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by Michelle Magorian

  Her father was sitting at a large, leather-topped desk covered with papers. He was wearing a dark-grey suit, but his bearing still seemed military. He glanced up quickly.

  ‘Hi!’ said Rusty. ‘I thought I’d come and see you.’

  She came in and closed the door firmly behind her. A small fire was glowing in the grate. She stood there, smiling sheepishly.

  ‘How do you like the uniform? Awful, isn’t it?’

  He drew himself up. ‘I did ask, Virginia, that I wasn’t to be disturbed. I’ll see you at dinner.’ He gave a short wave of his hand indicating the door, and leaned over his papers again.

  Rusty stepped towards the fire.

  He looked up, staggered at her disobedience.

  ‘It’s O.K.,’ she said. ‘You go on. I’m just going to make up your fire a little.’ And she picked up the tongs. ‘I guess you do the same with coal as you do with wood.’

  ‘Virginia, did you hear what I said?’

  ‘Sure I did,’ and she put some more coal on. ‘I’m just making it a little more comfy for you. Now,’ she said, turning around, ‘do you want me to bring you in a cup of tea? I used to bring in Uncle Bruno a coffee when he was working, so I know how it is. Only he didn’t do a lot of work at home. He tried to finish it at the office. He said he liked to forget about it as soon as he’d gotten back. But sometimes, when he was in the workshop, I’d go get him a nice cool beer, and he liked that.’

  ‘Virginia, I asked you to leave.’

  ‘I know it. But do you want me to come back with tea?’

  ‘No. Leave the room. That is an order.’

  Rusty gaped at him. ‘An order? You sound like you’re in the army.’ She laughed. ‘I guess you still are. Or are you?’

  He sprang to his feet.

  ‘O.K.,’ said Rusty, backing towards the door. ‘I didn’t mean to bother you.’ And with that she opened the door swiftly, only to find her grandmother hovering outside.

  ‘I distinctly told you,’ she snapped, ‘not to disturb him.’

  Supper was a polite affair. Rusty’s father sat at the head of the table, her grandmother at one side, and Rusty and her mother opposite. Charlie was in bed. Most of the conversation took place between her father and grandmother, while her mother remained almost silent.

  ‘And how is school, Virginia?’ said her father.

  ‘It’s O.K.’

  ‘Don’t you feel you’re missing something, not staying there at the weekends? When I was a boy, we used to get up to all sorts of japes then.’

  ‘Uh-uh. I like coming back.’

  Again, she crossed her fingers under the table.

  ‘Well, I’ve decided to let you continue coming home for the time being, but if for any reason I feel it would be better for you to remain at school, arrangements will be made for you to do so.’

  ‘Mother?’ said Rusty, turning. ‘Is that what you think?’

  ‘I make the decisions in this house,’ he said firmly.

  Her grandmother gave a satisfied smile.

  ‘You’re kidding!’ said Rusty. He sounded like something out of a Victorian melodrama.

  ‘And that’s another thing, Virginia. I would prefer it if slang was not used in the house.’

  ‘What’s wrong with slang?’

  ‘I forbid it.’

  ‘You what?’

  Her grandmother’s face turned almost purple. ‘You see what I mean,’ she said quietly.

  Rusty felt her mother’s hand on her arm.

  ‘Come on, everyone,’ she said. ‘Let’s not have an argument.’

  But her father was glaring at her. ‘Virginia, if you wish to continue coming back here each weekend, you had better learn the meaning of obedience.’

  Before Rusty could answer back, her mother squeezed her so hard that Rusty held her breath instead. She picked up her fork and resumed eating.

  ‘And, Virginia, we eat with a knife and fork at the same time in this country. I’m surprised that the school hasn’t corrected you.’

  Rusty ignored him.

  ‘Virginia, did you hear what I said?’

  She looked up. ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Right. That’s enough. Go to your room!’

  ‘What for? I haven’t finished eating yet.’

  He jerked his chair backwards and got to his feet. ‘How dare you answer me back!’

  ‘Why shouldn’t I?’

  Her grandmother gave a faint cry and held her napkin to her mouth.

  ‘Virginia,’ said her mother softly, ‘do as your father says. You’ll only make it worse for yourself.’

  ‘But why am I being sent to my room? For eating the way I’ve been taught was correct for five years? Is that it?’

  ‘Leave this room immediately!’ bellowed her father.

  Rusty flung her napkin on to the table and stalked out.

  ‘I told you she was rebellious,’ said Mrs Dickinson Senior. ‘Margaret! What are you doing?’

  ‘I’m going to have a word with her,’ Peggy said, rising.

  ‘You will do no such thing,’ snapped her husband. ‘Sit down.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Margaret, that is an order.’

  ‘Is it! How interesting.’

  ‘Margaret!’ said Mrs Dickinson Senior. ‘Come back.’

  But Peggy was halfway out of the room.

  Mrs Dickinson Senior turned hastily to her son. ‘You see what I’ve had to put up with!’ she said.

  Rusty hardly had time to sit on the bed when there was a knock at the door.

  It was her mother. Rusty watched silently as she closed the door and came and leaned over the wooden footboard of the bed.

  ‘Why did you have to go and say that?’ she said.

  ‘Say what?’ said Rusty. She curled her legs up underneath herself. ‘I don’t go for all this “you must not answer me back” stuff. I mean, that’s what dictators are like.’

  ‘But why did you have to be sarcastic?’

  ‘How was I sarcastic?’

  ‘You didn’t have to call him sir.’

  ‘What! I wasn’t being sarcastic -1 was being respectful. We always used to call Uncle Bruno sir if we were getting told off.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said her mother, and she came and sat at the end of the bed.

  ‘Only with Uncle Bruno, he’d tell us off and then we’d be miserable, and that’d make him miserable, so he’d either go take us out for a soda or start laughing.’

  Her mother gave a sigh. ‘I’m afraid he’ll expect an apology from you.’

  ‘For being respectful?’

  ‘For answering back.’

  ‘What’s wrong with answering back? Aunt Hannah and Uncle Bruno never told us off for that.’

  ‘You’re not living with Uncle Bruno and Aunt Hannah now.’

  Don’t I know it, thought Rusty.

  ‘Look,’ said her mother. ‘It’s not going to be easy for us to live together again, but we’ve just got to muddle through somehow. We’ve all been away and had different experiences and we’ve got to…’ She faltered ‘... try and be a family again. Your father hasn’t even been here a week yet, and he’s had a difficult enough time as it is with Charlie.’

  ‘He’s been getting the “treatment”, right?’

  Her mother nodded. ‘It’s been Uncle Harvey did this and Uncle Harvey said that and –’

  ‘And all the rest! I guess me talking about Uncle Bruno must have made it even worse.’

  ‘When did you do that?’

  ‘In his study; you know, after Grandmother told me not to go in there.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ she said. ‘That’s his inner sanctum.’

  ‘Don’t go Latin on me. I have enough of that at school.’

  ‘It means it’s his holiest of holy places. No one must venture in there unless invited or on very serious business.’

  ‘I asked if he’d like a cup of tea. That’s serious business, isn’t it?’

  ‘Oh, Virginia!’ she said, unable to
suppress a smile.

  They looked at each other.

  ‘Mother,’ Rusty said slowly, ‘I still can’t get used to being called Virginia. I know it’s me, but it feels like I’m standing next to someone. Do you feel that when someone calls you Margaret?’

  Her mother looked startled for a moment, and then nodded.

  ‘Yes, I do a bit. It’s almost as if I should be the way I was four years ago.’

  ‘But that’s how it is with me!’ said Rusty. ‘Like I should be a little kid.’

  ‘But you are a “little kid”.’

  ‘Oh, Mother, I’m almost a teenager.’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘A teenager.’

  ‘What on earth is a teenager?’

  ‘Someone who’s thirteen, or fourteen, or fifteen… Don’t you call them that here?’

  ‘I’ve never heard the expression.’

  ‘Well, in the States we even have teen magazines. Anyway, how come all the people in Devon call you Peggy?’

  ‘There were three Margarets in the W.V.S. when I joined, Margaret, Maggie and Meg. So I became Peggy and it caught on.’ She stood up. ‘Look, I’ll try and smuggle up some bread and hot milk, but think about what I said, won’t you?’

  ‘About apologizing?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘O.K.’

  As soon as the door was closed, Rusty drew out a small bundle of letters from under the mattress and pulled out the snapshot of Uncle Bruno and Skeet with the fish. She had always thought of Uncle Bruno as being her father. It must be awful for her real one to come back and find her and Charlie comparing him with someone else… Especially if the someone else was more fun.

  At breakfast there was no sign of her father. Rusty was informed that he would only be eating with them at supper, so Charlie, who had his earlier, would not be eating with him at all. Rusty found this very odd.

  It wasn’t until after lunch that her grandmother said she had permission to go to his study. After she knocked at the door and entered, he gazed disapprovingly at her jeans and motioned her in.

  ‘I believe you have something to say, Virginia.’

  Rusty held her hands behind her back and crossed her fingers.

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  He looked puzzled. ‘Does that mean yes or no?’

  ‘It means yes. Uh-huh means yes. Uh-uh means no.’

  He cleared his throat awkwardly and clasped his hands, resting them on the desk of scattered papers.

  ‘Boy,’ she said, ‘have you got a lot of papers to sort out.’

  He frowned.

  ‘Oh yeah,’ she said. ‘I came to apologize for answering back.’

  He drew himself up. ‘You realize,’ he said, ‘that an apology means that you promise never to do it again, don’t you?’

  ‘I guess,’ she said.

  ‘Guessing is hardly enough.’

  ‘What if you went nuts? I mean, I’m not saying you could go nuts. But what if you said, “Rusty, your hair is green and you have three legs”? Then I’d have to disagree, wouldn’t I? I’d have to say, “No. My hair is not green and I only have two.” Legs, I mean, not two hairs.’

  Her father stared at her.

  ‘ ‘Cause if I had two hairs I’d look bald and you wouldn’t be able to see what colour they were anyway.’ She swallowed. ‘I remember once Uncle Bruno telling me about Spike Jones and the City Slickers, and one of’em said to the other, “You’ve got thin hair,” and he said, wait for it, “Well, who wants/a* hair?”‘ She paused. ‘Get it?’

  It was obvious that if her father did, he didn’t think it amusing. If only he’d smile, just once.

  As she stood there, she realized that she’d mentioned Uncle Bruno again.

  ‘Your mother has suggested that we go out tomorrow for a drive,’ her father said. ‘I have made arrangements to borrow a car for the day. I shall be picking it up this evening.’ He looked down at her jeans. ‘I shall expect you to be dressed appropriately.’

  ‘That sounds neat. I mean the trip, not the –’

  ‘Yes,’ interrupted her father. ‘I think that will do. I’ll see you at dinner this evening. And by the way, your mother has explained the misunderstanding over “sir” Father or Daddy is quite sufficient.’

  Rusty waited for an apology, but none came.

  ‘And now, if you don’t mind, I have rather a lot of work to do.’

  On Sunday afternoon they all assembled in the hall in their Sunday best. Mr Dickinson gazed at Rusty’s L. L. Bean coat and saddle shoes. ‘Have you no English clothes?’ he said.

  ‘Only my school uniform and I don’t want to wear that out. Especially when Mother gave up her coupons to pay for it.’

  Peggy blushed. Underneath her heavy W.V.S. coat she wore the same tweed skirt and cardigan that she had changed into the night her husband had returned.

  Mrs Dickinson Senior was decked out in navy blue. Navy-blue hat, navy-blue coat, gloves, shoes, and discreetly darned pale silk stockings. Her father, who wore a dark suit several sizes too big for him, carried a trench coat over his arm.

  Charlie, who was holding on to his teddy-bear with fierce determination, was in flannel shorts, tie and an old green coat. His curly red hair, although flattened down with water, was already springing outward rebelliously.

  Mr Dickinson led them out through the door and down the road, almost in formation. He looked so stern that Rusty had a fit of the giggles.

  They turned a corner and stepped across the road to a car that was the image of the Bomb, only somewhat newer. Mr Dickinson stood by the bonnet.

  ‘Mother,’ he said, ‘you sit in the front. Margaret, at the back with the children.’

  As they climbed into the car, Charlie exclaimed, ‘Why are you getting in the back, Mummy?’

  ‘Well, it’ll be rather nice for us to be sitting together and looking out of the window, won’t it?’ she replied.

  As soon as everyone was seated, her father started the engine. It gave a gentle rumble and moved forward.

  They had hardly driven two miles when Charlie piped up, ‘Mummy, why is that man driving?’

  ‘Charlie,’ whispered Peggy, ‘that’s your daddy.’

  Over his shoulder Mr Dickinson stated quietly, ‘Margaret, I have asked you to call him Charles. He’s not a pleb, you know.’

  ‘What’s a pleb?’ asked Rusty.

  Peggy put her finger hastily to her lips.

  ‘I don’t like him,’ said Charlie. ‘When is he going away?’

  ‘Charlie,’ said his mother firmly, ‘don’t be unkind.’

  ‘Margaret,’ warned Mr Dickinson.

  ‘I mean Charles,’ she added quickly.

  ‘Are we going to Beatie’s?’ Charlie wanted to know.

  ‘No, darling, we’re just going out to see the countryside.’

  ‘Can I pick flowers?’

  ‘I don’t think there’ll be many out now, but yes, if we see some, you can pick them.’

  He gave a satisfied sigh and wriggled himself back into the seat.

  Rusty gazed out of the window at all the bombed buildings, and for the first time she began to feel sympathy for the many people who had lost their homes and their loved ones. She remembered Harry’s remark about the children who had been away in America, how they couldn’t understand what he was talking about; for a moment she felt angry at her parents for sending her away. She had a sense that something very important had happened in England, and she knew she had missed it.

  Gradually they left the buildings behind and emerged on to the open road. Charlie stood up, attempting to see the trees. Her mother sat him on her knee, while her father and grandmother chatted pleasantly, mostly about the weather and about people whom they knew from the past.

  They stopped by a pretty little stone bridge that draped itself over a tiny hill. A stream gurgled underneath it. Her mother clasped Charlie tightly and held him over the wall so that he could see. Rusty stood beside them and rested her elbows on it.

 
Mrs Dickinson Senior remained seated in the car, while Rusty’s father paced awkwardly up and down the lane.

  ‘Look, Mummy,’ yelled Charlie, pointing. ‘A fish! I saw a fish!’

  ‘Let’s go for a walk,’ said Peggy suddenly, and she lowered Charlie back on to the ground.

  ‘And explore,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, explore.’

  ‘Can I come too?’ said Rusty.

  ‘Of course you can.’ She turned. ‘Roger, we’re going for a walk. Are you coming?’

  He hesitated.

  ‘And what shall,’ do here on my own?’ said Mrs Dickinson Senior peevishly.

  Rusty’s father glanced at her and then cleared his throat.

  ‘I’d better stay with Mother,’ he said.

  Peggy nodded, and the three of them began walking.

  For no apparent reason, as soon as they were out of sight they started to run quite wildly. Charlie released his mother’s hand, thrust his teddy bear into her arms, and began shrieking, his small arms pumping madly up and down as he jumped and kicked loose stones.

  Rusty lifted him on to her back and galloped beside her mother, making whinnying noises like a horse.

  Exhausted, they stopped at an old stile and leaned over it, catching their breaths. As the wind shook the hedges, Rusty was vaguely aware of Charlie singing, ‘Ten Green Bottles’ and getting all the numbers wrong.

  ‘I suppose,’ said her mother quietly, ‘we’d better be getting back.’

  ‘I guess so,’ murmured Rusty.

  By the time the car was in sight it had begun to rain and they were running again, only this time without the lightness they had possessed earlier.

  They clattered over the bridge and across the lane, and dived, laughing, into the back-seat of the car.

  ‘I’m glad to see someone has enjoyed themselves,’ said Rusty’s grandmother stiffly. ‘You were rather a long time.’

  ‘Party pooper,’ muttered Rusty under her breath.

  Her father climbed into the car and slammed the door. By now the sky had grown dark. The engine gave a splutter, followed by another splutter, followed immediately by silence.

  Rusty glanced at her mother. She caught her eye and then turned swiftly away.

  Her father attempted to start the car again, but with no result.