The Care and Management of Lies (13 page)

T
hea sat in her room. Each day she returned to her job, and if it was Saturday or Sunday she remained in the room, sitting, waiting. Avril had been arrested. She knew that. The letter had been delivered the night before, the envelope plain, sealed and crossed with ink on the back so any disturbance could be identified.

Miss Dorothea Brissenden.

By Hand.

And then inside, on a small card, the informal message:

Thea, I do believe you should give up teaching. Trying to teach people does not suit women such as us, and I have discovered that it has had a very poor effect on me and what might come to pass. Leave it to others. I do not think I will be able to see you in the near future, so do not write or call. Best not.

Avril

At first Thea’s head seemed to swim with confusion. Leave teaching? Then the truth dawned. This was a warning. They were coming for her. Her name had been discovered, and it was only a matter of time before Thea herself would be caught in the net.
Give up teaching.
Yes, give up teaching that peace is a better way than war, than bloodshed, than fighting.

She felt herself begin to shake, felt the welter of emotions she had to counter every time she joined a group to mount a demonstration—always different people, always the same outcome. The shouting, the swearing, the names and calling, then the running, the footsteps behind her, and then safety, somewhere, anywhere—behind a wall, another building, always saved by her own inconsequential looks. Then the retching. Now the terror returned. It had begun to rise again when she read her brother’s letter.

I plan to enlist as soon as all the harvesting is finished. The hop pickers have nearly all gone home now, so once I’ve left, Bert needs only to concern himself with getting everything done through the winter so we’re ready for spring.

Thea struggled to her feet and stood before the mirror. She pulled out the pins in her hair, brushed it, and pinned it again, tidy. She put on her hat and jacket, and before leaving her lodgings, she drank a glass of cool water. Then she walked. She walked and walked. If she walked, if she was out and window-shopping on a Saturday morning, no one would think anything untoward. No one would look at her and say,
There she is, the suffragette!
They would not point and say,
Aha! The pacifist!
No one would accuse her of sedition, or of being a traitor. No, she would walk. Walk and not look. Walk and be seen to be a good woman, a nice woman, a woman who had no reason to be afraid.

And so Thea walked. She set one foot in front of the other without seeing, without looking at hoardings, without noticing shops closed, boarded, without noticing those around her, and without feeling as if people were simply going about their business when everything inside her was in turmoil.

“I say—Dorothy Brissenden! Dorrit!”

The voice seemed to boom along the pavement, bouncing off the shop window as Thea slowed to glance at her reflection, just to make sure she looked as ordinary as she was trying to feel. She turned back in the direction of the voice.

“I thought I would never catch up with you. Where are you going at that clip, anyway? Off to the races?”

At first Thea could not place the woman, though there was something in the voice, in the manner.
Camden.

“Is that Hilary Dalton?” asked Thea.

“Yes, it’s me, old Hilly. Must have changed a bit—I suppose we all have. After all, it’s been almost ten years since we became old girls, isn’t it?” Hilary Dalton leaned forward, concern etched into her wide cowlike eyes. “I say, you don’t look well, Dorrit. Let’s get a cup of tea inside you, and you can tell me everything.”

Thea pulled her arm back so Hilary could not link through hers—she could not be sure, but it seemed that Hilary was the type to walk along the street arm in arm. At the same time she smiled, so as not to seem churlish. Hilary Dalton had been like Thea and Kezia—not quite like other pupils at Camden, though she was not a scholarship girl. She was taller than most, big-boned and athletic at school. She loved mathematics and physics and wanted to be an engineer, following in her father’s footsteps—and she claimed she would, whether the world and her mother liked it or not. So she was an outsider, and on occasion joined Kezia and Thea at school, rubbing along with them when loneliness claimed her. Now she seemed so much more confident, her clothes of fine cut and quality, her movements assured. Yet there was still no frippery about her, though a few rough edges had been smoothed in the intervening years.

Hilary chose a tea shop nearby, insisting it be her treat. Over tea, she chatted about her life after Camden. “It was finishing school that did it—Mother insisted that if I was set on going into the family engineering firm, then I must go to Switzerland, so no choice. Then I went to university, and now I’m an engineer, though the men hate it.” She paused. “Anyway, I told my father—last week, in fact—that it’s about time I did something for this war. So I just went along and joined up.”

Thea looked up. The tea had warmed her stomach, and she cut into the teacake, thinking she might keep it down. “Joined up with what?”

“A medical unit. They needed drivers. It’s private, sponsored by a woman named Mary Rathbone—well heeled, sided with the suffragettes, though not to the extent that it embarrassed her husband. She decided there should be more women doing something for the war—blah, blah, blah—and I knew someone already in to be my sponsor, which helped, and now I’m in too—start training on Monday. And there’s a stipend, which helps, though we are considered part of the voluntary aid detachments. I shall be in France by Christmas, I would imagine.”

“In France?”

“That’s where the war is, or hadn’t you noticed?”

Thea nodded. “I’m sorry, Hilary, I just wondered, that’s all—you’re the first woman I know personally to have enlisted for war work.” She paused to sip her tea again. “Perhaps—”

Hilary tapped the table with her forefinger. “You know, Dorrit, I—”

“Please—don’t call me that. It’s Thea now. I am Thea, not a stupid name given to me by my Dickens-adoring father. Thea. Thea. Thea.”

Hilary raised an eyebrow and sat back. “I thought you said ‘Fear, Fear, Fear’ for a minute!”

Despite herself, Thea smiled. “I’m sorry. I just got a bit tired of it, that’s all.”

“And I don’t blame you. But you know, if you want to do a decent thing, you could join up with me. I could sponsor you—I’m on passing good terms with our fearless leader, you know. And I think they would snap you up. Any girl who has the stomach for a wild horse or the strength to drive a plough would be welcomed with open arms—and I know for a fact that you can do both, despite present appearances.” Hilary pulled a notebook and pencil from her bag. “Look, buck yourself up and take some Beecham’s, because you’re clearly suffering from something. Then on Monday, meet me at this address—could you be there by half past four? I will do the honors, introduce you to she-who-must-be-impressed when it comes to recruiting fresh blood—Daphne Richards. I’ll tell her I can vouch for you, that we were at school together, etc., etc., then I’ll leave you to it. How about it? I know I sound like a sergeant major already, but I really think we women need to step forward, and not just leave war to the men.”

Thea hesitated, then took the small sheet of paper. Was this her salvation? She knew that Avril would be pressed to talk, would be deprived of food or fed too much, would be questioned until she gave up names, and Thea’s was likely the only other name she knew. Thea was convinced that she was now on borrowed time, and she was scared. And she hated herself for her fear. Perhaps that’s what she had said, after all—
Fear, Fear, Fear. My name is Fear.

“Well, all right, Hilary. I can go along, can’t I? They might not want me, but I can see someone. I’d feel better anyway, because my brother, Tom, is enlisting.”

Hilary smiled and sat back in her chair. “He married Kezia Marchant, didn’t he?”

“Yes, that’s right,” said Thea.

“Can’t say that I could see her a farmer’s wife. Interesting girl, wasn’t she? Sort of passive until you realized that really she was quite a force in her way, and could be a bit stubborn too. But you two were thick with each other, weren’t you? You must be very happy to have her in the family fold.”

Thea nodded. “Yes, I suppose I am.” She realized then that Kezia was family and, for the first time since receiving Tom’s letter, wondered what the woman who had been her dearest friend might think when both she and Tom left for France. And as Hilary Dalton raised her hand to the waitress to call for more tea and cakes, Thea caught herself.
When.
She had thought
when
.

As she walked home, back to her room, which she had come to think of as her lair, she thought she might not go on Monday after all. She had felt more than a little strong-armed by Hilary, who had always been a pushy character. She suspected Tom might have found himself in a similar position, pressed to enlist, except it would have been his own sense of duty that pushed him, not the pressure of another. She wondered why Kezia had not stopped him, had not put her foot down and demanded he stay.

Arriving at Queen Charlotte’s Chambers, Thea was at once pounced upon by Mrs. Montague, who must have been lying in wait for her, twitching the curtains in her flat and watching the street to monitor her return. No sooner was Thea’s key in the lock than she was on the threshold; Thea stumbled as the door opened with the warden’s pull.

“There’s been two men here looking for you, Miss Brissenden.”

Thea felt the flush evaporate from her cheeks; she was now both hot and cold at the same time. “Looking for me? Do you know who they were?”

“Didn’t say, but it looked like trouble, and if there’s one thing I won’t have here, it’s trouble among my women.”

“Oh, Mrs. Montague, I assure you, I have neither courted, caused, or been the source of any trouble—you know that very well. I go to my work, I continue my work in the evenings at my desk. I keep myself to myself, and I pay my rent on time.”

“That’s as may be, but they looked like trouble all the same. I’ll have to ask you to be careful—I wouldn’t want to see them again. Men aren’t wanted here.”

“I know that very well, Mrs. Montague, and I assure you, I do not know any men. I wonder if something untoward hasn’t happened to my brother or sister-in-law. Did they say they would come back, or did they leave a message—a note?”

The woman shook her head. “No. They just said they would return early next week, in case you were away until Monday. They know you’re a schoolteacher—that much is evident.”

Thea smiled and made to move on. “Well, it doesn’t seem to be bad news, so I will just have to wait and see. Thank you, Mrs. Montague.”

She was well aware that she had left the warden standing, her mouth shaped in a perfectly round O, such was her surprise at not having the last word in the matter. Thea unlocked the door to her room, let herself in, and turned the key behind her. She leaned her back against the door, and as the full weight of realization seeped into her body, her legs went out from under her and she slid to the ground.
They’re coming for me. I’ll be charged under the Defense of the Realm Act. I’ll end up in Holloway.
She staggered over to the sink for fear that her stomach could not contain her anxiety on top of tea and cake.

She would see Hilary Dalton on Monday. She would put her best foot forward and persuade the “fearless leader” that she would stand tall before any foe, and could turn her hand to any task in support of the men of her country. She would do this because she knew she could not face a judge and jury. She would do it because she could endure the terror of a gun and the shell, but she could not see Kezia or Tom again if she were accused of being a traitor. And then she wept. She wept because she felt alone. She wept because she was powerless against the monsters of war and want. She felt trapped by her own passion. She wept because she was burning with a deep, searing pain, as if she had pierced her own heart with the knife of betrayal and was bleeding her failure to hold true. What irony—that the only way she could make amends with herself was to go to war.

Chapter 9

The housewife requires the qualities of a field-marshal. Instruction in selecting subordinates, tact in managing them, organizing of daily work, financial ability in handling the household budget, the taste that imparts charm to the home—these are not common facilities.

—
THE WOMAN’S BOOK

A
s Ada was scouring egg from the knives, Kezia stood at the back door and looked down at the collies, both shaking in anticipation, their ears like folded envelopes.

“He’s gone, sweet boys,” said Kezia. “He’s gone to be in the army, but he’ll be back. Don’t you worry.”

She knelt down and ruffled the scruff of each dog, then came to her feet again. “Let’s go and find Bert, shall we?”

The sky was silvered with clouds hardly distinguishable from one another. It was late October, yet November’s nip was already in the air as Kezia marched along the farm road, past the pigpens, past the oast house and then the orchards on the left and the new fields of turnips on the right, just beyond the old barn. There was no sign of Bert and Danny, or the four lads taken on to help settle the farm for the winter. There were fences to be mended, fields to turn, and cattle to be moved. Spent bines from hop picking were now piled along the empty rows of the hop gardens, left to brown and bracken, ready to be burned later when they’d dried, filling the air with that scent once again, but now filtered through smoke and flame that lent splashes of red to a day devoid of hue.

Kezia stopped at the top of the hill, where the road slipped down towards Dickens’ two cities, and stood for a while. It seemed at once that the landscape had ceased to breathe against the cold, its color dull, as if she were looking through a windowpane with grey muslin drawn across. She inhaled deeply, trying to bring Tom back to her, now, in this place. And she realized that she must fight her fear of being alone, of having taken on more than she ever imagined she could accomplish as both mistress and master of the farm.

One of the collies barked, its head forward, nose to the wind. Bert and Danny were bringing sawn wood up to the farm, each driving a cart, Bert with Mabel’s reins in his hands and Danny behind, working the more amenable Ted. Kezia waved. When Bert was alongside, he rested the leather on his knee.

“Mornin’, Mrs. Brissenden.” He touched his cap. “I’ve got them lads out in the hop gardens, cleaning up so we can let them sit till spring.”

“I’ll walk down and see them—I was making my way over there anyway, then up towards the railway line and back to the house.” She paused, looking at her feet and at the mud sticking to her boots. She used the foot of one to dislodge mud from the other, holding on to the side of the cart to steady herself. “Look, Bert, I know you and Danny have brought your dinner, but I thought you might like something hot today. Would you like to come into the kitchen? I’ve got some soup on the stove.”

Bert pushed back his cap. Mabel stamped her foot, ready to be off.

“Well, I don’t know, Mrs. Brissenden. I mean, it’s not like breakfast, is it? We’ve been at work since then, and we’re both a bit ripe, if you know what I mean. And besides, we’re used to taking dinner in the oast house. Just the two of us.”

Kezia smiled. She did not want to press the point, and she wondered how the men felt, now Tom was gone. Did they pity her? Did they think she was lonely? More to the point, did they wonder if she could cope when the rudder was in swing against a tide freshened by storm?

“I don’t mind, Bert. If you like, I can bring soup to the oast house—nice with your sandwiches.”

Bert nodded. “Right you are. We’ll be there at the usual dinnertime.”

“Good. That’s good, Bert. I’ll bring the soup.”

Kezia smiled and went on her way, bidding Danny good morning as she passed him. Ted seemed content enough to stand, showing none of Mabel’s impatience.

When she had circumnavigated the farm and arrived back at the farmhouse, Kezia felt her spirits rise. There was no soup on the stove, and none had been prepared yesterday, so she set to work. She would imagine her soup was for Tom, and it would be a good soup, the best soup, a soup that had her imprint on it. Bert and Danny would talk about the soup, and it would become known that she, Kezia Brissenden—Mrs. Tom Brissenden—was a good farmer’s wife.

K
ezia chopped the vegetables, simmered the broth, plundered the larder for peas she’d dried in summer and beans that had been soaking since the day before. She went to her kitchen garden and searched among the tied-back and cut-down sprigs for thyme and rosemary, savory and parsley. And as she cut into each, she held them between finger and thumb to breathe in the aroma. She added curcumin bought in London, and some tiny peppery seeds found in a jar in the larder, seeds she could not identify because the label had fallen off ages ago. She thought the bittersweet flavor that settled upon her tongue when she bit into a single seed would add something to Tom’s soup. And it wasn’t until Ada came in from the front of the house, where she had scrubbed the doorstep—not that anyone ever came to the front door—and asked, “Was someone here, Mrs. Brissenden?” that Kezia realized she had been talking to Tom, telling him all about his soup as she moved vegetables to the pot, as she peppered and salted the broth, and as the beans and peas and lentils merged with carrot, onion, swede, parsnip, and celery root. And just because she liked the idea, she added a chopped pear brought from the cold shed next to the kitchen garden. This would be the very best soup Tom had ever tasted, and she would write to him as soon as it was on the simmer, as soon as she was ready to pour it into a small saucepan and take it to Bert and Danny. She would serve them soup in her china bowls, and give them white linen napkins to wipe across their chins when they ate so fast the liquid dribbled into their stubble.

Dearest Tom,

Marshals Farm misses you. The men miss you, Sloppy and Squeers miss you, and I miss you most of all. But we are all looking after the farm, so you must not concern yourself. We know you have enough to worry about without wondering if this or that has been done. It’s all well in hand. We’ve still got Ted and Mabel, thanks be to the Lord. The men from the army came again last week, but they were both looking a bit tired (the horses, not the men), and Mabel was ready to knock a fly’s eye out if anyone but Bert came near her. I think she misses you too. I told them I was a woman trying to run the farm on my own, with only two men left and one of them lame, and I told them we had already been under orders to plough up a meadow and take down an orchard for more growing, and asked how they thought we would feed their army without our horses. I mentioned that my father had enlisted as an army chaplain—not that he’s gone any farther than a London barracks, as far as I know—and I would like to think the word of God settled in their ears and kept Ted and Mabel with us. I don’t know what we would do without the horses.

Kezia read the letter, and shook her head. No, she could not tell Tom of her concerns. It was unfair to tell him he was missed, and she could not possibly worry him about the horses, about the orchard to come down—she realized it had not been mentioned before, and would keep him awake at night. She decided it would be best to write the letter in pencil as a draft, then edit it before copying out her final version on writing paper. It took her two hours.

T
om was hungry. His hunger gnawed at his backbone. Nevertheless, he wondered if he could eat what was put in front of him. He had never been among savages, but he thought jungle tribes must be like men in a mess hall. Hundreds of men, hundreds of khaki ants, and big men, cooks—men cooks, mind—men serving up food, not with spoons but with their bare, soiled hands, hands that became cleaner as dirt adhered to the meat, potatoes, and bit of bread they shoved onto the next plate.
Move along, move along, no slacking.
A sergeant stood in attendance to make sure the new recruits ate, to make sure they didn’t linger a moment where a moment could not be spared.

The line shuffled along, elbows into ribs, knee into the back of another knee, man moving man. Tom hated it, could hardly stand the lack of space around him. Dinner was supposed to be private, personal, just him and Kezia, together. And no one else. Her hands were clean, the tablecloths laundered and crisp. Flowers were on the table, and all for him. Now this. He felt as if something were being taken from him, that he was no longer Tom Brissenden but a private among many privates. Funny, that—now he was Private Thomas Brissenden, yet everything was far from private, or personal, or individual. It was one lumbering beast of man animal. An army.

“Come on, move along, lads. Get on, move your arses and get that food down yer! On the double!”

Some of the men laughed; others paled—in particular the younger lads, many not even with a bit of fluff around their chops—and looked sick. Food had always been cooked by a mother or a wife. And even if the lad had been in a family of six children and one pot of broth, and the army food looked better than at home, home and mother were still a long way past. Weeks, even.

“Scum, that’s what it is. Look what they’re feeding us.” The speaker sat down next to Tom. It was a hut mate, Cecil Croft, who now pushed his food around on his plate. Croft had been a teacher before enlisting, a university man.

“I’d get on with it, mate, if I were you. That sergeant over there sees you playing with your food, you’ll be on a charge,” said Tom. He nodded towards his neighbor’s tin plate. It held stew, potatoes, and a hefty slice of bread.

“It’s not as if we’re not getting the calories, is it?” said Croft. “It’s what they do with the food to make them add up that makes me suspicious. I mean, it all looks the same. And brown bread.”

“They say it’s better for you.”

“Try telling the other men that—look at them, ready to throw it back. There’ll be a mutiny before we get to the boats, at this rate. White bread is cleaner, you know.”

Tom shrugged and poked at his food.

“Not good enough for you, son?” The sergeant loomed over Tom.

“Just getting the gravy onto the meat,” said Tom.

The sergeant leaned forward, the waxed end of his moustache tickling against Tom’s ear like an errant fly on a summer’s day. “Stand to attention, Private Gravy, now!”

Tom set down his knife and fork and scraped back his chair.

“Do it again, and this time do it faster, Private.”

Tom sat down, his behind barely touching the chair before he stood up once more. The noisy clattering of knives and forks had diminished, though few had stopped eating.

“Just getting the gravy onto the meat, what?”

“Just getting the gravy onto the meat,
sir
!” said Tom, his eyes to the front.

“Just getting the gravy onto the meat. Looked to me like you were playing with your food, Private.”

“No, sir.”

“No, sir. No, sir. Well, you’ve no time to get your gravy now, or your spuds, or your meat.” He turned his attention to the other men gathered, who were looking back and forth as if watching a tennis match. “Atten-shun!”

Men scrambled to their feet, standing with straight backs, facing forward.

“Private Brissenden here was poking round his gravy looking for a bit of meat. Was anyone else having trouble finding their meat?”

There was a low mumble.

“Did anyone else have trouble finding their meat?”

“No, sir!” the soldiers answered in unison.

“Well, now you’ll all have a chance to show Private Brissenden how to find his bit of meat, because it’s down to him that I want you all on the parade ground. Now!”

There was a stamping of feet to attention, and a turning around as one when the men marched from the mess hall. Tom remained at attention, only marching when the cohort at his table began to move.

“Not you, Private Gravy. The cook wants his floor scrubbed. The cook wants no filth in his kitchen, nothing to taint the rations.” The sergeant looked at Tom, who continued to look ahead. He pressed his face close to Tom’s and shouted a command. “About turn!”

Tom turned in the direction of the kitchen.

“Quick march!”

It was later, in the hut, that Cecil Croft came alongside Tom’s bed. “It’s all part of the game, Tom. Like surnames only, like the mass of men eating like pigs—men who have never had a good meal sitting next to men who’ve had better than you or I—it’s all done to make us into an army.”

Tom nodded. He went on polishing his boots, cleaning his webbing.

“Putting the mass of men against one is all part of the play. I’ve seen it before, at school,” added Cecil.

“I never went to a school like that.” Tom didn’t look up.

Cecil put his hand on Tom’s shoulder. “I did, Tom. I don’t think I ever heard my Christian name between the ages of six and sixteen. Croft this and Croft that—even my father called me Croft or Boy.”

“Then how come you’re different now?” Tom turned round, for the first time facing Cecil Croft.

“Because I wasn’t like any of them, Tom. That’s why I won’t call you Brissenden and you won’t call me Croft, because we’ll do our level best for our country, and we’ll play their game, but that’s all they’ll have of us.” And Cecil Croft looked at Tom for one more second before turning around and stepping along the line of beds to his own, where he slumped down and began writing in a notebook.

Tom finished the polishing, finished the spitting and the blacking and buffing, and in turn lay back on his bed. He pulled an envelope from under his pillow and took out a letter from Kezia.

My Dear Tom,

Let me tell you about the tea I cooked for you today. I am sure you will love it, but please let me know if there’s anything you think I could do to flavor it more to your taste.

Bert brought a rabbit to the door yesterday. Thank goodness Ada skinned and quartered it for me. I thought a hot pot would be a good idea, so I fried up the rabbit parts and put in a whole onion, chopped. But here’s what I thought to add—some sultanas. They come out big and juicy when they’re cooked and add a sweetness to the rabbit, so it’s like a little bit of summer in France added to winter in England. When this war is done, you can tell me all about France, can’t you? I daresay you’ll be home by spring in any case.