Coming Home (112 page)

‘Oh, Heather, you weren't even
there.
’

‘Heard all about it, though. Lived with it for days. My mum couldn't stop talking about it. “You should have seen Judith” she kept saying to me. “Like a real little fury.”’

‘He died of apoplexy, I think. Because the bank manager told him he had an overdraft. It was Mr Baines who told me about it, and all we could do was giggle. Dreadfully unseemly.’

‘Good riddance to bad rubbish, I'd say. Now, what about the Carey-Lewises? Are they all right?’

So they talked about Nancherrow, and how Diana's grief after Edward's death had been eased, in a small way, by the arrival and constant diversion of her grand-daughter Clementina. Just as, in some obscure way, the undemanding company of Phyllis and Anna had helped to get Biddy Somerville back on her feet again.

‘So they're all living together at The Dower House?’

‘Yes, and it's working. You've never seen my house. Sometime, when you get some leave, you must come over, and I'll show it to you. You'll love it. I do. I love it to bits.’

‘I still can't believe you've got a house of your own,’ Heather marvelled. ‘Really grown up. I mean, understand, I'm not envious in the very least, because the last thing I'd want would be a house to tie me down. But for you, it must be like a dream come true. 'Specially with your family so far away.’ She stopped, and then said, ‘Sorry.’

‘Why are you sorry?’

‘Tactless. Singapore. I read the paper in the train this morning.’

‘So did I.’

‘Have you heard from your family?’

‘Not for too long.’

‘Worried?’

‘Yes. Worried stiff. I just hope they've been evacuated. Anyway, Mummy and Jess. Everybody says Singapore won't fall, that it's too well defended, too important, everything will be flung into the battle. But even if Singapore holds, there'll be air raids and every sort of horror. And there doesn't seem to be anything, or any army, capable of stopping the Japanese. I just wish I could find out what's happening.’ She looked at Heather across the table. ‘You…you couldn't find anything out, could you? I mean, sort of, under the counter?’

The waiter came with coffee. Heather stubbed out her cigarette, and lit another. They sat silent while the black, strong coffee was poured into the little cups. When he had gone, out of earshot, Heather shook her head and said, ‘No. We only deal with Europe.’

‘I shouldn't have asked.’ Judith sighed. ‘Gus is out there, too. Gus Callender. He's with the Second Gordons.’

‘You've lost me.’

‘He was a friend of Edward's at Cambridge. He came to stay in Nancherrow. He and Loveday…how do you say? Hit it off.’

‘Loveday?’ Heather sounded incredulous. ‘Loveday fancied him? She never said anything to me.’

‘I don't suppose she would. It was extraordinary. She was only seventeen, and it just happened. An instant rapport. As though they'd known each other forever. As though they'd always been a couple.’

‘If he's a soldier, and in Singapore, he'll be in the thick of it. I wouldn't put my money on his chances.’

‘I know. I've been thinking that too.’

‘It's a bloody war, isn't it? Poor Loveday. And poor you. I suppose we just have to sit and wait. See what happens.’

‘Waiting's the worst. Waiting for news. Trying to pretend that the worst isn't going to happen. Mustn't happen. I want my parents and Jess to stay alive, and be safe, and one day come home and come to The Dower House. And I want Gus to stay alive for Loveday. After St Valéry, we thought he was dead, but he managed to escape and get home, and when she heard the news, Loveday was like a person transformed. I can't bear for her to have to go through all that agony for a second time.’

‘Judith, whatever happens to Loveday, she'll survive.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘I know her. She's a tough little thing.’

‘But…’ Judith was all ready to spring to Loveday's defence, but Heather interrupted her.

‘Look, we could go on talking all afternoon, and the day will have gone, and we won't have done anything. In my wallet I've got two tickets for the Albert Hall. The man I work for gave them to me. A concert that's due to start in half an hour. Do you want to go to a concert, or do you want to go shopping?’

‘What are they playing?’

‘William Walton's Violin Concerto, and Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto.’

‘I don't want to go shopping.’

So they finished their coffee, and paid the bill (with hefty tips all round), collected their coats from the cloakroom (more tips) and plunged out into the bitter cold and Piccadilly. As they emerged, a taxi rolled up to the pavement's edge, from which stepped a naval captain and his homely wife. They waited until he had settled his fare, and then swiftly hopped in, before anyone else could bag the cab.

‘Where to, love?’

‘The Albert Hall, and we're in a terrific hurry.’

The concert was wonderful, everything that Judith had hoped for, and more. The Walton was new to her, but the Rachmaninoff dearly familiar, and she sat lost in the music, transported into a sort of timelessness, the affirmation of another, constant world, set apart from anxiety and death, and battles and bombs. The rest of the huge audience was equally intent, and when the performance was finished, and the last notes had died away, displayed their appreciation with applause for conductor and orchestra, applause that lasted for at least five minutes.

But finally it was all over, and time to leave. Judith felt a bit as though she had spent two hours floating effortlessly in the upper air, and was now having to come down to earth again. So absorbed had she been that her cold was forgotten, but now, as they edged their way up the crowded, carpeted aisle towards the foyer and the main doors, the headache and the sore throat returned with a vengeance, and she realised that she was beginning to feel distinctly unwell.

They had planned to walk back to the Mews, or catch a bus, but when they emerged, with streams of others, into the black, lightless evening, they discovered that it had started to rain, a thin raw sleet, and neither of them had an umbrella.

They stood, bumped and barged, on the wet pavement and discussed their chances of getting a taxi, which were so slim as to be impossible.

‘We can't walk, we'll get soaked. Why
didn't
I bring an umbrella?’ Heather, always so efficient, was furious with herself.

‘
I
couldn't bring one, because I'm not allowed to carry one in uniform…’

And then, as they hesitated, trying to decide how on earth they would get home, good fortune beamed upon them. A private car drew up, with a driver, to be claimed by an RAF Wing Commander and his female companion. Clearly, he had had the forethought to arrange his own transport. He opened the door, the woman bundled herself inside, getting into shelter as swiftly as she could, and the Wing Commander was just about to follow when he caught sight of the two girls, illuminated in the tiny light that beamed from the interior of the car, standing forlornly and getting wetter by the moment.

He said, ‘Which direction do you want to go?’

‘Sort of, Sloane Square,’ Judith told him.

‘We're going to Clapham. Why don't we give you a ride?’

It was almost too good to be true. Gratefully, they accepted, and Heather got into the back seat, while Judith sat by the driver. Doors were slammed shut, and the car moved forward into the dark, wet street, with windscreen wipers going full-tilt, and the driver feeling his way by the faint beam of the darkened and hooded headlights.

Behind her, Heather made lively conversation with their saviours. ‘It's
really
kind of you,’ she told them. ‘I don't know what we'd have done otherwise.’

‘It's always hell getting home after a theatre or a concert. Particularly on a filthy night like this…’

Judith stopped listening. She had stood in a puddle and her feet were wet, and she was beginning to feel a bit shivery. When they got back, she would light the gas-fire and work up a fug, but before that happened, there was the small problem of food, because she'd had no time to buy anything.

They were now proceeding down Sloane Street. In the back of the car, chat was still going non-stop. They had finished discussing the concert, and were on to the horror of the Queens Hall being destroyed in the bombings, and the lovely lunch-time recitals that Myra Hess was giving at the church of St Martin in the Fields.

‘They're always packed. People just pop in to listen for a bit, on their way to or from their offices…’

The Wing Commander leaned forward. ‘Exactly whereabouts do you want to go?’ he asked Judith. ‘We can take you to the door, if it's not too far out of our way.’

‘Cadogan Mews.’ She turned in her seat to speak to him. ‘But…’ She hesitated. ‘The only thing is, I have to go to a shop. There's no food in the house. I came up from Portsmouth this morning and there wasn't time…but if you could drop us at our local grocery…?’

He said, ‘Don't you worry,’ and because of his kindness, all went smoothly. Judith directed the driver to the ramshackle corner store, which had always been the nearest and the most convenient for the Mews. It sold groceries and newspapers and cigarettes, and while the others waited, she went inside, armed with her Emergency Ration Card, and bought bread and eggs, and tiny amounts of bacon and sugar and margarine and a pint of milk and a jar of dubious-looking raspberry jam. The old woman behind the counter dug out a crumpled paper carrier into which she packed all this, Judith paid the bill, and returned to the others.

‘Thank you so much. That's perfect. At least we've got something to eat for tea.’

‘We couldn't allow you to go hungry. Where to now?’

They were delivered, in style, to the door. In the Mews, in the dim beam of the blacked-out headlights, the cobbles glistened, and a wet cat streaked across, in search of shelter. Judith and Heather got out of the car, effusive with thanks, even offering to pay their share of the fare, but they were dismissed forthwith, told that it was the least any person could do, and get inside, pronto, before they got even wetter.

It sounded like an order, so they did as they were told. As they closed the door behind them, the car was already turning, and on its way.

They stood, very close, in the inky darkness of the tiny hall. ‘Don't turn on any lights,’ Judith told Heather, ‘until I've done the black-out. Stay where you are, or you'll fall over the stairs.’

She felt her way into the kitchen and fixed the black-out, and dumped the paper carrier on the table. Then, still in darkness, she emerged once more, trod carefully up the staircase, and dealt with the black-out and the thick curtains of the sitting-room. Only then could she safely press the switch.

‘You can come up now,’ she told Heather, and together they went around all the rooms, even the ones that Judith had no intention of using, so that every gleam of light was sealed away. With this accomplished, Heather made herself at home, divesting herself of damp overcoat and boots, lighting the gas-fire, turning on a few lamps. Almost at once, everything looked quite different, snug and cosy.

Heather said, ‘I'd die for a cup of tea.’

‘Me too, but I must take some more aspirin first.’

‘You feeling awful?’

‘Yes, fairly.’

‘Poor thing. You do look a bit poorly. Do you think you've got 'flu?’

‘Don't even suggest it.’

‘Well, you go and dose yourself, and I'll make the tea.’ Already she was on her way downstairs again. ‘Don't worry. I'll find my way around.’

‘There's some bread. We can make toast by the gas-fire.’

‘Lovely.’

Judith took off her coat and laid it on the bed, and then removed her shoes and damp stockings and put on a pair of fleecy slippers. She took off her jacket as well, and instead pulled on a Shetland sweater that she'd brought up from Portsmouth. Then she took more aspirin and gargled again. Her reflection in the mirror did nothing to cheer. Her face looked peaky and pinched, and there were dark rings, like bruises, under her eyes. If Biddy were here, she would prescribe a hot toddy, but as Judith had neither whisky nor honey nor lemon, the knowledge didn't do her much good.

By the time she went back to the sitting-room, Heather had made the tea and carried the tray up the stairs. They sat by the gas-fire, and made toast on a long fork, and then meagrely scraped it with margarine and spread on the raspberry jam.

‘Tastes of picnics,’ Heather decided with satisfaction. She licked her sticky fingers. ‘Mum always used to put raspberry jam on splits.’ She looked about her. ‘I like this house. Like the way it's all been done. With the pale curtains and everything. Do you come here a lot?’

‘Always when I come to London.’

‘Better than a Wrens' hostel, anyway.’

‘I wish you could stay.’

‘I can't.’

‘Couldn't you ring somebody and say you've got a little headache?’

‘No. I must be on duty tomorrow.’

‘When's your train?’

‘Seven thirty.’

‘Where do you go from?’

‘Euston.’

‘How will you get there?’

‘I'll get a tube from Sloane Square.’