The House at Tyneford (33 page)

“’Ere, ’ave a drink,” said Burt, offering me a flask of water.

Grateful, I took it from him, swallowing in gulps. Taking a lobster pot to use as a stool, I settled back beneath the spotted hull of the nameless boat and continued sanding. After a time Burt joined me, and we worked in companionable silence. He handed me the flask from time to time, but then once when I drank, it wasn’t water but rum. I nearly spat it out in surprise and Burt gave a low chuckle.

“Aye. Needs a bit o’ a boost. A good tingle in yer veins.”

Mr. Rivers and Art stood on the deck of the
Margaret
with coils of new rope and began to feed them through the cleats, ready to rig the canvas sails, which lay in brown clouds beneath the mast. Placing a wooden handle in the jaws of the winch, Mr. Rivers heaved while Art fed a line attached to the sail up the mast. The sail fluttered and flapped like a furious tethered bird, and the boat rocked on its makeshift platform. The noise was deafening, like claps of stage thunder, and I lowered my sandpaper to watch the two men wrestle with the wind. Mr. Rivers left the winch to help Art, embracing the brown sail and reaching up with long arms to wrench it free. Suddenly it spilled along the boom, a great brown wing, half an eagle.

“Champion seaman, Mr. Rivers. Used ter race fer England when he wis a young man. Brilliant at yachtin’,” murmured Burt in admiration.

I glanced at him in surprise and the old man smiled.

“Aye. Doesn’t really understand yachtin’ myself. If yer is goin’ out arn the sea, might as well do a spot o’ fishin’. Sailin’ an’ no supper, seems a lot o’ bother ter me.” He gave a tiny shrug. “But Mr. Rivers, best yachtsman an’ sailor. Better ’an Kit. That boy’s too impatient. Brave an’ reckless. Dangerous that is. Sea is hungry fer foolish men.”

I put down my chisel and walked away. I didn’t want to hear his doubts about Kit. Not now, when he was at sea. Behind me in the crumbling rocks, sand pipits had made nest holes, but they were abandoned, the owners far away in sunnier climes. The dwellings had an empty look, like cottages with unlit windows at dusk.

“Burt doesn’t mean anything, Elise. He just worries about Kit. He’s very fond of him,” said Mr. Rivers.

He stood quietly beside me, watching the waves recede along the shoreline, the tide starting to turn.

“I don’t like the silence,” I said. “He always writes.”

“I know. But I am sure he’s all right. Navy wires the families straight away if there’s been a problem. Just up to something secret, that’s all,” he said.

“Have you heard anything from your friend in Paris?”

He shook his head. “I’m sorry. Nothing.”

He rested his arm lightly around my shoulders, and I leaned into him. His skin was damp and he smelled of sweat and work. Suddenly we were both aware of his nakedness; he dropped his arm and I stepped away.

“Come. Time to paint,” he said with a smile.

Everyone helped slick the bottom of the two fishing boats with layers of antifoul, aimed at repulsing the weeds and barnacles and keeping the hull smooth and cutting through the water at a lick. The sun began to slide down the sky, until it was a round red chequer hovering above the horizon. The clouds flamed, as bright as coals, and the sea shimmered pink, a miracle of watery fire.

“Needs ter ’ave a name. Smart boat like ’er needs a smart new name,” said Burt. “Yer want ter name ’er?” he asked with a grin in my direction.

“Are you sure?” I said, looking around at the hoary faces of the fishermen, their beards daubed with red by the setting sun.

“Needs ter be the name of a woman,” added Art, scratching at a smear of paint on his forehead. “It’s tradition.”

I thought for a moment. There was only one possible name.

“The
Anna
,” I announced.

“Right yoos are,” said Burt, passing me the flask of rum.

I sprinkled a few drops over the bow, wetting her. “The
Anna
!” I shouted and the men grunted their approval. I gulped a sip of the rum and handed it to Mr. Rivers. He drank, head thrown back. The sun dropped beneath the horizon and the pink sky dulled to grey. No lights appeared in the cottage windows, as blackout blinds were pinned into place. I thought of Anna and Julian. They’d be thrilled knowing there was a ship named for her. I wished I could launch the
Anna
that minute and set sail to find them. I took the flask from Mr. Rivers and swallowed another gulp of burning rum.

“Come,” said Mr. Rivers, turning for home. I hurried to catch him, and together we strolled along the stone path in the early dark. I stumbled and he reached out to catch hold of my elbow, steadying me. Behind us, the slap of the sea and the laughter of the fishermen faded.

One March morning I woke early and padded downstairs in pyjamas and bare feet. It was soon after six and the daily housemaid had not yet started to clean the hallway. I unfastened the blackouts by the porch so that dawn light peeped in through the mullioned windows. The small drawing room was piled high with scraps of fabric and wisps of cotton filling floated out in the draught. The ladies in the village, marshalled by Poppy’s aunts, had decided to make bed jackets for wounded servicemen, and the yellow drawing room was declared ideal for this worthy occupation. The ladies descended upon us twice a week and sat around the fire and stitched, drank Mrs. Ellsworth’s plum wine, gossiped about the misery of war and the hideous inconvenience of the blackout and were very happy. My efforts were endlessly criticised and pulled apart, quite literally, to be resewn. In my opinion, the fact that my running stitch was not perfectly even would be the least concern of the corporal or private or captain who sat in bed clad in my mauve floral bed jacket (recycled from a pair of old curtains—waste not, want not). It was an odd thing, making clothes for soldiers who were not yet wounded. The wearer of the ugly bed jacket was presently preparing to ship off to France or running exercises in a damp Wiltshire field or drifting in the North Atlantic, in rude health. We sewed and prepared for future injury, ready to cosset our soldiers in beautifully stitched bedroom curtains, while they drilled with guns and bayonets and learned to salute. It felt almost as though by making the wretched bed jackets we were dooming them to months lying in the hospital, doing the
Times
crossword with one hand.

From the kitchen, I could hear the sound of May cussing as she tried to get the vast black stove to light, so that Mr. Rivers could have hot water for his morning bath. The range was ancient and as temperamental as a maiden aunt. I had spent hours catering to its every whim, stoking it with coal, coke and kindling or simply pleading with it.

“Can I help?” I asked.

May was kneeling on the floor beside the range. She gave a shrug. “If yer like. It’s my last week any ways. Then Mrs. Ellsworth will have to light the stupid fing herself.”

“Don’t speak about Mrs. Ellsworth like that. It’s disrespectful.”

May snorted. “Did you not hear me sayin’ that I was off?”

I knelt beside her in my pyjamas, balling up old newspaper and feeding it into the stove. “I thought you liked it here. Mrs. Ellsworth is very fond of you.”

May had the grace to look a little guilt stricken.

“Well, I has to do war work, doesn’t I? Got a job in a factory in Portsmouth. Get my own money every week. No uptight old bugger to tell me what’s what,” she said with a glance toward the butler’s closed door. “Dad wouldn’t hear of a factory before. Said it wasn’t nice. Girls in my family has always been in service. But it’s my patriotic duty now, isn’t it, and he can’t say a word.”

The range finally lit, I stood up and brushed myself off.

“Don’t you look at me like that, miss,” said the girl. “You know what it’s like. Why would anyone stay when they has got a choice?”

Knowing the miserable drudgery of the scullery maid’s existence, I could not argue. “I hope you’ll be happy, May.”

As I walked down the corridor, I listened to Mrs. Ellsworth in the storeroom rattling jars and muttering to herself about the dwindling stock of jam. The back door opened with a slam, and the daily bustled inside with a blast of cool air and rustling parcels.

“Mornin’,” she grunted, hurrying past me to start cleaning the house.

She looked more harassed each day as she attempted to undertake the work of three maids and a footman. With a sigh, I wondered how we would manage without May. I had beseeched Mr. Wrexham to put away the dinner silver and china, and to use the plain luncheon set for both meals to keep down the amount of polishing, but he would not hear of it. “The standard of a house is measured by its silver. What would the Ladies Hamilton think?” I thought that as they were living in the dower house, with the army teeming through Lulcombe Park, they might tolerate luncheon silver. I was not sure that I cared; I was more concerned that our last daily might give her notice, exhausted by the endless work. I tried to help the servants by stealth: dusting the china when Mr. Wrexham was busy in the cellar, rolling out Mrs. Ellsworth’s pastry and setting it to blind in the oven, rubbing the beeswax onto the dining room table. Mr. Wrexham was gratified by May’s and the daily housemaid’s surprising efficiency, while the maids believed that Mr. Wrexham had undertaken the work himself. I knew that this system of haphazard subterfuge could not continue.

The door to Mr. Wrexham’s pantry was open, and I watched for a moment in silence as the old butler knelt by the grate, his elegant tailcoat covered by a white apron while he buffed his master’s shoes to a gleam. The room was devoid of decoration, save for a faded photograph in sepia tones of Mr. Wrexham with a young Mr. Rivers and his bride. There were no pictures of Mr. Wrexham’s family. On the low table beside a lamp rested a calendar, each day tidily crossed out with blue ink as it passed. I glanced at the calendar: sixth of March.

“Oh,” I said.

Mr. Wrexham looked around, a frown sliding across his face for an instant before his features smoothed over once more. I knew he viewed my presence in the servants’ halls as a violation of the green baize door.

“You may ring the bell in your room, should you require anything, miss,” he said with mild reproach.

I ignored the reproof and continued to stare at the calendar.

“The date, Mr. Wrexham. It’s my birthday. I’m twenty-one today.”

“No argument, I’m taking you to lunch,” said Mr. Rivers, propelling me across the driveway and into the waiting motorcar.

“But the petrol?”

“We’ve been saving the ration for months. And this is an essential journey. I’m taking you out to celebrate your birthday.”

He opened the door for me and helped me inside.

“All right,” I said, sliding into the leather seat. “Thank you. But it’s really not necessary.”

He rolled his eyes. “Good grief. I never realised how troublesome you can be.”

I said nothing. I saw myself dancing with Kit, my hair slicked as smooth as a boy’s. Kit dipping me, kissing me. I thought Mr. Rivers knew exactly how troublesome I could be.

Art drove us to Dorchester. Mr. Rivers and I did not speak much during the journey. He appeared busy with his thoughts and with trying not to knock into me as Art swung the Wolseley around the tight, hedged corners (Art was much more at ease driving Mr. Bobbin than the smart motorcar). I was transfixed by the rushing green of the fields, punctuated around Lulcombe by the sage of the crawling army trucks and khaki tents that had sprung up across the parkland like giant molehills. We became stuck in a traffic jam of great army lorries outside Dorchester. They crawled toward us like dragons, the brown hedges brushing them on both sides. There was something ominous in the tick and growl of their diesel engines, and Art had to steer the car almost into a ditch in order to pass. Fifteen minutes later, he pulled up outside the Royal Hotel and, grumbling, lumbered around to open my door. Mr. Rivers offered me his arm. “Shall we?” he asked with a smile.

We drank champagne. An elderly waiter filled my glass and I looked at the bubbles rushing to the surface. Champagne always made me think of Anna. I was wearing the pearls she had smuggled into my luggage, and I pretended that they were my birthday present. They felt tight around my throat.