by Agnes Owens
Prompt on six o’clock I went into the restaurant, for the sandwiches in my bag were damp and soggy and I hadn’t eaten since breakfast. There were a few other diners in the room but Mary Jane wasn’t among them. I sat down at our usual table anticipating some sharp words from Monsieur Savlon; if he ordered us out it would solve the problem of whether to leave or not, but I dreaded having to face him all the same. However, he laid a bowl of soup in front of me and said quickly, ‘Your sister, she is sleeping in my mother’s room. Do not worry. She will be fine.’ Before I could thank him for his trouble he went on, ‘Tonight I plan something special for you. I think you will like.’ I looked up at him blankly. Hesitating, he added, ‘Perhaps if Madame wears the nice dress she has on when she arrive it would be suitable for this plan.’ Then without waiting for an answer, he disappeared into the kitchen.
Upstairs I searched for the dress he had mentioned and found it lying creased on the wardrobe floor. Anyway, what did it matter, I thought, since I wasn’t going anywhere. If it was a surprise-party he was talking about, I didn’t want any surprises. I would only feel awkward. I wouldn’t be able to speak to anyone and I could envisage Mary Jane showing up drunk and making a spectacle of herself. I sat out on the balcony staring at the reflections on the river, wondering angrily if this was what I had come to France for. When I went back into the room, the wardrobe door was still open, and my eye fell on the dark-blue dress that Mary Jane had brought back from India. I tried it on and it fitted me rather well. The cloth had been cut in such a way that it flared out under the high bodice, flattering my full figure. As I studied myself in the wardrobe mirror I decided that I’d never looked so elegant, and that I would go to this affair after all, if only to show my face.
There was no one in the bar except Monsieur Savlon and the tiny old woman who collected the tumblers from the tables on the terrace.
‘Am I too early?’ I asked. It was nine o’clock. I’d imagined everything would have been in full swing by now.
‘Non, non – you sit here,’ said Monsieur Savlon, pointing to a table in the centre of the room. All the others had been stacked against the wall to clear a space on the floor. ‘You will take some?’ he said, opening a bottle of wine. ‘Very good. Very old.’ I sipped the wine, scarcely tasting it, as he sat down opposite me. ‘I drink this only on my birthday,’ he said.
‘I see,’ I said. ‘You’re having a birthday party?’
He frowned as if he did not quite understand. ‘I celebrate with you.’
‘How thoughtful,’ I said faintly, as I caught the eye of the old woman, who stood watching behind the bar counter, nodding her head slightly as if in approval.
‘You like music?’ asked Monsieur Savlon.
‘Yes, I do.’
‘Then my mother will play.’ He snapped his fingers at the counter, and as if a switch had been pressed the sound of violins filled the room. It struck me as all rather weird – the music, the absence of guests and in particular the fact that this small shabby woman was Monsieur Savlon’s mother. I must say I would have expected someone more grand.
‘You want to dance now?’ he asked.
It was the last thing I wanted to do. I hadn’t danced since my school-days, when we had all been forced to take lessons, but I couldn’t very well refuse him. As it happened, Monsieur was an excellent dancer, which made it easy for me to follow his lead, and I began to enjoy myself exceedingly.
‘The music is called “La Vie en Rose”,’ he said when he led me back to the table. Time passed quickly after that. We danced, then stopped to rest and sip our wine, savouring it slowly as befits a good one. After we had danced for about the sixth time – although I had lost count, really – Monsieur Savlon looked at his watch and said, ‘We will now finish. It is late.’ He called out to his mother, who had not moved an inch from her position behind the counter, and the violins played no more. I thanked Monsieur Savlon for a pleasant evening, but when I turned to thank his mother she had gone, and it was with a pang of sadness that I climbed the stairs, for it seemed unlikely that such an evening would ever come my way again.
Mary Jane was sitting up in bed when I entered the room.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ she asked, in a voice sharp as tempered steel. ‘And what are you doing with my dress on?’
I explained that I had only been trying on the dress to see how it looked, and had forgotten to take it off when I went downstairs to the bar to look for her.
‘You’re lying,’ she said. ‘When I went down to the bar the door was locked. What’s more, I could hear music.’ I felt my face flushing as she squinted at me curiously. Then her eyes went wide with dawning realisation. ‘Don’t tell me you were having it off with that old dwarf! My God, you must be desperate.’
* * *
Next morning Mary Jane told me that she was going to have another try at the castle. ‘Do you want to come along?’ she asked, pointing out that it wasn’t as hot as before.
‘I might as well,’ I muttered, finding it difficult to look her in the face – particularly since at that very moment Monsieur Savlon put the coffee pot on the table with his usual brisk ‘Good morning’. After he had gone Mary Jane leaned across the table and whispered, ‘Mind you, he might not be such a bad catch when you think about it. Must be worth a mint.’
An hour later we were out in the middle of a field which had more stones than grass in it. Mary Jane was walking on ahead while I lagged behind, trying to keep a good distance between us.
‘I’ve found the path,’ she shouted. ‘Do hurry up.’ When I caught up with her she was sitting on a flat stone, looking up at a rough track which led over baked earth and rock to the castle above.
‘What do you think?’ she asked.
‘I think I’ll manage,’ I replied.
We began to climb. The path itself wasn’t so terribly steep, but the effort of side-stepping over loose boulders tired me out. Mary Jane was always ahead, but not by much, and I was only minutes behind her when I reached the top.
‘So you finally made it,’ she said, as I stood there breathless, looking around for somewhere to rest my aching legs. ‘There it is.’ She pointed towards a heap of ruins at the edge of the cliff. She set off towards it, camera in hand, while I followed reluctantly. From close up, all that remained of the castle was a long, narrow enclosure of stonework. Grass and flowers grew through the smashed flagstones, and the rampart wall on the edge of the cliff was broken in parts.
‘That looks dangerous,’ I said, but Mary Jane wasn’t listening. She was too busy focusing the camera on the scene, aiming it this way and that, as if what she was doing was all so terribly important. I might have been amused at her antics if I hadn’t been so busy watching where she put her feet.
‘How about one of you?’ she said, pointing the camera in my direction.
‘Some other time. I’m not in the mood.’
‘You never are in the mood,’ she said. She gave an ugly laugh. ‘Except if it’s Monsieur Savlon, of course.’
‘Don’t start that again,’ I said. I walked away from her and looked over the parapet wall. It was a sheer drop down to the river below. Mary Jane came to stand beside me.
‘Magnificent, isn’t it? You can see everything for miles around.’
I stepped back. My head was beginning to spin. ‘I must have a drink of water,’ I said, turning back into the enclosure. We sat on two flat stones and drank from our flasks without looking at each other.
‘I’ve been thinking things over,’ Mary Jane said, ‘and I might as well tell you I’ve decided to go back to India. I had a letter from Lady Bonham Fletcher and apparently she misses me terribly and is desperate to have me back. I wasn’t going to go because I didn’t want to leave you on your own, but the way things are going . . .’ She let her voice tail off, as if there were no need for further explanation.
‘Why don’t you?’ I said. Knowing what a liar she was, I was positive she had no intention of going to India. �
�I’m sure it’s the best thing you could do.’
‘So we’ll have to sell the house,’ she added.
‘What do you mean – sell the house?’
‘It’s plain enough. I’m entitled to half of Father’s estate and if I’m leaving the country the only way I can get it is for us to sell the house.’
‘Mary Jane,’ I said, ‘please stop all this nonsense. I know you don’t mean a word of it.’
‘Oh, but I do,’ she broke in. ‘I want the house sold. It’s as simple as that. And anyway,’ she went on, ‘you’ve got to admit it’s in a terrible state – all that old piping and the place is rotten with damp. Just think, with your share you could buy yourself a nice little flat. It would be so much cheaper to run and easier to clean.’
My throat had gone dry. I began to trace circles in the dust with my finger. Mary Jane stared at me stonily. ‘Aren’t you going to say anything? You’ve got to face facts, you know. You’ve really no option.’
‘Perhaps you’re right,’ I said at last. ‘I might be better off in a small flat. I can’t say I’d considered it before, but if you say you’re going back to India . . .’
‘Of course I’m right,’ she said with such obvious relief that I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. ‘Well now,’ she went on cheerfully, ‘I must take a photo of you in front of the castle. Something to look back on.’
It turned out that there was too much shade there for the camera, and Mary Jane moved me on. ‘I’ll take it over by the wall,’ she said. ‘It’s brighter there.’ After a bit of manoeuvring to get the exact focus, she clicked the shutter. ‘That’s it,’ she said. ‘Now you can take one of me.’
‘By the wall?’
‘Of course, by the wall.’ Mary Jane took up a pose with one arm arranged on top of the wall.
‘Move over a bit,’ I said. ‘You’re too far to the left.’
‘For goodness sake,’ she said irritably. Fixing her smile on the camera, she took a step sideways. Then her arm flailed in empty space and she went backwards through the gap without uttering a word of protest.
Mary Jane was buried in the village cemetery. The coroner’s verdict was accidental death. Monsieur Savlon came to the funeral along with a few of the old village women, including his mother. It was a simple affair. The coffin was placed inside a marble tombstone and a priest said a few brief words. As I was leaving the cemetery Monsieur Savlon came up to offer his condolences. ‘Be patient, Madame,’ he said. ‘Time will heal your pain.’
Personally I thought I’d been patient long enough. Through my tears I told him that it would have been some consolation to visit my sister’s grave at least once a week, but alas, I couldn’t even do that. Monsieur Savlon stopped and confronted me. ‘But why not? You can stay for as long as you want – for ever, if you wish.’
‘For ever?’ I said with astonishment.
‘Forgive me,’ he said. ‘I have offended you perhaps. It is not the right time to say this.’
‘I’ll think about it,’ I said, turning away and wiping my eyes.
I am taking up Monsieur Savlon’s offer. It’s the best thing that could have happened. He has told me that there’s an empty apartment across the river. He knows the owner very well and he’s sure that I can get it. He assures me that the rent won’t be too dear, since it’s a poor village and no one is expected to pay more than they can afford. I can scarcely get over my good luck. After all those years of stagnating in Father’s old house, I’m about to live in an apartment in a French village with a balcony overlooking the river. Of course I’m sad about Mary Jane, in a way. But she was her own worst enemy. Which reminds me – I must get rid of her writing bureau before I sell the house. That’s where she kept all her correspondence, and as she said herself, it’s better to let sleeping dogs lie. I still can’t help feeling angry, though, when I think of her calling Monsieur Savlon a dwarf. How dare she say that about such a nice little man.
Marching to the Highlands and into the Unknown
In June 1949 my first husband, baby daughter of two months, and myself set forth for the North of Scotland. This venture was prompted by an article in a paper saying that people were wanted to work land in the Highlands, with accommodation provided. I was not keen on marching into the unknown, but it was a case of squaw follows Indian brave and asks no questions. So with £11, our baby, our clothing, a two-man tent and pram we took the train from Glasgow to a station beyond Inverness called Garve. It dawned on me then that we had no idea where we were going, apart from a vague intention to reach a place called Scoraig situated on the Little Minch.
I remember we obtained a lift from a tradesman going in the direction of Scoraig, but he had heard nothing about work and accommodation. We arrived at Scoraig and the only sign of habitation was a single house staring from a high point towards the Atlantic Sea. We might as well have been in the Sahara. We spied a small brick building, possibly a shelter for animals, and inside this we huddled, hating each other, while I attempted to feed the baby. However, a woman came down from the house and took us in and gave us a room to sleep in. She must have thought us mad, but accepted our story and for a week we camped in her garden. Her husband, who worked on the road, told us it was the only work available. The only payment we could give her, though she wanted none, was a carton of Epsom salts. She was as grateful as if we had given her a magnificent gift. We promised to write when we were in better circumstances. Sadly, we never did.
We set off back through this mountainous region, possibly beautiful if you were a tourist, but to me desolate and harsh, gushing rivers and jagged rocks.
We came to an inn stuck in the middle of nowhere and, overjoyed at this bit of civilization, set up our tent beside it. The buxom woman who owned the place sold us food, even offering my husband a job. She took a fancy to him but not to me.
After two days of camping and happiness for my husband, mainly because of his access to beer, I took the initiative and unpegged the tent, wrapped it up, and we set off again in silence. I can’t remember how long it took us to reach the town of Beauly but by the end of the journey we were both covered in cleg bites. The baby in her pram was protected by wet nappies hanging over the hood. The money was nearly gone. In Beauly I located what nowadays would be called a social security office and managed to obtain 14s by genuinely sobbing my heart out and holding the baby who cried too. This allowed us to buy food and walk to Inverness.
We reached Inverness and put up the tent in a place called, I think, The Black Park Camping Site, for a few shillings weekly. We stayed here for quite a while, since my husband got a job to do with erecting pylons. It couldn’t have been much fun for him going to work from a tent but I had problems too, walking every day from the site to the town for a few herrings or whatever was cheap, and making food on the Primus stove which was difficult to light. I remember one occasion when my husband complained about his meal and I threw the semolina for the baby round the tent in a fit of temper. On another I nearly set the tent on fire in the night while heating milk for the baby.
And yet there were occasions when I was happy pushing the pram along the canal bank or sitting by the river. It was summer and the place was lovely. This situation continued until late September when the weather became colder and the days shorter.
About this time I decided I could not carry on living in a tent with an infant a few months old and the winter approaching. One Saturday evening I packed and, pushing the pram, headed for Inverness railway station to return home to my mother. I left my husband in the tent drinking whisky.
I had to wait some time for the Glasgow train and, before it came, I turned about and pushed the pram back to the tent and that was that. We both decided to leave. We now had some money from my husband’s work so a few days later we assembled our belongings and we left Inverness on a train for Keith, another destination unknown to us. Anywhere, we thought then, was better than returning to Glasgow.
We arrived in Keith in the dark, came to a field and
pulled our tent round about us. We marched through the town the next morning, not a big place then as I remember it. We purchased some groceries from a shop in the town square owned by a man called McGillviray who asked us questions – why and where and what were we doing. We answered shamefacedly. ‘There’s a man lives here, originally from Glasgow,’ he said. ‘I’m sure he’ll let you put your tent up in his back garden, it’s a good size.’
This man called Alec Simpson did just that and his wife washed our grimy clothes and the baby’s nappies. Alec was pleased with us because my husband came from Glasgow and I had worked there. For a fortnight we camped in his back garden, burning fires at night, hanging our clothes to dry over the fence. The townsfolk called us the squatters. Before October ended we moved to a broken-down old building.
We lived there for a year. We were comfortable. We had coal, paraffin light, and my husband got a job with the English Electric Company. My second child, a boy, was born in Keith hospital. We might have lived in Keith for ever but the woman who owned the condemned building told us regretfully that it was being knocked down and we must leave. It was then my husband and I parted for a time. I returned to my home town and he went on working with English Electric. I’ve often wished to go back to Keith and see it all again, but no doubt everything would be unrecognisable now.
This adventure was judged by a councillor in my home town as ‘irresponsible’ – I was desperately applying to him for one of the available prefabricated houses. We got the prefab after waiting another year and a half and my husband and I, plus another son and daughter making four children in all, lived not particularly happily ever after until he died at the age of forty-three.
I suppose you could say my life was a struggle, as it is with most men and women of the working class even in years of good employment. I always worked when possible at anything I could find, i.e., in shop, office and factory. That was in the good old days when work brought satisfaction even if it was a hassle. Work was money and security and if I was not exactly happy with my lot I could relax with a drink at the weekend while watching the telly. Any disagreement which arose under the influence was forgotten when facing work on Monday. Yet I suppose there was always a hankering to do something better.