Searching for Pemberley (18 page)

“Did he say anything about the younger brother after the father took him out of school?”

“Yes. Reed was an orderly in a medical unit in Boulogne where the wounded waited for ships back to England. Jack took a belt of scotch and went quiet before finally saying, 'When the Germans broke through our lines in the spring of 1918 near Amiens, every man who could hold a rifle was thrown into the fight, including me and including Reed. We held the line until reinforcements arrived from England, but it was over for the boy. They sent him home to a hospital called Craiglockhart near Edinburgh where he was treated for shell shock.' Jack couldn't continue, so we changed the subject.”

After thinking about all Jack had told him, Rob said, “Everyone has their breaking point. The difference is most guys recover over time, but it seems that after Reed went to the front, his mind snapped, and he never came out of it.”

I ARRIVED HOME FROM work one evening to find my landlady waiting for me inside the front door, and in a voice that clearly showed her disapproval, Mrs. Dawkins informed me that I had a “gentleman caller.”

I was carrying a brown bag full of Spam, Lorna Doone cookies, and Wonder Bread for the family. On payday, I tried to bring home something that was either unavailable or in short supply. For the first time in its history, including wartime, Great Britain had found it necessary to ration white flour. After Mrs. Dawkins saw what was in the bag, her attitude softened.

“I'll get a pot of tea going, and I'll bring you in some biscuits. Go see what your visitor wants.”

When I opened the sliding door to the family room, I immediately recognized my gentleman caller, even though I had never met him before.

“Maggie, I'm James Crowell.” Handing me a large manila envelope, he said, “My mother wanted you to have this, and I
decided to hand deliver it. After hearing all about you over the Easter holiday, I thought I should at least introduce myself since we both live in London.”

Other than James Crowell being a couple of inches taller than his father, he looked so much like him that I felt as if I was seeing Jack when he was in his twenties.

“Do you have time to stay for tea? My landlady has a pot brewing.”

“That would be wonderful. My wife and daughter stayed behind with my parents for another week, and I don't like going home to an empty flat.”

Carrying a tray with a teapot and Lorna Doones, Mrs. Dawkins gestured for us to go across the hall to the front parlor. I was being admitted into the holy of holies, and without Rob. After setting the tray down, she offered to “pour out.” I was finding this whole scene to be rather funny. It was obvious Mrs. Dawkins was trying to get an idea about who James was and whether Rob had some competition.

“The boys will want to listen to their shows on the wireless, so you can visit in here.” Standing behind James, Mrs. Dawkins pointed to her ring finger and then to James, who was wearing a wedding band. I gave her a nod to let her know that James wasn't going to be able to put anything over on me.

“I am so glad to finally get to meet you,” I told James. “I've heard so many stories about you and your beautiful wife, and I spent a lovely afternoon with Julia.”

James talked for a few minutes about his daughter and how she had started crawling and was getting into everything before the conversation finally worked its way around to a discussion of his childhood in India.

“Mike and I were really small when we went out to India. Like most Anglos, we spent most of our time inside the walls of a compound, including going to school. Everyone had a ridiculous number of servants, but a lot of that had to do with their own rules. We had a cook and an ayah, or nanny, who spoke only Hindi. We also had a bearer, the Indian version of a butler, named Kavi, who taught us martial arts.” Taking a sip of his tea, he added, “India was unique. I got to ride on elephants and camels, and we had a mongoose as a pet. But we also had mosquitoes, red ants, and birds that made noises at night that would scare the life out of you.

“Early on, it was fun because there were lots of kids our own age. But that changed because most families sent their kids back to England to go to school when they were eight or nine. My mother refused to believe there was any benefit in sending a child off on their own at so young an age. I think she held us especially close because of losing her brothers in the war, so we didn't go to school in Glenkill in Scotland until we were twelve years old.

“Our tutors were mostly graduates from Oxbridge—Cambridge or Oxford—who came out to India for a bit of an adventure. We went back to England about every other year. The problem for me was going back to India. After spending the summer in the English countryside, it was very difficult to return to the heat, the bugs, and the smells.

“What I liked best was sailing home and going through the Suez Canal. One time when we were at Port Said, we saw a troop ship going back to England. It was a tradition for the soldiers to throw their topees, those tan helmets everyone wears in the tropics, into the water. If it sunk, you would never return to India. If it floated, you'd have to go back. It was a riot to see
all the soldiers throwing their helmets into the air and to watch their faces when the blasted things wouldn't sink.”

“What did you do when you didn't go back to England?”

“One year, we went on safari in Kenya. We saw elephants, hippos, lions, and lots of other exotics. The whole time we're looking at these animals, we're standing there in the blazing heat, swatting flies. When we got back to England, we went to the London Zoo and saw the same animals without the heat. Now, you could set my brother down in the middle of a desert, and he'd find a way to adapt. Not me. My preferences are pretty girls, football, real ale, and cool weather, in that order.”

I remembered Beth telling me that James had actually liked living abroad until he went to school in Scotland when he was twelve. After getting to know the other students, he resented that he had been denied a “normal” British childhood.

“In India, you have to assume that everything is riddled with disease, and everything we drank was made with chlorinated water. When we went to the hill stations during the heat, my mother had to watch the man who milked the cow to make sure he washed his hands. At night, we practically lived under mosquito nets. I was glad when it was time for me to go to school. I'm British and proud of it. I like plain food—meat and potatoes—none of those curried dishes for me.”

“I hope you like spaghetti, since you're married to an Italian,” I said.

“Actually, I do like it, which is a good thing, because that's all we eat. With the flour shortage, even spaghetti is hard to get. Angela goes to this Italian market in Finsbury, and the owner gives her enough for a few days. He doles it out in small amounts because he wants Angela to come back as often as possible. I
went with her one time, and even with me standing right there, the owner was staring her up and down. Cheeky bastard.”

“I understand you got married in Italy?”

James nodded his head vigorously. “When Angela comes back to town, we'll have to get together so I can show you our wedding pictures. Everyone in the village came to the party, and we had a blast, especially Mike. All the girls were after him. It's a good thing he brought a lady friend from Malta, or he wouldn't have had a minute to himself.

“Mike's my best mate, but we're complete opposites. He's the man every mother wants her daughter to marry. He was born knowing you're supposed to hold a door open for a lady. I had to be taught those things, which I was in a deportment class that my mother signed us up for one summer. We also had ballroom dance lessons, which we took with our cousins, Geoff and Violet Alcott, and the four of us were tossed out of class for cutting up so much.”

“What did your parents say?”

“Dad didn't care at all, and Mum had three brothers, so nothing surprised her. Besides, she's not as prim and proper as you think. When we got older, Mum told us about going back and forth between Boulogne and Folkestone on the hospital ships in the First War, and the Tommies taught her these really vulgar music hall numbers. One time, she started singing one, and we nearly wet our pants we were laughing so hard. Put her and Freddie in the same room, and you've a night's entertainment.”

“Who's Freddie?” I asked.

“My God, Freddie! He's the guy who keeps Montclair running. The Pratts brought him from Australia when they moved to England. Mr. Pratt was on the board of a juvenile
home, and that's where he found him. Freddie can fix anything. He's even better than my father, but he's far from your typical servant.

“At first, he made Grandpa Crowell crazy, but my grandmother loved him right off. Always said he reminded her of 'my Tom.' After a while, my grandfather saw Freddie's charm, especially since he's a comedian and loves to tell stories and jokes. When the Catons bought Montclair, Freddie was part of the package because he's brilliant at fixing things and saves them a ton of money. He's the one who taught Mike and me to play poker.”

“Do you mean he's still there?”

“I just saw him last week when I was in Crofton. Mike and I always visited him when we were between terms. When he's not on maintenance patrol, he's below stairs following the ponies. He has a motor scooter to go into town to place bets at the pub and play darts. The guy's brilliant.”

James leaned back into the chair. “My mother told me you'd sit there very quietly, and before I knew it, I'd be telling you my life story.”

I laughed and asked him, “What is your life story?”

“I was at Cambridge when I got called up. After basic and officer training, I was assigned to the 8th Army in Italy on the Adriatic side of the Gustav Line. I got there in December of '43, and everyone associated my arrival with terrible things happening, like our being sent to fight with the Americans at Anzio and in front of Monte Cassino. For a short time, I was billeted in a town south of Bologna with a fountain in the center and terraced vineyards—the whole scenic Italian village bit. That's where I met Angela.”

The tone of James's voice changed as soon as he mentioned his wife. He started to smile, and it was obvious he was thinking about the first time that they had seen each other.

“I was serving on the staff of the regimental HQ. I was told to go find the mayor, but he wasn't in his office, so I went to the office of the town's notario.” James asked if I knew what a notario was, and I shook my head “no.” “Neither does anyone else, except it seems that no piece of paper is signed in that town that hasn't passed through his hands. When I got there, Angela was bringing her father his lunch. That's all it took.”

“So you're a romantic like your brother?”

James shook his head. “I always thought I'd meet a girl from England at a dance or something like that. But when I saw Angela, I was completely bowled over. That's the difference between Mike and me. I was surprised at how weak at the knees I got; Mike would have been expecting it. That's what happens to a guy who read the Arthurian legends as a kid.

“When the shooting stopped, I went back to see Angela and asked her father for permission to court her. He agreed because, as long as I was in the Army, I could still get my hands on better food. The dating phase lasted five months, and we were always chaperoned, usually by her two widowed aunts, who walked behind us, arm in arm, dressed all in black. Kissing Angela was a challenge; anything more was an impossibility.

“After I got out of the Army, Angela and I were finally allowed to get married. I basically became her father's errand boy, but at least I learnt to speak Italian. Once Angela found out she was pregnant, we thought it best to move to England so the baby would be a British citizen. Italy was and is in terrible shape. Everyone in town had relatives in America sending them
food parcels, including Angela and me. When the time came to leave, we practically floated out of the village with all her relatives crying.”

James stood up, put on his coat, and pointed to the envelope. “You know that's only a fraction of what my parents have stored away in an upstairs room. I know Dad worked on it during his convalescence, and Mom cataloged everything during the war when she wasn't at the hospital. It probably helped to take her mind off the war, especially since my brother was in Burma fighting Japs.”

“And you were in Italy fighting Germans,” I quickly added.

“Yeah, but I always thought I was better off than Mike, working on planes in hot, humid, bug-infested Burma. Not only did he have to worry about the Japs, he also had to keep an eye on the locals, who preferred their Jap invaders to us. So much for making the world British.” Then he smiled and said, “And Italian girls are much prettier.”

Before I let him go, I wanted to ask him one question. “Is your Aunt Margie still living, the one who helped with some of the family research?”

A complete change of expression came over James's face. “I'm sorry,” I said quickly. I had said the wrong thing.

“No, no. It's all right. Aunt Margie. My God, I haven't thought about her in years.” He looked down and made a circular pattern on the carpet with his foot before saying, “She was married to my Uncle Reed. They had a cabin in Scotland west of Perth.” After a long pause, James said, “I've got to go.”

While buttoning his overcoat, he said, “My parents are very fond of you, and I think before all is said and done, you'll know more about my family than I do.”