Crooked Heart

by Lissa Evans

  ‘Oh.’ She came back into the kitchen. ‘So he meant to stay.’ The house on the Heath, she thought, leaping ahead – that’s where Noel would be, he’d sneak in there somehow – and she knew in the same instant that she’d never be able to remember how to get back there; it had been tucked away like a crumb in a rug and she had no idea of the address. She stood and thought, and then crossed swiftly to the dresser and grabbed a card that had arrived from Noel’s uncle and aunt just a week before. Five minutes more and she was ready, three banknotes from her secret store folded carefully in her purse, her torch and a spare battery in her pocket, her blue plush hat on and her sturdiest shoes, seeing as she was about to walk all the way to bloody Brickett Wood and bloody back again.

  ‘I’ll take that,’ she said, twitching the envelope from Donald’s fingers and dropping it into her bag. She turned to go, and then found herself swinging round again, like an unlatched gate.

  ‘You’ll be gone when I come back?’ she asked.

  ‘I should think so.’

  His head was bent and he was cleaning under one of his nails with a matchstick; Vee gazed at the nape of his neck. It hadn’t changed a bit in nineteen years. Not a bit. The skin there was still pale and tender, traced by a line of little soft baby hairs and she could remember exactly what they felt like, the fairy tickle of them on her fingertips, the weight of his warm head cupped in her hand. She drew in breath. ‘You’ll take care, won’t—’

  ‘You ought to hurry,’ said Donald. ‘And don’t forget to give it straight to her, not anyone else.’

  She stamped down the stairs like a four-year-old, and a steaming rage propelled her most of the way to Brickett Wood along lanes blue-striped by moonlight. It wasn’t until she was back on a metalled road, houses looming on either side, that she realized she’d been talking out loud to herself the whole way – shouting, probably, judging by the raw tightness in her throat. Her body seemed to thrum like an engine.

  She didn’t know which of the houses was The Beeches, but it didn’t take long to find one with a charabanc waiting outside, the driver asleep behind the wheel, and only a few minutes later the front door opened and a procession of girls began to drift down the path, yawning, pushing hair into turbans, coughing through the first cigarette of the day. Their pale faces were featureless in the darkness, their speech a sleepy jumble of complaints.

  ‘. . . not what I call a chop. Chip, not a chop . . .’

  ‘. . . feet are killing me . . .’

  ‘. . . fourteen and six they were charging, and I said to the woman—’

  ‘. . . so absolutely hilarious!!’ The last words were said in heavily accented rising shriek and Vee jerked her gaze towards the speaker, and saw that she was too tall and blonde to be Donald’s girl.

  ‘Was not funny at all,’ muttered another voice, also foreign.

  ‘He was very very funny but you have no sense of humour. He pretended to be a man with chust one leg and then we danced the Paul Chones. Backwards!’

  The volume of the last word seemed to send a shudder along the line.

  ‘Birgit, I’ve had three hours’ sleep and if you don’t shut your gob I’m going to shut it for you,’ called someone from the back.

  The blonde laughed merrily. ‘But in these nasty times it’s nicer to be cholly than be sad, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’d be even nicer if you’d just shut up and—’

  ‘I’ve got a letter for Hilde,’ said Vee, interrupting before someone (possibly herself) gave the blonde a well-deserved slap. There was a gasp and a sudden movement in the line and a small figure stepped forward, hand outstretched.

  ‘My ledder,’ she said, peremptorily.

  ‘All right, all right,’ said Vee, rattled. ‘I just need to make sure I’ve got the right person. You’re Hilde . . .’ She didn’t know the surname, she realized. ‘Hilde who’s Austrian.’

  ‘Yes, yes, give it to me now, please.’ The girl was still holding out her hand, and now she waggled the fingers impatiently. She was an unimpressive-looking little thing, a small mouth in a small face, hair tucked into an ugly knitted hat.

  Reluctantly, Vee took the letter from her bag and the girl snatched it from her and aimed a torch at the envelope. There was a split-second pause and then a cry of obvious disappointment.

  ‘This is not a ledder!’

  ‘Of course it’s a letter.’

  ‘It’s not a ledder with stamps, from another country.’

  ‘Sorry, I’m sure.’

  Hilde stared at the envelope as if willing it to sprout postmarks.

  ‘It’s from Donald Sedge,’ said Vee. ‘My . . . lodger.’

  There was a pause, and then a muffled reply. ‘I will read it later.’ The torch went out and Vee heard the crackle of paper being carelessly stuffed into a pocket.

  ‘But it’s urgent. I’ve just walked two miles to deliver that.’

  ‘I did not ask you to, did I?’ Her tone was hateful, but Vee could have sworn the girl was close to tears. There was a toot from the bus, and they both jumped as if jabbed with a spike. Hilde turned and hurried after the others.

  ‘Well good luck with that one, son,’ said Vee, bitterly. Love was blind, everyone knew that, but in this case it was also deaf as a post. She watched the bus move off, its shuttered light a yellow smudge in the darkness, and then she crossed the road and began the long walk to the station.

  15

  ‘Would you like a biscuit?’ asked Margery Overs. She spoke with a sort of gulping girlishness that contrasted oddly with her appearance.

  ‘I won’t thanks,’ said Vee. ‘I’ve not long had my tea.’ She smiled, and shifted slightly in her chair to hide the noise of her stomach. The truth was that she hadn’t eaten since the morning – one fly-blown currant bun at a café in Kentish Town – but since entering the Overs’ basement flat in Mafeking Road she had told such a string of lies that it seemed only natural to tag on another.

  Margery set the plate down and, for the umpteenth time, glanced over at the window, not that you could see anything through the shutters.

  ‘Mr Overs will be home any minute now,’ she said. ‘He’ll just be dropping into the grocer’s after work. He has to do all the shopping for me, I’m afraid.’

  She was a pale, heavy woman and her skin had a glassy tinge that put Vee in mind of uncooked hake.

  ‘Have you been ill?’ she asked politely.

  ‘Um . . .’ the woman glanced around the room, as if the answer might be pinned to the wall somewhere, ‘. . . oh dear. It’s so hard to explain. I can’t go out you see, Miss Gifford, it’s a nervous complaint. I haven’t been out for a number of years.’

  There was a long pause during which Vee became acutely aware of the low ceiling, the perfect, polished tidiness of the flat. She tried to imagine Noel living here but she couldn’t picture it, couldn’t see how he’d fit.

  ‘You won’t mind if I give Mr Overs his evening meal when he arrives, will you, Miss Gifford?’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘Because he’ll have just the half hour before he has to be out again on his warden’s shift. He does four evenings a week, till midnight, and yesterday he was on his feet for the whole shift, not a cup of tea passed his lips and it was five hours before the all-clear sounded. There’s a nice bit of brisket in the oven for him.’

  ‘Oh, that’ll be a treat.’

  ‘Yes, Mr Overs has always liked brisket. And it’s not too dear either.’

  ‘No, it’s quite reasonable. When you can get it, of course.’

  There was a further pause, during which Vee heard the creak of the clock, readying itself to chime the hour. Six tiny bell-tones followed; she rallied herself for yet another attempt.

  ‘Mafeking Road’s not all that far from Hampstead Heath, is it? Wasn’t that where Noel lived before he came to live with you?’

  And there it was again: an actual flinch, as if Noel’s name was a flung pebble, with the power to sting.

  �
�No, not all that far,’ said Margery, faintly, and then a key sounded in the lock and she almost sprang to her feet, teetering across the room like a spinning top.

  ‘You’ll never guess,’ she said, as the door opened. ‘The St Albans billeting officer’s here. A Miss Gifford.’

  ‘No trouble with young Noel, I hope?’ Geoffrey was all teeth; when he smiled it was like someone opening a piano lid.

  ‘Oh no,’ said Vee, standing to shake his hand. ‘He’s very well. It’s a routine visit. I’m seeing all the families of the evacuated children and asking routine questions. Which we need for our routine paperwork.’ She winced inwardly; how did council officials actually talk? She’d met enough of them over the years, but she’d always been too busy panicking to take note.

  ‘Miss Gifford first called here this morning, but I said to her that since our connection is through your side of the family, Geoffrey, I’d prefer it if you were able to talk to her.’

  ‘I hope that didn’t inconvenience you too much, Miss Gifford?’

  ‘No, not at all, I had a whole list of people to call on,’ replied Vee, who had spent most of the day dozing on a bench next to a bus stop.

  ‘I’ll just fetch your supper.’

  ‘Thank you, my dear. Do take a seat, Miss Gifford.’

  Vee bobbed down on an armchair as Geoffrey removed his coat and smoothed the remains of his hair. He was almost as short as his wife, and had a round, pink face bisected by a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles.

  ‘I seem to remember that you’re a relation of Noel’s godmother,’ said Vee, seizing her chance. ‘His godmother that lived near here.’

  ‘That’s quite correct, Miss Gifford. She resided in the vicinity of Hampstead Heath.’

  Ah yes, that was how council officials talked.

  ‘I remember now. Noel told me that it was a sizeable residence in . . . er . . . ooh, now what was the name of the—’

  ‘Supper!’

  Vee leaned back with a hiss of frustration, which she tried to cover with a cough.

  ‘Do please forgive me for eating in front of you, Miss Gifford, but my wife has probably alerted you to the fact that I’ll have to leave again shortly.’

  ‘No, you go ahead, I know how hard you wardens work. Don’t mind me.’

  Margery sat down beside her husband and watched with evident pleasure as he ate. ‘Delicious, dear,’ said Geoffrey, between mouthfuls, ‘absolutely delicious.’

  They were a dull enough pair, thought Vee; based on Noel’s remarks, she’d expected a couple of monsters, not Darby and Joan. And their flat was really quite pretty, as opposed to the sterile dungeon that he’d hinted at. Margery, it appeared, spent much of her day embroidering chair-covers while Geoffrey was presumably responsible for framing the prints that lined the walls: sunlit meadows and woodland scenes – the outdoors for a woman who never went outdoors – and a few photographs: Margery as a young woman, pretty in an anxious sort of way; Margery and Geoffrey’s wedding day, Geoffrey already balding, Margery gazing at him as if she’d just said ‘I do’ to Rudolf Valentino; a baby whose wan blob of a face was framed by a cross-stitched bonnet; an elderly woman and a child sitting on a garden bench.

  ‘Oh,’ said Vee, rising. ‘Is that . . . ?’

  ‘That was my cousin Mattie, yes. And young Noel, of course.’

  Noel was a little blurred, all knees and elbows, the woman utterly solid, like a granite outcrop; Rock of Ages, thought Vee. The pair were looking at each other; a firm look, like a handshake.

  ‘I meant of course to come and see Noel in St Albans,’ said Geoffrey, ‘but his foster mother wrote to say that she thought an early visit might unsettle him. We send regular letters.’

  Vee nodded sympathetically. ‘I’d say that was good advice from Mrs Sedge. You’ll be glad to hear that she’s one of our very best and most experienced foster mothers.’

  ‘Is that so?’

  ‘Oh yes. Honestly I wish half the ladies were as conscientious and caring as she is, she really is a marvel. In fact, I was only saying to my assistant last week that it’s a pity that we can’t pay people like Mrs Sedge a bit more than the other foster mothers, seeing as she’s worth at least two of them and my assistant said to . . . to my other assistant that we really should get Mrs Sedge on a committee to talk about how on earth she manages it all.’ She let Mrs Sedge linger briefly in the limelight – such a warm feeling – before moving on. ‘And in any case I saw Noel only last week and he’s looking top-notch, lovely rosy cheeks and no trouble with his limp and he especially sent you lots of love.’

  Geoffrey paused, mid-chew, to exchange a startled look with his wife, and Vee realized that she’d gone too far. She made a play of searching through her bag, and drew out a tiny black notebook that had belonged to her mother, the matching pencil attached via a cord half an inch too short for comfortable writing.

  ‘Just a few questions,’ she said, quickly. ‘Now, Noel is your . . . your nephew?’

  Geoffrey swallowed his mouthful, with difficulty. ‘Noel is actually no blood relation to me at all, Miss Gifford. His godmother, however, was my second cousin, and Noel’s guardian.’

  ‘So he’s an orphan?’

  ‘We believe so,’ said Geoffrey, primly, the set of his mouth precluding further questions along that line.

  ‘And he lived with his godmother in her house in . . . ?’

  ‘The Vale of Health.’

  ‘And is that the name of a road or a . . . ?’

  ‘It’s a dead-end lane that cuts into the south side of the Heath.’

  Bingo. Vee began to close the notebook, and then realized that she ought to ask a few more questions, just for the sake of authenticity.

  ‘And it’s all official, now, that you’re Noel’s guardians?’

  Geoffrey shook his head. ‘The wheels of the law are never swift, Miss Gifford, and the solicitor in question has moved out of London for the duration. Eager as we are to assume the responsibility’ – his wife closed her eyes – ‘we shall have to wait until a meeting has been arranged. And even then I believe the necessary paperwork may take some time.’

  ‘I see. And is there anything you think it might be helpful for Mrs Sedge to know about the boy? Like . . . er . . .’ Vee cast around for something, anything, ‘. . . his favourite colour? Hobbies?’

  Geoffrey’s habitual smile became a little fixed. ‘We never found Noel to be very enthusiastic about hobbies.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘Spying on people,’ said Margery, in a muffled voice.

  ‘Last Christmas we bought him a John Bull printing set, hoping it might spark his interest. But he didn’t take to it.’

  ‘He ruined it.’

  ‘Margery—’

  ‘He ruined it, Geoffrey. You were dog tired, it was your only evening off and you went all the way to Barnet to buy it from a man in the office.’

  ‘Margery—’

  ‘It was good as new, not a single letter missing, and you won’t believe it, Miss Gifford, but we found it the next day lying outside the front door, in the pouring rain. And the scarf I’d knitted him with his initials embroidered at one end, and I’d made a Christmas cake as well, with real icing, and he just crumbled it up on his plate, and no one could say that we didn’t try, Miss Gifford, but he’s not an easy child and in six months we didn’t get so much as a thank you from him, barely a word at all, just hatefulness, just . . . just . . . just . . .’

  There was a pause. Margery blew her nose, long and hard.

  ‘I seem to remember that he likes green,’ she said, through the handkerchief.

  Vee wrote FAVOURITE COLOUR GREEN in her notebook, taking her time over the letters. When she looked up again, Geoffrey was holding his wife’s hand, gently stroking it with his thumb.

  ‘Some pudding?’ Margery asked him, tenderly.

  ‘Well, I . . .’ Geoffrey’s sentence ended in a sigh. The first long note of the siren was lifting into the night.

  His wife let ou
t a mew of protest. ‘It’s early,’ she said, ‘and there’s still ten minutes before you’re expected at the post. You could have a slice of plum tart before you go.’

  ‘No, no, dear, I’m afraid I’d better be off. Excuse me, Miss Gifford, while I get changed.’ He rose, wearily, and left the room.

  He was back a minute or two later, tin-hatted and wearing a boiler suit designed for a man six inches taller, the legs twin concertinas.

  ‘I hope you have all the answers you need, Miss Gifford,’ he said, as his wife helped him on with his coat. ‘And of course we’re extremely glad that Noel is so well looked after.’

  He kissed Margery on the cheek and she clung to him, fussing over his buttons, her face blank with worry.

  ‘You will be careful,’ she said, ‘won’t you?’

  ‘Mrs Overs will be sheltering in the cupboard under the stairs here for the duration of the raid,’ said Geoffrey. ‘You’d be more than welcome to join her, Miss Gifford. It will quite easily accommodate another footstool.’

  Five hours knee-to-knee with Margery Overs. ‘No!’ said Vee, forcefully, before she could think of an excuse. There was a slightly awkward silence. ‘Because I have to get back to St Albans,’ she added. ‘To look after my mother. And son. So I’d better set off for the station straight away. Thanks ever so for your help.’ She was moving towards the door as she spoke, hauling on her coat, ignoring Geoffrey’s protests – ‘I have to advise you in my capacity as a warden . . .’

  The wobbler was still screaming as she reached the pavement and she paused to take the torch from her bag before setting off up the hill towards Hampstead; it was cloudier than last night, the moon a grey smear, the stars invisible. Somewhere to the north, a searchlight swung through the darkness.

  She found herself gulping great mouthfuls of air, as if she’d been underwater; she knew, now, why Noel hadn’t been able to stand it there. It wasn’t the size of the place, or the tidiness – it was the devotion. A man should cleave unto his wife and be as one flesh, as it said in Genesis 2, but what it didn’t say was that a love like that could be stifling to those around it, a velvet cloth that blocked out the rest of the world.