‘Well, of course, there’s so much to do – I’ll let you know exactly what’s going on.’
Laura nodded, unable to say more. As Joe wished her goodbye, she saw a questioning look in his eyes, but she turned away. She saw a dark, neat figure walking up the platform towards her with a porter, and as the woman approached her, calling her name, a current of knowledge of what was expected of her ran through her and she straightened her back and walked forwards.
Fire
London, 1939–1945
1
The first time Laura really spoke to her aunt was at breakfast the next morning. She was too tired when she got in to do much more than accept a cup of horribly strong tea and go early to bed. She woke with a jump, in a room heavily curtained against any light. Sitting up in bed and switching on the lamp beside her, she noted, as she had the previous evening, the solidity of her surroundings. Nothing here seemed new, or bright, or flimsy. Everything was covered in a patina of soft browns and greens, and as she pulled back the drapes the cloudy light falling through the window hardly seemed to illuminate the room.
Her watch had stopped in the night, and she found it hard to tell whether it was time to get up or not. After waiting a while she got dressed and made her way downstairs, and was relieved to find her aunt in the living room, reading a letter. Over breakfast they continued the conversation they had started the previous night, in which Aunt Dee seemed to be trying to build up a picture of their life in the States, and yet was hardly listening to Laura’s replies. Laura felt throughout that she was rather a puzzle to her aunt and thought how much easier it would all be if Ellen were with her. ‘I must send a telegram,’ she said suddenly, remembering. ‘I promised Mother that I would – to say I’d arrived safely.’
‘I did that last night, dear, don’t worry,’ said Aunt Dee. ‘I knew how Polly would worry. Sending you off on your own like this.’ Laura caught a disapproving tone in her voice and was glad when she heard the quick step on the stairs that meant her cousin Winifred had got up. She came in with a citrus scent of cologne and a demand for more coffee. A tall, angular girl with fair hair and red lipstick, she seemed to jar against that room of sombre tones.
‘Now,’ she said as she drank her coffee. ‘What to do this morning?’
Aunt Dee started to say that she hoped the girls would stay in quietly and do some reading, but Winifred shrugged her off, suggesting a walk and telling her with some impatience that of course they wouldn’t be late back for lunch. ‘Ten to one, we’ll be back before Giles gets here. We’re not going on an expedition, you know. Tomorrow, we can go into town, but now – I’ll get my coat.’
Laura was glad that Winifred was so insistent they should go out; she had seen nothing of Highgate on arrival the previous day. But as they walked down the streets, Laura only thought how subdued the edge of this city was, how the brick houses with their many-paned windows, set back behind their hedges, drew away from your gaze, closing in on themselves. They soon came to a large park, almost monochrome in this dim January light, which Winifred called the Heath. It stretched uninvitingly into the distance. Laura suddenly realised that a question was hanging in the air. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘Just wondered if it was like that – the crossing?’
Laura had missed the comparison that Winifred had made, but did her best to describe the journey. She had not until that point decided to keep Florence and her conversations a secret, but something in her held back; the effect that Florence had had on her perhaps reached too deeply into experiences that she had never spoken about, feelings that she was nervous of exposing to Winifred’s quick questions. And so she found herself mentioning Maisie instead, and the trip into first class, and Joe Segal, and how they had danced together on the last evening, and then she remembered the woman in the white swimming costume, the woman in the scarlet hat – what had her name been? ‘I think she was called Lady Reynolds,’ she remembered.
‘Amy Parker?’ Winifred said with interest. ‘Giles knows her – or, well, doesn’t know her exactly, obviously.’