Angel of Brooklyn (35 page)

Behind the screen, pulling on her clothes she felt deflated and exhausted. Fastening the buttons, tying her boots, she was Beatrice again, the girl from Normal, Illinois, missing her father, her brother, who had no real family, who sold pictures of the funfair, and who lived in a room decorated with small pink shells she’d picked up from the beach.

‘Mr Hoff wants the pictures as soon as possible,’ said Maurice. ‘I’ll let you know when they’re ready.’

She walked through the whispering lobby with people clapping her on the back and saying her name over and over in all kinds of accents,
Bay-ha-treece, Bay-ha-treece, Bay-ha-treece!

Mr Cooper was sitting outside with his hat on his knees playing pinochle with two strangers he’d just met on the street. He looked crumpled.

‘Can I walk you somewhere?’ he asked, standing up and brushing down his pants.

‘Champagne?’ said Mr Hoff through the cranked-down window of his automobile; he’d been waiting in there, drinking Florida orange juice, reading,
You Are Your Own Success
. ‘I know a wonderful little French place, looks like nothing from the outside, but it’s just like stepping into Paris.’

‘No,’ said Beatrice. ‘I’m going to go for a walk. But thank you all the same.’

Mr Hoff waved his hand, said something to his driver, and the car moved away.

‘You said no to champagne and Paris?’ said Nancy. ‘Are you nuts?’

They walked towards the coast, past doorways smelling of cabbage. A man with a little silver box and red beefy ears was talking to a ghost, and marching down the road there was a small church parade with songs that she recognised.

‘Regretting it already?’ said Nancy.

‘Not at all.’

‘You look deadbeat.’

‘I have a headache.’

‘You want to go home?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘I want to go look at the ocean.’

The beach was quiet. Nancy began to fidget, plucking at her sleeves. ‘I promised someone,’ she said. ‘I hope you don’t mind? You should have gone out for champagne with your Mr Hoff; I can’t believe you turned him down.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘Go ahead and keep your word.’

‘You don’t mind?’

‘Of course I don’t mind. I’m happy.’

The ocean trembled as a woman with a dachshund under each arm picked her way over the sand and a lonely-looking boy sat untying his boots, peeling off his socks like they were another piece of skin. Rolling his trousers to the knee, carefully, painstakingly, he walked into the flat lick of waves, lifting his feet and shaking them out. The water looked icy.

The boy made her think about Elijah. What would he make of her now? Would he quickly disown her? Pray for her soul? Would he slap her? Would he even care, cavorting in a saloon bar in an unchristian-like manner? She had to smile at that.

The sun was fading as she walked towards the trolley. A family was sitting outside a restaurant eating fried oysters and chicken, and she watched them for a while behind a menu screen, the woman with her wide speckled arms, clucking over a bone, the husband with a handkerchief tucked into the front of his shirt, his lips shining, picking something from his teeth, his sons with burnt necks, like stalks, asking for more lemonade.

She found herself in a familiar part of Brooklyn where the sky was still full of heat and unspent rain. Here, the shoeshine man had given up for the day, already tasting his supper, imagining his new wife happy just because he was home and how wonderful was that? Beatrice sat in a coffee shop and ordered a piece of cherry pie and ice cream, but when it came it turned her stomach, and she sipped her scalding coffee watching boys racing in a splintered orange box cart, and a woman washing her doorstep, occasionally rubbing at her shoulders and looking to the heavens.
Just burst
, she was thinking.
Just burst
.

Walking through the neighbourhood, she could feel her skin moving beneath her clothes, wondering if people could see through her, and would they know what she’d been doing, and could they smell the hidden shame in it?

The Galilee Hotel had lost yet more of its shine, and those windows that every so often had glinted and gleamed from pails of soap and water and the elbow grease lent from a hymn-singing Elliot Price, were so full of dust you could write your name on them, weeds were pushing through the cracks like yellow withered hands and there was broken glass strewn by the door.

She rang the bell before fishing for the handkerchief in her pocket, carefully collecting the broken shards, though one had pierced through the cotton and cut her finger, and without another handkerchief to bind it, it was dripping into the dust.

‘Yes?’ A woman appeared. ‘Can I help you?’

Beatrice took a small step back. She’d been expecting one of the old crowd.

‘I used to live here,’ she said, instinctively putting her finger into her mouth, and sucking on it. ‘Is Miss Flood around?’

‘She might be,’ said the woman, tightening her lips. ‘Shall I go fetch her?’

‘Might I come in?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m not allowed to invite strangers through the door. Not any more. You see, people take advantage,’ she said. ‘They say they’re selling hymn sheets, but they’ve never seen a hymn sheet in their lives.’

‘I’m sorry. Do you have a sticking plaster?’

‘I suppose I could ask.’

‘Miss Lyle,’ said Miss Flood, when she eventually appeared. ‘It is you. I thought it might be. Come in. How is that … place?’

‘Coney Island? I suppose it’s still dazzling.’

‘You don’t say? I thought it might still be blinding the innocent; now let me get you that sticking plaster.’

‘There was broken glass beside the door,’ she explained, holding out the handkerchief. ‘Best to wrap this in newspaper or something.’

‘Newspaper? We don’t have newspaper. Those things are full of filth and sensation. Though there might be one or two pages that the meat came in.’

Beatrice felt strange. The hotel was the same, but different. The wallpaper was so familiar, that tear in the corner, the small piece of damp that looked like a face, it made her heart jolt. Then they went into the dining room, and her eyes fixed onto the table she’d shared with Mr Price.

‘Have a seat,’ said Miss Flood, taking the glass-filled handkerchief and returning with a sticking plaster and a jug of water. ‘You must let me know how you’re getting on, over there.’

‘Over there’ was said with such a shudder that Beatrice suddenly thought, What if she knows everything? And she pictured herself an hour or so ago, standing in the nude, brazen and ungodly, and she could feel her face burning. The other woman was hovering in the doorway, pretending to read a sheet of notices.

‘I’m doing OK,’ she said quickly. ‘Yes, I’m still selling picture postcards. Just views of the beach and the fair and the ocean. You know, Miss Flood, some people have never seen the ocean, and they’re very popular cards.’

‘I expect they are, for those people who can read and write.’

Beatrice wrapped the plaster tight around her finger. She hesitated. ‘I was wondering,’ she said. ‘Have I got any mail?’

‘Nothing,’ said Miss Flood. ‘Are you expecting something?’

‘I was hoping to hear from my brother. I sent him my new address, but –’

‘Preachers have their minds on higher things,’ said Miss Flood. ‘They’ve no time for letter writing.’

‘So he hasn’t been here?’

Miss Flood shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘We haven’t had a preacher here in months.’

FALLING

Letter to Ada Richards

FRANCE

4 August 1916

Dear Mrs Richards,

It is with real sorrow that I write this letter, for it brings you I am afraid very bad news about your husband Private James Richards.

He played a very gallant part in the attack which we made against the German position last Monday. He was with a number of men who marched up the line and I am afraid he did not return and had to be reported as Missing Presumed Dead. I am deeply grieved to tell you that this is indeed the case as his body was recovered a couple of days ago.

I cannot tell you how sorry I am, in fact I can assure you that there is not one amongst us who doesn’t feel his death as a personal blow. Everyone thought so much of him, and admired his fine sturdy character, and his resilience and ever-unfailing cheerfulness. He was a brave soldier and a fine example to all.

I wish I could help to soften the hardness of your sorrow. There is one comfort at least in knowing that he gave his life in a sacred cause fighting for Right and Justice. It is the greatest sacrifice a man can make.

All those who have fallen on the field of honour in this world war, though perhaps they know it not, are following the path of self-sacrifice and of duty which Our Lord Himself once trod, they are following in his Footsteps and are helping Him to pay the price of the world’s salvation.

Let pride then be mingled with your tears. Your husband was laid to rest in a little military cemetery at Bertrancourt by the
side
of several of his comrades who have died so that England might live, and a cross now marks his grave. His soul we commended to the loving care of Our Heavenly Father, who will keep him until that day when you will find him again never more to be parted.

May God comfort and protect you in your sorrow is the prayer of all who knew your husband, and especially of you, in truest sympathy,

S. T. F. Wilson

Chaplain, C of E

2nd Battalion, Lancashire Fusiliers

Letter to Ada Richards

FRANCE

5 August 1916

Dear Ada,

It is with a heavy heart that I write to inform you of the death of your loving husband Jim. I cannot begin to tell you how much he will be missed by us all, and there is not a day goes by when we do not talk about him. All our prayers and thoughts are with you.

Jim was a first-class soldier, he was brave, a good companion, and he fought with pride and honour. Let me assure you that he did not suffer; his death was quick and clean. The chaplain was near him, gave him comfort and prayed for his soul.

As you know, Jim and I were good friends and we would often reminisce, and he would sing and keep our spirits up. The trench is a quieter place as the lads do not feel like singing without him. It goes without saying that Frank and Tom, and the other men from the village and nearby, are devastated.

I won’t talk about God, because it is not my place to do so, but I hope that you manage to find some comfort in your sorrow.

Yours, in all sincerity,

Jonathan Crane

Parcel of Personal Items Belonging to Private James Richards (deceased)

Photograph of a woman, inscribed,
Love Ada
.

Photograph of a woman, inscribed,
Best wishes, Mam
.

Tobacco tin.

Wallet, containing a letter and several sheets of notepaper.

Small leather purse.

Letter to Beatrice Crane

FRANCE

10 August 1916

Dearest Beatrice,

I will be sending this letter with a man called Bosley who lives on the outskirts of Bolton and is being sent home due to the death of his wife (measles). What I am going to write will not compromise the country, the war, or the army in any way, but I hope to dodge the censor. If I don’t, then so be it and I do hope the letter will still make sense to you with all the black ink and spaces. I will not name specific places, because they do not matter. I want to write about Jim.

By now Ada will have received the telegram, and perhaps the letter I sent as the man’s captain (more promotion, simply due to lack of men), and the letter that was penned by the chaplain. Jim’s personal items have also been sent home, and though I know nothing of that, I do know that on the Monday he left the trench, he put all his personal effects into a tin biscuit box he’d found and left it with another private, which was unusual, though no one seemed to remark upon it. The writing of letters to widows, mothers and sisters is something I have had to do more frequently in the last few months. Usually, a few compassionate lines will suffice, but when it is regarding one of your own, the words seem either meaningless, or like weapons waiting to ignite. That sounds trite. I knew him well. I could have called myself a friend.

As you know, I am not a religious man, though I do attend
church
because I think it is the right thing to do, showing a sense of community spirit, yet here I have looked for faith and I have spent many hours talking with the chaplain. In letters home, and in dealing with the dead and injured (some worse than dead), it is hard to speak the truth. We write about bravery, ‘giving their lives’, honouring their country, and of course, this is usually right and true, yet what about the rest of it? This is what plays on my mind day and night. This war is necessary. I know that. But what about the pain, the waste and the tragedy? Will no one away from the battlefield ever know the truth? I have now seen so much of hell that I am numbed by it. I think of little else. This place is my life.

But Jim. I remember Jim from childhood. He was, what? Five years older than me, and as a child, five years turns you into an adult. When I was still at school (‘you middle-class over-educated lot!’ – I can still hear his voice), Jim was a working man, had been for years, and I would see him walking home, covered in quarry dust. When he was eighteen his father died and left him the shop. I would watch him from Dad’s window, or from that corner of the garden with the view down the slope. He seemed so grown up and worldly-wise with a swagger in his walk, a sack of rabbits over his shoulder, or one or two pheasants that the farmer let him bag. And then, of course, he had Ada.

Ada is the same age as me. We often played together as children, I can’t remember our games precisely, but she was not a sissy, and so they were the usual rough-and-tumble affairs, chasing and tag and so on. I must admit to you now that I was a little jealous when they started walking out together, not because I was in love with her, or had any feelings for the girl, but because I wanted to be man enough to have a girl myself, someone to walk arm in arm with under the moonlight – I’d read fanciful stories and saw myself as quite the catch, but that’s youth for you. And then they married, and of course I wished them well.