A Single Thread

by Tracy Chevalier

  Her room at Mrs Harvey’s was so icy that most evenings when she didn’t go to the cinema she sat in the front room with the others. They all paid for coal, but Mrs Harvey couldn’t bear for her budgies to be cold, and added extra so that the room was reasonably warm. Violet read or embroidered with the wireless on, while Miss Frederick marked essays, Miss Lancaster sat with her eyes closed, and Mrs Harvey knitted or read the paper and tutted at the wireless. She tutted whether the news was bad or good: deaths in Spain following political protests, Lady Mary Bailey rescued after her plane crashed in the Niger, the Nazi Party doing well in regional elections in Germany. It was all part of the pot to her, like static emerging from the wireless without any hierarchy in terms of importance.

  It was pleasant enough, sitting together, the budgies chirping in the background, but sometimes the closeness night after night with people she had little in common with made Violet claustrophobic and irritable. The hesitant scratching of Miss Frederick’s pen on her pupils’ papers made her want to shout at her to be more definite; Miss Lancaster’s occasional snore made her wince. But it was too cold to spend any time in her room other than to sleep, huddled with a hot water bottle. Along with a copy of Warren’s Guide to Winchester, Tom and Evelyn had given her a bottle of brandy for Christmas. She began having a small glass every other night, but by mid-January and after endless scratching and snores, she was up to two glasses a night and waking with a headache in the morning.

  The office was also cold and grim. Violet and Maureen had one small Belling heater between them, and moved their typewriters together so they could share what little warmth emanated from it. Violet typed with her coat on, and there was always a cup of tea at her side. Even so she developed chilblains on her fingers. They made her think of the ringing chamber and what Keith Bain had said about the cold up there. The men ringing would be getting chilblains on their toes.

  Only Church House in the Inner Close seemed to be warm enough. Perhaps Miss Pesel had come to an arrangement with Dean Selwyn, for there was always plenty of coal, and the fire was built some time before the broderers started so that when they arrived it was already warm enough to take their coats off and stitch properly, without the need to stop and warm their hands.

  The women were working hard to finish pieces in time for the next Presentation of Embroideries service in February. Several choir stall seat cushions were almost ready, their history scenes in petit-point spliced into a colourful surround. Dozens of kneelers had been completed, and long bench cushions were being made, though they were complicated, and Miss Pesel insisted they be held back and done carefully, even if it meant taking more time. “All eyes will be on those bench cushions,” she declared. “If we get them wrong, we fail.” To Violet’s surprise, Maureen had progressed enough to be working on the long cushions.

  She herself was not working on any of those things, however. After a kneeler and many yards of cushion borders, she was pleased to have been chosen by Louisa Pesel to make alms bags – hand-sized pouches sent up and down the rows during services for congregants to put their offerings in. At St Michael’s in Southampton there had been a plate for the purpose, and Violet had always found it mortifying to see and be seen making a donation, and how much. An alms bag made for more discreet giving. Miss Pesel was particularly concerned that they be beautiful and striking. “More than the kneelers, more than the cushions, the alms bags will be noticed,” she explained to Violet and the rest of the alms team she had gathered. “They will be passed from hand to hand, and people will stop and look at them closely. They will note the colours and patterns and textures. When those things are successfully married, it brings them pleasure. And pleasure translates into—” She rubbed her thumb and two fingers together, and laughed at their surprised expressions. “Now, now, you don’t think the Cathedral runs on hope and air, do you? It is not just a building – it’s an enormous machine, or a small town, with complicated moving parts that need maintenance. The Cathedral has many volunteers such as yourselves, but it cannot rely solely on them. The Dean must be paid, and the vergers, and chaplains, the cleaners and stonemasons and gardeners. And it costs money to heat the Cathedral, and to run the lights, to clean it and maintain it. To buy the prayer books and hymnals and to print service sheets. To buy the polish and the candles and the flowers and to mend the chairs when they break and the roof when it leaks. But the Cathedral receives no money from the Government. It must ask its people, again and again, at each service. And that is what your alms bags will do – remind them of the beauty of the place, of the love and care that has gone into making every window, every pillar, every chapel and floor tile and, yes, alms bag, so beautiful that the spirit soars and the wallet opens.”

  There were to be four sets of fourteen bags, in the four colours used in the Cathedral vestments throughout the year: green for Ordinary Time, Pentecost and Trinity, red for before Advent, purple for Advent and Lent, and white for Christmas, Epiphany and Easter. Violet had been assigned purple (“Well, I couldn’t have given a Violet any other colour, could I?” Miss Pesel said with a smile). The embroidered designs were different from the cushions and kneelers, being modelled on old Elizabethan bags and samplers in the collection at the Victoria and Albert Museum that Louisa Pesel was familiar with, but given a geometrical twist. “I am a magpie,” she explained to the broderers, “stealing my designs from all sorts of places. I have even been known to take them from soap packets!” They were done mainly in cross-stitch on a diagonal, the pattern mostly of squares and diamonds, with Hungarian diamonds in striking black and white stitches around the edges. Special metal handles in the shape of Celtic knots had been fashioned for the bags, so that when held by the knot, the bag hung down, the mouth open and ready for whatever would be placed in it, the giver’s hand caressed by the kidskin lining Miss Pesel insisted upon – another way to make the experience of donating pleasurable.

  One evening Violet was working on her alms bag by the fire in the front room with the others, apart from Miss Lancaster, who had been seconded to Portsmouth for a trial. On the wireless the BBC Symphony Orchestra was playing Elgar while the budgies contributed tweets here and there. Cathedral bells rang in the distance, for it was a Wednesday practice night. Miss Frederick was sitting at the table where they ate their poached eggs each morning, working her way through a stack of papers. When she sighed for the third time, Mrs Harvey cried, “So much sighing! What is it, young lady?”

  “I have double the work,” Miss Frederick muttered, her hair dishevelled and her hands stained with ink. “And half of it in Latin! One of the teachers has left suddenly and I’ve had to take on some of her classes. My Latin is so rusty, it’s hardly better than the pupils’!”

  Violet stopped stitching. It felt as if a weight had plummeted through her stomach. She began forming in her mind a benign question, but Mrs Harvey, who had a keen nose for scandal, beat her to it. “‘Left suddenly’, did she?” she tutted, for they all knew what that was code for – like Olive leaving Southern Counties Insurance suddenly.

  “Oh no, it wasn’t that,” Miss Frederick replied. “Far from it. The opposite, if anything!” She went pink and laughed. It was a filthy, disgusted laugh that Violet could never have imagined coming from such a meek character.

  Even Mrs Harvey looked startled. “What do you mean?” she demanded.

  “When did she leave?” Violet interjected.

  “Today.” Miss Frederick answered the easier question. “I was handed these to mark, and I’ll be taking half of her classes until the end of term, unless they can find a replacement sooner. And no talk of any extra pay for the extra work! I don’t suppose you could teach Latin?” She was casting about wildly.

  Violet shook her head, swallowing hard, her supper at the back of her throat. There are a few girls’ schools here, she thought, and several Latin teachers. But she knew.

  When the knock at the door came, only Violet would have had any reason to connect it to what Miss Frederick had just
told them. And yet they all did, staring at each other. Miss Frederick even rose to her feet in a panic and stuffed the papers she was marking on the seat of an adjacent chair, then pushed it in so they were invisible under the table.

  “Who on earth can that be?” Mrs Harvey muttered. “It’s almost nine o’clock!”

  “I’ll get it, Mrs Harvey,” Violet said.

  “You will not. I’m the one answers my own door.” Mrs Harvey heaved herself to her feet and disappeared into the hall. Violet sat clutching her embroidery. “It’s Nell Hill’s daughter for you, Violet,” she heard her landlady call after a moment. “Second visit this month!”

  Miss Frederick was staring at her. Violet wanted to say something sharp and cruel, but she couldn’t think of anything clever enough. Setting her work aside, she left the room, feeling her fellow lodger’s gaze drilling into her back.

  Gilda was standing in the hall, her eyes red and enormous in her thin face. She was trying to smile and respond cheerfully to Mrs Harvey’s remarks about the coldness of the night. “It is rather late, dear,” the landlady said. “Is everything all right?”

  “Yes, I’m so sorry to trouble you. I just wanted to have a word with Violet about – about embroidery.”

  “Come up to my room,” Violet suggested.

  “Don’t do that,” Mrs Harvey said. “Your room will be too cold. Come into the front room.”

  “We’ll manage.”

  Her landlady was looking from Violet to Gilda and back, her expression shifting gears. “Shall I bring you up some tea?”

  “No, thanks, Mrs Harvey.” Violet couldn’t bear more scrutiny, and turned and led the way up the stairs. When she glanced back down, Mrs Harvey was wearing a full frown.

  She hurried Gilda into her room and shut the door. “Sit.” She gestured to the armchair and went to get the brandy and two glasses from the cupboard. Filling each with a fingerful, she handed a glass to Gilda and perched on the edge of the bed. “Drink,” she ordered. “I know what happened to Dorothy,” she added as Gilda took a sip.

  Her friend winced. “Lord, are people already talking? It’s only just happened!” Her voice rose to a wail.

  “Shhh. You don’t want to give Mrs Harvey more to talk about,” Violet said in a low voice.

  Gilda took a shaky breath, trying to compose herself. “How did you know?”

  “Miss Frederick, one of the lodgers here, teaches at Dorothy’s school. She told us just now. She didn’t name names, though, so you’re not implicated.”

  “Oh Violet, it’s even worse than Dorothy losing her job. Her family has thrown her out!”

  “Thrown her out of where?”

  “Out of the house! She has no place to live. I’ve left her sitting in the Suffolk Arms, where everyone was giving us funny looks. We don’t know what to do!” Gilda was crying now.

  “Why have you come to me?” Violet wanted to say, but didn’t. She got up and found a handkerchief in her chest of drawers. “Could she stay with you for a bit?” she said, handing it to her friend.

  Gilda shuddered and pulled her coat close around her. “Dad and Joe said no. They – they know about us now. They’re only just letting me stay, and only if I agree not to see Dorothy.”

  “And – did you agree to that?”

  “Of course not!” Indignation stopped Gilda’s tears. For the first time since she arrived, she looked more like herself. “That is – I didn’t agree or disagree. I said we’d discuss it in the morning.” She blew her nose.

  “So where do they think you are now?”

  “I told them there was a broderers’ meeting. Violet –” Gilda turned her red eyes on her – “do you think – could Dorothy stay here tonight? Just for one night,” she added quickly, “until we find a solution.”

  It was what Violet had been dreading since Gilda arrived, in fact since Miss Frederick had broken the news – that she would get dragged into their mess. “I’m sorry,” she replied, “but Mrs Harvey has a strict policy of no overnight guests.” Even as she said it she thought of Miss Lancaster’s temporarily empty room.

  “We could sneak her in after she’s gone to bed.”

  “It won’t work – she’s sensitive to noises. And she knows something’s amiss, so she’ll be extra vigilant. Does Dorothy have other friends she could ask?”

  “None that would understand and be kind the way you are.”

  Violet felt a flush of pride even as she knew she was not as kind and understanding as Gilda assumed.

  “Oh, what can we do?” Her friend covered her face with her hands for a moment, though she did not start to cry again.

  They were silent for a time, sipping their brandy. Then Violet heard the descending scale of the Cathedral bells until they stopped, and the tenor rang nine times.

  “I must make a telephone call,” Violet announced. “And you must distract Mrs Harvey.”

  She stood over the telephone in the hall for some time, hesitating between the call she wanted to make and the call she ought to make. She could hear Gilda in the front room, chatting to Mrs Harvey and Miss Frederick. Her voice was a tone higher and touched with hysteria. But she was managing to do her part and cover Violet’s call, and even to make Mrs Harvey laugh.

  Violet so wanted to hear Arthur’s steady voice at the end of the line, pulled from his darts or cribbage and sounding both practical and pleased to hear from her.

  But he was fourteen miles away, and a bellringer, and that was another world. She had to rely on her own world. She picked up the telephone.

  “Of course,” Louisa Pesel said when Violet explained. “Broderers look after their own.” Violet was grateful that she did not ask for details.

  “What did you tell her?” Gilda asked as they walked down the hill towards the bridge and the High Street, still stinging from Mrs Harvey’s gimlet eyes and dark remark about the lateness of the hour.

  “Only that Dorothy was having family troubles and needed a room for a night or two. Does she have any money to pay for the room?”

  “A bit, in the bank. She was saving for us to go on holiday in the summer. We were going to go to the Lake District.”

  Violet could imagine them, striding up the fells, visiting Wordsworth’s cottage, laughing in tea rooms, rowing on one of the lakes. She felt a stab of envy, until she reminded herself of the terrible state they were now in.

  It was a quiet night at the Suffolk Arms, very different from New Year’s Eve. Everyone looked up as she and Gilda entered. A few men were scattered around the room; Violet couldn’t help looking for the corn man, but he was not there. The piano sat silent, its lid closed. Dorothy was sitting in a dim corner, her eyes shut. A glass half-full of sherry and a full glass of water sat on the table in front of her. She looked up as they approached. “Hello, Violet,” she said. “Have you come to save me?”

  “She has,” Gilda butted in. “She’s been so clever!”

  “I don’t know about that. Anyway, I think we’d best go.” The eyes on them made Violet uneasy. “We’ve a bit of a walk, and it’s late.”

  “Let me just finish this.” Dorothy picked up the sherry glass, announced, “In vino veritas,” and drank. Then she picked up the water glass. “In aqua sanitas,” she said and took a sip of water. “All right. I am ready for my next adventure.” Grabbing the small bag at her feet, she called, “Via trita, via tuta. The old way is the safe way, and I am not taking the old way.”

  “She’s a bit tipsy,” Gilda whispered. “And who can blame her?”

  “Dorothy, have you paid for your drink?”

  Dorothy shrugged.

  Violet sighed. “I’ll settle up. You take her outside.”

  She’d had three sherries, Violet discovered from the barman, the price of her weekly cinema trip if she sat in the nicer seats. He waited until she’d paid, her coins safe in his palm, before he said, “Don’t come here again. Any of you.”

  Violet quickly turned away so that he would not see the shock register on her face
. She set her expression to a careful neutral as she joined the other two outside. Dorothy was holding Gilda’s face between her hands. “Nil desperandum,” she said. “Omnia vincit amor.”

  “Oh, speak English!” Gilda cried. “You make me feel an idiot.”

  “Never despair. Love conquers all.” Dorothy kissed her on the forehead. “Horace and Virgil.”

  I am well and truly part of their mess now, Violet thought. She wished she could step back, let Gilda walk Dorothy down to the hotel where Miss Pesel lived while she went home to bed. That is not what Arthur would do, she scolded herself. Or Miss Pesel. Or Gilda.

  She pulled her hat tight over her brow. “Come now, let’s go. Miss Pesel is expecting us.”

  Louisa Pesel lived in a hotel in St Cross, at the southern end of the city. She had moved there the year before, tired of cycling in from Twyford, a village farther south. “I do mean to find somewhere more permanent,” she explained as they sat with her in the warm hotel lounge, slowly thawing. She was wearing a thick robe embroidered around the neckline in a geometrical pattern; from Greece, Violet suspected. “But the embroidery project has taken up every spare minute. I just haven’t had the time to look. I expect eventually I’ll move somewhere closer to the Cathedral. I want a good-sized garden, for my irises.”

  “Irises?” Violet repeated politely.

  “Yes. I adore them. Always have. I formed an Iris Society in Twyford, and intend to here, once I’ve got a garden. I’ve planted a few bulbs for the hotel – some bearded white as well as purple – but I am not entirely sure they will appreciate them next summer.”

  Gilda and Dorothy were sitting side by side on a sofa, ankles crossed, knees together. Both looked dazed and exhausted, and remained mute. Dorothy had at least sobered up during their cold walk, and was no longer spouting Latin. But it seemed to be left to Violet to make conversation. It was past ten now, and she longed to be in bed, reading Trollope.