The Sea Change (29 page)

‘Please, I’m begging you,
you’ve got to let me use the telephone again,’ I plead with the man at the
office. His wife isn’t with him. He reads the note in my hand, squinting at the
telephone number. Then he beckons me inside.

Back in the phone booth, I hold the receiver
to my ear and dial the numbers from the note.

‘British Deputy High Commission in
Madras.’

It is the first composed voice I have heard
in days.

‘I – Hello, it’s – I’m –
My name is Alice Peak. I’m calling from Kanyakumari –’

‘Mrs Peak. Hold the line,
please.’

There’s a click. A clouded silence
shifts for minutes down the line.

Then a voice cuts in: ‘Mrs
Peak?’

‘Yes?’

‘Hello there, my name is Derek Wright.
I gather you’re in Kanyakumari.’

‘Have you heard from my husband? His
name’s James. James Peak.’

‘Let me check for you.’ His
words are clipped and precise, like the folds of an origami swan. ‘One
moment.’

There is a pause. I can hear other phones
ringing in his office and the swift flick of fingers running through a paper file.

‘Mrs Peak?’

‘Yes, I’m still here.’

‘A rescue worker called on behalf of
Mr Peak yesterday from the hospital.’

‘He’s alive?’

‘I’m afraid we have no more
information. I’m sorry but I can’t be sure.’

‘But I checked the hospital and
he’s not there.’

‘As I said, Mrs Peak, our records show
that we received a call from the hospital but that is all the information we can give
you.’

Stop repeating that name. I’m not
used to it and I just think of James.
‘Can you send someone to help me
find him? Please.’ My voice starts to falter.

‘We’ve been in close contact
with our rescue team at Kanyakumari, who are doing their best to ascertain the
whereabouts of each missing person. I will inform them about your husband. We will make
travel arrangements to Madras for every British
citizen. You will need
to contact us for a passport – I’m assuming that, like others, you lost yours in
the tsunami. Are you injured in any way? We’ve dispatched a medical corps to the
marketplace should you need any assistance.’

‘Tsunami …’

‘The wave, Mrs Peak.’

‘I’ve – If the rescue worker or
James … if they call again, please, I’m begging you, tell them I rang
and that I’m searching, and that I’m all right, will you?’

‘Of course. I’ll make sure I add
it to the file. When are you due to fly home?’

‘He wasn’t in the
hospital …’

‘Mrs Peak, your flight?’

‘I – I’m sorry, I don’t
even know what day is.’

‘It’s the eighteenth of
August … 1971.’

‘I know the year,’ I say
abruptly. ‘Our flight is on the twenty-third – from Delhi. We moved it. We
weren’t even going to come down here …’

‘Then you’ll need to get to
Madras before then. We will arrange your onward travel to Delhi once an emergency
passport has been processed for you.’

‘I’m not leaving without
James.’

‘We will be of assistance where we
can, Mrs Peak, and I understand how distressing the last days will have
been … but I would recommend travelling to Madras at your earliest
convenience … We will be able to help you with your search at the very least.
And with your onward travel.’ He pauses. ‘Is that all, Mrs Peak?’

I don’t reply.

‘All right, then. Please call this
number again when you reach Madras … and we will try to gain some clarity on
the whereabouts of your husband before you arrive.’

The line resumes its hum and I lower the
receiver.

We heard about the end of the war in the
same way as we heard of its beginning: on the wireless. It should have been momentous –
the dancing, the embracing of strangers – but by the time VE Day came, Pete had been
missing for two weeks.

Mama rushed into the house to say that
someone outside the Pembroke Inn had told her to tune into the news and quick. We sat at
the kitchen table, waiting for the old box to settle on the right station, Mama peering
into the speakers periodically as if trying to speed it up. We caught the tail end of
the announcement – enough to hear what had happened. I expected to feel relief. To think
suddenly of going home. But I could only fix my eyes on the empty chairs – the places
where Freda and Pete should have been – and remember Father, left behind in Imber. We
would be going home to nothing more than vacant rooms.

We tried to telephone Freda from the box at
the end of the street, but nobody answered. It had been nearly a year since she had last
been with us and I wondered if, even now the war was over, she would ever return to us.
After one more failed attempt at the telephone, Mama took me by the hand and tugged me
out of the box towards the Pembroke Inn. All along the street, people were coming out of
their houses and looking this way and that, as if to taste the air for any sign of
change. Inside the inn, the landlady balanced a gramophone on the bar and set a
Charleston tune playing. Boys in clean uniforms – yet to be sullied by fighting –
knocked together glasses, toasting their luck. And the entire place was filled with
bright noise, brighter than I had heard in months.

‘Cheer up!’ A soldier took a
seat on the stool next to mine.
‘Haven’t you heard the
news?’ He placed his cap on the oak bar and kept a hand on it out of habit. I
wanted to tell him that he could let go now, that there would be no ticking off from the
sergeant if he lost or damaged it. But instead I let him hold it: it seemed easier to
carry on as we were. He smiled expectantly, waiting for me to answer. I couldn’t
quite reconcile the youth in his features with the moustache on his upper lip: the two
did not fit comfortably together.

‘It won’t really be over until
we’re home,’ I murmured in reply. It was a foolish thing to say: places can
die, just like people. The air can leave them and they grow cold.

‘You’re not from these parts,
then?’

‘No, not quite.’

‘I know the feeling. My mother and
father are in York and my brother is already at war. Wouldn’t it be perfect if
they were all here with us now?’

I scraped together a weak smile.

‘To loved ones,’ he said,
holding up his glass.

‘To loved ones,’ I echoed,
letting the lip of mine kiss his. A soldier in the far corner dragged an ATS girl into
the middle of the room and they began to dance, feet picking out the rhythm of the
Charleston. My companion at the bar held out his hand. I glanced towards Mama, who was
laughing with Mrs Hunt, the landlady, and before I knew what I was doing, I had placed
my hand in the soldier’s. It was the end of the war; perhaps if I danced, if I
marked it in some way, it might feel more real.

I followed the soldier through the other
dancing couples to the centre of the room and thought of Freda practising her steps in
the parsonage: she used to put on high-heeled shoes and dance on the parlour floor with
the mop. Yet when it came to the dances themselves, she acted as if she couldn’t
care less. I remembered how, in the hall at Warminster Camp, the steps seemed so natural
to her, as effortless as sleeping.

I bobbed along as best I could in the middle
of the inn with
the soldier. I kept my head bowed over my feet, which
Freda had told me was an awful habit. I was supposed to look upwards and into my
partner’s eyes, but I was too embarrassed to meet his stare and I feared I would
lose concentration.

‘I’m jolly glad to see that
neither of us are dancers!’ he called over the music. I blushed and tried harder.
How elegant Freda would have looked if she were here. Everyone in the room would have
wanted to be her partner. She was probably dancing somewhere in London at this very
minute – under Big Ben or along the Mall.

‘I hear they’re showing a
picture in the theatre in Salisbury this evening.’ The soldier spoke into my ear,
hand still on my waist. ‘Would you like to go?’

‘I beg your pardon?’ I called,
over the sound of the gramophone, pretending not to hear.

‘I was wondering if you’d like
to see a picture with me.’

I tried to smile gratefully.
‘I’d love to but … there’s a boy, you see. And we’re
–’ I didn’t know what we were. Or if he would even come home again. He had
been gone for a fortnight. In town I’d managed to corner one of the land girls,
who’d said he had not been at the farm since a week last Tuesday.

‘I see,’ said the soldier,
rubbing the back of his head awkwardly. ‘Well, he’s the lucky
one.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I replied,
stepping away. ‘Thank you so much for asking.’

I returned to the bar to find Mama, who had
been watching me dance.

‘He seemed like a nice boy,
Violet,’ she began.

‘Can we go and ask after Pete at the
farm?’

She sighed and rolled her eyes.
‘Violet … the war has just ended. What are you doing thinking of Pete?
I’ve no doubt he’ll be back before too long. Especially now the fighting is
over.’

‘But, Mama, it’s been two weeks.
And he never mentioned going away. What if something’s happened?’

‘Darling, nothing’s happened.
He’s his own man, that’s all. But if it will put your mind at rest,
I’ll come to the farm. Just as long as you promise to forget about it after
that.’

‘I can’t promise. You know I
can’t.’

She held my gaze for a moment, then looked
with dismay at the soldier I had been dancing with, who had found another partner on the
other side of the room.

In order to reach Pete’s farm, Mama
and I passed through Fugglestone where Sam and his American troops had been billeted in
the run-up to the Normandy attacks. The barracks, once temporary, had not been removed
since the departure of the Americans but fortified with bricks and tiles. It seemed that
the military were planning on moving in for good, despite the war being over. It made me
fear for Imber and I wanted to tell my mother as much. But she remained taciturn,
marching as quickly as she could past the entrance without turning to look inside.

We followed the river and passed under the
railway line, which shuddered with the weight of an approaching train.

‘You shouldn’t worry for him,
Violet. He’ll turn up. He’s a grown man.’ She put out an arm to still
me and we waited for the train to arrive.

‘I know. But I appreciate you coming
with me.’

The carriages rattled over the bridge and
steam poured down towards us in voluptuous plumes before rising up again towards the
churning breath of the engine. For a moment, we were enveloped completely in its cloud –
just Mama and I and whiteness. I inhaled its metallic perfume. It was the only scent I
had taken to heart here in the town. All the others – petrol, wet cobbles, chimney smoke
– were pollutants to the hay and wool and yarrow that I remembered from home.

Upon arriving at the main farmyard, we were
met sternly by the farmer’s wife who, at the first mention of Pete, promptly
enquired after his whereabouts. ‘The boy knows he can’t
leave without serving his notice,’ she barked.

‘I’m afraid we don’t know
where he is either. We assumed you might be able to help,’ I ventured.

‘Well, I wouldn’t be asking you
if I knew where he was, would I?’

‘We’re sorry to have bothered
you,’ Mama apologized. ‘Violet was only concerned for his well-being. That
was all.’

‘Listen here. If he dares show his
face in Wilton again, you tell him that he’s to look for employment elsewhere.
I’ve plenty o’ lads who’ll take on his chores – lads who are reliable
and don’t take off at half a second’s notice.’

‘Has he done it before, then, Mrs
Hooper?’ I asked. Mama squeezed my arm, afraid I might aggravate her further.

‘You bet he has. And his
favour’s worn too thin this time.’

‘Thank you. We’ll be on our way
–’ began my mother.

‘You might as well take his
things,’ she interrupted, as we turned to leave the yard. ‘I shan’t be
wanting him back.’

My mother and I exchanged a glance.
‘If you would be so kind as to show us …’

‘He’s pushed his luck too far
this time,’ she muttered, bristling past us and waddling with force across the
yard. I assumed she wanted us to follow her so we set out after her. She stopped at a
stable block with a ladder leading up to the top floor.

‘Up there.’ She pointed.
‘I’ll be leaving you to it, then.’

I was not familiar with his accommodation at
this farm. He had kept quiet on the subject, saying only that he did not plan to stay
for long. As we pushed back the door at the top of the ladder, I was appalled to find
there was no fire or heating or any bed to sleep on – only a single, straw-filled
mattress resting on cold, bare boards.

‘Imagine doing a hard day’s work
in the weather we’ve had, then coming back and sleeping in here,’ said Mama.
‘It’s a wonder he’s still walking.’

‘Where are his clothes?’ I asked,
scanning the room foolishly for a cupboard.