‘Oh, God Almighty.’
We filed into the shadowed transept. Pamela tried to keep her voice down in church but it was so clear, so piercing always. ‘Can we sit with the Hornes?’
‘Shush, Pamela. Your voice is like a steam whistle.’ I glanced back at Selwyn. He was silhouetted in the doorway, a head taller than Aubrey. I couldn’t see his face but he would see mine. I gestured towards Lucy and Mrs Horne, to say that we were going with them. ‘Of course we can,’ I said to Pamela.
Old Mrs Horne and Lucy’s father were ahead of us, Mrs Horne broad-backed in a yellow frock, and leaning heavily on her son’s shoulder as she walked. We followed them into a pew. ‘Sit between me and Lucy,’ I whispered to Pamela.
‘I always sit with you, Ell. Let me go between Lucy and Mrs Horne.’
‘All right.’
She scrambled past our knees and wedged herself between Lucy and her grandmother. Lucy looked up at Selwyn and Aubrey, as they walked murmuring down the aisle with Lady Brock. Lady Brock squeezed my shoulder with her gloved hand as she passed. We rose to our feet and the vicar said, ‘O come, let us sing to the Lord, let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.’ I mouthed the words. Tomorrow I’d be bidding Pamela goodbye at my front door, watching her leave, and then going back inside. It was unimaginable. How would I go through the house, in and out of all the rooms? The dressing room, especially, where she slept: I didn’t know how I was ever going to go in there again. I’d have to move the bed, shift the little table. Make it different somehow.
How would Aubrey manage, with one arm? He wouldn’t be able to hold her hand in London, not if he was carrying her suitcase. She’d have to be very good, and not run ahead among the crowds.
‘In His hand are the deep places in the earth,’ I recited. ‘The strength of the hills is His also.’
We left the church and made our way to the Hornes’ house. It was extraordinarily warm for the end of March. The heat made the day strange, because the trees were still bare. Pamela shrugged off her cardigan, and walked ahead of me and Lucy, between Mrs Horne and her son. If one could call it walking: an hour in church, doing no more than sit, stand and kneel, had built up an intolerable head of steam in her. Every step was a jump, every fourth step a leap into the air, accompanied by a shriek. ‘That’s a fox,’ she told Mr Horne. ‘That’s what they do at night. They play about at night, and go like this.’ She leaped and shrieked again, and I heard Mr Horne, a kennelman all his life, say, ‘My word, Pam. You’re a brave fox,’ as he took her hand. In that moment I honestly would have preferred her to go then, just to vanish in an instant, and spare me the agony of waiting the rest of the day and the night.
‘Let’s have a tot in our cuppa.’ Lucy sniffed. ‘Bloody hell.’ I saw her sharp little face, the wetness in her narrowed eyes. We grasped each other’s hands, and then parted to climb the steps.
I watched Pamela bend over in the long grass, trying for the last time to feed Maurice, who was as recalcitrant as ever. The brandy hadn’t been a good idea. Mr Horne had said it would stiffen our sinews but it was only cloying my mouth, bringing me closer to tears. How close could one go to tears without actually crying? I had a pain in my throat from it.
‘Oh Maurice, you are sweet,’ I heard Pamela say.
I went over to the long grass, and put my hand on her shoulder. I’d been the one who’d told her that her mother was dead. I remembered her in the privy here, her face lit by the heart-shaped hole in the door. Won’t be long, Pammie, her mother used to say. A smaller child, in the grip of a great grief. It was my job to tell her now. ‘Pamela, tomorrow you’re going away to your cousins in Ireland.’
‘I know.’ She didn’t turn her head. ‘We’re going on a train to London, and then on a boat to an island, and another lady’s coming with us. Daddy told me after breakfast. He said you’d probably let me take the Peg family, but I should ask. So can I?’
‘Ireland. Not island. Though it is an island …’
‘That’s it. Ireland.’ Still holding the stem of grass, she straightened up and looked at me. ‘Can I take them?’
‘Please,’ I said, as a reflex.
‘Please?’
‘Yes.’
She took my hand, put the grass stem into it. ‘You try.’
‘No, I don’t think he’s hungry.’ I felt too weak, suddenly, to cry. ‘We’d better go home. The Hornes will want their dinner soon. Say goodbye to Maurice.’
‘Bye, Maurice.’ We went back towards the house. ‘Bye, heart lav,’ she said. ‘And blackcurrants. Oh – Ellen. You’d better bring your other hat, the one that stays on, because we’re crossing the sea. It would be a shame if that straw one got blown away into the waves. Nobody’d fetch it for you, that’s for sure.’
I heard Elizabeth’s voice, when she said ‘that’s for sure’.
‘I’m not coming, Pamela. I’m staying here and you’re going on the boat with a nanny, a lady to look after you. Over the sea to your aunt. Aunt Hester.’
But she was running ahead to Lucy, who was standing by the apple tree. I watched her walk along the trunk. One foot in front of the other now, toes pointed, steady. A big girl. Lucy held out her hands but they weren’t needed any more. Mrs Horne came out of the cottage, followed by a warm breath of gravy and draining cabbage. She was drying her hands on a tea towel. ‘We’re not sent more than we can bear,’ she said. ‘You know that, my dear.’ Then she turned and went inside. She didn’t expect an answer. I wanted to thank her, for being so kind to me, always. But there would be time enough for that.
We had our light luncheon. I forced down a scrap of carrot, cabbage and potato patty. After the meal I went upstairs to get Pamela’s things ready for her journey. I met Elizabeth on the landing. She was holding the blanket waistcoat I’d made for Pamela.
‘I don’t know if he’ll want you to pack this.’ Loyally, Elizabeth refused to say his name.
‘I’ll ask him.’ I took the waistcoat. ‘It rains all the time there, you know. Damp and chilly.’
Elizabeth sighed. ‘Well, she’ll have cast-offs galore now, from the big family. She won’t wear a new thing till she’s eighteen and gets a dress for dances, and even then it’s touch and go. I know what it’s like, I had three older sisters. I thought stockings came with darns.’ She grasped my arm. ‘Oh my dear, I’m so sorry. I’m speaking out of turn.’
Because my face was obviously stretched into some sort of awful mask, as I contemplated Pamela tumbling away into this flock of children.
‘Never mind, Elizabeth,’ I told her.
There wasn’t much to pack: it would take a quarter of an hour at most. I fetched together the few dresses, stockings, a pair of shoes, a pair of wellingtons. Underwear. I checked under the bed in the dressing room and withdrew a few more peg dolls, some still dressed in Selwyn’s handkerchiefs. She could have the handkerchiefs too. If Selwyn protested, I’d buy him more after the war ended. Surely it would, some day.
I heard footsteps on the stairs, and then Aubrey put his head round the door. I looked up at him, and then continued to lay out vests on the bed. ‘These will last the summer, I daresay. She’ll need warmer ones in the autumn. But Hester will take charge of that.’
‘You’ve been terribly kind. Keeping her in clothes over the years.’
‘I was given coupons.’ My voice was lifeless, insolent. I moved around the room.
He came in and sat down on the bed. ‘I’m sorry about all of this.’
My shoulders sagged. ‘Really, I can’t see why you should be, since none of it’s your fault.’
He was silent for a moment. Then he said, ‘Thank you for the suitcase.’
It was one of Selwyn’s, awfully old. I thought he’d probably taken it to school. ‘You don’t have to continually apologize and thank.’ My voice rose. ‘You have no suitcase. I’ll give you one. There was no one to look after your daughter, so I did it. We all do what we must.’
He said nothing, adjusted the sling on h
is shoulder. I turned away from him and began to put Pamela’s clothes into the suitcase. The wellingtons in a shoe bag, her winter boots: they might be too small by Christmas, but they would go, anyway. Two of the three vests. All the stockings, all but one pair of knickers, all but one pair of socks. Small white socks, some irretrievably mud-stained however much we scrubbed, but serviceable. I would put in her nightdress and toilet things tomorrow, and shut the lid, and never see any of these clothes again.
‘Will it be as warm in London tomorrow, do you suppose?’ I asked Aubrey, in the same high voice. ‘She’d better take her hat. Shall Hester want this waistcoat?’ I held it up. ‘It’s made out of a blanket. Nice and cosy.’
I glanced up at his reflection in the wardrobe mirror. He looked tired, discomfited. Catching my eye he forced an expression of manufactured cheer. ‘The house is glacial,’ he said. ‘The children play upstairs in their coats during the winter. So I’m sure it’ll come in handy.’
I put the waistcoat into the case. It was almost full. Where would she fit her toilet things, the Peg family, her book about London? I’d have to find another bag.
‘She thinks I’m coming too, Aubrey. We need to disabuse her.’ Despair passed through me like a breaking wave. I sat down next to him on the bed. ‘I did say. But you know how she runs off all the time. She didn’t hear me, or tried not to, at least. How are you going to manage in London? She’s not used to cities. I was thinking about it in church. You won’t be able to hold her hand and the suitcase—’
‘She might remember cities. She was in Plymouth, after all.’ He got to his feet so that I had to look up into his face. He seemed so young, this widower. It was almost ridiculous. I wondered how his face would change with the years. What sort of man he’d make, when he was Selwyn’s age. His brisk words cut off my thoughts. ‘My half-brother will meet us off the train. He’s much older than me and Hester. He works in the War Office, he’s an actuary. He’s a terrible old stick, he knows nothing about children, but he has a flat, and two functioning hands.’
We heard her feet on the stairs, and then she appeared in the doorway, beaming at Aubrey. ‘Guess what, we’re going to the Hall for tea. The Hall.’ She echoed herself, dragging the word out. ‘To show you the knight in armour.’ She came over to me and looked in the suitcase. ‘Oh, there’s my new waistcoat. I was looking for that.’ She picked it up and began to struggle into it, turning it upside down in her haste.
‘Pamela.’ I pulled the hem away from her shoulders. ‘Sit on the bed with me. Take this off. It’s too hot for today.’
She was hogtied, her arms bound into the waistcoat, but nonetheless scrambled onto the bed. ‘No it isn’t. It’s perfect.’
‘I’m not coming to Ireland with you,’ I said. ‘Pamela, are you listening? I’m staying here, and you’re going with your daddy.’
‘A mouse ate this blanket so it had to be cut up for clothes.’ She rolled away from me into a ball, kicking her foot against the suitcase. I got up and grabbed at the case before it fell onto the floor.
‘Pamela darling, I’m not coming—’
‘A family of mice. Squeak, squeak. Lucy’s got a waistcoat too, only hers is bigger but not much.’
Aubrey stood, bewildered.
‘You could help,’ I said.
‘Pamela, Ellen’s staying here and we’re going to London, just you and me. Then we’ll find a nice lady who will take you on the boat. She’ll make sure you have some chocolate—’
‘Stop talking. Stop talking, you horrible man.’ She sat up, threw off the waistcoat. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes shiny and hard. ‘I’m going to the Hall with Mr Parr. You can go wherever you want. Go to London or Ireland or Australia or Canada and see if I jolly well care.’ She scrambled off the bed and bounded out of the room, across the landing and down the stairs.
I put the waistcoat in the suitcase and clicked it shut. I still needed to find another receptacle for the rest of her things, but I wouldn’t look now. Aubrey sat down again on the bed, shoulders slumped. ‘Oh, dear.’
‘She doesn’t particularly like chocolate. Chocolate cake, yes, but not chocolate on its own.’
‘I didn’t know.’ He seemed to slump further.
‘How could you?’ I crossed the room. ‘I’ll go and see where she is. Since you can think of nothing better than to sit there in that hopeless fashion.’ My lips were shaking with anger but it didn’t weaken me.
‘Ellen,’ he said as I left the room, but nothing more, and as I started down the stairs I glimpsed him hang his head.
20
I FOUND HER in the kitchen making tiny dough balls out of a piece of bread, the grime from her fingers greying the already grey dough. I firmed my mouth and said her name. She looked up.
‘I know you don’t want to go to Ireland,’ I said.
‘Do you?’ She shot me the same hard, shiny look as she had given her father. ‘So what? It’s not like either of you care the tiniest bit about me.’
I kneeled on the floor beside her and put my arms on the arms of the chair. Gently she banged her foot against my thigh. ‘I hate you,’ she said in the softest voice. She gave me another small kick, and another. ‘Hate you, hate you, hate you.’
The house was still. Elizabeth was in the garden, pegging tea cloths on the line. Aubrey showed no sign of coming downstairs. Selwyn could have been anywhere.
I pushed myself upright and fetched a canvas bag, one with a strap, that hung from a hook on the door. We needed food of some kind, and water. There was an army canteen under the sink – I brought it out and filled it. Then I wrapped a hunk of seedcake, dried out but edible, in greaseproof paper. That would do. Both these items I put into the bag.
Pamela was watching me, swinging her leg, pouting.
‘Come on, Pamela. Come with me.’
‘Why should I?’
‘Outside. Now.’ I went to the kitchen door without looking back, heard the scrape of her chair on the floor.
I wheeled the bicycle towards the double doors of the garage, pushing it fast over the uneven path. She tagged behind, recently caught up, whining.
‘Why are you putting it away? I wanted to ride to the Hall.’
‘We need to put the real tyres on. Take hold of the bicycle so I can tackle this door.’
I opened one half of the door, lifting it so that it wouldn’t groan on its hinges. Inside the garage the sheeted car was motionless in the gloom, the tank empty. The bicycle’s inner tubes lay in their box on the shelf. I fetched the box down and gave it to Pamela, who watched while I stood the bicycle on its handlebars and saddle, reached for the spanners and removed both wheels. I loved this machine. It was never a labour, caring for it.
We used a couple of old spoons for tyre irons. They worked perfectly well. The outer tyres were off in an instant.
‘Why are you changing the tyres?’
Less whining now.
‘We can’t tackle the hill road on straw ropes.’
I prised out the ropes that William had bound, which were properly made out of eight twisted strands. He and I had fitted them together, he pressing the straw neatly between the flanges of the wheel before I sewed the two ends together with waxed upholstery yarn.
‘We won’t be going on the hill road. We’re supposed to be having tea at the Hall.’
‘That’s not for an hour and a half. Do be quiet and bring me that pump. No. The black thing.’ She didn’t know what a bicycle pump was, of course. I pressed the inner tubes into place, inflating a little to give them form, and worked the outer tyres back on and pumped some more. ‘Now, on with the wheels.’
Pamela was squatting by the bicycle now, holding the pump. ‘Coo. You should be a mechanic in a bike race, Ellen.’
In my haste I tightened the front wheel-nuts unevenly and pushed the wheel out of true. It seemed to take an age before it was ticking round steady and free. I put the straw ropes in a dry bucket beneath the workbench, righted the bicycle, and wheeled it out to le
an against the brick wall by the door. ‘Now a bit more air.’
‘Let me—’
‘No.’ I grabbed the pump from her. ‘There isn’t time.’
‘It’s rude to snatch.’
Behind us the front door opened. ‘Mrs Parr?’
At least it was Elizabeth, and not Selwyn or Aubrey. ‘We’re going for a spin, Elizabeth. Could you please tell the men we’ll meet them at the Hall for tea?’
It felt right to say ‘the men’ like that, airily, as one did at picnics or tennis matches, or, indeed, tea at the Hall. As if nothing untoward were happening. But Elizabeth silently wound her hands into her apron and stared at the bicycle pump.
I slipped it into my bag. ‘Come on, Pamela.’
When Mother died Edward and I walked through Pipehouse Wood together: the light-green shadow, the small ups and downs of a beech wood. Now Pamela and I travelled through the same light and shade, unseen by people on the road. I pushed the bicycle over bulbous, silvered roots; she trotted and gambolled beside me. She’d forgotten about Ireland, I could tell from the spring in her step. She was still just young enough to do that. Let things slip entirely from her mind. The path led along the bottom of the wood. We would have to join the road in the end, but at least, for this first part of the journey, the trees hid us. I walked on, and the warmth here, even among the trees, recalled the summers when Lucy and Daniel and I used to wander in and out of the deep beech-shadows here, hungry and none too clean, and glad to be in the sunshine. But I no longer cared about heat and cold. I would endure ten of the winters of my childhood, ten in a row with no summer between them, if it meant that I could keep Pamela by my side. Let me freeze and starve in the Absaloms again if, at the end of it all, my girl could stay with me.
Once on the road, the land started to incline: a tough climb, but we made better going than in the wood. I laboured from pedal to pedal. The breeze blew through the trees which lined the road. Pamela sang her song, hey, ho, but I had no breath to join her. I just listened to her clear little voice as Beacon Hill rose in the distance. The road started to level out, the air-filled tyres spun along. I didn’t remind her of the opportunity to pedal and she didn’t mention it, and I was glad, because I was faster.
We Must Be Brave Page 25