a Breed of Women (12 page)

‘Up to?’ Noddy said innocently. He looked around. ‘We’re up to having a quiet drink with our friends. What’s with you, dad?’

‘The camping ground,’ said the policeman.

‘Yeah, the camping ground, dad. What about the camping ground?’

‘You know.’

‘There been some trouble up that way?’

The policeman simply glared.

‘I’m sorry if there’s been any trouble,’ Noddy said regretfully.

‘You lot’ve been up to the camping ground tonight,’ stated the policeman.

‘We have?’

‘You have.’

‘No law against going up to the camping ground.’

‘You’ve been making trouble.’

‘Us making trouble? Look here, not one of us people has touched another human being tonight. We haven’t even spoken to anyone. Was anybody hurt in this trouble you’re talking about?’

The man in blue sighed. ‘I almost wish they had been,’ he said.

‘That’s no way for a policeman to talk,’ Noddy said piously.

‘And you know why? Because then I could take you in.’

He stalked out. There were quiet smiles among the crowd.

Harriet glanced at the watch on Noddy’s wrist. ‘Oh my goodness, I was due home nearly half an hour ago,’ she said.

‘Say teacher kept you in late,’ suggested Nance.

‘I’ll have to,’ said Harriet grimly.

‘Come back,’ they called as she left, even Nance. Small wonder then that Harriet’s heart sank when Cousin Alice mentioned a job that might expose her lack of typing skills.

She determined to do better and to make up for time lost the previous week. When the next typing class came round, she attacked
the machine with tremendous energy, tat, tat, tat, sat, sat, tit, sat, tat, tits, sit, tits, sit.

The instructor looked at her work and sighed.

‘Have you ever thought of going in for anything else?’ he asked.

Harriet considered telling Cousin Alice that she would never make a typist, but Cousin Alice was already talking about her forthcoming job with such enthusiasm that Harriet didn’t have the heart to say anything.

She didn’t have the heart to go back to typing again the following week, either. Instead, she found herself sitting in the milkbar. She regarded this as inevitable, after the last time she had been there.

Noddy smiled when he saw her.

‘We’ve been waiting for you,’ he said.

‘I suppose you have,’ she said, and again she was not surprised by her reply.

‘We’ve got someone here to meet you,’ said Noddy.

Behind the counter of the milkbar, a young man was stripping electrical wires down behind the fridge. He had sandy hair and a face that was smooth, if rather red, as if he liked the open air but it didn’t like him. He had large pale blue eyes that protruded slightly and a small neat mouth. She supposed he was handsome in a way though exactly how she couldn’t decide. Certainly he was older than the rest of the crowd.

‘This is Sydney, someone said. ‘Sydney, meet Harriet.’

Sydney ducked his bottom teeth in front of his top ones in a curious little gesture of greeting. ‘Hi,’ he said. ‘The kids told me there was someone new in town, but I never guessed she’d look as good as you.’

Sydney’s presence was oddly disconcerting. He was an electrician who serviced equipment in the shop, and that was how they’d got to know him, they said. Of course he was older, as she had thought. He’d done his time, which it appeared meant he’d served his apprenticeship, not been to jail.

When he’d finished the job, he brought a milkshake over and sat down with them.

‘So tell me about yourself, Harriet,’ he said.

She blushed and hung her head. He was much older and more sophisticated than anyone she had so far encountered. Of course there was Jim, there was always Jim to remember, but he was different Sydney was obviously a man of the world. And there had
been Francis, and her heart turned over, wondering where he was, and what had happened to him, and if she could ever fall in love with anyone else in the world. She looked at Sydney. Perhaps it would be possible to fall in love with him. But then he was so old, he was probably tied up with a girl. He was sure to be in love with someone.

There were short coarse red-brown hairs on the backs of his hands and along the tops of his fingers.

What could she tell him that didn’t sound childish and banal? She lifted her head, helplessly looking for something to say.

‘Do you come here often?’ she said at last The words sounded so awful and so foolish that if she could have escaped immediately she would have. But Sydney was wedged in firmly beside her.

‘No,’ he said gravely, as though her question were perfectly normal. ‘Only when I’ve a job to do. Don’t you think that perhaps now I’ve met you I could find more jobs to do here?’

Harriet met Nance’s approving gaze. She nodded sagely. Bob jeered, meaning it was a good idea, and wasn’t love grand.

Noddy said tenderly, ‘She’s not one of us, you know. Not really.’ Harriet gave him a protesting look at this apparent betrayal, but Noddy’s wisely wobbling head was telling her, this is my way of assuring Sydney that he won’t have to spend all his time with us if he takes you on. It was an act of such exquisite concern and consideration that Harriet felt her insides melting with love towards them all, towards Sydney. She hoped he felt her soft and loving feelings coming through.

Apparently he did.

‘Shall I play you a record?’ he asked.

‘Please.’

He got up, went over to the jukebox and slid a coin into the slot. He knew exactly what he was going to play for her. As the disc settled onto the pad, he sat down beside her again, and this time he picked up her hand and held it in his lap. ‘You’ll like this.’

Elvis started to sing ‘Love Me Tender’.

Now all of her melted, the voice dissolved round her like marshmallow held in her mouth and sliding down her throat. She throbbed, she was spellbound, the voice was molten gold. She noticed that her free hand was wet, and saw it was with her own tears. This was a dream world and she was part of it. She had been admitted, songs were being played for her, she had friends, and, it seemed, she was in love.

When the song was over, it was time for her to go again. ‘Next Thursday?’ whispered Sydney against her ear.

She nodded, as if hypnotised. Her world was loving her and she loved it back. ‘I’d run you home, but I’ve got another job to go to,’ Sydney said. ‘I’ll be better organised next week.’

Outside in the crisp dark, more than the cold hit Harriet. Certain inescapable facts had to be faced.

For a start, there was no way she was going to typing the following week, which meant that she would have missed three nights out of four. She could only type things about sitting on tits and Cousin Alice seemed to think that she was almost ready to go on to higher things.

There was no way that she would be able to learn to do better than that by the time the job became vacant, and what she would do was a question with such frightening ramifications that she quailed. Even if she were to give up Sydney after the following week (and she had already come to think of him as somebody valuable) she still wouldn’t be able to type in time to take the job. The May holidays were almost there, with only one more typing lesson left before the end of term, and on that night she was committed to Sydney. It was disturbing, and yet somehow comforting, because it was abundantly clear that her misdemeanours would catch up with her whether she went to that last typing lesson or not; it would not be a miraculous cure-all for her failures, so meeting Sydney wouldn’t make all that much difference.

But that brought up a new and even more devastating problem. If the May holidays were only one typing session away, she would have no excuse to go out on Thursday nights for two whole weeks. The situation was oppressive. There was no other single solitary excuse for staying out late in Weyville.

‘I’m thinking too far ahead,’ she told herself sternly. ‘I must concentrate on next Thursday night. One thing at a time.’ And, suddenly buoyant, she went in to face Cousin Alice.

Her relative looked at her approvingly. ‘I’m glad to see you looking so happy, my dear. I can see you’re ready for that job. I must have a talk to your typing teacher about your speed before the end of term.’

Harriet reached over and kissed Cousin Alice swiftly on the cheek, something she had never done before. ‘Don’t do that. I want it to be a surprise for you, she said, and Cousin Alice’s face shone with pleasurable anticipation.

The following Thursday dragged endlessly. She couldn’t find zips
that were the right colour for people, she gave wrong change, and when Mr Stubbs heard a customer complaining, he sharply rebuked her. His words brought home to her the desirability of change, and reminded her that a change might be more disastrous than the way things were. It was a nagging discomfort Something she would face tomorrow. Though that wasn’t far away.

At last it was time to go. It was almost dark as she walked down the street to the milkbar. A quiet wind was stealing through Weyville, scattering lolly papers in the air. A newspaper wrapped itself around a lamp post, and as she rounded the last corner before the milkbar, it caught her, sending chill little shudders through her like a premonition of something she was about to lose forever. She put her head down and hurried on.

Outside the milkbar, an electrician’s van was parked, and sitting at the wheel was Sydney. As she approached, he leaned over and opened the door. ‘Hullo, there,’ he said softly. ‘Ready?’

‘Aren’t we going inside?’ she asked, with a stab of panic.

‘They told me you didn’t have much time on Thursday nights. They gave us blessings and said they wouldn’t keep you all to themselves when we haven’t got much time together.’

Harriet got in uncertainly, not sure whether to shut the door or not. Sydney leaned across her and pulled it shut, his arm leaning heavily against her breast as he did so.

‘Where are we going?’ she asked, fearfully, now that this adventure had begun.

‘To my place,’ he said cheerfully, as he started the van.

‘You have a place of your own?’

‘Not my own. My parents’ place. I live with my parents.’

‘Oh.’ A great flood of relief passed over Harriet. She was to meet Sydney’s parents. It occurred to her that she didn’t know his surname.

‘Merrott,’ he told her. Sydney Merrott — it seemed a reliable name, even one that you could live with. Mrs Sydney Merrott. Taking her home to meet his parents. Already. And he had a steady job. Handsome in a sort of way, too. Not that she’d want to get married straight away of course. All sorts of things would have to be planned, and they’d need to know each other a bit better.

At least she wouldn’t have to worry so much about a better job; she could just stick this one out. Being Mrs Sydney Merrott and an electrician’s wife would take up so much of her time that she
wouldn’t need to get involved in anything else much.

Now she found it easy to talk. As they drove through the streets of Weyville, she told him about the bad day she’d had, and how she wasn’t too keen on selling haberdashery. She supposed his mother must come into the shop, and he said he supposed she must, and Harriet said wouldn’t it be funny if they’d already met, and Sydney said, yes, wouldn’t it be funny and did his curious act of ducking his bottom teeth over his top ones as he looked at her out of the corner of his eye. That didn’t seem to matter much because she felt so beautiful and happy. Already she was planning how she would tell Cousin Alice about Sydney, because if he was taking her round to his parents’ place so early in the piece she would certainly have to invite him to Cousin Alice’s. Maybe that was quite a good thing because sooner or later she would have to take him to Ohaka, and he might never have met people like her parents before; not that she was ashamed of them, but Cousin Alice was Weyville. He would understand that she came from a mixed background and might even find it quite quaint and see his new wife as somebody rather exotic.

They pulled into the driveway of a wooden bungalow. It was difficult to see in the dark, but by the lights of the van Harriet discerned that Sydney might be quite impressed by Cousin Alice’s house. There seemed to be nothing wrong with the Merrotts’ house, but Cousin Alice’s looked better established. This house had the slightly raw look of a place that had been built recently, but it seemed prosperous enough. Maybe the Merrotts hadn’t been rich for very long.

One outside light was on. Harriet thought this curious, and supposed that the family must all be on the other side of the house. On the whole, though, the place had a strangely bleak and uninhabited air.

She became conscious that Sydney was nervous. Perhaps after all she didn’t come up to standard. She watched him take the key out of his pocket in an idly detached way, and the truth hit her. Silently he let her in, and turned on a light, shutting the door behind them.

‘Your parents aren’t here, are they?’ she said, matter-of-factly.

‘No.’

‘Why did you tell me you were taking me to meet them?’ she asked.

‘Hey, wait a minute,’ said Sydney. ‘I never told you that.’

‘You said you were taking me to your parents’ place.’

‘That’s right. I didn’t say they were here.’

The simple truth of this statement was irrefutable. ‘When will they be home?’ she asked.

‘In two weeks.’

‘You mean they’re away for two weeks?’

‘That’s what I said. Bit of luck, isn’t it?’

‘Can I sit down?’ she said, at last.

‘We’d better get on with it if you’re short on time,’ said Sydney, and now there was no doubt that he was nervous.

So this is what it comes down to, thought Harriet, as she followed him silently to his bedroom. I am now about to be introduced to the great mysteries of life. After wondering all this time, she hadn’t even had time to anticipate the event — or even to decide whether she particularly wanted to find out what ‘it’ was right now.

Sydney’s room was very neat. Twin beds were made up just in Cousin Alice’s style with bright bedspreads and matching curtains. There was very little to indicate Sydney’s interests in life except a guitar standing in one corner.