The Lines We Leave Behind

by Graham, Eliza

  ‘There’s not enough of that to make floor-length curtains, madam,’ the shop assistant told her. ‘If you want floor-length, in green, or a neutral, there’s only the velvet.’ The velvet was the colour of mulligatawny soup.

  ‘We don’t have enough coupons for floor-length. The patterned would look lovely and fresh,’ Mama said. ‘It would bring the garden into the sitting room.’

  Robert and Maud were lucky to be having a garden in their new home. It had survived the last six or so years fairly unscathed, too.

  ‘Lovely drape, though.’ The assistant stroked the velvet. ‘Even in a shorter length it would be insulating. Useful with fuel rationing.’

  Coal shortages. Ration coupons. Maud would need to learn about these things. The knowledge of housewives would need to trickle into her as once the art of killing and deception had done. The roll of fabric she held was long and sturdy. In the case of a sudden attack, she could grab it and use it to knock opponents out of the way. There were cutting shears on the measuring table. Five paces away, and scoop them up with her left hand.

  ‘I’ll have the ferns.’ She blinked, and looked again. ‘Sorry, I meant the velvet.’

  Or had she actually meant the ferns? Ferns, velvet. Velvet, ferns. Maud closed her eyes.

  ‘Darling, you’ve barely looked at either roll.’ Mama gave her another worried look. ‘You may not be able to change the curtains for years.’

  A bride was expected to show deep and exacting interest in each aspect of the marital home-to-be. Maud had managed quite well with the choice of saucepans. Probably because there weren’t many to choose from. Large. Small. With lids. Without lids.

  Someone behind them dropped a tin of pins onto the linoleum. Maud’s hand clenched the fern fabric. She hoped Mama hadn’t noticed.

  ‘Change of plan, I’ll take the ferns.’ She made a supreme effort. ‘Is there some way we could line the curtains to make them warmer? Some kind of . . . wadding perhaps?’

  Was wadding the right word for something you stuffed between the curtain and its lining? Probably not, but the shop assistant looked relieved. ‘We do have a fabric we could use to interline, madam. A wise idea.’

  She liked the idea of being wise. The assistant rolled out something thick and spongy. She and Mama discussed it. Maud’s part was over now; she could wait until they needed her coupons.

  This basement furnishing fabric department was too small, too underground, too filled with rolls of material. Maud needed to be outside, even if it was drizzling and she didn’t have an umbrella. She wanted a cigarette. Actually, she needed a drink. Maud looked at her watch. Half past eleven. If they walked slowly perhaps they would pass a respectable hotel and she could persuade Mama into entering for a sherry. But Mama would want sandwiches and cake, if the latter could be found. Her hand fiddled with the strap of her bag. Could you smoke down here, or would they worry about the material? Some of it might already be smoke-damaged.

  ‘I’m ready for a break now,’ she told Mama.

  ‘We’ve barely started. Your clothes, darling. We need to head up to Bond Street now.’

  ‘I won’t need much,’ Maud told her. ‘I already have a wedding outfit and hat. And a few things to take on honeymoon.’ Darling, for what I have in mind, you won’t need many clothes. Her nightgown had been ordered. She hoped Robert would like it. More than like it; she wanted it to be the most alluring thing he had ever set eyes on. Had his first wife, Alice, been alluring on her wedding night? Maud tried to put thoughts of Alice out of her mind. Robert never talked about her.

  ‘That won’t do for the south coast in autumn. You’ll need some fine woollens and a smart dress for dinner, if we’ve got enough coupons.’ Mama’s eyes focused on something distant. Maud knew she was thinking about the long-ago holidays on those Dalmatian islands and the clothes they’d packed: the sundresses and hats and swimsuits and sandals. She couldn’t tell her mother that she’d flown over those very same islands, had trodden on Croatian soil again. ‘And talking of hats,’ Mama went on, ‘you’ll be wanting another one for when you leave the reception.’

  Any change in circumstances seemed to require new hats. Maud still had the beret she’d worn in the mountains of northern Yugoslavia. It was squashed inside a drawer with her jumpers and cardigans, the handful of earth now wrapped in a paper bag inside it. Robert had suggested throwing out the beret when she’d told him she still had it. ‘I’ll buy you all the headwear you want when we’re married, my darling.’

  ‘Let’s stop now,’ she told her mother again. ‘We could go back to the flat.’ The renovations were complete, the cracks in the plaster filled in, the walls and ceilings painted, rugs brought down from Shropshire to cover marks on carpets and parquet.

  Mama gave Maud a melancholy look. ‘You don’t seem to be very excited about buying all these things for your married life.’ Mama had only one daughter, one wedding to plan for, and Maud was not rising to the occasion.

  They’d reached the ground floor now. New stock must have arrived in the more glamorous household goods section: cocktail shakers and marble ashtrays were on display by the entrance to lure shoppers in.

  How badly Maud needed that drink and cigarette. Mama was saying something about pillowcases. Was there a way she could distract her to such an extent when they got home that Maud could have two sherries?

  In the street she noted a pillar box and a delivery van that would provide useful cover if anyone opened fire from above the street or from a moving vehicle.

  Mama linked arms with her. ‘So in just a week my daughter will be a married lady. We’ll be able to go out for coffee and do some shopping.’

  Why did you have to be married to do those things; wasn’t it exactly what they were doing now? Maud ticked herself off. Hadn’t she got what every woman wanted: a dashing husband, a lovely house to the north of Hyde Park (undamaged by the Blitz!), clothes? No need to carry out any kind of labour outside the house apart from, perhaps, a bit of charitable work. Or she could learn bridge, a skill that had eluded her so far. Possibly even think about university. Married women were allowed to study for degrees, weren’t they? Amber was back to being Maud again, gauche, out of her depth. But Maud would learn. According to the books, women always did when they married the right men.

  A gun pointed out of a shop door. She pulled Mama down. A cork popped out of the barrel. ‘Bang bang,’ the little boy said. Maud felt sweat bead between her eyebrows.

  ‘Darling.’ Mama was eyeing her, trying to release her arm. ‘Whatever is wrong? Is it wedding nerves?’

  ‘No. Yes.’ For how else would she ever explain to her? Mama wasn’t supposed to know anything about Amber and her war work, she was supposed to believe that Maud had spent it safely in the Signals section in Cairo. All this jumping at the slightest unexpected noise must seem utterly bizarre to her. Maud hadn’t been so highly strung before she’d gone off to Egypt.

  ‘Is it Robert?’ Mama sounded truly sympathetic. ‘Men can be . . . demanding even when they should be waiting for the marriage.’

  Well, that was one thing she had no reason to feel twitchy about. But she couldn’t tell her that without Mama finding out that Robert and Maud would not be jumping into the wedding night bed as strangers to its pleasure. ‘No, Robert’s very understanding.’ And he was. Luckily, Maud was marrying the one person who understood what she had experienced. ‘He’s the only man I could ever imagine marrying,’ she went on.

  A smile spread across her mother’s face. ‘That is a truly wonderful thing to know. It was the same for your father and me.’ And it must have been, the young girl from Croatia, formerly part of Austria-Hungary, and the one-time soldier from the other side who’d wed her and enabled her to enjoy married life in Kosovo Province, of all places, the sacred place of Serbdom.

  Dad had made things right for Mama. Robert could make everything right for Maud, too. He’d turned Maud into Amber, and perhaps he could reverse the transformation and make her fit for the worl
d of furnishing fabrics and hats.

  Maud resolved to throw herself into the last of the planning for the nuptials: a service in the town hall in Holborn. A reception at Claridge’s. A cake that had only one tier composed of real cake and the rest of cardboard, covered in royal icing. Champagne, because one of Robert’s friends had liberated a German mess in France, and found a crate of Veuve Clicquot.

  They found a taxi with its light on and drove back to West Kensington.

  Maud sat with Mama in her pretty refurbished drawing room with the small glass of sherry she poured for her and nodded and smiled as Mama rang the florist to discuss flower arrangements for the town hall and hotel (very simple) and then the hotel to discuss the menu (very limited). ‘You’re drifting through this as though it’s someone else’s wedding we’re planning, darling,’ Mama told her, writing herself a note, probably about late roses or ribbons for the cake, in the notebook she had bought specially for the wedding preparations. ‘Your mind is somewhere else.’ She gave Maud a look suggesting there were many questions she would like to ask.

  Poor Mama. She had probably always had plans for the wedding of her only daughter: a pretty church in the country, a grand reception, hundreds of guests. Instead she had a taciturn daughter who jumped at the slightest sound, a register-office marriage service and a small guest list. And a son-in-law she probably could not fathom, although on the few occasions they had met, Robert had been so good with her parents: open, quietly charming, interested in them. Robert was Maud’s fiancé and she couldn’t entirely fathom him either.

  ‘You’re happy with your wedding outfit?’ Mama looked anxious. ‘We’ve just got time if you wanted to change it?’

  ‘I love it.’ Maud really did like the pale-blue narrow-skirted silk suit with its dainty jacket. The slim fit was governed by the shortage of fabric, which was why she hadn’t opted for a full-length wedding gown but something that she could possibly dye and wear again. People liked to claim that their clothes were made from parachute silk, which was certainly romantic, but the fabric for this suit had come from a business friend of her father’s, who’d bought it in Belgium just before the war, and had swapped it for a cartload of Shropshire firewood.

  Mama had known just the very woman in Knightsbridge to tailor a wedding outfit for her. The dressmaker had measured her up, looking puzzled at the measurements. ‘Very slim round the bust and hips. Muscled arms and thighs. Have you done a lot of gymnastics, Miss Knight? Discus-throwing?’ Such an unladylike figure for a bride. The crease on Mama’s brow had deepened. She’d be wondering why her daughter had turned into someone so scrawny yet strong. Perhaps the long sleeves of the suit jacket were a blessing. In time, Maud’s muscle would mellow into the pleasing softness required of a bride. And the rest of her would mellow as well.

  ‘What are you wearing tonight?’ Mama asked conspiratorially.

  ‘Tonight? Oh, the dinner.’ Maud mentally scanned the contents of her wardrobe. ‘My black shantung.’

  ‘Lovely. With the pearls?’

  ‘Probably.’

  ‘You’ll do Robert proud.’ But then she looked at Maud’s nails. ‘Oh, darling.’

  ‘I’ll buff them. They’ll look better.’

  ‘This will be your last night out with Robert before you’re married.’ Mama leaned back into the chair and smiled.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘These final romantic nights out as a fiancée are such an important time for a young bride.’

  Was she a young bride? Sometimes she felt centuries old. Tired. More exhausted than she had been when she’d come back from Yugoslavia, or during her months working on the farm, even though she did very little these days. During the day she could nod off anywhere almost immediately. And yet at night, when she longed for sleep, her brain almost buzzed with electricity.

  ‘Tell me again who the hostess is?’

  ‘Cecilia Holdern. Wife of James Holdern. I think he was at school with Robert, or something. Would have been the best man if we’d . . . gone for that kind of wedding.’

  Mama sighed. Maud could see her making a big effort. ‘And they live in Holland Park?’ she asked.

  Maud tried harder. ‘They have two little girls.’

  ‘No son yet? I expect she’ll keep on trying.’

  ‘I have no idea.’ Maud fiddled with the lace tablecloth on the small side table.

  ‘Don’t get finger marks on that, darling. You wouldn’t believe how hard it is to get things properly cleaned these days.’

  ‘You’ll have to tell me which laundry to use.’ Maud knew little about this side of managing a house. She let Mama talk about delivery vans, starching, delicates, housemaids, nodding and smiling. Somehow she pulled herself out of her own body, viewing herself as she sat in the yellow-and-white upholstered chair: a bride-to-be imbibing her mother’s knowledge. Was that what normality was like? When did it become your own reality? Could someone look at her now and tell that she was an impostor, a fake, just pretending to be this bride-creature?

  ‘What does this friend of Robert’s do?’

  ‘He’s a doctor.’

  Mama served a lunch of soup and ham sandwiches and sent her to her room to rest afterwards. Maud couldn’t concentrate on the book she was reading. She lay on top of the eiderdown, staring at the newly painted ceiling. She must have dozed off because it was five when she looked at her watch and Mama was knocking on the door with a cup of tea and a biscuit for her. ‘Plenty of time to get ready. I’ll take your dress and press it for you.’

  Maud could run a bath. The hot water wasn’t bad here and it need only be a shallow one. Mama would be delighted to think of Maud pampering herself, behaving like a proper bride-to-be. The steam would flatten her hair, but she could probably borrow some piece of evening headwear from her mother and plonk it on the top of her head. Mama owned a beaded silver toque, which might look dashing with her black dress.

  She needed to get this evening right. There’d been something new in Robert’s tone that had made her aware that this dinner mattered to him, that Maud playing a particular version of herself was important.

  During their wild days and nights in Cairo secrecy had been important; they had been very far from an established couple. Since they’d become engaged he’d taken her out to dine in restaurants once or twice, always different ones, but she hadn’t met his friends. He’d been too busy. The Russians’ growing aggression meant that his section, or whatever it had evolved into – Robert was always a bit vague about the new department he worked for – was still very active. Maud might have used the free evenings to see her own friends, but making the effort to track them down seemed to require more energy than she could muster.

  She lay in the bath and let out long breaths. What a luxury all this hot water would have been only eighteen months or so ago, water that she hadn’t had to carry from a stream or well and heat up herself in a tin basin, huddled behind a sheet hung up for modesty.

  As they reached the Holderns’ front gate, a middle-aged woman in a long faun uniform coat and little peak-brimmed hat was coming out of the door. The nanny.

  Robert and Maud stood back to let her pass. Cecilia Holdern, blonde, creamy-complexioned, in her late twenties, came to meet them, greeting Robert with a delighted squeal and pecking Maud on the cheek. She showed them into her drawing room, bright and warm to an almost pre-rationing degree. Cecilia introduced Maud to James.

  ‘So you met Robert when he was working in Egypt,’ she said. ‘Doing his special work.’ She almost dipped her head in reverence as she mentioned it.

  Maud glanced at Robert.

  ‘Cecilia’s a very old friend, darling,’ he told her. ‘Trustworthy.’

  The Holderns would understand. Maud felt her muscles relax.

  ‘I thought my James had been brave enough.’ Cecilia’s husband had been an army medic, one of the first off the landing boats on D-Day, Robert told Maud; a terribly brave man who’d saved lots of lives in battlefield conditions.

&
nbsp; ‘You landed on the Normandy Beaches, didn’t you?’ Maud said. James blushed slightly at the compliment.

  ‘A bit sticky at times, but nothing like what Robert got up to in the wilds of Yugoslavia, dealing with those brigands.’

  Robert made a little noise in his throat.

  ‘Now don’t be modest, darling.’ Cecilia laid a hand on his arm.

  Maud blinked.

  ‘Your bride needs a drink,’ James said, opening the drinks cabinet. ‘Stop making me jealous while you heap praises on Robert the Balkan Hero.’ Ice clinked in a glass. ‘Pass the poor girl this nice stiff gin.’

  They sipped their drinks and then a middle-aged woman in an apron appeared and whispered in Cecilia’s ear.

  ‘Let’s be seated,’ she said. ‘Nice and cosy, just the four of us.’

  ‘So did you have a lot of parties in Cairo?’ James asked Maud as he pulled out her chair. ‘I’ve heard about the Gezira Club and Shepheard’s Hotel. Nice to know that some of you were living it up.’

  Maud could almost smell it for a moment: the spices from the little street stalls, the reek of ordure, the blossoms on the trees in the gardens, the lemon in a gin and tonic.

  ‘All a bit racy, I dare say.’ His eyes crinkled.

  ‘Egypt had its moments.’

  Robert was watching her closely and seemed visibly to relax. Maud took a spoonful of Brown Windsor soup.

  ‘What are you going to do now?’ Cecilia asked Robert. ‘Everyday life must seem a bit flat after all your adventures.’

  ‘I’m hoping to carry on in the same line.’ Robert rubbed his nose. ‘But without needing to work with the commies. Better not say too much. Essentially, I suppose I’m a kind of civil servant now.’

  ‘Bah, I know you’re much more than one of those stuffy old things.’ Cecilia leaned towards him, her tone confiding. ‘I just know you’ll be off doing something top-secret soon.’

  ‘Now, don’t scare Maud,’ James told her. ‘She’ll want her husband home promptly at six each evening, not risking his neck.’