by Mary Mackie
Frank and I were out in the streets again by three thirty, with amity restored between us. He took me to an art gallery where one of his paintings hung alongside works by more famous artists. I was impressed.
‘Shall you let me do your portrait now?’ he laughed.
We had tea at the Ritz, and later he took me to a box he had reserved in a music hall on whose bill both Little Titch and Marie Lloyd appeared. I loved the colour and gaiety, the dancing, bright costumes, and the catchy songs in which the audience joined. Neither Mother nor Grandmother would have approved of the innuendo, but it made Frank laugh. I laughed, too — even at the jokes against the Kaiser. Absurd to believe that anything could harm this jolly world of warmth and togetherness.
The master of ceremonies announced ‘The Gala Girls’, but it was not until the dance troupe came on to tap their shoes to the ‘Maple Leaf Rag’ that I recalled where I had heard the name. There, among the beauties in their frothy short skirts and long ringlets, was my acquaintance from the Channel steamer, Judy Love, and next to her a vivid redhead who could be none other than her friend Elsie.
‘You know her? Which one?’ Frank lifted his opera glasses to examine the girls more closely, and what he saw made him whistle. ‘The blond one? Quite a corker, isn’t she? We’ll go round after the show and say hello.’
‘There’s no need for—’
‘Of course there is, Kate. You can’t spot an old friend and just go away without saying hello.’
We did more than say hello: we took Judy and Elsie out to supper. They had a riotous time, bowled over by Frank’s charm, wit and artistic looks, by his long hair, his soft shirt with its cravat and baggy jacket, by the big-brimmed hat he affected, by the waiters who greeted him as an old friend, the well-dressed people who paused to speak to him and, not least, by the money he spent. His behaviour scandalized me, but after an unaccustomed glass or two of champagne I found myself joining in the laughter. Thoughts of war retreated, gladly put aside for happier things.
‘Lovely to see you again, dear!’ Judy Love cried as we delivered her and Elsie to their lodgings. ‘Didn’t I tell you that German boy wasn’t worth your tears? I knew you’d soon forget him.’ Giving Frank an arch look, she laughed. ‘But you should have told me more about your family. Wish I’d got a gorgeous uncle like this to take me about.’
‘Oh, so do I!’ Elsie shrieked. ‘Night, night, Uncle Frank! Going to give us a goodnight kiss, then?’
He was only too happy to oblige both of them with kisses, after which they stumbled up the steps to their front door, giggling and waving.
In the morning, I had only the slightest headache to remind me of a few hours which, by daylight, appeared scorchingly decadent.
Frank and I spent the next two days seeing the sights and visiting museums and galleries. On Saturday we attended a performance of The Cherry Orchard, which, said Frank, would convince his mother we had been serious in our pursuit of culture and, er-um, we needn’t mention the music hall, need we? He was incorrigible and I adored him.
On Sunday we walked in the parks and listened to the opinions at Speakers’ Corner. Frank heckled some of them, and raised laughter from the audience. Watching him, I knew I could never take the risk of having him hanged as a traitor. No one in Berlin would hear about armour-plated ‘water tanks’, not from me.
On our final day in London, Frank gave me some money to go shopping while he kept his appointment with his client. I bought a silver-plated lapel pin, with a tiny biplane on it, to send to Carl-Heinz as a memento; I knew he dreamed of being a flier some day. He could wear the pin, and think of me whenever he touched it.
After lunch, we took a boat trip on the river and, like any tourist, I goggled at landmarks I had only heard of before. If my uncle was trying to persuade me that a sojourn in London, as a student, was a desirable thing, he succeeded very well. The city would provide ample material and opportunity for me to practise my journalism. I almost began to hope that I might pass that wretched exam. Almost. In my heart I still prayed that a letter from Carl-Heinz might be waiting for me.
We dined in the restaurant car on the train that evening, arriving home after nine o’clock. I was able to plead extreme weariness and retreat to my room to think over all that had happened. Where did my future lie? Where my loyalties?
My heart leapt as I saw two letters waiting for me. Both of them were from Berlin – one from Gudrun, the other from my stepbrother. Sighing, I laid them aside, thinking that reading them would serve to send me off to sleep, but first I took my time about preparing for bed, put on a clean nightdress, gave my hair a good brushing, took a sip of the hot cocoa Annie had brought me and, already yawning, opened Fritzi’s letter.
Some phrases remain etched for ever in my mind, written in an erratic hand that revealed my stepbrother’s distress. I can’t think of it without the whole scene coming back in detail: pillows yielding against my back, feather mattress hugging me, fresh sheets harsh against my bare feet, smelling of air and starch – the beds were always changed on a Saturday. Lamplight laid a soft arc across the bed with its thick cream blankets and heavy white cotton spread, throwing patterns up the wall from the brass-knobbed bedstead. Shadows crouched in corners, water gurgled in pipes, and in the darkness outside drawn curtains a wind in the woods shushed and sighed…
And Fritzi’s letter in my hand silently cut me to pieces.
They had not wished me to know the truth, he said. Indeed, he himself had not believed it, at first. Now, since I persisted in my folly, he felt it was time I knew, even if it hurt me, which it would, and he was sorry about that, but it had to be, my own behaviour obliged him to be brutal in order to save me and my family from further shame and humiliation, to which end he had to tell me that I must not write again to Carl-Heinz. Carl-Heinz was using my letters to make mock of me – using them as proof that his stories of my immodest devotion to him had not been exaggerated.
Stories of… what?
Feeling as if an iced draught were stirring my scalp, I learned the truth about Carl-Heinz von Siemens, the honourable, blue-blooded, nobly born young officer of the Crown Prince’s élite guard. He had courted me as an amusement, regaling his friends with every detail of his pursuit of the silly young Ausländerin who had worn her heart high on her sleeve. He had recounted, amid laughter, the words he had used to turn my head, and the way I had responded, adding a little more, and a little more, until his audience gasped for each new instalment in the story of the sexual seduction of Katarin von Wurthe.
Seduction, total and complete – that was what he had claimed – my becoming his mistress, willingly surrendering to his frequent demands…
No… My brain refused to take it in. I sat without moving, hardly breathing, staring at the letter, reading it over and over. The words danced in front of me, mocking me.
Fritzi’s meaning came over more in what he hinted than what he said directly – he couldn’t write such things to me in plain words. Being my stepbrother, he had been the last to hear the rumours, but as soon as he got wind of what was being whispered he had told Pa, and Pa had sent word to Carl-Heinz that the association must finish. So the joke had ended and the rejection letter had been written, delivered by Willi. My parents had decided to ship me off without saying a word to me of what had happened. ‘We wanted no unpleasant scenes. Your mother is distressed enough.’ Anger made his penstrokes jagged.
‘The more I think of it, the more I thank God you are not my sister in blood. If you were, the shame would have killed my father, and forced me to resign my commission. You must never come back. You are no longer welcome here. You have disgraced us all.’
I had been branded an immoral woman without the chance to defend myself. That was what hurt me most. Rather than ask me, they had believed Carl-Heinz’s lies. ‘We knew you would not admit to it,’ Fritzi had written. Even if I had denied it, I would not have been believed. Did none of them know me at all? Did none of them trust me? Not even Mother?
Throwing down the pen, I ran to snatch his picture from beside my bed and stare at his smiling, lying face. The truth hit me with a force like talons clawing inside me. They had let me be part of their playtime, let me laugh and dance and drive with them, and then they had used my name, destroyed my reputation… Oh, I knew the way they talked about women! But that was other women, loose women, light women. Not the sisters of brother-officers! Except, of course, that I wasn’t Fritzi’s sister. I was low-born English, not Prussian aristocracy. I didn’t count.
Feeling as if my heart were dead inside me, I removed the photograph from its frame and tore it across and across, then laid the pieces in the fireplace and set a match to them and watched them burn, and used the flame to light a corner of Fritzi’s letter, and let it curl and blacken in my fingers until the final corner floated to charred ashes in the grate. After it I burned my last letter from Carl-Heinz, severing every tie.
It’s not true, Mother! I wrote again, in despair, the ink blotched by tears of both pain and fury. I swear it’s not true!
Seven
My appearance in the kitchen at six thirty the next morning startled a sleepy Annie. As we shared a pot of tea I told her I hadn’t slept well, that I was going out for some fresh air and if I did not return in time for breakfast would she make excuses for me, please? Annie’s good eye regarded me worriedly while the other fretted beyond my shoulder.
‘All right, miss, if you say so. Only… I’m not telling any lies. If anybody asks, I’ll tell the truth.’
‘That’s fine, Annie,’ I agreed levelly, not caring. ‘We should all tell the truth, as often as we can.’
On that misty, golden morning the trees all wore the same dark-green uniform, some turning brown at the cuffs, and in hedgerows blackberries hung in thick clusters. As I turned my trusty sit-up-and-beg cycle into the vale, laughter sounded from a field where women gleaned among corn stubble, while on the opposite side of the road a horse-drawn reaper chopped down bean stalks. The summer had done her work of ripening grain and fruit. Now she was withdrawing, shyly and sadly, leaving the stage for her sister, autumn, waiting in the wings.
Something of my life was ending, too. The last of childhood, perhaps. Despite the brightness of the lifting sun, the breeze brought a warning of colder days. My heart matched it, cold as the heart of the boy Kay, stolen by the Snow Queen. I would never care for anyone or anything, ever again. My pride in being German by adoption looked like stupidity now. Ten seemingly happy years in Berlin had been based on illusion.
A need for solace drew me up the rise to the church, lying quiet behind walls of dark yew. The click of the latch sounded like a shot, ricocheting through the stillness, and as I stepped over the high threshold the smell of old stone, dusty sunlight and damp hymn books enfolded me.
The church seemed even bigger now that it was empty, filled with the calm of long ages of listening for the still, small voice. Shafts of sunlight slanted through stained glass while great wooden trusses in the roof, soaring above like the inside of an upturned Ark, took and echoed every sound. I found myself walking on the balls of my feet, trying not to disturb the tranquillity as I waded through pools of coloured light, going softly up the central aisle and through the rood screen with its defaced paintings of saints. Like one seeking sanctuary, I sank down at the back of the choir stalls, my back to the great organ whose pipes lifted in stately symmetry. It almost seemed alive. Vibrations in the air still strummed to the memory of its music. Oh, yes, there were presences. Kindly ones, breathing a peace that failed to reach my shuttered heart.
Tears came stinging, making me pull a handkerchief from the soft purse at my belt, and as I did so something clinked to the floor – the lapel pin which I had bought in London for Carl-Heinz. I bent and picked it up, turning it between my fingers to watch the tiny silver biplane glint in the light, delicate as a dragonfly, a frame with wings, to be ridden by daredevils. I had bought it with such love, such hope… No, I mustn’t think like that. Blinded by more tears, I wiped them away, took a deep breath and lifted my head.
Opposite, on the wall between two tall stained-glass windows, a black marble plaque had been carved with words that leapt at me:
In Memory of John George Rhys-Thomas
a beloved son and brother
Drowned, August 4th, 1901, aged 27
‘When our tears of grief are dried,
we shall remember your laughter.’
John… I closed my aching eyes, reaching out with my senses to call him, as once I had called my secret playmates. But John wasn’t there. The church couldn’t contain him. He belonged outside, with the wind and the sun, part of the elements, in the woods, on the marshes, along the shore. It was there he would find me, when the time came…
A sharp bang jerked me back to reality. As it echoed through the empty spaces of the church I heard a male voice curse softly, then the measured tread of heavy boots on stone, and a curious swishing sound. Through gaps in the rood screen I saw a great sheaf of ripe wheat bound with twine, being carried on someone’s shoulder; the wheat was making a sibilant noise, ears and straw brushing together as they bounced up and down, whispering memories of sunlight and promises of crusty loaves.
I sat still, hoping I wouldn’t be seen. I couldn’t see the man’s face, only his faded blue shirt and brown corduroys, but there was something about the long legs and thick leather belt at his waist, the muscular brown arm embracing the sheaf… He came into the chancel, manoeuvring his burden through the screen, and went to drop it in a corner by the altar rail. He had taken off his cap, so I could see the curly hazelnut hair, newly cropped, and the angle of a hard brown cheek and jaw…
Philip Farcroft stood a moment gazing at the jewelled crucifix on the altar, taking his rolled cap from where he had stuck it in his belt. Then, turning to leave, he straightened with a visible start as he saw me.
‘Miss von Wurthe!’ He spoke softly, his deep voice hardly stirring the echoes. ‘I didn’t see you there! Good morning.’
I don’t think I replied.
‘I, er…’ He gestured at the wheat. ‘I’m just bringing the sheaves for the harvest service next Sunday. Got some more on the wagon outside.’
‘Don’t let me delay you.’
The flicker in his eyes said he had noted the rebuff. ‘Yes. Right,’ he said, and strode loudly away.
He brought six sheaves in all, two framing the altar, another four along the bottom of the rood screen. Each time, his boots made a rude intrusion in that quiet place. I could have left while he was doing his job, but I stayed where I was, my head bent, my handkerchief balled in one hand, the lapel pin in the other. I reasoned that I was waiting for the place to be quiet again, after the farmer had gone, but perhaps I was lying to myself. Something about Philip Farcroft had intrigued me from the moment I saw him standing in the doorway of the railway carriage.
At last a silence fell. I could sense Philip hesitating, then I heard hobnails clink on stone as he came to the chancel steps and said with a heavy attempt at humour, ‘Well, that’s my bit done. “Bringing in the sheaves”, eh?’
I nodded, murmuring something.
Another pause ensued. When I didn’t look up, he came slowly up the steps. ‘Is something wrong?’
I lifted my head, knowing my face informed on me. ‘No.’
Green eyes regarded me steadily as he said, ‘Our harvest’s nearly in, so long as this weather holds. We plan our barn supper for Saturday night, and then the thanksgiving on Sunday… Will you be coming to the service?’
‘I’m not sure.’ Wishing he would go away, I stared at my hands. How could I think with this great clumsy farmhand hovering over me?
But, instead of leaving, Philip slid into the pew a few feet from me, leaning on his knees, fiddling with
his tweed cap. ‘It’s peaceful here.’
‘Yes.’ After all, I was glad that he had stayed.
He turned his head to slant a look along his shoulder. ‘Am I intruding?’
‘The church is open for anyone, I suppose.’
The silence gathered round us, but, given my intense awareness of him, and the confusion of my feelings, it was hardly peaceful.
‘How’s the little ’un?’ he asked. ‘The baby. Edward Henry Rhys-Thomas.’
‘Edward Henry Philip,’ I reminded him.
After a moment, he rumbled, ‘She’ll forget about that.’
‘I don’t think any of us will ever…’ I stopped myself. ‘I suppose you know that everyone believes it was I who…’ I couldn’t put it into words, not to him. I was remembering the baby cradled in the big, calloused, gentle hands that were toying with his cap. I was remembering his body, half naked…
‘It seemed best to let them believe what they wanted to believe,’ he said. ‘I didn’t tell any lies, but when they made assumptions I didn’t argue. Easier that way. For everyone. It might be better if we forget about it, too. Miss von Wurthe—’
‘It’s Brand,’ I interrupted. ‘Catherine Brand.’ The edge in my voice made him send me another puzzled glance, but he was too polite to ask about it directly.
‘If you’re niece to Frank Rhys-Thomas,’ he said, ‘then you must be Clara’s daughter. You were here before, when you were a little girl.’
‘Yes. But I don’t remember—’
‘Oh, we didn’t meet. I was away at school a lot of the time. But everyone in Even’m knows the Rhys-Thomases. Your mother was very beautiful, so they say.’
‘All the men seemed to think so,’ I sighed, folding my handkerchief around the little silver aeroplane on its long pin. ‘Well, it was true. Still is. I don’t take after her – not in that way.’
After a long moment, Philip said slowly, ‘If any other girl said a thing like that, I might think she was fishing for compliments.’