A Winter's Child (16 page)

‘Good Heavens,' said Eunice Hartwell, coming unexpectedly through the door, her own long, pale hair uncoiling itself in wispy strands from an uncertain bun. ‘Polly – what have you done?'

‘Get out,' shrieked Polly, throwing yet another hairbrush across the floor at her sister. ‘Don't look at me. I've made myself plain, that's all – like you.'

But, having contemplated those riotous golden curls for an hour or so from every angle, it occurred to her that their distinctly boyish look really did – as Claire had suggested – accentuate the undoubtedly feminine charm of the face and figure beneath, creating – on the whole – an impression that was piquant, original, above all
modern.

‘I know women who spend a fortune having their hair curled trying to look like that,' said Claire, not from motives of kindness but simply to get away.

‘It's very smart,' said Eunice doubtfully. ‘Even too smart, I'd say.'

‘Oh dear,' breathed Miriam. ‘I do hope no one could mistake her for a – what is that word they use – flapper?'

And thus encouraged, since to be called a flapper had long been the subject of her most cherished dreams, Polly fell promptly and head-over-heels in love with her new appearance, parading it for the rest of the day before an admiring chorus made up of housemaids, the garden boy and Eunice's obliging husband Toby who, very kindly, went through the performance of failing to recognize her.
‘Who
is that stunning girl? It can't be Poliy.'

‘The very same,' she told him, sketching her little dancing curtsey, her elation lasting until she came face to face with Benedict who effectively, if perhaps unintentionally, quenched her ardour by the simple fact of not appearing to notice it.

‘Benedict – I have cut my hair.'

‘Ah – then I assume that is why you have missed your piano lesson yet again?'

‘Oh, Lord-
that!
‘

‘Yes, Polly. That. I have just come across Miss Peterson leaving by the back gate – having spent an hour waiting for you in the drawing room – and have sent her home in the car. And I am sorry to have to say to you once again, Polly, that if you feel obliged to cancel a lesson then it seems no more than common politeness to let your teacher know. I am surprised you should allow this to keep on happening, Miriam. The woman comes all the way from the other side of town by tram and, apart from her inconvenience, it seems nonsensical to keep on paying her for lessons Polly does not have.'

‘Oh Benedict, dear,' smiled Miriam, ‘If you have sent Miss Peterson to Faxby in the car, how is Claire to get there? Poor Claire – you will just have to put up with us an hour longer.'

And when the car returned, Miriam placed her gently inside it with a bouquet of freesias, a covered basket containing cinnamon buns and a large chocolate cake, and the information that she would see her on Sunday.

‘Sunday?'

‘Why yes, dear. We always dine together, absolutely all of us, on Sundays. And now that you've settled in you must be with us too. Family day, my husband always called it, and no leave of absence, no excuses. Such a
positive
man, my Aaron. They can eat where they like, he used to say, Monday to Saturday, when they're old enough. But one night a week they'll come home and eat at my table – since I pay their bills. Which was his way, of saying, of course, how much it meant to him to see us united in affection – everyone – all together. My husband set great store by tradition – a nuisance sometimes, I do agree. But Benedict is so like him. And, as the new head of the family, he
does
insist upon it.'

‘I see.'

‘Yes dear.'

And she knew she had been delicately, almost caressingly reminded that Benedict was her paymaster too.

She attended the garden party held for Miriam's birthday in May, wearing a long, pale lilac garden party dress and a large hat with a floppy brim and a trailing, lilac chiffon scarf around the crown – an outfit of which even Edward approved – taking her turn at strolling around the garden arm in arm with Miriam who, in powder blue lace and pearls, was at her radiant best. The sun was shining, the massive hedge of rhododendrons had flowered overnight, in tribute to the occasion, with a glorious display of deep red, deep purple, lilac and white. The cherry orchard beyond it had been transformed, by the warm weather into a fragrant cloud of pink blossom. There were bluebells raising their delicate heads beneath the wide arms of the chestnut trees, girls in pale dresses gliding like swans across the lawn and young men –
very
young, most of them – in flannels and blazers and public school ties reminding Miriam so forcefully of Jeremy that she was obliged, for a vulnerable moment, to lean rather heavily on Claire's arm, regaining her equilibrium only when the raucous presence of Eunice's four sturdy sons and Benedict's two physically more fragile but uncomfortably correct young gentlemen – home from school for ‘grandmamma's party' – brought to her notice the more awkward realities of boyhood.

‘Do go and
play,
children,' she said quite nervously to Benedict's serious, silent boys, a suggestion she had no need to make to her four Hartwell grandchildren who, from the moment of their arrival, had been knocking one another to the ground and scuffling like boisterous puppies, ruining, in the first five minutes, the expensive new shoes and jackets Eunice had bought – but probably not yet paid for – from Taylor & Timms.

‘Eunice dear, do you think – for just a little while – that they could be induced to keep their voices down?'

‘They're only children, mother – boys, after all.'

‘Eunice dear – Justin is fifteen and Simon twelve –
big
boys, you know.'

‘Mother! They're only having fun. It's only
natural.'
And Eunice flushed and glared hotly at Benedict's two immaculate, almost motionless sons who did not seem natural to her in the least.

There were little tables with organdie cloths set out on the lawn, beneath the trees, or simply dotted here and there about the rose garden. There was champagne, a heart-shaped birthday cake iced in Miriam's favourite sugar pink, cream ices, water ices, mountains of vivid confectionery, the string quartet from Feathers'Teashop playing in the trellised arbour by the goldfish pond. There were presents for Miriam, each one of her Hartwell grandchildren being dragged up to her in turn by Eunice, clutching a gift which Eunice had spent anxious weeks choosing, awkward hours packaging; Benedict's children performing the same office as correctly as little soldiers on parade, bowing gracefully and presenting parcels which had been wrapped by Taylor & Timms at Nola's laconic request, and which contained whatever the manager of that obliging store had thought appropriate. And – in accordance with Miriam and Aaron Swanfield's time-honoured custom – there were also gifts for everyone else, the day ending with a vast treasure hunt all over the house and grounds, in pursuit of the brightly coloured little boxes of treasure which Miriam had carefully labelled and hidden away for every guest.

‘How exceedingly generous,' said Edward Lyall in Miriam's hearing, knowing there would be a box of cigars somewhere with his name on it.

‘What fun,' said Nola sourly, having not the least intention of rummaging through redcurrant bushes or crawling underneath the dining room furniture for the sake of the silk scarf or the powder compact she would be likely to find.

‘What
fun
,' said Polly, devoutly meaning it, being ready to scale Everest should there be the chance of a surprise parcel at the summit.

‘How lovely mother looks,' said Eunice, needing an ally, since she would be unable to conceal from Benedict for much longer that her fifteen-year-old Justin had – fortunately without damage to himself – inflicted considerable and costly injury on a neighbour's property while borrowing
‘naturally
without permission', Toby's car. Nor would she be able to explain to him, since she did not fully understand it herself, why Toby had seen fit to exchange the only slightly scratched and almost brand new car for a much more expensive model.

‘Boys will be boys,' she kept on muttering to herself, her glance straying, despite her goodwill and her better judgement, to Benedict and Nola's children who appeared to have spent the afternoon drawing out chairs for old ladies, behaving like perfectly functioning little machines who would grow into big, powerful machines, like Benedict, or would malfunction restlessly, maliciously, like Nola. Her children, at least – if a little out of hand – were
natural.

‘Come on, lads. What about a scout round the hayloft?' said Toby, sounding hearty, feeling resigned, having no greater inclination for party games than Nola but well aware of the need to distract his own four rumbustious boys from their proposed schemes of ducking one or other of their cousins in the fishpond.

‘Happy hunting,' cried Miriam, blowing kisses to spur them on and waving her tiny, sparkling hand.

‘What a wonderful woman,' said Edward.

‘Tally ho,' shrieked Polly, bounding away like a greyhound off the leash, followed by a crowd of eager, awkward youths and one exceedingly optimistic old man.

‘Excuse me,' said Nola, ‘I have a headache coming on.'

Nothing at all – although one knew he
must
be there – had been seen of Benedict.

‘My dear,' called Miriam, beckoning to Claire, ‘come and keep me company. There's no need for you to go hunting. I have your gift ready.'

And with an affectionate hand she gave Claire an antique gold and enamel locket which held the photograph of a handsome, unknown child and a lock of baby-fine, baby-blond hair which she understood, with alarm, had been Jeremy's.

‘Wear it on Sunday, dear, at dinner, with your pretty red dress.'

She doubted if she could ever bring herself to wear it at all. The chain burned her skin as Miriam fastened it fondly but firmly around her neck, telling her – as she had feared – that the locket had been Jeremy's birthday gift to his mother, long ago on a warm May afternoon just like this, paid for with the whole of his first schoolboy allowance, the photograph taken on a furtive trip to Leeds for which she, suspecting him of mischief, had punished him.

‘And he just stood there and took the blame for something he hadn't done because he knew how much I loved my little surprises and he didn't want to spoil it for me. What a good heart he had.'

‘Yes.' Claire knew no reason to doubt his goodness. Quite simply with sorrow and guilt and a familiar sense of futility, she could not remember it.

‘And such sparkle. Such a sense of fun and folly – like me, I fear.'

She could not remember that either.

Returning to Mannheim Crescent she bolted her door, took off the locket and shut it hastily away in a drawer where, once out of her sight, it became a voice whispering to her all through the night to be let out, set free,
remembered,
so that her dreams were threaded once again with that terrible line of blinded men, shuffling towards the horrific, crucified presence she knew, without looking or daring to look, must be Jeremy. And even when terror jerked her awake and she lay in the heavy dark – clammy and weak with gratitude that the dream was over – she was so painfully conscious of the baby-fine hair in the drawer at her bedside that she had to get up and take it away into the other room before daring to sleep again.

Yet there were days when she succeeded in holding herself aloof from all Swanfield and Lyall intrusions, in the manner of a cat who can be seen and even touched but remains, nevertheless, quite separate. She had not yet begun to think about happiness. It was too soon for that and, in any case, she did not yet require it. She had already experienced great joy, albeit in difficult conditions, and although she had lost the source of it she did not believe that she had lost the capacity. Eventually it would revive. Already – and it did not trouble her to admit it – her sensuality was no longer stunned and dormant but stirring once more with curiosity, the sound, healthy impulses of a perfectly functioning female body which might hurry her – perhaps before her heart was ready – to take a lover.

But for the time being, and once again in cat-like fashion, physical sensations of a lesser nature contented her. After four years of personal discomfort, of cold water or contaminated water or no water at all, of cold feet, blistered hands, damp mattresses, dysentery, fleas, it was luxury enough to be warm and clean. After four years of personal danger it was a blessed relief to be safe. After four years of overcrowded huts, communal eating and bathing and breathing she was rich now in the possession of a door to lock, space in which she could move unquestioned and unobserved. After four years of belonging, by her own choice, to any man who cried out in pain, she was content now – for a little while – to drift, to evade, to rest on life's surface until, strengthened by solitude, she might equip herself to choose a new purpose. And until then, Mannheim Crescent with its motley population of drifters, evaders, solitaries, its prevailing winds of aimlessness and disillusion, seemed her rightful home.

There were rainy mornings when she did not get up at all, mornings of sunshine and warm breezes when, wrapped in a kimono which had seen better days, its embroidered dragons fraying at their seams, its gold threads coming loose, she would go out into the little walled garden, barefoot, her hair undone, and drink her breakfast coffee on a stone seat beneath the plum tree, smoking and reading, basking in the rich, sweet idleness of making no plans, journeying only from one moment to the next, a spectacle of Bohemian disarray which would have appalled her mother. She watched the plum blossoms open their eyes; absorbed through her skin, the fragrances of damp, growing green, of bluebells and dandelions standing companionably together, of ferns uncurling themselves in the sun. She listened to the rustling of leaves and grass, the movements and voices of birds and, every now and then, the notes of a hesitant piano from two floors above where a fragile spinster taught a limited repertoire of Strauss waltzes and Beethoven's
Fur Elise.