Bottled Spider

by John Gardner

  ‘Suzie?’ Out of the past, her name rushed towards her, carried on a familiar voice.

  ‘Tally ho. Ned knows her. Popsy identified. Friendly.’

  She hardly recognized him, he had changed so much. Seemed to have grown, aged from the young, rather cocky undergraduate. Grown into himself, her mother would say. Ned Griffith whom she’d loved and lost in a blazing row outside his rooms in New Court — the Wedding Cake — in St John’s College, Cambridge.

  ‘Golly. Ned. Gosh, Ned, how incredible.’

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Tentative. Not the cocksure U/T lawyer, as they’d say today. Lawyer Under Training.

  ‘Gosh, and you’re a pilot. I’d heard you were in the Raff ...’

  ‘How on earth ...?’

  She gathered up her wits. ‘Bumped into Pat Patton. You remember her? Nurse. Addenbrooke’s. Bumped into her in London. She’s an Army nurse now. Queen Alexandra’s. Very smart. Pips on her shoulders — everything. You’re a fighter pilot.’

  He gave a self-deprecating smile, combining it with a nod, not looking her in the eyes. ‘Spits,’ he said. ‘Up the road. Middle Wallop.’

  ‘Gosh, I was there yesterday.’ I sound like the schoolgirl I was: gushing. Her hand came up to tidy away an imagined unruly strand of hair.

  ‘What on earth were you doing there?’

  ‘Seeing one of the officers. Squadron Leader O’Dell.’

  ‘What, Fordy O’Dell?’

  ‘Hawk Eye O’Dell?’

  ‘O’Dell o’ the dell?’

  ‘Squadron Leader O’Dell. 609 Squadron.’

  ‘We’re 609.’ A baby-faced pilot officer with a medal ribbon she could not recognize under his wings. ‘Hey, you’re not the policewoman that came to see him yesterday?’

  ‘Policewoman?’ Ned sounded aghast. ‘You’re not a policewoman, Suzie, are you? Can’t be?’

  ‘Wait a minute.’ A tall string bean of a flight lieutenant looked at her as though he could see through her clothes. X-ray eyes. ‘You are, aren’t you? You were in the papers not so long ago. Some murder.’

  She nodded and Ned said, ‘Suzie?’ somewhat perturbed. ‘Look, I’d better introduce you.’

  They all had schoolboy names: Jem, ’Topher, Rich, Barny — ‘It’s Barnabas, actually,’ he said, near to blushing. Children, overgrown children, trained to kill in the air, sleek for the slaughter.

  Ned said, ‘This is an old friend of mine, Suzie Mountford. You haven’t got married or anything have you?’

  No, Ned. Negative, Ned. You should’ve given me a little more time, Ned. You pushed too hard and we ended up a thousand miles from each other.

  ‘You are the one though, aren’t you?’ ’Topher was the string-bean flight lieutenant. ‘The one the papers made a fuss about. You were investigating a murder, and some idiots didn’t think it was woman’s work.’

  On her side, she thought. How wonderful.

  ‘It was that BBC girl, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. Jo Benton.’

  ‘The “winter-drawers-on” girl.’

  ‘That’s the one.’

  ‘Is O’Dell mixed up in that?’

  ‘I had to ask the squadron leader some very dull and routine questions.’ Must give some explanation.

  What was she drinking? they wanted to know, and there was some argument about who would pay for her drink.

  Puppies. She thought of Simnel, bounding up outside “A” Flight Dispersal. Eager, breathless.

  ‘Should’ve arrested him and taken him off to chokey.’ Barny had one of those machinegun laughs, a series of little chuckles, quite high in the register, a bray.

  ‘Oh, I don’t think there was any harm of that. He was a friend of the deceased.’

  ‘A friend of Jo Benton’s?’

  ‘They were at school together.’

  ‘How are things in London?’ Ned asked.

  ‘About the same. Plenty of lost sleep. There seems to be a bit of a lull on, Jerry’s going for the ports and places up north.’ The words felt stilted to her.

  ‘You in London during the Blitz? The bombing?’ Rich asked.

  ‘Yes,’ she told him. ‘Most of it.’

  ‘Well Manchester’s getting a pasting tonight. Bad. The IO told me before we left.’

  ‘I got stuck in London for one night,’ ’Topher said grimly. ‘I had to make a dive down into Swiss Cottage tube station. Never been so frightened, and they had nowhere to pee except buckets. If you wanted to go properly you had to take the Tube on to Finchley Park.’

  ‘You should’ve tried Tottenham Court Road,’ Suzie said. ‘That was horrible. Very pungent.’

  They thought that was a witty remark and there was some further banter.

  ‘Hated being bombed,’ Jem said, shyly. He had blond hair with a lock that fell over his eyes. ‘Loathed it. Much rather fight the Hun in the sun.’

  The others set up a chant — ‘Oh, yes. There I was upside down in a cloud, on fire, nothing on the clock but the maker’s name and that was blurred.’

  They went quiet after that, splitting up, engrossed in a story, a joke, that Jem was telling. He came to the punch line, ‘And little Audrey laughed, and laughed and laughed.’ They fell about with laughter. Again, she thought, children; schoolboys behind the bike sheds. Eventually Ned shepherded her into the corner. ‘Suzie, I’m so glad to have met you again.’ She smiled up at him. ‘I never had the chance to apologize. I was a stupid ass. I regretted it terribly.’

  ‘I got your letter, Ned.’ Dear Suzie. I’m sorry about the May Ball. I’m sure you thought me very silly so, perhaps, it’s best if we don’t see one another again. Yours, Ned.

  ‘I’m the one to apologize,’ she told him. ‘I didn’t even have the grace to reply. I gave in my notice and they let me go immediately. Spun them a yarn. Said there was a family problem. Left Cambridge at the weekend. Went home. Had a bit of a bust-up there. Went to London and got a job — Perhaps it was my year for bust-ups?’

  ‘The job was in Harvey Nicks, wasn’t it? My sister saw you in there. Remember Eunice?’

  ‘Yes, lawks, she saw me serving people?’

  Tall ungainly girl. Came to see Ned on some flying visit. They’d spent all of half-an-hour together in his rooms, munching crumpets, toasted in front of the gas fire. She had only met Ned on the previous night. She wondered how Eunice could have recognized her? The photograph, of course. Ned had asked her to get a photograph done and she went to PolyPhoto and had one of those huge sheets, they chose the best two and she had a couple of enlargements mounted. Her Mum and Charlotte had copies, and she gave the especially nice one to Ned.

  ‘Another sherry for Suzie,’ one of the boys called out and she had to refuse and tell them why she was there. She explained to Ned that she was staying with her sister. ‘You on leave?’ she asked.

  He was off for two days. ‘We’ve been stood down from tonight until Boxing night. Can we meet again, Suze? Please, it’d be so nice?’ She had forgotten that he had always called her Suze or Sukey.

  She was uncertain at first, then thought, they’re flying most days — and nights — bumping up against the Luftwaffe. Constantly fighting the war. ‘Look, Ned, why not come to lunch, Christmas dinner, tomorrow?’

  All the uncertainty filtered in — well, isn’t it a bit of cheek? Be foisting myself on your sister. Are you sure? His defences broke very quickly. Yes, he could get a lift over, which house was it?

  ‘I’ll pick you up here. Then I can walk you back. We can go in together. Better that way.’ She told him about Ben and his enslavement to routine. Tomorrow at twelve thirty, then. Yes, of course it would be fine, and she almost left without buying the half-bottle of brandy.

  It had churned up old feelings. She stood outside the White Hart letting her eyes adjust to the blackness again, and became indecisive, ambivalent. Should she have asked him? Was it going to upset her being with him for more than an hour or so? How would he fit in?

  She walked back through the cold and d
ecided that, whatever else, it was the right thing to have done — invited Ned to Christmas lunch.

  Charlotte thought it was wonderful. She knew all the details of the break-up in Cambridge. Back in those days Suzie didn’t believe in second chances, but Charlotte had always felt that Suzie should have tried harder. Should never have accepted the inevitable and left. ‘Who knows,’ she said now. ‘There’s mistletoe in the hall, so maybe ...’

  ‘Oh, Charles, don’t be silly, it was a long while ago. We’re different people now.’ But she wondered. He had changed. He was a warrior now. A warrior on the wings of the morning.

  The children were electric with excitement, little Ben catching a sense of anticipation from his sister. They put Lucy down on her bed for an hour or so to get rested before her big duties after the Midnight Mass. Charlotte baked another batch of mince pies, Suzie tidied her room, wrapped the last few presents, and before she knew it she had to leave for church.

  Father Harris heard confessions at eleven o’clock.

  So she knelt at the prie-dieu next to the priest’s chair and poured out all the petty sins on her conscience since her last confession: the unfulfilled lust, the uncurbed tongue, the evils in thought, word and deed; and he gave her a penance — to say the Collect for Christmas Day and read the Corpus Christi hymn — then, with the purple stole hanging round his neck, he absolved her in the name of God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. And so she went to the Lady Chapel, where the Blessed Sacrament lay reserved, and said the Collect for Christmas and the hymn written by St Thomas Aquinas —

  Therefore we before him bending,

  This great Sacrament revere;

  Types and shadows have their ending,

  For the newer rite is here.

  Soon Charlotte arrived with Lucy and they all sat together in the same pew, and the church filled up, the verger going around and checking the huge blackout screens that were fitted over the great stained-glass windows.

  There was the scent of incense and all the truth of Christmas memories. The first notes of ‘Once in Royal David’s City’ sending a thrill chasing up the back of their necks; Father Harris solemn in the gorgeous cope that had been made by the Wantage Sisters specially for this parish. So the service moved slowly through its various stages, and as the choir sang ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’ Suzie was able to exchange smiles with Charlotte when they came to the line, ‘And Christmas Comes Once More’. Something they had done down the years almost every Christmas.

  And when it was over, they watched as the acolytes escorted Lucy carrying the Baby Jesus to the crib, placing Him lovingly in the manger. Then Father Harris knelt in front of it, blessed it with incense and Holy Water, and they all sang ‘In Dulce Jubilo’. Outside, the smiling priest shook hands with everyone and they all wished each other a happy Christmas. And so back to Falcon Cottage and bed.

  Christmas had come once more.

  *

  At four o’clock in the morning, Golly got out of the makeshift bed on his mother’s settee and lit the lamp on the table. It was cold and he dressed quickly, went through to the tiny scullery and sloshed water on his face, then dried himself and finished dressing. The back sitting room again smelled of paraffin from the lamp. Paraffin and the warm cosy smell of safety: his mother. He did not want to go out into the cold early morning, but he had his orders. He must obey.

  Fully dressed, Golly turned out the lamp and let himself out of his mother’s house. Now he began the long walk to Overchurch. Nobody is about. Not even the police.

  Not even Santa Claus.

  Golly, at the beginning of his journey, sticks to the roads. His plan is to go most of the way by walking through Whitchurch then on to clip Overchurch near the graveyard.

  His eyes soon adjusted and he went right through the villages, walking on the verges — hard as iron under his boots — all the way into Overchurch, down through the graveyard, then out across the fields and into the stand of trees fifty or sixty yards behind Falcon Cottage.

  On the way, particularly as he went through the villages, he silently chanted:

  Wee Willie Winkie runs through the town,

  Upstairs and downstairs in his nightgown,

  Rapping at the windows, crying through the lock,

  Are the children all in bed, for it’s now eight o’clock.

  Now he waits, still as a standing stone among the trees, waits like a bridegroom for his bride. And at eight o’clock, after it gets light, a lone Salvation Army man marches through the village playing a trombone, repeating the first few bars of ‘Christians Awake, Salute the Happy Morn’.

  It is a glowering and bitingly cold morn.

  Earth as hard as iron; water like a stone.

  In the bleak midwinter.

  Now.

  Nineteen

  Suzie changed into the grey woollen skirt she had bought in Selfridges and the blouse Charlotte had given her that morning: her Christmas present. Charlotte asked if her old blue dress was all right for lunch, and Suzie told her it didn’t look the least bit old to her, and how were they having it? Boiled or fried? Weak jokes apart, the ‘old blue’ was very smart indeed. Being an accountant’s wife obviously had its compensations.

  At exactly twelve thirty, Suzie walked into the saloon bar of the White Hart. Ned was already there. The string-bean flight lieutenant, ’Topher, had driven him over and they’d arrived early, forgetting that under the vagaries of the British licensing laws, the pubs couldn’t open until noon. The law demanded that Sunday opening times applied to Christmas Day.

  ‘We had to cool our heels by walking up London Road and back down Church Street.’ Ned chuckled as a horde of people crowded into the bar signalling that church was over. The choirmaster and the tenors led the way and the saloon bar started to fill up, the landlord making the most of it as they’d all be off for their Christmas dinners within the hour; unlikely to return again until Boxing Day at the earliest, and maybe not even then.

  ‘Did the sprogs get good presents?’ Ned asked.

  She told him the children had wakened them early — ‘Too damned early. We only just seemed to have gone to bed when they came pounding in. Even Ben, who really doesn’t know what any of it is about, was in a high old state. Crawled in brandishing his stocking. Lucy beside herself with joy.’ Almost immediately Lucy had dragged them all downstairs to open the other presents that had been put under the tree.

  Suzie was relieved to see that the coronation colouring sets were a great hit with Ben, so much so that he wanted to colour all three of them straight away and had to be restrained by Charlotte; while Lucy would go nowhere without the big teddy bear with the brown waistcoat, who now answered, or not, to the name of Mr Gherkin.

  ‘Why Mr Gherkin, sweetheart?’

  ‘Because he’s always burping Mummy,’ followed be a gust of ferocious laughter. Lucy was going through the phase of experimental, surreal humour, known to all small children. In telling Ned about the morning, Suzie felt the happy warmth of having been with her sister over the past thirty-six hours.

  When they shared a room as children, Charlotte had worn what Suzie still wore in bed, simple, sensible cotton nightdresses and, sometimes in winter, thicker ones of flannel that prickled something terrible. But now, in the bedroom at Falcon Cottage, Suzie discovered Charlotte the married woman. She saw the black, pink and blue sets of underwear with a lot of lace panels and trimmings, neatly folded on the wardrobe shelves. Then there was the silky nightdress, fresh for Christmas, sheer and reaching to the floor, exciting, diaphanous and revealing her nakedness underneath when the light broke through.

  ‘Ooh, your kit’s very clean and bright, Charles.’ Suzie used their old code words filched from the Galloping Major, and Charlotte did a mock pose, a turn, stopping in the ballet first position they’d both learned as children, modelling the nightie.

  ‘When did you start wearing tarty stuff like that, Charles?’

  ‘It’s not really tarty, but one learns, Suze. One learns qu
ickly, even before you’re married you’ll find out that you have to dress up for them, men. Actually I thought you’d have found out by now. And it’s really quite nice. You soon get very used to it and you can manipulate a man with a quick flash of lace, or a glimpse of suspender.’

  Just as she was shocked at her own secret preoccupation with sex, Suzie was disturbed by this seemingly esoteric change in her sister. This was a Charlotte she had never met before: one she never dreamed existed.

  Suzie and Charlotte were not only sharing a room, but also a bed — Charlotte’s marital bed. ‘Bet you wish I was Vernon, not your rotten old sister.’ Suzie poked her in the ribs and Charlotte giggled. As children they had often shared beds. Certainly they had, for a long time, shared a room.

  Now, in the early hours of Christmas morning, they hugged each other silly with delight, and they wished each other a merry Christmas and remembered all the years gone by when they had been together as young girls.

  ‘You’re really happy with Vern, aren’t you, Charles?’ Suzie had forgotten that Charlotte’s hair smelled vaguely of strawberries. She reckoned it was probably the shampoo she’d used almost all her adult life.

  ‘He’s the best bloke in the world, like my children are the best kids in the world.’

  ‘Ben as well?’ Some women, even in this supposedly enlightened age, would have put Ben in a special private hospital, to be looked after and cared for by professionally trained staff. In some circles a woman was thought of as a failure if she had borne a handicapped or sickly child.

  ‘Ben’s great. The best. He has a lovely sense of humour and he’s cheerful most of the time. He’ll make it, Suzie. I’ll never doubt that. He may not win any prizes, he may never speak, but he’ll be a delight to everyone.’

  ‘And you never feel angry. Having given birth to an imperfect child?’

  ‘God’s given me a handicapped child because He knows Vern and I are strong enough to nurture him. And if only one of us was left, the job would still be done.’

  While Suzie remained a devout believer, there were times when she was uncertain about God’s personal involvement in individual lives. She just couldn’t see it. But then, she would think, she couldn’t envisage eternity, or a space without end, or an infinite depth.