by MARY HOCKING
‘You would like him, Irene. When you first meet him, he’s just a tiny bit of the light comedian type – slight, fair hair, easy voice, charming to everyone. But I’m sure there is more to him than that. The maddening thing is that just when you think you are getting to know him, you come up against an odd reserve. Up go the shutters! I’ve heard from fellow officers that he can be moody. He has a sense of his own dignity, too – at parties he never lets himself go like the others. And though I appreciate his refusal to make himself silly with drink, I sometimes feel it is a kind of vanity more than a matter of principle which holds him back. I have a suspicion that if it wasn’t drinking – but some innocent clowning – he still wouldn’t enter in fully. This self-consciousness makes him a little less of a hero, but much more intriguing.
‘I am discovering what an awful beady-eyed little toad I am. Even though I like him so much, I can’t help seeing things about him, such as: that his charming, thoughtful treatment of others is in part a tribute to himself. It’s not that he wants to win other people’s admiration, so much as that he has to satisfy the high standards he has set himself. I think he may be a rather complex person, and I can’t understand what it is in me that attracts him!
‘I’m in love, Irene; I’m in love, I’m in love!
‘And I’d best be careful. Did I tell you the talk we had from the chaplain on the ship? “Men don’t look after goods they get cheap,” he informed us. “You don’t value anything you can buy at Woolworth’s. So if you want to have your fun, don’t be hurt if you get let down.” You can’t have it straighter than that.
‘I’ll have to stop soon. I’m going to meet him this evening, and that means catching a tram. I’m quartered in a convent, of all places for a good Methodist to find herself! They are Belgian nuns. Absolutely sweet. We haven’t any Flemish (or whatever it is – Walloon?) and they haven’t any English. We make big, gauche English signals at them, and they flutter back exquisitely at us. The convent is some way out of the town, and we have naval transport to take us down to the harbour when we go on duty; but at other times we catch a tram, where we sit in the first-class compartment. Can you imagine a first-class compartment on the tram to Shepherd’s Bush Green? So, later, when I have washed and changed I shall catch the tram and meet him in the garden of one of the big hotels. We shall have a couple of drinks and then we shall go for a walk along the Corniche. How I wish we could walk there forever! He is an intelligence officer. So he may be here for a while, but you can never tell. Some of the girls have had three boy friends in as many weeks. A boy friend is essential, otherwise you aren’t doing your duty by our gallant fighting men. Imagine trying to feed the five thousand with only a hundred odd Wrens and you will get some idea of the dilemma.
‘Now I have run out of paper and almost out of time. I’ll write again soon. I am longing to hear your news. I haven’t had a letter from you for weeks, so I suspect one has gone missing.
Love,
Alice.
‘P.S. His name is Gordon Stafford. He’s not handsome like those wonderful men in posters – “Back up the man on the bridge”; but he has light blue eyes that can twinkle very invitingly, yet somehow manage to make it quite clear just where you are expected to stop short of the presence. We’ll have to see about that!’
Alice put the letter on the floor and rubbed the palms of her hands on the counterpane of the bunk where she was crouched. Then she lay back and watched Madeleine. Madeleine was making up. As soon as she got the grease on her face, it melted. Madeleine persisted. Kathleen Miller, the other occupant of the dormitory, said, in the rather preaching voice she adopted whenever she spoke to Madeleine (it was her form of self-protection), ‘There’s nothing wrong with sweat, Madeleine.’
‘How right you are!’ Madeleine sketched a haughty eyebrow. ‘Let us all look to the day when it will be accepted that women too can sweat. We may not live to see it, but we can work for it – sweat for it, indeed! And it will come. We may not sweat unconcernedly, but our daughters will.’
Kathleen went out of the room. Madeleine lightly painted her mouth. ‘Why waste lipstick when it will so soon be removed? But then the same, of course, applies to clothes. Oh dear – has she gone? A pity. I’m sure she would have had something uplifting to say. Do you think we might keep a book of her sayings – the daily thoughts of a humble soul? Or perhaps “humdrum” would be better. She’s not really humble. She thinks she has a special place reserved for her in heaven, whence she will look down on me writhing in the pit.’
‘The front row of the stalls, surely?’
‘That was rather good, Alice. How unexpected you can be sometimes.’ She began to brush her hair.
Alice thought how exciting Madeleine’s life must be. And yet, even in the company of Madeleine, there was a strange sensation of waiting for it
all to begin. In some ways, our life is like that of the characters in a Jane Austen novel, she thought. Then, there were the preparations for the visit – which gown to wear, which ribbons for the hat – the coach drive, the anticipation as the characters neared their destination, the all-too-short enjoyment of the occasion, the exchanges and speculation on the return journey. Then home and all to do again another day. While now, there is this party on board ship, the pressing of clothes, brushing of hair, application of lipstick, mascara, the arrival at the dock, going up the gangplank . . . Madeleine would look around, attract the man of her choice, perhaps go to bed with him. Then, when his ship sailed, it must all be done again – another ship, another evening, another man. It was as though all life was a rehearsal for the great occasion; or a series of sketches by an artist who would eventually get it right.
‘And what are you looking so soulful about?’ Madeleine asked.
‘I was thinking about Jane Austen.’
‘That will get you nowhere with that man of yours. He is the kind who keeps the Jane Austen type of heroine waiting for years and years. You will end up like that ailing female in Persuasion, being brave and enduring when you are definitely past your best.’
Alice did not point out that the Jane Austen heroine usually got what she wanted in the end. Instead, she asked, ‘Don’t you like Gordon?’
‘I think I might be able to like him quite a lot if I put my mind to it. But it would never do. I have been around with too many men. Gordon is a shade exclusive, I suspect. He had a little run with Gwenda and dropped her when he found out her soul was no more unblemished than her face.’ She gave a theatrical sigh. ‘We have to pay the price, you know, for our sins – since Kathleen isn’t here to say it.’
Alice had looked forward eagerly to meeting attractive men, but had not been prepared for the excitement of being with such interesting women. She thought Madeleine quite the wittiest person she had yet met. Not everyone was so admiring. Madeleine was pale with crisp ash-blonde hair and narrow grey eyes which missed nothing. She had a sharp mind and a sharper tongue. The young subbies were frightened of her. ‘What’s wrong with her?’ one of them had asked Alice. ‘Why does she talk so odd?’ Madeleine needed a man with a good head on his shoulders and quite a bit of enterprise.
Less daunting, though every bit as effective, was Gwenda. She was dark with a heart-shaped face, demure blue eyes fringed with incredibly long lashes clotted with mascara, and a dreadful complexion. ‘You would think her skin would put any man off!’ Madeleine said. But Gwenda’s eyes made promises which her figure suggested she would be well able to fulfil. She was the one who drew men to her the moment she walked into a room. She could be a good companion to another woman when she had nothing better to do and was generally liked. She was quite as intelligent as Madeleine and there was considerable rivalry between them.
Jeannie claimed to be passionate and unconcerned with the small change of life – which may have explained why she never washed her neck. She had hair the colour of corn which is waiting for the reaper, worn piled precariously above her big, freckled face. Madeleine said she was ‘the most consistentl
y radiant person I have ever encountered. She should carry a sign warning that too much exposure to her may do one a mischief.’ Jeannie was warm and affectionate to all her women companions, although everyone knew she was more likely to poach then either Madeleine or Gwenda. This, she explained, was because, having such a warm nature, ‘I’m not calculating like those two; I have to respond.’
‘All in the genies, I suppose,’ Madeleine commented.
Jeannie was probably the most successful of the trio yet, in spite of her warm nature, men seemed not to like her but to accept her as one of the necessary challenges of life.
To Alice, these three were the great courtesans of their time. Yet none was beautiful. Beauty seemed a hazard for a girl. Inertia often went with it, Alice noticed; girls expected it to work for itself. Perhaps, in the more leisurely days of peace, it had; but now there was less time for its magic to take effect. A little more determination was required. One thing which Madeleine, Gwenda and Jeannie had in common was determination: the other was a strong sexual urge and the ability to enjoy their affairs.
Those who sought to emulate them were not so fortunate. There were several girls who tried to force themselves into the mould of men’s expectations and got not an ounce of pleasure in return for their not inconsiderable pain. Their example seemed to Alice to be relevant to herself. ‘I am never going to be a courtesan,’ she thought, ‘so I might as well stay the way I am.’ This sensible decision was made in the knowledge that Gordon Stafford seemed to like the way she was.
While she was riding in the tram on her way to meet him, she resolved to ask him more about himself. So far, it had been she who had recounted stories of home and family; he knew about the death of her father, about Louise’s marriage, and about Miss Blaize and the Winifred Clough Day School for Girls. He, on the other hand, gave only a few details of his life and background each time she saw him, as though his history was something precious that could be dispensed only a drop at a time. She admired this reserve, and felt herself in a position of trust when he told her he had been a scholarship boy who had gone to Cambridge.
As he stood waiting for her in the hotel courtyard, it was easy to see why Alice was sometimes puzzled by him. His face had a certain charm that might have been boyish, save that boyishness suggests the forthright, whereas in this face something – either diffidence or fastidiousness – tempered spontaneity. Lovers proceeding to their rendezvous can still display all the symptoms of delighted surprise at their first sighting of the beloved. Gordon Stafford did not react like this. When he first saw Alice, the face muscles stiffened and the eyes hooded: so might another man have reacted to a threatened blow. The wariness was only momentary, then the slow smile eased his features, although the eyes reserved judgement of the occasion until they had kissed and were walking towards the hotel.
Alice herself was not yet able to throw restraint aside immediately she greeted a man, so she was grateful for what she took to be Gordon’s forbearance. It troubled her, though, that later in the evening, when she had got over her wretched shyness, he was the one who seemed to hold back. I rebuffed him earlier on, she thought regretfully, and now he feels he has to be careful with me. She attributed to men a considerable capacity for understanding and sensitivity; the idea had not yet dawned, even as a distant cloud on her horizon, that most of them were capable of going fairly directly for what they wanted – and that there was something odd about those who failed to do this.
Gordon pointed. ‘The barrage balloons are going up.’
She did not look. Nor did she take note of the subterranean movements which told of heavy mortar fire. Life itself must be held suspended, certainly Rommel and the Afrika Corps must keep their distance, until something had been decided between herself and Gordon. She had been in the service long enough to know that wartime friendships – so quickly made – did not long survive separation. Out in the desert one of the major encounters of the war was being fought; men were dying – Guy was out there, might be dying, too – yet all that mattered was herself and Gordon. The world had become a very small place and they were the only people in it. She knew that this was monstrously selfish, but could do nothing about it.
By the time they were walking along the Corniche, the blue sky had darkened to violet and they were aware of the absence of light in the town, where a black-out was in force. Alice, looking away from the town at the vivid sky, exclaimed: ‘I never knew there could be such colour until I came out here.’
‘This is nothing.’ Automatically, he deflected the conversation, like a man shielding himself from the force of the wind. ‘You should see the lake of Galilee at sunset.’
She immediately transferred her delight to the contemplation of Galilee. ‘Yes, I must, I must!’ The thought that she might miss anything was unendurable.
They stood looking across the sea as the darkness came down and the moon dappled the water with silver. Gordon said, ‘You’re so enthusiastic,
Alice.’
‘That sounded a bit reproachful.’
‘No, it’s charming. Only I can’t let go of my feelings. If I do, they just go soaring away – like a child’s balloon. I’m left behind feeling cheated.’
‘Can’t you soar with them?’
‘Only at my peril. I get carried away and come down in some very uncomfortable place – right out there.’ He pointed away from the moonlight to where the water was dark and wrinkled as a snake.
‘Gordon, you shouldn’t think about being safe until you’re forty at least! This is the first time round.’
‘What do you know about being unsafe?’ His arm had been round her waist, now it moved involuntarily; his hand stroked the line of her thigh.
‘You’re not fair!’ she protested.
‘Fair? Alice, what a very long way you have to travel!’ He bent to kiss her. Voices called out of the darkness and there was laughter as other couples walked by. He kissed her again. She was ready for him now; slowly, her reserve melted, and she felt she had, in fact, swung out over the sea and the motion of the balloon was carrying her, swinging and dipping. She clung to him, while above his head the moon tilted vertiginously. At last, he held her away from him. ‘Well, I don’t know about you!’ He looked at her in surprise.
They walked on in silence. The night breeze was getting up. They could hear the boom of the sea in the hollows of rock and, further away, the distant boom of guns. Once, he took her hand and swung it high above their heads and laughed delightedly. On the way back, he kissed her more passionately and told her that he loved her. Alice kissed him, tasting his flesh. She had seen other lovers going about this business with a dedication she had found repellent; but then she had not understood the burning necessities of loving. Now, she was made free of this mystery. Gordon had done a great deal for her.
When they came back to the town, she was struck by how quiet it was; only the never-ending rumble of traffic on the desert road. There were few people about. The black-out seemed to have subdued the noisy town. Perhaps this disconcerted Gordon. She had hoped they would walk slowly back to the convent; but he said, looking round him distractedly, ‘Let’s find a dance, shall we? It’s not too late.’
‘Yes, all right.’ It was not what she wanted, but the promise of music playing while his arms were round her made up a little for the disappointment.
They walked through a dingy quarter of the town where as many as fifteen people might sleep in one room of a crumbling house. Gordon drew
her close to his side as they passed filthy bundles of rag propped in doorways. They had both been dismayed at the callous way in which service personnel spoke of the Egyptian poor. ‘I’ve had to revise my ideas about Empire,’ Alice admitted.
‘I never had any positive feelings about it. I was a pacifist for a time. My idea of war was of men bayoneting each other. When I examined it, I wasn’t sure whether it was the bestiality of it – or the fact that I should be terrified if someone came at me with a bayonet – that put me off th
e most. I didn’t feel able to give myself the benefit of the doubt.’
‘So you joined up?’
‘Yes. The Navy, though – no bayonets!’
In her dreams, she had imagined someone bold and brave, with very positive ideas about Empire, who would charge fearlessly with bayonet in hand if need be. She was quite prepared to dispense with that dream.
In spite of their sympathy with the poor of Alexandria, they would be glad when they came into a better part of the town. In anticipation, they began to walk more quickly. Then, suddenly, turning a corner they came upon one of those scenes like a shot from a film, where people come late upon an incident – the vehicle pulling away, the characters left behind looking after it, uncertain which way to go themselves now that the drama has been gathered up to continue elsewhere. The remnant, in this instance, was naval.
‘Has someone been hurt?’ Gordon asked.
‘A Wren.’ Alice recognized one of the signals ratings. He hesitated, eyeing her. The other sailors stood behind him; their faces, fish- white in the moonlight, told the story he held back.
‘Was she dead?’ Alice whispered.
‘Very.’ By way of confirmation, one of the sailors turned aside and was sick. ‘A couple of Aussies found her. It wasn’t them, though. We was behind them all the way from the bus.’ The sailors had closed ranks, shielding Alice from the sight of something on the pavement.
‘She shouldn’t have come along here alone,’ Gordon said.
‘She didn’t stay alone.’ The quiet venom in his voice was in itself more frightening than anything else.
Alice was uncomfortably aware, while they talked, of people watching from doorways, leaning from windows. The dark eyes watched, curious but detached, as though the English naval personnel were exotic specimens contained in some invisible bubble of atmosphere; a phenomenon to be observed, but unrelated to them.