Survivor (8 page)

Mariette was very aware that people
thought she was cold because she didn’t show emotion. She felt indignant that
just because she didn’t weep and wail, or say soppy things, they thought that
meant she didn’t feel anything.

The whole business with Sam had been the
most hideous and hurtful thing she’d ever known. He’d not only made her
feel dirty, ashamed and stupid, but her actions had made her parents and Mog feel
horrified and let down. She so much wanted to find the words to tell them how bad
she was feeling, how sorry she was that she’d hurt them, but she
couldn’t. Keeping quiet and out of their way had been her only way of coping
with the situation.

Then, when she found out she
wasn’t pregnant after all, she had thought that was the end of it, they could
all forget it had ever happened. But just helping more at home, trying to show them
all how much she valued them and how sorry she was, didn’t really make it go
away. It was still there, like a faint bad smell that refused to leave, whatever she
did.

Outside the house, it was even worse.
She sensed that everyone was talking about her; older people were snubbing her,
younger ones looking at her with a sneer. One by one, all her friends dropped her;
no one came round, and there were no invitations to go anywhere.

Perhaps other girls in her position
would have cried and made a scene, but that wasn’t her style. So she put her
nose in the air and made out she didn’t care.

When her father said that her godfather
in England had
asked if she would like to
visit him, her first reaction was utter joy. The thought of leaving behind the past
humiliation and disapproval was enough on its own. And who wouldn’t want the
adventure of going to London, and seeing all those amazing sights she’d seen
in books and magazines? She loved the idea of being on a big ship for more than six
weeks, and she felt excited at the prospect of getting a real job, meeting new
people who would have a much broader view of life than those she knew here in
Russell.

But the delight and excitement soon
vanished when she realized it was banishment, because she’d shamed her
family.

They didn’t say as much. They
talked of there being more opportunities for her, and of giving her the chance to
see the world. Yet even though that was what they truly wanted for her, Mariette
also knew they felt her past mistakes were affecting her brothers.

She didn’t know Uncle Noah and
Auntie Lisette. They were just names on a Christmas card, the people who sent
presents to her and her brothers on their birthdays. Granted, they were always
lovely presents – for her eighteenth they’d sent her a beautiful silver
bracelet. She knew they lived in a splendid house, that Uncle Noah was an acclaimed
journalist and author, and a good friend to both her parents. And yet, to Mariette
they were strangers on whom she was being fobbed off.

She had learned her lesson. Sam was a
horrible and worthless man, and she regretted ever having clapped eyes on him. She
certainly didn’t intend to make a mistake like that again. But however badly
she had behaved, she didn’t understand why the neighbours felt they had a
right to judge her. She hadn’t hurt any of them, and she could bet every
single one of them had done something shameful in their life too.

In the past, when she had daydreamed of
leaving Russell,
Mariette had always
imagined her friends and family shedding tears as they waved goodbye to her on the
jetty. She’d also thought that if ever she came back, it would be a joyous and
triumphal return. But now she felt everyone would be whispering ‘good
riddance’ as she left, and hoping that was the last they’d see of
her.

Miss Quigley had always said she was
defiant, and that’s what she decided she would be now. She would act like she
couldn’t wait to leave because Russell was too small for her. Maybe, if she
could put on a good enough act, she’d start to believe it too and stop being
scared.

Alone in her room at night, though, she
found herself crying. She was going to miss Noel and Alexis; however much they got
on her nerves sometimes, she loved them. As for Mum, Papa and Mog, she
couldn’t imagine what life would be like without seeing them every day. Who
would she turn to, if she was frightened or lonely? Her confidence had always been
remarked on, but what if it left her when she got to England?

‘I think you’re being very
brave,’ her father said one morning, almost as if he’d read her
thoughts. ‘I’m sure you are a bit worried about going to the other side
of the world without us, but you are going to love it, Mari. Along with seeing
London, I’m sure Noah will take you over to France. He has a place near
Marseille which used to be mine. Imagine seeing all the places your mother and I
have told you about?’

Mariette had always wanted her father to
be proud of her, and if the only way she could make that happen was to appear brave,
then that was what she must do. So she didn’t throw herself into his arms and
tell him she couldn’t bear the thought of not going sailing and fishing with
him, which was the truth. Instead, she just forced a grin and said how much she
wanted to see Buckingham Palace, the Tower of London, the River
Seine and the Eiffel Tower, and that she was grateful for
the opportunity she’d been given.

Mog dug out a thick, brown wool coat
with a red fox collar, which she’d brought here from England, and began taking
it apart with the plan of remodelling it for Mariette. Her mother found some brown
felt to make a hat to go with it, and she showed Mariette some beautiful feathers
with which she intended to trim it.

They booked a passage for her on a ship
leaving for England from Auckland on 18th December, at the height of summer, but
she’d arrive in England in the dead of winter.

She had always been a bit confused as to
why English immigrants moaned that New Zealand was upside down, how they missed big
fires and the snow and ice that came at Christmas at home. Her parents didn’t
do this – in fact, they had always laughed at people who struggled desperately to
keep up European traditions, including a roast dinner and plum pudding, when the
temperature was up in the eighties.

Their family always celebrated with a
special Christmas picnic on the beach, where they’d swim and play cricket. And
although Mog often told them tales about the mining village in Wales where she grew
up, she didn’t make it sound like the views on the Christmas cards that came
from England. They had pure white snow, horse-drawn sleighs and tables laden with
food. Mog’s were grim tales of eating a meagre rabbit stew, of a town coated
in coal dust, of men and women who were old at thirty-five because of poverty and
overwork.

Mog always said it made more sense to
celebrate Jesus’s birthday in a warm place, because that’s how Bethlehem
was. She loved to collect native wild flowers and greenery to decorate the house,
and she would hang up dozens of gaily coloured Chinese paper lanterns on the
veranda. When it grew dark, Dad lit candles in them and it was magical to sit
out there with the various neighbours who
dropped by. Mum said every year that it beat Christmas in England hands down.

Mariette didn’t mind missing
Christmas in Russell – it would probably be just as much fun on the ship – but she
was a bit worried that an English winter would be very much colder than it was here
in the North Island. Mog and her mother had often, in the past, talked of thick
pea-souper fogs back home, of ice on the inside of windows, and although they both
went out of their way to tell her now how warm and beautiful Uncle Noah’s
house would be, she was still apprehensive.

To take her mind off all the niggling
worries, Mariette buckled down to help with the sewing of the new clothes she would
need.

It was exciting to be making the kind of
clothes she would never have the opportunity to wear in Russell. Earlier in the
year, Noah had sent Mog some English fashion magazines and now she was in her
element, deciding which dresses and costumes she could copy. She found some lovely
cream lace in the trunk in which she hoarded fabric. That was going to make an
evening dress, and there was some lilac crêpe which draped beautifully. But Mariette
was doubtful about the checked wool which Mog planned to use to make a costume: it
looked more suitable for Miss Quigley, the schoolteacher.

‘I do know about fashion,’
Mog said reprovingly when she saw Mariette’s disdainful expression. ‘Mrs
Simpson wore a costume exactly like the one I’m going to make for you, just
before the King abdicated. No one was more elegant than she was, even if none of us
approved of her. You will find women in England take a greater pride in their
appearance than they do here, and they have rules about dress. It’s not done
to go out without a hat, or to go bare-legged, not even
in summer. When we go to Auckland to see you off,
we’ll have to buy you stockings and gloves. But once you are in England,
Lisette will help you get it right; she’s very chic, as you’d expect
from a Frenchwoman.’

On 12th December, two days before
Mariette was due to leave Russell, Belle woke in the morning full of misgivings
about sending Mariette away.

They had decided that Mog and Etienne
would accompany her on the steamer to Auckland while Belle would stay home with the
boys. Once in Auckland, Mog would supervise buying the items Mariette still needed
for England. Etienne was far better equipped than Belle to make sure his daughter
and her luggage got on the right ship at the right time. Besides, it would be less
painful for her to say goodbye here, rather than waving Mariette off in
Auckland.

‘I feel just the way I did in
France, when they packed me into that coach to take me to the ship bound for New
York,’ she admitted to Etienne. ‘If I feel like that, how must Mari be
feeling?’

Etienne had got out of bed to dress, but
on hearing the anxiety and dejection in Belle’s voice he sat back down on the
bed and enveloped his wife in his arms. ‘It isn’t anything like that for
Mari. Firstly, you’d been through every kind of hell before that day,’
he said. ‘You also had no idea where you were being taken. And you were much
younger than Mari. But Mog and I are seeing her off, and she’s going to people
who will love her as we do. She knows a great deal about England too. She’s
ready to leave us, Belle. She’s outgrown Russell, and she wants a new start.
You must let her go. We can telephone her from the bakery sometimes. She isn’t
being sold, as you were; she’s free to make an exciting, fulfilling life for
herself.’

‘But what
if war does break out? She might get trapped there,’ Belle said fearfully.

A shadow passed over Etienne’s
features that told her he was as apprehensive and sad about Mariette leaving as she
was. But he was made of sterner stuff than Belle was, and he would never admit
it.

‘Noah wouldn’t make jokes
about the government getting trenches dug in Hyde Park and stockpiling sandbags if
he really thought they’d be needed,’ Etienne said firmly. ‘He said
Hitler doesn’t want to fight England. Besides, even if he’s wrong, or if
things change, he’ll get Mari on the first ship back to us.’

‘Are you sure?’ Belle
asked.

‘How can you even ask that,
Belle?’ Etienne demanded. ‘Have you forgotten all he did for us in the
past? But for him we would never have got together again. Doesn’t that tell
you that we are putting our daughter in the safest of hands?’

‘Yes, of course,’ she
sighed. ‘But I can’t help worrying.’

‘Don’t let Mari see
it,’ he warned her. ‘She is all keyed up to go now, and we must send her
off joyfully or she will get anxious too. Now let’s make the most of her last
two days with us. We’ll prepare a picnic and go out in the boat to give her
something good to remember.’

A few hours later, as Etienne was at
the helm in his fishing boat, he glanced sideways at Mariette. As always when she
was aboard, she was right at his side, eagerly awaiting the moment when he would let
her take the wheel. Alexis and Noel were sitting astern with Belle and Mog. They
hadn’t yet developed their elder sister’s passion for the sea. They were
sitting quietly, far more enthusiastic about the prospect of reaching the beach for
the picnic than about the joy of being out on the water.

It was days like
this he was going to miss the most while Mariette was away. She was the only one in
the family who loved to fish, swim and sail as much as he did. Some of the best
times they’d had together had been out here in the bay, racing along in the
dinghy with the wind in their hair, soaked by sea spray.

He had an ache in his heart at her
leaving. She was so like him as a young man, determined, fierce and often ruthless,
all character traits that had served him well but didn’t sit well with
femininity. He fervently hoped that Noah and Lisette would be able to encourage her
to utilize her keen mind and would influence her to rein in her natural exuberance
and wilfulness.

Belle had been beautiful at Mari’s
age, with black curly hair, a soft full mouth and eyes the colour of a summer sky,
framed by thick sweeping lashes. She had the kind of devastating beauty that made
people turn to look at her.

Mari was merely pretty in comparison,
with hair the colour of new pennies, well-defined cheekbones and a sharp little
chin. Her eyes were the same shape and colour as Belle’s, but she had a habit
of giving people icy stares, just like Etienne did. Yet he felt that in another
couple of years she would become a real stunner. He hoped, by then, she would have
learned poise and a sense of her own worth. The thought of another man bending her
to his will made Etienne’s blood run cold.

‘It’s been the most perfect
day,’ Belle said as Etienne helped her climb aboard later that afternoon. Mog
came next, her skirt hitched up to save getting it wet.