Читать книгу The English Wife - Adrienne Chinn - Страница 22

Ellie jumps off the bus in front of the portico of the Samson and Hercules dance hall, where two chunky white-painted statues of the mythical figures hold up the porch roof. George waves at her from the top step, and she runs up to meet him and gives him a quick kiss on his cheek.

‘You look like a soldier in that outfit, Ellie.’

Ellie glances down at her navy uniform. ‘I’m sorry, George. It was busy over at the station. Fire over in Pegg’s Opening. It doesn’t take much for those old cottages to go up. It was just a cigarette this time that did it. I hope you don’t mind dancing with a girl in uniform.’

‘No, it’s nice. I just wish I’d known. I would have put on mine. It would have evened the balance.’

‘Don’t be silly, George. You look just fine.’ She smooths the white handkerchief that he’s tucked into the breast pocket of his brown wool suit jacket. ‘I can’t believe you managed to get us tickets. Everyone in town wanted to come to see The Squadronaires.’

‘Just lucky, Ellie. My boss was sent some tickets and his wife didn’t want to come.’

They push through the doors and through the crowd into the ballroom, the party dresses and suits of the recent past outnumbered by the khaki, Air Force blue and navy of uniforms. Paper-loop streamers hang from the ceiling and the Air Force dance band, The Squadronaires, handsome in their Air Force uniforms, are in full swing on the stage.

George squints at the room through his glasses. ‘Looks like all the tables are taken. We should’ve arrived before the interval.’

‘Oh, George, no one gets here before the interval,’ Ellie says as she bounces to the music. ‘Girls need time to get ready. Anyway, I’ve been at my desk all day. I want to dance, not sit.’

‘Fine, but I need a beer first. I’ll meet up with you over there by the stage. What would you like?’

‘Beer, please. Just a half.’ Ellie makes her way around the perimeter of the dancers until her way is blocked by the backs of a group of tall Newfoundlanders. ‘Excuse me.’ She clears her throat and shouts. ‘Excuse me!’ She pokes a broad shoulder.

The man turns around. ‘Well, there she is, after all this time.’ The smile lighting up his grey eyes. The long, handsome face. The name slips out of Ellie’s mouth before she has a chance to think. ‘Thomas Parsons.’

The smile turns into a grin. ‘You and my mam. The only two people who calls me Thomas.’ He hands his beer to one of his friends. ‘C’mon, maid. Let’s have a dance.’

***

George sweeps his gaze around the crowded dance floor and spies Ellie’s blonde head, topped by the neat navy AFS cap, bouncing to the rhythm of the swing band with a tall Newfoundlander. The soldier looks vaguely familiar, and George rakes through his brain to remember where he’s seen him before.

‘Well, what do you figure?’ A hand pats George’s shoulder. A soldier’s moon-shaped face, with a dusting of freckles across his nose, grins at him. ‘Charlie Murphy from the 57th Newfoundlanders over in Filby. You remember? I met you here with my friend Tom back in the summer. He spilt Coke all over your girlfriend’s dress. Oh, she was some vexed, wasn’t she? Could have frozen the North Atlantic with that face. I’ve been lookin’ out for you lot. Where’ve you been?’ He scans the crowd past George’s shoulder. ‘Is Ruthie with you? I’d be up for a dance or twenty with her.’

George looks at the boyish face and shakes his head. ‘Ruthie … Ruthie’s not here.’

Charlie’s face falls. ‘Don’t tell me another fella’s cut in?’

‘No. I’m terribly sorry, Charlie. There was a bomb. Her whole family … they were sleeping. They didn’t make it, I’m afraid.’

‘Oh, Jaysus.’ Charlie rubs his fingers over his eyes. ‘You knows, b’y, when you joins up you knows there’s a chance … there’s a chance you might not come back. But you never figure a pretty girl you meet at a dance, in her own home …’

George looks at the young soldier. It’s like all the joy stored in Charlie’s compact, exuberant body has melted away, like the ice lolly from Mr Suckling’s newsagent’s that he’d once left out on the garden table. He pats Charlie’s shoulder. ‘How about I get us a couple of beers?’

‘Nah, b’y. If it’s all the same to you, I’m gonna call it a night.’ Charlie nods towards the dance floor. ‘I sees Tommy’s off dancin’ with your girlfriend. Let him know I’ve caught the early train back to Great Yarmouth. I’ll gets myself a lift to Filby from there. I don’t much feels in the mood anymore.’

‘Of course.’

Charlie gives George a thumbs up. He nods in Thomas’s direction. His friend is swinging Ellie around the floor in an energetic jitterbug. ‘I’d be watching out for old Tommy, there. All the girls loves him back home. He’s as smooth as the ice on an inland pond, that one.’

George looks over at the two dancers. Ellie throws back her head and giggles as she loops under Thomas’s arms.

‘Thanks, but I don’t need to worry. Ellie’s my girl. We’re getting married as soon as the war’s over.’

‘Well, that’s all right, then. Nothin’ to worry about.’ Charlie adjusts his beret. ‘All the same, I’d keep my eyes peeled, if I was you. There’s nothin’ on earth like the charm of a Newfoundlander. And, I knows what I’m sayin’ ’cause I am one.’

***

The music segues into a leisurely foxtrot. Thomas draws Ellie closer and she smiles at him nervously, though she’s in no particular rush to leave the dance floor. ‘I’m getting rather thirsty after all that jitterbugging, Thomas. George was getting us some beer. He’ll wonder what’s happened to me.’

‘I’m pretty sure he knows where you’re at.’ Thomas nods towards the stage, where George leans against a pillar sipping a beer as he watches the dance floor. ‘Can’t say as I blame him.’

Ellie glances over at the stage and gives her fiancé a wave. ‘George has nothing to worry about. We’ve been engaged for ages.’

Thomas taps Ellie’s ring finger. ‘Why haven’t you got an engagement ring on your finger, then, maid?’

‘Oh, well, you know, the war and all that. He needs to save up some money. He works over at Mcklintock’s Chocolates. He’s in administration. He’s making his way up the ladder.’

‘Sounds like a clever fella.’

‘Oh, he is.’

‘I’ve saved up some stamps for him. Why anyone’d want to collect stamps is a mystery to me. Just pieces of paper as far as I can tell. My mam writes to beat the band. Every week I gets seven letters from her. She must be usin’ up all the ink in Newfoundland. I’ll bring the stamps next week.’

‘Next week?’ Was he expecting to see her next week?

‘Sure thing. We all wants to get away from barracks come Saturday. They’re puttin’ on trucks to bring us into town from next week. We won’t need to squeeze onto the two carriages on the train. Some fellas always get left behind. They were goin’ to have a riot on their hands if they didn’t sort it out.’

‘Well, George will appreciate that. The stamps, I mean.’

Thomas raises an ash-blond eyebrow. ‘How about you? Would you be happy to have a go on the dance floor again with a fella with two left feet?’

‘Two left feet?’ Ellie laughs. ‘You must be joking. You jitterbug better than any of the boys around here.’

‘That’s because a lot of us have family down in Boston. They brings us American records when they visits. Newfoundland’s a right crossroads of the world. All the aeroplanes heading to Europe has to refuel in Gander. They’d drop like a brick into the ocean on their way over if they didn’t. We had Carole Lombard over there in St John’s just before I signed up. The girls were all out in force hopin’ to see Clark Gable, but he didn’t show up. That’s her husband, you know. I read it in the Telegram.’

‘Ruthie would have loved to see Clark Gable.’

‘You never knows. Maybe she’ll see him here in Norwich some day.’

Ellie shakes her head. ‘Ruthie … Ruthie’s gone. Her house was hit by a bomb in July.’

Thomas squeezes Ellie’s hand. ‘I’m sorry. That’s hard.’

‘Thanks. Yes. It’s very hard.’ Ellie leans her head against the rough khaki wool of Thomas’s uniform. ‘It doesn’t seem fair.’

‘No, it’s not. We just has to keep going. That’s the choice we got.’

‘It’s why I decided to join the fire service. I couldn’t not do something.’ Ellie sighs against the khaki wool and looks up at Thomas. ‘I was studying art. I had a job helping a famous artist.’ She shrugs. ‘I gave it up. I still take an art class a couple of times a week, but it’s getting busier at the fire station. The Germans have already been over twice this month. One just missed bombing the Cathedral by a whisker.’

‘He must have been blind. A boy with a slingshot could hit that with his eyes closed.’

Ellie laughs and looks at Thomas. Ruthie was right. He has the same sandy blond hair and strong-boned face as Gary Cooper. The nose a little too long but fitting just right in his angular face. Not that it mattered, of course. It was just nice to dance with someone who knew how to, for a change. What was wrong with that?

A crash outside the building thunders through the music and the chatter, setting the paper streamers swaying. The band judders to a stop and a silence as thick as a winter quilt falls over the room. Then, a crush as the crowd suddenly surges towards the exit. Another crash outside, further up the road, followed by the whine of the air raid sirens.

Thomas grabs Ellie’s hand. ‘Not that way. There’s a cellar. The door’s at the back.’

‘No, I need to find George.’ Ellie pulls away and fights her way towards the stage. ‘George!’

A pair of arms enfold her. The familiar brown wool suit. ‘I’m here, Ellie.’

Thomas taps George’s shoulder. ‘C’mon, b’y. There’s a cellar. We’ll be safe there.’

***

Ellie sits on a wooden crate packed with wine bottles beside a large beer cask. The cellar windows are blacked out and reinforced with a crisscross of masking tape, and a single electric bulb hangs from the ceiling, throwing an eerie yellow light over the round-bellied beer casks and wooden crates of wine and soft drinks. Others have found their way to the cellar as well, and they sit together in an uneasy silence, waiting for the all-clear.

Thomas nods at the crates. ‘We’re not goin’ to go thirsty, that’s for sure.’

George squints through his glasses at Thomas’s face, lit pale yellow by the electric light. ‘How did you know there was a cellar?’

‘I always makes it my business to check these things out. Just in case.’

‘Well, I’m very glad you did.’ Ellie shifts on the crate, away from a splinter pushing through her navy skirt. ‘I wouldn’t have wanted to be squeezing into the shelter up the road with everyone else.’

George removes his glasses and tugs the handkerchief out of his breast pocket. ‘I saw your friend Charlie,’ he says as he wipes a film of dust off his glasses. ‘He said to tell you he’d gone back to Filby early on the train.’ He tucks the handkerchief back in his pocket and pushes the glasses over his nose.

‘That’s not like Charlie. He’s one for a party.’

‘He asked about Ruthie.’

Thomas nods. ‘All right, then. I see.’ He looks at Ellie. ‘He liked your friend. He talked my ear off all about her for months. He kept looking for her at the dance halls every time we came to Norwich.’

Ellie presses her lips together, willing the sob that’s forming in her throat not to spring into life. If it does, she can’t trust herself not to stop crying. She’d thought she’d cried all the tears allotted to her body, but she was wrong. They were like a perpetual spring with a source that never dried up.

The ear-splitting wail of the all-clear slices through the heavy stillness of the December night. They rise and stretch, unfolding into the pale yellow light illuminating the cellar. The revellers pick their way over the crates and beer casks and make their way up the cellar steps.

Outside, a half-moon hangs like a Christmas bauble in the twinkling sky. George holds out his hand to Thomas. ‘Thanks for your help tonight.’ His breath forms into a cloud that sits on the cold air. ‘Will you get back to Filby okay?’

Thomas shakes George’s hand. ‘No problem, George, b’y. There’s always someone happy to give a soldier a lift.’ He looks at Ellie and touches his forehead in a mini-salute. ‘See you anon. Thanks for the dance.’

Ellie watches as Thomas walks down the street, his tall figure growing smaller, his outline growing fainter, until he melds into the black winter night.