Opal Plumstead (40 page)

‘No, thank you. The lady is wearing it now – that’s the whole point,’ said Morgan. He took the shawl and wrapped it very carefully and competently about my neck and shoulders.

Then we stepped back outside in style. We wandered around the town together. It seemed as if my own elfin creatures had sprinkled their fairy dust over the familiar dreary buildings. I told Morgan tales of trips to this shop and that. I even told him the story of poor Mother being ill in the butcher’s shop and losing her job.

Morgan told me about his own excursions into town. He was kitted out at the saddler’s when he got his first pony at the age of six. He used to delve into the sacks of dried apricots and figs at the grocer’s when he accompanied the cook. He’d chosen
Treasure Island
and
The Swiss Family Robinson
and
King Solomon’s Mines
from the bookshop near the park.

‘My father used to take me to that bookshop to choose my birthday present,’ I said. ‘And then we’d go to the park and sit on a bench together and I’d read him the first chapter.’

Morgan and I went to that very park and walked down its small sandy paths and grassy slopes. The crocuses were out, cheerful clumps of colour in the green grass. We sat on a bench by the pond and watched two mothers help their children feed the ducks with bread scraps. We’d both loved to do that when we were little.

‘I wonder if there was ever a day when I was six or so and a tiny Opal of two was standing beside me, flinging her bread to the wind,’ said Morgan.

‘Flinging herself in after the bread and being taken home dripping wet and in disgrace,’ I said, laughing.

The only memory I did not share was the one of Father and me sitting on that bench together last autumn, when he was so late home from work. He hadn’t told me what had happened, though I’d sensed something was very wrong. It seemed so long ago now. I still loved Father with all my heart and missed him dreadfully. I worried about him every day, but somehow I didn’t feel quite so connected with him any more. So much had happened since he’d been sent to prison. So many sad and difficult things – yet today I was happier than I’d ever been in my life.

We walked right round the park and then out again.

‘Show me where you went to school, Opal,’ Morgan suggested.

‘What about you? You must have gone to a little dame school before you were sent away to boarding school. Or did you have a governess?’

‘Neither. Mother taught me,’ said Morgan. ‘Every morning. I would read and write and do simple sums. Mother thought I was a little genius, but it was simply that she’d drummed these lessons into me from the year dot. She bribed me dreadfully. Whenever I managed a list of simple spellings or read a passage without stumbling, she’d slip me a candy kiss. It’s a wonder I still have all my own teeth.’

I showed Morgan my own little dame school, where dear old Miss White had treasured her class of ten and taught us all the basics.

‘Were you her little pet?’ he asked.

‘I
wanted
to be – but a ghastly boy called Cedric was her favourite. She made him a little paper crown and said he was king of the class. He had curly fair hair just like you. It’s a wonder I didn’t hate you on sight,’ I said.

‘Was Cedric brighter than you?’

‘No, but Miss White thought he was. Still, I was the one who got a scholarship to St Margaret’s,’ I said proudly.

‘I used to know some girls from St Margaret’s – daughters of Mother’s friends. Annabel and Antonia Mannering. Did you know them? Antonia was younger. Could she have been in your form?’

‘Goodness, yes, Antonia was in my form. I’m afraid I didn’t like her, either.’

‘Because she had fair curly hair?’

‘Yes, she was very pretty, but it was mostly because she called me “little swot” and yawned ostentatiously whenever I answered a question in class.’

‘How horrible of her!’

‘Oh, it wasn’t just Antonia – they all did. They didn’t like me because I was poor and studious and a scholarship girl. I can’t really blame them. I must’ve been very annoying.’

‘I wouldn’t have found you annoying. I’d have thought you endearing – and very brave. Let’s walk past St Margaret’s and sneer at Antonia and all that poisonous gang of girls,’ said Morgan.

They weren’t there, of course, because it was the Easter holidays, but their ghostly gym-slipped presence hung about the gaunt grey building. I clasped the iron railings and stared at my school. It was strange remembering how much it had meant to me not very long ago.

‘Did you wander the playground all alone, clutching a book?’ Morgan asked.

‘I had one friend, a dear friend, Olivia,’ I said, ‘but I don’t see her now my circumstances have changed.’

‘Are you too proud to be in touch with her?’

‘Her wretched mother forbade her to see me ever again!’

‘Oh dear, that’s mothers for you,’ said Morgan with feeling. ‘Still, it wasn’t very spirited of Olivia not to try to stay friends with you.’

‘She wasn’t that kind of girl,’ I said. ‘But we did have fun together. When we walked home from school she always shared her sweets with me – usually Fairy Glen toffee chews!’

‘Ah, at least she had good taste.’

‘We used to hide from our strict teachers and eat our toffees in the graveyard,’ I said. ‘I love graveyards. Let’s go there now, Morgan. It’s beautiful in a strange sort of way.’

‘I like graveyards too. They’re generally wonderful for spotting wildlife,’ he said.

‘What about the
after
life? Have you ever seen a ghost?’

‘No, but I’d rather like to.’

‘I don’t believe in ghosts, but I used to torment Olivia, making little keening noises so that she thought a ghost was oozing out from under a tombstone.’

‘Perhaps it’s no surprise that she didn’t stay friends with you!’

‘Will you stay friends with me, Morgan?’ I said, before I could stop myself.

He looked me straight in the eye. ‘I’ll always be your friend,’ he said seriously.

We wandered around the graveyard together. I admired the angels and read out quaint inscriptions on the tombstones. Morgan identified birdsong and wild flowers, and spotted a fox skulking in the shadows. Then he pointed in the same matter-of-fact way and said, ‘There’s my father.’

‘What?’ I said, startled.

‘Over there – the big obelisk.’

It was the most ornate tomb in the whole cemetery, new and stark and rather ugly, made of a mottled liver-coloured stone that didn’t blend in with the white marble angels around it.

I went up to it and traced the engraving –
JOHN JOSEPH ROBERTS
, with his dates. It didn’t say ‘devoted husband’ or ‘beloved father’, and there were no gentle messages like ‘rest in peace’, or ‘sleep for ever’.

It seemed a strange choice for Mrs Roberts, who always had exquisite taste.

‘My father chose it,’ said Morgan, as if he could read my mind.

‘Your father chose his own
tomb
?’

‘My father had to be in charge at all times, even when he was dying. He had pleurisy and lingered a while. While he could still make decisions, he planned his entire funeral and designed his tomb.’

‘He sounds an extraordinary man. Do you miss him very much?’

‘Not at all, if I’m honest. I was rather afraid of him. I think it’s obvious I was always a mother’s boy. I don’t think Mother grieved much for him, either. She’d always been very meek and under his thumb, but she certainly came into her own after his death. No one expected her to keep the factory, let alone run it, but she’s done a grand job.’

‘I admire her tremendously,’ I said. I was very worried that she was displeased with me now. She would be downright angry that Morgan had chosen to be with me the entire afternoon. I shivered.

‘Oh dear, we should’ve bought you two shawls,’ said Morgan, tucking my cashmere more closely around me. ‘Graveyards are always freezing cold. Let’s go and find somewhere we can get warm.’

‘You should go home. Your mother will be worried about you.’

‘Opal, I’m eighteen. I can do as I wish. And you’re the sort of girl who does as she wishes too. We are free spirits.’

‘Free spirits,’ I agreed.

We started running around the tombstones to get warm, laughing and shrieking. If there
were
any ghosts palely loitering, we must have frightened them away.

Morgan took me back to the Royal Hotel and ordered a glass of wine for me and a whisky for himself. We sat in a delightful little side room, almost like our own small parlour, with a velvet sofa and a roaring fire in the grate.

‘This is splendid, Morgan,’ I said, sipping cautiously.

I already felt light-headed. I didn’t want to get completely drunk and make a fool of myself. Morgan ordered another whisky, but I still had half a glass of wine left and refused any more. After we had been there for an hour or so, Morgan suggested we have something to eat. I was still full from the delicious chicken lunch, but Morgan asked for cake and a pot of tea. A waiter brought us Madeira cake studded with red cherries, and strangely fragrant tea.

Morgan spotted a little cupboard and discovered that it was full of games – packs of cards, dominoes, even spillikins. So we played, sometimes inventing our own rules, but keeping strict count of who won each individual game. I won first, then Morgan, then Morgan again, and then
I
won.

It was getting late by this time – really late – but we decided to have one more game to choose the overall winner.

‘And what will the prize be?’ I wondered.

‘A kiss,’ said Morgan.

‘Very well,’ I said, as casually as I could, though I felt dizzy at the suggestion.

We played with a child’s pack of Snap. The game went on for a long time, with much to-ing and fro-ing of cards, but I managed to win.

‘Then you get the prize, Miss Plumstead,’ said Morgan. He leaned towards me and kissed me. I thought he would simply brush my cheek, but he kissed me on the lips. It was a quick kiss, over in a second, but it was a real kiss. I knew I’d remember that moment for the rest of my life.

Morgan insisted on walking me home.

‘But now you still have to get all the way back to your house, and it’s miles away. Have you got enough money left for another cab?’ I asked, aware that Morgan had spent an enormous amount already.

‘I have heaps of cash, don’t worry,’ he said, but I wasn’t sure he was telling the truth now. He saw I was looking anxious. ‘I shall probably run home.’

‘
Run?
’

‘I’m a good runner – honestly. I do five miles cross-country every week at school. I don’t want to sound as if I’m boasting, but I generally come in the first three. And when we go on manoeuvres with the officer cadets, we often run ten miles, and that’s lugging heavy equipment.’

‘You’re a soldier?’

‘Not a real one. We all have to do army training at school. I hate it – all the barking orders and pointless discipline. I hate the whole idea of killing people too. I’d never fight in a real war.’

‘Neither would I!’

‘We have so much in common, Opal.’

We had very little in common. He was eighteen and looked like a man. I was now just fifteen and still looked like a little girl, in spite of all my efforts. He was very handsome and I was very homely-looking. He came from a wonderful artistic background and I was a factory girl with a disgraced family. He was very rich and I was very poor. Yet somehow Morgan was right. We were soul mates.

MORGAN WENT BACK
to school the following weekend. I didn’t see him again until the summer, but I wrote to him and he wrote to me. We often wrote a letter a day, page after page. I kept his letters in my fondant fairy box. Quite soon I had to fetch another one home from work, and then another. I kept the letters in careful order, and went through Cassie’s drawers for thin blue ribbon to tie them up neatly. I tied specially elaborate bows so that I would be able to tell if Mother had tried to read them. I would have died if she had. It wasn’t that there was anything wicked or improper in those letters – they weren’t even truly passionate love letters. They were letters in which Morgan bared his soul, telling me all his innermost thoughts and feelings, and I reciprocated one hundred-fold.

I didn’t tell anyone at work. I certainly didn’t tell Mrs Roberts that Morgan was writing me letters. She was very chilly towards me the first few weeks after he went back to school. She swept straight past me when she inspected the design room and didn’t say a word – but she gradually thawed. I didn’t go to WSPU meetings any more, so we didn’t see each other at weekends, but Mrs Roberts started commenting on my artwork again. When I experimented with new backgrounds for my fairies, she became particularly enthusiastic.

I thought it might be a good idea to have season-specific novelty ranges: a blue and yellow summer seaside scene, with fairies riding tiny white horses on the crests of waves; an orange and brown autumn scene, with fairies and baby squirrels playing ball games with nuts; a red and green Christmas scene, with fairies decorating a great Christmas tree; a pastel spring scene with fairies playing kiss-chase amongst the primroses.

‘You’re a little marvel, Opal,’ Mrs Roberts said. ‘We’d better concentrate on the seaside scene for the summer. I’ll suggest each girl paints one seaside background every day so that you can embellish them with your fairies.’