Perhaps she said about me.” Mrs Gates took no notice. “The things she told me about myself,” she went on wonderingly. “Things I swear have been a secret between me and my Maker for thirty years – things not a living soul knows – and about Gates, too, God give him rest, for she says he’s dead, of an accident, she said –”
Mary twisted her hand suddenly out of Mrs Gates’s and said, “Do we have to go?” She mistrusted this excitable chat. It seemed to be involving her in a way she did not like. Perhaps the gypsy was a witch and she would be left alone with her. Perhaps after all she did not want to go off in the caravan. Her hand was once more back in that of Mrs Gates. She was being dragged towards the caravan. The woman sat on the steps, smiling at her.
“You stay with me,” Mary demanded fiercely of Mrs Gates.
“Of course I will, Mary,” said Mrs Gates.
“All the time,” Mary insisted.
“That’s right,” said Mrs Gates.
The caravan, red, with black designs on it, stood back from the fairground, on its own, amid a stretch of trampled ferns. Nearby an old white horse stood tethered, cropping grass peacefully. Larks, too high to be seen, sung their evening song in the sky.
Mary dragged her feet as they walked up to the woman on the caravan steps. But it was not the same woman – this one was very old, with a brown face lined and puckered like a shelled walnut, and grey-black hair pinned up on top of her head, held with two combs made of bone. She wore gold earrings and a long, ruddy-coloured dress.
“Mrs Gates – it’s a witch,” Mary hissed as they advanced. Was Mrs Gates going to leave her with the witch? Perhaps she had sold her – perhaps it was like Hansel and Gretel. She wished Jack were nearby.
“It’s a witch,” she said again in an even lower voice. The lark sang on, overhead. Mary was full of fear.
“I’m not a witch,” said the old woman as they came right up to the steps of the caravan. “Don’t be afraid of me.” She stood up and Mary saw that she was quite a tall woman. She came slowly down the steps and, as Mary and Mrs Gates drew back, she made a kind of stiff, mocking curtsey in their direction. Then she sat down on the step of the caravan again and said to Mary, “Sit down on the grass by me.” Mary looked anxiously at Mrs Gates, who nodded and, when she was sitting down, drew close to her. The old woman said, “Give me your hand then, little girl.” Mary, again staring up at Mrs Gates, held out her hot, grimy hand. The touch of the other’s hand, brown, fine-boned and cool, calmed her fears a little. The old woman looked first at the palm, then at the back. “An impatient hand,” said the gypsy. “Here is one who does not look before she leaps. Here is strength and the need to learn judgment.” She had a lilting voice, not like the clipped tones of Lady Allaun or the more robust tones of Mrs Gates, not a county voice nor a Londoner’s either. It had a strange accent and a compelling, singing sound. It was a bit like music, Mary thought. She did not quite trust the voice. Suddenly a little wind came over the edge of the hill and made her shiver. The silence was broken by Mrs Gates, saying, “Well, come on, gypsy. What else do you see?” She spoke roughly, for although country people were afraid of the gypsies, who told fortunes and could curse a woman’s unborn child in the womb, they also despised them as beggars and chicken thieves.
“Watch your tongue, old woman,” said the gypsy. “For I see you here, in the child’s palm.” She bent her head over Mary’s palm and said, tracing little lines on it with her cool, brown finger, “I cannot see all – some I cannot tell you but this is the hand of an uncanny child with an odd past and a future stranger still.” Her voice sang on, “Born of strange blood she will marry strangely, once far off from here a true marriage but short, unlucky, once close to here but no true marriage, and once, alas, true marriage but too close – too close.” She fell silent and began again, tracing Mary’s palm again with her finger. Mary sat still, feeling as if she could not move. She sensed Mrs Gates, rigid beside her. The old woman began to speak again in her sing-song voice. “I see children but a wrong deed, not done wrongly and a long hard path for you, my child, which you will tread bravely. You,” she said, now looking directly at Mary, “will be rich and poor and rich again but never at ease – no, not till you are as old as me and maybe not even then. Close to a fortune, close to a kingdom at the last, she will make her own way though the path will twist and turn – someone watches over you –” she said. Her voice trailed off. She looked, now, quite old and tired. Then she said to Mrs Gates, in a normal voice, “A brave hand – impatient, hasty, soft heart and an open pocket –” Mrs Gates stood looking at her, awed, and then, fighting her own dread, urged, “Come on, gypsy woman. What do you mean by all this? You’ve frightened the child and told her nothing.”
“She’s not afraid,” said the old woman and she was right. Mary felt quite excited.
“Is that about me?” she demanded. “About getting married and getting rich and all that?”
“Now look what you’ve done,” said Mrs Gates. “She’s over-excited on account of your mystifying nonsense.” But the old woman just looked at Mary and said, “She looks forward to the journey, not knowing how many miles she will have to travel without rest.”
“Like everybody else in this mortal world,” said Mrs Gates and then, as if dealing with a dishonest tradesman over a bill, said, “So she marries three times, do you mean to say? And she’ll be rich? And what’s all this about no true marriage? And how, pray, will she end?”
“As we all do,” said the gypsy from her seat on the caravan steps. “In six feet of earth, no more, no less.”
Mrs Gates breathed out impatiently and then reconciled herself to getting no more information from the old woman. She fumbled in her worn black handbag and took out her purse. She handed the old woman two coins – half crowns. Mary was startled. It was a lot of money. But the gypsy woman wave
d the money away, reluctant even to touch it. “No – not for this. No crowned heads,” she said.
“No – what do you mean?” asked Mrs Gates, looking at the money in her palm. Then she understood. The coins bore the heads of George VI and Edward VII. “Well – what sort of money do you want, then?” she asked. It was required to cross the gypsy’s palm with silver or bad luck would follow. So the gypsies said.
“Nothing – nothing,” said the woman. “Put your money away.”
Now the fair was stilling. The gypsies were packing up the stalls. Mary, glancing behind her, watched two of them lifting a big, white, black-spotted wooden horse off the roundabout. They began to carry it towards the little group – the old gypsy woman, the middle-aged housekeeper, the little, golden-haired girl.
“You cannot tell us any more, gypsy?” asked Mrs Gates in an unusually humble tone.
“The ending will not be unhappy,” said the woman. “Does that satisfy you? And she will not fail you, old woman – does that please you?”
“I suppose it will have to,” said Mrs Gates. She said formally, “Thank you, gypsy. Visit me when next you are passing through.”
She took Mary’s hand and began to lead her away.
“She will be there at your ending – will you like that?” the gypsy called out from behind. Mrs Gates swung round in alarm. “Not soon,” said the woman, with a malicious smile, revealing teeth stained and broken like an old dog’s, and one shiny gold tooth in front.
All The Days of My Life Page 7
