The Tennis Player from Bermuda (28 page)

I sprinted for the net, jumped over it, touched Dorothy’s hand, and ran toward the players’ box. Halfway there, I remembered the chair umpire, Mr Hewlett, so I turned around and ran back to the chair, reached up, and touched my racket to the toe of his shoe.

“Thanks! Well called,” I said.

Then I tossed my racket in the general direction of my pocket book, spare rackets, and Rachel’s old sweater, which were lying on the grass next to the umpire’s chair, and ran straight toward the BBC television commentary booth. This was a little shed at court level just beside, and a bit below, the scoreboard. The BBC commentator, wearing a sweater and his old-fashioned headphones, saw me racing toward him and looked alarmed.

I was just trying to reach my parents in the players’ box above the shed.

I stepped into the first row of spectators and reached up to climb onto the roof of the shed, but it was too high for me. One of the ladies in the first row put her hands under my backside and pushed. Father reached down and grabbed my right hand, while John grabbed my left. The lady spectator pushed, John and Father pulled, and I popped up on the roof of the shed.

From there, it was an easy step into the box.

Father hugged me. “Darling sweetheart,” was all he said. I kissed Mother’s cheek and then hugged Rachel. I was thrilled to see all three of them.

Claire said, “Solid, impressive play.”

Rachel nodded. In the earlier rounds, Claire had been exuberant about my wins. Now she was a bit more careful.

I guessed what Claire was thinking. By Thursday afternoon, barring rain delays, there would be only two ladies left in the draw. Claire would be one; some of the London bookies were beginning to give odds I would be the other.

John was standing back, on the other side of Claire. Without thinking that every pair of eyes in Centre Court was on me, I slipped past Claire, put my arms around John, and kissed him. I don’t mean I pecked his cheek. I gave him a full, 220-volt kiss square on his lips.

The Centre Court crowd was agog over the kiss.

I took John’s hand and turned back to face Mother and Father.

Mother’s eyebrow was arched at the kiss I had given John.

Father was wearing his DSC ribbon on the lapel of his jacket, and John was wearing his on the left breast of his khaki uniform.

“Mother, Father, please meet Captain John Fitzwilliam of the Royal Marines. John is Claire’s older brother.”

Then I said, “John, please meet my parents, Doctor Thomas Hodgkin and Doctor Fiona Wilson.”

The three of them shook hands. Father glanced at John’s DSC ribbon and then looked at John. I could tell he was gauging how old John was.

Father pointed to the ribbon. “Suez Canal?”

John nodded. “You?”

Father shrugged. “U-Boat attack east of Gibraltar. Ship all on fire.”

And that was that. Father and John were friends.

L
ATE
M
ONDAY
A
FTERNOON
, 2 J
ULY
1962
C
LARIDGE
’
S
M
AYFAIR

I sat on the edge of the bed in the room at Claridge’s I was to share with Rachel. Mother was unpacking my clothes and putting them away, just as she did when we traveled when I was, say, 12. Rachel was downstairs having tea with Claire.

I knew that Mother was about to rake me over the coals for my behavior in the weeks since I had left Bermuda for London. I must have insulted the Thakeham family, after Lady Thakeham had been so kind to me. That’s what Mother would say. I had been selfish. I had behaved completely contrary to the way I had promised her I would behave in London. And she would want to know what in heaven had happened with Mark?

Mother surprised me. She always did. She put the Tinling gown over Rachel’s bed and told me that she would have the Claridge’s staff brush it and then steam press it. “We dress for dinner on board the ship home, and you’re old enough now to wear a gown like this for dinner. The other passengers will be amazed.”

Then she said, “I take it you’re seeing John Fitzwilliam?”

“Yes.” Well, ‘seeing’ him was the polite word for what I was doing.

“Does he treat you well?”

“Quite well. He’s a gentleman.”

“That was my impression when I met him.” She exercised her maternal prerogative: “Are you in love with him?”

“Yes. A great deal.”

“Is he in love with you?”

“I don’t know, Mother. Probably not. He likes me, but that’s all. I’m about nine years younger than him. He may think I’m just a child.”

“Are you protecting yourself?”

Other girls get to have mothers who would never think of questioning their daughters about sex and who instead assume their daughters simply aren’t having sex. Me? No, I have to have for my mother a practical-minded physician who assumes that if her daughter is seeing a naval commando nine years her senior, sex probably enters into the equation.

“Yes. Claire took me to her gynecologist. But I don’t want you to be angry with her for that. I asked her to.”

“Since I would have done exactly the same for you if I had been here in London, I’d have a hard time becoming angry at Claire.”

“Mother, I know I more or less broke a promise I made to you.”

“I don’t care about any promise you made. I care about whether you’re safe, happy, and doing well.”

That was exactly what Claire had said Mother would say.

Then Mother asked, “Are you careful?”

“Yes.” I laughed a little. “John sets the pace, but he understands I need a minute or so.”

I assumed she’d have no idea of what I was talking about, but instead she laughed as well. “Tell me about it.”

I was amazed that she knew about these things, but apparently she did. She’d only slept with Father, she’d told me. Father set the pace the way John did? It didn’t seem possible.

Then Mother said, “But if you’re right about how he feels, that he’s not in love, you need to be careful with your own feelings.”

“I know.”

“So, are you careful with your feelings?”

“No.” I gave a rueful laugh. “I’m a mess.”

“You’re not a mess. You’re a quite normal girl.”

Mother held up one of my tennis dresses and frowned at it. I know I took five tennis dresses to England, and that sounds like a lot, but since I had arrived in London I had played tennis hard, almost every day, sometimes twice a day, and the tennis dresses, with the constant washing and pressing, were showing the wear and tear.

Teddy Tinling would have gladly – now that I was in the fifth round – given me fancy new tennis outfits for free, which I could accept and still remain an amateur. I knew, though, that Mother and Father wouldn’t approve my accepting clothing, and especially not clothing that would, no doubt – Teddy being Teddy – include brightly coloured underpants and short skirts to show off the underpants.

Mother, still holding up the tennis dress, said, “Fiona, I think we need to go shopping for some new clothes for you.”

Rachel and I were in our room when John rang that evening. Rachel answered; she had known John since he was a teenage boy. Rachel replaced the receiver and said to me, “John’s in the lobby. He wants you to come see him.”

I got my pocketbook and walked over to the dresser. I opened a drawer slightly and pulled out a clean pair of knickers for the next morning and slipped them into my pocketbook. My washbag was in the loo in John’s flat; I had everything I needed. I said, “Rachel – ”

She cut me off. “You go with John. I’ll think of something to tell your father.” Rachel had been a teenage girl in love at Wimbledon herself. “But I want you to get a good night’s sleep.”

I laughed. “I’m not given much control over how much sleep I get!”

Rachel said simply, “John’s waiting for you.”

John wasn’t in the lobby. He had parked the 356 on Brook Street in front of Claridge’s. It was a clear evening in London; John had put the hood down. He was in his khaki summer uniform, with shorts and high socks. John was tanned and so fit that I could see the outlines of the muscles in his legs.

He was leaning against the 356, with his arms folded over his chest, chatting with a young London bobby. It sounded to me that they must have known one another in the Royal Marines.

I put my arms around him and kissed him. John opened the passenger door of the 356, and I got in.

The bobby said, “Captain, sir. That’s a beautiful young lady you have there.”

John said, “I entirely agree, Mike.”

He jumped over the driver’s door, started the Porsche and threw it in gear. With the motor rasping, we headed into the Mayfair traffic.

T
UESDAY
M
ORNING
, 3 J
ULY
1962
B
ELGRAVIA

The next morning, probably at about the same time Rachel was telling Father that I had decided to spend the night at Claire’s flat, I got out of John’s bed, pulled on a pair of his boxer shorts, and a grey, cotton t-shirt with ‘SBS’ in black letters across the front. Both the shorts and the shirt were too big for me by at least twice; I had to hold up his boxers with my left hand.

I went into the hallway kitchen and tried to make tea for John on the huge, ancient cast iron gas stove. At one time, perhaps back in the Dark Ages, this stove must have served the entire house. It had all manner of strange valves and knobs. I turned one of the knobs, struck a match, and lit the burner. Flames shot up to the ceiling.

“John!” I yelled.

John ran into the kitchen and turned off the main valve. We both looked up at the ceiling, which now had scorch marks on it.

He said, “Put your hands up in the air.”

I stuck my arms up. He pulled the t-shirt over my head. Without my hand to hold them up, the boxer shorts fell down around my ankles. John scooped me up and held me in his arms.

“There’s only one thing you’re any good for,” he said with an air of weary resignation as he carried me back to bed.

“That’s not true!”

“Oh, I forgot. You can also play tennis.”

“Right,” I said and buried my face in his shoulder.

The Times
that morning had a photo of me on Centre Court that the photographer had taken
through
the tennis net. The top of my head was well below the net cord, though my ponytail was whipped above it. I was so low over my haunches that my left hand was down on the grass, probably to keep myself from sliding into the net. The ball was a white smear in the photo, and my eyes were locked onto it – I looked demented, to be honest. I didn’t recall the point, but judging from the angle I was holding my racket, I must have been just flicking the ball over the net.

There was a caption under the photo:

T
HE
B
ERMUDA
S
URGEON
A
RRIVES
I
N
H
ER
O
PERATING
R
OOM

W
EDNESDAY
A
FTERNOON
, 4 J
ULY
1962
T
EA
A
T
C
LARIDGE
’
S
M
AYFAIR

“I’ve invited Lady Thakeham to have tea with you and me this afternoon,” Mother said to me.

I should have known this would happen. Mother had accepted the situation on the ground as she found it upon her arrival in London on Monday, but she would want to repair whatever damage I had done to the relations between the Thakehams and the Hodgkins.

“Mother, I – ”

She interrupted. “We’re not discussing it. Captain Fitzwilliam is not invited – even though I know it distresses you to be out of his sight for even five minutes. I asked Lady Thakeham to bring her son with her, if he can get out of hospital. “

“Oh, you didn’t invite Mark!”

“We’re not discussing it. We’re going to have tea, we’re going to be polite, and, if we’ve done anything for which we should apologize, that’s what we’re going to do.”

“Mother – ”

“Fiona Alice Ashburton Hodgkin, do you want me to ask your father to have a word with you?”

I didn’t reply.

“I thought not,” Mother said.