Bobby's Girl (18 page)

‘Shakespeare didn't write
Androcles and the Lion
. George Bernard Shaw did.'

‘I know and you know but the Bishop doesn't. He's most insistent it was Shakespeare. It'll give you a chance to return to civilisation for the afternoon. You can wear that very fetching suit again.'

‘This very fetching suit is filthy after travelling here in a dirty train and truck.' She wasn't in a mood to be mollified.

‘It's clean enough to travel to Stratford tomorrow.' He dumped her bag in the canoe and climbed back in before turning to her and holding out his hand. ‘Careful stepping in. It might be an idea to take off those high heels.'

‘They're not that high and I'd rather not wade into that dirty water sploshing about in the bottom with my white tights.'

‘One of the perks of this job is you can send your clothes to the laundry free of charge.'

‘And they wash them, how?' She took his hand, and crouching low, slid on to one of the bench seats in the canoe.

‘Not very well,' he admitted. ‘Everything Sandy and I sent came back grey. The whites were dirty and the black had been bleached. Want a paddle?' He held out a spare one.

‘I've never paddled a canoe.'

‘Never?'

‘Never. I've sailed a dinghy and rowed a rowing boat
and ridden a horse. But a canoe is out of my experience.'

‘Then sit back, watch my technique and learn. You could be teaching this to the Pioneers tomorrow.'

‘That had better be a joke.'

‘Let's say Sandy and I might have exaggerated your and Kate's talents a little to get you the jobs.'

‘I said that both you and Kate could teach sailing, canoeing, swimming, sculpture, painting, drama, singing, dancing – ballet and tap – judo, karate, and would take callisthenics every morning at six sharp, six days a week,' Bobby replied in reply to her question as to what exactly he'd told the Reverend Howard and his wife about her.

‘You're not serious?'

‘Not about the callisthenics, judo and karate, no.'

‘Why are you paddling so slowly?'

‘Because this is about as private as we're going to get until our day off which might not be for a week.'

‘So what did you really tell the Reverend and Mrs Howard about me?'

‘That you're an art major entering your senior year in September and can teach art and water sports. You can swim?' he checked.

‘I can swim and I have the standard – British Standard – life-saving certificates,' she confirmed. ‘I've sailed dinghies, but nothing as small as those.' She looked across at the boats clustered on the bank of the lake.

‘They're Sunfish, small and unsinkable. Ideal to teach sailing to beginners. There's nothing to canoeing. Sure you wouldn't like a paddle?'

‘No, thank you. It's hard enough avoiding the dribbles from your paddle, without using one.'

Sandy waved to them from the jetty and Bobby quickened his pace. ‘A welcoming party's gathered to greet you.'

‘One more person on there and the jetty will sink. I suppose they're all laughing at the English girl “dressed for Ascot”, as you put it.'

His mouth twitched with suppressed laughter. ‘You'll be the first Brit most of them have met and your nation is known for its eccentricities.'

‘What are the kids like?'

‘Like kids everywhere. Good, bad, intelligent, stupid. The one thing all of them manage to be is annoying.' He stowed the paddle inside the canoe, reached out, grabbed a rope tied to a ring hanging from the jetty and hauled them alongside it.

Sandy held out his hand ready to help her out of the canoe. She took it and found herself in the centre of a noisy group of teenagers who fired questions at her from all directions.

‘Give the lady a break, folks,' Sandy shouted.

‘This way.' Bobby carried her bag past them.

‘We'll escort you to the luxury of your very own tent.' Sandy grabbed her arm as she tripped on the uneven ground.

‘The only other counsellor who enjoys the privilege of solitude is Joan. Molly and Doreen share.' Bobby lifted her bag on to a platform that was set a couple of feet above the ground.

‘Molly and Doreen are female counsellors from the Midwest, and they're waving to you,' Sandy informed her.

She waved back at the two girls in the neighbouring tent.

‘The Midwest's different from the rest of America?' she asked Sandy.

‘Very.'

‘Be careful,' Bobby warned. ‘You're not wearing the best shoes for the woods. I hope you packed sneakers.'

‘I have flat shoes.' She climbed up beside Bobby. ‘Why the platform?'

‘Bugs, raccoons, skunks, snakes,' Sandy grinned, ‘wolves, bears werewolves …'

‘Vampires, ghouls and ghosts …' she added.

‘Speaking of which, don't forget you're above ground level if you wake in the night.' Bobby ducked into the tent behind her.

‘We've had one broken ankle already. Fortunately she was a very ugly counsellor,' Sandy chipped in through the tent flap.

A sonorous masculine voice shouted, ‘Bobby? Are you in the new counsellor's quarters?'

‘Showing her the tent, and how the lamps work, sir.'
Bobby made a face at Penny. He picked up a hurricane lamp from the floor next to a sleeping bag.

She followed Bobby out. Reverend Howard was a large man in every sense of the word. As tall as Bobby, he was as wide as he was long. Fat hung in folds over the waistband of his trousers and the flesh on his arms wobbled when he moved. In contrast, the woman next to him was tiny. Barely five feet, she had a stick insect figure.

‘Reverend Howard, Mrs Howard, this is Penelope John, the Pioneer camp's new counsellor.' Bobby made the introduction.

‘Pleased to meet you, Reverend Howard, Mrs Howard.' Penny climbed down from the platform and extended her hand. Mrs Howard's handshake was limp and dry. The reverend's strong and damp.

‘You're not dressed for camp.' Mrs Howard wrinkled her nose and mouth disapprovingly and Penny understood why she'd acquired the nickname ‘Pill Face'. ‘I trust you have suitable clothes with you.'

‘I have shorts, jeans and T-shirts in my bag, Mrs Howard.'

‘I'm glad to hear it. Sandy, introduce Penelope to the female counsellors. Tell them to orientate her to the Camp Resonance and Pioneer way of thinking. And both of you boys – remember the rules. No male counsellor to enter a female counsellor's quarters or that of any female Pioneer under any circumstances.'

‘Yes, ma'am,' Bobby and Sandy chorused.

‘And no female counsellor to enter a male counsellor's
or male Pioneer's quarters.' The reverend stared at her for so long she felt uncomfortable.

‘I suggest you change and wash your face, Penelope. We do not allow our female counsellors to wear
make-up
,' Mrs Howard informed her tartly. ‘The Pioneers are here to learn self-sufficiency and enjoy nature in all its bounty, not mimic artifice.'

‘It's time you gathered your cook groups together for supper, boys,' Reverend Howard boomed. ‘Penelope, you can join Joan's cook group. They meet under the oak tree to the right of your tent.'

Bobby winked at her behind the reverend's back. She went into the tent. It was cramped and too low for her to stand upright. She opened her bag and rummaged around for jeans, T-shirt, canvas shoes, soap and flannel. As soon as she'd changed she went in search of one of the standpipes Bobby had mentioned. It, like the nearest latrine, was a five-minute walk from her tent. After soaking the flannel in the lukewarm water she scrubbed her face and hands.

A pretty girl with short brown hair and brown eyes, carrying an enormous iron cooking pot, joined her while she was rinsing out the flannel.

‘I heard Pill Face ordering you to remove your
make-up
. The woman would make a good prison guard. I'm Joan.' She set the pot on the ground and held out her hand. ‘It's my cook group you'll be joining. Not that the food's up to much. I can't cook and neither can any of the kids.'

‘Penny John.' She was relieved to see a friendly face besides Sandy and Bobby.

‘I've heard your name. Everyone in the camp has. Bobby's talked about you incessantly since we got here. You made quite an impression on him in England.'

She recalled their meeting in Grosvenor Square. ‘We made an impression on one another.'

‘He said you were protesting against the Vietnam War.'

‘Bobby was. I was at the embassy to get a visa to come here.'

‘I hate the war,' Joan said vehemently. ‘My father sent my two brothers to his cousin in Sweden to avoid the draft. We're a close family and miss them. But my father felt he had no option after what happened to my cousin, Mark. He was drafted last autumn and sent to 'Nam after six weeks' training. One month later he was posted missing. I think the not knowing is even worse than if he'd been killed. My aunt's had a breakdown and my uncle's given up. He can't work, can't eat, can't do anything. He's allowed the business he spent a lifetime building to go bankrupt.'

‘I don't know how any family can live with having a son or brother in constant danger, especially so far from home.' She thought of her older brother Ned and younger brother Evan. They'd teased her unmercifully since cradle days, but she loved them and couldn't imagine life without them.

‘It's obscene. Forcing fit, healthy, young men to fight in a war hardly anyone in America believes in. And then to see the coffins on television. Being unloaded and sent back to the boys' families … I'm sorry, I'm on a burn. I get angry every time I think about it.'

‘That's understandable.' She stepped back so Joan could reach the faucet.

Joan filled the cooking pot. ‘Just keep me off the topic of politics, especially when the Bishop and Pill Face are around. If they'd heard me just now they'd have me out of here quicker than I could pack, for spreading
anti-American
propaganda.'

‘It's only natural you feel that way given what's happened to your cousin.'

‘The Bishop doesn't think so. He believes young men should consider it an honour to lay down their lives for their country. But words are cheap, especially if you have no children of your own and you're too old to fight, like him. But it's supper time and we have boiled chicken and potatoes to look forward to. It'll be disgusting, but when we tried frying the chicken it didn't cook properly and half the kids were sick.'

‘You could boil the chicken to make sure it cooks properly, then fry it to crisp it.'

‘Fantastic. You know about cooking, you can take over.' Joan handed her the pot.

Exhausted from travelling, cooking chicken and potatoes for seven people, meeting more Pioneers and counsellors than she would remember and trying to find her way around the camp in total darkness with the aid of a hurricane lamp, the evening seemed interminable.

After cooking, eating and clearing away, simple tasks that seemed to take for ever, there was only an hour left before ‘lights out'. The Bishop insisted they spend it together sitting around a campfire. Boys one side, girls
the other, as ordered by Pill Face, singing universal songs, most of them wartime favourites like ‘It's a Long Way to Tipperary', ‘Keep the Home Fires Burning', and ending the evening with ‘Auld Lang Syne'.

While they sang, men dressed in what appeared to be spacesuits sprayed clouds of insecticide in a wide circle around the border of the campsite.

‘Is that DDT?' she whispered to Joan who was alongside her.

‘Insecticide of some kind or other. We've all been bitten. The theory is the bugs inside the circle die and new ones won't fly or crawl in over the area that's been sprayed.'

‘Why are the operatives wearing protective clothing and we're not?'

There was a lull in the singing and her voice carried.

‘Now you know what it feels like to be an American, Penny,' Sandy quipped. ‘We all have too many particles of insecticide in us to be fit for human consumption.'

‘And that's enough from you, Alexander,' the Bishop ordered. ‘Last song, ‘God Bless America', then bed.'

She entered her tent at ten o'clock, fell on her sleeping bag and didn't open her eyes until daylight streamed in through the tent flap she'd been too tired to secure. Her arms and face were burning and felt oddly swollen. She lifted her hand. It was covered in raised red welts. Grabbing her robe and toilet bag she crawled out of the tent to see one of Sandy and Bobby's fellow male counsellors standing in front of the assembled Pioneers who were following his lead in performing jumping jacks.

She headed to the nearest latrine. There was a queue outside the only shower. Joan saw her looking at it and gave her a plastic bowl.

‘Best time to grab a shower is when everyone's eating. Or disgustingly early in the morning.' She stepped closer. ‘You looked in the mirror this morning?'

‘No, and I wouldn't be able to see much of myself if I did. I've only a powder compact. I know I'm covered in bites because I'm fighting the urge to claw my skin.'

‘Don't. They're mosquito. If you scratch them they could get infected.'

‘I know, but I've never been so tempted to do something so stupid.'

‘That reaction is way beyond normal. You're obviously allergic. I've some stuff you can rub on – you're welcome to try it but it's not that effective. Nothing is, except DDT. The only consolation is, the bugs generally only bite at dusk and night.'

‘I should never have abandoned my dream of living in New York and visiting the museums and galleries.'

‘Bobby can be very persuasive.'

‘Penelope?' Pill Face stalked up to them. ‘From
eight-thirty
to ten-thirty you'll take a two-hour art class. You'll find all the equipment, paints, brushes and paper you'll need in the storeroom. Joan, show her where that is. The last hour before lunch you'll teach the non-swimmers, while the others have a free swim. Molly's leaving to begin her day off after breakfast, so you'll supervise her cook group at lunch and supper. This afternoon we're going to Stratford to see Shakespeare's
Androcles and the Lion
. You will assume responsibility for Molly's
group as well as assist with the Pioneers as a whole. In the meantime I'll sort out your schedule for the week and leave it in your tent.'

Her head was reeling but she managed a ‘yes, ma'am'.

‘Get a move on, both of you. Breakfast is scheduled to begin in five minutes.'

She waited until Pill Face was out of earshot before turning to Joan. ‘Is breathing time scheduled as well?'

‘You'll soon learn that all counsellors are expected to do all the breathing necessary for survival on their one day off a week.'

Pill Face was waiting for her when she emerged from her tent after lunch. Forewarned by Joan and Doreen about Pill Face's strict dress code – ‘no shorts or trousers of any kind to be worn by students or counsellors on outings' – she'd donned her green Quant suit. It was grubby but as all the Pioneers were travelling to Stratford in trucks she decided Bobby was right. It would be grubbier by the end of the day.

‘Your skirt is ridiculously, in fact obscenely short, Penelope. Change it at once.'

‘All my skirts are the same length, Mrs Howard.'