Love Fifteen Page 13

  Once, when their chatter touched on something official, one of the ugly girls gave the others a warning look and pointed at a poster with a cartoon of Hitler and Goering sitting behind two women on a bus above the slogan Careless Talk Costs Lives, which made the girls seem more important to the other passengers and made him wish he had a war job too. The rest got off at the top of Cromwell Road, then he and Margo sat on alone, with one or two titches and Quasis. Whenever he turned to look at her, she kept her eyes front or down into her lap. Then he could see she’d used Vaseline on her lashes. Halfway along Chesterfield, she flounced past to the stairs.

  He turned to look down as she stepped on to the pavement after a couple of other passengers. One foot twisted beneath her and she fell. He felt no sense of triumph, only longed to be down there to help her to her feet. A goddess subject to gravity when she should float weightless above mere mortals! And the fall hadn’t been elegant. He saw Sondergaard ask from the rear platform if she was hurt. She shook her head and smiled. Oh, Jesus, he longed to raise the gorgeous creature, to ask if she was alright, to pick up her dropped bag. Her deep blush showed how shaming the fall had been. She’d scragtched her hand where it hit the paving-stone. Helped to her feet by a middle-aged man, she thanked him with a smile that made Theo gasp. She pulled out one of those tiny handkerchiefs they always had and dabbed at the bloody scratch. Her blood! The bus pulled away as she took up her bag, shook out her hair and walked off the other way, slightly limping.

  The bus groaned up Ashley Hill in low gear and, crossing to Villa Borghese, he saw no car. One of Fred’s weeks away, but no Vince as yet. Harry the Canadian corporal could be there, having come by taxi. Mum was having trouble keeping her three men apart. Oh, but not today. This was Tuesday and she’d be at the New Palace with Laura Tombs, so he could safely have gone to Hazel’s place and waited for her to come home from school, but she’d warned him off till he’d thought of another way they could be together without being seen.

  TWELVE

  “They blooming doughboys!” said Tilda, from the sofa where she sat browsing the Evening Post’s headlines, “they’m coming in now tis nearly all over… after our boys bin four years in the trenches.”

  “It’s not that war, Gran,” Kay told her, taking her hand and kissing the white and liver-spotted skin.

  The direct hit on the gas-mains beside Tilda’s flat hadn’t only bombed her out but scattered her wits. She now wandered freely over time and place.

  “The Yanks haven’t come in this time, Mother,” Rose added.

  For a moment or two the old woman so beloved of Theo and Kay gazed about as if for help.

  “They do always leave it till ‘tis all h’over.”

  The worst raids were in the past, only the occasional HEs had been jettisoned for some weeks, but whenever she heard a plane Tilda asked if it was they buggers again. Sometimes she felt more scared of the Yanks than the Germans, a view shared by Harry, a Canadian corporal, one of those Empire volunteers who’d come to help defend the mother country. A distant cousin from Montreal, he brought nylons for Rose and rum for Tilda and for the two adolescents powdery Hershey chocolate that was better than nothing when you’d used all your points. Harry hated everything American and reckoned they wouldn’t ever enter the war, they were too busy fighting for the next dollar. He was soon escorting Rose to the Mauretania, the doorway of which had been a temporary shelter for Hazel and Theo that bang-on night. This watering-hole had survived the bombing and was now host to foreign servicemen and their good time girls.

  Taxis, once as exotic as camels in their neighbourhood, were familiar whenever Fred was away and Harry could get a pass. As the car’s horn and idling motor were heard in the street, net curtains were plucked aside and faces loomed at nearby windows, watching as Rose got aboard. This evening, as soon as the cab had driven off, Vince’s clapped-out old Hillman arrived. He was sorry not to find Rose in, but handed out some forbidden fruit from his cardboard suitcase: Evening in Paris scent for Kay, Capstans for Theo and Mintoes for Tilda. Theo still rummaged for give-away fags in Dad’s drawer, ignoring the packet-of-three. Since the first mention of Hazel’s unusual but fortunate condition, he’d never given another thought to babies. They had so much else to talk about, like whether life after the war would be American or Russian or a terrific new mixture of both, marrying the liberty of the west to Soviet equality. No-one ever spoke of the possibility of a German world. The Nazis were too much like mad scientists in some corny second feature from Monogram Studios played by Von Stroheim or Fritz Feld. You couldn’t take such people seriously. Old Hess – of the brilliant eyebrows – had just parachuted into Scotland, wanting to talk peace. He broke his ankle and asked the farmer who found him to be directed to some old Duke he knew about. Inky and Theo worked up a sketch based on news reports.

  Farmer (John Laurie): “Och aye, if you’ll just bide here the while, young Angus here will go and fetch him on his wee bicycle. Meantime, Fritz, will ye be wanting a wee dram?”

  Hess : (Sig Ruman) “Was ist zees Dram?”

  Jock: “Och, whisky, ya ken.”

  Hess: “Nein, sank you, I neffah drink anyssing zat makes you drunk and do silly sings I might lader on regret or zat might upset ze Fuhrer.”

  You couldn’t help liking such total loonies a bit. Our lot weren’t all that different. Old Churchill was mad too, giving the up-you sign all over the place, not seeming to have a clue what it meant. He’d come to the university just down from their school after one of the worst raids and people had said there were tears in his eyes, but he and Inky reckoned they were from smoke off the smouldering cigar he always carried, along with all those corny hats and the stick and siren suit. And near the end of autumn term, the whole thousand boys had been made to stand by the playing field and watch George VI inspecting the OTC and give him three cheers. He sounded pretty mad too on the radio, but looked better in the flesh, a bit like Gary Cooper acting as a British officer. Theo was sorry he hadn’t made a speech, as he’d wanted to perfect his stammer.

  The Germans broke their treaty with Russia in their usual way, by invading what old Winnie called ‘That varsht land’. They nearly reached Moscow but were held back there and at Stalingrad. Hazel exulted in the Soviets’ heroic defence of their country and said it showed that right would always prevail against might. On her wind-up portable gram she played ‘Song of the Steppes’ by the Red Army Choir. It was all the rage, part of the Russia-love that had swept the country. Teachers always said filmgoing was a mindless and moronic waste of time but Theo reckoned, if Hitler had seen Charles Boyer as Napoleon in ‘Marie Walevska’, he’d never have risked invading the USSR in the Eastern winter.

  *

  “What does this pass-grip demand?”

  Fred closed his eyes and wracked his brain.

  “A pass word,” Theo finally read out, “and give me that pass word.”

  “I haven’t the foggiest. You sure this is right?”

  “Tubal Cain.”

  “Who’s he when he’s at home?”

  “The first artificer in metals.”

  Fred grabbed the book.

  “You’re on the wrong page. That’s the Raising to the Third Degree.”

  Theo took an imaginary cigarette from between his lips and rattled out: “Okay, Bugshy, show if you won’t talk, we’ll shee how you like the third degree,” with old Bogie’s lisp. He was wearing his only suit, a single-breasted charcoal-grey pinstripe he hoped made him look like a gangster. His father hadn’t noticed.

  “Very well,” Fred said, “if you can’t take it seriously-”

  “Well, can you?”

  “Can and must. Here.”

  He passed the book back, open at the right page. Theo scanned the instructions.

  “Okay, so you’re kneeling, trouser-leg rolled up, shirt open, wearing one shoe and one slipper… and a running nose round your neck. A what?” He slipped into Groucho: “And a nice position that would put you in.”


  “Noose, son. A running noose.”

  As if to dislodge a smut, Theo flicked the page with a finger and looked again.

  “Yep. And what do you swear?”

  “Not to reveal, write, care, mark, engrave or otherwise delineate the secrets of Masonry.”

  “What are the penalties, should you do so?”

  “To have my throat cut across, my tongue torn out by the root and something about the sea?”

  “Have it buried in the sand of the sea at low water mark.”’

  “Or a cable’s length from the shore, yes, that’s it.”

  “Jesus!”

  “Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain.”

  “What’s it all supposed to mean?”

  “Never mind. Just see if I can reel it off.”

  “You don’t know, do you? What it means?”

  “No-one does. It’s a secret. An arcana. That’s why it has to be put in mysterious ways.”

  “Arcanum.”

  “What?”

  “Arcana is the plural. Don’t they even know that, all these grocers and commercial travellers?”

  “Retail representatives, thank you. And no, they haven’t had the advantage of your expensive education. And who paid for that, pray?”

  “Muggins,” Theo admitted.

  “And how will Muggins continue to stump up your fees without an increase in his salary?”

  “He won’t.”

  “So how will he ensure promotion?”

  “Becoming a Mason.”

  “You’ve got it, boy.”

  “Okay.” Theo shrugged.” Anyway I’m supposed to be asking the questions. Next the Worshipful Master gives you the step, the sign, the grip and the word of an Entered Apprentice …”

  “There you are, son. That’s it. The grip. Equals the handshake. All that matters. Open Sesame to a better job in H.Q., so I’ll be able to stay home all the time, not one week in five. Keep an eye on you all.”

  Fred sneaked a crafty look at his son and Theo prayed he wouldn’t blush and betray Rose’s outings with Vince and Harry. Fred appeared to notice nothing and Theo felt his skills as a liar must be improving, as he grew up.” Right,” his dad said, “back to the oath. But, while we’re on the subject of your schooling, have you done tonight’s homework?”

  “Yeah, this afternoon. Half day.”

  “I’m throwing money down the drain on you. You’re still bottom in Maths and twenty-third in History. Why should I go on when you don’t even try?”

  “It’s the way old Artie teaches it, all treaties and kings. No insight. No grasp of the forces that really move the world.”

  “Well, it’s funny your sister’s always near the top in all her subjects.”

  “She doesn’t know what she’s going to be so she’s got to be good in them all. To be on the safe side. What use will algebra be to a film director?”

  It was an evening in March and they were in the front room where Fred usually retreated to play his Brahms and Tchaikovsky 12-inch 78s. Before they could revise the oath of silence, Rose swept in, wearing the velvet evening dress that Theo liked to touch with his cheek in her wardrobe. She had a pearl necklace and her hair was in an Amami wave.

  “Have I overdone it?” she asked.” Too glammed up?”

  “Not a bit, my love,” Fred said, advancing to kiss her.

  “Mind, don’t spoil my make-up.” She evaded him, touched his cheek with one finger and pursed her lips in the looking glass over the mantelpiece.” I hope you’re ready, Theo.”

  She moved on to the upright and sorted sheet-music into a leather manuscript case. Her maiden initials stamped in gilt had been mostly worn away since her hopeful days as a singing student.

  “You’re wearing the necklace I gave you.”

  “So I am.”

  She’d shown Theo the contents of her jewel-box one day, letting the necklace slip between her fingers like drops of mercury poured on to a dish in the Science lab. They were cultured, she boasted, though to him they looked no better than ordinary ones.

  “By your poshed-up appearances, I take it you’re entertaining? Well, what’s your target for tonight?”

  “Oh,” she said, squinting at the sheet-music titles, “they never tell us till we’re there.”

  “If then,” Theo said.

  “Top secret mission then?”

  Fred hated them to spending evenings away during the one-in-five weeks he spent at home, so this sarcasm was automatic, almost a reflex action. And tonight he was too distracted and anxious about his catechism in the temple to feel much about his wife and son’s war effort.

  “Your big night too, isn’t it?” Rose said. At times she seemed to Theo almost fond of her husband. “Nervous?”

  “A few butterflies. But I’ve got the responses off pat, thanks to Einstein here.”

  “You mean Eisenstein,” said Theo.” Hardly Einstein when I’m bottom in Maths.”

  He had mentioned the director when their Film Club had showed ‘The Battleship Potemkin’.

  “After all,” Fred persisted, “it’s supposed to be more warm welcome than ordeal. I’ll be among colleagues and well wishers.”

  A motor-horn sounded outside and Rose plucked aside the net to wave.

  “There’s the car.”

  She now put on a raincoat over her bare shoulders and arms as Fred came into the murky hall, reached for a clothes-brush from a hook below the tiny mirror and began skimming it across his son’s shoulders.

  “Scurf galore. We don’t want those F-for-Freddies seeing that. Might so upset them they’ll lose sight of what they’re fighting for. Instead of soaring into the wild blue yonder, they’ll come plummeting to earth.”

  They looked into the dining-room to say goodnight to his gran and sister. While he and Rose were out with the concert-party and Dad was at the lodge with one trouser-leg rolled up, Kay would be either at home with Tilda and the wireless or playing ping-pong with oiks at the Youth Club in the local school. None of them knew much about Kay’s private life. Theo’d seen her with some Cotham School oiks in the museum, round behind British Mammals, but that was a game for professional virgins and she probably still didn’t know nearly as much as he did. When he tried to find out whether she had a regular bod, she stared back like she had when he’d dropped a depth-charge stinker during one of those necking-parties they used to have when they were kids.

  Vince was waiting in his Austin Seven and returned the wave Fred gave from the bay-window. On the drive through the twilit blacked-out city, Mum sat in front and sometimes from the back seat Theo saw Vince put his hand on her knee, at which she made a not-now face, rolling her eyes. As soon as he’d heard they were joining a troupe of local amateur entertainers, Vince had volunteered to drive them, an offer quickly taken up when he told the organisers he had a petrol allowance from his reserved occupation. ‘“What as? A Spiv,”’ Inky had asked when Theo passed this on. But all the grown-ups they knew were into some sort of criminality, if only scrounging a few eggs or the odd gallon of petrol.

  They left the city to the south by the Bridgwater Road. From the summit of Bedminster Down, they had a broad view of the city just after the sun went down and not one of its three-hundred-and-fifty thousand citizens showed even a sliver of light.

  The fact they were going in Vince’s car meant tonight’s camp wouldn’t be as far off as some. For the more remote stations, wireless and radar units or coastal look-outs on Bristol Channel, they went in the troupe’s own mobile theatre, a single-decker bus converted by a tiny stage at one end. What, in a real theatre, would have been the wings on one side was the space they’d parked in, often a rainswept plot of ground on some exposed headland. During the other turns, each artiste waited in whatever shelter they could find, usually the porch of a Nissen hut or camouflaged awning for the unit’s motor transport. To make their entrances, they clambered up the steps, summoned by a fanfare from the mini-piano.

  But this evening they were playing a milita
ry hospital in a large pre-war barracks. Convalescent soldiers in Reckitts blue uniforms sat in ranks of chairs along the aisle between beds in which more serious cases lay in pyjamas.

  Rose was fifth on the variety bill.

  “Oh ma babbie,” she sang, “ma curly-headed babbie,

  Yo’ daddy’s in de cotton-field a-wo’king for de co-oo—oo-oo-oo-oon.”

  Theo watched from beyond double-doors in the end wall, beside the Sister’s room. His mum stood under a couple of overhead lights; the rest had been turned off to create a feeble penumbra but enough was reflected to show the bed-patients’ shaven heads. Some blankets were held up by frames to relieve the weight on hidden wounds.

  “So lulla-lulla-lulla-lulla bye-bye.

  Does you want de moon to play wid

  Or de stars to run away wid?

  Dey’ll come if you don’t cry.”

  In the front rows of walking patients sat one or two medical officers and female nurses, listening politely, like the rest. A snort of laughter from a bed was suppressed as an NCO’s head shot round. Poor sods, he realised, they thought this was as funny as he did. Though he’d have been upset to hear Rose openly mocked, surely these poor wretches had already paid their dues and had enough to suffer without this woman twice their age singing in darkie language to the din of an untuned upright. He was on next and felt this could be the right time to try a new routine he’d been rehearsing in private, based on material worked out with Inky.