Although the women were united in a close, almost cosy, alliance against adversity, and the more robust characters among them were at pains to outlaw pettiness and ill-feeling in the prison community, there was no doubt that every woman in the camp detested Betty. Her furtive, deceitful ways, her selfishness, and above all her conspicuous lack of care for the woman who had saved her life, offended profoundly against their charitable common morality.
Betty, completely obsessed with her own survival, barely noticed their hostility, and they never voiced it. It occasionally puzzled her that the other women did not extend their warm comradeship to her in the same terms as they did to Jean, but she put this down to the snobbery of the middle-class British women who formed the camp’s unofficial leadership.
That evening, Jean fell asleep as if the effort of writing had exhausted her. In the middle of the night she began to mutter her husband’s name and Betty, suddenly feeling helpless, went to the next-door cell to get help from Irene, the girl who had dressed up.
‘Crikey,’ she muttered, feeling Jean’s forehead wet with sweat. ‘She’s got a temperature all right. We’d better take her to the hospital straight away. Hope it’s not that swamp fever catching up with her.’
They carried Jean round to the hut which acted as a hospital and Betty, because she was no longer sleepy and had nothing else to do, sat and dabbed Jean’s face with water for a few hours. She became more and more delirious and her temperature was soaring. Betty knew Jean was going to die. Many of the women with whom they had first been interned had contracted the same fever, and its progress was swift and inevitable. Another day, perhaps two, and Jean would be gone.
Betty slept a few hours before daybreak then woke and queued for her morning cup of rice with a teaspoon of palm oil as a luxury. The Japanese officer in charge of the camp announced that there would be a distribution of mail that day, and most of the two hundred women in the prison eagerly gathered in a long line outside his office, talking excitedly as their captors slowly deciphered the addresses on the small bag of cards.
‘Mrs Rawlins?’ Betty gave her name without much hope that there would be anything for her.
‘Here.’ Into her hand was put an envelope addressed to Mrs G. W. Rawlins (British Civilian Internee), Women’s Camp, Palembang, Sumatra, c/o Japanese Red Cross, Tokyo, Japan. Up the side was stamped the number of the examiner who had verified that the message was no more than fifty words long and contained no mention of ill-treatment, food shortages or the progress of the war. Betty walked briskly back to her cell.
‘Aren’t you going to read it?’ Next to Betty on the bare bamboo sleeping-platform sat a curious Irene who had no letter of her own. ‘Come on, Betty. You stood out there in the sun for an hour to sign for it, you must open it.’
‘I can’t. I don’t know the writing. It might say something awful.’
The girl took the letter from Betty’s hand. ‘Tell you what we’ll do. I’ll read it, and if I think you won’t like it, I’ll keep it for you.’
Betty shook her head. An Englishwoman appeared at the doorway of the bamboo hut, her skeletal form silhouetted against the bright sunlight. ‘We need volunteers to bale out the latrines – either of you two?’
‘I can’t, the sores on my legs haven’t healed,’ Betty said at once, drawing a contemptuous nod from the older woman. Betty never volunteered for anything unless there was a chance of extra food rations.
‘I’ll go.’ Irene scrambled off the platform and Betty was left alone in the dim heat of the hut. She turned the letter over, looking for a clue to its contents. Then she lay back and surrendered to the mental vacuum which was always waiting for her, narcotic, comforting nothingness.
‘Sister Katerina – I didn’t see you.’ The sweet-faced Dutch nun had entered the hut quietly. She was a respected leader among the camp women and had no doubt been sent to Betty by the others. Deftly she picked up the envelope before Betty could reach it, and without a word opened it and read the card inside. Then she handed it to Betty with a smile.
‘Not bad news, I think.’
It was from an officer whose name Betty did not recognize, at Changi internment camp on Singapore Island, informing her that her husband had been alive two months earlier when he had left camp with a party of prisoners ‘sent north for an unknown purpose’. ‘We shall try to send news of your survival to him. I know he would wish to send you all his love,’ the message concluded.
‘Happy now?’ It was hard to tell. Betty’s face was habitually vacant with very little expression. She had suffered, of course, a severe illness after childbirth, but by now they had all suffered as gravely, and many had died.
‘Yes, I’m happy. Thank you, Sister. You’re so kind.’ Betty folded the card in two and tucked it into the old Bakelite soap-dish which contained her remaining precious possessions including the marcasite watch which Gerald had given her on their engagement.
‘The kitchen needs another person to pick rice, I think.’ The nun held out a hand to help her down from the sleeping-platform.
‘What day is it?’ Betty asked her. ‘I can’t keep track of time here.’
‘January 24th, today.’
‘Good heavens, it’s my birthday.’ I must tell them in the kitchen, she thought at once, perhaps they’ll give me a treat.
‘Well, now you can hope with God’s help to spend your next birthday with your husband. How many years is it you have been married?’
‘Let me count – I can’t believe it, but it must be almost four years. My goodness.’
‘Congratulations, my dear, and bless you.’ To her embarrassment, the nun gave her a firm, clean kiss on each cheek. Even in the enforced intimacy of the internment camp Betty could not learn to like being touched.
‘I wonder when that letter was written.’ Betty reached out and opened the soap-container to look. ‘Where’s the date? Oh no!’ The nun looked over her shoulder.
‘What’s the matter now?’
‘It’s months old. That’s no good. Gerald could still be dead and I not know.’ With anger, she threw the card down and let the other woman put an arm around her shoulders.
‘If God wills it he will be alive. Now, come to do some work and make yourself think of other things. Many women have no news at all, remember. At least, for you, there is still a chance.’
Later, as she sat outside the cooking hut with a wicker-basket, picking out weevils, gravel and woodchippings from the prisoners’ meagre rice ration, Betty thought of the marcasite watch. If she sold it, she could buy eggs, or some sugar perhaps. If Gerald was dead, he couldn’t mind, could he?
Chapter Fifteen
There was a noise in the distance, a low, tired roar that did not rise or fall but ground on remorselessly like a faraway ocean. It was the noise of London traffic. Cathy opened her eyes and dissociated dots of light and colour rushed painfully into her head. She shut her eyes again. She felt weightless, floating, heavy with nothingness.
At her side, something moved. A door opened and closed. The door was somewhere beyond her feet. Her throat was sore and there was a bad taste in her mouth. Her right arm felt awkward, as if it were being bent backwards against the joint. Her foot hurt, her left foot. It was hot and tender, and the blankets were raised over it.
She opened her eyes again and willed the inrush of dots into a picture. A room, a window. She was lying flat and a tube was stuck into her right arm. The door opened and closed again, there was a rustle and a nurse was standing beside her.
‘How do you feel?’ She picked up the clipboard at the foot of the bed and made some notes on it.
‘All right.’ Cathy tried to smile.
‘Your sister’s coming to see you, she’ll be here soon, I expect.’
The nurse’s manner did not invite conversation. She left the room a few moments later and Cathy tried to sit up. It was difficult. Obviously, she was very weak. There was a large, uncomfortable band of sticking plaster across her throat. Determined, Cathy
pulled herself down the bed until she could reach the clipboard, and held it above her eyes to read it. It was Thursday. She had been admitted on Tuesday. Her temperature was normal, but it had been low when she was brought in.
She felt clearheaded but foolish. It was nice to feel so silly. Nothing was important. No one could hurt her. There was nothing to think about.
The door opened violently and Monty rushed to her.
‘Darling, darling Cathy!’ Monty’s hair smelt smoky, reminding her of the world of pain outside the white walls. ‘It’s all right, darling, I’m here. You’re OK, you’re going to be OK.’ Cathy tried to smile again but her mouth was disobedient. She felt inexpressibly happy to see her sister, but her face was stretching into all sorts of grimaces and as Monty ripped a tissue from the box nearby and dabbed at her eyes, she realized that she was weeping. They hugged each other for a long time.
‘Have they told you anything?’ Monty asked her at last.
‘What anything?’
‘No, they haven’t, have they, the shits. Your doctor’s all right, but the nurses are absolute bitches. I don’t think they approve of suicides, somehow.’
The word suicide was puzzling. ‘Am I – did I …?’ her voice subsided in doubt.
‘Don’t you remember?’
Cathy tried to remember, and remembered that her husband had left her and wanted to divorce her. She began to cry again. She could remember nothing else. ‘Are there any pillows?’ she asked. ‘I’d like to sit up.’
Monty brought a pile of pillows from a chair and helped her sister upright, moving the cradle over her foot with care.
‘Why have they put a tent over my foot? Is there anything to drink? My mouth tastes horrible.’
Monty poured some water. ‘You’ve hurt your foot.’
Slowly, Cathy began to remember. ‘But I took pills, I must have been unconscious. How could I have hurt my foot?’ She smiled. It was ridiculous. She laughed. She couldn’t stop laughing, it was so funny. Her face was wet; she was crying again.
Monty passed her some tissues. ‘I’ll tell you everything later, when you’re more together.’
‘No, tell me now.’
‘No, Cathy, tomorrow.’
‘Don’t be silly, you know me – I’ll only worry about it.’
‘But you’re out of your head.’
‘Considering the things I do when I’m in my right mind, that’s probably as sane as I’ll ever be.’
Monty laughed, and Cathy laughed, and they hugged each other; then Cathy started crying again and Monty put the box of tissues by the hand that was not connected to a drip.
‘OK, but it’s heavy. You’re in St George’s Hospital, you’ve been here two days. We found you at home, you’d fallen off the bed. This,’ she patted the sticking plaster across Cathy’s throat, ‘is because they gave you a tracheotomy. You were in intensive care for a day.’
‘And that?’ Cathy pointed at the hump over her foot.
‘Does your foot hurt?’
‘Throbs a bit, why?’
‘You were lying so the blood supply in your leg was restricted, and no blood was getting through to your foot. They think part of your foot may be dead, because it was deprived of oxygen a long time, and you might be going to get gangrene.’
‘My goodness. I thought that only happened in war films when they start amputating people’s legs with blunt knives.’
‘Don’t be silly.’ Monty squeezed her hand and tried to sound utterly reassuring. At one point the doctor had mentioned that amputating Cathy’s leg was a possibility.
‘Does anyone know I’m here?’
‘I rang up Lord Shrewton. He was terrific. We agreed he’d tell Charlie, and now you’ve come round you can see him, if you want.’
‘And Jamie? Is Jamie all right?’
‘He’s fine.’
‘Mummy?’
‘Yes, I told her. There’s some bridge tournament on, so she said she’d only come up if you got worse. Didi went bananas but I told Caroline to tie her down.’ They laughed again.
Next day the crazy elation vanished and Cathy felt hopeless. The hospital psychiatrist came to see her, and a doctor.
‘The shrink said I was a classic case,’ she told Monty. ‘His line was I was still grieving for Daddy. I told him he ought to try being married to someone like Charlie. I bet he wouldn’t sit there looking so smug if his wife was screwing everything that moved.’
‘He’s only worried that you’ll try it again and get the hospital bad publicity. Did you tell him about the pills the doctor was giving you?’
Cathy shook her head. ‘They were only tranquillizers, nothing important.’ Her sister looked better, Monty thought. Her cheeks had a vague tinge of colour and her eyes were no longer staring out of her head as if she’d seen a ghost.
‘Any news on the foot – how does it feel?’
‘Awful. It’s agony and they won’t give me enough painkillers because they say it’s a good sign that it’s hurting.’
‘Is it infected?’
Cathy nodded. ‘They gave me antibiotics, too. If I could walk I’d probably rattle.’ They fell into a companionable silence. Cathy reached for the magazine which Monty had brought her and opened it without much interest.
‘Did you really want to die?’ Monty asked suddenly.
‘Yes. It was all I could think about. I just knew it was what I had to do. I’d failed at everything so I had to die.’ Cathy spoke slowly, hardly able now to understand how she had felt when she had planned her death with such meticulous care.
‘Are you angry with me for stopping you from dying?’
Cathy considered the question. ‘No. I’m pleased to be alive now. I feel as if living means everything, when dying meant everything before. I feel awful about Jamie. How could I even think of leaving him?’
‘You’d flipped, you didn’t know what you were doing. You must have been junked up on tranquillizers for months, too.’
‘Do you know what I couldn’t make the shrink understand, Monty? I wasn’t trying anything, I was going to kill myself, and I failed and I feel bloody awful. I’ve failed at everything. I’ve lost my husband – I did everything I knew to keep him, and I lost.’ She snivelled and groped for the tissues.
‘He doesn’t know you, does he? He’s used to seeing hysterical chicks who’re trying the old emotional blackmail. He doesn’t understand that you weren’t just messing about.’ Cathy’s tears began to burst uncontrollably from behind her closed eyelids. ‘You haven’t failed,’ Monty consoled her. ‘You can’t win anything if the deck’s stacked against you.’
‘Other women do.’
‘Like who? Mummy? Didi? Mrs Emanuel or the Marchioness? What do you want to be like when you’re fifty? Some harpy who fucks up Jamie’s life because she hasn’t got a life of her own?’
Cathy rubbed tears from her eyes. ‘Jamie. Poor little Jamie. How could I have thought of killing myself and leaving him all alone? Are you sure he’s OK, Monty? Will you ask them to bring him to see me?’
With long hours in which to think, Cathy soon began to discover the significance of who visited her, and why. Monty came every day and treated the bleak little ward as if it were just another room in her own home, sitting gossiping and watching television. When she was there Cathy forgot that she was injured.
Charlie sent her flowers, with a card promising a visit. His father, Lord Shrewton, visited quite regularly, despite the fact that he was obviously acutely uncomfortable in the presence of a woman who had been so appallingly wronged by his son. Cathy put him at his ease by encouraging him to talk business, and the reserved but sincere affection they held for each other deepened. The Marchioness called once, briefly, twittering inanities.
Her most trying sympathizer was her grandmother, who wafted into the room in her new spring fur, a puff-sleeved chinchilla, and calling, ‘Where is the poor, dear girl? My dear, how simply awful for you to be cooped up in this hideous room. You must make them move
you at once. Those curtains! Too drab!’
She brought flowers, champagne, and a turquoise silk negligée trimmed with fake point de Venise lace. ‘Now when Charlie comes you must be sure to look beautiful but fragile. Lie back on the pillows weakly and say almost nothing. Have you got some white make-up? I’ll get some sent to you.’
Cathy suddenly saw her grandmother as if she were a creature from another world, incapable of understanding how life on earth was lived. Here I am, she thought, lucky to be alive, lucky to have two legs and facing the possibility that I’ll never be able to walk normally again, and Didi’s only interested in teaching me to act like a courtesan so I can get Charlie back. If it wasn’t for Charlie I wouldn’t be in this mess.
Lady Davina at once sensed that her pupil’s attention was wandering. ‘You’ve been very, very stupid,’ she hissed, her wrinkled, powder-caked face poking forward like a vulture’s. ‘You’ve played right into that girl’s hands and you’ll have to work like a demon to get Charlie back in line now you’ve behaved like a silly little fool.’
‘I thought you said men liked women who acted like silly little fools?’ Cathy saw that her sarcasm was completely lost on her grandmother, so she changed the subject. ‘Have you seen Jamie, Didi? I miss him so much, but I think the Marchioness wants to keep him down at Coseley so he won’t have to see me in hospital.’
The old woman glared at her through beads of blue mascara. ‘Have you gone completely mad? There’s nothing more likely to put a man off than a snivelling brat about the place.’ Her bracelets clashed as she raised her arms in a gesture of despair. ‘I never could understand why you allowed Nanny to bring the little horror downstairs all the time and leave toys all over the house. Men can’t stand children at any price.’
Cathy sighed and leaned back on the pillows, letting her eyelids droop as if with exhaustion exactly as her grandmother had counselled her to do with Charlie. ‘That’s it! That’s just how you should look!’ the old woman exclaimed. ‘Now remember to look like that, say nothing, and make him feel guilty. He’ll soon come to heel.’
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