Their Finest Hour and a Half (34 page)

‘I say!' called the boy. ‘The wind's taken my hat. My kit's not on properly, we can't possibly shoot.'

Kipper seemed not to hear.

‘Oh no! Me too,' called another young ham, flicking his own over the wire, and suddenly the air was full of flying helmets.

‘Stop that!' shouted Kipper, ineffectually. ‘Stop that this—'

There was a dull crump, and a fountain of sand, and a triangular piece of hat with the chin strap still attached whined past Ambrose and hit the tea-urn with a tremendous clang.

‘
Actor “only able to find character work since loss of nose” says barrister.
'

Everyone had ducked, involuntarily, and as the sand ceased to patter down, there was a slow unclenching of shoulders. The silence was broken by Kipper.

‘Going for a take very shortly,' he shouted. ‘First positions, please.'

The afternoon light was beginning to weaken as the RAF planes began their thunderous runs above the beach. Dark crosses had been painted on the underside of their wings, and the shape of their tails had somehow been altered or added to, Edith thought, so that they looked indefinably
foreign
, but when she asked Arthur if that were the case, he only nodded vaguely and carried on staring at the sky. He had been very silent for the latter part of the afternoon, all through the excitement of the trapped dog, and the near-mutiny of the extras – very silent but scrupulously polite, and when the camera boat had docked at the harbour, he had escorted her across the gang-plank and up to the headland, and had found a camp-chair for her to sit on beside the new camera position, and had brought her tea, and had altogether behaved in a way that was so different from Verna's idea of licentious soldiery that Edith, to her shame, had felt rather disappointed. He stood now, his head tilted back as he watched the planes, and she scrutinized his thinning crown; there was, it seemed, no angle from which Arthur appeared memorable. Of course, it was dreadfully shallow of her to think in that way, especially since her own looks were so undistinguished, but she simply couldn't help it. She wasn't demanding a Cary Grant, but she wanted to find an aspect, a feature, an expression of Arthur's that was more than merely inoffensive, in the same way that she always liked the most mundane of garments to possess a cherishable trim, or an unexpectedly gorgeous lining.

If he asked her out again, she wanted to be able to accept for a reason beyond that of simple flattery, and if he didn't, then she'd like to be able to recall in future years (or even to mention, occasionally, casually, to Dolly Clifford and the others in the sewing-room once she was back in London), that the military advisor who had invited her to watch the filming in Norfolk had possessed nice eyes, or good hands or a ready wit. And she wanted that recollection to be a truthful one because there was nothing sadder than owning memories so unremittingly spartan that they had to be embroidered before display.

She blocked her ears as the planes roared over again, a beat apart, much lower this time, the noise so vast that it seemed to shake her whole body. The camera tilted and swivelled, the sky darkened briefly and then they were gone again, chasing each other across the bay, climbing steadily, a final dip of the wings and then away. The drone of their engines dwindled after them.

‘Cut,' said the director, and Phyl pressed the button on her stopwatch; a tiny click, suddenly audible.

‘Thank you,' said Kipper, to the crew. ‘And that's a wrap for today.'

Arthur had remained staring at the sky, but at Kipper's speech he seemed almost to awaken and shake himself. ‘Would you care for a short walk?' he said to Edith. ‘If you're not too cold, that is?'

She realized almost immediately that something had changed. As they strolled through the fishy air of the harbour's edge, he kept glancing at her, clearing his throat, adjusting his spectacles, running his fingers across his chin as though checking for stubble growth.

‘Along here?' he suggested, when the cobbles gave way to coarse grass, and they took a sandy path that wound inland, parallel with the line of stunted hawthorn that marked the coast road. The day was closing in, the light bluish-white, the colour of watered milk. ‘You're not cold?' he asked again; the path was quite narrow and his sleeve was brushing hers.

‘No, no,' she said, though she was actually a little shivery. He was going to kiss her, she realized – he was going to wrap an arm around her thirty-six-year-old waist and place his lips on hers, and she felt herself begin to breathe faster. ‘He's a good kisser,' the juniors at Tussaud's would sometimes say about a boyfriend, and Edith had sometimes wondered precisely what they meant – were they talking about duration, frequency, lip texture? And should she lean against him when he took her in his arms, or place a hand behind his head and kiss him back, as women did in the ‘hotter' sort of film, or would that appear to be overeager? Because she was feeling suddenly rather keen: it was
passion
, perhaps, that could transform the mundane into the noteworthy, and a passionate Arthur might be a memorable Arthur. And perhaps – it occurred to her – perhaps it wouldn't stop at kissing, perhaps she should be prepared for more than that. She was a grown woman, after all, and he was a soldier far from home and wouldn't it be just a little thrilling if, when Verna said, ‘You know what I mean, don't you Edith?' she was able to reply, ‘Yes, Verna, I know
exactly
what you mean.' And if all this were happening too quickly – well then, she could blame the era they were living in, the ‘war madness' that the newspapers loved to talk about, she'd simply be a woman of her time, she'd be acquiring a past and . . .

‘Miss Beadmore,' said Arthur, stopping abruptly, so that she'd walked a yard or two beyond him before she'd realized. ‘Edith,' he said, as she turned to face him. ‘You don't mind if I call you Edith?'

‘No, of course not.'

‘Thank you. Edith.' He hesitated, and then took off his spectacles to polish the lenses and Edith waited, her heart drumming; of course, if it did go further than kissing then she'd have to
be careful
, as the phrase went, but then she'd heard that all soldiers were issued with . . .

‘I realized something this afternoon,' said Arthur, staring down at the spectacles. ‘You see, I hadn't thought before of how lucky I'd been. Surviving.'

His hands were beautifully clean, the nails smooth and trimmed neatly, and she caught herself wondering if his body, pressed close, would smell of soap, and she almost snorted at a thought so un-Edith-like.

‘It's almost as if I've been given a gift,' said Arthur. ‘I don't want to waste it.' He replaced the spectacles, and looked at her, his eyes smaller behind glass. ‘Edith,' he said, and made a sudden movement and Edith moved too and then found herself flailing for balance because instead of enfolding her in his arms, he had bobbed down on the spot and she had very nearly flipped headfirst over his shoulder, a fate averted only after much teetering and the use of his face as a brake.

‘I'm sorry,' she said, embarrassed, stepping back. ‘Are you hurt, or . . . ?'

He looked up at her, a red mark on one cheek from where she had planted her thumbnail.

‘Edith,' he said. He was on one knee, she realized. ‘Edith,' he said again, reaching for her hand, ‘I want to ask you something . . .'

Edith stared at him.

He's not, she thought, he can't be, he
can't
be.

*

It seemed to Edith, in the astonishing aftermath of Arthur's proposal, that she had inadvertently unleashed the elements, like the girl in the fairy tale who summons the sea with a careless phrase. A single syllable, a brief glance, had changed everything, and in the tidal wave that followed she was swept along like a scrap of flotsam.

Her last entirely clear memory was of saying ‘yes' – or rather, of hearing the word emerge from her own mouth, like an unexpected hiccough. The amazement on Arthur's face must have been mirrored on her own.

‘Oh really?' he'd exclaimed, looking startled, and she'd felt flustered and had begun to say, ‘What I mean is . . .' and then had changed it, mid-sentence, to, ‘I wasn't expecting . . .'

‘No,' said Arthur. ‘No. Neither was I.' He seemed rather dazed, keeping hold of Edith's hand as if it were a hanging strap on the Underground, and she herself had no inclination to move, since any movement would initiate the next stage of the proceedings, and she hadn't the faintest idea of what that might be. The naked truth was, that although the ‘yes' had surprised them both, it had been preceded on her part by a series of very rapid and rational thoughts –
He has just proposed, he seems sincere, he is not hideous, he has a good job in civilian life, he owns a house, he is very likely the only person who will ever ask for my hand in marriage . . . oh and won't it just knock Verna for six
– and it had been the last and most venial of these that had triggered her answer.

‘Well . . .' said Arthur, eventually, letting go of her hand. He stood up, and dusted the sand from his knee, and then took off his spectacles and gave them a thorough polish.

‘Well . . .' he repeated. ‘My goodness . . .'

A faint mist was beginning to rise from the marshes. ‘I suppose we had better be getting back,' said Arthur. They turned, and walked in awkward silence towards the harbour, and disbelief seemed to thicken the air between them – disbelief and a certain embarrassment. Perhaps, thought Edith, perhaps it would be altogether easier to carry on as if the events of the last ten minutes had never happened.

They plodded on. The crew was still on the headland, smoking, packing equipment into boxes, winding cables, their voices carrying clearly in the chilly twilight.

‘They'll just have to get a stuffed one, won't they?'

‘What, a stuffed one that swims and barks?'

‘They could do it in long shot.'

‘They'd have to do it on wireless before that worked.'

‘We lost a donkey once.'

‘On what?'

‘Irish comedy,
O'Hoolihan's Treasure
. We was shooting on Ealing Common, and the bugger ran off, last seen heading for Acton.'

‘Did you get a stuffed one?'

‘No we just put ears on the director.'

Laughter followed, and then all heads turned as Edith and Arthur emerged, self-consciously, from the gloaming.

‘Oy oy,' said one of the men, grinning, ‘and what have you two been up to?' There were sniggers from his colleagues.

‘Now stop it,' said Phyl, ‘I'm sure they've just been for a nice walk.' But there was amusement in her narrow grey eyes, and Edith felt suddenly indignant, for was it really so funny, the idea that she and Arthur might have been ‘up to' something? They were not a joke, the pair of them, they were not coconuts in a shy – and besides, they had most certainly done more than just go for a
nice walk
. Defiantly, she took Arthur's arm.

‘Oy oy,' said the man with the cable, again, ‘so when's the wedding?'

Edith and Arthur exchanged a swift, involuntary glance – a double flinch, almost – and Arthur turned crimson.

‘Oy
oy
!' said the man, in quite a different tone, and Phyl exclaimed, ‘You're a dark horse, Arthur, and did she say yes?' and when Arthur nodded, she said, ‘Well, I'll be damned!' and the chap with the headphones walked over and shook Edith's hand and clapped Arthur on the back, and said, ‘come for a drink,' and that was just the start of it, the very start of a great surge of sentimental goodwill that bore them up and carried them off, and within minutes the bar of the Crown and Anchor began to fill with other crew members who'd heard the news, and a makeshift banner appeared between the beams, bearing a picture of intertwined hearts and the legend:

CONGRALUTIONS ON YOUR ENGAGMENT

and a man with a Ronald Colman moustache leaned beerily over Edith's shoulder and said ‘None of the scenic artists can spell, that's why they draw for a living,' and the actor Hadley Best kissed Edith's hand and called for a toast and everyone raised their glasses and shouted, ‘To Edith and Arthur!' as if they'd known them for years, and then the costume lady (‘Call me Glenys') took Edith aside and asked her if she fancied a job as a standby wardrobe assistant, since the studio was sure to be a nightmare, they'd be using a water-tank and it would be wet, dry, wet, dry the whole blessed time, and the only girls she could get nowadays were a pack of silly gigglers, and then a bottle of champagne – actual champagne! – appeared from somewhere and Edith, who never drank, found herself taking a great gulp, and became a silly giggler herself, and the man with the Ronald Colman moustache leaned over her shoulder again and said that he was the NATKE rep and that if she was going to work in wardrobe then she'd have to join, and he needed a word about the dues, and then Glenys returned with a pink gin and said, ‘Oh unions, they're
such
a nuisance,' and the chap with the moustache countered that that was a fine thing to call the greatest advance for the working man since the end of slavery and if she didn't agree with the principles of social justice then why didn't she just move to Berlin where he was sure they'd be happy to have her, and Kipper appeared suddenly and led the man with the moustache away, and Glenys put one heavily ringed hand on Edith's arm and said, ‘A word of advice, my dear,
don't
have a long engagement, not during a war,' and held up the fourth finger of her left hand in order to demonstrate that there was a diamond ring beneath the swollen knuckle, but no wedding band, and then one of the actresses climbed on to a stool and sang the whole of ‘Apple Blossom Time' although no one appeared to be listening, and Hadley called upon Arthur to make a speech, and there was a great assenting roar, and Arthur, who was on his second glass of champagne and beginning to look rather tight, got to his feet and said, ‘Thank you, everybody, on behalf of my intended and myself, for your good wishes,' and sat down to prolonged applause before standing up again and adding, ‘I would also like to thank Mr Hilliard for his kind and useful advice,' and Ambrose Hilliard, over by the window, inclined his head and smiled graciously, and then Arthur, who had just resumed his seat, stood up for a third time and said, ‘Oh, I've just remembered something – Mr Hilliard, didn't you mention on that first morning at breakfast that you knew a dog who looked exactly like Chopper?' and there was a sudden hopeful movement from the corner where Kipper was standing with the director, and then all heads swung back towards Ambrose Hilliard.