Now that we’d said we loved each other, it felt as if everything had shifted so that we were in the still eye of a storm with all the madness of the world whirling around us. The hours we didn’t see each other were almost unendurable, and the snatched moments when we were alone were more tantalizing than satisfying. In the evenings, I cycled down to the sawmill as fast as if all the hounds of hell were on my tail. And as the swallows returned to their nests and I reluctantly rode away, the pedals seemed almost too heavy to turn. Bill always watched me until I was out of sight. I lifted myself round in the saddle on the last bend, and he raised his hand.
Every evening Bill and I sat on the ground, or stood if it had rained and the ground was damp, on either side of the wire, and talked and talked. He told me about his job as a railway clerk. “Paddington ain’t the prettiest station,” he said. “That’s St. Pancras.” Nostalgia swept over his face, and he went silent for a moment, then continued. “It’s the smell of it, the trains, the coal dust, the smoke, a kind of metallic . . . I don’t know how to describe it, but it smells like home.” He struggled to find the words. “It’s like when Mole is following Ratty and gets a scent of his old home, and it floods over him. . . .”
I shook my head in bewilderment. “Mole?”
Bill laughed. “Of course, you ain’t got Wind in the Willows here. Mole and Ratty and Badger and Toad.”
I had no idea what he was talking about.
“And I bet you don’t know Winnie-the-Pooh or Piglet either? Never mind. They’re kids’ books. You can read them to our children.”
A great rush of love came over me. “Our children,” I repeated. “Yes, our children!”
We looked at each other without speaking for a long time; then he promised that after the war, we would marry and have children together. And the world would be peaceful and so beautiful. It would be all wind through willows and a house at Pooh Corner.
* * *
Once I knew that Bill loved me and we would be married one day, I became desperate in my desire to be with him. I waited until the next time he said, “I wish you didn’t have to go,” as he did every night, and then, flushing deeply, I said, “I come back when my mother is asleep? Are you locked?”
“Would you do that?” he asked, sounding a little breathless at the prospect. “If I left the laundry room window ajar perhaps I could squeeze through. They hardly ever check it. I’ll try it tonight and tell you tomorrow.” He laughed aloud at the prospect.
By now it was mid-September, and darkness was falling earlier and earlier. Before the war we’d have seen lamps in windows, families going about their business, making their dinner, darning their socks. But now the shutters were firmly shut before the lamps were lit, as if everyone was closed in their small worlds, unable to contemplate the enormity of what went on beyond their walls.
For two nights running, Bill had left the laundry room window slightly ajar when the guard came round to lock them into the factory, and it had gone unnoticed. Tonight he would use it to sneak out. He’d told me that every night the prisoners had to leave their trousers and boots in the washroom, as it was assumed that nobody would try to escape in their socks and underwear. But most of the men had spare trousers and boots. I was glad Bill had spare trousers. I didn’t think it would be romantic to see him in his underwear and socks.
I pretended to go to bed as usual and lay down in the dark, but didn’t undress. When my mother came upstairs, I pulled the bedclothes up to my chin and pretended to be asleep. I could hear her breathing as she stood and looked at me for a long time. Eventually she sighed softly and went out of the room, closing the door behind her. I lay completely still and focused all my attention on listening. I heard her moving about her room. One floorboard creaked and creaked and creaked again. And then, finally, it was quiet. She was quiet. The thin sliver of light under my door vanished as she blew out her lamp. I’d decided I must now wait for an hour, unless I heard her snoring. I practiced irregular past participles to keep my mind occupied, although excitement and anticipation effervesced in my tummy. “To be: I am, I was; I bring, I brought; I come, I came; I do, I did . . .” What would I do tonight? And would it change who I was?
When I was sure my mother must be asleep, I sat up and gathered my shoes in one hand. I turned the doorknob slowly and silently and pulled open my bedroom door. It scraped slightly, and I stood in the doorway, waiting and listening. Nothing but the sounds of the night outside: a dog barking far off, which set off the honking of some geese miles away. I took one step at a time across the landing and onto the stairs, hugging close to the wall to reduce the creaking to a minimum. At the foot of the stairs, I stood and listened again. Nothing. I crept through the dark kitchen, slid the bolts and opened the back door. It was impossible to do completely silently. I waited again, but there were no noises from upstairs. The door clicked shut behind me, and I knew my mother and Marek were in an unlocked house, but I dismissed the thought. I wouldn’t be gone long, and she’d never know I’d been away.
I’d left my bicycle outside the house, leaning against the wall, so I was able to wheel it quietly onto the road. There was half a moon, and it was brighter than I had expected, so I was glad I’d worn dark clothes. I’d been afraid I might not be able to see the road, but it was picked out in the moonlight like a ribbon of water. I thought of all the people sleeping behind the shuttered windows of their houses, not knowing I was on my way to meet my love! I pushed the bike until I was out of sight of the house, and then I mounted, letting the thrill of the night rush through me as I flew away through the darkness.
Five minutes from the sawmill, I hid my bike in the hedge and crept nearer on foot, making my way around the perimeter wire to the back of the mill, away from the road, where we normally met. I cupped my hands around my mouth and made the owl hoot that was to be our signal. I waited, my stomach churning in anticipation, but nothing happened. What if the guard had noticed the unlocked window? What if Bill hadn’t managed to sneak away? What if his spare boots had been discovered?
I hooted again, and this time there was an answering movement inside the wire. At first I thought it wasn’t Bill at all, was perhaps a guard come to denounce me, to tell me Bill was under arrest for attempted escape. But then I realized it was Bill with a dark woolly hat over his blond hair. He crept forward to me over the thin strip of ground between the building and the wire, waved his boots to me and threw them over. I caught them easily and laid them on the ground. One bare foot at a time, he began to climb the fence, up in four steps and over the top, then dropped down on my side with a soft thud. We both stood and waited, listening, looking at each other. I was so nervous, I began to giggle, clapping a hand over my mouth to stifle the sound.
“Shh,” he whispered. “Where are my boots?”
I handed them to him, and he yanked them on roughly over his bare feet.
“You must tie laces,” I said, imagining him tripping up before we could make it into the trees. He bent and stuffed the laces down into his boots.
“There,” he said. “Satisfied? Come on now.” And taking my hand, he pulled me beside him across the strip of grass into the woods.
Under the canopy of trees, it was darker and hard to see our way forward. We felt our way with our feet and hands, touching the tree trunks as we passed them, kicking through the bracken underfoot.
Eventually we reached a small clearing, and he stopped, looking back toward the black shape of the sawmill, just visible through the trees.
“That should do,” he said. “Come here.”
I almost ran into his arms, turning up my face to be kissed.
After a moment he pulled back. “Are you cold? You’re trembling like a rabbit.”
“Not cold,” I said. “Just . . .”
I didn’t have the words for the shivers that passed through me. This was the adventure I’d longed for. It felt as if my life was starting at l
ast.
“Are you afraid?” he asked, gazing at me in the moonlight. “I’ll never do anything to hurt you. Nothing you don’t want to do. I love you.”
“Not afraid,” I said. And I wasn’t. “I love you. I want . . .”
The novelty of hearing myself say the words was still an arrow of joy in me. He drew me into the clearing, where we could see a little better.
“Here, let’s sit down. It’s just so wonderful to have you to myself for a little while without any guards. . . .”
“Or mothers.”
He sat with his back to a broad oak tree and patted the earth beside him. I took off my coat and laid it beside him on the ground, which I knew would be damp, then sat close, cuddling into him. He wrapped his arms around me, and we sat watching the small movements of leaves against the sky, listening to tiny rustlings in the undergrowth. We must have looked peaceful, but my heart was banging against my ribs, and I wanted him to start making love to me. I wanted to be a woman.
I turned in his arms and kissed his throat, his carefully shaved chin, his lips, which opened for me. I ran my tongue over the chipped edge of his front tooth, claiming every imperfection as my own. As we kissed, he gently laid me down on my coat. He had one arm under my neck, but the other hand was free, and it went to the small buttons on my blouse. He fumbled unsuccessfully with one button and then moved his hand to cup my breast and then back again to the infuriatingly tiny buttons. I wished I’d worn something else and broke away from the kiss, pushed myself up onto my elbows, twisting toward him as I sat up. His eyes were steadily on me as I undid the buttons one by one and removed my blouse. It was chilly in the September air, and the hair stood up on my arms, but I didn’t care. I lifted my camisole over my head and reached behind me for the fastening of my bra. As I took it off, I automatically covered my breasts with my arms, but as he watched me and made no move, I slowly dropped my arms to my sides so he could see me properly in the moonlight.
He let out a very long, low sigh and then reached forward to trace the curve of my right breast to the tight nipple. I shivered with cold and delight as he cupped my left breast in his warm hand and bent with his mouth to the right until I thought I might die with joy.
Kissing me again, he guided my hand to the hard lump in his trousers and pressed it there. The thing inside jumped of its own accord, and my hand jerked away in surprise. He drew back to consider me. “Have you ever? No, you ain’t, ’ave you?”
“I am a good Catholic girl,” I said indignantly.
“Of course you are.”
His head was bowed, and I couldn’t tell from the way he said it whether he thought this was bad or good. In peacetime most girls were married long before they reached twenty. Many had children. But in war, nothing is the same. Now was the right time for me, married or not. A cold breeze ran over my bare torso, making me shiver and wrap my arms around myself.
He raised his head at the movement, and I could see the struggle on his face. He gazed at me for a long moment as if making up his mind. “Then we won’t do it till we’re married,” he said. “There’s no way of knowing what’ll happen, and I don’t want to leave you with a kid.”
This proved more than anything that he loved me, and now I wanted him to do it even more.
He said, “You know I’ll come back after the war and marry you? You do believe that, don’t you?”
I ran the tips of my nails along the bare patch between his sweater and trousers, hoping this would encourage him to resume.
“Why not marry now?” I asked, meaning the consummation as much as the sacrament.
He shook his head. “You’re crazy! There’s a war. I’m a prisoner.”
“But we love each other. Perhaps there is way.”
“Even you couldn’t make that happen!”
“Do you want I try?”
“Yes, yes, I’d marry you tonight, right here if this tree was a priest.”
He struggled up onto his knees and turned toward the tree. “Yes, I do!” he said, and I knelt beside him and exclaimed, “I do too!” and he pulled me into his arms again, running his hands over the goose-pimpled skin of my bare back. I thought now we might do it, and I wanted him to so much, but soon he told me to put my clothes back on because it was too cold.
I was filled with a cocktail of frustration and disappointment, love and pride in him, but he was right; it was becoming really cold. So I began to dress myself.
“When we’re married, I’m going to make love to you all night,” he said.
We sat huddled up to each other for a long time, not speaking. I wondered whether a time would come when it would be so normal to be together like this that we would take it completely for granted.
* * *
As I approached the house, I knew that something was wrong. I leaned my bike against the wall and turned the handle of the back door. Nothing. It wouldn’t open. I pushed harder. Nothing. Then I heard movement inside. For a terrible moment, I thought it might be the Russians, but then the bolts were thrown back, and I faced instead the fury of my mother.
She hauled me into the kitchen and slammed the door. The candle on the table wavered in the draft.
“I know where you’ve been,” she hissed, smacking my arms with her open palm and then with the back of her hand, blows buffeting me with each thought. “You little slut, you’ll bring shame on all of us.”
I dodged a blow to my head and pulled myself out of reach of her slaps, around the table.
“Don’t you know that Bill could be shot?” she raged. “That you could be shot?”
“He’s going to come back and marry me. We’re engaged,” I protested.
She faced me across the flame of the candle, and it threw witchlike shadows up over her face.
“You little idiot, don’t you think they all say that? Don’t you think that’s what men have always said? How will he come back when we’re the slaves of Russia? He’ll be back in London with his old girlfriend and never think of you, the stupid little farm girl who let him have his way.”
“That’s not true. I didn’t. It’s not true.”
“He’ll promise you anything to do dirty things to you. I didn’t think you were such a fool. You’ll be pregnant with his bastard child, and nobody will ever marry you. They’ll all know you’ll do it for free. We’ll be a laughingstock.”
“It’s not . . . I haven’t . . . He wouldn’t . . .”
“You’re the same as Matylda and Dagmar. I thought you were better than them. Does he give you money?”
“Mother!” I was shocked.
“They say Matylda and Dagmar do it for cigarettes and chocolate. Is that it? Did you sell yourself for a square of English chocolate?”
Now I was outraged too, hot with the temper I’d inherited from her. “I don’t know how you can think that. You brought me up. You know me. Or perhaps you do it for chocolate yourself? Is that what the Oily Captain gives you?”
We stared furiously at each other across the table, and she flopped into a chair. The light of the candle cast angry shadows on the kitchen walls. I sat down opposite her, barely able to keep still or quiet.
Her voice was softer, and I knew she was struggling to bring herself under control, just as I was. “As soon as the road and the harvest is finished, they’ll go back to Lamsdorf and be sent somewhere else, to another place. Captain Meier has told me. Your Bill will be sent to a munitions factory or a mine, and you’ll never see him again.”
“That’s not true.”
“Look. The Russians are coming, and the Nazis are getting ready to withdraw into Germany. They won’t let their prisoners run free to join the Red Army and fight against them. They aren’t such fools.”
I looked across the table at her, and in the flickering light, her face seemed older than I’d ever seen it before. The heat of my anger slowly drained, and I tried to s
peak calmly, to sound like a grown woman, not a petulant child.
“And I’m not such a fool either. I haven’t done the thing you think. Not without being married. He’s going to come back. I know he will, and I’ll wait for him.”
My mother bit her lip and nodded. “Then you’re going to be terribly hurt. He’ll never come back. Once he gets home, you’ll be like a dream, the only good thing that happened to him in all these years of hell. But his old life will close around him, and it’ll be easier for him to slide back into that than to come looking for you.”
“Then I’ll go to find him.” I saw myself setting out with a new hat and suitcase, climbing onto a train to take me to Bill.
“Izabela, listen to me. I know more about the world than you.”
“We will be married. You’ll see. I’ll prove you wrong.”
She pulled the candle toward her. “It’s late. We have the turnips to harvest in just a few hours. We both need to sleep.”
I stood up. She was right. We were both exhausted.
She crossed the kitchen with the candle and stopped at the foot of the stairs. “One thing.”
“What?”
“Promise me you won’t go down to the sawmill again at night. It’s too dangerous. If they catch Bill outside the wire, they’ll shoot him or take him straight back to Lamsdorf for punishment.”
I hesitated a long time, and the candle flame stuttered.
“All right,” I said, “I promise. Not at night.”
I was already forming other plans for us.
Seven
The next morning I left the house early and went to confession. As I’d hoped, there was nobody else in the church, not even the busybody village ladies who almost seemed to live there, polishing brass and fussing with flowers. I confessed my anger with my mother and blushed to mention my impure thoughts and deeds. The priest gave me absolution, but before we left the cocoon of the confessional box, I said, “Just a minute, please.”
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