Searching for Pemberley (26 page)

“When I returned to the States in March '45, I went to Boca Raton, and a bunch of us would go to the clubs in Miami Beach. As far as the people in Miami were concerned, and the same thing later when I went to Los Angeles, the war was over. Patton was across the Rhine, 300,000 German troops had surrendered, the air war over Germany was winding down, so it was party time. It's true the worst of the fighting was over in Europe, but what about the Pacific? Everyone's dancing while Marines and sailors were dying by the thousands in the battle for Okinawa.

“It was the same thing when I went home on leave. I met guys who had been discharged from the Army, and they had never seen one minute of overseas service. The Army decided it was a waste of money to deploy them even though there were tens of thousands of guys who had seen plenty of combat, who didn't have enough points to go home. Did that make sense?

“I couldn't relax. Everyone was pissing me off. My neighbor tells me he's going crazy because of all the overtime he's putting in for the railroad. I flew three missions in six days, and he's complaining about making overtime. My dad keeps asking, 'What are you going to do with your college education?' I hadn't even been discharged at that point.

“It was worse in Atlanta. By then the war was over in the Pacific, and the newspapers and radio ads were all saying, 'We're looking to the future.' Great. Fine. But what about the guys in the VA hospitals or the families of flyers who were getting letters from the War Department informing them that their son's body had finally been located in a cemetery in Germany, and what did they want to do with the remains? I was angry ninety percent of the time.

“And then I met you,” Rob said, turning to face me. “You're living in that tiny attic apartment, sitting in front of a space heater trying to keep from freezing, and sharing rationed food with your landlady. The very first time I saw you, you told me you were wearing the same skirt you had worn for the last four years, but what did I think about your new red blouse? What I thought was, I'm going to take this girl back to my flat and make love to her all night long. I was falling for you even before we got to Mrs. Dawkins's house.”

I slid along the bench and sat next to him, taking his hand in mine. I understood why Rob wanted to live in England. The
British were still confronted with daily reminders, not only of what had been won, but also what had been lost. Rob wanted people to remember just how much had been sacrificed.

“Maggie, how can I plan a future with you when I seem incapable of putting together a plan for the next year, no less for a lifetime?”

I could see how unhappy he was, but I had to tell him what was on my mind. “You are hurting because you think the world has moved on when so many people are still suffering. But, Rob, people are not designed to be noble. Our basic instincts are to survive, and part of surviving is standing up, dusting yourself off, and getting on with it. Although I can't stand in your shoes, I understand what you are feeling. I've visited seriously wounded friends at Walter Reed Hospital, and I've been to too many funerals of friends and relatives.” Taking a deep breath, I continued, “I love you. But if you are expecting me to wait until all of the hurt has passed, I can't do that, and I won't let you shut me out.” Because he was staring at his hands, I couldn't gauge the effect my words were having on him. “What I'm trying to say is, we are in this together or we're not. Either we start a life together, or we say good-bye. That's not a threat. It's just the way it has to be.”

I asked him to walk me to the Underground but not to see me home. I told him I loved him and kissed him good-bye, and then I went down into the station alone.

THE NEXT DAY AFTER work, Mrs. Dawkins knocked on my door, and I was certain she was going to tell me that fights between lovers were not allowed in her house. Instead, she asked if she could have a word with me.

“You and your fellow have had a bit of a dust-up, haven't you?”

“It's not a dust-up, Mrs. Dawkins. It's a breakup. It didn't work out.” I was really depressed, and I didn't want to have this conversation.

“Rob's a good man,” she told me. “You don't let the good ones get away. There aren't enough of them around.”

Because I saw so little of Mr. Dawkins, I couldn't even guess what their marriage was like. I did know that she ate dinner with him every weekday night at 11:00 when he came home from his shift, and because of his hearing loss, she always kept a notepad in her apron pocket to write things down so she wouldn't have to shout at him. Sitting down on the bed, she said, “I'd like to tell you something if you're of a mind to hear it.” This was a side of Mrs. Dawkins I hadn't seen, and I couldn't imagine not listening to her.

“Even though my dad had a good job, my mother always rented out this room, your room, for what she called pin money. In 1934, Mr. Dawkins moved in. His wife had died, and he didn't want to live alone. His hearing's quite bad because he was an artilleryman in the First War. He can't tell how loud he's talking, so we always kept paper in the kitchen for us to write each other notes. After he'd been here about a year, he writes me a note, which I'm thinking is how he wants his eggs cooked. But on it says, 'Will you marry me?'” Snapping her fingers, she said, “Just like that. I didn't even know he was interested in me.

“Now, deaf as he is, Mr. Dawkins is not a bad-looking man. He had a decent job, didn't drink, went to church every Sunday, and paid his rent on time. But, I'm thinking, he's twelve years older than me. I was twenty-seven at the time, a very plain girl to be sure, but I hadn't given up all hope of falling in love. But I said 'yes' anyway. Do you know why?” I shook my head. “Because he's a good man, and that's a rare bird for sure. I've never had any regrets, and you've seen how the children run to him when he comes downstairs. I can't give Rob a higher compliment than saying, 'He's a good man,' and you are a kind, sweet girl, and you deserve him. I've seen the way he looks at you. Don't give up on him.”

Mrs. Dawkins was not given to displays of emotion, but when she kissed me on the top of my head, it opened a floodgate. She didn't say another word but continued to hand me one Kleenex after another until I could finally stop crying. After that, I went to the nearest pay phone and called Beth. I told her what had happened with Rob, and she asked, “Do you want to come here, or shall I come to London?” I told her that I would prefer to get out of the city.

Beth met me at the Stepton station in her Aston Martin convertible with the top down. Handing me a headscarf, she
told me to climb in. “When my father was dying from throat cancer—the cigars got him in the end—he said he was leaving me this car and asked that when I drove it to think of him, and I do every time.” Without any detours, we quickly reached the house, and Beth said, “We are quite alone. Jack has gone to Sheffield with Freddie to pick up some hardware for Montclair. So it's just we girls.”

Beth had lunch already prepared, and I set the tray down on the coffee table in the living room where we ate bread and butter sandwiches and drank tea. I told Beth what had happened, and afterwards, I had a good cry, not just about Rob, but about being so far from home. I was missing my mother so much that I was ready to book passage to New York as soon as the ship's office opened on Monday.

After listening without interruption, Beth sat quietly for a long while. Finally, it seemed that she had come to a decision, and then she said, “I'm not one to air my personal history unless it will serve some purpose. But Jack had problems, which I compounded, and I don't want Rob and you to fall into the same trap. So if you will allow me, I would like to share some things that may be of help in your understanding Rob.

“When Jack came home from France, he enrolled in a postgraduate program in engineering at Manchester, and he would come home to Montclair on weekends. He was never comfortable living above stairs, and I didn't blame him. It was a damned depressing place in those years right after the war. With Trevor, Matthew, and Tom gone, and Reed in and out of hospitals, a pall fell over the house.

“There was some joy in our lives. James was born in 1920, and Michael arrived in 1922. So we had two young children
scampering around the house, but Tom's death was an open wound for Jack. He found it impossible to heal with my mother reminding everyone of what the war had cost her personally.”

Beth looked at the clock and said, “It's gone noon, so I'm going to have a Royal Blackla.” She poured a whiskey for herself and asked if I would like one. Even though I didn't like the taste of the stuff, I nodded, and Beth made a whiskey and soda for me. “I don't drink all that often, but when I do, I take my whiskey neat.”

Returning to the sofa and pulling her legs up under her, Beth continued. “Next thing I know, Jack tells me that he has been offered a job building railway bridges in India. I agreed to go, thinking the job would last for two or three years. Jack worked for the railway company for ten years.

“In '34, he contracted malaria, and we returned to England for about fifteen months. It was a very good time for Jack and me, and the boys were so glad to be with their father. But by the time he was ready to go back to work, there was little work to be found because of the Depression. That's how we ended up in Argentina. A large percentage of the country's railways were controlled by British firms, and they wanted to protect their investments. Because Argentina had also been hit hard economically, the job involved mostly supervising maintenance work.

“Buenos Aires has a large British colony, and I felt as if I was back in England, circa 1910. All the upper-class b.s. I had left behind was alive and well in Argentina. The only person who disliked it more than I did was Jack. I didn't realize how much he hated his job, and he didn't enlighten me. And me? I made a lot of wrong assumptions that very nearly ended our marriage.

“One evening, while attending a company party, Jack's boss, who was three sheets to the wind, came up and slapped him on
the back and said, 'Jack's the best. He's the only one who doesn't complain when we send him to some god-awful hellhole. He's even volunteered to go to some of these dumps.' That statement opened my eyes. In India and Argentina, I could rarely visit Jack at his job sites because of disease or unrest or other dangerous situations. Now I believed that Jack had asked for these assignments for the very reason that they were so inaccessible. I was wrong, but that's what I believed at the time.”

A look of resolution came over Beth's face. “I decided that if I wasn't wanted, I bloody well could be unwanted in England. At least I would be with my sons. I told Jack that I was returning to England to help his mother care for his father, who was in decline because of heart problems. On the long trip home, all I could think about was what a sham our marriage had been.

“In late 1938, all eyes were on Germany, which, once again, was beating the war drum. For Great Britain, a country that had lost 700,000 men in a war with Germany, there was an underlying panic that it could happen all over again. When Hitler threatened war over the Sudetenland, Britain signed a pact agreeing to the separation of that region from Czechoslovakia, which then became a part of a greater Germany.

“Neville Chamberlain has been vilified for the concessions he made to Hitler at Munich regarding the Sudetenland, but I can tell you he would have been strung up by his toes in Trafalgar Square if he hadn't done just that. People forget that Chamberlain was met by cheering crowds at Heston Airfield when he returned from the Munich conference. The British did not want another war. The French did not want another war. But we were going to get one because now Hitler was talking about Poland.

“Jack was still in Argentina when war was declared in September '39. When he arrived at Crofton Wood shortly before Christmas, I had not seen him for half a year, not since his father's funeral in May. Jack got a job right away because England was rapidly converting civilian plants to military uses. He was even busier in 1940 with the Battle of Britain, trying to repair infrastructure faster than the Germans could bomb it. Then came the Blitz. I saw very little of him in the first half of '41.

“Jack had his own moment of clarity that year. He told me he would be away for weeks at a time because of the extensive damage done to England's industrial cities. I told him I expected that even though nearby Liverpool and Birmingham had been pummeled, it would be absolutely necessary for him to work in Southampton, which was as far away as he could get from Crofton and me. He just stared at me, but he didn't dispute it.

“In late '42, when the wounded started to come back to England from the desert campaigns in North Africa, I was working at a hospital in Sheffield as a nurse's aide, a Volunteer Aide Detachment. In the First War, we had a code of conduct that stated, 'Do your duty loyally; Fear God; Honour the King.' It was a simpler time. We dealt in moral and patriotic absolutes, which is why the country didn't scream bloody murder when 60,000 of our boys died in one battle with nothing to show for it.

“At first, I handed out coffee or tea and sandwiches to returning soldiers at train stations where the waiting rooms had been turned into reception centers, but after Jack went to France, I received extensive medical training at a London hospital and was assigned to the hospital ships sailing between Boulogne and Folkestone. The orderlies walked between double-tiered bunks asking, 'Where in Blighty do you live?' That's what they called
England—Blighty. They wanted to get the men to a hospital closest to their home.

“In February 1917, Jack was wounded when an ammunition storage facility exploded sending shrapnel everywhere. He was sent back to England with an infected arm. I received permission from my head matron to go to him, but only after producing a certificate of marriage. These matrons were tough, very tough, and they didn't tolerate any nonsense or fooling around from their volunteers. They cared so much for their patients, but frankly, until you proved yourself, they didn't give a shit about you.”

As serious as the discussion was, I couldn't help thinking how different Beth was from the lady I had met the previous autumn. That Beth would never have said “shit” or drank whiskey “neat.” I liked this Beth a lot better.