Survivor (34 page)

He put his hand over hers on the table.
‘You should have rung, blubbing or not, you need friends when people are nasty
to you. I would’ve tried to help.’

‘I
didn’t feel I knew you well enough to impose,’ she said. ‘But
never mind all that, I’m fine now.’

‘So how did you end up
here?’

She explained briefly about living with
Joan, and how her friend was later killed in an air raid. ‘Her children had
been evacuated to Lyme Regis, and I’d been here to meet them and Mr and Mrs
Harding, who they were billeted with. Before Joan died, she asked if I would be the
one to break the news of her death to them.’

‘My God, Mari! What an awful
task!’ Edwin exclaimed.

‘Painful, certainly. But it was
better for the children to hear exactly what happened from the person who was with
their mum and loved her, rather than to just get a message passed on via someone who
had no interest in their welfare. Anyway, I’ve formed quite a bond with the
children and the Hardings, so they invited me down for Christmas. A couple of airmen
on the train told me about the job in the pub. So I hot-footed it out of London, and
here I am.’

‘That is quite a story,’
Edwin said, his expression full of concern. ‘But how marvellous that
I’ve found you again! I’ve thought of you so often, wondered how you
were, where you were. I certainly didn’t expect to find you in a seaside tea
shop!’

He turned to Tim, his companion, briefly
apologizing for neglecting him, and explained how he had met Mariette for the first
time that night at the Café de Paris, and that her relatives had all been killed,
along with Peter, whom Tim had known. ‘It was a sheer fluke that Mariette went
off to the powder room and I moved away from the dance floor – if not for that, we
would’ve been killed too.’

A shiver of pleasure ran down
Mariette’s spine; she could hear Edwin’s delight in finding her again in
his voice. She’d forgotten how handsome he was, with his kind brown eyes
and beautiful deep voice. But it was
more than just how he looked: he was a link with Rose, Noah and Lisette, a reminder
of all the jolly times she’d had with them, how comfortable and easy life had
been then. She might feel she was happier here in Sidmouth now, but she would never
forget Uncle Noah’s kindness and generosity, or how much his family had
changed her for the better.

‘Are you stationed down here
now?’ she asked.

‘No, we’re stationed in
Bristol, flying Lancasters and getting our revenge on Hitler.’

‘I read that Bath and Exeter,
Norwich and York were bombed in retaliation for all the damage you did to German
cities,’ she said. ‘Just make sure you give them twice as much as
they’ve given us. But what are you doing here in Sidmouth?’

‘As you probably know, there are a
lot of RAF men down here doing various jobs. We just have to be present at a meeting
of bigwigs tomorrow. We’re here till Monday, so I hope you’ll have some
spare time for me?’

Mariette had been asked out lots of
times since she arrived in Sidmouth, but she’d always declined. Part of the
reason was because of what had happened with Johnny. She felt guilty about stringing
him along, and never wanted to be in that position again. The other reason was that
she was aware men saw barmaids as ‘easy’, and she didn’t want that
reputation in Sidmouth. So, for now, she was happier to go to a dance or the
pictures with some of the new friends she’d made in the bar. That way, she
could have some fun without the pressure that came with being someone’s
girlfriend.

But she was prepared to make an
exception for Edwin.

‘That would be really nice,’
she smiled. ‘I’ve got to go now as I promised I’d open up the bar
tonight. But pop in, it will be lovely to see you. ’

As she rode her
bike back to the pub, she was bubbling with excitement. She had liked Edwin right
from the off, on that terrible night. She had no doubt that, if Rose and Peter
hadn’t been killed, they would all have gone out in a foursome again. But what
really stuck in her mind was how kind he’d been to her after the bombing; a
man who could show such strength and compassion towards someone he hardly knew had
to be a very good man.

At half past seven that same evening,
Edwin walked into the pub with his friend Tim and two other airmen. Mariette did her
best to hide her delight that he’d chosen this pub, rather than one of the
many others in the town. The bar was already quite busy and the men went over to an
empty table, but Edwin came up to buy the first round of drinks.

He made a thumbing gesture towards his
friends. ‘I twisted their arms to come here,’ he grinned. ‘Good
job there’re some girls in here, or I might have become very
unpopular.’

‘It is supposed to be the best pub
in town,’ she said as she began to pull the pints. ‘Not that I’d
really know as I haven’t been in any others.’

‘So where do all the men who
worship you take you?’ he asked, his eyes twinkling.

‘You mean the ones who buy me a
port and lemon and tell me they are going to take me to the moon and back?’
she laughed. ‘You just can’t depend on men these days. They promise
that, but I never get beyond the pub door.’

‘Not even one with a boat to take
you sailing?’

She was touched that he remembered she
loved sailing. ‘No, and I’m not sure that civilians are even allowed to
take a boat out to sea. My best hope is with fishermen but, as you probably know,
they consider it bad luck to have a woman aboard. And anyway, most are working on
the minesweepers.’

‘Sorry I
haven’t got a boat to offer you. But how about a cliff-top walk tomorrow
afternoon?’

‘I’d like that,
Edwin,’ she said.

He paid her for the four pints. ‘I
wish I could stand up here all evening and talk to you, but the chaps will get
shirty with me. So is it OK if I come for you about two then?’

The pub was more packed than usual so,
even if Edwin had stayed at the bar, she wouldn’t have been able to talk to
him. But he did keep looking round and grinning at her, and she knew he wanted her
company more than that of his friends.

Before going to bed, Mariette agonized
over what to wear on the walk the next day. Her mother and Mog had sent her a lovely
dress and jacket for Christmas. The dress was a sleeveless turquoise print with a
full skirt, the short jacket was plain turquoise with the collar and cuffs matching
the print of the dress. But it was more suitable for a dance, or going out to
dinner, than for a cliff-top walk.

She had replaced some of the clothes
she’d lost in the bombing. But they were all second-hand as she only had
enough coupons to buy new underwear. None of the clothes were as nice or as
fashionable as her old clothes had been. She felt dowdy in the gored tweed skirt and
cream crêpe de Chine blouse that Sybil thought was lovely. The black crêpe dress was
one she liked, but she wore it most nights in the bar. And if she had to wear the
brown polka-dot dress once more, she’d scream.

So the only dress left was the one
she’d recently run up on Sybil’s sewing machine. It was just a cotton
print, pastel flowers on a white background, sleeveless, with a scoop neck and a
full skirt. Sybil had given her a wide blue leather belt to wear with it, and
although it was a bit early in the year for something so summery, she supposed if
she wore a cardigan she’d be warm enough.

She looked down
at her scarred legs and winced. She’d been wearing slacks when she met Edwin
this afternoon, and this evening her legs would have been hidden from view behind
the bar. What was he going to think of them?

‘Too bad, if he doesn’t like
them,’ she said to herself in the mirror. ‘Your papa always said people
should be proud of war wounds.’

Edwin came into the pub the following
day on the dot of two o’clock. Usually, Friday was a busy day as many elderly
married couples came into town on the bus. While their wives shopped, the men came
in here for a pint. But as it was mild and sunny today, the men were probably
sitting on benches on the seafront.

Mariette had already told Sybil all
about Edwin. She’d arranged to go off early as the pub was open until three
thirty.

When Sybil saw Edwin, she winked in
approval at Mariette. ‘Don’t come rushing back for opening time, I can
manage,’ she said.

‘That’s a very pretty
dress,’ Edwin said as they walked down towards the esplanade. ‘Is it
new?’

‘Yes, I made it. I lost everything
when I got bombed out, but I managed to buy the material for this here in Sidmouth.
I think I told you before that I used to dish out second-hand clothes to people who
were bombed out. I never expected that I would be in the same position myself one
day.’

‘I wish you had telephoned me
before. You must have felt so terribly alone after losing your uncle, aunt and
Rose,’ he said. ‘I would have taken you to meet my family, they would
have all rallied round, found you things to wear and stuff.’

‘With Jean-Philippe being
convinced I’d been sponging off his family, I wasn’t going to go cap in
hand to anyone,’ she said. ‘But thank you, anyway.’

‘Peter’s parents told me he was callous towards them at the funeral.
They were shocked, they’d expected Rose’s brother to be as warm and
caring as she was, but they put his attitude down to grief. Had they known he was so
nasty to you, I think they would have insisted you go home with them.’

‘He was really vile,’ she
admitted. ‘I did plan to think up something nasty, just to get back at him,
but Joan dying put that out of my head. So now I try not to dwell on him, and just
remember all the good times with Noah, Lisette and Rose. I couldn’t even bring
myself to tell my parents just how nasty he was – they would have found it too
upsetting as they’d known him since he was a small boy – so I just hope he
gets washed overboard from his ship, and dies a slow and cold death.’

Edwin chuckled. ‘He isn’t on
a ship, he’s got desk duties in the Admiralty. I checked up on him. But
perhaps we can hope a bomb singles him out on his way home one night.’

Mariette laughed. She had, for a short
time, been twisted up inside with anger towards the man and had wanted revenge. But
she realized now that she no longer cared. She was happy, and he wasn’t – or
he would never have been so nasty – so it was time to forget him.

It was easy to set unpleasant things
aside in Edwin’s company; he was so easy to be with. Conversation flowed
effortlessly between them as they related things that had happened to them in the
last year, chatting about friends, family and the war as it had affected them. He
noticed her scarred legs and was very sympathetic, not repulsed.

‘They’ll fade,’ he
said. ‘I bet in a year or two you’ll have a job to see them. And with a
pretty face like yours, who is going to be staring at your legs?’

He had lost even more people close to
him than she had.
‘It’s a
terrible thing to admit to, but I hardly react any more when one of the chaps
doesn’t make it back to base. None of us do,’ he said. ‘We go off
to the pub and raise a few glasses to them, tell a few stories, then that’s
it, back to normal. I sometimes wonder if, when this war is over, we’ll all
become basket cases when the reality of who we’ve lost hits us.’

‘I can’t even imagine the
war ending,’ Mariette admitted. ‘We all talk about it, sing “The
White Cliffs of Dover” and “When The Lights Go On Again”, but
sometimes I think it’s never going to happen, and I’ll never get back to
New Zealand.’

‘Would you stay here, if you fell
in love with an Englishman?’ he asked.

That question seemed a loaded one, but
she managed not to giggle or blush. ‘Maybe, if we could live somewhere pretty
like this.’ She waved her hand towards the cliffs up ahead of them. ‘But
I think I’d try twisting his arm to emigrate to New Zealand.’

‘I don’t think you’d
have to twist very hard,’ he said, and half smiled. ‘It’s going to
take years to rebuild our cities. So many homes will be needed to replace those lost
in the bombing, and rationing will probably go on for years. There are already
thousands of widows and orphans, and almost everyone will have lost
someone.’

‘From what I’ve learned
about the English while I’ve been here, they can handle all that and
more,’ Mariette responded. ‘But let’s get a move on, or
we’ll never get to Beer.’

At seven that evening, they caught the
bus at Beer to get back to Sidmouth.

‘It’s been such a lovely
day,’ Mariette said as she slumped down on to the back seat.

‘What a
surprise that it turned out so warm,’ Edwin said. ‘Freckles have come
out on your nose! Looks like summer’s finally here.’

Mariette just smiled. It was Edwin who
had made the day so special, not the warm sun, and she didn’t want the day to
end. He laughed easily, could talk on almost any subject, and he didn’t try to
impress her or talk down to her. He was caring too.

He had told her about the pregnant
girlfriend of one of his friends who had been killed. ‘She’s in a bit of
a state, she feels she can’t go home, but she can’t manage on her own
either,’ he said, as if her plight had been playing on his mind.
‘I’ve been trying to persuade her to write to Bill’s parents and
tell them – after all, the baby will be their grandchild.’

‘I think it’s wonderful of
you to try to help,’ she said, unable to think of any other man she knew who
would do that. ‘I agree she should try his parents, but not before she’s
told her own. I know my parents would be very angry if I went to someone before
them. She’ll have to grow herself a spine too. If she loved your friend, she
should be proud to carry his baby and hold her head up high. Skulking around,
feeling ashamed, only gives the gossips more to talk about.’

Edwin grinned at her. ‘Well,
that’s direct! Or should I say fierce?’

Mariette blushed. ‘I do think some
girls are frightfully feeble,’ she admitted. ‘But then, I’ve had
to learn how to look after myself.’