The Memory of Us: A Novel

by Camille Di Maio

  “Lady Number One is Miss Penelope Cumberland. Miss Cumberland has been attending the University of Edinburgh, studying music. She enjoys playing the piano and helping her parents breed spaniels.”

  Penelope and I had been in school together for years. Plump and pretty, she was a sweetheart if there ever was one, and I hoped that her auction went well. She walked out onto the stage confidently, turning this way and that.

  “Do I have ten shillings?”

  “Ten shillings!”

  “I have ten shillings. Do I have twelve?”

  “Twelve shillings!”

  And so on and so forth. Penelope went for a respectable one pound and two shillings, and was bought by her beau of seven months, Nigel Gray, who had worked overtime pumping petrol to make sure that no one else took his girl out. He hopped onstage after he’d won and planted a big kiss on her cheek. Together, they shuffled through the crowd toward the band, waiting for the auction to end and the dancing to begin.

  “Lady Number Two is Miss Rose Smith. Miss Smith moved to Liverpool from Swansea only two years ago, and is employed as a seamstress. She enjoys seeing movies and going on picnics. Do I have ten shillings?”

  Rose Smith went for one pound, seven to Mrs. Tabitha Brewer, her employer. I knew that Rose wanted to participate but really didn’t want Charlie Franks to win her. He had asked her to step out with him several times, and obstinately didn’t believe that her no was firm. When it appeared that he was going to be the winner, Mrs. Brewer threw out a mercy bid and won Rose herself. No doubt she intended to let Rose select her own escort for the picnic.

  We were all crowded around in the back, hoping for glimpses of the progress of the auction. It provided juicy gossip, and everyone wanted to be the first to spread it.

  I finally had my turn to peer through the curtain, just in time to see Lady Number Three, Miss Anne Murrish, daughter of a local solicitor, ready to take the stage.

  “Do I have ten shillings?”

  Thwarted by his last attempt, Charlie Franks was determined to win an evening with any girl, and was the first to acknowledge the ten shillings.

  “Who will give me twelve?”

  “Twelve!”

  I looked to see who had bid next. I found the source of the voice, and nearly lost the contents of my stomach.

  It was Kyle.

  Dressed smartly in gray slacks and a herringbone jacket, he was even more handsome than I had remembered. And I had tried so hard not to remember. I must have been barmy to think I could. Why was he here tonight? Why was he bidding on a girl when he was heading back to the seminary? I thought he wasn’t allowed to like them.

  He didn’t bid beyond the twelve, but that didn’t make me feel any better.

  I gave up my spot at the curtain and laid my head against a tree. My perfect day, my perfect evening. Ruined by the very person that I had tried so hard to forget.

  I could hear that Anne went for a respectable two pounds. I tried to summon up happiness for her, but it was beyond my abilities.

  Five more girls before it was my turn. I checked my wristwatch and ran back to the hall to put myself back together.

  Lucille saw me leave and ran after me.

  “Julianne! Jul! Wait for me!”

  I slowed a little so that she could catch up, but I kept moving forward because I had to get out of there.

  “Jul, what happened?” Her words came out with labored pauses as she caught her breath, but it didn’t stop her from springing into action. She brushed my hair from my face and pulled out her powder to fix me up.

  I hung my head and didn’t want to tell her at first, but I knew she’d get it out of me anyway. “It’s him, Lucille! He’s here, and he just bid on Anne!” I pointed a shaky finger in the direction of the stage.

  “Him, who? Him him? Your priest?”

  “Cut it out, Luce. Yes, him. And no, he’s not my priest. He’s not any priest. I told you that he’s not nearly done with school yet.”

  I sniffed, and she pulled a handkerchief out of my handbag.

  I asked her all of the same questions that I had agonized over myself. “Why is he here? Why is he bidding on Anne?”

  She put her arms around me, rocking me a little and shushing me like a mother to a baby. “There, there. Calm down. I don’t know why he’s here, but it’s no concern of yours. Walk away from this. I’ve already told you that there’s no good end in it.”

  “But why is he here?”

  She sighed, resigning herself to my recklessness, and mustered the words to console me. “Maybe he’s just a horse’s ass.”

  “Lucille!” I’d never heard an improper word from her. But my darling friend knew what it would take to make me smile.

  “Well, sometimes you have to just say what you’re thinking. There’s another possibility, though.”

  “I can’t wait to hear this one.”

  “Maybe he plans to bid on you and he’s just practicing.”

  I let this one sink in before dismissing it. “Practicing, huh? Not sure I buy that one.”

  “Well, dear, you have to believe something, because you’re on shortly. There’s twenty thousand people waiting for you, and you’re a mess!”

  Her urgency brought me back to the task at hand. Hastily, we reapplied the cosmetics and brushed my hair until it was shining. She grabbed my hand and led me back to the curtain, gave me a tight squeeze, and disappeared.

  “Lady Number Seven is Miss Irene Bath . . .”

  I paid no mind to the details, scanning the crowd for Kyle, and found him in the second row. My knees weakened at the sight of him.

  “Do I have ten shillings?”

  “Ten shillings.” From the back.

  “Do I have fourteen shillings?”

  “Fourteen shillings!” From the right side.

  “Fourteen shillings. Do I have sixteen shillings?”

  “Sixteen shillings.” It came from Kyle.

  He didn’t bid any higher than that, though, and Irene went for two pounds, five shillings.

  Maybe Lucille was right. Maybe he was just preparing to bid on me.

  Melody Carlyle came and went for two pounds, seven. Kyle had bid at sixteen shillings again, and no more.

  My turn.

  Primp. Plump. Straighten. Pucker. Toss. I was ready.

  “Lady Number Nine, Miss Helen Westcott.” I stepped through the curtains as he introduced me. “Miss Westcott will be attending a nursing college in London in September. She currently works with her father in Albert Dock. She enjoys reading, the movies, and fashion.”

  Before he could get to the bidding, I stepped close to him and whispered in his ear.

  “Excuse me, Miss Westcott has informed me that she is usually addressed by her middle name, Julianne. So, do I hear ten shillings for Miss Julianne Westcott?”

  Several bids for ten shillings were shouted out, and the Lord Mayor quickly increased the ante, knocking out a few men at a time. By the time I had reached two pounds, four ardent bidders had walked away.

  I turned and turned again, summoning all of the coquettishness I could muster, all the time scanning the crowd for one face. But Kyle had vanished from his seat. When we reached two pounds, six shillings, I finally found him. Or rather, his back. He had left the crowd altogether, and was walking, hands in pocket, past the dance floor until I couldn’t see him anymore.

  I was infuriated. I had people in the crowd breaking previous records with their bids, and the one person that I had any interest in hadn’t even offered two pence. Well, even if he wasn’t around to see it, I was sure that he would hear how much I had gone for, so I waved and smiled, playing it up in the hopes of driving the bidding to unprecedented heights.

  And I did. I garnered an astounding four pounds, six shillings, eliciting rousing cheers for several minutes. Whoops and handshakes came from the left corner of the crowd, and I was able to see that Roger Kline had won. I didn’t know him well, but he was the son of a member of Parliament and was said
to have a bright political future ahead of him. I was sure that an outing with him would be interesting, at least. I waved to him and blew him a kiss of thanks before slipping back through the curtain. With the pageantry behind me, my chest began heaving and I gasped for air.

  Lucille and Mother and Father were waiting for me near the lodge. Lucille could barely contain herself, even jumping in place. She ran to me first and wrapped me in a giant, joyous hug. “Jul! Four pounds, six shillings! That’s amazing! No one has ever gone for that much. And to Roger Kline! He’s so good-looking.”

  I shot her dragon eyes, and she recoiled, recalling that I didn’t care if Roger Kline or the Man on the Moon had been victorious. I wasn’t going to play the charade for her, not when she knew the truth of it. But for Mother, who seemed immensely pleased with the prospects of the winning bidder, I bit my lip and smiled. And, of course, my father looked proud.

  I excused myself to walk the grounds while the auction progressed, making a wide arc around the walled garden so that no one would find me, especially Roger. I was in no mood for adulation right now and didn’t care to continue the pretense.

  I found a tree stump to sit on and watched the gaiety from a distance. My mind was numb, and my legs were tired. I was looking forward to going home and celebrating a job well done tomorrow. Tonight only despondency would be my companion.

  At the conclusion of the auction, Lucille found me and tried to pull me toward the dance floor—it seemed that there was no lack of gentlemen asking her for my whereabouts. I asked her to relay that I was feeling ill and told her to tell my parents that I would be walking home. I gave her the keys to the Bentley and hoped that she would find it unharmed.

  The light from the moon was brilliant, and it made walking the familiar path easier. The people in the few cars that passed looked bewildered at the sight of the lone girl in the elegant dress, mascara painting trails of woe on her face. One bearing friends of my parents offered me a ride, and while it was tempting to give my aching feet a break, I stayed the course. Stubborn, like my brother.

  A mile from home, the heel of my left shoe broke and I stumbled to the ground. Blood ran down my leg, and I felt shards of gravel piercing my skin. The throbbing was so intense that I could have sworn it was audible. I sat down and hugged my knees to my chest. Great, I thought. It can’t get any worse than this.

  Then thunder cracked through the sky, and I felt the first of what would surely be many raindrops.

  Chapter Five

  I looked around in what was quickly becoming a torrential downpour, and I saw in the distance a barn. I’d walked past it often and thought it was a blight on the landscape, with its peeling red paint and sagging doors. It was out of place in a city, one of those occasional plots where the family had owned it for centuries and had not given in to the development surging against its borders. But it was a welcome sanctuary at this moment. I pulled myself up and started to hobble toward it, unbalanced on my shoes.

  “Here, let me help you!” a voice from behind me called out. A man stepped forward and wrapped his arm around my waist, helping me walk in the direction of the barn. I shuddered at the realization that I was alone in the dark with a stranger, but I did not have a choice unless I wanted to continue on in the storm. I couldn’t see him because my eyes were closed against the heavy droplets, and I whispered a desperate prayer to a God I seldom spoke to.

  Letting go of me, he opened the door with both hands. It made a piercingly shrill scream, and appeared to be off its tracks. He waved me inside, where the malodor of farm animals made my nose prickle, and their neighs and baas and groans were unnerving. I shivered in my dress and was once again aware of the pain in my leg. I waved my hands out in the pitch-blackness, utterly disoriented. He told me to wait, closed the barn door with a heave, and fumbled until he found a lantern along the wall. He stood in silhouette as he lit it before approaching me to put his jacket around my shoulders. I tugged the coat tight around me. It smelled good—like earth and cologne.

  I wiped my hands across my hair and face as he took my hand and led me over a hay-scattered floor. My breath caught as I looked up. It was Kyle. What a way for him to see me, dripping with rain and tears. At least I had the rain to blame, disguising the tears. Or they could be attributed to my pain. The visible one on my leg. The deeper one was unseen.

  I tightened my lips to prevent myself from saying the things that I really wanted to say, and let a meek “Thank you” escape instead.

  He didn’t answer but found a pail and overturned it so that I could sit. He rubbed his hands up and down my arms, shoulder to elbow, trying to warm me up. A month ago this gesture would have sent chills—good chills—through me, but right now I was only distracted by imagining how disheveled I must have looked to him.

  In the dim light, he was as attractive as I had remembered, and my resentment softened against my better judgment.

  He smiled at me briefly, and then moved his hands along his arms, back and forth, until he was warmer. They looked strong and masculine. I wondered what it would be like to hold them.

  Foolish girl. There you go again. Was it Lucille’s voice in my head or my own?

  My teeth no longer chattering, I expressed my gratitude with more sincerity. He had made a habit of earning my goodwill. Kyle found a rickety milking stool, and scooted it next to me. He sat with elbows on his knees and hands together.

  “My pleasure,” he said. “We can’t have young ladies wandering alone in the dark and rain by themselves.”

  “I was on my way home, and I didn’t have much further to go.”

  “I know, but then you might have contracted pneumonia, and if your parents knew that I could have prevented it, they might just call up the Bootle Home and have me dismissed.”

  A grin had spread across his face, and just that quickly we were back bantering in the kitchen of Bootle Home. “Maybe I should tell them that you held me hostage in a desolate barn and see what they do then!”

  “Oh, but at least you wouldn’t be dying from the elements. I think I could talk them into pardoning me.”

  “It’s my word against yours.”

  “Well, then I’ll have to treat you like the lady that you are, and hope for the best.”

  I didn’t have a response for that, so I asked him how he’d found me.

  “I followed you,” he said with candor. “I was on my way home after the festival when I saw you walking away. You looked upset, and I worried about you making it back safely. I kept my distance so that I didn’t bother you, and I would have left as soon as you got in.”

  I couldn’t let him know the true cause of my distress.

  My knee ached and I looked down. The blood had seeped through the satin of my gown, as if it weren’t already ruined from the fall. I gingerly lifted the dress away from the wound and, disregarding modesty, lifted the hem high above my knee and held it there while I went to work on the silk stocking. I rolled it down a bit at a time, wincing with every movement until it was finally off, and my bare skin felt the sting of the cold air.

  When I looked up, I found Kyle’s gaze fixed upon my leg. His eyes were slightly glazed and his jaw tense. I peeked down again and realized that the hem of my garter was showing. I stifled a smile, remembering the drama with which I had pronounced to Lucille that no one would, in fact, see my garter. I rolled the dress back down and smoothed out the wrinkles in vain.

  His gaze met my eyes and he leaned in before abruptly sitting straight up. We stumbled out words at the same time.

  “So, whose idea—” he started.

  “What were you doing—”

  “You first.”

  I nodded. “What were you doing at the festival? Aren’t you a Catholic?” Aren’t you going to be a priest? was what I really wanted to say, though I already knew the answer.

  “Catholics can’t raise money for good causes?”

  “What about the cathedral? It’s Anglican.”

  “Are you Anglican?”

/>   “Well, no. My family’s not very religious. I mean, we go to church once in a while.”

  “There you go, then. It’s going to be a beautiful monument to God. I am happy to help make that happen.”

  He had me there. Damn him, I could never get in the last word.

  We settled into awkward silence. When I shivered again, he got up to readjust his coat on me, then sat awkwardly again on the little stool.

  “I wonder how long the storm is going to last.” Weather was a neutral topic, and I wanted to keep talking. I feared that the rapid beat of my heart would give me away in the silence. Besides, I loved the sound of his deep and gentle voice.

  “I don’t know, but I’ll walk you home when it’s all over. If we get hungry, I can slaughter that cow over there and have a meal. Do you have a cleaver in that handbag?”

  “Very funny.” I smiled. “Lucille and I ate so much at the festival, though, I don’t think that I could eat even a bird right now, much less a cow.”

  “All right, Helen.” I could see his grin even in the dim light.

  “Oh, you heard that?”

  “Yes. So, what’s the story?”

  I stretched my legs a bit and removed the pail so that I could sit on the floor. Kyle did the same, and we sat side by side, leaning against the slats of a horse stall. All but touching.

  “Well, my grandmother’s name was Helen, and my father felt obligated to name his only daughter after his mother. But he allowed my mother to choose Julianne as my middle name, and to call me by that. I’m very glad that she did. My grandmother died when I was little, but I remember her and I didn’t like her at all. She was old and crabby. I read once that Helen means ‘torch.’ But to me, it means ‘old and crabby.’”

  Kyle chuckled. “Well, that would explain how quickly you corrected the Lord Mayor. But it’s ironic, you know. Your fictitious meaning for your name.”

  “How so?”

  “Because I think Julianne comes from the Latin word for ‘youthful.’”

  I barely heard what he said, as my ears were ringing from the beautiful sound of my name on his lips. I wanted to hear it again. “I’m sorry, what did you say?”