The Girl from Simon's Bay

by Barbara Mutch

  Wait for me. I will return.

  He’d sent his daughter in his place. Sam said she was lovely, and she had letters for me from David. Ella was fulfilling his wishes.

  Yet how will I manage to face her and not break down?

  And how will she take the revelation that her father betrayed her mother with me, and that she has a brother?

  My sin is catching up with me once more.

  I will return.

  My breath faltered from its normal involuntary rhythm.

  I closed my eyes to the shadowy beach and lay back on the cool, yielding sand.

  Chapter Sixty-Seven

  Sam promised to meet Ella Horrocks again at Ricketts Terrace. It was the safest place. No one went there, not even vagrants, so no one would see them.

  Ma had already left for work by the time he woke.

  ‘Is she alright?’ he asked Grandpa, who always got up in time to see her off.

  ‘Yes, but tired, I think.’ Grandpa frowned. ‘The early shift is always hard, your ma worries about the bus being late. I’ve made toast, Sam. Come sit down.’

  ‘Thanks, Grandpa. I’ll take it with me.’

  ‘Wait,’ Solly lurched over and held his arm, ‘have you heard about Benji?’

  ‘Benji?’

  ‘He’s run away. Broke his banning order and disappeared. I haven’t told your ma.’

  Sam picked his way along the track that led towards Glencairn and Simon’s Town. Sometimes, when he needed to think, he avoided the crowded bus and took the bush route. It wasn’t as beautiful as walking above Simon’s Bay, of course, but there was a rockiness to the path that often matched his mood; and somehow the exercise contrived to settle his mind by the time he came down the stretch into Simon’s Town. He ought to be thinking about Benji, and whether his disappearance had implications for Sam himself. The police would interview Benji’s friends, questions might be asked about Sam’s plans, his quiet passport application. He needed to prepare answers, be ready to deny being a Communist.

  But instead all he could think of was Ella Horrocks. Was it ordained – her word – that he’d walk past Alfred Lane on a particular afternoon and decide to visit the ruins of Ricketts Terrace? That she would choose the same afternoon to do so?

  Ella.

  Surprising, captivating Ella.

  She was waiting for him when he arrived, sitting on the same length of wall. A rising wind whipped white horses on the sea. He took the extra precaution of approaching from across the mountain, just in case someone spotted her going up Alfred Lane, and noticed him going the same way. It also gave him the chance to look at her, unobserved. She was wearing blue jeans, a loose white blouse and the floppy hat from before. There was something arresting about her. You didn’t want to stop looking. Maybe her father had it, too. Blue eyes with a flash of grey, or perhaps it was green.

  Maybe Ma hadn’t been able to stop looking, either.

  He watched as she turned to follow the flight of a gull, spotted him and waved, then jumped up and climbed towards him. Her eyes were anxious.

  ‘I thought you might not come.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Well,’ she looked down awkwardly, ‘perhaps you were upset. I talked so much, you probably thought this trip was all about me, but it isn’t.’

  She sat down on the wall. Sam joined her.

  ‘I told Ma I’d met you. I told her your father had died.’

  She put a hand up to her forehead.

  He felt ashamed, she was still in mourning, he could have spoken more kindly.

  ‘I’m sorry, Ella. If I haven’t said so before.’

  She nodded.

  ‘How is she? Will she agree to see me?’

  Sam looked at the row of broken cottages. Caved-in roofs. Glassless window cavities. Rubble and dead palm fronds choking what were once carefully swept paths.

  ‘I don’t know. Ma’s strong. She’s fought hard for us. She never talked about your father.’

  Ella smiled and touched his arm, like she’d touched him yesterday. She seemed to have no fear, no understanding that even the simplest, kindest gestures could be misconstrued and land you in jail.

  ‘Dad said she was brave and ambitious. That she could keep secrets.’ Ella stopped for a moment, distracted by a layer of mist that began to swirl over the ridge at Red Hill. ‘He asked her to wait for him. Then he asked my mother for a divorce so he could marry Louise and bring her to England.’

  ‘What?’ Sam gasped. ‘I know nothing of that, Ella. But my pa sometimes shouted at her, talked about rescuing her—’ he bit back what he was about to say. Pa had called Ma a cheat.

  From the dockyard came the wail of a hooter as two tugs chivvied a warship from its mooring. Tiny figures lined its deck. A band played faintly.

  ‘But then,’ Ella squared her shoulders and addressed the bay, ‘Mum became pregnant with me. Dad wouldn’t admit it was the turning point, but I know it was. It’s the only explanation.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Ella looked down at her hands, then straight up at him.

  ‘Mum made him choose between me – and your mother.’

  Sam felt her words like individual blows of his chisel on hardwood.

  ‘So you see, I’m the reason they never got together.’ She smiled at Sam through a veil of tears. ‘I need to thank her for letting me have my father. I need to apologise that I came between them.’

  Sam stood up and held out his hand.

  ‘You won’t need to do that. Ma would never ask that of you.’

  She let him lead her up the mountain path to a flat rock where they got an even more splendid view of the shining bay. He waited while she caught her breath and wiped her eyes. Beyond the harbour wall, the warship was peeling away from its escorting tugs and steaming towards the Hangklip–Cape Point gap. A pair of sunbirds buried their beaks in the orange tubules of a Cape honeysuckle. Here, far above town, only nature’s laws ruled. He could be honest. He could be himself.

  ‘Your father sounds like a special man. As special as my mother.’

  She smiled. ‘He was. He is.’

  ‘Imagine,’ he ventured, ‘if they’d married, where would you and I be today?’

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  It was dark by the time I left the beach. The pale face of Venus rode on the western horizon. I walked back to the flat and told Sam he could arrange for Ella Horrocks to visit.

  That was the easy part.

  The actual meeting turned out to be tricky to organise.

  On Ricketts Terrace, a white visitor would’ve been unusual but not remarkable. Like Sam’s customers, for example, or the odd dockyard colleague of Pa’s, or a grateful patient with a small gift. Ocean View, however, was coloured only. I wondered whether there might be a ban on white people visiting, and whether I should try to find out. But an enquiry might simply bring down a further raft of restrictions on our heads. I’ve discovered it’s often best to be determinedly ignorant, then you can’t be accused of breaking a law you were aware of.

  The most practical problem, though, was that of transport: how to get Ella to Ocean View, and return her safely back to Simon’s Town. The train stopped at Fish Hoek, but the station was several miles from us so a further connection was needed. A bus was a possibility and Sam would need to make sure he was there to meet Ella and accompany her because a lone white woman travelling into a coloured area might not be safe. Or she could take a taxi, but then the taxi would drop her at the entrance to Ocean View and she’d need to find her way to our block, running the risk of robbery if she wandered about alone.

  I found myself mystified by the logistics of managing travel based on skin colour.

  Maybe we should find a venue in Simon’s Town. But where?

  ‘We’ll come by bus, Ma,’ said Sam firmly. ‘I’ll meet Ella and bring her with me.’

  ‘She might be nervous—’

  ‘But what else can we do? We can’t go to a cafe or a public place. They’re w
hites-only. It’s got to be here.’

  Yes, I thought, it’s got to be here. Also because we need privacy when I tell them, if I tell them …

  ‘So we’ll make it the bus, Ma? After work?’

  ‘Yes. I’ll try to get off early,’ I hesitated. ‘You must warn her, Sam. She mustn’t be too friendly. You never know who could be watching. After Benji and all.’

  ‘I know.’ He grimaced and patted my shoulder. ‘We can’t be seen to know each other too well. I’ll put her at the front, near the driver, and then I’ll take the seat behind her. And keep my distance when we’re walking. Don’t worry, Ma, it’ll be fine.’

  I sat on my bed later that night, fingering the Pink Lady.

  I’d saved up enough for Sam to go. The money was sitting in my bank account. As soon as his passport arrived – any day now, he’d been promised – he could book his ticket and leave. Nothing must endanger his departure.

  It’s a fine balance.

  Ella Horrocks’ arrival might be the very best thing that could happen to Sam.

  Or it could wreck his chances.

  As for me, I must find the strength to see it through.

  Chapter Sixty-Nine

  War log

  August, 1945

  We thought the Japs would never surrender, it would be island-to-island, house-to-house.

  But the Bomb has ended it. Peace at last.

  And Elizabeth is expecting. I have no words to express how I’m feeling. Amid the formal surrender, I must write two letters. I must find a way through.

  But, as with the war, I fear there’ll be no winners.

  Only the elements – sea, land – will survive.

  And, if we’re lucky, a slice of love.

  ‘What will you do,’ Sam asked on their third meeting at Ricketts Terrace, ‘when you return to England?’

  She gave a pensive smile and leant against his shoulder briefly. She was so relieved, every time they managed to get together. She still worried he’d disappear; that he and his mother, whom she was about to meet, would sink back into a vast brown population that she would never breach.

  ‘I was going to continue teaching. Near home. But now Dad has died.’

  They were again sitting on the uneven wall in front of the ruined cottages. Nimble swallows performed loops against the brilliant sky. The sort of day you wanted to bottle, Ella thought. Yet African weather was so mercurial, it changed without warning. There was no gradual ebb, like at home. No time to get used to one spectacle before a different one presented itself.

  ‘You can still do that. Make a career, something for yourself apart from Corbey.’

  ‘That’s what Dad always said, the estate doesn’t have to take all my time. But I’m not sure.’

  She wanted to say that, in a strange way, nothing could be resolved until she met Louise Ahrendts. It was no longer simply a matter of fulfilling Dad’s wishes by handing over the letters and then saying goodbye. Louise was the woman her father adored, the potential stepmother she, Ella, never knew. Dad believed that if she was still alive, Louise might inspire Ella in a way that could be pivotal.

  Potentially joyful, potentially life-changing.

  She turned around to look up the mountain where Dad said they’d walked unseen amongst the sugarbirds and the yellow proteas.

  She turned back and smiled at Sam.

  In private, there was a breadth and sensitivity to him she hadn’t expected. He had opinions about sculpture and Communism and the design of Viking longships, but he was also adept at reading moods and nuances. What about his future? He wanted to break out, make something of himself. But in order to do so, he’d surely have to leave this gorgeous, troubled place.

  And the family he loved.

  She stared over the pristine bay.

  What had that young man said, as they stood at the ship’s rail on their approach into Cape Town?

  ‘There’s everything here. Beauty. Cruelty. Humanity.’

  Chapter Seventy

  Luckily the buses were running on time on the appointed day. I rushed home early and dusted the sitting room, and swept the floor and the landing and the stairs down to the entrance of our building. Ella might recoil from our surroundings, but at least they’d be clean. I’d arranged for Pa to take supper with friends in another block. Then I laid a tray for tea with Ma’s best cups and saucers that had survived the move, and made triangular cheese sandwiches. The activity helped take my mind off the coming meeting, but I kept reminding myself not to be shocked when she looked like David, spoke like David.

  I waited on the sofa until I heard Sam’s key in the lock.

  He stood aside and ushered a young woman forward.

  ‘Hello,’ the girl said, holding out her hand, ‘I’m Ella Horrocks.’

  I looked at her, at the eyes that were David’s, and I took her in my arms. Ella began to weep, surprisingly noisily. Uncontrollably. I fought to stay dry-eyed. Sam put his arm around her shoulder, so that she was embraced by both of us. We held her until I felt the shudders subside.

  She drew back and wiped her eyes. She was slender, with fine features and blonde hair, and she was wearing a plain green dress and sandals. David was in her hair, the line of her nose, the smooth temple before the war wound.

  ‘I’m sorry! I thought I’d never find you—’

  ‘Come, Ella,’ I managed. ‘Do sit down.’

  She glanced around her but didn’t register the cramped living room, the small windows. I waited while she gathered herself.

  ‘How long have you been in South Africa, Ella?’

  I found myself searching for more of David, but I mustn’t do that. She’s her own person.

  ‘Two weeks. I was worried I wouldn’t find you,’ she glanced at Sam.

  ‘You went to Ricketts Terrace.’

  ‘Yes. It was very sad to see it like that. Dad said it had the best view in the world.’

  I smiled. She stopped and looked down at her hands. I sensed she’d prepared what she wanted to say, and was steadying herself to do so. Perhaps she’d known the moment would be overwhelming. She was very young to be so astute, and so composed after tears.

  I waited.

  ‘I know this can’t be easy,’ she began hesitantly. ‘Thank you for agreeing to see me. I have something for you.’

  She opened her bag and took out a letter and handed it to me. ‘My father wrote this before he became ill, but it was returned to us, as was an earlier letter, marked address unknown.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘The Post Office stopped deliveries.’

  ‘Dad wanted to come to South Africa but he died just before we were due to sail.’

  She clasped her hands tightly. I wanted to reach across, comfort her, tell her she was doing well.

  ‘He asked me to find you and give you the letter.’

  I looked down at the envelope. Just after the evictions! So close …

  Ella stared at me with a fervent stillness that I remembered. I swallowed and breathed deeply. David settled about me. His fingers were on the envelope. His love was waiting in the words he’d written. I realised my hands were trembling. They never tremble when I’m in theatre. Sam had his palm over his mouth.

  ‘Thank you, Ella.’

  I got to my feet, bracing myself against the side of the chair. ‘May I read this in private?’

  She nodded.

  The sides of the room seemed to close about me.

  I forced out the courtesies. ‘Sam, please make tea for Ella. And do help yourselves to sandwiches.’

  My darling,

  I have written to you so often – indeed, hundreds of letters – but never sent them apart from one, some months ago, when my concern about your situation became acute. I offered financial help to you and your family to leave the country. That offer still stands. The letter was returned to me, saying address unknown. I hope – profoundly – that you are safe.

  Many years ago, my lawyer asked me if I had any doubts about my wife’s ability
to raise our daughter on her own. No, I said out loud. But yes, I said in my heart. I went back to Corbey, desperate for you, and watched Ella asleep in her cot, and I realised I could never leave her under Elizabeth’s sole influence. And now my daughter has grown up into a fine young woman, lively, impatient with conceit or dishonesty, and warm-hearted. How much of her has been moulded by chance, and how much by my sacrifice of you for her, I will never know and would not be vain enough to imagine. I’m simply grateful for the lovely person she’s become. She shows, incidentally, a similar mix of grace and intent to you, and I hope she may yet develop your steeliness …

  My situation has altered at last, and I must tell you, even though I risk opening up wounds that have been buried for so long. I am soon to be divorced. Elizabeth agreed because, it turns out, she has a new companion. She will remarry once the divorce is final. I’m past feeling bitter, there is only a lasting regret for the wasted years.

  And so I’m writing to say that if you’re free and still love me as I love you, I will come to Simon’s Town. But if you’re married and have a family of your own, or don’t need my help, then I will leave you be and send you my best love and wishes … and thank you, again, for the most precious moments of my life.