by Sara Crowe
Cameo wrote from Somerset and told me that our young nephew Oliver is a hero because he discovered not one but three Germans in the trees near their village, who, in spite of their injuries, found the strength to surround him.
‘Which one of you three’s the strongest?’ Oliver asked.
‘Er ist (He is)’ they replied, pointing to the big one.
‘OK,’ said Oliver to the tough guy. ‘You and me against them two.’
At least that’s what Oliver says!
It’s so frustrating for me, being away from all the action. My contribution to the war effort is tiny; only some light volunteering at present, digging veggies at Brownscombe Farm. I have hours to spend in pursuit of my studies, but I wish I was doing something more helpful. Maybe I could specialise in military entomology? Eradicate the threat from insects of the trenches? Develop a vaccine to combat lice or stop the spread of typhus?
Study news
Contrary to popular belief, the Daddy long legs is not a spider but a fly. Interesting. But what I want to know, is why are so many spiders called widows? Professor Podger of Evolutionary Biology says we will go into the matter very fully. He has set us a short essay on the subject of ‘highly organised bacteria’ (bacteria with specs, briefcase, and a pie on the go in the fridge?). He states that these organised bacteria are more successful than others that are lazier in multiplication, and claims to be a fan of lactobacillus and streptococci.
Going to Dicken John’s study for cocoa tonight. I know he has eyes for Consuella, but . . . ‘Don’t let one cloud obliterate the whole sky’ (Anaïs Nin).
Sue
Friday August 28
FINALLY, ON WEDNESDAY, my chance came. A letter arrived from Dad telling me that he and the Dane were in Venice on a mini break, therefore I knew the coast would be clear and I’d be able to search the house in peace. I was very hopeful of finding a note from mum.
I rang in sick, saying that I had a terribly infectious skin complaint, because I knew that would worry Loudolle. Mrs Fry would have to find another dogsbody.
Titford is a relatively dull place, jazzed up by groups and societies: the walking group, the ladies pottery set, the gentlemen’s club for crown bowels. The history group preserve the bones of the town and offer up information about the blue plaque, and maintain for the streets their oldey back drop, by fighting a valiant fight to keep the bus stops thatched. Mum never liked those Titford types much, she thought they were small-minded and pokey hole, but she did have one or two friends dotted about to keep loneliness in check.
The High Street is cut into segments by four sets of traffic lights, with the library right at the bottom. It’s a high street like many other, the only difference being that in Titford they love to demonstrate about things. It’s because the town is so boring that they need to liven it up. I passed the car shoe shop on the left, and by car shoes I mean the sort of backless loafers that mothers keep in the car to ferry children. Ivana had several pairs, though not the reason to wear them.
Nothing had really changed. There was nothing extraordinary, no notes on the ground behind lampposts, no banners saying ‘welcome back Sue’. I passed the bookshop, where Aileen had a Saturday job and the brick used to be tied outside, and Flowers ’n’ Cards and the Titford Gallery and Je T’aime boutique and, finally, the library. I tried to ignore it just then, and turned off the main road and into Addison Drive, where I looked down towards my old house. It was like looking back in time, like I could just walk up to the door and my Mum would be there to meet me. I must have walked down that road a thousand times, maybe even a million. It was such a familiar stranger, or maybe I was the stranger, reborn in the eight short months since I’d left.
I went in and stood in the hall. Standing at the bottom of the stairs, I realised that actually I’d remembered wrongly, I did get scared in Titford. Mum made the mistake of telling me that I mustn’t be afraid because the fear attracts things to you, and that made me even more afraid, so I often used to debunk into her bed and Dad would be pushed out and go and sleep in my room and we’d all wake up in different beds in the morning. It was quite chaotic.
Such memories were accompanied by the smell of rain on a Titford morning and of burnt toast coming from the kitchen, and the sound of mum scraping the char off the toast before calling me to get a move on: ‘Quick Sue!’
Her voice filled the quiet of the hall until I tripped on some car shoes and the past was broken away. I picked them up and noticed that they were tied together with a cobblers label which said: ‘This pair should not be together because they are a mismatch. One is a 40 and one is a 42.’
It was clear as day: a message from the other world. I took the label as evidence and put it in my pocket. I knew they shouldn’t be together. Dad was forty and Ivana was forty-two.
Somewhere in the kitchen lurked a cheese that was jumping. I buried it in the garden, so they would not have to return to smells. Further along the counter there was a card on the kitchen pin board, which had two names in gold leaf: Nicholas James and Ivana Beverley. I’d forgotten her Nana was English.
I trawlered through some correspondence, and beneath a stack of letters I found a birthday card to Mr Edgeley from my mother. How odd that Mr and Mrs Edgeley had given it back to my Father, but perhaps they thought it was the correct thing to do for posterity. And on closer inspection of the post mark on the envelope, it appeared it was posted the day she died. It read:
Dear Mick,
Happy Birthday. Hope you have a lovely day. I’ll be thinking of you and wishing you well.
Much love,
Blue xxxx
PS don’t forget the embroidered cloths.
It was galling to know that her state of mind had been good enough to remember a birthday, and only added weight to my theory that she had meant to be revived. I don’t understand why my Dad hasn’t told me about it, how he could think that it wasn’t important.
The sight of Ivana’s things round me made me sick; it looked like we had a squatter. I went up to the bedroom, to check it hadn’t all been a mistake, to check I wouldn’t find Mum sitting in bed and so surprised to see me. But of course she wasn’t there, and there was no trace of her on the surface, only Ivana’s face creams and collection of small furry animals gathering dust. Although behind the scenes there were still tracks to suggest mum’s existence; the circle where she put her tea mug and the worn patch on the rug where she stood at her basin that retained the shape of her feet. So many traces of her, beneath that squatter’s top note.
In my experience I have noticed that the backs of drawers seem to be a good place to find things, so I started my note hunt there. A lot of Ivana’s rubbish had to be gone through, nasty bedside potions, a letter from the doctors, and one of those Red Indian dream catchers for the prevention of nightmares. But at the back of the chest, in accordance with my theory, I did find a clump of paper. It was one of those fortune tellers you make at Christmas, with my hopes for the future written under the blue flaps and Mum’s written under the green. Mine said things that I wanted to happen like, passing my driving test and falling in love and getting a puppy. And Mum’s said, ‘Grow old gracefully and keep jogging’. If those were her hopes for the future, no wonder she did what she did.
I finished upstairs, having ploughed every furrow, including behind books, under the mattress, and in Dad’s papers, where I found a box labelled ‘Blue’, which when I opened it, proved to be empty. Where had he put the contents? Had he thrown away her old letters, the ribbons from her bouquets, the birthday cards she treasured? The thought was so overwhelming that I had to sit down for some moments.
Downstairs I continued and my eye fell on two photographs on the mantelpiece, one of Dad and the Dane at a dinner, and the other of him, Mum and me when I was a baby. In between the photo and frame, there was a yellow piece of paper. I had to sit down with it in my shaking hands. Could this be it? Could this be what I came for? There aren’t many situations in life where you can f
eel such dread and excitement. The familiar threads of the sofa tickled the back of my calfs and I held my breath as a voice inside said, open it, open it, open it. I unfolded the paper and gasped to see her handwriting, but then immediately was disappointed as I realised it was only a label for the picture.
‘This is Sue!’ it said. I must have been only a few months old at the time when the photo was taken, and she was very pleased with me. This is Sue! And the ‘S’ was super flamboyant and the ‘e’ was close up against the ‘u’ and it had a flourish through the bottom and to the right that was utterly unique and enviable.
I had thought about spending the whole day in Titford, but when it came to it I didn’t even stay the afternoon, and I spent no time at all in my bedroom. It was so small and suffocating and like a coffin compared to Green Place, and in the backyard a weed had grown up round a broom where it had been left standing still for too long.
The front door gave its familiar plastic click as I left like a thief with my treasure: the fortune teller, the birthday card, the label, all of them messages from the other world.
I passed by the library on my way back to the station and planned to go in and check in all the sleeves of the Poets, but it was no easy place for me to go to, so I stalled for a while in Je T’aime. Aileen used to treat herself from Je T’aime all the time with the money she made from begging.
I thought about what Aunt Coral would do in such a distressing situation and so I bought a dress. It was pink and lacy and frilly, and made good company for me as I finally plucked up the courage to go into the library, holding the raspberry coloured Je T’aime carrier bag for security. The first thing I saw was Mr Jewell with his feet up on the desk, smoking. But as I walked up, he stubbed out his cigarette and flapped at the smoke, embarrassed at being caught with his trousers down.
‘I do apologise Miss,’ he said, briefly glancing towards the smoke alarm which was covered with an Elastoplast. ‘I know I shouldn’t, but I’m not allowed to leave my desk, not if I’m here on my own. I do apologise, I’m trying to give it up!’
He cleared his throat and flapped at the smoke again then resumed his librarian’s air.
‘What were you looking for?’ Then he looked at me closer. ‘Do I know you …?’
The sight of him just as in my dream was so unnerving that I had to excuse myself and go, which left him bewildered. How do you find the words to say, Yes you do know me, I am the daughter of the woman that you found – the woman in the incident – and I would like to check in the sleeves of the poets to see if she left me a suicide note. It was like a gloved hand held hostage my vocal chords.
I practically ran back to the station, where there were leaves on the tracks and pigeons were grumbling in the concourse rafters, and in the distance the top of the Titford church tower was the only thing left in the sun.
Back on the train I watched out of the window as the sheep went past from county to county, and the buildings changed and grew less provincial, for Titford is nothing like Egham. And when I got off back here at Egham I couldn’t wait to get back to Green Place, where Aunt Coral ran out to meet me.
‘Sue, I’ve been so worried about you,’ she said, ‘Loudolle said you had a skin disease.’
After a dinner of mince when everyone else had gone to bed, I showed Aunt Coral my cobblers label – my message from the other world. ‘This pair should not be together, because they are a mismatch, one is a 40 and one is a 42.’
‘I’m not sure that it is a message from the other world,’ said Aunt Coral.
‘It is,’ I said. ‘Because Dad is forty and Ivana is forty-two, they are a mismatch, don’t you see?’
‘You’re being a fool to yourself Sue; you’re looking for a message where there is none.’
‘In order to be a fool, Aunt Coral, you have to not know that you are one. So to be a fool to yourself is impossible, if you already know that you aren’t one.’
‘I’m not sure I follow,’ she said. ‘I think you’re over-tired. Being a fool to yourself means you are being a fool to yourself as opposed to being a fool to somebody else. It isn’t to do with knowing or not knowing that you are a fool.’
Sometimes she can be obtuse.
‘I’m not sure I agree, but I do see your point,’ she said after a pause. ‘And I know you are searching for why she did this, but it may be that unfortunately, we just don’t know. Even if you live with a person for years, it’s still possible to not really know them; we only ever know of a person what they choose to let us see. And what is inside can be opposite to what is on show.’
But of course I knew my mother a lot better than she did. I showed her Mr Edgeley’s card.
‘She sent this to Mr Edgeley,’ I said, ‘from number 42. He was her ballroom partner.’
‘Let me see,’ said Aunt Coral.
‘This could have been what she meant by the numbers forty and forty-two. Maybe she is trying to tell me something that I cannot interpret.’
‘Possibly, or it might just be his address,’ said Aunt Coral.
‘You think my messages from the other world are rubbish.’
‘Not if they help,’ she said.
It was going to be impossible to make her see, and I had to forgive her, for I knew she was unable to see things another way. She is just too pragmatic and sciencey.
‘Do you have any idea what she might have meant by the PS?’ I said.
‘It sounds like she’d lent him some cloths,’ said Aunt C.
‘But why would she bother about cloths if she was going to end her life in the afternoon?’ I said.
She gazed into the middle distance. ‘I don’t know,’ she said after a while. Mum leaving me as she did was the ultimate in not caring. Sometimes I feel so angry with her, which is then accompanied by guilt. Being angry with a person you love is such a vicious opposite and a never-ending conflict in your never-ending life.
I went off to bed feeling deathly but not so deathly that I didn’t put a note under Loudolle’s door:
Loudolle
Hope you don’t catch my skin disease, which is very itchy. I just wanted to warn you that my face has been up against that eye.
S
The moon is full, the wind tussling the tired leaves of summer, and soon Mr Jewell will appear and light up.
Coral’s Commonplace: Volume 3
Aunt Fern’s, Whistlers Corner, Sleep, Somerset, August 12, 1944
(Aged 22)
Mother suns herself on the beach, seizing the wonderful moment, remembering when the Junkers 88 kept flying over on their way to take part in the blitz. The hamlet here was too small for the Germans to bother with, but they did once take a pop at a fishing boat. Mr Donaldson dived into the sea to slow down the bullets. He was lucky.
Aunt Fern’s boys Alleric and Oliver play nearby, running races through the barbed wire tunnels on the beach in spite of the possibility of mines. They were well drilled in earlier days when the skies were still full of bombers, as to what to do if they discovered a German pilot on the run. Aunt Fern says the drill went like this:
Aunt F: ‘What should you say?’
Alleric and Oliver: ‘You are my prisoner.’
Aunt F: ‘And if he becomes aggressive?’
A and O: ‘I am your prisoner.’
Enemy paratroopers had been known to disguise themselves as nuns and vicars. As a consequence the locals have become highly suspicious of the Church.
The others are well. Mother drives a food truck in the village, and yesterday she misjudged its height and took a short cut under the bridge to make her delivery. The recipients of the food have been complaining of nuts and bolts in their rations.
Cameo had a job for a short time, driving the pilots to the airfield. That was until they discovered that she had lied about her age to get it! (Her driving was self-taught in the Bentley up and down the drive at Green Place. Mother and Father didn’t know!) Her cunning plan was to meet all the pilots and get invited to all the dances and it wor
ked. Now she has an American boyfriend who has taught her ‘the jitterbug’. He thinks the Somerset accent and the American accent are similar! His name is Lieutenant Chadwick Clements. She waits for him in the woods behind his barracks . . . oh my! She explained that nearly every time his squadron flies out on a mission, somebody doesn’t come back, and the ones that do have lost a friend who didn’t. They drink gallons because of the pressure. It’s not surprising.
Before the war we knew very few men, and now there are all these soldiers. It’s hard not to fall, with the constant reminder of the shortness of life intensifying every moment. If I thought it was my last day on earth, I would want to spend it in love. The most popular woman in the village is the seamstress, Mrs Allsuch, who can remodel your dress and make even a frump feel pretty. A new collar here, a contrast belt there – it all saves on the ration book. Yet it seems so shallow to be even thinking about romance, when every day, people are giving their lives.
I wish it were my turn to wait in the woods for a pilot. Almost everyone I know is having some sort of dalliance; even Mother has a General with a twinkle in his eye who makes sure he passes when she’s gardening. I must have an invisible sign on my head which reads, ‘Desperate, Proceed with Caution’. I worry that it’s because I’m too old, the plain one, the swot, the geek, one of the privileged few who are lucky enough to study, who are expected to deliver honours unto their family. I must try and rewrite the sign on my head so it reads something less unsettling. I must not look like I’m searching, in spite of the fact that I am.