I want to know everything about your life. Everything.”
Darkness had fallen; the sky was clear and full of stars; being able to see them, undazzled by the neon lights, had been one of the benisons of the war. Marek had gone to the window. Now he came back to bed, and kissed her chastely on the forehead to show her she could converse uninterrupted, and like a child she folded her hands and began.
“I have goats,” she said. “Nearly twenty of them. Angoras. They’re very beautiful animals. Kendrick doesn’t like the milk-no one likes the milk-but we make cheese, and they don’t smell at all, they’re very—”’
“Thank you,” said Marek. “I am acquainted with goats.”
“Yes.” She admitted this, her head bent. “And bantams; I have a flock of Silkies, they’re beautiful birds, white feathers and black legs. Of course the eggs they lay aren’t very large-you wouldn’t expect it-but they have a very good flavour. And we won first prize in the Village Show for our onions, and—”’
She babbled on, producing her strange agricultural litany, and Marek, afraid he would be given the milk yield per Jersey cow, gently turned her head towards him. “You were going to make Crowthorpe into a sanctuary,” he prompted, remembering Leon’s words in the internment camp.
“Yes.” She was silent, remembering her vow. “And I have. It’s just that when you have a sanctuary you can’t exactly choose. I mean, when people came and knocked at the door of a cathedral in the olden days, the priest couldn’t say “I’ll have you and you and the rest must go away”; he had to have everyone.” She paused, surveying in her mind the current population of Crowthorpe. “The land girls are all right, and so are the evacuees that came first, the little Cockney ones, but then we had two more lots from Coventry and Birmingham and they hate each other and their children make Molotov Cocktails in lemonade bottles and throw them out of the window, and the people I wanted like my mother and Sophie can’t get away; Sophie’s in Cambridge and Leon’s joined the pioneers, so I’m left with people like Tamara—”’
“Tamara! You’re not serious? The Little Cabbage?”’
She nodded. “She’s not there all the time but she doesn’t get on with her mother and I don’t mind her too much because she plays the gramophone with Kendrick and he tells her about Dostoevsky. Of course it would be nice if she brought her ration book and stopped stealing the flowers from the conservatory, but it’s not easy for Kendrick, me being so busy… and none of it matters because it’s wartime and compared to people all over the world—”’ She broke off and he saw her pass a finger along her lower eyelid, in the gesture he had seen her use at Hallendorf to stem the tears of a child.
“Ellen, I don’t understand this,” he said, gathering her into his arms. “I don’t understand what you’re saying. Nora said… that’s why I didn’t come… Not because of Kendrick-he can go to the devil-but because of you.”
“Nora,” said Ellen, bewildered. “How does Nora know?”’
“She came up to see you.” But he could not go on. Nora’s description of Ellen in her fruit-filled orchard still had the power to sear him. “She was like that girl in the Mille Fleurs tapestry,” she had said. “The one with the unicorn. You must let her be, Marek. You must promise me to let her be.” Forcing himself, he tried to put into words what Nora had told him. “That’s why I didn’t come; because of the child.”
Ellen stared at him; a searchlight fingering the sky passed over her face and he saw the huge, bewildered eyes.
“Oh God!”
The bleakness in her voice made him overcome his own misery. Somehow he must enter into what now seemed her reason for living.
“What is it, the baby? A boy or a girl?”’
She lay back against the pillows. “I don’t know,” she said wearily. “It might have been Tyrone or Errol or Gary… there are so many of them and they’re all named after film stars.”
He pulled her up, grasping her shoulders. “Explain,” he said urgently. “Don’t play games with me.”
She tried to smile. “I told you about sanctuaries; you can’t choose. The billeting people asked me if I’d take unmarried mothers-the idea is they help with light housework in exchange for their keep and then when they’ve had their babies, after a month, they go away and put their babies in a crèche and find work. The first part works all right-they’re nice enough girls; they’ve mostly been made pregnant by some soldier who’s posted overseas. It’s when they’re supposed to go away that it’s not so good.”
But he was scarcely listening. “You mean you haven’t got a child; you’re not even expecting one?”’
She gave a forlorn shake of the head. “Nor likely to,” she could have said, but did not, for it seemed important to protect Kendrick. The move from the master bedroom to the old nursery had not made much difference. Kendrick continued to stammer out his adoration and to beg her night after night not to leave him alone, but that was as far as it went. At first the knowledge that his talentless fumblings were unlikely to produce a child had devastated Ellen, but the endless infants produced by her unmarried mothers had calmed her distress. There would be plenty of children after the war in need of homes. She would adopt one then.
But Marek was transfigured. He would not have taken her from her child, or deprived a man of his flesh and blood, but now there was no obstacle.
“Thank God,” he said. “You’re mine then”-and reached for her again.
The second time is better than the first; more certainty and already that touch of recognition that is one of the most precious elements of love. Marek now was a conqueror; the relief, the joy he felt transmitted in every gesture, and Ellen followed him movement for movement… remembering as if her life depended on it the feel of his skin, the muscles of his shoulder, the touch of his hair.
So that when morning came and she said she must go back, he did not believe it.
“You’re mad. You’re absolutely mad.
Do you think you’re making that poor devil happy with your pity? Surely he deserves better than that?”’
But he was not frightened yet. He was still certain of victory.
“I promised,” she kept repeating. “I promised I wouldn’t leave him alone. Night after night, I promised. He’s always been alone. His brothers bullied him and his mother despises him. The whole house is full of photos of Roland and William and not one of Kendrick—”’
“For God’s sake, Ellen, do you suppose I care about any of that? I remember him from school-he was always by a radiator. You can’t help people like that.”
She shook her head. “I promised,” she kept repeating. “He’s so afraid; he follows me about all day and tells me how much he loves me. You can’t take your happiness by trampling on other people.” And then, very quietly, “What will happen to the world, Marek, if people don’t keep their promises?”’
She saw his jaw tighten and waited almost with relief for him to give way to one of his rages. A man who defenestrated Nazis and threw children into the lake would surely lose his temper and make it easier for her.
But at the last minute he understood, and held her very quietly and very closely, and that was almost more than she could bear.
“If you change your mind I’ll be at the Czech Club in Bedford Place till I sail.”
But she only shook her head, and opened one of his hands and held the palm for a moment against her cheek, and then she said: “It’s time to go.”
The train was exactly what she needed; it was freezing cold, the toilet did not flush, someone had been sick in the corridor. In such a train one could let the tears come, and opposite her in the evil-smelling frowsty compartment, an old woman leant forward and touched her knee and said: “Aye, there’s always something to cry about these days.”