by Rosie Thomas
Across the aisle the General sat beside his American wife. As far as Nancy could judge, Lady Bolton had become more English than anyone else in the church if a certain kind of Englishness could be measured by hauteur. A reflection on how the bride’s mother might have reacted to Eliza’s hair and scarves and clashing bangles made Nancy quiver with laughter, but her amusement was pricked by a stab of grief. Eliza was so absent, so entirely gone from them. As if sensing her sadness, Devil took her hand and patted it.
If only Eliza could have been here to see one of her children following the route she had planned. She had given up her son to the unknown world of Harrow and then to the even less comprehensible army and today she would have judged the sacrifice well worth it.
Harry Bolton sat in his wheelchair to one side of the chancel steps. He sang the hymns without having to refer to the printed sheet and he followed the order of service with full attention.
Cornelius read the first lesson, only the slightest tremor in his voice betraying his terror in standing up in front of so many people. Harry was to read the second and when the time came Arthur stepped briefly from Bella’s side to wheel his friend’s chair to the centre of the aisle. There was a murmur of surprise as he helped Harry to rock to his feet. Balanced partly against Arthur’s shoulder and partly on the casts that encased his feet and ankles, Harry read the verses with his family and friends looking on.
‘I’m not going to damn well sit down to do it, am I?’ he had insisted.
Behind the net veil of her smart hat his sister Maud dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief.
The newly-weds processed down the aisle and emerged into the sunshine beneath a guard of honour formed by soldiers of Arthur’s regiment. The ancient churchyard was packed with villagers and estate workers eager to see Miss Bella’s wedding. Children perched on the walls and old women pressed between the gravestones for the best view. Two or three of the young girls must have been cinemagoers because they nudged each other and pointed at Jake Jones. He raised his hat to them and they giggled.
Cornelius kept to the shelter of the church porch as the bride hitched up her skirts, seized her husband’s hand and dashed through the showers of rice to their waiting landau. The coachman flicked his whip and a pair of greys decked in ribbons and flower garlands trotted away from the lych gate. In twos and laughing groups the guests followed them down an avenue of chestnut trees to the manor house.
Maud’s husband came to wheel Harry’s chair, but Harry told him to accompany his wife and sons and let Cornelius do it instead. The two of them lingered in the porch.
‘I think we did jolly well,’ Harry remarked.
Cornelius’s shaking hands were hidden in his pockets.
‘I don’t know about you. I almost couldn’t manage it,’ he muttered.
Harry settled his cumbersome casts on the chair’s footrests. ‘I felt the same. Speaking selfishly, I can’t bear to be looked at with all the glow of people’s sympathy. I don’t blame ’em, I’ve done the same myself. You know, even though I saw all those poor chaps going through hell I never properly took account of how bloody lucky I was to be unhurt, until I wasn’t.’
He flicked a glance at Cornelius and then gave a quick cough. He rummaged under the blanket that covered his knees and fished out a crumpled cigarette packet and a box of matches. He lit two cigarettes and passed one to Cornelius before sucking the smoke into his lungs.
‘Those who don’t know any better might call it bravery, eh? But to be brave you have to know fear, and I wasn’t quite imaginative enough for that. You strike me as a different case, if I may say so.’
‘I can imagine, all right,’ Cornelius replied.
Harry took another deep pull on his cigarette before throwing it aside. He hoisted himself upright and gave Cornelius a full salute.
‘Arthur told me what you did, and for how long.’
Cornelius didn’t answer and in the following silence Harry adjusted his lap rug and peered out into the graveyard to see how many onlookers remained.
‘Most of them have gone, in the wake of your friend the film star. I think I’m ready, if you are.’
Cornelius took the chair handles and started pushing. Over his shoulder Harry remarked, ‘My ridiculous accident with the runaway motor bus did have the effect, as a result of your brother’s bravery, of obliging my dear mother and father to see sense at last. Arthur has been my friend since our first day at Harrow. He’s an excellent chap and he will make Bella very happy.’
‘I think so too,’ Cornelius said. ‘And he is a lucky man to have her.’
‘Stop pushing a minute, will you, and come round here?’
Cornelius did as he was told. Harry put out his hand and the two men gravely shook.
‘I’m proud to call Arthur and you my brothers-in-law. Not that Maud’s Hughie isn’t a perfectly decent chap. Now, we’d better show ourselves at this wedding breakfast or Ma and Maud will be furious with me. It doesn’t take much to have that effect, believe me, as I’ve unfortunately discovered since I’ve been living back at home. Never mind. I can give you my solemn promise that there will be more to drink than a single glass of champagne with the toasts because I have seen to it personally.’
‘My father will be pleased to hear that,’ Cornelius said as he propelled the wheelchair down the chestnut avenue.
The wedding breakfast was laid out at round tables in the great hall of the manor, under a beamed roof and overlooked by gloomy Bolton portraits. The room had been emptied for the occasion of a grand piano, several dog-dented chintz sofas and other ponderous family furniture. The receiving line was in the hall’s anteroom, where Lady Bolton had gone her own way with the flowers. The scent of lilies was overpowering.
Devil stood in the line with Arthur and Bella and the General and his lady. He had found a source of drink independent of Harry’s supply because although he started meekly enough by shaking hands with county grandees and describing himself if asked as an impresario or a theatre owner, by the time the end of the line was in sight he had become an escapologist who was about to amaze the world with an impossible feat based on the Earl of Carnarvon’s discovery in the Valley of the Kings.
‘Come to my first performance at the Palmyra theatre. Prepare to be amazed,’ he repeated.
One elderly lady wanted to know if he was acquainted with his lordship’s grieving family.
‘Not personally,’ Devil grinned. ‘Are you?’
‘Why, yes. His widow is a cousin of mine,’ she replied faintly.
Jake rejoined the line and firmly took him by the arm.
‘That’s enough.’
‘I was just starting to enjoy myself,’ Devil complained.
In the crowd Nancy found Lizzie with Raymond Kane. They had been quarrelling and Lizzie angrily pursed her full red lips. Her hair was arranged in a row of pin curls under a saucer-shaped hat.
‘He’s just a child,’ she protested.
‘He’s a brat,’ Raymond snapped.
‘Tommy is overexcited,’ she explained to Nancy. ‘Ma and Pa have taken charge of him.’
The Shaws were uncomfortable in what they felt to be elevated company so they had withdrawn to a corner behind a pedestal flower arrangement. Tommy hopped up and down beside them, his satin stock askew.
‘The boy needs a thick ear, if you ask me.’
‘Nobody did ask you.’ Lizzie gave Raymond a little shove. ‘Go away and let me talk to my cousin.’
As soon as he was out of earshot she gave Nancy a shrewd look.
‘So. Tell me everything.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Come off it. Something has happened and I want to hear about it. Don’t you dare be evasive with me, Nancy Wix.’
Nancy had to laugh. At that moment the crowd parted, and as if the little scene had been lit for her benefit she saw Lion Stone. He was at the other end of the room, whispering in the ear of a girl who reached up and provocatively tugged a handful of his curls.
‘Do you miss him?’ Lizzie demanded.
‘I miss the idea of him.’
‘Any new ideas?’ Lizzie took a sip of her drink and mimed a splutter. ‘My God, what is this? Fruit cordial?’
‘Lady Bolton inclines to TT, according to Arthur.’
‘To hell with that. Over here, please.’ Lizzie crooked her finger to one of the hired staff and ordered him to bring them some real alcohol. ‘Go on,’ she ordered Nancy once their glasses were charged.
Nancy’s happiness welled up, splashing the already delicious day with shards of iridescent light.
‘There is someone.’
‘Aha.’
‘But he’s not free, and I can’t tell you a single thing so don’t ask me.’
‘Married?’
‘I’m afraid so.’
Lizzie regarded her over the rim of her glass. ‘You’re a grown woman. If you want my advice it would be to take what you want from life, don’t be browbeaten just because you’re a woman, and don’t make excuses or look for any allowances for the same reason. Bear in mind that you rarely get a second chance. I won’t pry any further, which is damned difficult for me, but – darling Nancy – I have never seen you look so bloody enchanted.’
It was true. In the space of six weeks Nancy’s loneliness had dissolved and only through its absence did she understand how it had afflicted her. In the quiet Bloomsbury evenings she and Gil talked for hours at a time, unfolding their histories to each other. On the nights they were able to spend together she lay in his arms, almost unable to believe in her own happiness. If Celia was away in the country for a weekend they stayed in the flat, only emerging for decorous walks beside the boating pond in Regent’s Park or for drives to sit beside log fires in country pubs. This must be how it was to be married, she thought. It was a matter of ease and intimacy, of being able to be silent or sad as well as foolish together. It was having a safe harbour. As for the future – she let herself wordlessly dream without even giving shape to the wishes.
Nancy smiled at her cousin. She was too protective of the magical state to say another word.
‘What about you?’ she parried.
Lizzie was always ready to talk about herself. ‘I’m trying to make money. It’s not easy.’ This was what she always said. ‘Otherwise, Ray’s all right. He can be a bit of a boor but he’s got what it takes, if you know what I mean. I wouldn’t marry him though, even if he was asking, which he isn’t. He doesn’t hit it off too well with Tommy for a start, and the boy has to come first.’
They watched the child emerge from his corner and make a dart at one of the crimped bridesmaids. Lizzie took more of an interest in her son these days, apparently valuing his company while offering him her own unimpressed view of the world.
‘Don’t pull the girl’s hair. Oh dear, too late,’ Lizzie cried. She grabbed her cousin’s arm. ‘Come on. Let’s see who’s here before the speechifying starts.’
Somewhat surprisingly General Bolton was deep in talk with Faith and Matthew. He left it to his wife to steer the Lord Lieutenant towards suitable county targets. The groups of country neighbours and Bolton cousins and Arthur’s brother officers parted as the cousins passed. Powdered faces peered, soldiers stood an inch taller and gentleman farmers shook their crimson jowls. People looked at Nancy not because they recognised her from the stage – this was not a Spiritualist crowd – but because her brightness today drew the eye like a fine picture.
‘See what I mean?’ Lizzie Shaw murmured from the corner of her mouth.
The double doors to the hall were thrown open and the guests were invited to take their seats for the wedding breakfast. Nancy was delighted to find herself next to Jake. Jinny and Ann were also on their table although the two women had been tactfully partnered with a neighbour’s shy son and one of Arthur’s bachelor friends.
Jinny winked at Nancy and Jake. In theory the room contained everything she most disapproved of, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to enjoy herself.
Jake leaned back in his gilt chair to study the room.
‘Eliza would be pleased.’
Unlike Whistlehalt, the only other sizeable establishment Nancy knew outside London, Henbury was defiantly a pre-war country house. It was a realm of dogs and stirrup cups and rhododendrons, of military service and medal ribbons, and county hierarchies that were minutely understood and observed. Eliza had aspired to this world for Arthur, but Jake and Nancy understood a little more about the subtle strata of English life and so they looked beyond. That was the definition of social advancement, Nancy decided, which was what her mother had ultimately believed in. She wondered what Eliza would have made of Gil, and his more elevated position in the world. She would have been interested in him as a man, she was certain of that.
Jake murmured in her ear, ‘When will you come down for a weekend? Freddie told me to make sure of you because I shall have to go to America again quite soon. Movie work pays.’
Nancy hesitated to make plans. The chance of time with Gil doing the simple things they enjoyed together was too precious. It made her smile that for a sophisticated man he liked the most ordinary activities – to be alone with her, taking a stroll to the shops in Kingsway and carrying back groceries in a netting bag. They would sit at the little kitchen table to eat what she cooked and then retreat to the bedroom. He enjoyed the respite from being rich.
She demurred. ‘I’m not quite sure when I can leave town, Jake.’
Jake raised an eyebrow. ‘Bring him, whoever he is.’
She really hadn’t known it was so obvious.
‘I can’t do that, but I promise I’ll come soon. I need you, and Jinny and Ann.’
Pointedly he said, ‘Yes, you do.’
He was so shrewd and feline, and the better she knew him the more dearly she loved him. They talked a little shop about the theatre. Jake was booked to do a short series of readings at the Palmyra and these were already sold out. Devil was enthusiastic about his long-threatened Tutankhamun escape trick.
‘What do you know about it? Will he manage to bring it to the stage?’ Jake asked her.
‘It will be impossible to stop him. In the meantime it’s giving him and Gibb a lot to work on. I don’t know anything else, except that it’s a tribute to the great Houdini.’
The first plates were being lifted and it was time for them to turn to their neighbours, but before they did so Jake nudged her. Sylvia Aynscoe, tiny as a wren, was placed between two large soldiers. In her old age she was becoming forthright and she was putting them both in their place.
Soon it was time for the speeches. General Bolton’s in praise of his younger daughter was so gently affectionate it made Bella blush. Arthur thanked his new in-laws with modest grace. Nancy thought again that it was Arthur’s gift to fit in anywhere, but he did it particularly well here at Henbury amongst myriad Boltons. He might have been bred specifically for the role. It was a good match – no one in the room, Lady Bolton included, could imagine otherwise.
Cornelius said he could not manage a best man’s speech, so one of Arthur and Harry’s brother officers gave a tribute to the groom. A modest buzz generated by an equally modest flow of champagne filled the room. The shy boy beside Ann was trying valiantly to flirt with her.
After the toast to the newlyweds Arthur and Bella prepared to cut their cake and Nancy went hunting for Devil. She found him at the table he had shared with the Boltons, his chin propped on his hand.
‘I keep thinking I’m going to be asked to do my act for the gentry, and then be dismissed afterwards with a couple of guineas in an envelope.’
‘I feel the same. A private sitting in the Blue Room, do you think? How much should I charge? Jinny and Ann are joking about feeling so déclassé. Jinny said she might ask the head gardener if there’s any greenhouse work going this winter. But you shouldn’t be thinking like that, Pa. We’re family now.’
He huffed. ‘I prefer the family I’ve already made, thank you.’
&n
bsp; Bella’s hand with the wedding ring rested over her new husband’s as they sliced the cake with Arthur’s dress sword. After the applause and cheers the couple left to change and the older country neighbours and relatives began to say their goodbyes.
‘You are a horrid boy and I hate you,’ the ringleted bridesmaid hissed at Tommy Hooper.
The boy was seized by a dark idea. He ran behind the floral arrangement that had earlier sheltered his grand-parents, gathered his strength, and pushed. He wasn’t tall, but he had his departed father’s compact strength. The plaster pedestal rocked satisfyingly and he pushed harder until it gathered momentum. Finally the tipping point came. Flowers, vase and pedestal fell and smashed into a thousand pieces. A tidal surge of water rose in the air before gushing across the floor. An old lady screamed and the bridesmaid pointed a small finger.
‘It was him. He did it on purpose.’
Devil sighed at the mess.
‘If only I could do a pass and put it all back together. But I’m afraid that is beyond even me.’
Lizzie seized her boy by the arm, marched him to Lady Bolton and made him apologise. He didn’t get much of a scolding because the bride and groom were ready to leave. The guests surged out into the damp twilight to wave the newly-weds off.
Arthur had borrowed a car. In the press of well-wishers surrounding it he hugged Nancy.
‘You are the best sister a fellow could have. I’ll be so happy when you get married too. Won’t you and Lion think of it?’
For a conventional man on his wedding day the desire to draw her into the same favoured circle was understandable, but Nancy still felt a tremor.
‘No, that’s over now. Who knows what will happen next?’
She kissed his cheek and patted the spruce shoulder of his civilian coat.
‘All the joy in the world to you and Bella.’
The bride’s bouquet was caught by the girl who had tugged Lion’s curls. Bella and Arthur motored away to their week’s honeymoon with a selection of army boots bouncing from the rear bumper. Tommy Hooper liked this better than anything else about the long day.