Red Joan (22 page)

In time, however, Joan began to feel as if she might not be dying after all. It came to be a relief that she did not hear from either of them as it meant she didn't need to think of them so often. She began to pay more attention to her work, and even started to make plans to go back into academia after the war, perhaps as a research student in Cambridge, or even as a teacher. Sonya's decision to cut her off no longer upset her as it had done at the time, as Joan came to accept that she had always known, right from the start of her relationship with Leo, that if it ever came down to a simple choice, she would be the one to be cast off. It was to be expected. They were family after all.

That might even have been the end of it if Sonya had not come home when she did, turning up in the late spring of 1944 with Jamie, the young man Joan had read about in her early letters (
He's so clean, Jo-jo! And such a lovely head of hair!
), having married him in Geneva and persuaded him to come and live with her in a farmhouse in Ely. When they met, Sonya introduced Joan to him as her best friend, startling Joan because, while this might once have been the case, it was no longer true. And yet there was something in Sonya's tone of voice which Joan recognised as an appeal to her of some sort, to stand by her, to not be cross with her for ignoring her for so long and for choosing Leo over her, and so Joan had simply laughed and nodded and squeezed her friend's arm. After this the lie seemed to stick, and their old friendship was resumed as if Sonya had never been away, although Joan was more careful this time, aware now of how easily she might be cut adrift.

When Sonya came to Cambridge to remove her belongings from her old room in Newnham, it was Joan who helped her pack up everything. They managed to fit most of her things into a single trunk, and one of the porters helped them lug it to Jamie's car. It was a warm, sunny day, one of the last sunny days of the year, and when she looks back on it, Joan remembers that it was marred only by her sudden recollection of the shirt she found in Sonya's cupboard after Sonya had gone. Leo's shirt. She knows that if she had not accompanied Sonya to pack up her room she might never have brought up the subject, and even now she cringes to remember how she broached it with Sonya. She couldn't help it. How suspicious she must have seemed. How unkind.

It was just as they were about to leave. Joan had gone to the wardrobe and pulled the discarded shirt from the shelf with an accusatory flourish. It no longer held any trace of Leo, but gave off a musty odour. ‘Whose is this?' she had asked, holding the shirt up to the light and putting her hand on her hip.

Sonya had simply glanced at the shirt and shrugged, turning back to the trunk that she was unpacking in an attempt to re-pack more efficiently. Her face remained utterly expressionless, as if Joan was holding up a ragged dishcloth. ‘I don't know.'

‘Don't you think it looks like Leo's?'

‘It looks like a shirt. And you look like Miss Strachey when you stand like that.'

‘But Leo wore ones just like this,' Joan persisted, ignoring her remark.

Even now, after all these years, she couldn't have explained exactly what she thought Sonya would say. It was only a shirt, after all. It was just that she had been so certain when she first smelt it, so sure, that she couldn't push from her mind the belief that there was something odd about it that she couldn't put her finger on. Come to think of it, why had Sonya not made a joke of a man's shirt being found in her cupboard as she would normally have done, or taken it as an opportunity to reminisce over which of her young men it might have belonged to?

‘But aren't you even curious? Why would a shirt like Leo's—'

‘Oh come on, Jo-jo. Why are you being so peculiar?' Her face broke into a smile. ‘I haven't been in this room for years. How can I possibly remember whose it is?'

‘But you were just going to leave it there.'

‘I can't be taking other men's shirts back to my marital home. My husband would want an explanation.' She raised her eyebrows at Joan and her face broke into a sudden, bright laugh, so familiar that Joan started to laugh too, and she found herself stuffing the shirt back into the cupboard and following Sonya outside to the car, no longer sure why she had been so adamant that an explanation was required. They had driven into town and the rest of the day had passed in a luxurious haze of sun and long walks and iced tea with slices of lemon.

‘Just like old times,' Sonya declared before she left, squeezing Joan's arm and then kissing her abruptly on the cheek.

The subject of the shirt was not brought up between them again, and after a while Joan became convinced that she had been mistaken. She did not like to think of it, not just because she was ashamed of how she had acted, but also because it was uncomfortable to recall those earlier suspicions. Once again, it was Sonya with whom she drank cocoa on the rare nights she was not working at the laboratory, Sonya whose clothes she borrowed to go to the cinema with unsuitably earnest young men, Sonya who fixed her hair when she bleached it for too long and it turned green instead of blonde, Sonya who was her dearest, greatest friend. And Sonya who, when she found out that Joan was being sent to the University of Montreal on a research trip that summer, was the first to hear about it.

The trip to Canada was, according to Max, an opportunity for the British research plant to combine its results with the Montreal laboratory, and for the two sections to work on a strategy for future collaboration. Not to be mentioned to a single soul. Joan did not need to be told this. She knew it already. She knew which particular aspects of the project the Canadians were working on, and she knew how important this trip could be for the project. She also knew that there were dangers in crossing the Atlantic at this stage of the war, and that Max had left instructions on how his work should be continued if they did not make it back, but she was not put off by the danger. So many people were facing far greater dangers than this. These were unprecedented times, after all. On top of this, she still believed, along with the rest of them at the laboratory, that they were working against Germany, that their project would act as a deterrent, that it was a safe, clever thing that was worth the risk of an Atlantic crossing. And so of course she would not have told a soul. Why would Max even think he had to tell her?

When Joan mentioned the trip, Sonya merely exhaled smoke through her nose, and tilted her head to look at Joan with a hint of mischievousness in her eyes. ‘Will you see Leo when you go over there?'

‘No,' Joan said, trying to appear shocked at the very thought, as if it had not even crossed her mind.

‘Really?' Sonya said, looking away with a slight smile twitching on her lips.

‘How's his thesis going anyway?'

Sonya glanced sideways at Joan. ‘Now why would you be interested in that?'

Joan shrugged. ‘I heard so much about it. And it was important, wasn't it?'

‘Well, it depends who you ask. If you ask him, you'd think he'd invented a cure for cancer.'

‘So he's finished it?'

Sonya nodded, although her eyes betrayed some degree of irritation. ‘He's advising the American and Canadian governments on Russian aid.'

‘But that's wonderful. It's what he wanted.'

Sonya took a deep inhalation of smoke and shook her head. ‘There is such a thing as pride, Jo-jo. The Soviet Empire doesn't need American help.' She paused. ‘Leo thinks they're going to be grateful, but . . . ' She stopped, deciding against whatever it was she was about to say. ‘Anyway, so it's just you and Max going on this trip?'

‘Uh-huh.'

Sonya smiled, a slow, spreading smile.

‘What's so funny?'

‘Well, you know how you could really annoy Leo . . . ' she said, nodding at Joan in that knowing and mildly patronising manner that Joan remembered from those late-night meetings at university, ‘ . . . if you wanted to.'

‘I don't want to.'

Sonya took out her lipstick and brushed it lightly across the plump part of her lower lip, and then pressed her lips together so that when she grinned again her whole mouth had turned bright red. ‘Fair enough.'

Joan sighs. ‘All right then. How?'

‘Oh, come on, Jo-jo, it's obvious. You've got to sleep with Max.'

‘But he's married.'

‘Ah yes, my dear, but otherwise you're going to turn up and see Leo—'

‘I'm not going to see him.'

Sonya shook her head. ‘It's inevitable. He won't be able to resist finding you once he discovers you're coming to his university, and he'll just wrap you around his little finger again. The only way around it is to sleep with someone else first. Preferably someone like Max.'

‘How do you know what Max is like?'

Sonya lowered her cigarette. ‘Because if he were ugly, you'd have told me by now.' She paused, considering this theory further. ‘Besides, you must miss it a little bit. Don't you?'

‘Miss what?'

‘You know what.' Sonya looked at her. ‘Sex.'

Joan remembers how she had been shocked by this question. It was one of the qualities she admired in her friend, that she would say things no one else would dare to say. She had a talent for it.

‘Sometimes,' she whispered, and she knew as she said it that it was true, and that she would not have said it to anybody else in the whole world but Sonya. ‘But it's not personal. I just miss the feeling of it, the . . . ' She stopped, uncertain of the word. ‘The comfort of it.'

Sonya had smiled at this confession. ‘There you are then. And besides, what else are you going to be doing for all those days cooped up on a boat to Canada? You might as well.'

‘Well, I thought I'd be conventional and take a book or two.'

Sonya lowered her eyes and looked up at Joan through her eyelashes, just as she had once taught Joan to do. ‘Oh Jo-jo. Will I never grind that streak out of you? Anyway, do as you please. I know which I'd rather do.'

 

There is a knock on the bathroom door.

‘Time to resume.' Mr. Adams' voice is abrupt and impatient.

Joan jumps at the interruption and realises that she is crying. She is standing in front of the mirror in the bathroom, her hands numbed by the cold water, and tears are pooling in her eyes. She is glad that Mr. Adams cannot see her. It would not do for them to see how easily she can break under the strain of their questioning. She must not let them see how tiring it is to remember everything in such vivid detail. She must be stronger than this, if not for herself, then at least for Nick.

She reaches for a towel and dries her hands. Her hair is thin and white, and her skin appears papery in the dimming light. It has been so long, she thinks, since she was
held
by anyone. And yes, she does miss it, but who is there to tell now?

She wonders once more about Sonya, if she is still alive, if she ever thinks of her, if she is standing alone in a bathroom somewhere, running her fingers along the surface of her skin, observing how it flakes and sags, and wondering how she ever got so old.

 

The boat leaves at dusk. It is large and grey and decked out with civilian flags. There is a contingent of orphans being sent to Quebec where the boat docks, the children being crocodiled into bunks away from the rest of the passengers, dangling teddy bears and blankets along the planked decks. Joan and Max have cabins on the same corridor; second class, but not adjoining. The boat is not due to leave for another hour or so, but already it feels full.

Max puffs to the top of the stairs and edges sideways along the deck towards her, their two suitcases knocking against the wooden railings. ‘What have you got in here?' he asks, not stopping but grimacing his face into an expression of mock despair.

Joan grins. ‘All my warm things. And some books.'

‘We're only going to be away for five weeks.'

‘Exactly. Five weeks. And Canada's supposed to be cold.'

‘Not in July.'

‘It's always cold in the mountains. I've seen it on postcards.'

Max rolls his eyes and picks up the cases again. ‘All right, all right. I'll leave it in your room for you. See you at dinner?'

‘Are you not staying for the big send-off?' she calls after him.

He turns at the door leading to the cabins and shakes his head. ‘I've never liked goodbyes.'

After he has gone, Joan remains standing on the deck. Already the shore looks untouchable, transient, even though the ropes are still attached and a platoon of soldiers is waiting to board, black-booted and loaded with duffel bags. The clouds on the horizon are inky blue, spun through with fading silver sunlight. She thinks of Leo leaving from this same port and feels a rising sense of sickness at the thought of seeing him again. Her fingers are cold and her lips dry in the sea air, and she finds with a tangle of annoyance that Sonya is right. Even the thought of being near him makes her suddenly aware of her heart's frantic activity in her body and she knows she must not make any attempt to see him. It would be just as it was and she would have to be strong all over again, and the thought makes her feel heavy and tired.

She retreats to her cabin and changes into a light cotton dress. The lighting in the cabin is dim and flattering as she pins up her hair, and she hesitates for a moment over whether or not to wear make-up. She is most certainly not going to sleep with Max—why should it make any difference to her whether Sonya would or wouldn't?—and so she doesn't want Max to think she is a floozy by turning up for dinner in lipstick and rouge. She slips on her shoes and turns to leave, and as she does, she catches a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Mousey-English, Sonya might call her if she saw her going down to dinner like this. She hesitates, and then steps back towards the dressing table. Perhaps it is foolish to think that Max will even notice whether she is wearing make-up or not. What the hell, she thinks. She'll wear lipstick if she wants to. She is going to dine at the Captain's Table and drink wine and listen to swing music and forget about everything just for a short while. What does it matter?