The Piper's Tune

by Jessica Stirling

  ‘I missed you,’ she said.

  He knew he would have to go soon, would have to leave her, not just for a week or two but for months, perhaps years; yet he felt steady, oddly steady, just having her hand to hold.

  ‘And I you,’ he said.

  ‘How long do we have?’ Lindsay asked.

  ‘An hour is all I can spare, I’m sorry.’

  ‘No. I mean, how long…’

  ‘A week or so, that’s all.’

  ‘But you will be back, won’t you?’

  ‘For the launch and then the trials, yes,’ Geoffrey said.

  He had told himself that he only wished to be her friend, to strike up a friendship that was as close to platonic as possible, but he knew now that he had been deceiving himself all along and that if she had not been another man’s wife he would have found a means of possessing her completely. He had never been an opportunist, though, and reluctantly he drew away.

  Lindsay said, ‘Will you write to me, Geoffrey?’

  ‘Is that wise?’

  ‘Perhaps it’s better to be just a little unwise than totally foolish.’

  He nodded: ‘Yes, I’ll write.’

  Outlined against the window’s smudges of spring rain, Geoffrey’s features were almost too clean cut, too regular. She saw control there, tautness, the angular discipline of the jawline. She knew so little about him: of his wishes and desires she had no knowledge at all. There would be so much to discover in the months of separation. Next time they met, whenever that might be, there would surely be unity, a kind of harmony, for although they had loved without loving and had nothing but tender memories to share, next time they would not be strangers to the notion of being in love.

  The taxi-cab prowled among the tenements that guarded Aydon Road and, forty minutes before shift-change, drew to a halt in front of the office block. Lieutenant Commander Paget gave Mrs Lindsay McCulloch his hand.

  But only to help her alight.

  * * *

  Gowry said, ‘Look, I really don’t have much time. I have to pick up his lordship at half past five o’clock.’

  ‘Kind of you to spare us any time at all,’ said Bertie sarcastically. ‘Does he know you’re meeting me?’

  ‘Sure and he does. He sent me,’ Gowry said.

  ‘Why didn’t he come himself?’

  ‘In case you brought Sylvie with you.’

  ‘So he really doesn’t want to see Sylvie ever again?’

  ‘That is about the size of it,’ Gowry said. ‘Talking of size, how is she?’

  ‘Showing.’

  ‘Have you called in a doctor?’

  ‘She won’t have it. It’s her child, she says, and she’ll not have anyone fiddling with it.’

  ‘That isn’t right,’ Gowry said.

  ‘I know it isn’t,’ Albert said. ‘If only Forbes would come to the house and talk to her, I’m sure she’d listen to him.’

  ‘Perhaps she’ll listen to me.’

  ‘Only Forbes. She’s never listened to anyone but Forbes.’

  ‘What are they saying about her down at the Mission Hall?’

  ‘She’s stopped going. In fact, she’s stopped going out altogether.’

  ‘That isn’t right either.’

  ‘What am I supposed to do about it?’ Albert said testily. ‘I didn’t knock her up. I haven’t left her in the lurch.’

  ‘Not exactly in the lurch,’ Gowry said. ‘There will be some sort of financial arrangement. Something to keep you going.’

  ‘Did he tell you to say that?’

  ‘He’s not that callous, Bertie,’ Gowry said. ‘He’ll pay rent on the apartment for two years, then, if Sylvie hasn’t found a husband by that time, the arrangement will be reviewed.’

  ‘That’s fine as far as it goes,’ Albert said. ‘But what are we supposed to live on in the meantime? I’m not fit to work and I’m damned if I’m going back to begging on the streets.’

  ‘You were never a beggar,’ Gowry said.

  ‘As close as you care to imagine. I couldn’t have done it without Sylvie and I’m not dragging her back to that existence, not now she’s almost a mother.’

  ‘Fifty shillings a week.’

  ‘Insufficient.’

  ‘Sixty, that’s as far as Forbes’ll go.’

  ‘Three quid a week’ – Albert pulled a face – ‘won’t go far enough.’

  ‘Three quid a week and a roof over your head,’ Gowry said. ‘Good God, man, thousands of Clydesiders would jump at an offer like that.’

  ‘I’ll have to let the servants go.’

  ‘Aww!’ said Gowry.

  ‘Make it a fiver?’

  ‘No.’

  Albert shifted his buttocks on the massive arm of the lock-gate.

  Gowry and he had arranged to meet on the towpath of the canal at the bottom end of Wordsworth Street. At that hour of the afternoon the path was almost deserted and there was little enough traffic on the canal these days, only an occasional horse-drawn barge or a puffer nosing across country. Albert wore a flannel donkey jacket and a knitted cardigan over a collarless shirt. He hadn’t shaved and the stubble on his jowls was frost white. He looked shabby, Gowry thought, like a man on the road to becoming a liability.

  Albert said, ‘Forbes isn’t the only fish in the sea, you know.’

  ‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’

  ‘She’s not entirely dependent on him.’

  ‘Who is she dependent on then?’ said Gowry. ‘You?’

  ‘She still has a papa,’ Bertie said. ‘He might be very interested in what’s befell his daughter. I’m sure he’d be willing to shoulder some of the burden if only he knew what sort of plight she was in.’

  Gowry swore and got to his feet.

  The surface of the canal was smoored with rain, hardly rain at all, really, just a pinkish sort of haze that held the city’s smoke within it, along with tints of early summer. The nap of Gowry’s tunic was pearled with moisture and a little bead or two gathered on the brim of his hat, like sweat.

  For a moment there was no sound but the splash of water in the sluice of the lock and the distant clanking of tram-cars from the direction of Maryhill depot. Then Albert said, ‘I mean, your brother’s not the only rich man of my acquaintance, not the only one who’s feathered his nest through marriage.’

  Gowry swore again, walked four or five paces along the towpath and returned. He put his hands on his hips. He said stiffly, ‘I take it you’re referring to Tom Calder? Has she been in touch with Calder?’

  ‘She wants nothing to do with him.’

  ‘What makes you think Sylvie will agree to taking money from him?’

  ‘She doesn’t have to agree.’ Albert put his arms behind him and leaned back a little. ‘In fact, if I play it right Sylvie needn’t know anything about it. Like – what – an anonymous benefactor?’

  ‘Calder won’t fall for that. He’ll want to see her.’

  ‘Oh, that can be arranged too, I’m sure.’

  Gowry dug his hands into his trouser pockets and had another little stroll to himself. He turned, walked, returned, said, ‘It’s a good one, Bertie, that I will admit. Play Calder against Forbes. Blackmail them both.’

  ‘I thought you’d like it,’ Albert said.

  ‘I don’t suppose it matters that you might ruin two marriages or, at best, bring a whole lot of misery to two ladies who’ve done nothing to harm you.’

  ‘I have Sylvie to think of,’ Albert stated.

  ‘Calder will pay up,’ Gowry said, ‘but Forbes might not.’

  ‘Forbes might not? Really? Forbes might not? Oh, how I’d like to be a fly on the wall when Tom Calder and your precious brother come face to face. Do you suppose for one minute that Calder will let Forbes keep his mucky little secret intact? He’ll pay, of course he will – Tom Calder, I mean – but he’ll make damned sure that Forbes pays too.’

  ‘Aren’t you forgetting one thing?’ Gowry said.

  ‘What’s that
then?’

  ‘The baby.’

  ‘Baby?’

  ‘Sylvie’s baby,’ Gowry said. ‘In four months or so there’s going to be a real live baby squawking in your ear.’

  ‘I’m not scared of babies. I learned a lot about babies from my dear departed wife, though we never had none of our own. I raised Sylvie, didn’t I?’

  ‘Sure and look at the hash you made of that.’ Gowry clamped a hand to Albert Hartnell’s shoulder. The wall of the lock loomed behind him, dark brown water swirling below. ‘Still, it’s not for me to judge, is it? Poor cow never had much of a chance, however you look at it. She isn’t quite right in the head, Bertie, I suppose you’ve realised that?’

  ‘She’s just – just her own person.’

  ‘She’s got a little screw loose, Bertie. She needs a lot of care and attention.’

  ‘He promised he’d look after us.’

  ‘He will. He will,’ Gowry said. ‘But he won’t be blackmailed into marrying her, if that’s what’s on your mind. Take it from me: I know my brother, he’s capable of anything when he’s crossed.’

  ‘I was under the impression he cared for her.’

  ‘I think he does, or at least he did,’ Gowry said. ‘It could have gone happily on for years and years if only she’d had the savvy to let well alone. She tried to trap him, Bertie. She tried to trap him with the oldest trick in the book and I’m not entirely sure that you didn’t put her up to it.’

  ‘Now, now, now, no need for that.’

  ‘All right. I’ll give you the benefit. None the less,’ Gowry said, ‘I’d advise you not to tamper with the Franklins.’

  ‘Your brother ain’t a Franklin, nor is Tom Calder.’

  ‘Not to tamper with that family in any shape or form,’ Gowry said. ‘My brother will do what’s right by her.’

  ‘Like marry her?’

  ‘Rot! That’s rot – and you know it. Sylvie might have feathers for brains, Bertie, but you certainly haven’t. Marriage was never on. Never. He’ll see her right as far as money goes, but don’t expect any more from Forbes than he’s prepared to give. And don’t – you hear me? – don’t drag Calder or anyone else from the family into this mess.’

  ‘I thought you liked my plan.’

  ‘Maybe I do, maybe I don’t,’ Gowry said. ‘But I’ve been around long enough to realise that the best-laid schemes have a way of going wrong, especially if you’re dealing with my brother.’

  ‘Is that a threat?’

  ‘No, it’s a warning, Bertie. And you would do well to heed it.’

  Albert grunted and, getting to his feet, stepped away from the arm of the lock-gate. He had no qualms about Gowry McCulloch. But behind Gowry stood the Dubliner, the smooth-tongued snake who – as he, Albert, saw it – had corrupted them all. He hated those smart young men who claimed the world for themselves. He hated them with a smouldering hatred fired more by jealousy than justice, a weak-kneed, impotent sort of hatred that crushed him and kept him in his place.

  ‘Sixty shillings a week,’ Gowry said.

  ‘Rent paid?’

  ‘Rent paid,’ Gowry said. ‘And get her to a doctor or, if she really won’t wear that, fetch in a midwife to give her the onceover. If there’s one thing I don’t want, it’s for Sylvie to lose this child.’

  Surprised, Albert said, ‘The child? What do you care about the child?’

  Gowry grinned. ‘Spare a minute to think about it, Bertie.’

  After a pause, Albert said, ‘Don’t tell me you’re setting up the kiddie as protection against your brother?’

  ‘Got it in one, Bert,’ Gowry said, and, still grinning, went off towards the bottom end of Wordsworth Street where he had parked the motor-car.

  * * *

  Lindsay’s tour of the submarine both excited and depressed her. A team from Vickers-Martin were fitting a wicked-looking machine-gun on the bow quarter, for on submarines, so Geoffrey informed her, the weapons, along with everything else, were installed before launching. The Vickers’ crew was being assisted by several of Franklin’s metal workers supervised by George Crush. Geoffrey had instructed her to wear a tight-fitting skirt, shoes with low heels and to put her hair up into a knot and cover it with a scarf and as she was helped up the scaffolding and led to the conning tower Lindsay was conscious of the men’s eyes upon her. She did not know what awaited her within the fish-shaped hull or if she would be alone down there with Geoffrey and, if so, what speculations that would give rise to and what sort of twisted story might wend back to Forbes before the day was done.

  She should have known better. The claustrophobic chambers at the foot of the iron ladder were crowded. There were men everywhere: men kneeling, men lying on their backs, men in overalls, men stripped almost naked. In the operating-room steering cables were being adjusted and it was all Geoffrey could do to find sufficient room to point out the gauges and explain their functions. The engines too were all in place and Lindsay inhaled the odours of oil and sweat mingled with a throat-catching whiff of chlorine from the accumulators. A submarine was no place for a woman, she realised. The word that sprang into her mind was ‘foetal’ as she inched after Geoffrey along the plating to inspect the tiny saloon where the sailors would sleep during off-watches. Franklin’s joiners were busy assembling bunks. The rapping of hammers seemed to vibrate throughout the vessel and Lindsay was soon headachy and rather breathless. She was proud of the Franklin’s workforce, however, for it was plain that it was not just the prospect of wages that kept them hard at it but the satisfaction of creating something intricate and complex by the exercise of their skills.

  She was relieved when, after twenty minutes below, Geoffrey guided her up out of the glare of the electric lanterns and into hazy sunlight. She shook her head to clear it and looked at the greeny-brown coil of the Clyde and thought of the open sea and the depths to which that skinny fish-shaped shell would descend, carrying with it all the ingenuity of which men were capable, backed by human lives.

  ‘Do you ever think what might happen if a piece of equipment fails?’

  ‘Too much to do making sure that it doesn’t,’ Geoffrey said.

  ‘How many in the crew?’

  ‘In this craft, two officers and twenty men. That’s a hefty complement for a submarine but we need a large crew to operate such a powerful vessel.’ Reading her concern, he said, ‘Cruising underwater isn’t as bad as you might imagine, not nearly as bad as chasing through a rough sea in a rocky old destroyer.’

  ‘Will you be on board during the trials?’

  ‘Yes, certainly.’

  ‘Who else – besides the crew, I mean?’

  ‘Two naval inspection officers, plus three from the yard.’

  ‘My father?’

  ‘I doubt it. Tom Calder probably, and a couple of engineers.’

  ‘Geoffrey?’

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘Is she safe?’

  ‘As houses,’ Geoffrey said.

  On the ride back to Brunswick Park in the taxi-cab, he made no attempt to kiss her, for which Lindsay – in a way – was glad.

  * * *

  Baby Philip was greedy that evening. He suckled on her breast with a petulance that suggested punishment. Harry, on the other hand, was quieter than usual and contented himself by building elaborate constructions on the tabletop with his collection of wooden alphabet bricks. Lindsay watched him out of a corner of her eye and wondered if he had inherited the Franklins’ aptitude for thoroughness and if, in twenty or thirty years’ time, he would be designing and building ships too and, if so, what sort of ships they would be: great liners that would slip smoothly across the Atlantic in three or four days perhaps, or warships so swift and deadly that nothing that sailed in or upon the seven seas would be safe from their guns.

  The rain had drifted away and the evening sky had taken on a shimmering brilliance that filled the rooms to the front of the house. In the dining-room the table had been set and dinner would be served as soon as she had fin
ished feeding Philip. With her baby at her breast and Harry in sight, Lindsay felt more relaxed. Winn had gone off in a huff because she, Lindsay, would not say where she had been that afternoon. In fact, she had returned home before Forbes and had spent a few minutes with her father in the parlour discussing the prototype’s place in the navy’s programme of modernisation and what it might mean to Franklin’s future, then she had gone up to the nursery.

  Winn had been on to her at once, quizzing, interrogating, probing. There would be more of the same from Forbes, no doubt, an inquisition that she would just have to endure. She had nothing to hide, everything to hide: kisses and state secrets, the effervescent sensation that being in love endowed her with, and the confidence to keep such inspiring secrets to herself.

  Forbes would probably make love to her tonight. He usually did when he thought she was avoiding him. He would take her with angry determination, no longer expecting her to give him pleasure or admit that he was pleasing her, thrusting himself into her with all the force of a pugilist, as if she were an opponent from whom he must wrest a victory. She would match his energy stroke for stroke, though, lifting herself rhythmically against him while dwelling only on the spasmodic sensations that he wrung from her, sensations that she had learned to enjoy even although she knew that his purpose was pragmatic, not to give and take love but to teach her a lesson in obedience, and render her pregnant once more.

  Geoffrey would soon be gone. At least for a time they would become letter-lovers, their kisses replaced by tenderness of another kind, less satisfying but in its way more tangible. Forbes had simply failed to realise that babies protected her, rendered her more mother than wife. Another baby, another child, would only increase her happiness and strengthen her position, for no matter how many sisters and brothers Forbes imported she would never allow herself to become a prisoner in her own home again.

  Pappy Owen had given her a measure of independence and for that she was grateful, but in hindsight she resented his ill-considered match-making, the fact that he had thrown Forbes and her together to heal old wounds, the wounds of a former generation. She missed Pappy, his joviality, his appetite for life, but he had been replaced by others, particularly by her children. They were her family now, her centre, her future. They were the deciding factor, if only Forbes would realise it, that kept her from taking Geoffrey Paget as her lover or of running off with him to live in scandal and in sin.