Blast From the Past (7 page)

There was some trouble at the check-in desk, not because of Polly’s age – she was, after all, perfectly legal and did not look particularly young. It was the T-shirt she was wearing that required careful negotiation, the objection being that it had a picture of a cruise missile on it that had been altered to make it resemble a penis. Polly explained that this was a comment on the masculine nature of war.

‘I’m afraid that other guests might find it offensive,’ the receptionist explained.

‘Oh, and I suppose nuclear arsenals aren’t offensive?’ Polly enquired.

‘Nobody is attempting to bring a nuclear arsenal into the hotel,’ said the receptionist. ‘Perhaps the gentleman could lend you his coat?’

Jack could not do this because he did not wish to advertise the uniform he was wearing underneath. Polly was clearly a loose cannon and a troublemaker and Jack did not want the manager phoning his colonel and complaining about the type of girl American officers brought to the hotel. In the end a compromise was reached. Polly reluctantly agreed to keep her arms folded across her chest while she remained in the public parts of the hotel, thus covering the offending political statement.

‘I thought this country was supposed to have freedom of speech. I don’t think!’ Polly muttered as Jack led her away.

And so began a relationship which very soon was to become an intense and all-consuming love affair. A love affair which, although in some ways desperately brief, would last a lifetime. Two people of different ages, different backgrounds and, most importantly, utterly different principles and values, were to be bound together from that ecstatic moment on.

Newton said that for every action there is an equal and an opposite reaction. Jack and Polly certainly lent substance to that observation.

A few days after Jack’s first encounter with Polly he wrote to Harry, angrily anticipating the sibling ridicule he knew he must endure.

‘
Oh, yeah, ho, ho
,’ he wrote. ‘
You think this somehow proves your piss-weak psychological theories, huh? You think that this girl is like Mom, am I right, Harry? Of course you do. You’re so transparent. Well, forget it. In fact before you forget it, shove it up your ass, then forget it. This girl is not a bit like Mom, or Pa, or you. She’s like me! Yeah, that’s right, like me, because she’s a fighter, the real thing, a two-fisted bruiser with poison for spit. OK, maybe what she fights for is a bunch of crap, in fact it is a bunch of crap. Quite frankly I hear less woolly thinking when sheep bleat. But so what? She’s got guts and she fights. She doesn’t sit on her ass smoking tealeaves like Mom. She doesn’t think that stuffing envelopes for the
Democrats
once every four years makes her an activist. What is more, Harry old pal, she hasn’t hidden away from life making dumb furniture which a factory could make better and at a tenth of the cost, like you, asshole! Polly is a soldier, she’s out there, punching hard and kicking ass for what she believes in. Besides which, she’s the sexiest thing I ever saw in my whole life, so screw you
.’

When Harry read the letter he was pleased. Despite its abrasive tone it was by far the most romantic letter Jack had ever written. In fact it was the only romantic letter he had ever written. The only time Harry could remember his brother being even half as excited was when he had been promoted to captain at a younger age than any of his West Point contemporaries. Jack had never been enthusiastic about anything except sport and the army. He had certainly never talked about being in love and yet now his entire soul seemed to be singing with it. Of course Harry was happy for Jack, but in the midst of that happiness he was also uneasy. It seemed to Harry that his brother now loved two things – soldiering and this English girl. It did not take all of Harry’s intellectual powers to work out that these two things were not compatible. Harry could see that in a very short time the crunch would come and that Jack would have to decide where his loyalties lay.

It was Newtonian physics again; for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Jack’s current happiness was surely storing up an equal quantity of unhappiness for someone.

13

‘POLLY? POLLY! ARE
you there? Are you there, Polly?’ The long-lost but still familiar voice breathed out of Polly’s answerphone. It was rich and low and seductive as it had always been.

‘Are you there?’ Jack said again into the telephone.

A little way along the street Peter was getting frustrated. He’d been surprised to see the telephone box occupied. It never had been before at that time of night. He felt angry. It was 2.15 in the morning. People had no business using public telephones at 2.15 in the morning. Particularly his own private, public telephone, a telephone with which Peter felt a special bond. Many times on that very phone Peter had heard the voice of the woman he loved. The cold mechanics within its reciever’s scratched and greasy plastic shell had vibrated with her adored tones. That phone, his phone, had been the medium through which Polly’s precious lips had caressed his senses.

‘It’s you, isn’t it?’ she would hiss. Hiss directly into his ear, so that he could almost imagine he felt her breath. ‘Fuck off! Fuck off! Just fuck off and leave me alone, you disgusting little prick!’

Peter didn’t mind Polly’s anger at all. Some relationships were like that, fiery and tempestuous. After all, he certainly gave as good as he got. Peter liked Polly’s fury. It was passionate, exciting. So many nights he had stood listening to those blistering, heavenly tones. Looking at the photographs he’d laid out on top of the tattered telephone directories, sucking on his precious straw and masturbating into the lining of his overcoat.

That telephone box was where Peter had had sex with Polly. It was his telephone box and now some bastard was using it.

Peter felt the knife in his pocket.

A flick-knife he had bought in Amsterdam one night when he had not had the guts to go into one of the shops that had women in the windows. Peter liked to carry that knife about with him for his protection and also because he fantasized that one day he would find himself in a position to use it in defence of Polly. He imagined himself chancing upon her in the street; she would be surrounded by vicious thugs who would be taunting her, pulling at her clothes. She would be weeping with terror. He would kill them all before claiming his reward!

Peter fondled the flick-knife in his pocket.

Still Polly did not pick up the phone. In fact she did not move. She couldn’t; she was too shocked. The only animation she could have managed at that point of supreme surprise would have been to fall over. She avoided this by gripping onto a chair back for support.

‘It’s Jack,’ she heard him say again. ‘Jack Kent.’

She knew it was Jack Kent, for heaven’s sake! She would never forget that voice if she lived to be two hundred and fifty years old. No matter what was to happen to her, be it premature senility, severe blows to the head, a full frontal lobotomy, she would still be able to bring that voice instantly to mind. Its timbre was resonant in her bones. Jack’s voice was a part of her. But what was it doing broadcasting out of her answerphone in Stoke Newington at 2.15 in the morning? His was quite simply the last voice in the world that Polly had expected to hear. If the Queen had woken her up to ask her round to Buck House for a curry and a few beers it would have seemed a more natural occurrence than this.

Still receiving no reply, Jack’s voice continued. ‘Weird, huh? Bet you’re surprised … Me too. I’m surprised and I knew I was going to call! How surprising is that? I just got into town. It’s only ten p.m. in New York, so it’s not late at all. Don’t be so parochial, we live in a global village now.’

It was the same old Jack, still cool, still cracking gags.

Still vibrant with sensual promise.

‘I can’t believe I just heard your voice, even on a machine. It’s just the same …’ Jack’s voice was even softer now. Even softer, even lower. ‘Are you there, Polly? Look, I know it’s late … real late … but maybe not too late, huh?’

Too late for what? Surely he didn’t mean …? Polly could not begin to think what he meant. She could scarcely begin to think at all.

14

JACK KEPT TALKING
. He knew she could hear him.

‘I want to see you, Polly. Are you there, Polly? I think you’re there. Pick up the phone, Polly. Please pick up the phone.’

Across the street Jack could see that the man he had noticed earlier was walking slowly towards the phonebox. In his hand was what looked like it might be the hilt of a knife, but there seemed to be no blade. The man walked right up to within a yard or so of the phonebox and then stood and stared. Perhaps he wanted to use the phone. Perhaps he wanted to use the phonebox as a lavatory. Perhaps he did not know what he wanted. Whatever was going on, it did not take the instincts of a soldier to work out that this man meant Jack no good.

Their eyes met through the cloudy plastic of the window. Peter and Jack, two men from opposite sides of the world, connected by a woman whom they had both wronged, with whom by rights neither should have been having anything to do at all.

Jack kept his eyes fixed on Peter’s. Matching him stare for stare. Meanwhile, he spoke again into the
phone
. Delivering his voice back into Polly’s life.

‘I think you’re there Polly. Are you there? Pick up the phone, Polly.’

He imagined her standing in her flat, staring at the machine. Its red light blinked back at her.

‘Are you there? Pick up the phone, Polly.’

Suddenly Polly did as she was bid and snatched up the phone, fearful that in her hesitation the voice would disappear again, back into the locked vault of her memory, where it had resided for so many years. Clunk. Whirr. Clunk. The answerphone announced its disengagement.

‘Jack? Is it really you, Jack?’

Down in the street, outside the phonebox, there was a glint, a flash of orange streetlamp light reflected on shining metal. Peter had pressed the button on his flick-knife and its wicked blade had leapt out into the night, thrusting itself forward from within the hilt, from within Peter’s clenched fist. It glowed orange in the night like a straight, frozen flame.

‘Yes, Polly, it’s me,’ said Jack. ‘Listen, can you hold the line for just one second?’

It was not what Polly had expected to hear, and it was not, of course, what Jack had expected to say. You do not, after all, return from the dead, wake someone up in the middle of the night, give them the shock of their life and then put them on hold. Circumstances, however, had forced Jack’s hand. At this supreme moment in his plans, in his life, fate had suddenly dealt Jack a wild card. A mugger had clearly blundered into
his
life and the situation would have to be dealt with.

Jack kicked open the door of the phonebox. It was a good kick, firm and accurate. A confident kick, which connected with the frame of the door rather than the windows and sent the whole thing swinging outwards at speed and into the man who stood outside. Peter had been in the process of reaching for the door at the time and the force hit him first in the hand and then in the face, surprising him considerably and making him drop his knife.

As Peter leant down to pick up the knife the door swung closed and Jack kicked it again. This time the door hit the top of Peter’s head and he went over into the gutter. Jack left the phone hanging, stepped outside and with one final bit of confident footwork sent Peter’s knife down a convenient drain.

‘If you want to make a call you wait, OK?’ said Jack to Peter. ‘I thought the British were supposed to be good at standing in line. If you disturb my call again you’ll regret it.’

With that, Jack returned to the box and picked up the phone.

‘Sorry, Polly, some guy thought he owned the callbox.’

Peter decided not to wait. He got up and ran. He was unbalanced and inadequate in any number of ways but his instincts of self-preservation were entirely healthy. He hadn’t wanted a fight anyway and he had not intended to use the knife, he had just wanted to scare the fellow off. Since that was now clearly out of the
question
Peter decided to get himself away and consider his position.

Perhaps he would not telephone Polly tonight after all. His hand stung and his head hurt and he felt in no shape to begin the delicate task of restarting their relationship. What is more, he had promised his mother faithfully that he had no current plans to call her. She had made him promise again only that night. He had been trying to sneak out of the house quietly, but she had heard him and had come running from her room in her nightie. Peter hated seeing his mother in her nightie; she seemed so much older and more shapeless.

‘It’s gone midnight, Peter. Where are you going? You’re not going to phone that bitch, are you?’

‘I’m going for a walk, and don’t call her a bitch. She’s all right.’

‘I’ll call her what I like, lad, and as long as you live in my house you’ll leave her alone.’

Peter had shrugged and headed for the door but she’d grabbed him by the ear.

One day she would do that one too many times.

‘Do you promise?’

‘Yes, Mum, I promise.’

In fact, Peter’s promises to his mother were pretty worthless. He had also promised that he would not obtain Polly’s new ex-directory telephone number. Computer hacking was something that the law took more seriously than swearing at people over their intercoms. Peter’s mother was worried that if Peter did it again he would be put away. He had done it again,
though
, and Polly’s number had been burning holes in his thoughts for weeks now.

But he would not phone her tonight. The tough American in his phonebox had spoilt it. He would just walk up the street, round the corner and past the building in which Polly lived. Peter liked to stand there in the emptiness of the night and stare up at her window. Imagining her alone in her bed. Imagining himself beside her.

Polly was not in bed. She was standing, phone in hand, shaking with shock.