by Maggie Hope
Charlie laughed softly. ‘Neither did you. It doesn’t matter, does it? It’s a silly custom, I always think. I thought we would rather see each other, enjoy the concert together.’
Marina thought he could have sent a card anyway but her resentment was melting in the warmth of his presence. She didn’t say that she didn’t even know his address, so how could she have written to him or sent a card? They had reached the door of the church now and went in and found their seats, hard wooden chairs brought in from the Sunday School to augment the pews. There was an air of magic about the place today, the people talking in hushed tones, the vaulted ceiling darkly mysterious, a lighted tree in the entrance, a crib and gold-painted cardboard angels above it. The choir and orchestra were taking their places, the audience rustled as they settled down in their seats and looked expectantly towards them, talk trailing into silence. Charlie took her hand in a warm, firm clasp and the orchestra tuned up and finally launched into Handel’s Messiah.
It was magical all right. Charlie leaned over to her in a pause and whispered, ‘You look rapt. You see, I told you you’d love it.’
She did. ‘Oh, yes, it’s grand, it is,’ she assured him. ‘Thank you, Charlie.’ The evening passed in a haze of music and singing, low and reverent or sometimes unbearably sweet then swelling to a triumphant chorus which soared to the roof and beyond. And Marina’s heart swelled with it, her hand still held in Charlie’s firm grasp and her shoulder close against his and that was as sweet as the music. Too soon it was over.
Outside, balancing on cobblestones in the black strappy sandals she had got for Christmas from Kate, her toes curling up against the cold, Marina looked around the square at the coloured lights decorating the town hall and in Doggart’s windows the reflections of the street lamps. They seemed to carry all the enchantment of the evening after the dark of the blackout years of war. She thought of news reels she had seen of London with the lights on again: Piccadilly, Shaftesbury Avenue, Oxford Street. No doubt Durham could not possibly compare but she would not change the little city for anywhere in the world, lit up or not.
‘That’s a faraway look you’ve got in your eyes,’ said Charlie, coming out of the church behind her. ‘What are you thinking about?’
Marina laughed and he tucked her hand into the crook of his arm. ‘Oh, just that I haven’t got used to the lights yet. Durham looks so lovely like this, doesn’t it?’ She lifted one foot off the ground as she spoke and shivered; the cold was shooting up her legs through the thin soles of the sandals.
He noticed the gesture. ‘You’re frozen!’ he exclaimed. ‘Why on earth are you wearing dancing sandals on a night like this?’
‘I … they were pretty …’ And her sensible brogues were shabby and scuffed and even if she had the coupons there was such a shortage of nice shoes in the shops, everything went to the great god export.
‘Come on, we’ll find a pub and warm you up,’ he said and drew her down a street and into the Mitre. The place was full and so was the lounge, but Charlie left her and fought his way to the bar with the ease of long practice. Marina kept her head down, feeling abandoned. She wasn’t used to pubs, wasn’t even old enough to be in one, and she was nervous that if the landlord noticed her he would know that immediately. Laughing and talking went on all around her and people pushed past her. ‘Scuse me, hinny, sorry,’ someone said and put a large hand on her shoulder to steady her after bumping into her. Marina smiled shyly.
Charlie was soon back, though, and led her to a corner by the fire and thrust a glass of sherry in her hand. Not the sweet ruby wine they usually drank to bring in the New Year at home but a clear amber-coloured liquid which tasted acidic on her tongue. She could feel its warmth coursing down her throat and even her toes felt better.
‘Charlie!’
Marina looked up to see a group of students carrying glasses of beer threading their way from the bar. They were talking and laughing together but their eyes were on her, speculatively.
‘What are you doing here? I thought you weren’t coming back until after the New Year,’ one said. He stared at Marina. ‘Still, need I ask, eh, old boy?’
She caught Charlie’s look of annoyance before he quickly assumed a smile. ‘Marina, these reprobates are friends of mine from college. Clive, John, and the other one is Scouser. Lads, this is Marina. She works at Shire Hall, in the Treasurer’s Department. Processing all our grants, so be nice to her.’
The one he called Scouser made an exaggerated O with his mouth. ‘Been robbing the cradle, haven’t you, Charlie? Not that I blame you, lad.’ His accent was thick Liverpudlian and Marina had some trouble in following him. When she did she blushed and took another quick drink, draining her glass.
‘Shut up, Scouser!’ said Charlie and took Marina’s glass and put it down on a nearby table. He finished his own beer and took her arm. ‘Come on, love,’ he said, ‘let’s go. Goodnight, you lot.’
Marina was drawn out of the bar with unexpected suddenness. She called goodnight over her shoulder to the grinning students behind.
‘Let’s go to my place,’ said Charlie, ‘at least we can have some peace there.’
‘Oh, I don’t know …’ said Marina, thinking of the bus journey home. She would have to get back to Bishop Auckland in time for the last bus out to Jordan.
‘Don’t you want to?’ He was looking down at her, his face close to hers, one eyebrow raised. ‘Of course, if you want to go straight home –’
‘No. I’ll come.’ The hot denial came immediately.
Marina trembled, whether with cold or excitement she wasn’t sure.
Charlie shared a house with other university men at the top of a steep hill near the main road out to Crook. Teetering in her high-heeled sandals Marina leaned against him for support and he put his arm around her and rushed her up the slope so that by the time they reached the top they were both panting and laughing. He took out a key and opened the door, ushering her into an untidy kitchen with a square hole where the range used to be and a gas cooker in its place. There was an old chipped sink and draining board with an assortment of cups and a couple of pint mugs up-ended on it. The deal table in the middle of the room was surrounded by a selection of odd chairs.
‘Go into the other room, for God’s sake, and take off those ridiculous shoes before they cripple you for life,’ Charlie ordered, as she stumbled slightly on the worn lino. ‘Not that they’re not sexy, they are, but your legs don’t need them.’
Marina blushed and, carrying her sandals, did as she was told.
It was the first time she had been here. She walked over to the window in her stockinged feet (precious nylons she had queued up in Woolworths to buy), and looked out at the city below her. The lights, strings of them. The looming cathedral, standing guard. That’s what she needed: something to stand guard over her. What a fool she was! One part of her mind told her this but the other wasn’t listening. Instead it was listening for Charlie’s footsteps as he came through from the kitchen, and her blood sang. It was half-past nine, she saw as she looked at the watch on her wrist. Another Christmas present, this time from Lance. If she wanted to catch her bus and the connecting one in Bishop she would have to go in ten minutes.
Charlie came up behind her. ‘You don’t want your coat on in here, do you?’ he murmured and slipped it off her shoulders. As he did so he buried his face in her neck. ‘Mmmm, you smell delicious.’ She turned to face him and he put the coat over a chair and took her properly in his arms and Marina melted inside, or felt that she did. He smelled delicious, she thought, of toilet soap and not White Windsor which Dad and Lance used because it was all they had in the war and before and they were used to it. ‘Nancy boy soap,’ they would sneer if they smelled this but it wasn’t, it was lovely. Then all thoughts of soap and everything else were driven from her mind, she could think only of the way he was kissing her, his tongue driving into her mouth, tasting her, and she was tasting him and her mind whirled as her body tingled with the most
tantalising sensations so that she hardly knew it when they sank down on to the tartan blanket which covered the sagging couch.
The feel of his hand on her breast gave her pause for a second only, it felt so right. Her senses whirled. When he slid his hand to the hem of her skirt she was incapable of stopping him. But then he lifted his head at the sound of a male voice going past the window.
‘Come upstairs, my love,’ he whispered. ‘We don’t want anyone bursting in on us, do we?’
Scouser, opening the front door, was just in time to see a female leg disappearing and Charlie’s door closing softly. He grinned to himself. ‘Good going there, Charlie,’ he said but there was no one to hear.
Just for a moment Marina hesitated as she saw the bed. What was she doing here? But it was just a moment before she gazed up into Charlie’s eyes. ‘Do you love me?’ she asked. Everything would be all right if he loved her, wouldn’t it?
‘Do you love me?’ he countered but she heard only what she wanted to hear.
‘Oh, yes!’ she replied and stood passively while he took off her dress and never even considered enough to be thankful she was wearing her new undies, cami-knickers and bra, artificial silk and lace-trimmed. He pushed the straps over her shoulders and she stood there and let him look at her because, after all, they were committed to each other now. They had confessed their love to each other and one day they would be married. And, she admitted to herself, at the moment she didn’t care if that fairy-tale future wasn’t what he wanted. She loved him and was sure she could make him love her.
Charlie picked her up and laid her on the bed and kissed her lingeringly. Then suddenly he was transformed, shedding his own clothes hastily and abandoning them where they fell. Until he too was naked and springing into the narrow bed, perforce half on top of her, and she could feel his hardness against her belly.
Marina was a modern girl, a woman she would call herself, she knew what it was all about, didn’t she? There had been lessons in school on human biology, occasions for tittering behind their hands and Miss Macdonald intoning solemnly on the need for adult responsibility, love and commitment.
None of it had prepared her for the surge of feeling which threatened to drown her or the pain which brought back some sense of reality as he drove into her. Charlie moved above her, mouth open, eyes glazed in a red face before shuddering and falling on top of her, his face buried in the pillow by her side. Marina lay quiet, waiting for him to recover.
So this was what it was like, married love. She felt a tenderness towards him, he seemed so vulnerable now. But was this all?
‘Did you come?’ asked Charlie. He lifted his head and kissed her gently on the lips before rolling off her carefully for it was a narrow bed. In the end he was balanced precariously on the edge.
Marina felt wet and sticky and muscles she hadn’t known she had were protesting. ‘Come?’ she asked, not understanding.
‘Was it good?’ he asked, a little uncertainly now.
‘Oh, yes, marvellous,’ she said. ‘Oh, Charlie, I do love you.’ But he was asleep, one leg across hers, an arm over her chest and anchored on hers, a way of stopping himself falling out of bed. Well, she would have to stay now. But of course it was all right, they would be married. Maybe she was young to be wed, not yet seventeen, but after all, her own mother had only been eighteen. With Charlie she would have an introduction to the academic life of the university, she might even be able to take her Highers, go on and do other courses.
Marina eased her shoulder slightly, then in spite of the discomfort she fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Chapter Eight
‘I had to stay with my friend, I missed the bus,’ Marina said as she went in the door. ‘I –’ But there was no one there, the fire had burned down in the grate and the kitchen was chilly. ‘Mam?’ she called. ‘Mam, where are you?’ There was no answer.
It was the day after Boxing Day. Marina had caught the first bus out of Durham and rehearsed what she was going to say all the way home – and there was no one to tell it to. Of course, Dad and Lance were on first shift, they weren’t in yet but they soon would be, she thought. Going upstairs, she found her mother’s bed was unmade as though she had left it in a hurry; her own bed was smooth and obviously unslept in. Marina sat on it, mystified. She was tired and cold and her muscles were stiff and she felt she could smell Charlie on herself.
Well, she could hurry and wash and change before her mother came in, with any luck. She went downstairs and took a ladle of water out of the boiler which was part of the range; it wasn’t hot but at least it was lukewarm. She washed herself upstairs and dressed in her everyday clothes, coming down again to fill the boiler up for the men. They were going to build pithead baths at all the mines, or so the government said, but for the moment they still needed hot water and the tin bath which hung on the wall outside in the yard.
Mam often went out to help with a birth, in the middle of the night sometimes, Marina told herself. She could thank her lucky stars that this had been one of those times. She looked up at the mantelpiece and saw there was a note propped up against the tea caddy. Goodness, how had she missed it? What a relief! Mam must have been called out during the night and probably thought Marina was home and in her bed. She certainly wouldn’t dream her daughter had done what she had done, would she? Marina was filled with guilt once again as she reached for the note and read the few words.
‘Marina. Gone to help with Sarah Sharpe, poor soul, she’s dying. If I’m not back, make chips for your dad and Lance. There’s some corned beef in the pantry to go with it and a new jar of pickles. Mam.’
The tension flowed out of Marina. Her secret was still her own. And, after all, it wouldn’t matter anyway. She and Charlie would get married and live in Durham … oh, the future was bright! She hummed to herself as she prepared the meal for Lance and her father. She was peeling a potato when suddenly she dropped the knife and clasped her hand to her head.
‘What a selfish, unfeeling pig I am!’ she said aloud. She had been so pleased that her parents weren’t likely to get to know about her illicit night with Charlie that she hadn’t given a thought to her friend or Rose’s poor mother. As soon as the men came in and she had seen to their needs she would slip along there and see if there was anything she could do. Poor Rose, and poor Michael and Mary. What were they going to do now? How old were they? Six? For some reason she did not think of Alf Sharpe at all, nor of what he was feeling.
‘What will we do now?’
Rose, Aunt Elsie and Alf sat round the kitchen table, drinking the tea which Kate Morland had made for them. Rose couldn’t understand why she felt no grief. She hadn’t cried, was simply numb.
‘You should eat a bite of breakfast for a start,’ said Kate. ‘Howay now, just try a slice of toast. You’ll feel the better for it.’
She didn’t feel ill, Rose wanted to say. For a minute she wondered why Kate was here, making the breakfast, when she was perfectly capable of doing it herself. She looked at Aunt Elsie who was spreading dripping on the toast, offering some to Rose. She felt nauseous but took it and bit into it obediently, and was surprised to find she could swallow it.
Alf was munching steadily through his breakfast, spreading the precious butter ration on toast and covering it with plum jam. Men! thought Kate. Though, to be fair, her Sam wasn’t like this one. He might be a gambler but he was a feeling sort of fellow. She stifled a yawn. By, she was getting too old to be up half the night every time something like this happened in the village. And all for the sake of a new pinny or suchlike. Not that she wanted any more … no, she didn’t do it for any reward. But her mother had done it in years gone by and Kate had helped her and then when her mother got too old had carried on by herself.
‘Don’t worry about it now, Rose,’ Alf’s sister Elsie was saying. Mind, thought Kate, it was easy to see those two were brother and sister, they were so alike. In person that is if not in nature. Elsie was such a nice woman and obviously kind, her
face open, no malice in her at all. Kate wondered why she had no family of her own. She had been a great help in laying out Sarah. Rose had wanted to help but Kate had banished her to the kitchen.
‘Go and sit with your dad,’ she had said. But the girl barely looked at him and when he’d tried to hug her she had pulled away and run outside to the yard gate. There she’d stood, staring out into the blackness, until Elsie had gone out to her and brought her in. ‘You have a lie-down, pet,’ her aunt had said as they came into the house, her arm around Rose’s shoulder, and the girl had nodded and walked up the stairs though she hadn’t stayed there for long before she was downstairs again, wandering from the kitchen to the room and back again, a bundle of nerves. In the end, it was Alf who had gone upstairs to bed. Kate looked at him now. He’d finished his meal and was taking the cigarette stump from behind his ear, lighting it with a brass lighter made from a shell case. Most of the men had them; the soldiers had made them during the war and sold them to make a bit extra.
‘You’ll have to go to the register office in Bishop for the death certificate, Alf,’ Kate reminded him sharply, for he was sitting back in his chair contentedly blowing cigarette smoke at the ceiling.
He frowned. ‘What, now? Can I not do it later?’
‘Best do it now, and don’t forget to get a copy for the insurance,’ Elsie joined in. ‘And while you’re about it, phone the Co-op Funeral Service and someone will come out and make arrangements.’
Rose looked down at the half-eaten toast on her plate. The funeral. Of course, that was what they had to do now, arrange the funeral. But first she had to tell Michael and Mary. She could hear them stirring and wanted to tell them herself.
‘There’s the bairns,’ she said. ‘I’ll just go up to them.’
Kate looked at Elsie as Rose ran up the stairs. Neither woman tried to intervene though Kate cast an accusing glance at Alf. ‘Poor lass,’ she said and Elsie nodded.