Mad Joy (18 page)

In the days that followed Anthony stepped up his attentiveness towards the children, as if by making himself indispensable to their happiness he could force my hand through some sort of gratitude or sense of obligation. When that failed, he began to mention his family house in Sussex, his inheritance, the car he had bought just before the war. I suppose he imagined that, because I had married James and lived in this house, I must be the sort of girl attracted to wealth. He may have taken my indifference for coyness, because he developed this tack with offers of meals in restaurants, visits to important friends’ houses, a share in the privileged life of an officer.

Sometimes I was almost charmed by his chirpiness with the children, but very occasionally I would see a glimpse of something more sinister: a sudden flaring of the nostrils when all did not go his way, a movement in the muscles of his cheek as he concealed a clenching of the teeth, a thin, determined set to the lips.

And then again, just as I imagined he was off my trail, I would sense him watching me as I came out of the bathroom, see him skulking in an alcove and fixing his eyes on me with an intensely knowing look.

This is when I should have said something to Howard, but I
didn’t. I did ask if we were obliged to have the officers, and he explained that we were. When he asked if there were any problems, I said that there weren’t. I felt suddenly very foolish. What could I possibly have said? Nothing had happened. It would have seemed unpatriotic to want one of them to leave because I thought he was making eyes at me.

In the early days of June 1944 – around four o’clock – something unexpected happened.

I was collecting sheets from the beds ready for washing. I went to the officers’ room as I always did for their laundry, and felt suddenly curious. They were away all day and there was no risk of being caught – for another hour or so at least – so I began to look through their things. Douglas had very little: a
photograph
of his family, one of his girlfriend, and a small travelling alarm clock. He also kept a diary which I didn’t read – not because I was morally good, but because I wasn’t curious about him. Anthony had a small leather writing folder inside his underwear drawer. I unzipped it and inside were three
photographs
: one of his family, one of a girl, and one of himself standing beside a car. The girl was fairly plain, but clearly
well-to
-do. She wore a jewelled necklace, off the shoulder evening wear, and her nose was tilted in that slightly imperious way Celia had with her nose. On the back was written ‘Stella, Jan 1943’. I zipped everything up again and placed the folder back in the drawer. Further back, buried in the socks, was a magazine of naked women, and another of pornographic cartoons. I looked at this for some time, because I had never seen anything like it. Some of the things the men were doing to the women were unthinkable, and the obvious aggression in the pictures made me shudder.

Returning to the landing with my arms full of sheets, I spotted someone through the window. There, on the gravel drive in front of the house, stood a young man in uniform. I hurried down the stairs to the front door.

He stood quite still, his eyes looking around him earnestly, and when he saw me he smiled.

‘Can I help you?’ I asked.

He continued smiling.

‘George! George – I didn’t recognize you! It is you, isn’t it?’

He stepped forward coyly and let me embrace him. I invited him in and offered him tea, but he insisted he didn’t want to stop me doing whatever I was doing.

‘I was having a cup of tea,’ I said. ‘And then I’ll take the potato peelings out for the pigs.’

I tossed the sheets into the scullery and then joined him in the kitchen. He hardly stopped smiling, and I found I was delighted to have him there. I told him he looked so grown-up in his uniform, but that was a lie. In fact I thought he looked painfully young and vulnerable, and I wanted him not to have to fight in this war at all.

After we’d exchanged news, he accompanied me to the pigsty and chuckled at the pigs. I offered to show him round the little farm we’d created, and he agreed keenly. He smiled a lot, at everything, but all the while I felt he was hiding something.

We went right the way round the grounds: through the Victory Garden, the field, the orchard and back across the lawn to the stable, near the yew trees which ran up to the wall and the entrance gate.

‘Is everything all right, George? Is there something worrying you?’

He took a deep breath and let out a faint sigh. It was clear there was something, so I waited. He ran his hand down the nose of our horse, Ivan, and continued looking at him as he said, ‘The thing is, Joy, I only joined up because everyone else was. I didn’t really want to at all!’

‘There’s no shame in that. It makes no odds, does it?’

He turned to look at me. ‘The thing is, I know I’m going to die. And I’m scared. That’s the truth of it: I’m scared.’

He looked at me so anxiously that I put my arm on his sleeve. He puffed out a sigh again as if this confession had been a monumental effort.

‘I think everyone’s scared. I know James is. You wouldn’t be human if you weren’t afraid. It’s not anything to be ashamed of.’

‘I don’t know if I am ashamed of it. I’m not scared of dying, see. It’s not
that
I’m scared of. I know I’m going to die. I just know it. If you’d seen what I’ve seen … The thing is, I’m scared of …’ He trailed off and sighed again.

‘What is it, George?’

He began to run his hand across the wood grain of the stable wall. ‘I’m scared … of not … of dying before I’ve even … lived.’ He looked at me desperately. ‘Joy, I haven’t kissed anyone. I haven’t made love to a woman. I’m eighteen and I haven’t even kissed anyone!’ His voice was beginning to shake a little, and I put my arms around him. He held on to me so tightly I felt tears prickling my nose and eyes.

‘Last time we were at Buckleigh House together you weed on me,’ I reminded him.

He held me back from him so that he could see my face. ‘I promise I won’t wee on you this time.’

Then before I could disentangle myself his lips were on mine, pressing into mine with such warmth I felt a flood of emotion. His left hand cupped the nape of my neck and I couldn’t believe the tenderness of it, or the relentless hunger of it, which matched my own for James – matched my own except this wasn’t James. But he was so much a part of my childhood, and so much a part of everything good and wonderful I remembered, that for a moment I was Buster Keaton and he was a sheepdog doctor. And suddenly his hand was on my breast, and the sparks shooting off hotly in all directions were so like the ones I felt with James, and it felt so good to be with James again, that suddenly he
was
James.

No sooner had these thoughts begun to rush in than I caught him. I pulled his hand away and then I pulled back.

‘No! I’m sorry—’

‘I’m sorry, Joy. Forgive me.’ He was breathing heavily now, his lips wet and swollen with kissing. ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have.’

His contrition, his heavy sorrowful face in the midst of his lust somehow ennobled him. I wished I could have given in to him, shown him everything he wanted to know.

‘It’s okay.’ I said, straightening my blouse. ‘Please don’t worry, George.’ I held his hands to show him that I wasn’t offended. ‘But I don’t think you’re going to die. Not yet, anyway. I don’t think you’re going to miss out on any of it.’

I led him out of the stable, and there was a new shock awaiting me. There, slouching against the stable door, with his eyebrows mockingly raised, was Anthony.

The sly curve of Anthony’s smile could not have been better calculated to make me feel my shame. He could not have better judged his appearance, lolling there as an obvious spectator, to renew my awareness of what I always knew myself to be: bad. Rotten through and through. It was as if Gracie had spent a lifetime trying to convert me, trying to instil some goodness into me, but it had, after all, been nothing more than a clever cover-up. With his sneaky voyeurism he had caught me out being what he knew me to be: wicked and irredeemable. I had seen it mirrored in his eyes as he watched me try to pretend he hadn’t seen me. And when George had saluted him, he had saluted back, smirking. Such clever malevolence I had only seen in one other person in my entire life. He had been sent to punish me. Sent to remind me of my own wretchedness. I was wild, I was mad, I was evil, and no one had guessed. All these years and I had fooled everyone. But he knew. Anthony had known from the start.

By this time Gracie had moved into Buckleigh House
permanently
. Sadly, the move had not heralded a union between herself and Howard, an idea I had cherished for so long. She
didn’t seem unhappy though. Most days she helped with small chores and kept me company over a cup of tea. What she did on the other days I didn’t know, but if she visited her old house I had little time to visit it now. However, she often appeared only briefly at weekends for a quick cup of tea, looking as though she’d been out walking or digging her garden.

On one such day, we sat in the orangery knitting. The beech trees on the far side of the road leading up from the village to the Buckleigh House gate were host to scores of rooks who were making a dreadful racket. I was distracted, because I wanted to tell Gracie about Anthony, and ask her advice, but I was afraid now either that she would tell Howard or that she or both of them would approach him and find out about the incident with George. I couldn’t bear the thought that it might get back to James. I lived in dread that I had ruined the most beautiful thing that had ever happened to me and, more horrifyingly still, it seemed obvious to me now that I had always been unworthy of happiness, and that its withdrawal from me was almost inevitable.

I must have looked flustered because Gracie asked me if everything was all right.

‘Those rooks,’ I said, trying to rethread a darning needle with wool that had become too fluffy with handling. ‘A grim time of year for birds.’

‘June? Lovely time I should’ve thought. Wake me up with such a chorus in the morning – oh, I love it best of all in June.’

‘Not so good for fledglings.’

‘Oh? I suppose not. But still, we all have to leave the nest.’ She clicked away with her needles and then looked up almost guiltily. ‘Well, all save me, I suppose. I’m still sitting four square in my folks’ nest, aren’t I?’ Then she gave an apologetic little chuckle. ‘Wouldn’t have minded being shoved out myself, though.’

As if in indignation that Gracie had escaped the natural order
of things, the rooks began to croak in unison: loud ‘krohs’ and ‘krahs’ that flooded in through the open orangery windows.

‘You don’t know the half of it with rooks.’ I said. ‘Once they’ve booted them out, they build a little circle of thorns around their nests so that the fledglings can’t come back.’

‘Never! Fancy doing that to your own children. Well, I never!’ She shook her head in disbelief. ‘How come you know so much about birds? Did James tell you that?’

The darning needle was becoming sweaty in my fingers.

‘You always did know a lot about birds. Even when you were small. I expect it comes from your time in the woods …’

There it was again, a little flash of something, something darting away from the edge of my memory – almost,
almost
I had it by the tail, but it had gone.

Maybe Gracie took my frown and my silence to indicate a discomfort with this line of questioning, for she quickly abandoned it.

‘Fancy that, then. One thing encouraging your children to leave the nest, but what sort of parent stops them from coming back ever?’

I began to feel sick and thirsty. ‘I’ll open another window and create a through draught, shall I? It’s so hot in here.’

My agitation about Anthony’s discovery of me and George together did nothing but grow. And I was quite right to be worried about it, for the following day my worst fears were realized.

It had promised to be a perfectly normal weekday. For the whole of the previous evening, however, both Douglas and Anthony had been detained at work, and had returned very late indeed, so that Mrs Bubb had had to give them a cold supper well after midnight. This had been the night of 5th June 1944, and it wasn’t until later that we would learn the nature of the secret planning they were engaged in.

At breakfast, Howard asked if Mrs Bubb or I would like a lift to Gloucester in the cart. I certainly could have done with a day out, but Mrs Bubb looked exhausted, and I had heard her complaining earlier that the village shop was right out of Oxo and never had any decent soap, so I insisted she take the opportunity for a day’s shopping. Although, if I’m honest, I also felt a vague uneasiness about spending a long trip sitting beside Howard – whose company I usually enjoyed – so soon after the George incident. I had no reason to think he knew about it, and if I had been wiser I would have told him about it – and about Anthony – right from the start. But as it was I
wished Mrs Bubb and Howard a pleasant trip, and they set off shortly after the officers’ MC truck puttered off down the lane.

I stretched my legs out on the chair in the kitchen and yawned. The evacuee children had already set off for school, Andrew was playing with Jill outside on a rug, and would no doubt stay out all day playing in his imaginary worlds, with occasional forays into the kitchen for a drink or a sticking plaster or an additional prop for his game: a wooden spoon, a newspaper, a piece of string, a jam jar or a crayon.

Yesterday’s wind had died down, and I looked forward to a pleasant day. After the chores I would potter: just me and the children, for the first time in ages.

It was in this mellow frame of mind that I unhooked my socks from the line above the range and proceeded to put them on. I was surprised therefore, to hear footsteps on the stairs, and was just rising to go and look in the entrance hall when the kitchen doorknob began to turn. I watched it with a growing sense of nausea.

Anthony stood beaming in the doorway. ‘Did I miss
breakfast
?’ He yawned emphatically then came in and slumped down on the chair by the range and splayed his legs in a relaxed and proprietorial way, as if he might almost be about to summon breakfast. ‘Bit of a lie-in today, I’m afraid.’

I could feel my heart beating indignantly. ‘But you’ve missed the transport. The truck went ages ago. What are you going to do?’

He scratched his head nonchalantly and said, ‘Oh dear! Looks like it’s just you and me, then. Dearie me.’

He lay back and closed his eyes with a smile. I loathed that smile. It was knowing and mischievous, hardly even pretending to be benign, and there was something abusive in the power it knew it wielded over me.

‘You haven’t heard, then?’ he sighed.

‘What?’

‘You haven’t had the wireless on?’

He looked at his watch.

‘The communiqué from Supreme HQ will be out by now, and at midday Churchill will make an announcement to the House of Commons.’ He patted his hands on the arm of the chair. ‘Yep. Today’s the big day, young Joy.’

I made my way hurriedly towards the back door. Once in the porch, I could slip my Wellingtons on and be out of the house before anything could happen. He wouldn’t dare do anything in front of the children. I prayed they would stay close to the house now. I could hear Jill making ‘deh’ noises not far off, and I willed her to stay put. But before I could exit the door to the porch, Anthony strode over and shut the door behind me. I stood in the kitchen, sandwiched between him and the door, and I could smell his sleepy breath as he towered over me.

‘Oh, don’t be unsociable, Joy. It’s D-Day! There’s no
escaping
it. This is it!’

‘What do you mean?’

That smile again. ‘This is the day we’ve all been waiting for. This is what me and Dougie have been planning all these months, you see. All this top intelligence work and this is the culmination of it. Allied troops have landed in France – the biggest sea-borne invasion ever. Bet you didn’t think I was doing such important work, did you?’

I looked away from him.

‘Did you?’ He persisted, with a slight edge of aggression this time.

‘I had no idea, no.’ I swallowed hard, and my mouth was becoming very dry. ‘Good. Well, I think I’d better … I have to check on Jill—’

‘Joy, Joy,
Joy
!’ He shifted his weight a little and I thought he was going to step back, but instead he put his arm around me. ‘I think this calls for a celebration, don’t you?’ I tried to wriggle free but the tightening of his grip was so sudden and brutal that
I knew struggling would be pointless. ‘I think a man deserves a little “entertainment” when he’s worked so hard for his country, don’t you?’

Up until this point I had tried to deny my worst fears about his intentions, but there could be no doubting them now. If I clouted him it would be excusable, surely? Why didn’t I, then? Why didn’t I?

‘No! Please, don’t! You’ve got me wrong. I’m not like that—’

‘Oh, I think we both know you are, Joy.’ And just in case I hadn’t understood the allusion, he said it again, deep into my ear. ‘I think we both know exactly what you’re like.’

He had pushed his groin right up against me and I thought I could feel everything through the serge trousers. He took advantage of my shock to grab at my breast and knead it roughly before dragging open the neck of my blouse and pushing his fingers on to the nipple and pinching hard.

The worst of it all, as I suddenly seemed to stand outside myself and watch the disaster like a bystander, was that I had this terrible, shadowy sense that I deserved it. I
was
wretched, and it was clear he knew that I was. ‘You’re a bad girl, Joy, and you know it!’ he panted, as if to verify my sense of worthlessness. He took my buttock in his hand and lifted me hard up against him. ‘You’re a bad, bad girl and you love it, don’t you?’

I tried to push him but he squeezed harder on my nipple with each shove, pressed his lips on mine and gave threatening little bites. Even so, it was not any physical handicap, but my utter sense of worthlessness that more than anything prevented me from freeing myself.

He had worked his fingers inside my corduroys when a sudden pounding on the outside back door made him start. He released one hand and stood back from me, opening the kitchen door behind me slightly with his right hand. It was
glass-panelled
, and opened on to the porch where, as I turned, I saw
the back door let the sunlight flood in as a young woman in MTC uniform gingerly opened it.

‘Sir! You’re needed after all, sir. HQ need you straight away!’

He recoiled from me as though he had no idea who I was or what I was doing there, ran his hands through his hair and tilted his head back slightly.

‘I’ll be right there, Cribbs. Wait in the truck.’

‘Sir!’

I took advantage of his disentanglement to dart past him into the sunshine, holding my blouse together at the neck and striding shoeless into the sunlight, where I waited until the truck took him away.

When Howard and Mrs Bubb returned later I had gathered myself. Although people had been celebrating throughout the day, we listened to the wireless together and heard the good news officially for ourselves. The best news of all – brought to us by Douglas – was that he and Anthony were to leave for good the next day, their mission over, and were being posted elsewhere. Once I heard this I really did feel like celebrating, and D-Day has remained for ever in my memory as my own Deliverance Day.