Something Dangerous (Spoils of Time 02) (72 page)

But it was the noise which was really separating the women from the girls now; and it was frightful. There had been ‘gun shyness’ tests: if you could cope with standing behind four 3.7 guns, all going off at the same time, you were all right. Barty found she could – just; but it wasn’t only the noise, it was the closeness of it all, the heat of the smoking cartridge case as it shot out, the smell of grease and cordite, they were all part of an assault that seemed to go deep within her, confusing all her responses. She developed strategies to cope with it, bracing herself mentally as well as physically, but a few of the girls couldn’t cope at all and developed something similar to the shell-shock Barty had observed in the men at Ashingham during the First War, a kind of withdrawal and even quite severe trembling. They had to leave, to do other work; Parfitt was very scornful.

They were all given rubber ear plugs, but mostly they didn’t wear them; there was so much crucial shouting going on, shouting of orders, information, warnings and you simply couldn’t hear that with plugs in. Barty learned to manage without, and sent up silent prayers that she wouldn’t suffer from permanent deafness.

Permanent deafness: better than blindness, though. Her heart ached so much for Kit that she sometimes felt it physically, a heavy throbbing of helpless sympathy. She had been given compassionate leave when she first heard the news, to go and see him; remembering his glorious looks, his joyful attitude to life, his burning inquisitiveness, she was shocked by what she found, a still, dull shell, hardly troubling to greet her, certainly not to smile.

She had expected to have to work hard, to be tactful, gentle, careful of everything she said and did, but it was far worse than she had feared. He patently didn’t listen to much that was said to him, hardly answered her questions, shrugged off her enquiries as to his health, refused every offer, of a walk, being read to, the radio, the gramophone. After half an hour she had felt exhausted and made an excuse to leave, and went to find Lady Beckenham; she was brusque with her.

‘Of course it’s difficult. I should know, I’m dealing with him every day. But hardly surprising. Wouldn’t you feel like that? I know I would.’

‘Yes, of course. But – what will become of him, it’s hard to see him getting any better at all, with this attitude.’

‘Oh, give him time,’ said Lady Beckenham cheerfully, ‘amazing what that will do. And look at Billy, what a state he was in.’

‘Yes, but you found him something to do, something to give him hope. I can’t think of anything that might help Kit. What on earth can he do, for the rest of his life.’

‘Can’t imagine. But there was some composer who was deaf, wasn’t there—’

‘Beethoven,’ said Barty. ‘Can – can Aunt Celia get through to him?’

‘Not really. She comes down every weekend, sits with him for hours, but he’s just the same with her. Poor chap.’

‘Doesn’t he want to go home?’

‘Not really. He’s happier down here. Says it’s more peaceful. And it’s safer of course. Anyway, he’ll come through. I’m sure of it. Just a matter of finding something. When you get to my age, Barty, you know that things usually do pan out. They have to. He can’t sit there for the rest of his life brooding. It won’t work.’

Barty smiled at her; and thought what an amazing woman she was. She must be over eighty, yet she still charged about Ashingham day and night, ordering everyone about, more than half running the school, helping Lord Beckenham when necessary in his Home Guard duties, overseeing her horses – and still riding herself. The doctor had forbidden it, saying that a fall could be fatal, but she told him that if she couldn’t ride she’d rather be dead and that was the end of it.

‘Izzie is being marvellous, she’s the only person he’ll talk to at all. That upsets Celia, between you and me. I did think Billy might be able to help, but Kit gave him very short shrift. Dear old Bill; wedding bells in the air, you know.’

‘Yes, it’s lovely,’ said Barty, ‘I’m so happy about it. She’s such a dear girl. She really loves him. Well, I’d better go and have another try with Kit, and then I’ll have to leave. I’ve got to report back tonight.’

‘Enjoying it, are you? Beckenham is desperately jealous.’

‘I absolutely adore it,’ said Barty simply.

Another letter had come from Boy: equally cold, equally distant. He had a final leave before moving off with his regiment to another location; he could be away some considerable time and he would like to see the children again before he left. Again he would prefer her not to be there. He imagined she would understand. As far as he could gather from what Henry and Roo had said, she was very seldom at Ashingham, so he imagined it would not exactly be a problem. He would be staying with a friend in London, since she had closed the house up. (‘And I can imagine the sex of the friend,’ Venetia said bitterly to Adele.) He would be gone before Christmas, and would organise some presents for the children which he would have delivered to Cheyne Walk. Perhaps she would be good enough to take them down with her.

And that was it.

Thank God, she thought, standing up, pressing her hand into her aching back, thank God she had her work to distract her. Otherwise she’d go completely mad.

Barty was having quite a lot of fun now; the nearest town put on very good Saturday night dances. The first one had actually been a bit of a shock, they had got used to the army hops with everyone in uniform and had sat there, khaki wallflowers, in a line, miserable in their stout shoes and thick stockings, looking at the civvy girls in frocks and curls; ‘bleedin’ tarts,’ said Parfitt, speaking for them all.

They had a few drinks at the bar, and had just decided to go and catch the bus back to barracks when a young officer came over to them, half bowed to Parfitt.

‘May I have the pleasure?’ he said.

‘Charmed, I’m sure,’ she said, and allowed herself to be led into a rather stiff waltz, winking at them over her partner’s shoulder every time she faced them.

Barty watched her enviously; she thought the officer was rather good-looking, wasted on Parfitt . . .

‘Wake up, Miller.’ Parfitt was grinning at her. ‘I brought you a partner over. Told him you was more his sort than me. Here you are.’

Barty shook her head, laughing; but ‘no, honest, he said he’d like to talk to you. Didn’t you?’ she said rather aggressively, digging him in the ribs.

‘I – did, yes. That is if you wouldn’t mind, Miss—’

‘Miller,’ said Barty, ‘and I wouldn’t mind a bit.’ The more she looked at him, the more he seemed to look like Cary Grant.

He was stationed nearby; doing commando training. He was very young, just thirty, but ‘I was born middle-aged,’ he said apologetically. ‘Everyone always thinks I’m older. John Munnings, by the way, sorry, should have said.’

‘And what do you do, John Munnings? When you’re not a’ – she examined the stars on his epaulette – ‘lieutenant.’

‘Oh – solicitor. There you are, you see. Dull. Middle-aged.’

‘Well, at least you’re not an accountant,’ she said cheerfully. He grinned back at her; he had a very nice smile.

The band struck up again: ‘You are My Sunshine’.

‘I love this,’ she said happily.

‘You dance awfully well,’ he said, unscrambling his feet for the third time.

‘Thank you,’ said Barty.

‘I know I don’t.’

‘Well – you’re not bad. And you know what they said about Fred Astaire?’

‘No.’

‘When he did his screen test: can’t act, can’t sing, can dance a little. Look what happened to him. You could get better.’

‘All right. Will you be my Ginger for the next dance at least?’

‘I will. With pleasure.’

She had seen him several times since then; she liked him more and more. And he was very good-looking. He was hating army life, he said, ‘but we have to do it, don’t we?’

‘We do. Actually I love it.’

‘You can’t.’

‘Yes, I can. It’s so – different. So absorbing.’

‘You’re amazing,’ he said. And then, rather awkwardly, ‘I would have thought you’d be an officer.’

‘I didn’t want to be. I’m happier mucking in with the girls. It’s more – I don’t know – relaxing.’ She smiled. ‘It’s funny, you know, Parfitt, the one you danced with first, she’s the greatest snob I’ve ever met. Well, with a couple of exceptions,’ she cast a mental glance at Celia and Lady Beckenham, ‘she’s so class-conscious, never stops going on about it.’

‘But you like her?’

‘I love her,’ said Barty, smiling.

After the third dance he asked her if he might kiss her. Amused at his old-fashioned chivalry, she had said of course he could. It hadn’t been – earth-shattering, not exactly – well, not in the least earth-shattering – but very nice. She liked him more and more. They had a lot in common, liked the same books, music, the theatre; they found a great deal to talk about.

Parfitt was hugely excited by what she called the romance.

‘Obviously likes you, Miller. But you can’t marry him.’

‘I wasn’t planning to,’ said Barty, laughing. ‘But why not?’

‘“Change the name, but not the letter, change for worse and not for better.” You must know that.’

‘Not really.’

‘Anyway, if you do get spliced, I want to be chief bridesmaid. Seeing as I introduced you.’

‘All right,’ said Barty, ‘you can be. That’s a promise. If we do.’

Even Venetia, with her lack of literary experience, could see that Lyttons were publishing a lot of the wrong things. Her father, Edgar Greene, and a couple of the other elderly male editors were suddenly in charge again, virtually unopposed, offering the public historical biographies, earnest intellectual novels, books of collected essays. Celia did her best, but she was distracted, depressed about Kit and bereft of Barty, of Jay, and of the two new young editors she had hired; she found it hard to push her own ideas through.

‘I feel like the army at Dunkirk,’ she said to Venetia one day, ‘stranded on the beaches. Without a landing craft in sight. What was the use of beating off the purchase-tax threat in order to publish all this dreary rubbish?’ She sighed, pushed away the proofs of a new edition of her Queen Anne biography. ‘This is not what people want. Or that dreadful pompous set of political nonsense that Oliver is so pleased with. We need lots and lots of popular fiction, things like
Rebecca
and
My Son, My Son
. Even really good, meaty stuff like
The Grapes of Wrath
– did you read that – no, of course you didn’t.’

‘Don’t be horrid,’ said Venetia equably. ‘I loved
Rebecca
though.’

‘Oh, she’s so marvellous, Daphne du Maurier. I do wish she was ours. You know Oliver turned her down, all those years ago. I can hardly bear to think about it. And you know that Macmillan’s biggest problem is finding enough paper for reprints of
Gone With the Wind
. And Oliver tells me, with his eyebrows raised, that people don’t want what he calls that sort of thing . . .’

‘That’s what we want,’ said Venetia, ‘an English
Gone With the Wind
.’

‘A little unlikely,’ said Celia briskly, ‘but yes, something like that. Anyway, if we don’t find something soon, we’ll be in serious trouble. We need a really big seller. Lyttons is barely breaking even at the moment. Sales are abysmal.’

It needed a German bomb to drop on Venetia’s hairdresser for them to find it.

‘It’s too awful,’ she wailed when she arrived at Lyttons one morning, ‘look at me, hair like one of those hedgehogs baked in clay Grandpapa’s always going on about, stomach like an unexploded bomb, and I’ve got to go and see Christina Foyle about a lunch for Guy Worsley. She’ll just show me the door.’

‘I’m sure she won’t,’ said Celia, ‘but you don’t look quite your best. Why don’t you go to Elizabeth Arden? They don’t do a bad job. You could get your nails done as well, they certainly need it. I would, Venetia, you’ll feel a lot better.’

It was very hectic at Miss Arden’s; Venetia had to wait for almost an hour. She was sitting reading an article in
Vogue
on the new hospitality – ‘offer a hot bath, far more welcome than gin’ – when she realised someone was trying to attract her attention. She pretended not to notice; she really wasn’t in a mood to be sociable.

But ‘It’s Venetia, isn’t it? Venetia Warwick. You may not remember me, I knew your sister. I work on
Style
magazine.’

Venetia smiled politely. ‘Yes. That’s me.’

‘I thought so. How is Adele? I heard she was safely back in England. What a nightmare for her with her poor husband still in Paris. If she ever feels like doing any work—’

‘I don’t think she will,’ said Venetia carefully, ‘she’s down in the country with her children.’

‘Lucky her! Wish I could be. Still, some of us still have jobs to do.’

‘Yes,’ said Venetia, and then because politeness required some kind of response, said, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t remember your name.’

‘Lucy, Lucy Galbraith.’

She did remember her now; she’d been married to someone called Tim Galbraith and there’d been a messy divorce, he’d gone off with his own sister-in-law.

‘Yes of course.’

‘You must forgive me for bothering you. I hate it when I’m trying to read at the hairdressers. But I just wondered – well, it’s a bit of a cheek, but nothing ventured, and all that. I’ve had an idea for a novel.’

‘Oh yes?’ said Venetia. She struggled to imitate her mother’s famous polite coolness. ‘How marvellous.’

‘Yes. Actually more than an idea. It’s half written already. I suddenly got so tired of being a fashion editor, thought there must be more to life. And I know your family are in the publishing business, so I wondered if I could possibly persuade you to have a look at it.’

‘Well, it’s a bit difficult at the moment,’ said Venetia, ‘we’re frightfully limited as to what we publish, paper rationing you know and—’ She suddenly stopped. She might be turning away the new
Gone With the Wind
. ‘Er – what’s it about? Your novel?’