The Four of Us (10 page)

Terrified that they were soon going to be numbered among them, Geraldine, with Primmie at her side, tried to fight a way through what had become a full-scale pitched battle, to Artemis and Kiki. It was impossible. A policeman, truncheon raised, made a grab for Primmie, catching hold of her by her hair.

As Primmie, still held only by her hair, was dragged away kicking and screaming, another policeman made a similar beeline for Geraldine. She twisted to evade him and saw, as she did so, that just behind Artemis a path in the crowd was being opened up by mounted police. It wasn't a charge. The horses were backing first this way and then that, in order to force an area of space that the police could occupy. Suddenly Artemis was an island. As the crowd who had hemmed her in scattered before the horses should reach them, Artemis remained dazedly where she was, unaware of what was taking place behind her. Even as Geraldine kicked out at the policeman trying to arrest her, she could see only too clearly what was about to happen. And so could Kiki.

Kiki, much nearer, gave a scream of warning, and then as Artemis continued to stand confusedly in the path of one of the backing horses Geraldine saw Kiki launch herself forward to hurl Artemis out of its way.

Artemis went flying. The rump of the horse barged into Kiki and then, as she tottered, struggling to retain her balance, the horse, still with its back to her, gave a flick of a rear leg, its hoof catching her full in the stomach.

She went down beneath it as if felled by an axe.

Geraldine could never remember exactly what it was she did next. Later, in court, it was detailed she'd bitten the hand of the policeman trying to haul her away so deeply he had needed hospital treatment. All she knew at the time was that she had to get away from him; that she had to reach Kiki.

The horse, aware now that a body was beneath it, was standing absolutely motionless, serving to guard Kiki from further hurt as the battle between demonstrators and police reached fever pitch.

Geraldine fought a way towards her like a wildcat, reaching her at the same time as two ambulance men with a stretcher.

‘Is she dead?' She hurled the words at them, hysteria a mere beat away.
‘Is she dead?'

Artemis was kneeling in the dust and dirt by Kiki's side, her tights torn and bloodied, her face a mask of fear. ‘No,' she said in a cracked voice. ‘She's not dead, Geraldine. Her eyes flickered open for a moment a second or so ago.'

As the ambulance men lifted Kiki on to a stretcher, Artemis covered her face with her hands and began to sob.

Geraldine hauled her to her feet. ‘We're going with her, Artemis. Wherever they're taking her, we're going with her.'

The main body of the fighting was now taking place on the far side of the square and, as the ambulance men began carrying the stretcher towards one of the waiting ambulances, the remaining demonstrators readily made a pathway for them. Geraldine kept hard on the ambulance men's heels, not letting so much as a yard separate her and Artemis from them. Only at the ambulance doors was she stopped.

‘You can't accompany her,' one of the men said curtly as he helped load a still-unconscious Kiki into the ambulance.

‘We're her friends,' she said, her voice just as curt as his. ‘And we're going with her.'

She never did hear his response. From behind her came the sound of running feet and her arms were yanked backwards with such force she thought they were going to come out of their sockets.

The officer arresting her had egg yolk spattered on his uniform and livid green paint dribbling from his helmet and was in no mood to be messed with. This time there could be no twisting and turning and fighting back. As another officer, hard on his heels, clapped handcuffs on Artemis, she knew that this time they were both most definitely looking at an appearance in court. She didn't care. The only thing she cared about was Kiki.

The ambulance doors were still open, and in the seconds before she and Artemis were frogmarched away she saw that blood, so dark as to be almost black, was seeping through the crutch of Kiki's jeans. Realization slammed so hard that for a moment she could scarcely breathe.

Whatever Kiki's injuries, she was sure of one thing. There was now no need for her conversation with her mother that evening.

If Kiki had been pregnant, she was no longer.

Primmie dressed slowly. First her grey knee-length A-line skirt, then her snowy short-sleeved white blouse. She shrugged her arms into her blazer, wondering if Artemis, Kiki and Geraldine would be wearing school uniform on their last day, certain that, if they were, they would not be feeling nostalgic over it, as she was.

‘Get a move on, Primmie!'
her mother bawled from the bottom of the stairs.
‘Yer gonna be late!'

‘Coming, Mum!'
she yelled in answer, taking a last long look at herself as a schoolgirl.

She was, of course, the only one of the four of them who could still remotely pass as a schoolgirl. Even in school uniform, Artemis, Kiki and Geraldine had long since looked almost bizarre when dressed for school – Artemis, because no school uniform in the world could disguise her voluptuous curves. Kiki, because the knowingness in her green-gilt eyes would have been disturbing in a woman a whole decade her senior and Geraldine … Primmie paused, trying to hit on what it was about Geraldine that made it impossible to believe she was still – for the next few hours at least – a schoolgirl. Geraldine was just too effortlessly self-confident.

If it hadn't been for Geraldine – and the confidence she inspired – she doubted if her parents would have been happy about her moving into the two-bedroomed flat Artemis's father had provided for Artemis in Kensington.

She ran down the stairs, reflecting that though the last few months had been good ones for her they hadn't been particularly easy for her friends.

For Artemis, the battle about not going on to university hadn't been too bad, because her mock A-level results were so poor no university in the country would have taken her. Kiki's battle, however, had been far different. Ever since the aftermath of the Grosvenor Square demo, when a registrar at St Thomas's had told her father she'd had a miscarriage, Simon Lane had been a different man. Instead of being furious with Kiki – as they had all expected him to be – he had blamed himself for somehow having failed her as a parent. Not wanting to fail her again, he had brought every possible pressure to bear when it had come to the subject of her going – or not going – to university.

Kiki had been absolutely adamant about not applying for a place. ‘I've given up two years of my life by staying on through the sixth form to please him,' she'd said fiercely to them all, ‘and I've done so on the understanding that I can then do whatever I choose. And I'm choosing to be a rock singer – not a two-a-penny university graduate.'

Geraldine, too, had been stubbornly immovable in her decision not to go on to university. ‘I'm getting engaged to my cousin, Francis,' she had told Miss Featheringly, when Miss Featheringly had spoken to her about her decision. ‘And after we're married we're going to travel the world – and when we've travelled the world we're going to live at Cedar Court, where our great-grandfather was born and where Francis was born.'

According to Geraldine, Miss Featheringly had been scandalized by such an idle, unproductive attitude towards life. Geraldine, however, hadn't given two hoots. ‘At least Miss F. will be pleased with you, Primmie,' she'd said. ‘Durham's a top-notch university. Almost as prestigious as Oxford.'

Miss Featheringly
had
been pleased with her. ‘And because of your family's financial circumstances, I think it is quite reasonable of you to take a year out in order to save money towards your costs when at Durham,' she'd said when Primmie had told her she wouldn't be taking up the place she'd been offered until September 1970 and that, until then, she would be working as an account handler at a leading advertising agency. Wisely, she hadn't told Miss Featheringly that during her year before beginning university she would be sharing a flat with Geraldine, Artemis and Kiki.

‘Come on, Primmie, darlin',' her mother said, pushing a plate of buttered toast into her hand as she walked into the kitchen. ‘Yer never late fer school and yer don't want to start now, on yer last day, do yer?'

‘No, Mum.' Suppressing a fit of the giggles, Primmie took hold of the proffered plate.

‘An'so what'appens in mornin'assembly on yer last day?' her mother asked, leaning against the sink, her hands wrapped round a mug of steaming tea. ‘Is it a bit special?'

‘Probably. I know Miss Featheringly has asked Kiki if she'd like to sing.'

‘Sing to the school?' Her mum's eyes widened. ‘Not one of'er rock songs, Primmie, surely?'

Primmie bit into her toast. ‘No. She was going to, but I think we've talked her out of it.'

‘You
cannot
sing a Janis Joplin number,' Geraldine had said to Kiki emphatically, when Kiki had announced that she intended doing so. ‘There'll be school governors in attendance as well as every member of the staff. I may not have a lot of time for Miss F., but even I wouldn't wish her to be publicly embarrassed. And, anyway, how can you sing a heavy rock number with no backing group? Whatever you sing, you're going to have to accompany yourself, and you've only got one pair of hands.'

It was probably that last argument, Primmie thought, that had dissuaded Kiki from opting for her favourite Joplin number.

‘Well, whatever darlin'Kiki sings, I'm sure it'll go down a treat,' her mother said, breaking in on her thoughts. ‘Now get a move on, Primmie, or yer goin'to miss that bloomin'train!'

‘I can't believe this is the very last time I shall ever have to haul myself through the school gates,' Geraldine said to her as, arms linked, they strolled through the usual crush towards Bickley High's front steps. ‘Only another few hours and we'll be free at last.'

‘I'm going to miss it. I've been happy here, right from my very first day.'

‘You'd be happy anywhere,' Geraldine said dryly. ‘You have an indecent capacity for being happy. Which is more than can be said for Artemis,' she added as they walked into the cloakroom and Artemis steamed up to them, a pained expression on her face.

‘You said
no one
wears uniform on their last day, Geraldine, and look at you!
You
are.'

It wasn't quite true as Geraldine wasn't wearing the cardigan that was obligatory when wearing a blouse and skirt. Not that Bickley High's school skirt looked like a school skirt on Geraldine. Instead of being modestly A-line, it was pencil straight and, as it barely skimmed her knees, her long, colt-like legs seemed to go on for ever. The top two buttons of her blouse were carelessly undone. There was no sign at all of her school tie and her raven-black hair was coiled in a glossily sophisticated knot in the nape of her neck.

‘I said it wouldn't surprise me if people didn't wear uniform,' Geraldine said gently.

‘And so I didn't! And you are, and Primmie is, and I just
know
everyone else is!'

Primmie regarded Artemis's patchwork maxi-dress with serious misgivings. It was far too fussy. And it certainly wasn't appropriate wear for the last day at school. Only the patchwork's colours – raspberry, bilberry, plum and wine-red – were not completely impossible.

‘It will tone with a school blazer,' she said, ‘but you're going to have to keep it on all day.'

‘But I haven't got one with me!'

‘Then borrow mine.' Primmie yanked open her locker door and retrieved the blazer she would never wear again.

Artemis gratefully took it from her. ‘Has Kiki said anything to you about what it is she's going to sing?' she asked, painfully aware that she was going to stick out in assembly like a sore thumb.

‘No.' Primmie looked round the crowded cloakroom for a glimpse of Kiki's distinctive spicy red hair. ‘Has she said anything to you?'

‘She told me that as a rock number was out and as she couldn't plug her electric guitar in and would have to accompany herself on her Spanish guitar, she was going to opt for a French song by the actress Jane Birkin. I don't know it, but something French seems an odd choice …'

They were now walking out of the cloakroom into the corridor that led towards the assembly hall. Geraldine stopped dead in her tracks.

‘Dear God,' she said devoutly, her face paling. ‘Not
“Je t'aime, moi non plus”
?'

‘I think so. Something like that, anyway. Is it unbelievably sentimental?'

‘It's unbelievably sexy! It isn't so much a song as a dirty phone call heavy-breathing number – and Jane Birkin sings it with Serge Gainsbourg. Who's Kiki going to sing it with? The school gardener?'

Primmie groaned, knowing Kiki would think singing such a song in assembly hysterically funny.

‘Perhaps she was teasing me,' Artemis said hopefully as they filed on to a row at the back of the hall.

On the platform, seated to the left of the school governors and wearing her hated yellow gingham dress, Kiki looked serenely out over the sea of faces, her guitar propped beside her chair. When Primmie caught her eye, she winked.

‘Jer-us-al-em,' the school began singing. ‘Jer-
s
-al-em.'

Tears pricked Primmie's eyes. It was the last time she would be singing it as a start to her day. The last time she would stand between Geraldine and Artemis, looking at Millet's
The Angelus
and Millais'even more beautiful
Ophelia
.

As ‘Jerusalem' came to an end and Miss Featheringly stepped forward to lead the school in The Lord's Prayer, she looked at the posy of flowers in Ophelia's hand, knowing the meaning of every one of them. A poppy, for death. A daisy, for innocence. A rose, for youth. A violet, for faithfulness. A pansy, for love in vain.