Celandine (22 page)

* * *

‘She
looks
a bit like a witch, I must say.’ The lounging inhabitants of Tratt, the sixth-form study, regarded Celandine with mild interest as she stood on the mat just inside the door. Very comfortable they looked in their low cushioned chairs ranged around the cosy little fireplace. One of them was busy with a toasting fork and there was a sizeable pile of bread, sliced and ready, on a plate by the glowing hearth. A large heavy-framed mirror hung above the fireplace, and Celandine could see her own pale face reflected there as she stood in the doorway. The hair took her by surprise, as always.

‘Yes, it’s the hair, isn’t it?’ The cool eyes of the group continued to look her up and down, the neatly groomed heads tilted this way and that as they considered her.

‘Tell me, child,’ the girl with the toasting fork waved the thing lazily in her direction, an invitation to come closer, ‘do you read tea leaves, that sort of thing?’

‘Um . . . no.’

Celandine was aware of a slight rustle behind her, and in the mirror she saw the reflection of another girl entering the room, bringing with her an atmosphere of newly-ironed starch, and faintly perfumed soap. It was Aberdeen, the Head Girl.

‘Hullo. What are you doing here?’ Aberdeen carried an armful of large books before her, and the title of the top one stared out like a red banner –
Beethoven
.

‘I . . . I don’t really know,’ said Celandine. ‘I was told to report here.’

‘Oh, we thought we’d better have a look at her, Gillian, that’s all.’ One of the girls in the armchairs stifled a yawn. ‘This is the Witch – the kiddie that laid a curse on poor old Carol, you know, the Bulldog’s terrier. Ha ha! That’s rather good, isn’t it? The Bulldog’s terrier.’

‘Not something we should be joking about, though.’ Gillian Aberdeen walked over to a table and lowered her pile of books onto the brown velveteen cloth. ‘And in any case, I don’t believe it for a moment. Witches and curses, indeed. Right, that’s the last of the German books from the library. Now then.’ She turned to look at Celandine. ‘Howard, isn’t it? You’ve already been interviewed by Miss Craven, so I gather?’

The blue eyes of the Head Girl seemed tired, and there was a little worry-frown across her brow that looked as though it might be there permanently. Her appearance was immaculate – the pleated skirt crisply pressed, the long dark hair clipped firmly into place – but there was a distracted air about her, as though she had too many things to think about.

‘Yes. I had to go and see Miss Craven this morning, during lessons.’

‘Well, in that case I see no reason for you to be here. Help me with these books some of you, for goodness’ sake – there’s simply a ton of them to find a home for.
And
we’ve all these pens and things to sort through.’

‘Purged of all evil German influences, are we? What a lot of nonsense this whole business is. As if we
didn’t
have enough to do.’ One or two of the fireside-loungers began to stir themselves, grumbling.

‘It isn’t nonsense at all.’ Aberdeen sounded cross. ‘We must help in whatever way we can.’

‘Oh, you’re such a priss, Abbers. What possible difference can it make to the war whether Tiny Lewis in form 2b uses a German nib or a British one? I’ll bet the Kaiser’s not scouring Bavaria for pen nibs made in
Sheffield
 . . .’

‘
Is
Bavaria part of Germany?’

‘Here you – Witch,’ the girl who knelt by the hearth spoke to Celandine, her toasting fork brandished like a demon’s trident in the fireside glow. ‘That’s all right. You can cut along now. But if you come up with any good curses to lay upon brutal house-mistresses, then let us know – do.’

Celandine wondered why they called her Witch. She wondered also whether she would ever be eighteen, and a prefect, and allowed the privilege of making toast whenever she felt like it. It seemed doubtful, somehow.

She backed towards the doorway but then stopped, to avoid colliding with yet another girl about to enter the room – a face at her shoulder, glimpsed in the mirror opposite. It was a face she had seen before, slightly freckled, not pretty exactly . . .

Celandine quickly turned, but there was nobody there. She stood staring at the empty doorway.

‘Yes, Howard? Was there something?’ Aberdeen was speaking to her.

‘Um . . . no, Aberdeen. Nothing.’

‘Off you go, then.’

Celandine closed the sixth-form study door behind her and walked slowly back down the echoing stairwell.

She later assumed that the rumours of her supernatural powers had been started by Molly Fletcher. Molly had been present in the staffroom when the incident with the dog had occurred. But though she began to hear the word ‘Witch’ being whispered behind her back, nothing was said to her face, and most of her peers continued to ignore her.

Celandine was therefore glad of Nina’s company. Whenever some activity required that girls be split into pairs – walking to church, dancing lessons, nature trips – it was a comfort not to be left standing alone. Celandine realized, with a jolt of sudden sympathy, that standing alone must so often have been Nina’s lot before her own arrival at the school.

They lived a curious half-life, the two of them, thrown together by circumstance rather than choice, part of the teeming crowd of bodies that moved through the relentless routines of bed, lessons, meals and bed again – yet as separate from that crowd as the poor Siamese twins that floated in formaldehyde on the chemistry lab shelf.

Gradually they learned to understand one another and become friends. Beneath Nina’s stammering shyness lay a quiet resilience that Celandine couldn’t help but admire, a quality much better suited to this imprisonment than her own unpredictable temper, she felt. And Nina, so mistrustful of any offer of friendship
lest
it should suddenly be withdrawn, slowly allowed herself to accept that Celandine would not drop her the minute it became convenient to do so. Together they managed to survive the lonely weeks, outcasts though they were, without feeling too miserable.

As half term approached, Celandine was shocked to discover that Nina would be remaining in school for the holiday.

‘My parents are in India,’ said Nina. ‘I’ve nowhere else to go. Other girls stay as well, so I’m not the only one, you see – and I’ve done it lots of times.’

But Celandine said that she was sure nobody would mind if Nina came back to Mill Farm with her, and so asked permission of her mother in her fortnightly letter home. It wasn’t until permission had been given that Celandine realized, with a pang of disappointment, what Nina’s presence at Mill Farm would mean; there would be no possibility of any visits to Howard’s Hill, and all her plans to do so would have to be postponed. She would not be able to go and see Fin, or any of the little people.

The little people. How far away and impossible and dreamlike that world seemed to her now.

Chapter Nine

AS IT HAPPENED,
the weather over half term was so appalling that Celandine doubted whether she would have ventured as far as Howard’s Hill in any case. The October rain swept across the wetlands and hurled itself against the rattling panes of the farmhouse, seeping in below the window frames and forming little puddles on the sills. The girls traced their names in wet fingermarks upon the painted wood and looked despondently out at the stableyard, now awash with mud and sodden straw.

They played endless games of Old Maid, and Nine Men’s Morris, read to each other from
Aesop’s Fables
– taking it in turns to invent the silliest of morals they could think of – and picked out the tunes from Freddie’s book of
Campfire Songs
on the piano in the parlour. Freddie would not be coming home for half term, which was another blow. He was apparently going off somewhere with a school friend instead.

Once, during a fleeting break in the weather, Nina looked up at the dark hump of Howard’s Hill and said, ‘What’s that place? It looks
very
mysterious, don’t you
think?’
And Celandine, more to relieve the tedium than anything else, came very close to telling all. How Nina’s watery eyes would widen in astonishment if only she knew just how mysterious ‘that place’ really was. Yet it wasn’t so much the breaking of her vow that made Celandine hold her tongue, rather that she had almost ceased to believe the whole fantastic story herself. How ridiculous it seemed, that there could be a whole other world up there. At any rate, she simply said, ‘Yes, I’ve always thought so too,’ and dealt another hand of Old Maid.

‘I’m sorry we can’t go outside. It’s a bit of a bore, when the weather’s like this.’

‘I’m not bored.’ Nina sounded surprised at the suggestion. ‘If you think this is boring, you should try staying in school for the holidays. I love being here. I wish
I
lived on a farm.’

‘Really?’ Again Celandine caught a glimpse of how Nina’s life must have been before they had met. ‘Do you miss your mother and father?’

Nina nodded, and said nothing. Celandine saw that she had touched a nerve. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Is it my go?’ She laid down a card, and tried to imagine what it would be like if her own mother and father were constantly away. Would she miss them? She wasn’t at all sure that she would. Was that wicked of her? She missed Freddie. And Tobyjug.

‘I’m so glad you’re here, Nina, honestly I am. You must come and stay every half – if you’d like to, that is. It does get a bit lonely by myself, and it’s so much better if you have a . . . a friend.’

Nina nodded again, and managed to whisper, ‘Yes. It is.’ But now her eyes looked more watery than ever and so Celandine decided that she had probably said enough.

Ten minutes later, they looked up from their card game. The unfamiliar sound of a petrol engine came rattling into the yard, and a few moments after that two heads flashed past by the window, one of them wearing a peaked cap. Both faces were screwed up against the rain.

‘Gracious,’ said Nina, above the rhythmic
thumpeta-thumpeta
noise outside, ‘whatever’s
that
?’

Celandine looked at her blankly. ‘Freddie,’ she said, after a moment. ‘I think one of them was Freddie. Not the one in the hat.’

They got up from their chairs and peered through the streaming window. A brief exchange of raised voices was just audible above the engine noise and the squalling wind. Then they saw a large motorcycle swing around the yard and roar towards the open gate once more – ridden by a young man in a cap and greatcoat, his passenger now no longer visible. He looked wet through. The motorcycle disappeared through the gateway in a cloud of smoke and steam.

‘Come on,’ said Celandine. ‘Freddie’s home! Don’t know why, though. I thought he was supposed to be staying with someone from his school.’

They arrived in the hallway at the same time as Mrs Howard. Freddie was standing on the coconut matting, shaking the drips from his summer jacket – an entirely inadequate piece of clothing to be wearing
on
the back of a motorcycle in mid-October. His trousers clung to his legs, and muddy rainwater simply streamed from him onto the mat. He was carrying a small leather suitcase.

‘Freddie! What is this? Are you here—? Oh, I am so glad! Give me a kiss! Come – come out of these clothes. Yes, yes, at once! I will fetch Cook for bringing a hot bath.’

‘I’ve no time, Mother. No – really. I have to be gone again in three-quarters of an hour. Just popped in to get changed, you know. Hallo, Dinah! And er, hallo . . . er . . . oh, Nina is it? Hallo.’

‘Changed? You are leaving again this
shortly?
Freddie – no! There are no clothes here ready, nothing is
ironed
on . . .’

‘Now don’t
worry
, Mother. I have a suitcase here, with clean clothes . . . won’t take me a minute. Is there a towel in my room? I’ll be down again directly – then I’ll explain. Back in a jif. What have you done to your wrist, by the way?’

‘I
boiled
it on the teapot.’

‘Oh. Bad luck.’

Freddie bounded up the stairs, taking his suitcase with him. Mrs Howard and the two girls were left to stare wonderingly at one another.

‘What is this place – a house for mad ones?’ Lizzie Howard threw up her hands in despair. ‘Accchhh! Well, he shall have some thing to eat, in whatever case. Celandine, lay a little plates in the parlour, and I shall find Cook.’

By the time they could hear Freddie coming back
downstairs,
there was a tea table laid in the parlour, with a plateful of bread and butter, a dish of damson jam, half a fruit cake, and a fresh pot of tea. The parlour led directly on to the dim hallway, and something about the deliberate and measured tread of the footsteps on the stairs made them all look towards the open door. Through the banister rails they caught a shadowy glimpse of khaki and brown leather, and Mrs Howard already had her hands to her face in shock as Freddie appeared in the doorway. He was dressed in army uniform.

‘No . . . oh no . . .’ Celandine could hear her mother beside her, breathing into her cupped hands, but she could not take her eyes off Freddie. He looked . . . foolish. He had scampered up the stairs an excited schoolboy, and had come back down a soldier – except that he was not a soldier. He couldn’t be. He was just Freddie, dressing up again, and in a costume that didn’t fit very well. It was too big.

‘Jock’s coming to pick me up again in half an hour.’ The voice was as familiar as ever, but the booted feet sounded foreign and strange, a leathery creak as Freddie walked towards the table, and the smell of the new serge uniform was somehow ominous. Mrs Howard sat down heavily on one of the parlour chairs.

‘Well, I wish somebody would jolly well
say
something.’ Freddie picked up a piece of bread and butter and put a blob of jam on it. Celandine watched the knife spreading the home-made jam, saw how the tip of it carefully picked out one of the damson skins . . . he never would eat the skins. She looked at the scrap
of
dark skin, curled up and glistening now on the side of Freddie’s plate, and knew that she would remember it for ever. There was something so sad about it that she had to turn away, swallowing back the tears. She didn’t want Nina to see her cry.