by Jane Johnson
Jethro added, ‘They can fucken go back to their own country. We don’t want ’em. They shoulda stayed and fought rather than come begging here. They was supposed to be our allies, fighting Hitler and all. Now they’ll come and live in houses that should go to proper Cornish and eat food we can’t spare. Fucken furriners.’
‘Fucken bastards,’ six-year-old Jem had echoed gleefully.
Olivia had been shocked. ‘But they’re escaping the Nazis. We’re offering them sanctuary – they’re refugees!’
‘We got enough a them a’ready, fucken emmets.’ The village had welcomed an entire Jewish school from London’s East End.
But she was only a girl: what did they care for her views? They just laughed at her and called her unpatriotic, which had incensed her. ‘Well, you’re blasted idiots!’ she had shouted after them, unable to use the forbidden word and knowing it to be an inadequate response. Shortly after this, on their eighteenth birthdays, the two older lads had enlisted in the navy and soon after Jethro had been lost when his cruiser had gone down, torpedoed in the Mediterranean. Witnessing the grief of his family at the remembrance service, Olivia had regretted her outburst. Eighteen was too young to die, for your country or anything else. But another part of her whispered that at least Jethro had got to see something of the outside world she was so hungry to glimpse for herself.
There was still no sign of Mamie when she reached Treharrow. The cows were out in the big field, black-and-white shapes moving placidly against a carpet of green; beyond them a tractor moved in the potato field, dragging the haulm topper behind it. Soon the harvesting would begin: one of the reasons the Land Girls had been drafted in. They’d be kitted out with wellies and potato sacks and set to work. She hoped to heaven she didn’t get sent up here too. It was this thought that kept her from knocking on the door at the farmhouse to ask if Mamie had come home; besides, she had an idea she knew where the girl might hide. Skirting the farm buildings, Olivia ran behind the byre, making for the leafy footpath that led down the steep hillside towards the coast path. In the hedge beside the wildflower meadow there was a hollow in the roots of the hazels that was Mamie’s favourite den.
Olivia crept along the hedge, ducked through the gap into the meadow and came quickly to the den, but it was immediately clear when she knelt and stared in that Mamie wasn’t there. Inside was a bizarre collection of objects. A candle stub in a painted tin, a box of matches, a little pile of wrapped sweets, a potato sack used as a carpet, and a small wooden doll. Olivia picked it up and took it out into the sunlight for a better look.
In an almost uncanny echo of Mamie herself, its face was carved wide and flat, its mouth curved up in a sweet smile. It wore a neatly sewn dress of pale cambric. Looped around its neck and body, like a crossed bandolier, was a string of dark red beads joined by a silk tassel.
*
Across the field, in the shadow of the elm, the man watched as Olivia emerged from the hollow with the doll in her hands. He was struck by the intense concentration of her downturned gaze as she turned the object around in her hands, ran her fingers down the carved face and along the beads. He held his breath. Would she take it away? Would he have to go after her to take it back? It struck him that he did not want to do that and yet he might have to. And so he stood there, invisible, balancing on the balls of his feet, his muscles trembling with intent.
Then she bent and replaced the doll inside the hollow. He watched her stand there for a long moment looking back inside the little shrine, then turn and walk back the way she had come, her expression thoughtful.
7
Becky
THE IRON KEY HIDDEN INSIDE THE CARVED TOTEM FITS the lock in the door from the cellar to the tunnel with fairy-tale ease. With mounting excitement, I click on the torch app on my phone, open the door and shine the cool beam into the void. It illuminates a flat area that runs for a few feet, but after that the darkness is impenetrable. I wedge the door open with a heavy tin of what must be paint, though it has lost its label, irrationally terrified that it may somehow close behind me, then scuff along the flat section, playing the beam of the torch in all directions to make sure I don’t fall down an unseen hole, or knock myself out on an outcrop of rock.
I can see that the tunnel is not a natural feature – there are the marks of tools – it must have been mined as an escape route from the house or a secret ingress up from the cove. As I step down something catches me painfully on the shoulder, and I yelp. I pat at the rock and compacted earth and feel the protuberance: thin and cold and hard. A spiky little stone, it comes away in my hand. Without thinking much about it, I stow it away in my jeans pocket, a little keepsake of my adventure.
Down I go, feeling the darkness gather at my back like a cold weight. And, God, it is really cold down here, the sort of chill that goes right to the marrow of you. It’s probably just what comes of being in a lightless place where sea-ethers and seeping water permeate, but it feels a bit uncanny: all the little hairs on the back of my neck are stirring.
I think about rockfall, about getting trapped down here; I think about tripping and falling down all those steps; I think about someone entering the house, moving the paint pot and closing the cellar door against me.
So often in the past years I have opted not to do things. I have not braved the world. I have hidden myself away, avoided sex with the lights on, looked away from mirrors. I have even hidden from my own creativity. I have not picked up a paintbrush in years. I have been in the studio only to watch Eddie sitting at the wheel, moulding clay to his will, and even this quiet skill seemed to me like oppression. But getting on the train down here was a turning point: I am taking back some control over my life. I press on through the narrow cave, squeezing past the pinch point, and at last emerge into the clear light of the cove.
Feeling light-headed with relief, I dance a kind of victory dance, stamping my feet on the shingle, kicking bits of seaweed here and there, twirling round and round with my phone held high in triumph. Now, the beach really is mine, and mine alone. I have private, secret access to it, albeit rather dark and scary access.
And there is the sea, sparkling and turquoise, the waves lapping in with tender invitation, and in a sudden access of daring I strip down to my knickers and run across the beach, across the painful pebbles to where the wet sand squelches between my toes, and into the shallows, sucking in my breath at the change of temperature, lifting my knees high, then launching myself forward in a clumsy half-dive. I laugh in shock: the water is heart-stoppingly cold. My breath comes in a series of stutters as my whole body seems to constrict, and then I am swimming, my arms and legs moving jerkily, buoyed up by the Cornish sea.
Such a sense of freedom! I tread water, laughing out loud. I have taken myself by surprise. I am capable of more than I had thought, stronger and wilder than I knew. I swim up and down, making my muscles work and my limbs coordinate. I turn onto my back and let the sun bathe my face and torso, trusting the sea to keep me afloat. Despite everything, at this moment in time I am still alive, still myself. Rebecca Young. Daughter to lost parents, sometime artist, sometime lover. I resolve to go down into the village this afternoon to call Eddie. I may even invite him down here…
No, I won’t. Even as the thought occurs, I shoo it away. For now, until Olivia returns, Chynalls is my special place. I do not want Eddie coming down and spoiling it. Besides, he has his show coming up. He would think me mad even to suggest it.
I flip over… and become aware of a dark head a few feet away from me. Another swimmer, in my cove? But no, it’s a dog, a black dog. I paddle my legs, turning to look for its owner, but there is no one on the beach, and when I complete the circle the dog has vanished. I must be seeing things. But then the head pops up again, closer, and I see it is a seal. Sun gleams off its mottled, glossy head and its large black eyes. Its gaze radiates cheerful curiosity. Then it slips beneath the water and a moment later I feel it brush against my belly, a cool, slick touch that seems to convey friendl
iness and the wish to play, yet not to upset my equilibrium.
My whole body becomes a smile. I take a breath and duck my head underwater and open my eyes in the strange green light and there she is, waiting for me. We swim little circles around one another, the seal graceful and strong, and I feel graceful and strong as I match her, until at last she suddenly refines her bodyshape and torpedoes away from me, and that is the end of our game. I am sad, but swollen with delight. I kick to the surface and am just about to strike back towards the shore when I hear a shout, and looking back I see a small boat, its outboard motor burbling as it slows. There are two men in it. They are shouting at the seal, swearing at it, driving it off. And then they see me, and they stop. I recognize them as Saul and Ezra, Rosie and Jem’s sons, and the strength starts to go out of me. All of a sudden I can feel the tiredness in my muscles. Panic starts to make me heavy, awkward, less buoyant. I thrash the water, swallow a huge mouthful of burning seawater, snort and choke and begin to sink. I force my arms into an ugly crawl, heading back to the beach slowly, so bloody slowly. Pride drives me on, pride and vulnerability.
At last the seabed scours my toes. Another stroke and I am able to stand with the water rippling against my chin. I turn to watch the boat. It has not moved. Ezra and Saul are still watching me. What are they doing out there? I see no fishing rods. Are they towing lines for mackerel? Are they checking crab or lobster pots? It must be something fish-related if they were trying to drive the seal off, I reason.
The boat bobs up and down with the waves. They must have turned off the outboard motor, as if they are waiting for something. Perhaps they are waiting to watch me emerge. I think about my pale body in its clinging underwear and my teeth start to chatter, great shudders of cold running through me. What matters more – saving myself from hypothermia or guarding my modesty? Get a grip, Becky, I tell myself in the voice of my mother. Walk out of the sea and put your shirt on. What does it matter what they think?
Turning my back on the boat, I start to walk to the shore. The water drags at me, reluctant to let me go. I forge forward till the sea lies at my waist, the breeze chill on my shoulders, and I shove my way through the waves till I am clear and walk as quickly as I can without breaking into a run. I swipe up my clothes, shrug my shirt on over my head, cursing myself for not having undone the buttons before taking it off. It sticks to my wet skin, rucks up over my chest and I haul it down hard, glad that it is baggy enough to cover my knickers and skim my thighs, which are drying in the breeze, prickly with salt. I turn to face the sea and the boat is still there, just beyond the necklace of rocks guarding the cove. I wrestle my jeans back on and zip them up and feel armoured once more.
‘I hope you enjoyed the show!’ I yell, knowing the sound will never carry as far as the boat. I hope they detect my anger. I hope they see they have not cowed me. I aim my phone at them and snap a photo.
I decide not to return to the house via the cave. Not wanting to surrender my piece of secret knowledge to the onlookers, I take the earth steps up to the sea gate. By the time I reach the track there is no sign of the boat.
Inside the house I heat water in the scullery and have a stand-up wash in the copper bath to get the salt off. I dunk my head and have to use the yellow bar of soap I have found for shampoo. It stinks of bitumen, the hot, nose-stinging smell of road mending. I wonder what it will do to my hair, but remarkably it leaves it glossy and tangle-free.
The wardrobe in my room renders up a Guernsey sweater in thick blue wool. Moths have been at it, but the holes aren’t too noticeable; besides, there is no one here to see me. I drag it out, and turn with the jersey under my arm. The long mirror on the inside of the wardrobe door throws my image at me. There is little worse in life than being caught unawares by your reflection, before you’ve made the small adjustments all women make – I have avoided mirrors for so long that I have forgotten to look out for them – and there I am, thin and white and strangely shaped with concavities where there should be curves, ugly purple marks and puckers of skin where it should be smooth.
Shocked anew at the carnage, I trace the scars left by my treatment. A double mastectomy and lymphadenectomy. This small round lump just beneath my collarbone my implanted chemo port; this dark mark where the drain exited (I can still remember the crawling sensation of it being drawn out again, wormlike, foreign). I did not opt for reconstruction: it seemed to me then a pointless distraction from the matter of life or death, a foolish vanity. I did not want fat carved off my belly or buttocks or back. I did not want fake nipples sewn or tattooed onto me. I think my mind was not in the right place at the right time to make these decisions, being still awash with primal fear.
And now I am afraid again, afraid of the ‘something’ that has been seen on my latest scan. Afraid of the kindness in my consultant’s voice, carefully calibrated not to scare me away. Afraid of the possibility in my tenuous future of the words ‘recurrence’ and ‘incurable’, maybe even ‘terminal’. I am three hundred miles from London, having run as far away from it all as I can without falling off the edge of the world.
I take in my reflection, this sexless patchwork of a woman, remembering the first time Eddie saw me after the surgery, how he could not disguise his horror and repulsion. He had always loved my breasts – like apples, like peaches, he would say as he kissed them, gathering them into his hands. He used to draw me naked. He was not a fine draughtsman, but he had a good sense of form, as you’d expect of a potter. Those soft pencil sketches showed someone female, proportionate, seductive. The breasts were lovingly rendered, shaded to give a sense of mass and heft, while the face remained sketchy – profile, eyes downcast, hair curling around the shoulders. Everywoman.
I turn and the light strikes me full on and gilds the surfaces, smoothing the imperfections, showing that my scars are less livid. And suddenly I see myself with a painter’s eye: the form has a certain elegance to it, interesting, beguiling even, suggesting a withholding of self, a house of secrets. I press my fingers gently against my skin and feel no lumps beyond the familiar scar tissue, but what do fingers know? They are not scanning devices. And yet the fear is diminishing as a thought begins to take hold and I start to see how I might draw myself. It is a little shocking, but exciting. It is something I would never have thought to do before. My mind wanders to the discovery of the packet of charcoal sticks. Some other artist has been here before me. I wonder who it was?
Creativity is a curious thing. For years I took my own for granted. It defined me, gave me the personality I always felt I lacked. I would paint or sketch every day, fitting it in around the necessities of getting by in a city that cost too much to live in. When I was working, in a succession of temping jobs, I would get up early, taking sketchbook and pencils with me on the train to arrive at the river while the dawn light slicked the surface and the birds sang all around me. I would draw early morning mudlarks scanning the low-tide shores, the way the light shone through the canyons of the City’s towers. I found lost gardens and drew them through the bars on the gates that shut me out of them. I drew birds courting, and sly cats lying in oblongs of sunlight on backstreet pavements. I drew reflections on the river and the dazzle of sun-freighted air filtered through cherry blossom. And then I would pack my drawing things away – all the visions of the delicacy and dreams – and trudge to the tyranny of work. By the time the financial crash hit and there were no temping jobs to be found, I had squirrelled away a reasonable sum, enough to tide me over for a few months. That summer, I gave myself over to painting, taking buses all over London to pockets of untouched parkland, to bird sanctuaries and commons. I painted people picnicking on Primrose Hill and swimming at the Ladies’ Pond on the Heath. I painted statuary in Highgate Cemetery and fallen angels in Nunhead. I met other artists and exhibited with them. I sold some paintings, each time feeling such disbelief and wash of gratitude towards the purchaser that I wanted to halve the price, or give my work away. I ploughed my profits into new canvases and paints. It
was during the last month of my freedom that I exhibited at the art fair and met Eddie. And everything changed.
For a while it was like being in a dream, all life’s edges blurred into soft focus, except that Eddie was in centrefield and sharp focus, blocking everything else out of my view, with his flag of black hair falling across his forehead, the sharp curve of his lips, his wild energies and single-minded creativity, desperately seductive.
I take my phone and go in search of a signal. There is none in the house. I go out into the garden and hold the phone high. Not a single bar of reception. I consider heading for higher ground but the woodland behind Chynalls looks dense and unwelcoming. I will go down into the village, where I can also ask about good workmen capable of undertaking Olivia’s project.
*
The village of Porth Enys was once described by an eminent poet as the loveliest in England, and you can see why. Its cottages cluster around three sides of an oval harbour in which boats bob on sparkling water and children play on the crescent of golden beach. Take away the cars and dress the people in period costume and it could be a snapshot of a bygone age. But then your eye is drawn by the bright kayaks ranged against the harbour wall, the defibrillator unit on the wall of the harbourmaster’s office, the brightly coloured plastic buckets and spades outside the shop.
The next day, at the railing overlooking the harbour, at last I get a signal and suddenly missed call notifications cascade across the screen. Eddie, Eddie, Eddie. All from Eddie – I spot a curt Where are you, Becks? and then WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU, all caps, no punctuation. I delete them all. I am so tempted to take the coward’s way out and text him. But conscience won’t let me. I call him. It rings and rings, then: ‘Yes?’