by Peter Rimmer
In a family feud they killed everyone in the other family to stop the retribution. She had run, picking up her skirt, her mother's savings clutched in her mother's purse. She thought she was going to die of the cold. She expected the farmer to throw her back into the sleet and mud. Instead they had put her into a hot bath and a warm bed and let her sleep.
They gave her clothes, took her to the railway station, and waited to see her safely on the train to London. Someone of her people must have seen her. A week after Jack had moved her into the flat, the doorbell had rung and outside was her family trunk. No message. No person. Just the trunk. She had hauled the thing inside and shoved it under the bed. It was weeks before she relaxed. She had a friend in the world after all… The key had been pushed under the door.
Sitting alone on the carpet in the sitting room, dressed in her mother's clothes, Fay tried to look into the future, bringing the seventh sense, the one of foresight into her mind. After half an hour she fell back on the carpet exhausted. All she had seen was mud, holes in the ground and barbed wire. And heard the noise. She also knew she was carrying Jack Merryweather's child, and the child was a girl. There were going to be two of them out on the street if Jack was killed.
Chapter 13: December 1914
"I thought it might be you," said Robert St Clair. "Can't be many chaps with the surname of Merryweather. Make yourself at home, Jack. What a pity. Those nice new uniforms don't last long out here. We're in reserve for another three days. Then we go up. This dugout is luxury. Even has a roof. Well, we'd better have a drink. You did bring a drink? Long way from Africa. Have you heard from Harry Brigandshaw? Been here since it started. Stopped the Hun getting to Paris, then we all dug like beavers. Front line's three hundred yards from here. Rather higgledy-piggledy. Chaps jumped into shell holes at first. Then dug communication trenches. Linked us all up. Jerry did the same. Mostly we're separated by a couple of hundred yards. Lots of barbed wire, then shell holes and mud. Then the Huns' barbed wire. Funny thing about barbed wire. You can blow it to heaven but it comes down again. More tangled and twisted. I'm the longest surviving lieutenant. The rest are dead. Jerry doesn't like officers. Sometimes we get a hate on the reserve trench. We'll be in the front line for Christmas. Now, bring out that bottle you're hiding and give me all the news. You look fit, Jack. Dirty from mud but fit. And please don't walk around with that hat on in the trenches. We always wear tin hats. Gives the men a feeling of security. Doesn't make any bloody difference really …Sallie. That was her name. Sallie Barker. Has she sent you any more wires?"
"Nice to see you Robert, if I'm allowed a word in edgeways. Where do I put my gear?"
"Over on that duckboard."
"How's Lucinda?"
"Miserable."
"Bit of a coincidence isn't this?"
"Not really, Jack. They circulate a list of new officers and we pick and choose. Pretty random. I was orderly officer when the list came through. They send us a list a month before the new chaps finish training."
"And if I'd failed the course?"
"You wouldn't be here, would you? Now, what have you got in your kitbag, 'officers for the use of'?"
"A bottle of brandy."
"Good. Jolly good. Let's drink it."
"All of it?"
"Of course. Nothing keeps around here. Unless Jerry puts in a push, we won't be disturbed much for three days. Our chaps usually know in advance when Jerry is going to come in force. Telltale signs. Big guns start blazing. Big movements behind the lines. Our chaps can see from the balloons when Jerry doesn't shoot them down. Then our chaps shoot down Jerry. Pretty much tit for tat. Jolly nice to see you."
"Do you always talk so fast?"
"Did you notice? The more I talk the less I think and you don't want to think around here. I was one of the first territorials. Joined the T.A. when I came back from Africa. Madge didn't want to marry and then this bloke Barend pitched up and that was it. Turns out Lucinda and I had been staying in his house for months, the one you stayed in I think. The T.A. unit was next to the bloody school I taught in. Snotty little kids don't like history, mark my words. There are usually four of us in a dugout. CO likes to spread his officers around a bit. I was the duty officer when the shell hit the other one. Couple of months ago. Short of officers since. Anyway, now you're here Jack which is good. There's another bloke here tomorrow. You don't have any food in that kitbag, do you?"
"No, Robert."
"When I'm really scared shitless, which is most of the time, I think of Elephant Walk. Or Purbeck Manor. And all the food. Strangely it helps. Look. I tell you what. We'll go show ourselves to the men and then come back for a drink."
Jack followed him out of the dugout, cut into the earth from the reserve trench which traversed on both sides of them, slightly zigzagged so no one could get into the trench from the other side and shoot everyone in line. His feet sank into the mud and his greatcoat pulled along around his feet. He kept his officer's hat on his head. Robert had crammed on a tin hat with the thick band that let it rest on the cranium. The man was a wreck. High overhead he heard a whistling noise and stopped.
"Ours, old chap. Jerry's getting a hate. In ten minutes Jerry will start shelling us. How it works. Sort of tit for tat. No one getting anywhere in the mud. They say it goes right to the coast, so Jerry can't outflank us… Sometimes I hear the African lions at night but that's only when I am asleep."
The cold had reached into the marrow of his bones as Jack followed. It was getting dark, so the men all looked the same. They seemed pleased to see Robert St Clair. Jack wondered how long he was going to live. All that money and nothing to show for it. No one of his own to spend it when he was dead… Overhead the scream of shells was now continuous.
For Albert Pringle, six thousand miles away in the Rand Club, life could not have been better. The Union government under Louis Botha had known which side their bread was buttered and had declared war on Germany. Put down a rebellion by Bittereinders left over and revived from the Anglo-Boer War and, for all intents and purposes, added German West Africa to the Union of South Africa, all under Boer control but British hegemony, a satisfactory diplomatic alternative to everyone trying to kill each other. Further up north the South Africans were trying to kick the Germans out of Tanganyika, German East Africa; Albert thought he and his new country were doing very well. Though he had to smile. Despite Sallie Barker being the brains of the company, she was not a member of the Rand Club. Women were not even allowed in the club, let alone to become members. But Albert, Jack Merryweather's gentleman's gentleman, had been proposed, sponsored, and elected all within a week. The only thing that spoke in Johannesburg was money which was how Albert thought it should be. If anyone knew he had been a valet they said nothing. The past was the past.
Sitting with men twenty years his senior who treated him as an equal was one part of his satisfaction. The other part was keeping out of the war but doing as much business with the British War Office as possible. If other people wanted to use his explosives to kill people that was their business. He was getting rich, and he wanted a long life to enjoy his wealth; heroes' memories lasted a very short time after they were dead. Anyway, he told himself to placate the niggling feeling he was rationalising, he was too important to the British war effort to be sent to the trenches like his brother. Walter had rushed back to England from Australia to join the same regiment he had fought with in the Anglo-Boer War. What was it about men who always wanted to fight! Now his children were fatherless and Albert was sending Walter's wife money, a woman he had never met, and never intended to meet if he could help it. What did they think life was all about? Poor Walter. His wife now suffered. Not Walter. Heroes! Bloody stupid… Then he brought his mind back to the long bar at the most exclusive club in Johannesburg and tried to put the war out of his mind. Poor Walter would never drink another glass of beer.
It was the speed of the change that made Tina Pringle smile. She had turned seventeen on G
uy Fawkes Night the month before. A year before that she had been helping her mother around the small house and wondering what would come of her life. Barnaby, she knew, was beyond her reach, however much fun they had had together as kids. She had left the board school at fourteen without much listening to what the teachers had to say. With a little stretch of her imagination, she said she could read and write but had never read a word since leaving school. Adding and subtracting left her flummoxed.
Barnaby had not been her first, not that he had done it in the end which she thought was rather a shame. Once a year the fair came to Swanage. The bloke that ran the horse rides for the kids in town had been in her mind since she was ten. He had done her down behind the horsebox when she was thirteen. He was lovely. A big bloke. Everything was big. Dark too. Probably a gypsy but who cared. He was lovely, lovely. She knew she had something all the boys wanted, but she teased more than she shared. Flashing her big tits, giving 'em a smile. It was all fun. She was sexy, not pretty, and that was going to be her ticket into the real world. But like most of her bright ideas, nothing had come of it until Albert came home, brother Fred caught them in the act, and Albert bought her ticket to Africa on a big boat.
She and Albert told everyone she was nineteen. The old housekeeper had been given the sack, poor dear, and Tina was running the house with eleven servants. The house in Parktown on the ridge looked out to the distant bush and had been bought for a song by Albert when the mine owners ran out of gold. She, Tina Pringle, was mistress of the great house, and if one thing was clear, she was not going back to England. In her new clothes and hair dressed in the fashion, young Barnaby was the last thing on her mind. She was going to make something of herself and marry a rich man. Tantalising sex appeal and youth were all she had but in a mining town with little competition, it was enough. No one questioned her Dorset brogue or asked her to spout off about politics or the war. The men had their eyes fixed on her bosom not her brain. In a crowd of new rich the English language was mangled more often than not. She was at home. Powerful. In possession of something all of them wanted.
When Albert came back from the Rand Club, there were already six men paying court to his sister and it made him bloody laugh. With Tina running his new house, Albert was suddenly the most popular man in town. As he walked into the room to greet his guests, the German artillery found the range of the British reserve trench, and Jack Merryweather, without any control, voided his bowels.
The combination of Tina Pringle and free drinks was irresistible. Within three minutes of Albert being home, the doorbell rang from the marbled hall and a young man strode into the sitting room. Albert had never set eyes on him before. Within thirty seconds he had a drink in his hand and a position to the left of Tina. This stranger had poured his own drink with familiar ease. Before Albert could find his wits the same doorbell rang again. A man of about fifty strode into the room and poured himself a drink. The man had just joined the crowd around Tina when it happened again. Mostly Albert was in his office or the club at sundowner time. Drinking alone, he found himself an outcast in his own home. The man of fifty, having had a good look down the front of Tina's dress pulled away from the crowd.
"Your first time?" he asked Albert.
"In a way, I suppose it is… Who are you, if I may ask?"
"Lightfoot. Benny Lightfoot. I'm an American. And who are you? Do you know anyone here?"
"Just Tina."
"That's right. We all are here to visit with Tina."
"Isn't she a bit young for you?"
"Who cares?… Excuse me? That's a friend of mine just come in… You want me to fill your glass? That first one hit the spot."
Albert was not sure whether to laugh or throw the man out on his neck. He chose to laugh. His sister was having a good time. Maybe one of the men in the room was rich. He liked the idea of a rich brother-in-law. Booze was cheap, so the money did not bother him. Working on the principle that if you can't beat them, join them, Albert refilled his drink, took a swig, and joined the circle clustered around his sister. She was as cool as a cucumber. The clothes he had bought made her look the nineteen she said she was. Albert doubted if their mother and father would recognise the youngest of their children.
"Oh, it's Albert. Home early love. Some of my friends come to visit. Everyone say a big hello to Albert. He is my brother. He's the one what owns this 'ouse. Say cheers! It's 'is booze too. He is a bloody darlin', isn't he? Cheers, Albert."
Only the fifty-year-old had the decency to look embarrassed. Then the one-way conversation picked up and everyone turned their attention back to Tina. Albert was again left on his own. The fifty-year-old put his glass down on the grand piano and slunk out into the hall. Albert heard the front door open and close. They knew their way out as well as in. The price of being rich, he tried to tell himself. If there was one thing he had found out in life, the moment a man had money, everyone was trying to get it off him. And rich men were popular so long as they stayed rich. On that note he was confident. As fast as Serendipity Mining and Explosives made artillery shells, they were being blown to pieces in France. The ammunition trucks left his factory for Durban every day. Then the Royal Navy escorted them all the way to France. Only one of the ammunition ships had been sunk by German torpedoes before it arrived. The explosion had sunk a Royal Navy frigate riding alongside. They were working three shifts at the factory. What was the cost of a few bottles of Scotch he asked himself? Without being noticed, he went outside through the small doors on to the long veranda that looked down from Parktown Ridge. What the hell! Tina was enjoying herself. Maybe even some of the men in the room were going to join the war. By the time the sun began to sink into the African bush, Albert was halfway to being drunk. And it was a Friday. When he went back into the room to refill his glass and join the trivial conversation surrounding his sister, there was another woman standing halfway into the room. She was enormous. Fatter than anyone Albert had seen. The chin was completely lost in the rolls of fat around her face. Even her feet were swollen in her shoes.
The apparition saw him, broke into a broad smile and waddled towards him across the big room.
"Darling. How wonderful to see you. Give your Lily a big hug."
The cruise for Lily White had been a disaster. She had booked and paid to go around the world first class. It took just one day to know she had made a mistake, even with the fancy clothes she had bought in Cape Town to help disguise who she was. The accent she had tried to cultivate so hard let her down with a thud. The looks that had kept the men on her side for so long were gone. The bosom that Jack Merryweather had liked to wallow in was all of a piece. Chin. Stomach. Bosom. All the same thing. So she ate. Morning, noon, and night. For three months she ate. Helping after helping. Breakfast. Lunch. Tea. Supper. She waddled up from her cabin four times a day. By the time the ship brought her back to Cape Town she had doubled her weight. Largely, for the whole journey, no one had spoken to her. She was the largest invisible being on board ship. The worst thing was, that when she thought through her problem, she knew any alternative would not be any better. She had had her life. Not even one man tried to get to know her money. She was just too fat to even get a peck on the cheek.
At the end of the voyage, she had sat around in Cape Town doing nothing other than eat. Sometimes she read the papers. She even watched the share price of Serendipity. At the end of her tether, and fearing for her life, she had finally taken the train to Johannesburg. Even walking ten yards was a strain on her heart.
The first word that came to Albert Pringle's mind was shit! Instead, he put on a big smile and tried unsuccessfully to give Lily a hug. She had obviously run out of money in a year and had come begging. Sallie once again had been right. The trust for Lily set up in 1913 for just this eventuality would solve their problem. Lily would always have an income and not be dependent on their charity. They would be rid of her.
"How did you find out my address?" he asked having floundered in the fat.
"From the prospectus," smiled Lily, feeling better for the first time in months.
"What prospectus?" said Albert, with a sinking feeling in his stomach.
"Serendipity Mining and Explosives. I put my money from the Mansion House into your company. I still have all the shares."
"We didn't see your name as a shareholder. How many shares do you have?"
"Ten thousand. One per cent of your equity. I put it through with my bank as nominee."
"Jack Merryweather did the same thing but we found out the real owner of the shares. Anything one per cent or over we wanted to know who we were dealing with. Our chaps in London were very good."
"My real name's Lily Ramsbottom. Now you recognise my shareholding. Give us a drink love. A stiff one! I really need a drink! Nice house. Nice view."
"Of course. Of course. What would you like? Well, I should know. Scotch. Yes. A Scotch."
"Don't look so bloody relieved, Albert. Sallie was right to put my money from the sale of the Mansion House in a trust. She may have been a damn good bookkeeper stopping others stealing my money. But she weren't a patch on Lil. I had to put up a cheque for twenty thousand pounds to get my shares remember. How do you think I got that? From the whorehouse! Just in case, so to speak. Don't look so aggrieved. You did all right. Blimey, anyone would think I was a thief. Sallie could stop the others stealing but not me, see." Then she began to laugh making the fat roll around her body.