Time Squared, page 21
A moment’s consideration. “All right.”
They decided he would say his farewells to his family, telling them only that he was going up to London for a couple of days. No need to mention Eleanor. She would speak with her aunt, who would likely give her a knapsack of farm provisions, but she wouldn’t have much else to carry.
Of course, no one was fooled when Robin explained his plan at luncheon, including the rather lugubrious dean, who seemed to spend a moment considering whether to interfere before deciding the matter was beneath him (hierarchically rather than spiritually) and taking more fish. Nor did her aunt try to stop Eleanor when they returned to the Hall. On the old deal table in the kitchen, she packed some Durex into Eleanor’s knapsack along with the eggs and cabbages and bacon, giving an embarrassingly explicit demonstration of how to use them. (She was also packing a cucumber.)
“You can have the box. I don’t need any at the moment, do I?” An allusion to poor Mr. Stickley that made Eleanor pick up her knapsack and flee for their meeting place in the orchard, finding Robin already pacing and waiting, eating a windfall apple. Then they were off.
17
It was late afternoon, and the day was unusually warm for October. Robin threw down his sour apple as they took the public footpath leading from the orchard into the cornfields. As the south wind continued to blow, the trees bordering the fields rustled with memories of summer. Tendrils of hair blew onto Eleanor’s lips, which were damp even though she and Robin weren’t talking much. Their plan was to keep off the roads near to the Hall and castle, not being secretive but not wanting to be noticed, either. At every moment, Eleanor was conscious of what was going to happen that night. It gave her a feeling of imminence. No other word.
Robin walked briskly, keeping a step ahead of her. He’d spent his childhood wandering the countryside here and knew every inch. They hopped stiles and crossed cattle guards, and after an hour or so the footpath turned abruptly downhill, where it met a sunken wooded lane Eleanor had never seen before. Robin turned her up the lane, which wasn’t much wider than the footpath and had been walked so long it was dug down deeply below the fields on either side. The overhanging trees made the light around them look humid and weedy as a river.
“Like a river, or being in a glass house,” Eleanor said.
“Ours is long out of commission.”
“The grandparents must have led beautiful lives.”
“You don’t?”
“A file clerk. They would be horrified. But I’m not.”
Robin led her over a stile onto a new footpath that took them up a hilly field where they startled some pheasants that whirred up like fireworks. He said it would soon meet an old road to London once used for driving cattle to the Smithfield market, which she remembered vaguely having heard about and pictured as narrow and rutted. Yet when they reached the road, it proved to be macadamized, still narrow and closely bordered with hedges but smooth enough that after jumping a fence they could pick up the pace.
“Not tired?” Robin asked, as if he hoped she might want a rest.
“It’s not even dark,” she said.
But the sun was rapidly sinking. Soon they were walking into a peach-coloured sunset that turned the air that rare dusky rose. It picked out berries in the hedgerows, each twig ending in a cluster of jewels, a broach of burgundy pearls, a drift of glass rounded by the sea. The air smelled of woodsmoke and well-tended animals. Robin took her hand, and Eleanor realized she was perfectly happy. Surely you were allowed that once in your life.
Before long, the rose colour faded and the wild animals came out, nosing into the unexpected warmth. Robin dropped her hand to point out a hedgehog trundling along under the hedge. I love hedgehogs, she told him. Not such good eating. Oh, do stop, Robin. Around the next bend, an owl flew in front of them, its big wings flapping like carpet beaters. And there on the hill, two hares leapt joyously up a pasture into the last light of day.
Maybe not so joyously. A fox undulated behind them, looking debonair with his anticipatory swish of tail. Old England. A peaceable kingdom. It wasn’t, of course; alive with prey and predators. But it also wasn’t war.
At a quiet crossroads, Robin stopped and offered his canteen.
“Not yet, thanks.”
“Neither thirsty nor tired.” Robin took a swig.
“I’m actually quite fit, despite the city.” The growing darkness helped her say it. “I’ve thought, sometimes, we don’t actually know each other very well. I’m the type who needs to be active.”
“Some things are pretty obvious, surely.”
“What a bore, to be so obvious.”
He smiled, leaning close enough that she could see him looking possessive. She was glad he was so pleased with her. Pleased with them. Well, she was, too, despite the flutters.
“I will have a drink, actually.”
He handed her the canteen. Cool water. It must have been icy when he ran it in. The click of cold metal on her teeth fell somewhere between surprising and unpleasant.
“You wanted something stronger?”
She shook her head as they walked on. “Edward would have packed brandy, wouldn’t he? The two of you are so different, I’m quite fascinated. Being an only child, I suppose. I have Kate, but I don’t think it’s anything near the same when you haven’t got the same parents.”
“I’m not sure anyone has quite the same parents. My father was far easier on me than he was on Ted.”
“Does that mean you miss him more?”
“Rather less, probably. I’m afraid my brother minds everything too much.”
“I hate to say it, but I find him a little exhausting. Although I do like him.”
“I like Kate, for what it’s worth. Her husband . . . better in small doses.”
“I’m not sure he’s coming back.” A feeling she had, which meant nothing.
“Because he doesn’t care if he does? But there’s something thwarted about Arden, don’t you think?”
“What a fate. Not wanting to come back and you do.” She shook off her earnestness. “So we’ve settled him.”
It was almost dark now, although the moon wasn’t far past full and would cast a good light. As they walked on, Eleanor felt the hair prickle on her arms, but for a new reason. The Luftwaffe would fly in soon. She hadn’t kept track consciously, but since the Blitz had started in early September, she’d been trained like Pavlov’s dog. She looked up but there weren’t any bombers, and of course she would have heard them first anyway. Nor did they always fly in over Kent. Wind speed and direction, she supposed, cloud cover, weather—fortunately it had often stormed in September—and an attempt to confuse the anti-aircraft gunners. But they would be here soon, and across the country, the AA gunners would be in their positions and even more twitchy than she was. The whole of London would be listening for sirens.
Eleanor looked back over her shoulder to see the stars coming out in the east. There, the sky was already clear and black, while a rich navy lingered in the west. A couple of years ago, London would have cast a light bright enough to cloud the heavens, even though it lay below the horizon. Now, everybody’s blackout curtains would be drawn, the watch committees knocking up anyone who left a crack. Finally, busybodies had found a justification. Eleanor suspected the watch of being made up of the same ones, the same type, who centuries ago had denounced their neighbours as witches. Night must have looked like this when the witch-hunters went out hunting, lit only from above, the windmills and hayricks and trees casting giant uneasy articulated shadows under the waning moon.
“What are you thinking?” Robin said. When she paused, he turned amused. “You so audibly think,” he said.
“How flattering to be paid such attention.” Eleanor flounced a little and smiled. “If you give me a penny, maybe I’ll tell you I was thinking about the blackout. How nobody likes it, although of course we all know we need it. I was wondering if it’s largely because it gives nosy neighbours an excuse to spy.”
Eleanor held out her hand, and Robin made a show of fumbling in his pockets for a penny.
“Only shillings, I’m afraid.” The shillings in his palm caught the moon and glinted. She took one.
“Now I can add to my art collection.”
“Art collection.”
“It’s a story,” she said, as they continued on, the road winding uphill. “It starts with the time my aunt took me to an art opening when I was eight or nine. I was leaned over by an immensely tall woman with scarlet hair. My aunt told me later it was Lady Ottoline Morrell. She apparently said something apposite, although I can’t remember what. Mainly she scared me.”
“Didn’t she die a couple of years ago?”
Eleanor thought so. “It ended up a family joke, how I told my aunt I should like one of the paintings, please. A little boy by Vanessa Bell, Virginia Woolf’s sister. My aunt bought it and dunned my father. Who was amused, fortunately. That was the start of my collection, which is my aunt’s term. I’ve also got a couple of Kate’s, and some photographs of my parents, Elliot & Frye, and I managed to get a red chalk sketch I wanted out of Goodwood. Praying hands. That’s where I might need my shilling. I had to buy the sketch at one of the content auctions. My patrimony. Cost: eight shillings. The creditors wouldn’t let me just take it. Nor will they in the final auction, I fear.”
“They wanted your shillings?” When she nodded: “I suppose we’ll come to that.”
They reached the top of the hill and paused. The moon was bright but the valley below had disappeared into mist, which had risen as evenly as cream in a bowl. They could see a short distance into the valley and then there was nothing, a greyish blank, until the moonlit road emerged up the next hillside.
“Ghostly,” Eleanor said, and as they descended into the valley, the cool humidity clung to her like a spectral child. The muffling of their footsteps was beautiful, echoing behind them as if they were four, so they sounded like a family of padding animals. There must have been sheep in pastures to their right, the beasts shifting uneasily as they passed. They could only see a few feet ahead, even though Robin had out his flashlight, but he was confident they were still on the old road to London. Nor had they seen any traffic since the mist descended, although as they started uphill again beside a low stone wall, a brief flare of light behind it marked the opened and quickly closed door of an invisible house. A man holding his own flashlight walked out of the fog and onto the road. Farmer, from the looks of him.
“That will be His Majesty’s uniform,” he said belligerently. “And who’s him wearin’ it?”
“From Ackley Castle, my friend. I’m Denholm,” Robin said. “Glad to see you’re keeping an eye out.”
The man wavered. “Who’s your father then?”
“We just lost him. You can stand down. I’m on my way back from leave.”
Unacknowledged by either Robin or the farmer, Eleanor felt herself turning to mist. This is what it’s like to be inconvenient, she thought. Robin angled himself half in front of her, even though the farmer refused to see her anyway, because what did she signify? If not a German spy, then a girl freebooting it at night. Freedom was fine for Robin but not for her. When the farmer stood down (as Captain Denholm had ordered) it was still without a glance at her. Grumbling, “Ow right, then,” he stomped off into another flare of light and slammed the door.
Eleanor couldn’t help giggling into Robin’s overcoat. “The invisible woman. Or Mata Hari. I’m not sure which he thought me. Is this woman’s role? I should capitalize: Woman’s Role. Men either don’t see us or can’t bear to see us in case we contaminate them. I’d like to think we’re advancing, but . . .”
“It would be better to stay off the road. Though we easily could go wrong in the fog.”
“Since you’re travelling with a seductive spy, that is of course a danger.”
Then she remembered the Durex and blushed, glad he couldn’t see it. In silent agreement, they picked up the pace, Robin soon falling into a march. It was forty-five miles from Preston Hall to London and they couldn’t have made a dozen so far. That was lucky given the farmer; people around here knew Ackley Castle. But fame had its limits, and Eleanor was glad when the road began winding through less populated country, hilly country, parts of it wooded. In one long climb after another, they found the heights clear of mist but the valleys so shrouded and humid they half swam through them. Occasional drivers or riders or passersby stopped to challenge them, not thinking for a moment they might be challenged themselves, too rooted in the land and their own rightness upon it.
“And what happens if we encounter German spies?” Eleanor asked. They’d just waved on a truck with only its sidelights lit, driven, she was certain, by a black marketeer running meat into London.
“It’s all right,” Robin told her. “I’ve got a pistol, too.”
“You mean he did?”
“Never took his left hand off it.”
“Well, this is an adventure,” Eleanor said merrily.
“You’re still not tired?”
“I shouldn’t have boasted quite so thoroughly about my new boots. But I’m fine.”
“Up the next hill is a dry old wood,” Robin said. Well, here we are, Eleanor thought, and grew conscious of breathing rapidly.
When they reached the heights, Robin led the way over a low wood fence into a stand of trees. It was still unusually warm in the dry heights when they were out of the mist. A humid summer night: how odd for October. The moon was high now and the wood open enough for a silvery light to find its way down to the bracken covering the floor. Its dry fronds rustled against their legs as they took a narrow animal path away from the road. The first leaves had fallen onto the bracken and where the moonlight caught them they glowed like old gold, like fool’s gold, like veins of fire to light the path.
Before long, they passed a huge old yew tree surrounded by a crumbling metal picket fence. Ahead Eleanor could make out an even more ancient oak that looked as if it had been building its boles since Elizabethan times. The night was alive with small invisible scurrying creatures, or maybe they were sprites called out by the summery warmth to dance around the toadstools. Pixies, she thought, the word coming to her out of nowhere. She wanted fireflies, but looked up and saw a brilliant watch of stars and that was enough.
Then they reached the oak and there were fireflies, too. Just a few of them, woken to flit up into the branches like newborn stars. “Surely this can’t happen,” she said, feeling under a spell. There was an owl here, too, on a lower branch, its alert ears visible in the moonlight. The land sloped down again beyond the oak, and Eleanor could see wisps of mist wandering up the hillside to infiltrate the trees. Not see it precisely, but sense a change in the air that turned the more distant trees woolly, so they might have been embroidered on the tapestry of night.
“Here?” Robin said, spreading a blanket from his knapsack under the oak. He seemed determined and eager and slightly nervous, which had the surprising effect of calming Eleanor. She trusted him, and was surprised to realize how deeply she loved him. When they sat down, and lay down in what might as well have been a savannah, she helped him with her clothes, slowly at first. If they survived the war they would marry and have children. If they didn’t survive, at least they would have had this.
* * *
They were awakened by a rumble. Eleanor bolted upright, finding that mist had risen and shrouded the hilltop, leaving them in complete darkness. No stars. No moon. Robin clicked on his flashlight and aimed it at the forest floor, which let them see each other and a few feet of bracken. They couldn’t make out what was approaching from the south, but knew it was the Luftwaffe coming for London. The fleet was still far away and high enough it seemed like the grumble of a distant storm. Nor could Eleanor make out the ack-ack guns and tracers and searchlights that must already be targeting them.
“That isn’t . . . ?” Robin asked, knowing that it was but still slightly muzzy from sleep. “Not sure what to do.”
“Some people don’t bother with shelters, figuring that when their time’s up, it’s up.” Eleanor paused, wondering how much gossip he’d heard about the past month’s horrors; the ones that didn’t make the newspapers or BBC. “Especially after a bomb gets down the Underground, where people have been told to go to be safe. Although we try to keep news of incidents like that from getting out.”
He noticed the unconscious slightly nervous we.
“I’m in transportation at the Ministry. It’s rather boring. But one hears things.”
“How do you cope with the bombs?”
“We’ve fixed up the cellars, Kate and I. Cots and candles. They’re quite deep.” Eleanor heard her voice shaking. “You mean now? If the artillery gets off a lucky shot, they might bring a plane down on top of us—or the castle, for that matter, if Edward’s gunner is up there.”
Robin didn’t seem to find it any more likely than she did.
“Sometimes they discharge their bombs randomly on their way back home, whether to ‘sow terror,’ as the newspapers have it, or because there’s been a cock-up in their bomb bay over London. I think a cock-up is far more likely.”
“So we’re just as likely to get hit . . .”
“. . . here, there or anywhere. Unless you know of a cave.”
“Bit claustrophobic,” Robin admitted, surprising Eleanor. So they shared that, too.
Going silent, they leaned back against the tree and let the bombers approach, which was harder than she would have thought. Her mouth was dry and she was scared—terrified—wanting to run but knowing it was a chicken-with-its-head-cut-off sort of thing. (She had no idea why the thought of chickens frightened her.) The Luftwaffe could have been approaching from the west or east, since Eleanor knew the ears were easily fooled, but it sounded as if the bombers were coming directly toward them, the droning hum of the engines growing louder.
