A Fragile Peace

by A Fragile Peace (retail) (epub)

  ‘Let’s start again,’ he said, obligingly. ‘Merry Christmas.’

  ‘And to you,’ she said shortly. She saw Peter moving towards her through the crowd. Libby called to Edward who was by the gramophone. The unmistakable sound of Tommy Dorsey’s trombone swung some couples immediately onto their feet. She tapped her foot.

  ‘You like to dance?’ Tom asked.

  ‘Yes, I do. Don’t you?’

  He shook his head, leaned against the wall behind him.

  ‘Allie? Am I interrupting?’

  She turned to Peter as to a rescuer. ‘Of course not.’

  ‘Would you like to dance?’

  ‘I’d love to.’

  Peter turned politely to Tom. ‘If you wouldn’t mind, of course?’

  Tom regarded him for a moment with lucid, caustic eyes. Then he made a sardonic, sweeping gesture of acquiescence with his left hand and sipped his beer.

  Allie avoided him for the rest of the evening – something which, in truth, was not difficult to do since he made no attempt to approach her again. She danced until her feet ached, talked – or rather shouted – until she was hoarse, and at last escaped to a quiet corner where she could kick her shoes off for a moment and rest. It was midnight, and as the Christmas bells pealed joyfully out across the roofs and spires of London, people began to drift away. The air was thick with cigarette smoke. Allie moved to a small open window and stood looking down into the cold, windy street, the sound of the bells coming clearly to her over the noise behind her.

  ‘Good night, Kate, Bob – yes, and the same to you. Merry Christmas, darlings, and a Happy New Year. See you at the Thompsons’ next week…’

  The front door closed at last. A couple of people that Allie did not know were in earnest conversation in the corner of the room. Libby crossed the almost empty, littered living room.

  ‘Well, that’s that. How did it go, do you think?’

  ‘Marvellously.’ Allie looked around. Over the repetitious scratching of the gramophone needle she could hear raised, familiar voices. ‘Where is everyone?’

  Libby lifted the needle from the gramophone. ‘In the dining room,’ she said equably, ‘putting the world to rights. I was just about to suggest that we go and explain to them, nicely, that this is Rampton Court, not a bear garden.’

  Allie followed her sister to the open door of the dining room. They reached it in time to hear Tom say, pleasantly, ‘Perhaps you don’t agree that Chamberlain sold the Czechs down the river to save his own skin?’ He was leaning against the table, legs crossed, watching Peter. ‘Or perhaps you don’t accept that appeasement in the face of monstrous provocation is simple, gutless cowardice?’

  ‘Tom—’ began Richard.

  ‘I’m not saying he was right. I’m saying he was faced with an impossible situation.’

  ‘Tell the Czechs that. Or the Jews who fear for their children. Ask them their opinion of an impossible situation.’ The soft words were vitriolic, the voice still nervelessly pleasant.

  ‘You cannot launch a nation into total war without due consideration of the consequences.’ Peter’s voice was low.

  Tom’s sudden grin was wolfish. ‘Adolf’s certainly a clever little bastard, isn’t he? He knows the English character to the core.’ He stabbed a long finger into the air. ‘While we were duly considering consequences he’s taken half of Europe—’

  ‘That’s an exaggeration.’

  ‘—and the more we let him get away with, the more certain he becomes that he can take the other half. You can’t appease a power-crazed lunatic—’

  ‘That’s enough.’ Unexpectedly, Libby marched firmly into the charged air, one small hand uplifted, looked from face to face. ‘That – is – quite – enough.’

  Richard shrugged an apology to his sister and took Tom’s arm. With a movement that verged on violence, Tom shook it free. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said to Libby, the disciplined evenness of his tone at odds with the savagely bright eyes. ‘My fault entirely. I apologize.’

  To Allie’s surprise Libby smiled in a manner that was almost provocative. ‘You’ll have to pay a forfeit for your disgraceful manners.’

  He stood away from the table, head tilted a little, watching her.

  ‘I’m not having my party finish like this. Richard, be a dear. Put the Dorsey on again. Mr Robinson is going to dance with me.’ She extended a small, imperious hand. With good grace and an abrasive half-smile Tom took it. Allie watched in astonishment as Libby, glancing over her shoulder, led him like a tethered lamb into the other room.

  ‘Well, I’ll be damned,’ Allie said mildly. ‘That sister of mine could wind the devil himself round her little finger if she tried, I’m sure of it.’

  ‘Must run in the family.’ Peter held out his hand. ‘Dance with me?’

  She moved easily into his arms. From the other room came the sound of laughter. He held her, very gently, close to him, her head on his shoulder. Dreamily she moved with him, her senses lulled. When he stopped dancing and lifted her chin with his finger, she did not resist. While they were dancing, he had guided her beneath an enormous bunch of mistletoe that hung above their heads, turning gently in the warm currents of air. He looked down at her, smiling, his eyes serious. She experienced a flash of unnerving revulsion as she remembered Ray’s fervid, wet kisses. She stiffened. He hesitated for a second, then bent his mouth to hers. His lips were pleasantly cool and firm, his moustache soft. He held her hard against him, wrapped firmly in his arms.

  She liked it. She liked it very much. The happy realization bloomed in her like a flower. Tentatively she lifted a hand, felt his hair, smooth and soft beneath her fingers.

  When, finally, they drew apart it was to discover a slight figure lounging in the doorway, a faint, amused approval on his face.

  ‘A very merry Christmas to you both,’ said Tom Robinson, gently.

  * * *

  Peter kissed her again, in the porch of Ashdown when he took her home. The lights strung on the tree on the lawn danced in the cold wind, throwing multicoloured, impish shadows across the house and garden. They stood in the deeper darkness of the doorway.

  ‘Would you like to come in?’

  ‘Not tonight. I really have to go. Mother will have me up at the crack of dawn to go to church, and we’ve a houseful of relations…’

  She shivered as the wind swirled into their sheltered corner.

  He tightened his arms a little. ‘You must go in, out of the cold. When can I see you again?’

  Her heart was beating very fast. ‘I – whenever you like.’

  ‘The weekend? Saturday? Would you like to go dancing?’

  ‘Yes, I would.’

  ‘I’ll pick you up about eight.’ He bent to her swiftly and kissed her again. ‘Now off you go. You’re freezing.’

  She let herself quietly into the house, stood for a moment listening to the sound of his car receding into the distance, then sped upstairs. In her bedroom, in the dark, she stood for a long time looking out into the Christmas night. The black mass of the hill across the river lifted densely against a stormy sky. The bedroom was very cold. She wrapped her arms about herself, hugging herself against the chill.

  Peter. Kind, strong, dependable Peter. Everyone liked him. Everyone approved of him. And so they should. He was a dear. And she had liked his kisses. She really had.

  The warm glow of pleasure died. Clambering over the far rim of her consciousness came a black spider of a thought that she had been trying in vain to keep at bay.

  Nice Peter. Pleasantly conventional Peter who, she was sure, would have strongly held views on the way that nice girls did and did not behave. Peter who, one day, if her family’s and – if she were honest – her own hopes and expectations came to anything, might ask her to marry him.

  She would have to tell him. Have to. Before things went too far. Even if it meant, as it well might, losing him before he ever became hers.

  She thought of Libby and Edward, of their obvious happiness
, of the tempting cradle of happy stability such a marriage would offer.

  She would have to tell him.

  From across the river, the church clock struck the brief hour, the sound almost lost in the rising wind.

  Chapter Nine

  Through a crisp and frosty January they saw each other each weekend and, occasionally, at lunchtime during the week. For her twentieth birthday, in the middle of February, Peter took her, again, to the theatre and on to the Savoy for dinner, where he presented her with a small box of marzipan apples that delighted her more than anything else could have. With no declarations or dramas, it became understood, between them and to outsiders, that they were, to use a marvellously old-fashioned phrase that Allie rather liked, a courting couple. But though their personal lives were calm and happy, it was becoming increasingly impossible to ignore the dire signs of coming conflict in the world at large.

  ‘You’ll be called up, won’t you,’ asked Allie, as they walked one lunchtime in Regent’s Park, ‘if there is a war?’ On the twenty-third of January a booklet had been issued entitled The National Service Handbook – a scheme, as Neville Chamberlain had sombrely described it, ‘to make us ready for war’. In it was clearly outlined the service that the young men of the country would be called upon to fulfil.

  ‘I’d join before they called me up,’ he said simply.

  She looked at him in blank astonishment. ‘But – I thought you didn’t agree with the idea of a war?’

  ‘My darling, no one in his right mind would agree with the idea of a war. No one could actually want a war. But if it comes then I shall fight with the next man.’

  ‘But – everything will be ruined, won’t it?’ Her voice was desolate.

  They had stopped walking. People hurried past them, intent about their own affairs. The first miraculous and fragile signs of new growth were all about them; the brave, tender spears that would become spring’s flowers stood staunchly in the cold wind, last year’s dead leaves skittering across newly green grass.

  ‘There’s absolutely no point in worrying about it. Face it if it comes. Until then, be happy.’ He bent to kiss her. She closed her eyes and tipped back her head, waiting, like a child, for the touch of his lips. He hesitated, his mouth a breath from hers, watching her with faintly troubled eyes.

  Her eyes blinked open. ‘What is it? What’s the matter?’

  ‘Nothing.’ He kissed her, swiftly, took her hand. ‘Come on. If we hurry we’ve time to walk around the zoo.’

  * * *

  As the weather improved he began to teach her to drive. He was a good teacher, patient and good-tempered, and she, to her own surprise, proved an apt pupil. Her initial nervousness conquered, she discovered that she really liked driving, and they spent long days, as the warmth of spring softened the air and dressed the countryside in drifts of pink and white blossom, motoring to the sea or into the country, lunching in small country pubs, exploring churches and stately homes. Their happy affection for each other grew day by day – they liked the same things, shared a slightly off-beat sense of humour. Allie’s family, watching, drew a collective, silent sigh of relief. Allie herself stubbornly put off telling Peter what she knew one day would have to be told.

  Later, she always told herself, later. Not now. Don’t spoil it now.

  Then, one day, they bumped into Ray Cheshire and a girl that Allie did not know at a dance held for charity at a big house near the village. She made the necessary introductions distantly, and was furious when, with a spectacular lack of perception, Ray asked her to dance.

  ‘Quite like old times, eh?’ he grinned, blithely obtuse, as he whirled her onto the floor.

  ‘No,’ she snapped. ‘It isn’t.’

  Her tone brought him down to earth. ‘Oh, come on, old girl. Don’t be like that.’

  ‘What I am or am not like has absolutely nothing to do with you,’ she retorted, adding with unnecessary cruelty, ‘it never did.’

  They finished the dance in silence.

  The encounter frightened Allie. Naïvely, until that moment, it had not occurred to her that there might have been gossip about her and Ray. The thought appalled her. Supposing someone said something to Peter? Supposing – awful thought – that someone already had? The fear lodged in the recesses of her mind and would not be shaken free.

  She had to tell him herself.

  But still she did not.

  * * *

  By April, people were not speaking of if war came but when. Anderson shelters were buried in backyards and gardens, blackout curtains measured and made. Full-scale rehearsals were held of the evacuation of schoolchildren from possibly threatened areas. Even the coloured picture cards given free with packets of cigarettes, featured with more prudence than optimism a series called ‘Air Raid Precautions’.

  Myra dealt with Ashdown’s windows early and with her usual efficiency. Even Hitler was not going to catch Myra Jordan unprepared. Especially Hitler. One April night Allie and her father were sent into the garden to detect any crack of light that might show through the screened windows.

  ‘The conservatory glass will have to be wired,’ said Allie.

  ‘Great God.’ Robert’s voice was strained as he stared at the black bulk of the house. ‘Who’d have believed that we’d come to this again?’

  Allie had no answer for that. In times past, she would have touched him, comforted him. But, despite the easing of their relationship, those days were long gone. She stood rigid, a foot from him, looking at the house. ‘There’s a crack at the side of the bathroom window,’ she said bleakly, and turned to leave him.

  ‘Allie—’ He put out a hand, caught her arm.

  She waited.

  ‘Allie, please. Aren’t we friends again?’

  ‘Of course we are.’ She heard the attenuated lightness of her own voice and flinched from it.

  He let go of her arm and stepped back.

  ‘I’m trying,’ she said, tightly. ‘Truly, I’m trying.’ And she fled from him.

  * * *

  Late that spring and into the summer there was what Libby aptly described as a ‘positive epidemic’ of weddings. As the likelihood of war increased, many young people decided that there was no time for niceties, and hurried marriages became the order of the day. After being a bridesmaid twice in one week – once to a cousin and once to a schoolfriend – Allie found herself the butt of some gentle but none the less meaningful teasing from her sister. She and Peter were visiting Rampton Court for dinner, and she was helping Libby to lay the table. Libby hummed melodically an old music-hall tune and, recognizing it, Allie flushed.

  Why am I always the bridesmaid,

  Never the blushing bride…

  ‘Shut up, Lib.’

  Ding, dong, wedding bells…

  ‘I warn you.’ Allie glanced fiercely over her shoulder to where Peter and Edward sat by the window in the last peach glow of the setting sun. ‘I’ll crown you if you don’t shut up!’

  … only ring for other gels…

  Allie advanced on her sister threateningly. Libby giggled. ‘Now, come on, don’t tell me you haven’t named the day? You aren’t planning on running away together and doing us out of all the fun, are you?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous. We haven’t even mentioned marriage.’

  Libby’s eyebrows climbed almost into her shining hair. ‘Well, pardon my cheek, but isn’t it about time you did? You’ll look a pair of idiots if Adolf catches up with you before you get spliced!’

  The thought had not escaped Allie. Peter had not once mentioned marriage – an omission that, under normal circumstances after only a few months’ courtship, might be perfectly reasonable: but the circumstances were far from normal. More and more she was coming to wonder. To worry.

  That night, as they travelled home, she was very quiet. As the car rolled to a halt outside the house, Peter turned and surveyed her in silence in the darkness, one arm on the steering wheel, the other hooked over the back of the seat. She did not l
ook at him.

  ‘Allie? Is something wrong?’

  She nodded, briefly. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Something you want to talk about?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Do you want to go inside?’

  She shook her head.

  Silence stretched between them.

  ‘Allie?’

  ‘I don’t know – how to say it. Where to start.’ She had taken a handkerchief from her pocket and was pulling it nervously between her fingers, her head ducked.

  He smiled a little. ‘Just say it straight out, love, and we’ll take it from there. It can’t be all that bad?’

  ‘It is.’

  He waited.

  ‘I suppose that—’ She stopped, cleared her throat, started again. ‘I suppose you would expect the girl you marry to be a virgin?’ The words were too aggressively blunt. She wished them unsaid the moment they were out. ‘Oh, damn and blast it,’ she whispered, miserably, and covered her face with her hands.

  There was a long, lacerating silence.

  ‘Say something,’ she said. ‘Something.’

  He had not moved.

  She felt the hot sting of tears rising behind her eyes. She chewed her lip. She would not cry. Would not.

  ‘Are you – trying to tell me that you’re not?’ His voice was quiet, and careful.

  ‘Yes.’

  He said nothing.

  ‘You knew, didn’t you?’ she asked drearily. ‘Knew, or guessed.’

  That snapped his head up. ‘Dear God, no! It never entered my head! Why should it? Allie…’

  She flinched from the pain and disbelief in the words.

  He caught his breath, made an obvious attempt to control himself. His hands, upon the steering wheel, clenched and unclenched a couple of times, spasmodically, and was still.

  Allie began to speak in a low, brittle voice, her head bent, her eyes on the faint white flicker of the twisting handkerchief in her lap. ‘I’m not going to make excuses or pretend that it wasn’t my fault. It was. Utterly. I wasn’t forced. I wasn’t – drunk or anything. No one took advantage of me. And it was more than once.’ Once started she found to her horror that she could not stop. ‘If anything, it was more my fault than his. I led him on. I instigated it. I was – angry—’ she had put a hand to her mouth, as if physically to hold back the words ‘—with – everything.’ The tears were brimming now and she knew she could not hold them. ‘I’ve no excuse. None.’