by Betty Burton
‘Wrong,’ she said. ‘I’m off to buy some graph paper and some coloured pencils – I’ve got quite a lot of work to do before my Committee convenes. It was nice to see you again, Nick.’
1939
Getting under way as well, on a small island not far off the South Coast, was a new and extremely secret establishment known as Project XJ-R6, set up by the Ministry of War.
XJ-R6 – known in its own circles as Arsix – was a Special Corps of vetted military and naval personnel, created to organize, protect and support a team of’boffins’ who would soon inhabit the warren of underground rooms that were having the final licks of paint applied. It was hush-hush, really secret – not like the radar place on the Downs, which was so secret that everyone in Hampshire knew about it, nor as secret as the proposed fast little motor-torpedo boats on the drawing boards of secret offices whose doors were open to card-carriers of all persuasions.
As everyone involved knew, Arsix was the most secret establishment of any so far created. As well it needed to be considering what the boffins intended creating there. Had people living on the mainland a mile away known about the proposed experiments to be carried out there, then southern Hampshire might have moved itself to the safety of Yorkshire. And had Yorkshire known, they would have sent it back again – in a hurry. The cultures were but one of the proposed experiments. Arsix was to be a compost-heap of minds from whose richness new ideas of the means to create death and destruction would spring.
The names of personnel who were to be involved in the Special Corps attached to Arsix had been run through a long, close check-list of necessary characteristics and traits. These ranged from their loyalty rating and dedication through their financial and domestic arrangements to their marital status and physique. When the statisticians came up with their list in alphabetical order, amongst the ‘Ks’ was Kennedy, H. of the Princess Royal’s own Hampshires. There was nothing listed to his detriment and in favour were his years holding a commission in the Terries, his approval of every aspect of the British establishment, both Church and State, his degree in chemistry and years of experience in laboratory management in the cereals business.
He was so elated at what had so far been revealed to him in the briefing room for trainees, that Georgia’s news, which was that she was going to run some sort of committee in preparation for an outbreak of war, scarcely dented a single brain-cell.
However, he dashed her off a few lines explaining that his work would preclude him from leave for at least two months, and this being so he was delighted that she had found herself something to do and was it in the Townswomen’s Guild? He could write nothing yet of the promotion that was bound to attach itself to the work he was undertaking. He rather liked the idea of one day turning up at the door glittering with new insignia.
He wrote nothing either of the female members of the Special Corps, who were surprisingly feminine with their uniform sleeves rolled up to the elbow, and hair that was kept rolled round their caps until they were off duty. It was as well not to start any stones rolling with a girl like Georgia: she could be a little strange at times, such as with the girls who liked to help out at cricket matches.
* * *
Meanwhile, Georgia felt that she was beginning to live; every day was exciting to her now that she was no longer a housewife. There was something about that long, hot summer that was both lackadaisical yet urgent – that war was inevitable and that the last moments must be used to the full. Couples who hadn’t intended to married. Women who hadn’t intended to became pregnant by men who had intended.
Georgia went to the buffet supper at The Cedars in one of Markham’s only two taxis. She was surprised to find that it was quite a grand affair with the French windows of the house open and lights streaming from the house on to the terrace where there was music and a bar. She was surprised also to discover that Mrs Hardy and Eve were both away from home. She could not imagine Hugh, even in his bachelor days, having people to the house without a hostess present. The other half live differently.
It was quite late in the evening when Freddy Hardy came to ask her for a dance. ‘Duty done, now I can concentrate on pleasure. May I?’ He bowed in a delightfully old-fashioned way, then led her up to the terrace where couples were jiving to music from a radiogram in a walnut cabinet.
‘Enjoying yourself?’
‘Absolutely. It is very beautiful up here.’
Someone changed the record and a slow waltz was played.
‘Oh,’ Georgia said. ‘I love to jive.’
‘I’ll change it back.’
‘No, no, leave it.’
The way he held her reminded her of Hugh – the well-taught product of a formal dance school. He was good, and she had not realized until tonight how much she missed the dancing part of her life. In the deepening gloaming he held her close, not thrusting thighs at her as Hugh’s friends did, but firmly and with much more of his body in contact with hers. I don’t care, Georgia thought. Perhaps he is everything they say, but tonight I don’t care. I long to just dance and be held by a man.
‘Hungry?’
‘A bit.’
His hand slid into the folds of her bodice. ‘Practically starving.’
She didn’t make a great thing of it, but removed his hand and pulled herself a couple of inches away from the warmth of his cheek and small, round belly. When the dance was over he brought her a drink with a lot of ice and they sat side by side on the stone collar of a formal pond.
‘Gin and orange, my favourite,’ she said.
‘Pure guess-work though… don’t see you as a G and T or Martini lady, nor Scotch or beer. You’re more the G and O than anything.’
‘More the shop-girl?’
‘Meaning?’
‘Oh, nothing really. But Hugh, my husband, says it’s a common drink. Only shop-girls drink gin and orange.’
‘He’s one of the Sports Club lot, isn’t he…? See, I’ve done my research. I never did get on with the Sports Club lot.’
‘Some of them are a bit…’ She felt it disloyal to continue.
‘Whenever I’ve come across them they only seem to be bent on drinking themselves silly. Then they talk about beating hell out of the Irish… or the Jews… or the bloody miners and dockers and anybody else who comes from north of Leicester. I’ve got no time for a lot of Bolshie agitators like the miners or dockers, but I don’t think that I’m better than they are. The trouble with the Club lot is that they do, and that the rest of us had better know it.’
Georgia thought such criticism was a bit rich coming from him.
‘They’re harmless, it’sjust that they like to cling on to the feeling of being Conquering Heroes. It’s only the beer talking.’
‘That’s balls, if you’ll excuse the language.’
When she didn’t reply, he said, ‘Sorry, I hope you don’t love him too much.’
‘He would never use bad language in front of me.’
‘You’re an unusual woman, Young Mrs Kennedy. You aren’t phlegmatic, yet you appear to take things in your stride. I noticed you at the meeting… I wasn’t surprised that white-haired Adonis was hanging round you.’ ‘Young Mrs Kennedy’ said banteringly, in the way that Nick said ‘Georgia Honeycombe’ to her. ‘Come on, I’ll take you for a walk down to my little stream. You’ll like it.’ He took her hand and guided her through the garden, and the cigar and haircream scent of him caught her as she followed. His hands were surprisingly cold and hard. He said, ‘Warm nights beside a stream take me back to my childhood, all that water-mint.’
‘When I was a child we lived in The Cricketers at Emberley, and there warm nights smelt of beer, of ox-eye daisies and the Gents.’
‘I like you, Young Mrs Kennedy.’ He smoothed her spine.
‘You should stop that right now, Councillor.’
The complications of the situation and her reaction to them intrigued her even as she acted them out. It was as though she could stand back and observe her behaviour.
<
br /> She did not understand her ambivalence. She was aware of the gossip about him, that he couldn’t keep his hands off women, yet she had walked away from the party with him and into this wild and unlit part of the grounds. She was wary of his every move, yet she felt almost hungry for the feel of him. Was it for him? She had felt the same way with Nick, longing for the feel of masculine hands on her bare skin and heavy moist breath in her car, as there had been just now in the slow waltz.
‘You are a clever and beautiful woman, Mrs Kennedy.’
‘Thank you, and I’m also married and faithful.’
‘Lucky man. Here’s my stream, and a seat to sit and enjoy midsummer.’
His hand still clasping hers, they sat quietly. The stream swirling into tree roots and pouring over stones. If Hugh had not gone away I wouldn’t dream of behaving like this. I suppose this is what I meant by freedom.
‘I really shouldn’t be here,’ she said quietly. ‘If Hugh had not gone away, I wouldn’t dream of behaving like this.’
‘Like what? You are the soul of propriety.’
‘As though I’m a free agent. I’m not, I’m a married woman.’
‘But without a husband.’
‘No. I have a husband.’
‘Not in your bed where you need him.’
Hugh leaving. Hugh not being able to contain himself, expending himself like a boy dreaming. Hugh asleep in two minutes. Hugh unable to look directly at her next morning.
‘I hope you don’t listen to the gossips, I’m not what they make me out to be. I like women – I’ll be honest, I prefer to be sitting here with you than jawing with a crowd of men. I thought you would appreciate my little stream. Don’t you want to be here?’
‘I don’t know. It’s peaceful and lovely and the mint smells wonderful. My senses tell me that I do. My common sense…’
‘Well, ask yourself do you like being here?’ He kissed her in a friendly kind of way but stayed holding her close and breathing close to her ear. ‘Do you like being here?’ His hand slipped inside the deep vee at the back of her dress.
‘Yes, but…’ She pulled his hand away. ‘I’m a very proper person really.’
He kissed her ear lightly. ‘I’m glad. Impropriety is boring.’
A small night-breeze moved the reeds and caused Georgia to shiver. He breathed once heavily as though capitulating, then released her.
‘We should go back. Here, put my jacket round those bare shoulders.’ He pressed one shoulder with his lips and Georgia stood up, knowing that if she did not do so now, then she might not do so at all until it was too late.
They walked slowly and quietly up the slope towards the house and the noise of the party. Before they reached the cultivated part of the garden which was hedged in clipped yew, Georgia slipped off the jacket and handed it to him.
‘Thanks, but you’d better have it in case people get the wrong idea.’
‘They get the wrong idea about me whatever I do. But you’re right, they shouldn’t have the wrong idea about you. I hope you won’t find yourself judged by association with Freddy Hardy.’
‘I don’t really care. When Hugh left, I said to myself that there could be small freedoms to be gained for women in this war. And the one I’ve gained tonight is to be free to talk to a man without having to explain myself to anyone. It’s been nice. Nobody ever showed me a stream on a hot night.’
‘I have to go up to the house to see if the bar needs replenishing. I don’t show many people my stream.’ He laughed lightly. ‘It’d never do if it got about that Freddy Hardy kept a bit of land so he could go there sometimes and smell the wild mint.’
Before they stepped through the yew hedge, he kissed her warmly, holding her close, as he might have had she been leaving for ever. She liked his soft, dry lips and the pressure of his convex belly against her own and kissed him back.
A flirtatious kiss. No harm done.
He said, ‘Thank you for that, Young Mrs Kennedy.’
No one saw them step back through the yew hedge and rejoin the party. No talk, no speculation, no gossip. He turned as he went back up to the house. ‘Mrs Kennedy. Did you know that you are absolutely stunning?’
At home, she unzipped her pretty party dress and slipped it from her shoulders. Standing before the long mirror, she considered herself. Stunning? Was that the line he was always shooting women? Why had he asked if she knew it? She could not be objective. In the mirror she saw only Georgia Honeycombe’s hair, face and body. She slipped her hand beneath her breast as he had done, and again it tightened as it had on the terrace. It had not felt like Sports Club pawing.
What would you have done if he had tried to seduce you, Georgia Honeycombe? She closed her eyes. Didn’t you go down to the stream to find out? What would his hand have felt like? Cold and hard and expert.
Opening her eyes, she watched herself move to the dance rhythm on the wireless. She smoothed nightcream over her skin and watched her fingers touch her own fair skin and allowed herself to enjoy the tender sensation. And for the first time since a young girl, she did not avoid her own eyes, nor did she turn away. There was nobody watching her. No headmistress, no vicar, no mother. She allowed herself to look at and touch her own body. No shame. No sin.
1939
The last couple of weeks of the school holidays in 1939 were as hot as anyone remembered. The children, who had lived in their bathers for a month or more, looked brown and wiry; endemic runny-noses had cleared up and their hair looked clean and sun-streaked.
Marie Partridge stood at her back gate and waved as one of the big girls took Bonnie off for the day. It was only half past nine, but Marie could see that the coloured washing was already dry. It was tempting to take it in and fold it down and get ahead of yourself, especially as she would probably feel guilty about Charlie getting back and finding it still hanging there. But greater temptation was to be going out on a Tuesday morning. Dragging herself away from the routine of the Tuesday coloureds, she dashed indoors where the kettle was already boiling for her stand-up wash-down in the bath.
In twenty minutes Marie was putting on her lipstick. She hesitated as to whether or not she should put a touch of Bourgeois behind her ears, but decided that perhaps it wasn’t quite the thing if you were going to be involved in anything to do with food.
Before she left, she made a quick inspection of the house to see if there was anything out of place – she didn’t want to provide Charlie with one single bit of extra ammunition. The plaster SS Queen Mary on the mantelshelf chinged the quarter hour: it was kept ten minutes fast, so she had loads of time. Time to get in the coloureds.
Once they were neatly folded and damped down ready for ironing, Marie felt lighthearted. She went out the back way and slipped the key under the lavatory mat. Her high heels clicked as she made her way from her house in Nightingale Road, along Gladstone Road towards Jubilee Lane.
Sam was in the garden picking runner beans. ‘Marie! What you doing out on a Tuesday morning?’
Marie, taken aback at seeing him, feeling a guilty blush trying to rise, said very brightly, ‘And what are you doing not at work? Those beans are looking good. Has Charlie seen them? He thinks nobody can grow runners like he can.’
Before he could answer, her mother-in-law came from the house. ‘Come on then, Marie.’ Marie hastened away.
* * *
Sam was halted in his tracks at seeing the two women wearing their afternoon shopping clothes in the middle of the morning, and with their faces made up and wearing ear-rings. ‘Where you off to? You know it’s my leg morning.’
‘Well, there isn’t nothing I can do about that, is there?’ Then, low to Marie, ‘Hurry up before he gets hisself worked up.’
Marie disappeared along the side of the house.
Dolly raised her voice. ‘If we’re not back by dinner time, I’ve left you some sandwiches in the larder.’
Close-shouldered, the two women hastened through the side-gate and away, leaving Sam with a fee
ling of mild outrage and a sense of being conspired against. There came one of the explosions of pain in his half-leg where the muscle had been blown away and left only bone. He thwacked the wooden replacement with his sturdy walking stick. ‘I know you’re not there, y’ bugger.’ The pain subsided like a beaten cur and lay quietly growling, waiting for the next time when it could pounce.
That he was the recognized head of the Partridge family was important to Sam. He might not have much left below the groin, but he was still head of his family. The family needed him. As he had said to his beer-mug cronies in the King William, ‘It’s all right for women these days getting uppity and laying down the law about married women getting jobs, but when it comes to it, it’s always a man who has to carry the can.’
This was the kind of unspecific statement with which the beer-mugs could readily agree. They nodded, ‘A woman’s place is in the home, Sam.’
‘Right. Five halves of Boilermaker, Joe.’
‘It’s her natural place, Sam,’ said Joe, drawing the beer.
‘And one for yourself, Joe.’
The beer-mugs nodded as the Boilermakers flowed. ‘And man is the bread-winner.’
‘Men must work, and women… cheers.’
‘Like in nature, Sam… the hen on the nest and the ewe with her lambs.’
The beer-mugs had pondered that one without perceiving that cocks and rams aren’t much of providers. But still, it was the general feeling that counted.
‘And no woman ever got her legs blown off like Sam there.’
Whenever Sam suspected that there was something going on in the family that he was not aware of, anxiety made knots in his stomach and gave him trouble with the bit of leg that had decomposed in France. He would admit it to no one, but he had felt bad ever since Dolly had gone behind his back and got her name down for this job at the kitchens at the Old Mission Hall.
And now where are they off to? Charlie didn’t know about it, or he’d have said. On a Tuesday! There was too many things going on these days. Nobody tells me, oh no. No legs, so no brains. And then there was Vern Greenaway going about telling people that the Labour Party would have to stop functioning if there was a war.