Not That Sort of Girl (18 page)

To stop her constant nagging anxiety she went to London for a few nights to help her mother and go out with Ned’s regimental friends, Harold Rhys and Ian Johnson. They took her to dinner at the Czardas in Soho and to dance at the Café de Paris. They told her how brave Ned had been in the fighting, that he would surely get decorated (they were right; not so long afterwards he was awarded the Military Cross). Their vicarious pleasure in Ned’s gallantry and courage mitigated the extreme boredom of their company. She felt like an adult listening to prattling children and gave them only half her attention while the unoccupied part of her mind mulled and digested the feelings she had for Ned since he confided his fear to her. She felt protective and was glad that he was brave. She tried to persuade herself that it would be sensible to forget Mylo and concentrate on her husband, that if she tried hard enough she would succeed.

Driving home through St James’s Park, she passed banks of tulips lifting their heads to the moon and was reminded of walking hand in hand with. Mylo the year before, of picnicking with him on a park bench, eating rolls, pâté and an apple between them, for they had not the money to go even into a pub, and her heart was wrenched back on course.

R
OSE PAID THE TAXI
and greeted the cats, lissom in adolescence. They twined in and out of her ankles, mewed, ran towards the kitchen, indicating that they were hungry, had not been fed. She followed. Two perfectly good cat dinners awaited their eating. They crouched down and ate, needing her company, needing an audience. And I need to be here, she thought, standing in the kitchen already grown familiar; it is after all easier to bear anxiety in my own environment. She admitted that Slepe was her home.

Farthing crossed the yard carrying a shotgun. He wore a Home Guard armband on the sleeve of his working jacket and his Sunday hat.

‘Look a lot less foolish when you gets your uniform,’ Mrs Farthing’s voice from the cottage borne on the still air. Farthing shouted back, ‘I shoot with the gun, love, not with uniform.’ He sounded stalwart and jocular. Rose heard him mount his bicycle and clatter across the cobbled yard to the accompaniment of shrilly shrieked goodbyes from the little evacuees. She cupped her hands and shouted from the kitchen window, ‘I’m back, Mrs Farthing.’

‘Good. I fed the cats. Want anything?’

‘Nothing, thanks, let you know when I do.’

‘I’m going to have a big wash tomorrow. I won’t be round for a day or two, if you can spare me.’

‘I can spare you.’ Enough to know the woman was there. From the back of the house she heard the Ministry of Information telephone pealing unanswered. The clerks kept office hours, they also kept to themselves, casting doubtful looks at Rose if they crossed her path, as though she had no right, did not belong. Ned had been irritated to find that they had fitted new locks on the communicating doors. He frowned when Rose said she neither minded nor cared. ‘They should have asked permission,’ he had grumbled. ‘It’s my house, dammit.’

What does it matter? thought Rose, amused by Ned’s prickly attitude.

She found bread and cheese in the larder, ate standing in the kitchen, drank a glass of milk, poured a saucerful for the cats and went out to the garden.

A combination of dust in the atmosphere and evening mist coloured the moon like a blood orange. She stood on the steps leading to the walled garden and watched. In the distance she could hear the rattle and creak of harness, the rumble of wheels, the snort of carthorses as the Hadleys lifted the last load of hay by moonlight. Their lives were not much affected, thought Rose. They would not change as the Malones would be changed by their evacuees, and Ned and his friends by the Army. Even Farthing would change in the Home Guard, she thought, and smiled as she contemplated the self-importance already worn by Air Raid Wardens in the village. London was full of men joining the Fire Service or Ambulance, girls too. Uncle Archie and his Flora, to hear him talk, would run Scotland single-handed. Even her mother had said that the moment her flats were complete she would join the Red Cross. Rose wondered at all the activity, the stern enjoyment.

I want nothing to do with the killing, she thought, as she wandered under the lilacs, watched the cats crouch, freeze, leap after moths, miss. Yet I must do something; looking after Slepe and being wife to absent Ned is not enough to prevent me thinking. I must fight despair.

‘The evacuation is over,’ she said out loud. ‘There will be no more news. It is over, over, over. I must do something to still my mind.’ She walked through the door in the wall to the vegetable garden.

I will help Farthing here. Grow food. Perhaps the Hadleys will let me help on the farm? I will tire myself to sleep, prevent myself thinking, teach myself to forget. When she went up to bed the moon had lost its rosy look, resumed its gold. She drew back the curtains, undressed by its light, looked out at the cats still cavorting in the garden, got lonely into bed, supposed she would lie sleepless, slept.

Jerking awake she listened for a repetition of the sound. A pebble winged in through the open window to land with a skitter on the polished boards.

Springing to the window, she leaned out. Dark in the moonlight stood a man and a dog. The man, his face in shadow, stared up. The dog wagged, gently expectant.

‘Rose?’

‘Aah—Mylo,’ she whispered. ‘Mylo!’

‘We will climb the magnolia,’ he said. ‘Come, Comrade, up you go.’ He set the dog to climb, steadying her from below as he followed. The dog scrambled, scrabbled, the magnolia leaves clattered, man and dog came in over the sill in a rush. ‘Are you glad?’ Mylo held Rose in his arms.

‘I had so nearly given you up.’

‘You knew I would come.’

‘I hoped, how I hoped—the telephone did not …’

‘France is cut off for the duration.’

The dog flopped down on the floor with a sigh. Mylo, his arms around Rose, his face in her hair, swayed with fatigue. ‘Get into bed,’ she said, helping him off with his clothes. ‘Are you hungry?’

‘Later, later. Come close, take off that nightdress thing, let me feel you close.’ She lay beside him, he put his arms around her, buried his face in her neck, fell suddenly asleep.

Overwhelmed by joy Rose gulped great draughts of air sweetened by new-mown hay, sweetened far better by Mylo’s sweat. While Mylo slept exhausted and the birds in the garden tuned up for the dawn chorus Rose knew the intense happiness of relief. Curled up beside him she catnapped, waking to the delight of feeling him with her. She listened to his breathing, laid her hand on his heart, feeling its beat under her palm. On the floor the dog whimpered in its sleep, scratched on the boards with dreaming paws.

As the mistlethrush led the birds in noisy crescendo Mylo woke, turned, held her close, kissed her eyes, found her mouth, made love tenderly with fluent passion, lay back laughing.

‘We managed it right this time.’

‘Exquisite.’

What had she done, so wifely with Ned, so friendly with George? Not this, nothing like this.

‘And again?’

‘And again and again.’

Beside the bed the dog sneezed politely, craving attention.

‘My poor Comrade. I brought her for you. I said if you must come with me, you will have to settle with Rose. She is probably hungry. We have travelled far.’

‘I will take her down and feed her, let her out. Where does she come from?’

‘France.’

‘How?’

‘She latched on to me. Followed my bicycle. I had a bicycle some of the way. She wouldn’t go home. Has no home. She followed me from Conches to Perros-Guirec, leapt for the boat, fell in the water. I fished her out, she sneaked ashore with me at Brixham unnoticed and we came on here. Will you keep her?’

‘Of course. I have been waiting for the right dog. I stocked up with tinned food. Ned would have liked me to have a labrador. What do you suppose she is? Or an alsatian.’

‘A French mongrel.’

‘I will feed her. What’s her name?’

‘I call her Comrade …’

Rose slid out of bed. ‘Come, then …’

‘Stand still a moment, let me see you properly.’ Rose stood in the early light smiling.

‘When you are old, you will look no different. Who is here? Are you alone in the house?’

‘Yes. For the moment. The Farthings live in the cottage; he gardens, she helps when she feels like it; Ned’s regiment is at Catterick.’ She must mention Ned. He exists, she told herself without alarm.

‘Got back from Dunkirk, did he?’

‘Yes.’

‘One wouldn’t want one’s worst enemy to be taken prisoner. I’m glad.’

Rose pulled on her nightdress and dressing gown. ‘Must you?’ Mylo protested.

‘I will take them off when I come back.’ (Mylo lay back.) ‘Don’t you change, either …’

‘Hurry back.’

‘I will. Come, Comrade.’ Rose ran downstairs with the dog, let her out into the garden, watched her trot through the dew, crouch thoughtfully. I shall tell Ned she is a stray, that I found her lost. The dog scratched the grass, kicking little clods of earth behind her, came back to Rose full of cheer. In the kitchen she put the kettle to boil, opened a tin of dog food. While the dog ate, she laid a tray, made coffee, boiled eggs, made toast, found marmalade, butter and honey, carried the tray upstairs. The dog followed at her heels, ignored the cats staring balefully through the banisters.

Rose pushed open the door, carried in the tray. Mylo was asleep again. ‘Come in, all of you,’ she said. The dog lay down by the bed while the cats, every hair on end, their tails like bottle brushes, sprang for safety onto the windowsill, baring needle teeth, gaping with silent mews.

Mylo woke. ‘Rose?’

She put the tray on the bed. ‘I must keep you secret; I only brought one cup for us.’

‘Take those things off.’

She dropped the dressing gown and nightdress to the floor, rejoined him in bed. They ate breakfast sitting close, sharing the cup. Then they made love again without haste, delighting in one another.

‘You would think to see us now that we got it right the first time in that dismal little hotel.’ He stroked her flank. ‘I love you, love you, love you.’

‘And I you.’

‘You should see the expression of boredom on the faces of the girls I have regaled with my love for you. One yawned in my face.’

‘Many girls?’

‘You should not ask questions. How is Ned?’ he countered.

‘Ned is all right.’

‘Isn’t that
nice.’

‘Now then …’

‘You are right, neither Ned nor other girls have anything to do with us.’

‘No, nothing.’ (Almost nothing, very little.)

‘And do you speak of me?’

‘Never. If I did, if I began, I should not be able to stop. I would go on and on and my love might dissipate in the process.’

‘There is that risk.’

‘Not really,’ she said, ‘how could it?’

‘Ah, my love,’ he murmured, kissing her, ‘and yet in the nature of things it is better to keep me secret, nobody must know—my job.’

‘What job?’

‘To-ing and fro-ing.’

‘What? Where? Not …’

‘Yes. I shall be going back …’

‘No!’

‘I must. I shall come back often. Don’t weep, Rose, don’t weep. Nothing is easy.’

It was later she felt resentful.

T
HOSE PRECIOUS DAYS HAD
set a standard difficult to adhere to, Rose thought, waking in the hotel bed, listening to the slap of water against the hotel jetty. The weather had been perfect; they had been so happy in their love, finding one another with passion, merriment, satisfaction. There had been no room for doubt or jealousy. They had resolutely shut out fear. The memory of those days in the midsummer of 1940 would endure strongly enough to bring the prick of tears, give courage in times of doubt or boredom, keep hope alive through disappointment, irritation, jealousy and anger. Do I dare hope, she asked herself; is hope a neglected habit which was strong in youth when I feared Mylo was gone from my life, had stopped loving me, loved someone else, was dead? There certainly had been times when hope guttered pretty low.

As a robin began to sing in a bush outside she looked across at the Bonnard hanging in view of the bed. ‘I hoped you would keep it in sight,’ Mylo had said that summer morning. ‘You guessed that I sent it. You knew, of course?’

‘Even though you wrote no word.’

‘What is that garment she is wearing? A shift?’ Propped on his elbow, he examined the picture.

‘Camiknickers,’ she said.

‘Shift is a prettier word.’

‘She has broken a shoulder strap.’

‘Do you break yours?’

‘I remember one snapping when you hugged me in the park. I thought if I protested it would spoil the moment …’

Mylo had laughed at that. ‘Look at our Comrade,’ he had said and they leaned together from the bed to stroke the dog’s silky ears as she looked up at them, puffing out her lips with a whimper of devotion in the effort to express her affection, poor dumb animal.

I remember every moment.

‘I feel like that about you. I am as inarticulate as the dog,’ he had said.

‘You are not doing badly,’ she remembered saying with satisfaction. (Only temporary satisfaction, of course.)

We walked across the hayfields by the light of the moon. We lay on the grass in the walled garden under the lilac and syringa, we brought our meals out to the garden, we swam naked in the river. Why were we not interrupted or disturbed? I remember. Farthing was busy with his Home Guard; it was soon after that that he got his uniform; and Mrs Farthing had her big wash, an annual event of stupendous dimensions when curtains, covers, even rugs, were scrubbed clean; she probably made the little girls help her, so preventing them spying on us.

We lay in the bath and I told him about Nicholas and Emily; he said, ‘Do not let them hurt you, keep them at arm’s length; they will try to insinuate themselves into your life.’

‘All very well,’ she remembered saying; ‘they have a gift of some sort.’

‘A talent for finding your sensitive spot and prodding it?’

‘Yes,’ she had said. ‘You put it exactly.’

‘Then hide your sensitive spots.’