Daughter of Riches (25 page)

Bernard was surprised – he had heard the Carterets had been turned out of their home, but he had no idea they were living in St Peter. He called out a greeting and Charles came across the road, beaming, and as taken by surprise by the chance encounter as Bernard was.

‘Bernard! Well, well, what are you doing over here?'

Bernard explained, and Charles chuckled.

‘I might have known you wouldn't be kicking your heels for long! I hope this doesn't mean I've lost you for good! I intend to get the agency up and running again as soon as this damned war is over and we're back to normal, you know, and I shall need you to help me.'

Bernard said nothing. This was not the time, he thought, to tell Charles that during the last two years he had given a good deal of thought to what he would do when the war was over and that he had made up his mind to try and set up in business on his own account. An electrical contracting business might fit the bill, he had thought, something that would make use of his newly acquired skills and also give him the chance to be his own boss. Whereas in the old days the job in the tourist agency had seemed an excellent starting point he now felt by the time things ‘returned to normal' as Charles put it he would be past the stage where he could be satisfied with being a glorified office boy.

‘How are your family? Are they all well?' he asked now.

‘As well as anyone can be with all the shortages. I've been out collecting nettles, as you can see. Lola does wonderful things with nettles.' Charles indicated a large bag stuffed to the brim with greenery. ‘Look, why don't you drop in and say hello since you're over here? They'd be pleased to see you, I know, and you can try a glass of Lola's excellent rose hip cordial.'

‘Well that's very kind but I wouldn't like to impose …'

‘Nonsense! We hardly ever have visitors these days and Lola does miss it!' Charles shook his head sadly. ‘Besides, you look as if you could do with a cool drink. It's a hot afternoon to be working.'

Bernard had been looking forward to getting home, taking off his working clothes and having his tea, but Charles seemed so anxious to press his hospitality it seemed churlish to refuse. He was beginning, Bernard thought, to look a good deal older, with deep furrows forming on his face as if the skin was suddenly too large for the frame, and there was a stoop to his shoulders that had not been there in the days when they had worked together.

Bernard completed packing away his gear and locked up his van and the two men walked together along the lane leading to the Carteret cottage.

‘Paul won't be there, I'm afraid,' Charles said, turning into a path which led between burgeoning hydrangeas and curved around the side of the small grey stone cottage. ‘ Quiet Sunday afternoons at home bore him. But I expect we shall find the others in the garden.'

At the rear corner of the cottage the path passed beneath an archway of climbing roses which had shed their petals like white confetti on to the rough paving stones. Beyond it, a border filled with snapdragons, sweet-william and marigolds edged a small neat lawn where two dilapidated deckchairs had been set out. In one of them Lola was reclining, her skirt draped up rather inelegantly between her knees, in the other Catherine curled like a small plump cat. The moment she saw them Lola sat up, straightening her skirts in embarrassment.

‘Just look who I ran into!' Charles called to her. ‘It's Bernard. I told him we'd be highly offended if he didn't drop in to say hello, and I promised him a glass of your rose hip cordial. There is some left, I hope?'

Lola rose from the deckchair. Her cheeks were faintly pink.

‘The cordial is not all that wonderful, I'm afraid,' she said. ‘With no sugar it is not easy to make it taste right. But you are welcome to a glass, Bernard.'

‘Thank you. That would be lovely.' But Bernard was not really listening to her and his reply was totally automatic. Although he smiled at her politely, in actual fact he was looking past her at Sophia and wondering in near disbelief if this lovely young woman could really be the chubby schoolgirl he had known.

In the two years since he had last seen her Sophia had changed almost beyond recognition. Now she lay on her stomach on the lawn, propped up on her elbows as she split the stem of a daisy and threaded it lazily on to the chain she was making. Her hair, bobbed now to shoulder length, fell becomingly around her face, her legs, bent at the knees, kicked and crossed just above a deliciously curved rear with an almost childlike grace.

Bernard felt almost weak suddenly and there was a kind of throbbing deep inside him that he had never experienced before.

‘Sophia – you could get the cordial for me,' Lola said. ‘I put it on the marble slab to keep cool.'

Sophia carefully put the daisy chain down on a book she had been reading and got up. Like everyone else on the island she had lost weight; unlike some it suited her. The puppy fat had gone leaving only flattering curves and mysteriously she looked taller. Because she was wearing shorts her legs were still in evidence – long and lissom, tanned a rich nutty brown by the sun.

She glanced at Bernard as she passed and smiled, a small, almost coquettish twinkle as if she had somehow known what he was thinking. Bernard felt the beginnings of a blush and looked hastily away.

‘Come and sit down, Bernard,' Lola said, indicating one of the deckchairs.

‘It's all right – you have your chair. I can sit on the grass.' Bernard threw himself down on the lawn, surreptitiously watching the kitchen door for Sophia's return.

A few minutes later she was back with the cordial in a jug covered with a little beaded cloth to keep out the flies. Lola did not miss the fact that she had used the opportunity to put on a bit of lipstick – too precious to use all the time now that it could not be replaced – but Bernard just thought how beautiful she looked. In something of a daze he answered Lola's questions about what he was doing now and he was very relieved when she switched her attention away from him and turned to Charles.

‘Did you see anything of the prisoners of war whilst you were out?'

‘From the distance. They were down working on the railway again.'

‘In all this heat! Oh, is terrible – terrible! The Nazis will rot in hell! Did you know, Bernard, Sophia saw some of them arrive? She said they were treated worse than animals, isn't that so, Sophia?'

Sophia nodded. A shadow had fallen over her face. Bernard felt his heart twist again.

‘The trouble is we see so much of them over here,' Lola went on. ‘ The railway they have been set to build is so close by and they march them over from their camp at St Brelade. Some of them are Russians, you know that? My countrymen, used for slave labour! It breaks my heart!'

‘Have you heard about the hospital they are building over in St Lawrence?' Charles asked. ‘They have the poor sods tunnelling into solid rock so the whole hospital will be completely underground and safe from any air raid attack. I'd like to put a bomb inside and blow the whole thing to smithereens.' He, too, spoke with an anger that was totally out of character and Bernard paused in his contemplation of Sophia to wonder at the effect the occupation was having on people, changing their whole outlook on life and bringing hitherto deeply buried aggressions to the surface.

When he had finished his glass of cordial Bernard rose reluctantly. His mother had always impressed on him that it was most rude to overstay one's welcome and the last thing he wanted to do was make a bad impression on the Carterets. But even as he thanked them for their hospitality and said his goodbyes his mind was busy. Sometime, somehow, he had to get to see Sophia again. But would she want to see him?

He stole another look at her. She, too, had got up and was following him to the gate. For one wild moment he almost asked her there and then, right in front of her parents, if she would go out with him. But of course he did not do it. Bernard had no wish to make a fool of himself. Something so important had to be thought about and planned carefully.

At the gate Sophia suddenly reached up on tiptoe and placed the daisy chain around his neck.

‘Something to remind you of the country when you get back to town,' she said mischievously.

Bernard felt the blush begin again, not just in his face this time but all over his body. But as he walked back to where he had left his van her words sounded like music in his ears and the daisy chain had become to him a laurel wreath.

When Sophia left the dental surgery after work the next evening she was surprised to find Bernard waiting for her.

She had, of course, noticed his interest in her in the garden. Each time she had glanced up she had found him staring at her though he looked quickly away the moment their eyes met and the blush that had spread up his neck when she placed the daisy chain around his neck had not escaped her notice either. But it had been a game to her, a new game, testing out a power she had not known she had and when he had left she had felt a little ashamed of herself for flirting so brazenly though she was still exhilarated by the experience.

The trouble was, Sophia thought, she found it impossible to think of herself as an attractive young woman. As a child she had been painfully aware that she was too plump to be beautiful and even her relationship with Dieter had done nothing to change her opinion of herself. What they had shared had somehow, she felt, been
in spite of
the way she looked, some sort of sweet chaste friendship with romantic overtones, not about sexual attraction at all. And of course Dieter had left her. She had never heard from him again and she had eventually allowed herself to come to the painful conclusion that he had forgotten her.

Not, of course, that she had forgotten him. Somehow Sophia doubted that she would ever again experience that total fierce love, the fragile bitter-sweet happiness, the tender dreaming, the way her whole body had seemed to sing and soar. There was only one Dieter – perhaps every woman has only one. First love, perfect, all-consuming and blind. It was over, she told herself, she must put it where it belonged, firmly in the past. But it wasn't that easy, for measured against that love all other emotions seemed pale and tawdry, lacking, somehow, the magic she had once known.

Sophia's realisation that she had changed from a rather ordinary looking child into a desirable young woman came as a slow awakening. At first she did not even notice the appreciative looks and when she did she could hardly believe it. She tested them out; when a young man was walking towards her in the street she would hold her head high, pretending not to notice him and then glancing up at the last moment to see if he was looking at her. Invariably he was and the knowledge started a little spiral of excitement deep inside her. After a few times her confidence began to grow and she looked at herself critically and through new eyes, trying to see what it was they saw. But still alongside the confidence was a complementary uncertainty, two ends of the spectrum vying with one another, sending her differing messages. None of the boys ever did more than look; they were usually strangers and she never saw them again. And when it came to boys she knew, friends of Paul for instance, she was usually so afraid of being branded a flirt she behaved so coldly they never dared make an approach. In deep introspective moments Sophia was sure this was because boys did not really find her attractive, they just couldn't help looking, and this made her behave more coolly than ever – she did not want them to think she had erroneous ideas about her own looks – that would be humiliating!

Somehow, with Bernard, it had been different. She had flirted, she knew, and she had actually enjoyed it. With his first blush her confidence had soared and somehow after that she had not been able to stop herself. Only afterwards had she been convinced she must have made a complete fool of herself. And it had honestly not occurred to her for one moment that he might seek her out in an effort to see her again.

When she left the surgery and saw him waiting there she could hardly believe her eyes and her first thought was that he wanted her to take a message of some kind to her father.

‘Bernard!' she said. She felt clumsy and awkward, no trace now of the coquetry that had given her such heady power in the garden. ‘What do you want?'

A dark flush spread up Bernard's neck. Truth to tell he was feeling just as awkward as she was. He could hardly remember his carefully rehearsed words but he had to say something.

‘You know the revues they do at the Opera House? Well, there's a new one on now called
Hello Again
and we've helped them stage one of the scenes – the Electricity Company, that is. I wondered if you'd like to go.'

Sophia was so surprised she, too, was lost for words for a moment.

‘I thought tickets for the Opera House Revues were like gold dust!' she said.

‘They are. But they've given the Electricity Company some complimentary ones and I've managed to grab a couple for us – if you'd like to come, that is …'

‘Well …' Sophia hesitated, a little frightened suddenly by the startling consequence of her afternoon's flirting. Then, as she saw Bernard's quick defensive look she made up her mind.

‘Thank you, Bernard,' she said. ‘ I'd love to.'

The show was a triumph and Sophia, who had rarely been to the theatre, enjoyed every moment of it. Bernard, looking very smart in a sports jacket and slacks, met her outside, and the apprehension she had been feeling about her first real grown-up ‘date' disappeared in a thrill of pride as he ushered her inside, steering her protectively through the crowds thronging to see the new hit entertainment. By the time the curtain went up every seat had been taken, even the chairs which had been set out in the aisles, and more people were standing at the back. Sophia glimpsed a couple of German officers amongst them and felt a twinge of discomfort. But this was soon forgotten as the smell of the greasepaint wafted out, the orchestra tuned up and the show began. Sophia wondered if Bernard would hold her hand but he made no move and after a while, as the music of Ivor Novello's
Lilac Time
stirred her senses and resurrected the exciting sense of power she had experienced in the garden, she took the initiative and slipped her hand into his. They sat very still, Sophia frightened for a moment by her own boldness, Bernard almost afraid to believe his luck, until the big scene to which the Electricity Company had lent their expertise began.