Someone Special (31 page)

Not Daddy’s, though. Daddy said if they didn’t watch out Jamie would be a cissy, a real little nancy-boy. He wanted Mummy to cut Jamie’s hair and not dress him in frilly shirts and pastel-coloured shorts, but although Mummy agreed that Jamie would have to have his hair shorter when he started junior school, no one had done anything about it. Mummy said Jamie was still just a baby and Daddy had to allow him to grow up naturally. Daddy muttered a bit but left it at that.

However, at Mummy’s suggestion that the party should be put off Daddy went very still for a moment. Then he said quietly but firmly that since Anna would not be going to boarding school until she was thirteen, and perhaps not even then, a party to celebrate double figures did not seem unreasonable.

Ten friends from the high school were coming, all girls of course, and two boys from the grammar school who happened to catch the same bus as Anna in the mornings. Several cousins were coming, some children from the village and, best of all, Anna’s friend Daniel Clifton. Dan was older than she, but they had got on well from the first time Mrs Lucas had brought Daniel round and told Mummy that he was going to live with her now since his mother had remarried and moved abroad.

‘Although she’s my daughter, Mrs Radwell, and I shouldn’t really say this, I’ve been very disappointed in Rosalie,’ Mrs Lucas told Constance in tones meant to be hushed and confidential but which were easily audible to the two youngsters playing on the terrace outside the drawing-room. ‘She’s treated her son in a very cavalier fashion, and now she’s simply left him with me without an apology. She went merrily off with her Italian count – he’s most certainly Italian, though I can’t say whether he’s a count – without giving a thought to the boy’s future, though she does pay his school fees and so on. Her first husband died in a car crash. She was heartbroken at the time, and her loss seemed to make her determined to enjoy her own life, if necessary at the expense of others. However, Daniel is a good boy and he’s in boarding school most of the year, so I can just about manage. But as I get older …’

‘She’s my gran,’ Dan said later, when Anna asked why his name wasn’t the same as Mrs Lucas’s. ‘My Mum’s mother. She’s all right, gran.’

But right now, kneeling on the nursery windowseat
and contemplating the cedar tree, Anna wasn’t really worrying about Dan, or Mrs Lucas, or any of her other guests. She was worrying about the weather. If it was fine she would have a wonderful time, but suppose it rained? Goldenstone was a big house but although Mummy had promised tea in the conservatory if it rained, this would not compare with tea under the cedar. And what about games? Games out of doors could be much rowdier and more fun than games in the house. And suppose the rain held off until tea was laid? Then it would be too late for Daddy to do magic things with a marquee and they would have wet sandwiches and soggy potato crisps, to say nothing of melting puddles of ice-cream, and everyone would say it served the Radwells right for showing off.

Anna had already heard nanny say it was a bit osten-something-or-other to have such a party when times were so difficult. The depression had just put nanny’s brother Bill out of work and heaven knew, nanny said gloomily, what would become of him, his wife Betty and their five small children.

‘But it won’t help Bill if I don’t have a tenth birthday party,’ Anna had pointed out, ever practical. ‘I wish I
could
help him, nanny, but I can’t.’

Nanny sighed and gave Anna a hug. ‘You’re right, but that don’t make it any easier,’ she said. ‘That in’t as if farm work was well-paid, but when you lose even that …’

‘Couldn’t Bill help in the garden?’ Anna suggested brightly. ‘If he’s done farm work he’ll know all about growing things and Daddy was saying we could do with more help.’

‘That’s a long way to come, my woman. It ’ud be a good walk, then a bus ride, then another walk. Bill, he live in Acle, just up the road from where I was brought up,’ nanny said. ‘But you’re a good girl to try to help, I won’t forget that.’

‘Anna, whacher doin’? I wants my tea I does. Where’s nan gone, eh?’

Anna glanced around and smiled; Jamie, back from his ride in the motor car with Mummy, beamed back at her, his yellow-chick curls on end, his cheeks reddened from sun and wind.

‘Nanny’s down in the kitchen, with cook. She’s making us a pancake each, Jamie, only don’t let on I told you, it’s a surprise.’

Jamie, a most satisfactory person in many ways, uttered a crow of delight, then clapped a grubby hand over his mouth. ‘I won’t say nothin’,’ he promised through his fingers. ‘Them’s my favourite things, Anna, pancakes is.’

JJ deplored his son’s use of English, but Anna secretly agreed with Mummy that Jamie’s own special way of talking was rather fun and would be missed when he began to put words in their proper order and to their proper use.

‘Yes, I love pancakes, too. Hey, don’t throw your coat on the floor, someone’s only got to pick it up you know.’

‘Ye-es, only I can’t reach the ’ook,’ Jamie said amiably, picking his coat off the floor and hurling it in Anna’s general direction. ‘Can you ’ang it on the ’ook for Jamie?’

‘For who?’

‘Sorry, Anna; can you ’ang it on the ’ook for me?’

Anna, giggling, got off the windowseat and hung the coat on the lowest hook behind the door. There was a stool kept specially so that Jamie could hang up his coat but somehow it was always tipped over, carted off to Jamie’s bedroom for some purpose, or upside down and playing the part of a submarine or a tank; at any rate, it was rarely available at coat-hanging times. What’ll happen to him when he gets to school, though, Anna thought,
turning to unlace Jamie’s shoes and find his slippers. He won’t have a big sister to wait on him there. She said as much, and her small brother cast her a roguish glance out of his big blue eyes.

‘No, not a sister; but teacher will put me boots on,’ he announced cheerfully. ‘Or anuvver kid, a bigger one.’

‘Little beast,’ Anna observed. ‘Come on, you can help me lay the table for tea.’

‘Tea and lovely pan … oh, sorry, Anna. Not a word,’ Jamie said, remembering. ‘Where’s spoons put?’

The day of Anna’s tenth birthday party dawned fair; as the children ate their breakfast they noted the light breeze and the sunshine, and a shower of rain at eleven o’clock just seemed to freshen the grass, add a gloss to the flowering shrubs and the primulas and rock roses starring the garden beds.

Although Bill lived in Acle, he had indeed approached the Radwells about a job and had been taken on to help in the garden. Despite the distance, he arrived each morning by half past eight and did not set off again until five-thirty; in between he was everywhere and doing everything, or so it seemed. He cleaned shoes, carted coal and chopped wood. He dug, weeded, planted. He barrowed logs into the woodshed from the very edge of the estate and sometimes he drove JJ into Norwich, dropped him off at Norwich Thorpe in time for the London train and picked him up again at six o’clock, even though it made him late home. But he only drove if Constance was too busy; in the main she preferred to chauffeur JJ herself.

As Anna was brushing her hair before putting on her party dress of peach-coloured voile, she saw Bill and Roddy, the garden boy, staggering a bit as they carried out the long table from the kitchen, setting it down under the cedar tree. They produced chairs next, folding wood and canvas affairs which had been hired, she believed.
Then Cook came out with a very big white cloth. It was too early for wasps and bees, thank goodness, but Anna hoped they wouldn’t put the food out too soon or the birds which twittered and sang in the cedar tree might decide to make their mark on things.

Next was a screen for the conjurer; the Punch and Judy man would bring his own puppet theatre later on, to entertain them after tea. So it had been decided that they wouldn’t need a marquee, then. Anna was half glad, half sorry. She had never been to a party in a marquee, unless you could count the marquee they had hired for Aunt Audrey’s wedding. It had been a lovely wedding; eight bridesmaids, all dressed in what Aunt Audrey had called ‘rose shades’. Anna had liked the swimming lemony light inside the marquee, the scent of crushed grass and scent, the soft sound of the rain pattering on the canvas, and the sheer unreality of it all. Outside, you knew the rain-soaked daffodils hung their heads, the beech tree’s bare branches moved restlessly, scattering drops as the wind caught them. There was the chill of the gusting rain and a nippy Norfolk wind straight off the North Sea, while inside it was all summer, all light dresses, sandals, and the smells that go with cricket matches, hot sunshine, cream teas.

But that had been more than a year ago; now it’s my turn, Anna thought, staring at the preparations. It would have been fun to have a marquee, but having the sunny garden would be even better. Very soon now she would be dressed and brushed and allowed to use a little tiny speck of her mother’s nicest scent. She would go downstairs to greet her guests, girls and boys so subdued by parental presence and best clothing that they would look quite different, peep at her shyly, mumble their greetings. They would carry interestingly wrapped parcels for her, she would unfasten the string, open the paper, exclaim, and then they would troop out into the garden, a game
would be suggested, they would start to play …

‘Anna darling, are you nearly ready? The cousins will be here in half an hour, they are to arrive early, to help with the games.’

Mummy’s voice echoed round the room; she was calling up the stairs, Anna realised with relief, so she didn’t know that her daughter was still mooning around clad in nothing more than her white liberty bodice and pink cotton knickers.

‘Nearly ready, Mummy,’ Anna shrilled. She dropped her hairbrush, grabbed her party dress and began to struggle into it. Next door, she heard Jamie shouting at Nanny for pulling his hair; he must be further on with getting ready than she was; Nanny always combed Jamie’s curls last because it was the worst part.

‘Don’t tug so hard, it don’t matter if there’s tanglies, nan,’ Jamie said. ‘Oh not them shoes, them shoes pinches me toes!’

Rumble rumble went Nanny’s reassuring answer. Anna couldn’t hear what she was saying but she knew the gist of it.
Don’t wriggle, young James, or you’ll feel this hairbrush on your b.t.m. and them shoes was bought specially to go with your sailor suit and well you know it, young man!

In self-defence, dreamers have to learn to move rapidly. Anna was into her dress and white sandals, with her hair pulled back and her peach silk ribbon ready in one hand, when her mother pushed open the door.

‘Good girl, you do look nice! Now will you wear your hair in a tail or shall I tie the ribbon round your head and fasten it beneath your hair, like an Alice band? You could have it loose, but when you play games it’s probably easier if it’s tied back.’

‘Daddy likes it with a bow on the front bit,’ Anna said. She sighed as her mother’s face was momentarily darkened by a frown. ‘But it doesn’t matter – whatever you want.’

‘A bow on the front bit is rather common, darling,’ Constance said gently. ‘I think it’s best tied back.’ She brushed briskly, then tied Anna’s heavy fall of dark gold, silky hair back into a pony-tail. She fastened the ribbon so tightly that Anna’s eyebrows and eyes rose and became elongated and slitlike; Chinese, in fact, Anna thought, examining her reflection in the mirror on her dressing table.

‘There you are, darling; very neat,’ Constance said briskly. ‘How do I look? Suitable for your party?’

She looked beautiful, of course. The gleaming cap of white-gold hair was always in perfect trim, her slender, boyish figure looked wonderful in a navy and white dress with a pleated skirt and dropped waist. She wore silk stockings and her shoes were navy and white too, like the dress. Anna, who had thought her peach voile the height of fashion, sighed.

‘You look lovely, Mummy. I wish I could look even a little bit like you do.’

‘Oh don’t worry, darling,’ her mother said. Her voice was slightly frosty, though Anna could not think why. ‘Daddy will think you’re a dream of loveliness in that colour, even though it clashes with your hair. As for me, he’s so used to me he scarcely sees me any more.’

‘He does! He thinks you’re the most beautiful person in the world, he
dotes
on you,’ Anna said loyally. ‘And it’s true, Mummy. If I grow up to be half as pretty as you I’ll be terribly lucky. Nanny says so, and gran, and Uncle Luke … oh, was that the bell?’

‘It’s the cousins!’ Constance cried at once, a hand going automatically to tidy her immaculate hair. ‘Come along, Anna, we’ll welcome them together!’

They ran down the stairs hand in hand, Anna conscious that she must look heavy and ungraceful beside her willowy, golden mother.

*

It was a marvellous party; it would have been a marvellous day but for one small incident.

They had played games, watched the conjurer, had tea, played more games. And then the Punch and Judy man arrived. Everyone came out to watch that, even some parents who had arrived early to pick up their young. The Punch and Judy man was at his best; Dog Toby was the smallest, sweetest dog in the world – the birthday girl got to shake Dog Toby’s paw – and the crocodile, the policeman, all the other characters were just right, frightening enough to be exciting but not enough for nightmares.

Then it was time for everyone to troop indoors, flushed and chattering, to receive the small presents (penknives for the boys, manicure sets for the girls) which nanny had toiled over. Anna, running across the hall, was nabbed by Mummy, standing talking to her friend.

‘Anna darling, Daddy’s going to take the cousins home; he told me to tell you to put your outdoor things on and go with him, for the ride.’

‘Where’s my coat?’

‘In the cloakroom, silly. Wash your face and hands and comb your hair while you’re in there.’

Mummy shushed her off into the small side cloakroom and sure enough there was Anna’s navy school coat, her brown lace-ups, and the beret Mummy had bought her. She was washing her hands and face sketchily when she heard her mother starting to talk to Aunt Beryl; they must have been just the other side of the door, for their voices came to her as clear as a bell.