The Collaborator (28 page)

E
very evening that week, I take some food to the barn. Kirill is there, waiting for me. I never stay long: we speak briefly, but it doesn’t feel safe to talk like we did when he sat at my kitchen table. This saddens me: I feel that we’re withdrawing from one another a little, and I’m so glad we had that time together, safe in my house. I no longer feel afraid when I do this, though I am always wary. It becomes a routine with me, something I grow accustomed to. To take the food to the barn, to speak to Kirill: then to come back home and wait for Gunther. Moving from one world to another.

On Friday evening I go as usual; but Kirill isn’t there. I sit in the barn doorway, feeling the soft dull thuds of my heart. At last, I think I hear a quiet footfall; and relief swims through me. I turn quickly. But there is nothing behind me—only rustling grasses and leaves and the shadows of leaves. I wait for a long time. I don’t like leaving Evelyn and Millie; but I can’t go till I’ve seen him. The sun begins to set in a blaze of pink and amber and gold. I sit so still that rabbits come right up to me, moving utterly silently through the pale ruffled grass. There’s a chalky
crescent moon in the deepening sky, like a nail-paring. When it’s almost curfew time, I head back home.

I tell myself that anything could have happened. Perhaps the prisoners have been forced to mend the hole in the fence. There could be a different guard on, who doesn’t turn a blind eye. I tell myself he will be there tomorrow. But I have a cold, sick feeling.

‘You have that little frown,’ says Gunther. He runs one finger down between my eyebrows, as though to wipe the frown away. ‘Is it Millie?’

‘No, it isn’t Millie. It’s nothing. Really,’ I tell him.

I can tell he doesn’t believe me—but he doesn’t say anything more, and that worries me, that he doesn’t question me further. As though he knows I may not tell him the truth. I wonder if he suspects me.

The next day, when I go to the barn, the things I left are still there under the tractor, the basket and tea-towel scattered, the food strewn around and gnawed at. It looks as though rats have been there.

I feel a chill. I think of the horror of what I saw by Harry Tostevin’s land, all those months ago now—the man who was beaten and kicked to death. I can’t bear to think what may have happened, in the hell that Kirill inhabits.

I return every evening, hoping: but Kirill isn’t there, and the food is untouched where I left it, or has been spoiled by animals. I know I will have to stop doing this. I can’t really spare the food, if nobody is eating it. So I only go on alternate days, and then I stop going at all.

I don’t know what to tell Millie. I decide to say nothing. She inhabits the present tense of childhood; she’s always out with Simon, battling with conkers, roaming the Blancs Bois, fishing for sticklebacks in the streams. Maybe she scarcely thinks about Kirill now.

One day I make a treat for tea—some apple charlotte with apples from our orchard, Bramleys that are good for cooking. I sweeten them with Gwen’s honey, and make a crunchy topping from some precious crusts of stale bread. Millie watches. She loves to see me prepare the apples, how I cut from each a single gleaming spiralling ribbon of peel.

She comes back into the kitchen as I take the pudding out of the oven. Delicious scents float on the air—caramel, apples, toasted bread.

‘Mmm. That smells really nice. Kirill will like that,’ she says.

I don’t say anything. I have my back to her. I feel her questioning gaze on me.

‘What’s the matter, Mummy? Is Kirill all right?’ she asks me.

I know I have to tell her, to be honest. I owe her that. He was her friend first, as she said.

‘I don’t know, sweetheart. I’m worried about him. He hasn’t been to the barn. I haven’t seen him for a while.’

Her small face darkens. She says nothing for a moment. A cranefly skitters across the window, gangly, grey as rain. Outside, there’s a blustering wind that scuffs at the drifts of coloured leaves, and more leaves fall past our window: the season ending, everything falling apart.

‘What’s happened to him?’ she asks me.

‘Maybe he hasn’t been able to leave the work camp in the evening. Or maybe they’ve moved him somewhere else. He might even be in a different country,’ I say.

But I don’t know if that can happen—whether they move the slave-workers from one country to another, or whether once they’re here on Guernsey, they stay.

‘Has he died?’ she asks me.

The words shake me, coming from her.

I have such an urge to reassure her, as you do when a child has a nightmare—soothing them, telling them all is well with the world. But it feels wrong to do that.

‘I don’t know, Millie … Sweetheart—you will always remember this has to be a secret, won’t you? Kirill being our friend? That we fed him?’ I take her face in my hands, look into her eyes, see the gold flecks in the darkness of them. ‘We mustn’t tell anyone, ever. Even if we never see him again.’

She looks straight back at me. Her gaze is sepia-brown and luminous.

‘I
know
that, Mummy. You’ve
told
me.’ She’s a bit cross, impatient, because I keep repeating this. ‘I promised. It’s our secret, isn’t it? Our really big secret.’

And I think, with that little lurch of the heart,
Yes, it’s our really big secret.

PART V:

DECEMBER 1942-NOVEMBER 1943

W
inter comes—the third winter of the Occupation: everything closed down, retreating, my garden full of barren white stalks like little bones. It’s cold. We rarely have frosts on Guernsey—but a vicious wind blows that chills everywhere it touches. From the lane past Harry Tostevin’s fields, you can see the sea, pale and ferocious, how it beats and batters the land, the plumes of white spray flying. I ration our wood very carefully. When a fire has been lit in our living room, I tell the girls off severely if they forget to shut the door and let a little heat escape. If the war goes on for another year, I don’t know where our fuel will come from. I may have to fell the trees in my orchard—though whenever I think this, sadness tugs at my sleeve.

One day, Blanche comes to find me in my bedroom. Vivid spots of embarrassment flare in her cheeks. I feel a flicker of apprehension.

‘Mum.’ Her voice is hushed and ashamed. ‘I wanted to ask you something … The thing is … It’s the curse. It hasn’t come.’

‘Blanche. No.’ I’m appalled. Our hunger, the shortages, and now
this:
another mouth to feed.

She flinches.

‘Don’t be cross, Mum.
Please.’

‘Why on earth shouldn’t I be? How many months have you missed?’

‘Just one. Mum, you don’t understand. I haven’t … She can’t quite say it. ‘I mean, honestly, it’s not that. You know that, Mum, you know I don’t even have a boyfriend. The thing is, I wouldn’t
think
of going out with one of the island boys. They’re all so boring … And even if I did—of course I wouldn’t—you know … Mum, I do as the Bible says. Why don’t you trust me?’

I look into the summer blue of her eyes. She doesn’t flinch from my gaze.

‘You’re really telling the truth?’

‘Yes. I promise.’

My anger seeps away.

‘Sweetheart—I’m sorry. I was worried …’

She doesn’t say anything. I know she won’t readily forgive me for doubting her.

‘I think it could be happening because you’re hungry,’ I tell her. ‘If you get too thin, your system all closes down. I’ve read that somewhere.’

‘Oh. Are you absolutely sure?’

‘Yes. It doesn’t mean that there’s anything wrong,’ I tell her.

I think how my own cycle has been erratic too. I feel bad that I was so cross with her.

‘Will I still be able to be a mother when I get married?’ she says.

‘Yes, of course,’ I tell her. ‘It’ll all go back to normal when we have a bit more to eat.’

I put my arm around her. Her body is stiff, resisting. She’s still cross that I didn’t trust her.

Our clothes are all worn through. It’s not so bad for Millie: she’s able to wear all Blanche’s old things, so she still has plenty of clothes—a tartan kilt, a Fair Isle jumper, a dress of white organdie with a sash of cherry-red ribbon. Anyway, she’s still only six—she doesn’t care what she wears. But Blanche is desperate. She stares at the pictures in her magazines, and yearns for glamorous clothes.

One day I’m using my sewing machine; some of our sheets are wearing through, and I’m turning them sides-to-middle. Blanche watches me thoughtfully.

‘Mum. Could I do some sewing? Could I make myself something new? I look so frumpy nowadays.’

‘Of course you don’t, sweetheart, you always look lovely …’

‘You’re only saying that because you’re my mother,’ she says. ‘Really. I mean it.’

‘I could have a look in St Peter Port. But there’s hardly any material in the shops now,’ I tell her. ‘Only the ends of rolls that nobody wants.’

‘Celeste made a skirt from old curtains,’ she says. ‘She looks so stylish in it. She really looks the part … There must be a bit of material in the house I could use.’

I go up to the back attic, determined to find her something.

The attic feels separate, sequestered, the only sound the shuffle and murmur of pigeons up on the roof that seem loud in here, as though the air is breathing. Through the dormer windows you can see the high winter sky, as grey as tin and shining.

I open a big old blanket chest, the camphor smell tickling my nose. I find pillowslips and tablecloths that I brought here when I was married—linens too good for everyday use, and so somehow never used. I’d forgotten all about them. At the bottom of the chest, I find a green velvet curtain that used to hang inside the front door to keep out the draughts. I shake it out, hold it up. It’s a rich jade colour, like deep sea-water on a hot summer’s day, like the sea at Petit Bôt where it laps at the foot of the cliffs. The shade would be perfect for Blanche. I’m sure she could make this into something. Myself, I’m hopeless at sewing: any length of fabric will feel recalcitrant in my hand, as though it has a life of its own. But Blanche is a natural seamstress.

I take the curtain downstairs, hold it up to her face. ‘The colour looks beautiful on you,’ I say. ‘Could I use it? Really, really?’

‘Yes, of course. I’ll hang it out to get rid of the smell of mothballs …’

‘But what should I make?’ she asks me.

We look in my sewing cupboard in the dresser. We poke around among the entangled, lavish colours, the skeins of thread and scraps of vivid wool, and find a Simplicity pattern that I bought and never used, for a sleek fitted jacket. The woman in the sketch on the packet has a sheen to her; she looks as wealthy young women used to look before the war. She has a hat of damson velvet pulled flirtily over one eye, and her shoes are spindly and delicate. You can picture her in the Palm Court of an opulent hotel, perched louchely on a bar stool, with a cigarette in a long holder and a Side Car in her hand.

Blanche peers over my shoulder.

‘That’s
exactly
what I want to look like,’ she says.

Blanche sews assiduously every evening. In five days the jacket is ready, and she puts it on to go up to Celeste’s house. The colour sets off the caramel blonde of her hair, and the fit is perfect. She suddenly looks so much older—not just a girl any more. Her loveliness dazzles me.

‘That looks gorgeous,’ I say.

‘Yes,’ she says, accepting this.

As she’s leaving, we hear the ringing of a bicycle bell in our yard. I go to open the door: it’s Johnnie with a present from Gwen, a bag of cabbages and curly kale. He’s rushing, as usual. He almost bumps into Blanche as she slips out through the door.

‘Oh,’ he says.

I see the way he looks at her—eyes widening, as though she startles him, as though he’s never really seen her clearly before. She’s aware of his look: she’s shy, a little embarrassed, with this boy she used to play with. A bright blush spreads all over her face and her neck. Neither of them says anything; neither of them smiles.

Later, when she comes home just before curfew, I remember the little incident.

‘It’s a shame you never see Johnnie now,’ I say to her, not thinking. ‘Remember when you were children, how the two of you used to play? You’d be off in the woods for hours and hours. And I’ll never forget that afternoon you tried racing snails on the terrace … You were just like Millie and Simon …’

She gives me a rather hard look, unsmiling. I know that I’ve struck the wrong note.

‘That was an awfully long time ago now, Mum,’ she tells me, coolly.

She still has the jacket on. She goes to look at herself in the mirror in the living room. She holds up her hair with her hands, seeing how it might look swept high up on her head, revealing her graceful pale neck, a few stray blonde curls hanging down. She’s like a yellow flower on a willowy stalk that tilts its face to the sun. She smiles at her reflection, striking a pose. She strokes the lapel of the jacket.

‘A week ago this was just an old curtain,’ she says.

I admire her—the way she’s made something so lovely from a thing so long forgotten.

Gunther still comes to my house. His close-cropped hair is white now. When I notice this—as always when I’m aware how the years have marked him—I wonder what he is seeing when he looks at me. My hair is still dark, free of grey; but if I catch sight of myself in the mirror, when I’m unaware, not smiling, I see a new severity in my face—my lips are tight, my forehead creased in a frown—as though I’m surrounded by things I need to defend myself against. So I try not to look in the mirror. Our love has become a quieter, gentler thing now: sometimes we just fall asleep in one another’s arms, like a long-married couple. I feel a deep gratitude for him—for his presence in my life, in my bed. It makes everything bearable.

We still get news of the war, from the wireless that Celeste’s mother has hidden in one of Mr Ozanne’s coffins. Blanche tells us about the siege of Stalingrad. The Germans are in the city: the German army is cut off, surrounded, but they will not give in.

I ask Gunther about it.

‘What’s happening in Stalingrad?’

I see how his face tightens, the hardening of the muscles round his mouth.

‘It’s Hell on earth there,’ he says. I hear the splinter of fear that is always there in his voice, when he speaks about Russia. ‘The dogs and rats flee the city, only the people remain … Even the river burns, they say. There is nothing but fire and death there …’ He stumbles: as though there are no words in either his language or mine that could express the horror of it. ‘They are calling it the mass grave of the Wehrmacht,’ he says.

We welcome the coming of spring—the tremulous catkins, the flowering in the hedgebanks, the hope that comes with the softening air, the lengthening light. On daffodil-yellow mornings, when the breeze has a scent of blossom and last night’s rain still wet on the grass, you can believe for a while that things don’t have to be this way, don’t have to be such a struggle. That there could be an end to this: that we could be living a different life.

Spring gives way to summer. The swallows come: I love to watch their darting flight over the fields, the warp and weft of their movement, as though they are weaving some gossamer fabric in the blue wide air. The roses in my garden bloom, the Blancs Bois is full of singing birds, and secret under its gorgeous canopy of green. The world turns on in all its loveliness, oblivious to us: whatever is done to us, whatever we suffer, whatever choices we make.