I said: ‘What are those simple bits of etiquette?’
Over dinner I thought it looked as if it might be getting serious. He didn’t paw like his cousin, but the light was on. Oh, Lord, I thought, and to keep his mind off it I asked him about himself.
His mother was still living, and had a flat in Hans Place.
‘Why did you leave the Navy?’
‘You might say, why did I go in the Navy. When I was thirteen my brother, who was to have come into the business, had already been killed, but by then my father had made up his mind that I was going to be saved the unpleasantness of working in a family firm, so I was sent off to Dartmouth. And from there, of course, it was straight on.’
‘The unpleasantness?’ I said gently.
‘Yes. My father and Christopher Holbrook never hit it off. Christopher’s one ambition has always been to squeeze out the other members of the family in favour of his own son, and when Tim was killed it looked as if he was going to succeed. Then when my father died I wrecked everything by leaving the Navy and coming in in his place.’
‘Did you mind leaving the Navy?’
‘No, I wanted to get out. In my opinion it’s a dead end now – sadly enough. In peace it has a sort of skeleton usefulness, but in war, which after all is what it is designed for, it will become about as serviceable as mounted cavalry. I couldn’t see it as a proposition at all, so I was glad to go.’
‘So you came to fight at Rutland’s?’
‘I’m not all that combative. I haven’t looked for trouble. But I think the worst is over now.’
For a moment I thought of two letters marked PERSONAL lying on Christopher Holbrook’s desk.
‘I’ve wondered sometimes,’ he said, ‘if my cousin Terry Holbrook has ever made things difficult for you.’
‘Difficult? How?’
‘I thought that might have been clear. I’m glad if it isn’t.’
‘Oh . . . well. There hasn’t been anything serious.’
‘Sometimes I wonder . . .’
‘Wonder what?’
‘As you know, Terry’s wife let him down. I sometimes wonder if he gets all that much fun out of his present philandering or whether half the time he isn’t trying to prove something to himself.’
I said: ‘Perhaps your father was right, and it was a mistake to come back. You should have become an archaeologist.’
It was always a surprise when his smile came. It softened up all the rather off-key determination in his face. ‘You’re dead right, I should. But I’ve done quite a bit of digging up of old bones at Rutland’s.’
He drove me home about eleven-thirty. The street where I had my rooms was a cul-de-sac and there was no one about, only five or six parked cars and a street lamp and a stray cat sitting near by licking its back foot.
‘Thank you awfully,’ I said, trying to talk even more the way his sort of girls talked. ‘It’s been a gorgeous day. I have enjoyed it all.’
‘We must do it again,’ he said. ‘Let’s see, next Saturday, I don’t think there’s anything near enough.’
‘I can’t next Saturday,’ I said too quickly.
‘Another engagement?’
‘Well, sort of.’
‘There’s something the Saturday after at Newbury. What about it?’
‘Thank you. That would be lovely.’ By Saturday the 24th I should be out of his reach.
I put my hand on the door of the car to open it.
‘Mary.’
‘Yes?’
He put a hand on my shoulder and drew me to him and kissed me. There was nothing particularly passionate about it, but you certainly couldn’t say he was inefficient. His hand moved over my head.
‘You’ve such lovely hair.’
‘D’you think so?’
‘It’s so strong and yet so soft . . . are you cold?’
‘No.’
‘I thought you shivered.’
‘No!’
‘It’s been good today – for you?’
‘Yes, Mark, it has.’
‘So far as I’m concerned,’ he said, ‘to say it’s been good is quite an understatement.’
‘I must go. Thank you again. Thank you, Mark. I’ll see you on Monday. Good night.’
That night I woke up in the middle of the night dreaming I was crying, but it wasn’t feeling sentimental about Mark Rutland. It was a dream I sometimes had, although often I didn’t get it for twelve or eighteen months. In fact it wasn’t so much a dream as a sort of dream memory.
I sat up in bed and looked at my watch and cursed; it was only half past three.
Lovely hair he’d said I’d got. Maybe that was what had started it off, him saying that. I wondered if he would have thought the same ten years ago.
It didn’t really start with the hair; it started when Shirley Jameson said something insulting in the playground about my mother. I can’t even remember what it was she said but I know at thirteen years old it seemed frightful and I flew at her with waving fists and there was a fight there on the paved yard. In the end I was dragged off and there was a row and we were both kept in, and then we had to go and say sorry to each other in front of the headmistress.
At this time I was sleeping with old Lucy, and old Lucy wasn’t clean, especially her hair, and I got lice in mine. Mother used to comb my hair out over a newspaper with a small-tooth comb and you could hear the little tat-tat as the lice fell on the paper. Then she would empty the newspaper into the fire and the lice would slide off and crick-crack as they went in. After that she would rub in ointment, but I don’t think she ever told me that it might be helpful to use soap and water. Anyway, one day soon after that first row, I was coming home from school when Shirley Jameson and two other girls she was friendly with caught me up, and Shirley Jameson said she’d seen something crawling in my hair that afternoon in school. If it had only been her I should have told her to go jump in the sea, but with the other two there I couldn’t do that, so I just told her she was a bloody liar. Then she said if she was a liar I could prove it by letting her look through my hair then. We were in an entry, and there didn’t seem any way out, so I had to let her. All the time she was doing it I was grinding my teeth and praying to God she wouldn’t find anything. At first I thought I was going to be lucky, and then suddenly she squealed with delight and came away with a thing between her thumb and forefinger.
I lost my head then because I screamed at her that she’d never found it in my hair at all and that she had taken it out of her own hair and had it in her fingers all the time. I was going to lay into her but the other two girls grabbed my arms and twisted them behind me and Shirley said, take that back or I’ll slap your face. So I said I wouldn’t take it back, because it was God’s truth, so she gave me a good swinging slap that I think surprised her as much as it surprised me because she stopped and stared at me. Then she said, will you take it back now, so I said no, and then a queer look came into her eyes as she suddenly realized she was going to enjoy this.
So she gave me a slap on the other side of my face that made my head ring, and one of the other girls said, go on Shirley, go on and make her cry. So Shirley went on, first one side and then the other. But of course I wasn’t nice to hold, and eventually I kicked myself free and butted her in the stomach and knocked her against the wall and ran up the alley. And they came baying after me. I ran like mad all the way and they never let up till I got to my street.
When I got there I didn’t dare go in because I knew I’d get half-murdered coming in like that. My nose was bleeding and I’d lost my school bag and they’d pulled all the buttons off my blouse and torn the strap of my vest.
In the dream I was always crying at this point, and I always woke myself up, because if I didn’t it would begin all over again. But when I really woke I never was crying, my eyes were always hard and dry. I’ve never cried, except for effect, since I was twelve.
In fact – though I never dreamt this part – things went on quite differently that day f
rom what I expected. After I’d sat on the back step for a bit I went in with a story that I had been coming round the corner of Prayer Street and had gone to cross the road and had been knocked down by a bicycle. But when I got in my Uncle Stephen was there, he’d come in on his ship that day and they were making him supper. I told my story, and Mother and Lucy swallowed it hook, line, etc., especially as they were busy all the while with their guest and hadn’t much time for me.
But I noticed while I told it his eyes were on me in a rather queer way, and that made me uncomfortable because I always admired him and thought him the person I should have wanted to be like if I had been a man. He was a good bit younger than Mother and tall and good looking but he had gone grey early, because at the time of this visit he would only have been forty, and he was certainly grey then.
I remember, besides looking at me in that rather sceptical way, he also looked me up and down with a certain amount of surprise because by now I was just on my fourteenth birthday and I was growing up. I remember holding my torn blouse up at my neck when he looked at me because although I knew Uncle Stephen could have nothing but decent thoughts about me, yet I knew he was seeing me as other men would see me and was thinking I was nearly a woman.
After supper he said he would walk with me to the place where I had been knocked down and perhaps we should find the lost school bag, so I could hardly say no. So we went, and on the way he talked about South America, where he had just come from, and I asked him about the horses there. Then I found the corner where I was knocked down and we cast about for the school bag and I casually went down the entry and found it lying under the shadow of the brick wall, so we were able to take it home. But half-way home he said, ‘What really happened, Marnie?’
I was so angry at being disbelieved, and by him of all people, that I went into the whole story again, describing the bicycle and the boy on it and the woman who picked me up and what she was wearing and what I said and what they said; because by now I almost believed it myself.
So in the end he said: ‘All right, my dear, I only wondered.’ But I could tell from the tone of his voice he still didn’t believe me and that made me madder still, because I cared what he thought.
We went the rest of the way home, with me in a sulky silence, until at the door he said: ‘Have you thought about what you want to do when you leave school? What would you like to do?’
So I said: ‘I’d like to do something with animals, chiefly with horses.’
‘A lot of girls do. If you couldn’t do that?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘What are you good at at school?’
‘Not much, really.’
‘Isn’t that over-modest? Your mother says you’ve a head for figures.’
‘I can add up.’
‘Only that? Well, Marnie, in another year we’ll see. I’d like to be able to help in some way, to send you perhaps to a secretarial college, to give you a chance of getting out in the world. There’s more to life than this, Marnie. I’d like to get you away.’
On Thursday the 15th I did all the pay packets myself. They offered me Jennifer Smith from the progress department but I said I wouldn’t have her, so they didn’t press. At two o’clock on the Thursday I made out a cheque for £1,150 payable to Cash and took it to Mr Holbrook to sign. I then gave it to Howard, the caretaker, who went across to the bank with it, accompanied by Stetson, the foreman. They came back with the money in two blue bags and left it with me. To the £1,150 I added £250 takings from the retail side and began to make out the pay packets. I was left undisturbed and I worked, never stopping. By five o’clock I’d done more than three-quarters of the job, and when Mr Ward came in to lock the money and the pay packets away he asked sarcastically if I was trying to do Miss Clabon out of a job.
So another week went past. I got a postcard from Susan, whom I’d softened up quite a lot by this time. ‘Glorious weather. Went Shanklin yesterday. Have just bathed. See you soon. S. C.’ Like Hell she would.
During the previous weeks I had loitered through the works several times and fingered some of the papers that were stacked in the storeroom and about the works. On the Tuesday I went up to one of the young men, called Oswald, who was on a cutting machine and said to him: ‘D’you think you could do me a terrific favour? I’m organizing a Church social on Saturday afternoon and we’re going to play games. I want a lot of small pieces of paper for them to write on. Do you think you could possibly cut me some?’
‘Of course. Just let me know the size. What sort of paper do you want?’
‘Well any plain paper – no lines – so long as it isn’t too thick. And I want the pieces about postcard size or a little longer, about an inch longer. I wonder, could I go and choose from those stacks over there?’
‘Sure. Go right ahead.’
So I went and chose my paper and he cut it up into the required size just like I asked.
Thursday the 22nd was a windy day, and the dust and leaves blew along the street outside the works. Autumn was coming early, and I felt sorry for types who were going to take their holidays by the sea, skulking behind walls and walking up draughty dismal piers. But it would be all right for riding. It would be just right for riding. In my handbag today I brought 1,200 slips of paper ready cut to size and rubber-banded in packages of fifty. Oswald had done them for me.
Mark made things easier by leaving straight after lunch. One of the girls told me he was going to a sale at Sotheby’s. I wondered if there was going to be another Greek stirrup cup in Little Gaddesden.
The amount taken on the retail side during the week was about £350, but Mr Holbrook wasn’t to know this. I made out the cheque for £1,190 and he didn’t query it. Afterwards I wished I’d risked more. I took the cheque to Howard, and he and Stetson got the money. They were back by two-thirty and I began work at once with Adcock, J. A., No. 5, whose basic wage as a journeyman printer was £10. 15s. 3d.
When everything had been added and deducted the total amount to go into his pay packet was £18 2s. 6d. I took up the first envelope and opened my bag and took out eighteen slips of paper from the first rubber-banded package and put the slips in the pay envelope. The eighteen pounds went into the other pocket of my bag. I had tried the slips against a similar number of one-pound notes in envelopes at home, and it just wasn’t possible after shuffling them to tell which was which.
I went at it flat-out today. As I’ve said, the next office had only the telephone switchboard and some filing cabinets in it, and the one girl, Miss Harry, at the switchboard. The frosted-glass partition between us didn’t quite reach to the ceiling, but there wasn’t any real communication; we could hear the low buzz of the calls and she could hear our Anson machine and probably the chink of money. The door beyond her office had to open and about six steps be taken before anyone opened my door, so I had several seconds if necessary to shut my bag and look innocent. In fact, except for the little alteration at the end of each calculation, I was working as usual.
I was only interrupted three times all afternoon.
When Mr Ward came in at five I only had £260 left.
‘Hm,’ he said, rubbing his mole. ‘Better even than last week. We’ll give Miss Clabon notice.’
I smiled. ‘It wouldn’t work. She’s really very good. Let me just finish this one, will you?’
He stood picking at his finger-nail while I finished off Stevens, F., journeyman apprentice, £8 4s. and put the money in an envelope and sealed it. Then I arched my aching back while he picked up the tray with its neatly stacked and named and numbered envelopes and carried it to the safe. While he was putting this in I got together the rest of the silver and notes and clipped the notes with rubber bands and put them in the cash-box. I carried the cash-box and the ledgers to the safe and held the door while he put them in. He locked the door and put the key in his pocket and took out a packet of cigarettes. He looked as if he was going to help himself, but he thought better of it and offered me one.
&nbs
p; The generous impulse must have nearly killed him. I smiled and shook my head.
He said: ‘No vices?’
‘Well, not that one.’
‘Quite the paragon, eh?’
‘No.’ I smiled again. ‘Do you dislike me, Mr Ward?’ I felt like challenging him tonight.
He was frightfully occupied shaking out a match and looking at the watch-spring of black smoke that came from it. ‘It’s not my business to like or dislike employees of this firm, Mrs Taylor. My business is to see that they do their work.’
‘But you must have your own opinions.’
‘Oh, yes.’ He squinted down at his cigarette. ‘But those opinions are my own, aren’t they.’
This obviously wasn’t his day for confessions. ‘I’m glad you have nothing against me.’
‘What could I have? You’re so efficient. Everyone agrees.’
I picked up my bag, which suddenly seemed to me to look fatter than it should have done. I looked at my watch, Five-twenty. They weren’t working overtime today, and most of the printers would be on their way out. It’d be murder if one came to the hatch now and asked for his wages tonight. It had happened once in April.
I went to the door. ‘You’ll be here tomorrow, Mr Ward?’
‘No, I’m going up to a meeting of paper wholesalers. Why?’
‘Mr Rutland will be back?’
‘Oh, yes, he’ll be here; and both Mr Holbrooks.’
I went out of the office and walked slowly, pretending to fumble with my shoe, until I heard Mr Ward lock the door. Linda Harry was putting on her jersey and she followed me out. We went along together to the cloakroom, where there were still two or three girls powdering their noses. I stayed there talking to them until I saw Sam Ward leave the building.
As I was just going to go out Linda Harry asked me if I had a light. I darned nearly opened my bag to see. But I said, no, I was sorry I hadn’t.
We were about the last. You wouldn’t believe how quickly the place emptied. I said good night to Howard and went down towards the High Street tube.