She's Leaving Home (57 page)

She herself had been twenty-one when the war broke out. Another year or two and she would be thirty. The boys – men, really, Daniel and Simon, as dear to her as brothers – were a couple of years older. They should both have had wives in pinnies, and little sons with dirty knees and cheeky faces, and modest insurance policies and mortgages. Instead their progress had stopped dead. Daniel lodged in two draughty rooms where, reliable gossip had it, he was soothed by another man’s wife, while Simon was still with his mother and sister. The fracture of their lives would scar them for ever. Under her lashes she examined first one man then the other, but when Simon tried to catch her eye she smiled vacantly and glanced away. She did not want to share her musings, at any rate not with him.

The space before the Town Hall had filled quickly. Over hastily erected loudspeakers martial music blared scratchily and unidentifiably. Dignitaries emerged on the balcony in robes and chains of office, their visages red and sweltering in the bright sunshine. The Labour leader of the Council, Alderman Luke Hogan, appeared with his son, also Luke, a recently returned POW. The tall young man leaned over the parapet and waved, his pale gaunt face so like his father’s. The Lord Mayor, the Earl of Sefton, seemed to fill the balcony by himself, his beaming Countess at his side.

The crowd began to sing and drowned out the victory marches: ditties to pay tribute to those who had stood by Britain in her darkest moments – ‘Oh Susannah’, ‘Waltzing Matilda’ and the like. A clock struck three, to three energetic cheers. Then, unmistakably, the tones of Winston Churchill boomed through the air. Silence fell.

‘Yesterday morning, at two forty-one am, at General Eisenhower’s headquarters
…’ To the crowd’s slight disappointment there followed an interminable list of defeated dignitaries and Allied heroes who had signed the surrender documents. As usual Churchill rolled every syllable and lingered between phrases, prolonging the moment they so desired. The listeners became faintly restless. It had been announced that the text had been agreed and the identical statements were being made simultaneously in Washington and Moscow but nevertheless – when would he say it – when?

‘Hostilities will end officially at one minute after midnight tonight, Tuesday the eighth of May…’
A premature shout went up and was hushed instantly. ‘…
celebrating today and tomorrow, Wednesday, as Victory in Europe days.’

There was a pause. Churchill raised his voice.

‘The German war is therefore at an end.’

‘Yes!’ Simon threw his cap in the air, grabbed Annie, and gave her a bear hug. ‘Marry me! I’ll buy that house in West Derby – we’ll live happily ever after!’

She pushed him away, face scarlet. ‘Shush. He’s not finished yet.’

Churchill could not stop himself adding a few words of laudatory self-congratulation.
‘After gallant France had been struck down, we from this island and from our united Empire maintained the struggle single-handed for a whole year, until we were joined by the military might of Soviet Russia, and later by the overwhelming power and resources of the United States of America. Finally almost the whole world was combined against the evil-doers who are prostrate before us… We may allow ourselves a brief period of rejoicing. But let us not forget for a moment the toils and efforts that lie
ahead – Japan with all her treachery and greed remains unsubdued… We must now devote all our strength and resources to the completion of our task –’

The gravelly voice had risen a whole octave; a clear tenor floated out from the loudspeakers to the hushed multitudes.

‘Advance Britannia! Long live the cause of freedom! God save the King!’

A broadcast blast of trumpets from the buglers of the Scots Guards ceremoniously sounded the victory. The music started; bells pealed out from the seamen’s church, St Nicholas, then other belfries took up the signal, and soon the whole city was ringing for joy; the crowd burst into raucous song, the Lord Mayor waved his feathered tricorne hat, kissed the Lady Mayoress, shook hands with a tired Sergeant Logan and his father; waved again, and uttered into the microphone words lost in the cheers and celebration below; and the crowds began to dance with each other, in and out of the bollards, around the Town Hall, down to the Municipal Annexe, in and out of shops and arcades and halls, by trestle tables being set up in streets for the following day’s parties, around the market place and along the Pier Head, jumping, clinging, screeching, free. Free: and at peace.

Annie was not sure what time they stopped and slumped in a doorway, only that it was nearly dark, and their clothes were damp from rain, and she was not entirely in control of herself. That the three had managed to stay together was a minor miracle, but somehow it symbolised the comradeship of the conflict itself, those qualities of gritty endurance which had seen them through. It had been a remarkable time, for all the pain. All over.

Time to start again.

Simon had acquired a half-bottle of cheap sherry in a brown paper bag. He took a swig and handed it to Annie, who shook her head. ‘Had enough,’ she slurred. ‘Not going ’ome in this state. Bit
shicke
, I am. Stay out a bit. My mother won’t worry. Not tonight.’

‘Annie: Annie. Listen to me. I may never be able to say this when I’m sober.’ Simon had her arm. She wriggled but he held tight. Daniel rose shakily and strolled away. About fifty yards from them he leaned on a doorpost, hands in pockets, head down.

‘Whatissit?’ At last Annie gave Simon her full attention. He spoke rapidly, as if he had rehearsed the words but could not get the flow quite right.

‘I’m going to leave Berman’s at once. Get out while the going is good. My uncle has some cash and we’ll start our own firm. Trousers for the mass market – no more bespoke tailoring for me. I shall make money, Annie, I’m set on it. Here in Liverpool. Will you join me? I meant what I said about the house. I love you dearly, Annie, you must know that. I’ve loved you for ever. I know you can love me. Marry me. Please, say yes. Please.’

With a hurried movement he was on one knee, still talking urgently. ‘I haven’t got a ring yet – I didn’t know it was going to be today, nobody did. But I’ll make a wonderful husband for you, Annie, and I’ll devote my life to making you happy. On my knees I swear it. You deserve the very best. Say yes.’

Annie stood and tried to lift Simon, but he resisted and stayed down, his face upturned in the bluish lamplight. Their hands entwined for a minute, then she slid hers away, and walked slowly and deliberately to Daniel’s side.

The drizzle had restarted; fine silvery drops on his hair and shoulders gave him a ghostly sheen. His face glistened with what she suspected might have been tears. He took his hand out of his pocket and wordlessly wiped his face with his open palm. She slipped her hand into his before he could hide it again.

‘Did you hear that, Daniel?’ she asked softly. He nodded.

‘He’s decent and worthy and I’m very fond of him, as you are, but he’s not the man for me. It’s you, Daniel, it always has been. You, all mixed up and passionate, trying to deny your heritage, dreaming of being something you’re not: but good and honourable, and so in need of a decent home it
breaks my heart to watch you. Alone in the world – your father dead, your cousins about to emigrate. Your girlfriend back in her stately pile – she’ll have forgotten you already. But I’m here. I can help you. I can make that home. I am the right partner for you, Daniel. And you for me.’

He looked down at her. The tears flowed down both their faces and neither attempted to hide them. ‘Take Simon,’ he said brokenly, and made to move away. ‘I am no use to you. He will make something of himself – I never will.’

She stood in front of him, small and fierce. ‘I’m not as clever or as bookish as you, Daniel Majinsky. I’m not some smart society lady, but so what? I know what you need. You know what you need, dammit. I love you. I worship you! For God’s sake, stop arguing. You’re not on your soapbox now. This is a real future I offer you. The head of a family – a name for yourself, which you’ve never had. Love for decades, for the years ahead – not just for this month or next. Oh, Danny, it has to be. Otherwise I swear I’ll not get wed at all, and neither will you. If you say no, what else is there for you? Come on, be sensible.’ He laughed quietly at that, gazed down at her small hand held in his for a long moment and massaged the fingers, as if erasing a memory. Then gently he took the tiny girl in his arms, and kissed her, and held her close.

When they turned to look behind them, Simon had gone.

In the library of a Georgian house two hundred miles away, Spanish sherry sparkled in a decanter on a silver tray as Waterford crystal glasses were clinked together. The ancient butler, bowed but with his lined face creased in pleasure, glided out. A rangy setter dog loped into the room and sat at their feet, its head across the shoes of its newly returned master.

‘Darling. Here’s to the peace.’

‘To peace. And to Mr Churchill. And to our brave boys – all of you.’

The two drank. His hand trembled and he glanced away.

He leaned back on the sofa. ‘You must have had such adventures, old girl. We’ll have to catch up. Was Liverpool too frightful? You are such a brick. What a place to have to go.’

‘Better than Stalag IIB at Fallinghestel, I’ll bet.’

‘Rather – but I don’t want to talk about that. Isn’t Liverpool supposed to be crammed with characters? Here, sit beside me. Your spouse may be a heap of battered old bones but there’s nothing amiss with my sense of humour. Did you meet any interesting coves? Tell me.’

‘I met a few.’ Her voice was calm. ‘Some wonderful people. Such stoicism, even as their little terraced houses crashed about their heads. I came to love them, in a way.’

‘Anybody special?’ He was teasing, but his eyes were cloudy. It occurred to her that he might prove a far more jealous and orthodox husband in future. There would be no more adventures, no
pre-war
open marriage from here on.

She pondered, head on one side, and brushed a stray curl off her brow.

‘No, darling, of course not. Nobody remarkable at all.’

‘He quickened the heart and mind of the nation, inspired the young, met great crises, led our society to new possibilities of justice and our world to new possibilities of peace and left behind so glowing and imperishable a memory.’

Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.,

A Thousand Days – John F. Kennedy in the White House

(André Deutsch, 1965)

Birthday. Seventeen. Cards from her parents and, unexpectedly, from Auntie Gertie with a $20 bill folded small. The scribbled note told her to take it into a bank. It would be worth over £4, more than she could earn in a week. To Gertie that was probably small change. And to Michael, and his family.

Before breakfast, still snuggled into the bedclothes, she started a letter to her aunt with the usual stilted phrases of gratitude. Then it felt as if the old lady herself had entered the room, her skirts a-swish, her eyes inviting confidences. Helen began to write more freely.

Helen giggled at herself. It was a bit early in the morning to be thinking so much about sex. But Gertie would not be startled and would answer her somehow. Maybe in person, if she, Helen, could manage to get across the Atlantic, even if only for a short trip. From downstairs came the sounds of clattering plates and cutlery. Hastily Helen laid the letter aside and threw off the blankets.

On the early bus into town Helen felt cramped and out of sorts. She was not ill, or she would have telephoned Boots the Chemist to cry off. The summer job had metamorphosed into regular Saturday employment at the flagship store in town, which suited her fine. It was less likely that members of the community on their way from sabbath service would pop in and embarrass both of them with their furtive handling of forbidden money. And the big shop was busy, with better pay and more to keep her occupied.

The Boot’s people were friendly. Mr Clay the pharmacist from Allerton Road must have had a word with his city centre counterparts for she had been spoken to twice and had the sense of being nurtured, cautiously but deliberately. Pharmacists might be defensive about the invisibility of their profession, but (they murmured) they were readily employable. A chemist – druggist, Michael would say – was always valued, especially when doctors were revered but not entirely heeded. Should her exam results be inadequate, if Cambridge and other seats of learning should decide against her eventually, she could do worse.

Yet every instinct rebelled. To spend a lifetime doling out cough sweets and painkillers to whingeing customers was not quite basking in the white heat of the technological revolution. There was no point in striving so hard just to be ordinary, to disappear in a white coat into the pharmacist’s den, that neon-lit cupboard behind the counter. By contrast the
creation
of those new pills, the research into the new frontier of medicine and antibiotics: that would be a worthier objective. Her heroine Marie Curie with radium, or Dorothy Hodgkin who had unravelled the mysteries of penicillin
and Vitamin B1.2: those women benefited humanity, as much as any man. Compared, say, with the men who invented the H-bomb, rather more so. Mr Mannheim would agree.

The pressures were on. Childhood was slipping away. A sunlit pasture was passing and the future seemed alternately fantastic and murky. Soon she would have to earn her keep, accept her responsibilities and adapt herself to citizenship. Before many more weeks had elapsed choices would emerge, concrete and urgent.

Birthday.

Her mother had inquired tentatively over the porridge whether she wanted a few friends round for a little party, but without Michael it would have been no fun and with him impossible. The suggestion had made Helen smile inwardly, but she was tactful with Annie. To her mother she was still a small girl, and maybe always would be. Children never grew up in their parents’ eyes. It made teen life excruciatingly difficult.

It meant there was nobody older around to talk to, with whom to share her fears and unease. At times as she rode on the top deck of the bus to a few hours of simple, undemanding certainty, she felt panicky. Most people would dozily stay on the bus for ever and go to easy jobs, day by day, with no more anxieties than the size of the pay packet on Fridays. That would be true of the bulk of the girls at school, whatever ambition Miss Plumb had tried to instil. Most people were content to be ordinary. She was not, and it hurt and frightened her.

Only Michael. He would grasp what troubled her, and guide her gently to greater trust in herself. Michael, here and now, not Aunt Gertie, remote across the ocean. Michael would advise her not to be put off by her own isolation. Michael. But he, indeed, was both a part of the solution, and part of the problem.

‘I am sorry, Michael. I have to go to that darned school dance whether I like it or not. As a prefect I am a hostess.’

Helen shifted the phone to her other ear. Her tea break was ten minutes. The call box on the comer near Boots was draughty and her feet were frozen.

‘Gee! What’s a prefect, Helen? I wanted you to come to the base. We got some guys leaving and there’ll be quite a shindig.’

She laughed, a trifle nervously. ‘Maybe it’s fortunate I can’t come, then. But the dance packs up about half past nine. The younger children can’t have a late night. Why don’t I meet you later? In town? Gerry and the Pacemakers are on at the Cavern. Their record’s gone to number one – we’re lucky to get them.’

‘Heavens, sweetheart, that’s ancient. My mother sang it to me when I was a kid.
Carousel
, isn’t it – Rodgers and Hammerstein? Nowhere but a crazy country like England could that be a hit.’

‘It’s sold a quarter of a million copies in ten days. And Cilla’s got a Top Twenty hit now too – “Love of the Loved”.’ Helen spoke with lofty dignity. ‘See you there later, or not?’

Michael mused. ‘I can’t hear myself think in that smelly dive,’ he admitted. ‘Better at the pub – The Grapes, is it? – opposite. As near ten as you can make it. And happy birthday, sweetheart. I haven’t forgotten. OK?’

Maurice Feinstein ran his finger down the entertainments listing in the Echo.

‘I fancy
Brides of Dracula
. Peter Cushing and Andrée Melly. Liverpool girl, she is.’

Nellie clicked her tongue. ‘You sure? Bit gory, isn’t it?’

‘No, it’s a laugh. My son Jerry saw it with his girlfriend. He said the whole cinema fell about. You’re not supposed to take it seriously, Nellie.’

She peered at him. ‘
Mutiny on the Bounty’s
more in my line. Or
The VIPs
with Burton and Taylor. I can’t believe how gorgeous that woman is. Provided you don’t spend the rest of the night sighing over her finer points.’

‘There are bare breasts in
Bounty
, I’m told,’ he murmured roguishly, and reached across the table for her hand. ‘Or we could stay in, if you prefer.’

‘Later, Maurice. I want to go out. As long as you don’t mind if we’re seen in public.’

‘I don’t mind, if you don’t. I’ve put those sort of worries behind me. If we bump into Sylvia Bloom I’d simply tell her I’m no longer in the market. She’d get the message.’

‘Won’t you lose customers?’ Her face was grave.

He considered. ‘I don’t think so. Maybe one or two’d close their accounts but they’d have to clear them first. And there isn’t another decent kosher delicatessen between here and Manchester, so I
reckon we’re safe.’ He held her gaze. ‘I don’t care, anyway, Nellie. I’ve found you, and I’m happy. I only wish I’d realised years ago.’

‘Me too,’ she said simply, and let him stroke the inside of her arm, and tickle her palm till she wriggled.

A moment’s silence ensued, as if both were still unsure how to express their emotions. Then Maurice spoke slowly.

‘I can’t marry you, Nellie. You must see that.’

‘’Course you can’t.’ She did not want him to say why not. She did not want to hear him put into words and thus make permanent her status as an outsider. Quickly she added, before he could interrupt, ‘Because I’m already married.’

His jaw dropped. Astonishment gave his face a boyish look. ‘Did I know that?’

‘You must have known I was married. I don’t call myself “Miss”. P’raps you assumed I was divorced. Well, I’m not.’ Briefly she explained about Pete, and the robbery, and Spain. There would be plenty of time to tell him more, if he wanted details. He would sympathise, of that she was certain.

‘I nearly lost you,’ was all Maurice could answer. ‘Another couple of weeks and you’d have been away. It was that close.’

‘And you’d have been hitched up with that cow.’ The two began to giggle again, but Nellie watched him carefully. He might still be easily hurt. She did not yet know him well enough to be sure of the boundaries. Young lovers they were not, exactly.

‘If we don’t shift we’ll miss the features,’ she announced at last, and folded the paper. ‘
Brides of Dracula
, if you insist. On the way back we’ll collect a couple of brown ales and I’ll make you fried egg and chips when we get home. How does that sound?’

The gym hall was decorated, but scrappily. A few balloons, a streamer or two of crepe bunting, all somewhat forlorn. Orange squash and biscuits were ready on a side table for 6d. Coloured spotlights had been erected and focused on the platform. The main lights were full on: prefects had been warned not to switch any off in order to discourage illicit petting in corners. The toilets were to be checked regularly, and the bushes behind the hall. It might be chilly outdoors but nobody wanted any
goings-on
. Not at the Blackburne House school dance.

To the pupils’ relief the skiffle group were not bad. This was how the Beatles had started, and Rory Storm and the Hurricanes and the Merseybeats and the Swinging Blue Jeans and countless other groups now household names. The tacky instruments, some amateurishly cobbled together, didn’t matter. It was the beat, the noise they could make, the riffs they could lay down and the amps their home-made loudspeakers could drive into the ether. The boys put on a brave show, sufficient to furrow the brows of teachers who stalked the hall like sentinels, but which pleased the hundred or so youngsters obliged to turn up.

As for the players, Helen knew that the payment of a fiver for the night would be gratefully pocketed. Better than an early morning paper round in the dark and wet with a bagful of dailies,
Beano
and the
Radio Times
for ten bob a week.

She did not have a partner, so busied herself as a hostess, trying to ensure that as far as was possible in the artificial atmosphere the kids could enjoy themselves. She wore the gingham dress nipped in at the waist that Auntie Gertie had liked. It was Michael’s favourite, too – he said it made her look like a regular American girl.