I think, on reflection, this may be a love letter. Not one where the hero and heroine end up in each other’s arms, perhaps, the conventional happy ending, but possibly a contented ending, as we write to each other across the ocean, leading separate lives that fulfil us. I wish you every possible happiness, darling Nigel.
Please give my love to Miss Lily too. I miss you both, more than I can say.
Love, always: many, many kinds of love,
Sophie
Chapter 25
Ships, no matter how small, vast or leaky, always have a fancy-dress party. It is best to have a headache that night, or be forced to dance with a man who feels he can behave like a gorilla because he is dressed as one.
Miss Lily, 1914
Mrs Falteringham gave a cocktail party, with small meatballs on sticks and creamed watercress in pastry boats, caviar on buttered toast, and plenteous champagne, because the ship’s doctor told her champagne was strengthening. She forgave Sophie and Georgina for failing to join her bridge table. Green she regarded with well-founded suspicion, as a woman — rather than a lady — and not a bridge player either.
Sophie dreamed, not of gunfire or dying men or fruitless journeys in the night, but of factories with slightly sloping, well-drained concrete floors that could be washed with jets of water every evening, and factory canteens with comfortable chairs along each table, and labels for products other than corned beef.
The ship stayed a week at Cape Town, though neither Sophie nor Georgina took advantage of the time to take more than day trips into town, buying the obligatory carved elephants and ivory beads, as Sophie belatedly realised she should arrive home with gifts for all those people she hadn’t seen for years. She did at least have a Parisian cloak, never worn, that would be perfect for Miss Thwaites, if wrapped in tissue paper as if she had never considered wearing it herself, and Cape Town provided a wooden box of the most excellent cigars for her father, as well as an ivory and ebony chess set that he and Miss Thwaites might play together. Each piece was an African animal, from the king of the beasts, the lion, to giraffes for bishops and monkeys for pawns.
Timothy delighted in a daily donkey ride, with Mrs Brown, the nanny he had been staying with in England, clapping as he rode past her. She seemed devoted to him. She had been recommended to Georgina by chance acquaintance on the voyage from Ceylon, and had then gone to Georgina’s father’s home and from there, before the story broke and everyone was watching Georgina’s actions, to a small house she had rented under another name within a day’s train travel of London.
Mrs Brown made no reference to Timothy’s father, Lord William. This was possibly tact, but Sophie thought that it was more likely because she was a person who disliked thinking about potential unpleasantness and so focused on each day as it unfolded. Sophie envied her the ability, a little, but would not have accepted it if the gift were offered her.
‘I have two mummies,’ Timothy told Sophie proudly as she helped him off one of the rides. ‘One is real mummy, and one is looking-after-me mummy. I’m not supposed to mention two mummies,’ he added, ‘in case other boys are jealous.’
‘That sounds a good idea,’ said Sophie, taking his hand to lead him to the stall where Georgina was haggling over a small carved collection of animals he had fallen in love with.
‘Mummy, are there elephants in Australia?’
Georgina glanced at Sophie enquiringly. Sophie nodded. ‘Yes, but not wild ones. In zoos.’
Timothy considered. ‘Could an elephant live on a farm?’
‘I suppose so. A big farm,’ said Sophie.
‘Do you have a big farm?’ asked Timothy artlessly.
Sophie grinned, knowing what was coming next. ‘Yes.’
‘Mummy says we might not live with you but we will visit. If you had an elephant, we could visit it too.’
‘But it might get lonely.’
‘Not if we visit it a lot.’
‘What do you think about dogs, cats or guinea pigs?’ put in his mother.
‘It depends on the kind of dog,’ said Timothy cautiously.
‘Any kind of dog,’ said Georgina, smiling.
‘Rash,’ whispered Sophie.
Georgina smiled, and shook her head. ‘We’ll visit some puppies when we reach Melbourne. You can choose the one you like best.’
‘Really?’ He hugged her, hard. ‘You are the best mummy in the universe. Did you know the universe is so big anything can fit in it?’
Georgina nodded.
‘Did you know that dogs need friends and lots of room to play? Will our house be big enough for two dogs? And an elephant?’
‘Just be grateful he doesn’t want a boa constrictor,’ muttered Sophie. They were still laughing as they climbed the gang-plank to the ship.
Green vanished for three days, with Sophie’s permission. Sophie noticed the ship’s engineer was not at his usual table for those days either. Green returned, looking very slightly smug as she set out Sophie’s evening clothes for the last night before they sailed for Australia.
‘Engineers know how to handle their equipment?’ asked Sophie dryly.
Green looked startled, then laughed. ‘I wondered if you’d notice,’ she admitted. ‘Do you mind, Miss Sophie?’ The miss was an admission that Sophie did have a right to mind, as her employer.
‘Not if it doesn’t frighten the horses,’ said Sophie, quoting Mrs Patrick Campbell, she who had spoken of the deep, deep peace of the double bed after the hurly-burly of the chaise longue.
‘I’ve managed for thirty-five years with no scandal and no gossip,’ said Green calmly. ‘Rose-scented soap or gardenia?’
‘Rose tonight. Thirty-five years? You started early.’
Green grinned. ‘The butcher’s boy and a haystack.’
‘Was it prickly? Oh,’ as Green doubled up with laughter, ‘that was not meant as a pun.’
‘Yes to both,’ said Green. ‘You’ve a run in your stockings and a stain on your white collar. I’ll see to them tomorrow.’
Chapter 26
When, port by port, you begin to think, We are nearly there, then you know the place you are headed for is truly home, either physically or in the heart.
Miss Lily, 1914
Flowers in her cabin on the day they left Cape Town: roses, with love from Nigel, Lily and Jones, which she cried over, a little, then laughed and showed Green, who had flowers from all three too. So wonderful to have someone to share Lily and Nigel with.
Orchids from Mr Slithersole, and the largest bouquet structurally possible, containing every kind of flower the Cape Town florist might have available, from her father. She could hear Dad’s voice say, ‘Just put everything in! Nothing but the best for my little girl.’
He sent chocolates too, a four-pound box that she shared with Timothy, one each morning and afternoon, and with Mrs Falteringham, who had now switched to champagne, one glass at mid-morning, one at lunch, one pre-dinner and two as she dined. ‘The doctor says champagne suits my constitution better. I have been wondering,’ she added thoughtfully, ‘if I might take a little house in Melbourne rather than return home to my sad memories. They say Melbourne is quite civilised, and the warmth would be good for my arthritis, the doctor says.’
‘I am sure he is right,’ said Sophie. Mrs Falteringham would join a bridge club within a week, be chair of the ladies’ flower-arranging sub-committee at church and give little suppers, enriched by champagne and caviar, for surely there were doctors as compassionate and clever in Melbourne as on board ship.
Caviar on toast four nights in a row at dinner. The purser must have bought a large tin that must be used up. Fruit cups that held strange shapes among the familiar oranges and apples for dessert. A choice of chilled bouillon or hot at mid-morning, and small cakes, each identical under different gaudy icings, at the captain’s tea dance in the afternoons. Sophie did not dance — had not danced, apart from the waltz with Dolphie just a few short weeks earlier, since the beginning of the war. So many
of the young men she had danced with having gone forever. It would be impossible for dancing to ever be memory-free again.
This voyage was for looking forward, not back.
Timothy saw a pod of whales, leaping with flapping glistening flukes. It took days to persuade him that not even the river at Thuringa was suitable for a pod of whales. But the sight tempted him to the ship’s library, and a book on whales, and Georgina settled with deep joy into teaching him to read from a book’s text, instead of simply words on a slate.
And then, finally, a thin line between the sky and sea, and then a thicker line: cliffs and rocks and trees. Australia, though their first port of call at Fremantle was still as far from home as Germany was from England. Part of her wanted to dash down the gang-plank and hug the nearest gum tree, or sit on the dock and listen to Australian accents, almost the same as Sydney’s. But the ship was only refuelling there overnight, its cargo destined for Sydney. A few passengers left, presumably replaced by others, who were also heading east.
Sophie was sitting at her desk writing a final postscript to Nigel, to be posted with new letters to James, to Ethel and Sloggers, to the Dowager, to her Goddaughter, little Sophie, now growing up among her aunt’s family, and to others she had worked with. She looked up as Georgina burst in.
‘Giggs, darling, what is it?’
‘He’s here,’ said Georgina shortly. ‘My . . . William.’
‘But that . . .’ Sophie had been going to say impossible. But, it was all too possible. It would only have needed a telegram from Emily to send Georgina’s husband not to England but to Fremantle, where she and Georgina, and his son, must make their first landfall in Australia. He need only have bribed someone at the port to show him manifests, and to keep an eye out for Miss Sophronia Higgs thereon.
Did British divorce laws apply in Australia? Would Australian laws force Georgina to return to this man here too? They had to presume they would.
‘Did he see you?’
‘No. But he must know I’m here.’ She took a deep breath. ‘He’s not just visiting — I saw him go into a stateroom on the other deck. He’d been gazing at the children. Thank goodness Timothy was with Mrs Brown.’
Sophie nodded slowly, thinking. ‘He can’t be sure which child Timothy is, not today at any rate. A strange man can’t ask each child their name, not straight away, anyway. The first thing to do is keep the boy out of sight tonight.’
‘But tomorrow! Even if Timothy stays in his room till Adelaide someone will comment on his absence. I . . . I should have changed his Christian name too. But it would have confused him . . .’
‘And William would still have been able to work out which is your child. He only has to see the way Timothy looks at you. We must deal with William tonight.’ She pulled the bell for the stewardess. Her mind raced. It was as if every nerve that had quietened down since France was alive again, her brain working a thousand times faster than before.
The steward knocked and entered. ‘Would you ask Miss Green to come to my cabin please?’
‘I have a plan,’ she added as the steward left.
‘Sophie, what —?’
‘It is best that you don’t know it. Do you trust me?’
‘Yes,’ said Georgina.
‘Can you do what I ask? Utterly and absolutely?’
Georgina stared at her. ‘Yes,’ she said again, at last.
‘Let William see you. Let him see which is your stateroom too. Just a glimpse, if possible, but try to let him see you are scared. Try not to meet him, but if it’s inevitable, don’t tell him Timothy is even here. Don’t say anything — just run to my cabin and lock the door. My cabin, not yours.’
‘Yes, but —’
‘He’s not going to make a public fuss. Not when he doesn’t need to. I imagine he’ll have a court order and people to enforce it in Melbourne, when he can tell them exactly which child is his. Giggs, darling, I promise you will be safe,’ said Sophie clearly. ‘Today is Wednesday. It was always on Wednesdays that he beat you, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ said Georgina flatly.
‘Tell me the details.’
‘But . . .’
‘I need details,’ said Sophie softly.
‘I would undress and get into bed, early. The nightdress had to be silk, low-cut back and front, and sleeveless.’ The words flowed, as if suddenly undammed. ‘I’d wait, in the darkness. Always in darkness. It was as if what happened in the dark did not exist. William would come in and explain my crimes. I was not allowed to talk, to defend myself. And then —’
‘That is enough,’ said Sophie gently. ‘Ah, Greenie, excellent. Giggs, darling, go out to the deck. Sit in a chair and watch the scenery. If he sees you . . . when he sees you . . . come back here as quickly as you can.’
‘But what if he tries to stop me?’
‘He won’t try force you in public. But Greenie will be with you as soon as she and I have finished here. I doubt he will do anything with her there.’
‘He will order her away!’
‘And I will not go,’ said Greenie.
‘You don’t know William,’ said Georgina desperately.
‘I once made a general eat the guts of a dog he had shot,’ said Greenie calmly. ‘Then I shot him too.’
‘Go,’ said Sophie softly. ‘It will be all right.’
Georgina left, still looking terrified. But that was just as it ought to be. That too was part of Sophie’s plan.
Chapter 27
A woman loves her son. A man owns him.
Miss Lily, 1914
The three friends sat at dinner, pretending to eat consommé royale, fillets of Nile perch with sauce béarnaise, quail in bacon, which must surely have been frozen, unless South Africa or Australia had quail too, steak in red wine sauce that Green said must surely be hippopotamus, it was so large and tough, though none of the three of them managed to laugh. Sophie’s nerves tingled.
Mrs Brown and Timothy had eaten earlier with the children and were now safely tucked up below decks. Sophie had paid a waiter a large amount of money to stand a surreptitious watch over their door, and another to fetch her or Green at once if anyone disturbed their cabin.
Lord William sat at the captain’s table, laughing. He had been drinking whisky earlier, and alternated whisky and wine with his meal. Bad form, thought Sophie. Lord William had been in the colonies far too long. He did not look at their table of women but seemed strangely excited, as some men were the night before they went ‘over the top’ to win a foot of soil from the enemy, or die.
‘You’re sure he saw you go to Sophie’s cabin?’ asked Green quietly.
Georgina nodded, lifting the same spoonful of meat to her mouth over and over again.
Then suddenly Lord William was with them, as the waiter served coeur à la crème with strawberries. ‘May I join you, ladies?’
‘No, thank you,’ said Sophie politely. ‘I am afraid we prefer privacy. Nor have we been introduced.’
Lord William laughed, confident, handsome. ‘But Georgina can introduce us, can’t you, darling?’
Georgina said nothing. She stared at the table, as Sophie had instructed her.
‘No word for me, after so long?’
Georgina remained silent.
Sophie rose, Green and Georgina following her example. ‘I believe I am tired. Will you excuse us?’
She heard him chuckle as they wound their way through the tables, felt his eyes on them as they left the dining room.
The night was filled with the usual shipboard noises: the change in engine mutter as they moved out from Fremantle Harbour; the creak of hawsers; laughter on deck; and a faint hiccup from Mrs Falteringham with the unmistakeable tittup of her sensible heels as she made her way to her own cabin.
The sounds of the docks retreated. The ship rolled slightly as it headed further from the shelter of the river’s harbour. Sophie lay in her briefest silk nightdress, waiting. It must be midnight, at least. Surely he would come . . .
The door opened. Sophie turned quickly, pressing her face into the pillow.
‘You didn’t really think you could escape?’ he said softly. ‘Where is my son?’
Sophie said nothing.
He laughed quietly. ‘You will tell me everything tomorrow. But tonight . . . you know what tonight is, don’t you?’
She did not move.
‘Punishment,’ he said. ‘I am going to have to punish you for many, many nights. Punishment for running away. Do you know how embarrassing that was? For stealing my son.’ The softness had gone from his voice. If one could shriek in whisper, this was it. ‘A wife belongs to her husband! A son belongs to his father! You are a thief twice over. Three times a thief. A wife does not steal her husband’s reputation. You know what I have to do, don’t you? You know what you deserve?’
Still she stayed silent.
‘It is my duty! A man’s duty to make his wife obey him. You have felt nothing,’ he said quietly, ‘like the punishment you will receive tonight.’
Clothing dropped on the polished wood floor. Trousers, she thought, underpants, coat, tie, collar studs, shirt studs, shirt, undershirt. No sounds of a one-legged hop to remove socks. A true gentleman, Miss Lily had said, always first takes off his socks.
The sound of socked feet towards the bed. A hand drew back the sheet.
The whip’s first bite across the back of her neck was fire. Its second was so much pain that her body felt only shock. On the third lash, she screamed.
‘Shut up! Do you want the whole ship’s company to hear you?’ He grabbed the pillow to shove over her face.
The light flashed on. He turned as Green clicked photo after photo, holding up her small square box. Sophie screamed again, louder, again and again, holding the sheet up to cover her silk-clad breasts, but letting the marks of the whip and the trickles of blood show on her back and shoulder.
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