by Jane Bailey
Now he has buried his hand deep inside the undergrowth of her skirts, and she is crying. In fact, no – she is not crying: she is making little groans, little sighs. He is whispering things I can’t make out, and moving his hands gently, and the effect is to make her give little ‘oh’s’ and sobs and sighs, but she is definitely not crying.
Now he is leading her to the back of the barn and is laying her down on some stacked hay bales and there, amidst the lambing ewes and the air rich with the smell of birth, he lies on top of her.
My view has disintegrated with this move, and I can just make out the tops of Aunty Joyce’s stockings, her knees bent, and Heinrich’s strange nudging movements against her. It is like nothing I’ve seen before, except perhaps the caged bunnies. This is it then. This is shagging, and it’s ever so rude! One of the ewes bellows angrily, but they continue to move against each other, obscured by straw and shadows and the limit of my chink in the wood. Her sighs turn to soft wails, and she seems to be in pain. Just as I am about to go to her rescue, it stops.There is no sound, no more movement, except one or two indignant ewes kicking the straw and bellowing as though they are well and truly hacked off. Heinrich and Joyce seem to be smiling now, laughing at the sheep and brushing down their clothes. I dash off back down the lane. I can’t wait to tell Tommy. In the big barn I have seen birth and I have seen shagging, all within the space of a day and a night. Two of the great mysteries of life revealed under one roof.
Don’t sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me
Tommy is set to leave school at Easter when he’s fourteen. The Top Class children do practically nothing, and Boss Harry seems to turn a blind eye to them. The boys stalk the streets at dinnertime, loaf about with half-smoked Woodbines tucked behind their ears and talk about ambushing girls. The girls, on the other hand, have transformed themselves from the adventurous minxes they were in Standards One and Two. They no longer show all for a Victory V or allow themselves to be examined in a harvest stook surgery with tufts of barley. They are all buttoned up now, soaped and curled and saving themselves for the men they marry. And the boys, bursting with lust, full-grown and aimless, are so tormented by a coy look or a swinging hip that they plot violation.
Only one or two girls can be counted on to break ranks, and in so doing they probably save the virtue of many others. One is Betty Chudd – mother’s pride and joy – who is rumoured to have gone all the way with Leslie Capper.
Since Leslie is a couple of years older than anyone at school and works at the sawmill, no one can really verify it, although his younger brother Will is convinced. And anyway, everyone can testify to Betty’s loose ways – except for her mother who can’t see the wood for the trees – and it is Betty who becomes the trophy that lures them on, even if it is the lowered lashes of some other girl that really fuels their frenzy.
I can’t imagine that Tommy will be affected by anything so daft (especially now that I know what it entails). Even so, he does seem to grow in height each time I see him, and his voice – a varying reedy-rusty-bray when I met him – now seems to have settled to a deep, liquidy bass which I adore. And then one day something happens to threaten the easy friendship we have, threatens to change things for ever.
It is the weekend, and I have spent the morning stone-picking up at the farm, and the afternoon daydreaming with Tommy amongst the snowdrops, which have appeared slyly in the woods. Tommy and I are wandering back home across the fields, a little wary of being seen together, but too busy chatting about Aunty Joyce and Heinrich to care. As we reach the lane that links the village to the farm, Betty Chudd comes out of nowhere like a fox, leaning suddenly on a gatepost beside us, and twisting her toffee-coloured curls around her fingers.
“Comin’ up the lane then, you?”
Tommy turns from my strong protector into a clumsy oaf. His arms and legs seem suddenly not to fit his body, and his head seems too heavy to hold up straight on his neck. It lolls hopelessly, rolling from one shoulder to the next, as his eyes take in the panorama from the gatepost to his boots.
“Might then,” he mumbles.
“When?” she presses, wrapping both arms backwards over the five bar gate, so that her breasts stick out and pull at her dress buttons.
I assume he is just being nice, using the ‘maybe’ as a means of escape. So now I wait for something that will send her politely packing. But he folds his lips, then glances at her briefly, and says, “When ’er’s gone.”
I am horrified. There is no doubting, from the slight nod of his head in my direction, that ‘ ’er’ is me. I simply can’t believe Tommy can do this, and I plant my wellingtoned feet in front of him and stare for an explanation. His avoidance of my eyes confirms my worst fears: he is putting her before me. But there is worse to come.
“G’won then. Wunt wait f’rever.”
She’s up to something, in my opinion. Her cardigan has fallen completely open and, apart from her brown buckled shoes, her legs are entirely bare, as though imitating stockings. A daft thing to do in February. She looks like she’ll catch her death of cold, if you ask me.
“I’ll walk ’er back, then I’ll be up.”
“The little’un can walk ’erself back, can’t she?”
“Wunt be long, look.”
“What, you ’er lover or summut?”
He exhales as if desperate, then swallows earnestly. I am beside myself. Not only are they talking about me as the ‘little’un’ and ’er’, but worse: they are talking about me as if I’m not there. I should stomp off, I suppose, and leave him to the Sheepcote trophy he is longing to grab. But I let him walk me back and say goodbye, shooting him a wounded look, hoping to stop him. All I do, possibly, is inhibit his pleasure as he races back up the lane in the growing shadows of a late February afternoon.
It is a savage lesson to me; for all our intimacy and mutual security, there is a huge, burgeoning, crucial part of him that I cannot share. Not yet, at least.
The days slip bleakly into March. The skies are a blank grey-white and the lanes full of mud. There is nothing to look forward to, now that Tommy is lost to me. I don’t know if it is jealousy, fear or just plain callousness that fuels my cunning, but I have a way to make him notice me. A way, at least – as Miss Lavish would say – to make contact.
“I need to ask you something in private,” I say, as I catch up with him in the lane one morning, with some other big boys.
“What’s up then?” he asks, tousling my hair, but still walking.
“In private!” I hiss.
He grins at his mates and stops for a while. “What?”
I watch until they are out of earshot. I glance at the hedgerow and then at him, doing my best to adopt a pained, confused look. “What does ‘have his wicked way’ mean?”
He breathes a laugh.
“Who’s havin’ their wicked way, then?”
“No one.”
“Where d’you hear it, then?”
I shrug innocently.
“Oh … it’s nothing … just someone said Mr Fairly had his wicked way with your mum.”
His face turns ghostly. Now I have his full attention, but it’s not what I expected.
“Who said that?”
“Just someone.”
“Who?”
I swallow, uncertain: “Tosser …”
He looks up to the sky then bends almost at the waist, burying his head in his arms as if it is all too bright for him. “No! No! Please God, NO!”
I am aghast at what I’ve done, and not sure how to undo it.
“She only said, ‘Some folks say …’ It may not be true …”
But Tommy is making strange grunts of pain, wails of misery. “You don’t understand, do you? You’re too young to see what this means!” He turns away from me, not towards the boys, but towards a gate, and he runs like a hare across the fields.
I am the person who makes Tommy decide to run away from Sheepcote. So what happens next is all my fault.
Moonlight cocktail
The clump and thud of Uncle Jack leaving wakes me up, and I can hear Aunty Joyce clattering about downstairs although it is still dark. She pops her head round the bedroom door and whispers, “Kitty?”
To her probable disappointment I show that I am awake. “What time is it?”
“Early. Go back to sleep. I’m just off to do some teas.”
But I can’t go back to sleep now. I don’t like being in bed when the house is empty. As soon as she’s gone I get dressed and go downstairs. It is four thirty in the morning, and I’m suspicious. Lambing finished last week and there won’t be anyone up all night waiting for Aunty Joyce to bring them a cuppa.
I give her a ten-minute start, then set off and turn into the dark lane that leads to the barns up behind the house. The light is flickering from behind the broken slats as before, but when I peek inside there is only Thumper and the farmer, talking about some ewe that seems to have been in difficulty overnight. I have to step back quickly as they make their way to the barn door, cover the oil lamp, and head across the yard. Their voices trail off towards the farm door, and when it opens I can see Aunty Joyce for a moment, holding a kettle and bathed in the kitchen lamplight, until the door clatters shut and they have all three disappeared behind it.
The lane behind me is so black I don’t want to go back home, but I can think of nothing else to do. Slowly, I pick my way along the hedgerow, wishing there were a moon.
Suddenly I hear footsteps. They are coming towards me. I stand stock-still and stare into the dark, but can see nothing. Then I hear breath and I try to hold mine. The footsteps get nearer and nearer until they are almost next to me, and I can make out a tall, dark figure.
I must catch my breath or something, because it stops.
“Who is it?” I ask.
There is no answer, but the dark figure moves in closer towards me. I can no longer keep the panic out of my voice, and I ask again in a high-pitched whisper, “Who is it?”
“Kitty!”
“Tommy?”
“Kitty! What you doing ’ere?”
“What …? Oh, God! You gave me such a fright. Christ alive!” I take deep breaths of relief. “What on earth are you doing so early?”
Tommy puts his arm on my shoulder and whispers urgently, “Listen! I’m running away. Whatever you do, don’t say you saw me, okay?”
“But you can’t! What about me? Where are you going?”
He sighs, as if he knew I wouldn’t understand. My eyes are accustomed to the dark now, and I can see the outline of his face. “Look, Kitty. I have to go. I can’t explain it now, but I’ll write to you.”
“What d’you mean, you have to go? Who’s making you?”
“Fairly’s my bloody father, isn’t he?”
“Of course he’s not! How d’you make that out?”
“You wouldn’t understand. I’ve got to go. Just believe me.”
“Are you going for ever?”
“Yes.”
“But … you mean I won’t see you again? Not ever?”
He sighs again. “I’ll write.”
I’m horrified. I hold on to him tight, as if I can keep him here by force. “You can’t go without me! I’m coming too!”
“Don’t be daft. I’m going to sea.”
“I’m coming! If you go now, you’ll never see me again. Don’t you mind? Don’t you care about me at all?”
“Of course I’ll see you, one day.”
I am beside myself with frustration. I feel so powerless and confused I want to shriek.
“Tommy! Listen to me! The war’ll be over soon, my mum said, and I might be gone from here and never get your letter! Who knows where I’ll be? And then you can’t come and live with us, can you? She said you could, I asked her, my mum said you could.”
“She didn’t even want to meet me.”
“That’s not true! She came unexpectedly. Look! We can go there now – she’ll give us somewhere to hide at least. An’ she’ll give you money for a ticket – she earns lots at the factory. Honest she will. Let me come with you!”
I’m pulling at his coat sleeve and jumping up and down. He keeps sighing.
“If you come with me an’ we’re found, I’m as good as dead. They’ll all reckon I kidnapped you.”
“Well, I’ll say you haven’t.”
“You don’t know what they say about me. There’s rumours …”
“I know.”
“You do?”
“We won’t have to be found, then, will we?”
He sighs again.
“Five minutes. You got five minutes, okay? Get summut warm to wear an’ food – an’ a blanket. Five minutes an’ I’m off.”
I dart into the blackness of the lane, turn on to the road and into Weaver’s Cottage. I find an old canvas bag of Uncle Jack’s under the stairs and grab the remains of a loaf of bread and a tin of meat from the shelf. I run upstairs for a blanket, but decide against taking one as it’s sure to be noticed straight away. I go back to the cupboard under the stairs and unhook an old oilskin and sou’wester from underneath a heavy coat. It will have to do. I roll it up and stuff it in the bag, and run out of the house and back up the lane in dread that Aunty Joyce might come back home before I leave.
The sky is turning from black to royal blue. We don’t go through the farm fields in the end. We let the March wind blow us down the lanes in search of escape. By the time the sky has turned pale we are beyond the woods. With a canvas bag of bread and Spam, a rolled-up blanket of Tommy’s, socks and the old sou’wester, we make our bid for freedom: two specks bobbing along the budding hedgerows into the verdant, wood-fringed horizon of the wolds.
Tommy’s secret
I have always known that Tommy has a secret. I have always known that he will tell me one day, and that when he does it will uncover some much deeper mystery, something vast.
He is the one person I haven’t been able to badger with my constant curiosity. He will tell me when he is ready, and I feel certain it is going to be now, on this journey.
He is like a wild animal, testing the ground, wary of sudden movement, biding his time. And I have waited, motionless, letting him get the scent of me. Beneath all my laughter and endless babble I know I am marking time, inching closer.
Do I realize what I’m doing, running away with someone who is thought to be a killer? Have I any idea, as we turn off from the hedgerows into the secret smells of the woods, what dramatic train of events I have set in motion? The sun ducks in and out of the wind-blown trees, lighting up the spikes of dog’s mercury that are beginning to carpet the ground. There are hints of cow parsley, along with the first fierce green arrows of arum leaves unfurling along our sappy woodland path. Spring is on its way, and it is unstoppable.
When the sun goes down on our first day, we make our bed on a blanket of sorrel waiting to flower, and spread the oilskin beneath a leafing canopy of hazel branches.
As light fails, Tommy pulls his blanket around us and begins to point out birdsong. The yellowhammer, mistle thrush and chaffinch sing their last notes, while the blackbird goes on way into dusk before it falls silent.
We wait.
Then the song thrush gives a tuneful nocturne, then the robin. And when at last, from deep within the woods, the tawny owl gives its first tentative hoot, Tommy is ready to tell his story to the darkness.
It had been a hot day in June seven years ago when Tommy and Rosemary took their nets to go fishing. Their hopes were pinned on minnows, nothing more. If there was a leader, it was Tommy, but only because he knew the stream so well, and because Rosemary was quiet and more inclined to follow. Otherwise they were two peas in a pod, two seven-year-olds with time on their hands and a summer afternoon to explore.
They padded down the valley towards the willows, heading downstream.They talked of sticklebacks, but didn’t extend their hopes that far. Identification was their joy. If they could see beneath the dark surface those creatures who were meant to be
there, they would go home happy, satisfied that all was right with the world, and just as it said it was in Rosemary’s What to Look For in the River. Although neither of them said as much, fish spotting was much more fun than fish catching, because they never really knew what to do with the ugly blobs they took back in jam jars, and there was always an awkwardness as the day went on and they were still there, dying or dead.
For Tommy, the pleasure of outings like these was going back to Joyce and Jack’s for tea. Not the home-made sponge cake or the gooseberry jam, but the tender look from Joyce, and the smell of a home.
They had been by the bank for an hour, and must have dozed off in the shade of a willow, when a noise startled Rosemary. She stared at two figures wrestling much further up the grassy bank some fifty yards off. She nudged Tommy, without taking her eyes off the writhing figures, who were performing something she had only ever seen done by animals.
Tommy looked up, his face dotted in sweat, his head swimming with sleep. Rosemary was sitting up with her mouth open.
There, in the long grass of a hollow, shaded by a willow, was a man, holding down a small boy of eight or nine. The boy was crying, and the man seemed to be hurting him. Rosemary gasped in horror, and Tommy, suddenly panicking, pushed her down into the grass. But the wrestling stopped. The man sat up.
Rosemary began to whisper, barely able to breathe under Tommy’s grip. “Let me go!” she hissed.
The man had stood up, and hastily buttoned his trousers. He had seen them, although Tommy was hopeful he might not have recognized them at a distance.
“Come on! Quick!” Tommy yanked Rosemary to her feet, but she just stood there, gawping in horror.
“Mr Fairly!” she breathed, not loud enough for him to hear, but directly enough for the man to know that he had been spotted by the Shepherd girl, who sat in the third pew at church.
“Run!” screamed Tommy, grabbing her away. “Run, Rosie! Come on! RUN!”