Day (14 page)

‘It isn't safe here . . . the glass could shatter. If you can't be in the shelter, or the basement . . .'

Very soft, ‘I don't really care. Do you? That is, I don't think it makes any difference.'

‘If your number's up . . .'

‘Yes.'

‘You think we can't change what happens to us.'

‘I used to. Not sure now. Or maybe that's the wrong way round. I don't know.'

Then she's saying how she married Donald quickly – their mothers being friends and having known him for years and suddenly being his wife: this married woman: changed into his wife just a fortnight before he went away.

And why would you say that, why would you tell a stranger that you didn't understand your marriage and were glad that you hadn't a child and why would you invite that stranger up into your home and be with him and talk and then hug him very quickly, a flinch in the end of it, a kind of regret, but anyway you hug him, you do that to him.

‘It isn't safe here.'

Why hug him then leave him alone?

‘No, we shouldn't stand by a window. It's silly. And it's very late. You should sleep.'

All of his blood confused by this, jumping in him, straining. ‘I –'

‘The spare room is all in mess.' She backs into the shadows at the side of the table, fades beyond him. ‘But there's a big couch through here. Do you mind a big couch?' Walking ahead, becoming brisk. ‘I'll find you a pillow. I do have nice pillows – someone gave them to us. Wedding present.' Alfred following blankly, the hurt of her kindling something all along his arms until, by the time she has made the couch ready, he is shivering.

‘Are you cold?'

‘No.'

Needing her to bring him the quilt, let him lie under that. But he doesn't ask.

‘You look it.'

‘I'm not.'

Room full of broken furniture, chairs bleeding horsehair and the iron pieces of a bed stacked by the fireplace.

‘You're sure?'

‘I'm not.'

A breath between them and the room swinging underfoot. ‘Well, I'll let you rest. The bathroom's second – no, from here, it's third on the right. I mean . . . you'll know it when you see it. That kind of idea. I really need to . . .'

‘Of course.' Words coming out of his head and dropping round his feet, as much sense in them as gravel, fag ends, bullet casings. ‘Of course. Thank you.' For the first time realising how much he would seem to her from another country, how silly and alien he would sound. Talking about equality was one thing, touching a man like him as if he was possible, that was another.

‘Sleep well, Alfred.' Calling him by his Sunday name as she closes the door.

I should have worked her out from that – hugs you then runs away – means it, then doesn't mean it. That's how she is.

Except I still don't think so.

I believe she was kind, that she still would be kind.

He'd turned out the light and lain under her blankets until he smelled all of her house, already covered in holding her, and no chance to sleep, only to feel that she would be lying now in her bed, the pair of them lying in their beds, and he didn't know what he should do.

So he did his own running away before she could wake. Washed in her basin, gently, gently, washed with her soap and readied himself and then ran away. Never tried to see any more of London's sights.

But I remembered her address, repeated her address, went straight to the station for the usual chaos and hanging about – bought cheap, grey notepaper and hoped that wouldn't be a problem, because there was a war on, after all, and I wrote to her, sat on the platform and started to write.

Dear Joyce

The way to break your heart from the beginning. The first pieces shivered off then by how dear she was.

But it was only what you always put. I didn't expect her to know what it meant. She didn't have to. I think I could still have been happy if all of the feeling had been only mine.

Liar.

Bloody liar.

Fucking liar.

Yes, I know.

drop

There were days when Alfred liked the filming, when it suited his temperament which mainly needed rest. Time was, he'd have loved the phoney drills, the displays of gymnastics, physical skill. And there had been that genuine hope in his mind that he'd come over here and get fit again, into condition – he could still do a handstand, or almost – but he was maybe too old for that, or else his mood was wrong, because now he was happiest when they told him to lie down. Possibly this was because when he fainted lying down, no one would notice, but it could be he'd become a lazy bastard, a pit-basher.

And if he couldn't lie, he'd hope to sit, so this morning he was jolly, comfortably seated with a dozen or so other bods, tapping away at tin cans and making dummy ventilation pipes for the film's supposed tunnel. Although he'd got bored with that quite quickly and it didn't much matter what he was actually making, so he was slowly in the process of converting two splendidly clean and shiny Carnation tins into a miniature cooking stove with added blower to give it some punch. He was just cutting out the blades for the little fan. The lad next to him paid no attention, but over the way, a chap smiled, recognised the contraption as a Kriegie standard and then made a point of averting his eyes politely. Alfred decided the chap might therefore be all right, but also thought they needn't ever speak.

As Alfred tinkered with the cooker the cameraman and hangers-on stopped and shifted, adjusted and started, but Alfred hardly noticed. He found himself glad to be busy, humming a tune and as mindless as he could have wished until he recognised the melody he'd chosen and then the words tripped him, brought him down.

‘Tho' the days are long, twilight sings a song,'

Pluckrose had picked it – partly because it took his fancy.

‘Of the happiness that used to be,'

Partly to shut up the Bastard who always sang dreadful trash.

‘Soon my eyes will close, soon I'll find repose,'

Partly to tease Alfred.

‘And in dreams you're always near to me.'

A sleepy tune to it and clinging in a pleasant way and he'd listened for the first time while Pluckrose, like the elongated boy he really was, frowned into Alfred's face, studying him hard as any chart to be sure they were enjoying the same thing and to the same degree, that somebody was sharing his enthusiasm.

‘Tho' the days are long, twilight sings a song,

Of the happiness that used to be,

Soon my eyes will close, soon I'll find repose,

And in dreams you're always near to me.'

And Alfred did like the song – vaguely recalled that he'd heard it before – and especially appreciated the teasing, because
his
happiness was still there, impregnable – by this point, he'd sent letters and received them, Joyce's words layered, soft and bright in the back of his head – and there wasn't a love song that didn't seem new and indecent and lovely and the blush that rose over him when he gave in to the lyrics and listened properly was something he didn't mind happening with Pluckrose.

‘It's all right – I'm ghastly with our fair sisters myself. As organised and successful as the BEF. I may become a nun.'

‘You mean a monk.'

‘Not giving up my last chance yet.'

While Alfred thrummed with the knowledge that he
did
dream her, loved dreaming her and the rare, deep mornings when he'd wake with the touch of her clear and focused, as if maybe she was leaning on his arm, or had pressed her hand up to his cheek. All imagined, all wishful thinking, but more than that, too – like a promise, a message, a contract. You couldn't feel something so perfectly and not have it arrive in the end. He'd been so certain about it he was actually pleased to wait, enjoyed the sore way it made him.

‘Will it do for us, Boss?'

‘Hm? Oh, yes. At least, I think it's nice.'

‘Nice? Nice? It would tear a virgin's underthings into tiny, delicious threads. Spin her round the dance floor to that, shoot her a line about risking life and limb for King and whatnot . . . and all would be well and all would be well and all manner of things would be bloody well, I'd say.'

‘I wouldn't know.'

‘Certainly they would. Pick your secluded nook, get all cosy, then breathe on her glasses.'

‘You what?' Worried that Pluckrose somehow knew that she really did wear glasses to read.

‘Breathe on her glasses, old man – so she won't see what you're doing . . .' He widens his eyes, winks. Then waggles his hands, placating. ‘But no offence intended, just . . . Oh, to hell with all that – d'you think the boys'll like it? The tune?'

As it turned out, the crew was very much in favour. They played it on Pluckrose's gramophone, or any other available gramophone, at every permissible hour. They grew fond of it, possessive. Intent on preventing pilfering, breakages and loss, they all found they'd finished up buying one or two or maybe more records of ‘I'll See You in My Dreams' – with Pluckrose's assistance.

Whistling to it in the sergeants' mess, the Bastard had dabbed and slid his horny grubby hands across a tabletop so they sounded a little like brushes on a drum skin and he'd been quite amenable for a while. ‘It's not half bad, is it. Not too shabby.'

Alfred, Pluckrose, Miles, Bastard Hanson: they'd all sunk back in the battered armchairs and the sergeants' mess had become very slightly golden to them in a way they enjoyed.

‘
Lips that once were mine, tender eyes that shine,

They will light my way tonight, I'll see you in my dreams.
'

Pluckrose had leaned across and knocked his knuckle delicately on the back of Alfred's copy of
Tee Emm
– asking to break in and interrupt his reading.

‘Enter.'

‘Damned civil of you, think I shall.' Pluckrose mimed drawing on a pipe. ‘Gad, sir – it's a grand life, ain't it.'

‘I suppose.'

‘Oh come on, though. I've found you and your star-crossed sweetheart a loverly ditty. You can croon it to her when next you meet. Results guaranteed.'

‘Thanks a lot.'

‘You do like it? Honestly?'

‘Yes. 'Course I do. It's very –'

‘Enough. Before you even start. Not another one of the Day artistic and critical lectures – education's an awful thing – and my life will be short enough as it is: no time to waste.' He paused for a beat to be sure he had Alfred's entire attention. ‘But may I discuss a fine plan that I have?'

‘I suppose.'

‘Wise choice. First of all – did you ever hear of a fellow called Cardini?'

Hanson sucked his teeth. ‘Who's he, then? An Eyetie admiral?'

‘Shut up, Hanson – the adults are talking.'

‘Yes, talking all over the bloody music.' He'd got hold of some toast from somewhere, possibly his pocket, and started gnawing on it frighteningly.

Pluckrose sighed and rose up like an extremely long-limbed dowager, beckoning Alfred away to the window where they stood and examined the drizzle and heavy cloud that meant they'd be flying nowhere tonight.

Alfred didn't usually have to prompt around Pluckrose, but, ‘Cardini?'

‘Yes.' As close to a whisper as Pluckrose ever got. ‘Served in the trenches: '14 to '18: and while he was there, to stay sane he taught himself card tricks, magic. Turned professional in peacetime. I saw him once – amazing. Did remarkable things in all directions – while wearing gloves. Magic was how he stayed sane.' He leaned his head over, blinked at Alfie, hesitant.

‘Well, go on, you big, soft article. What's your plan?'

‘More of a theory. Yes. That would be more accurate.' He paused again, but then grinned at Alfred and patted his arm. ‘You see, I stay sane imagining people like Cardini – or Rob Wilton, Tommy Trinder, Jasper Maskelyne, old Maxie, Max Miller – I run through a great, long music-hall bill: wonderful turns and plenty of dancing girls between, loads of leg. Keeps up the morale. D'you see?'

Alfred didn't want to disappoint the pink, affectionate face looming in at him. ‘Not . . . I don't really . . . No.'

Pluckrose sighed. You could see him wondering whether he should go on.

Alfred elbowed him gently. ‘Because you're no bloody use at explaining, you barm pot. Have another go.'

‘Suddenly, you suit those sergeant's stripes.'

‘Get on with it.'

‘Precisely.' Pluckrose beamed, buoyant again. ‘Any road up – I was reflecting on a bit of business I'd seen old Cardini do and then . . .' He grinned with significance. ‘I
got interrupted
. Had to jump off the blood wagon and climb aboard D for Doris and drop HE on the widows and orphans –'

‘Don't joke about that. I've told you.'

‘Only being realistic. But as you wish. The point is – I
got interrupted
. This is on Wednesday last, you may remember – our first little visit to Germany . . . So all the way out to Happy Valley and all the way back with the natives decidedly hostile, chucking pots and pans and fuck knows what – for the whole of the op, in the back of my mind, there's this idea that I have to get home, because
I wasn't fucking finished
with what I was doing. Cardini – I hadn't thought through to the end of his turn. I wasn't done.'

‘You're not seriously –'

‘No. I'm not. I'm just saying it maybe could do us no harm if when we left on our next outing, we had something unfinished.'

‘You want us to learn card tricks?'

‘
No
. You dreadful little troll. I want . . .' Pluckrose halted, drew in a large breath and hissed it out while he folded his hands behind his head, stretched the length of his back. ‘Tell you what, I'll show you.'