Ghostwritten (15 page)

Yet the truth was, we shouldn’t have starved. We knew that the Red Cross were sending food parcels, but we never saw them because the Japanese didn’t distribute them. We got just one, on 25 May 1944; I remember the date because it was my mother’s birthday, and she said it was the best present that she’d ever had. In the boxes were tins of butter, ham, sardines, sugar and coffee – ordinary items, yet to us, manna from heaven, and we eked it out for as long as possible, relishing every morsel. But even more sustaining than the food inside were the labels on the outside, stating that these things had been sent by the American Red Cross in Washington DC. Up until that moment we felt that the world had forgotten us. Now we knew, for the first time, that people far away were trying to keep us alive. This knowledge gave us a huge psychological lift.

The food situation continued to deteriorate. The allowance had dropped again, this time to less than half a cup of cooked rice a day. By now, women and children were falling ill. They had tropical ulcers that wouldn’t heal, and dysentery. Worse, some people were starting to show the swollen legs of beriberi. The gravity of our situation was unmistakeable.

‘I feel almost nostalgic about Bloemencamp,’ Kirsten told us miserably. ‘There we could just about cope. But in
this
dump …’ She pinched her fleshless hip. ‘For the first time I know I might die.’

‘You’re
not
going to die,’ my mother said to her. ‘You’re going to be fine. We’re
all
going to be fine, and we’re all going to—’

Kirsten grimaced. ‘Live happily ever after?’

My mother pursed her lips. ‘Who knows what the future holds? But we’re going to help each other to
survive.
’

Kirsten shrugged. ‘Not all women are helping each other, are they?’

This was true. There was a lot of bickering and arguing, even fights. The day before, there’d been a vicious argument over a bar of soap – there’d been slaps and hair-pulling before the two women had been separated. There was a furious squabble going on right now, with voices being raised because someone’s
kelambu
was taking up too much room.

Under such pressure it was impossible to maintain a civilised veneer. A woman in our house went to the
gedek
and traded her wedding ring for a piece of bacon, which she then cooked for her three children on the back of an iron. She stuffed a sheet under the door of their room,
but the delicious aroma still drove us insane. Some women wept, but others called her names and swore that they’d betray her to the Japs.

‘They can’t cope,’ Kirsten said as we listened to this. ‘They can’t cope with the fact that she’s been able to feed her children, where they haven’t been able to feed theirs.’

‘Exactly,’ Ina agreed. ‘And the courage she showed only makes them feel worse.’

Seeing other mothers crack under the strain, Peter and I worried that our mother would crack too. But she had enormous self-control. She kept out of trouble at work, and avoided getting into arguments with other women. Sometimes she got angry with Peter and me, especially if we squabbled, which we often did. But we were living on top of each other, we were always hungry, and bored, because we had no toys or books. Although our bickering grieved our mother, she never smacked us. But some mothers did hit their kids, not caring who saw.

By this time there were several thousand of us in Tjihapit; yet every day hundreds more arrived. The Dutch and other Europeans had long since been rounded up, but now it was the turn of the
Belanda Indos.
They’d previously been exempt, on the basis that they were really Asian and therefore on Japan’s side, even though most felt themselves to be Dutch. They were being interned because, we now knew, Japan was losing the war and its leadership wanted to eradicate
any
Western influence. So we watched the
Belanda Indos
stream through the gate.

They had a lot of possessions, which we eyed covetously: more importantly, they had food – baskets of chickens and ducks, and sacks of flour and rice, which we stared at like ravenous dogs. I have never forgotten their horrified expressions as they first laid eyes on us. We were all desperately thin, our hair matted and louse-ridden, our bodies filthy, our clothes heavily patched or in rags.

‘Welcome, ladies,’ Kirsten called out to them as they walked by. Some of them held hankies to their faces because we stank. ‘Welcome to our delightful camp and we very much hope that you enjoy your stay – not that we’ve the slightest idea where you’ll all fit.’

More houses were cleared, or people simply had to squeeze up. But with so many extra people, the water supply became a trickle. The sanitation was revolting, and we were catching illnesses from each other. Worst of all, there was even less food.

One morning Shirin announced that the Japs had figured out how to solve the overcrowding problem.

‘How?’ Kirsten demanded indolently. ‘Are they going to kill us?’

‘No,’ Shirin answered seriously. ‘They’re going to send more boys to the men’s camps.’

Mum looked up, alarmed. ‘From what age?’

‘Thirteen.’

My mother closed her eyes with relief.

At the start of internment, boys up to the age of fifteen had been allowed to stay with their mothers, but some women had complained that the boys were staring at them, or flirting with their daughters. So these
fifteen-year-olds, having been deemed a ‘danger to women’, were transferred to the men’s camps. Then fourteen-year-olds were sent away, too; and now it was to be the thirteen-year-olds. Some of the mothers in Greta’s house mounted a protest against it. They all wore white – the Buddhist colour of mourning. They told the commandant that these boys were still children and begged him to reconsider. Instead, he had them beaten and locked up. The women were let out three days later, to be told that their sons were to be transported at first light.

‘They don’t even know where they’re being sent,’ my mother murmured as the boys walked past our house to the waiting trucks. Some of the mothers were brave and refused to cry; but, as the engines started, many of them wailed and surged forward, clawing the air as they tried to reach their sons. The soldiers crossed rifles and pushed them back. Then the trucks drove away through the gate.

Now, with no teenage boys left in Tjihapit, we girls had to do the heavy work. I remember having to lift the huge food drums in the
dapur
, or wheeling the garbage cart out through the gate. Yet, still more people were arriving, and now, in August 1944, we heard that boys of twelve were to be transported. A few weeks later, it was announced that boys of eleven would have to go into the men’s camps. Then it was rumoured that soon even boys of ten would be picked up. At this my mother became agitated, because Peter was nine and a half.

Once, when she and I were alone together, she told me how worried she was.

‘I
must
keep Peter with me,’ she said. ‘We don’t know what these men’s camps are like: the conditions might
be worse than they are here, with even less food. And I don’t think he’d survive another bout of malaria if he were on his own.’

I don’t think he’d survive …

The words sliced into my heart. But at the same time I was aware that my mother was now treating me as though I were another adult, not a child, and I wanted to help her. ‘So what can we do, Mummy?’

She lifted her finger to her lips. ‘No one, apart from us, knows how old he is,’ she whispered. ‘So we’ll simply lie about his age.’

‘Yes,’ I whispered back. ‘And because he’s so small, I’m sure we’ll be believed.’ I felt proud to be my mother’s ally, taking important decisions with her.

‘You will help me protect Peter, won’t you, Klara?’ my mother asked.

‘Of course I will,’ I promised.

But soon we were distracted from our anxiety by two startling events. We learned that a month before, Paris had been liberated. Without a radio, we hadn’t known. We were so euphoric that we had to be careful not to smile or sing in front of the guards. A few days after that, we were informed, at
tenko
, that the camp was to be ‘liquidated’. At this there were wails of despair, because many women thought it meant that we were all going to die. It had been whispered for months that once the Japanese realised that they were losing the war, we would all be machine-gunned, or locked inside churches and schools which would be set on fire. We’d heard rumours of a plan to send us all to Borneo and release us into the jungle without food or water. So at the word ‘liquidation’, there were screams and cries. Then the translator
raised her megaphone again and ordered us to be calm. ‘Liquidation’, she explained, meant only that Camp Tjihapit was to be closed. We were to be transported again.

Klara and I had almost finished our morning session. We’d covered a lot of ground, but I’d found it hard to concentrate. We would soon come to the part about Peter’s death. I dreaded it. I needed to go on thinking of him being alive, surviving, growing up.

‘Are you still not sleeping well?’ Klara asked as I turned off the recorder. ‘You look pale.’

‘I’m sleeping better, in that I
go
to sleep – I think the valerian helps; but the problem is I have these … dreams.’

‘What do you dream about?’

I hesitated. ‘Peter,’ I answered.

Klara looked puzzled. ‘You dream about my little brother?’

‘I do. It’s as though your memories of him have brought him to life. I feel that I know him myself, and I’m worried about what’s going to happen to him. In fact I can’t bear to think of it … because …’ Klara’s face had blurred. ‘I’m sorry,’ I whispered.

Klara looked bewildered. ‘You don’t have to apologise, Jenni – I’m very touched: it’s as though you feel my sadness, and just as deeply.’

‘I do feel it – and I know how hard it’s going to be for you to talk about what happened to him.’

‘It will be. But then it’s hard for me every day – it’s still so much on my mind.’

I wondered again why Klara’s grief seemed not to have been softened by time. Then I remembered something I’d once read about trauma; that if a traumatic event isn’t integrated into a person’s life, so that they can at least accept it, then they’re destined to relive it, again and again.

Evie … Evie …

‘I dream about someone else too,’ I went on softly. ‘Someone I knew a long time ago.’

‘Your father?’ Klara asked after a moment.

‘No, it’s …’ My voice fractured. ‘It’s …’

Klara looked shocked. ‘Jenni, my dear – please don’t cry.’ I groped in my bag for a tissue. ‘I don’t know who this person is, but couldn’t you perhaps get in touch with them again, if not seeing them upsets you so much?’

‘I can’t. It’s too late.’

‘Well, I … wish I could help you, Jenni.’

I fought the urge to tell Klara everything, fearful that if I did, it might destroy our rapport. In any case I was here to do a job, I reasoned, not to talk about myself. I blinked back my tears, then looked at my notes.

But the time was going to come when I would.

‘Klara, you talked about having faced a “dilemma”; I wondered what you’d meant by that.’

She grew pale. ‘I had to make a very difficult choice
– one that’s haunted me ever since. I do want to tell you about it, Jenni, but I’m not ready to do so yet. Please bear with me until I am.’

‘It’s fine, Klara. I’m not trying to rush you.’

I knew that she had to tell this part of the story in her own time.

As I unlocked the cottage door, I could hear the landline ringing. I picked it up.

‘Jenni?’ It was Honor. ‘Listen, I’m going to take a few days off. I’ve done all the pre-records for Sunday’s show, and as the rest of the programme’s going to be live, I’ve got a four-day gap in my schedule.’

‘Well, make the most of it.’

‘I intend to. That’s why I’m calling – because I thought I’d come and see you.’

‘What? Down here?’

‘Yes – if it’s okay.’

‘You mean you want to stay with me?’

‘Well, I don’t have to stay – I could go to a B and B. But it would be great if I could spend some time with you and see a bit of south Cornwall. I thought I might even get tonight’s sleeper train so that I can be there by the morning. They’ve got berths available – I’ve just checked.’

‘Honor, it would be
great
if you came; I’d love you to stay, but let me ask Klara and call you back …’

I rang Klara. ‘Of course Honor can stay,’ she said at once. ‘It’ll be good for you to have company, Jenni. I worry that you’re working too hard.’

So early the next morning I drove to Truro station.

As I arrived, the sleeper train was just pulling out.
Honor walked towards me, dragging her pink-and-black case behind her like a huge Liquorice Allsort, its wheels thundering across the platform.

‘Jen-ni!’ She grinned. ‘This is so nice of you!’ She wrapped me in one of her hugs. ‘And thanks for picking me up at ungodly o’clock.’

‘Of course I’d pick you up! It’s so nice that you’ve come. How was the journey?’

‘Gorgeous – I was rocked to sleep. I love night trains, and it gives me a bit more time with you; but I won’t interrupt your work,’ she promised as I beeped open the car. ‘I’ll go for walks, and I’ve got a couple of books, and my iPad; then we can chat in the evenings.’ I put her case in the boot. ‘So is it going well with your Dutch lady?’

‘I think so; we’re making progress, at any rate.’

We drove off, Honor making admiring remarks about Truro’s Georgian architecture; then, as we sped towards the Roseland, she talked about Al, who’d finally phoned, and asked her to have dinner with him the following week. She chatted about Nina, who was having acupuncture for her morning sickness. I was enjoying listening to Honor, and felt comforted by her presence. As we wound our way through Trelawn, I remembered that this was where Klara’s friend, Jane, lived. I stopped and bought some groceries at the village store, then we drove on to Polvarth.

Honor exclaimed over the cottage, the cows and the sea. ‘It’s all so lovely,’ she said as I showed her first her room, then mine. She studied the seascape on my bedroom wall. ‘That’s good.’

‘It’s by Klara’s grandson, Adam.’

‘Do you know where it is?’

‘It’s the local bay, just at the end of the lane here.’

‘Oh, I’ll walk down there later.’

I didn’t respond. The thought of Honor being on the beach gave me a strange, hollow feeling.

We went downstairs and now, over breakfast, Honor asked me about Rick.

‘Oh God,’ she murmured when I’d explained. ‘You’ve always said that you don’t want to sprog. I assumed that Rick knew and didn’t mind.’

‘He did know, and
said
he didn’t mind; but now he does, which gives us a huge problem.’

‘That issue
is
a deal-breaker. So what will you do if …?’ Honor’s meaning hung in the air.

‘I suppose we’ll split up.’ The thought of not being with Rick made me feel ill. I imagined leaving him, my clothes and books packed into cases and crates. But where would I live? Not nearby, as Rick would still be at the school. I’d have to stop doing the reading; I suddenly realised how much I’d miss the children. I saw them crowded round
Stick Man
or
The Tiger Who Came to Tea
or running to the Book Corner. Would Rick and I say goodbye, never to meet again? Or would we stay friends? If so, how would I be able to bear it when he met someone else? I imagined another woman in our flat, cradling their baby – Rick’s baby. Then I realised that the woman I was imagining was Kitty, only too happy to commit to Rick at last.

At eleven I walked up to the farm.

‘Has Honor arrived?’ Klara asked me.

‘Yes, she got the night train. She’ll be here until lunchtime on Saturday.’

‘Will she be okay on her own?’

‘Oh, she’ll be fine – she’s good at keeping herself busy. She’s going to go for walks and read.’

Klara looked anxious. ‘I do hope you’ve got enough to eat.’

‘We’ve got plenty; and thanks again for letting her stay. I promise it won’t interfere with the memoir.’

‘Well, you must take
some
time off while she’s here. In fact, Jenni, it would suit me if we didn’t do our four o’clock session today.’

‘In that case I’ll do something with Honor this afternoon. But before we start recording I’d like to take photos of the handkerchief.’ I took out my camera and the piece of black card that I’d brought as a background.

Klara opened the carved box. ‘I’ve been wondering when you could meet Jane.’ She took the hanky out and laid it carefully on the card. ‘I think it would be best if I brought her here. We could chat over a cup of tea and some cake.’ I zoomed in on the handkerchief, focusing the names. ‘That would be great,’ I said as I snapped away. I peered at the screen. ‘These are good.’

Klara folded the hanky and put it back in the box. ‘Do you want to photograph the recipe book too, Jenni?’

‘Yes, please.’

She took out the green notebook. As she did so I caught a glimpse of some of the other things in the box: a large brown envelope, a thick blue airmail letter and something that was wrapped in white cloth.

Klara handed me the notebook. I put it on the card, then photographed its front cover and several of the inside pages. As I did so, I tried to imagine the desperate
hunger that had inspired its creation. I checked the photos, then returned the camera to my bag and got out the recorder. ‘So how did you and Jane meet?’

‘Through our children.’ Klara put the notebook back in the box and closed the lid. ‘Jane’s son, Frank, was at school with Vincent. That was fifty years ago, goodness me.’

‘And did Jane work?’

Klara nodded. ‘She did dressmaking and alterations – she was very skilled. That’s what she’d do in the winter. In the summer months she ran the tea hut.’

A warmth rose in my chest. ‘For how long?’

‘Oh, all day – she used to ring a bell when she was about to close.’

‘I meant … how many years did she run it for? I just wondered,’ I added as I registered Klara’s puzzlement at the question.

‘Let me think.’ She narrowed her eyes. ‘Jane and her husband bought it in the early Eighties and she only sold it in 2006, after he’d died, so … twenty-five years. But it used to be open every day from Good Friday until Halloween, rain or shine. It was lovely then; it’s still nice now, though it’s gone a bit posh. When Jane ran it, it was teas and coffees, ice creams and sweets, buckets and nets; it was lovely.’

‘It was.’

‘Oh, of course you’d remember it yourself – you were here in ‘87, didn’t you say?’

‘I think that’s when it was, I’m not quite sure.’ I tried not to stutter. ‘But you know, Klara, if Jane’s memory’s not going to be reliable enough, perhaps I could interview someone else – another friend of yours?’

Klara looked at me in surprise. ‘Well, as I say, Jane’s memory
is
erratic, but she means a lot to me, and I’d love you to try. So let’s stick to the plan for you to meet her, perhaps early next week?’

‘Sure,’ I said, my heart sinking. ‘Anyway, where had we got to? Oh yes …’ With a shaky hand, I pressed
Record.

I returned to Lanhay just after one.

‘I’ve been exploring,’ Honor reported as I hung up my coat. ‘I went down to the beach, but it was high tide and completely covered, so instead I walked round the headland. I got to a place called Carne, had a scrumptious hot chocolate from an ice-cream van, gazed soulfully at the sea then came back.’

I took the finished tape out of the recorder and labelled it. ‘Sounds lovely.’

‘It was glorious; there are still masses of wild flowers – I saw lots of pink valerian. It’s terrific for sleeping problems.’

‘I know. Klara gave me some.’

‘Do you still sleep badly, Jen?’ Honor looked concerned.

‘Not too well, no.’

She gave me a compassionate glance. ‘Well … it must be very hard at the moment, wondering what’s going to happen with Rick.’ I didn’t tell Honor that that wasn’t the only thing preoccupying me. ‘It’s a shame you don’t want to have kids,’ she went on. ‘I mean, it would make everything so easy if you could just—-’

‘Having children
doesn’t
make things “easy”.’

‘Right … I just meant that it would make the
decision
easy. Of course having children is a huge challenge
and exhausting – everyone knows that. But it must be wonderful, if you’ve always wanted them, to get that chance – I hope
I
do. Maybe I won’t.’ Honor shrugged. ‘But, Jen, you’ve found a man that you really like, and who feels the same about you, so I hope you don’t throw your chance at happiness away. Anyway … lecture over. Shall I make lunch?’ She opened the fridge and peered inside. ‘Ham and cheese omelette?’

‘That would be nice.’

Honor took out the box of eggs, then lifted the lid. ‘Ooh – blue ones.’

‘They’re from the farm. Araucanas,’ I added as Honor rummaged in the cupboards and pulled out a frying pan. ‘Klara told me that she’s busy this afternoon, so I’m going to take the rest of the day off. Would you like to go to St Mawes? I’ve never been.’

‘I’d love to.’

An hour later we made our way there along the narrow, winding road, turning off at St Just in Roseland to look at the church set in a subtropical garden beside a tidal creek. We drove on and, as we rounded a bend, there was St Mawes, rising steeply up from the harbour, the houses interspersed with Monterey pines, giving the village a Mediterranean air. At the far end was the small castle. The gardens sloped down to the wide waters of the Carrick Roads.

‘It’s beautiful,’ Honor murmured. ‘All those boats, and that lovely promontory.’

‘I guess that’s St Anthony Head – and that’ll be Falmouth Docks across the water.’

We drove slowly up to St Mawes Castle, parked, then crossed the drawbridge and went in.

After we’d explored its battlements, we walked into the village, strolling along the waterfront past steep, narrow streets where romantically named houses jostled for space – ‘Smugglers’ Corner’, ‘Trevarth’ and ‘Sea-Spray’.

On Marine Parade we passed an art gallery, and a gift shop in the window of which were some knitted baby hats and bootees in the shape of penguins and lions. We gazed at them.

‘How adorable,’ Honor breathed. ‘I want to buy them right now, for Nina’s baby.’

‘No,’ I said firmly. ‘Too early.’

‘True. We don’t want to jinx it.’ We walked on. ‘So what are you going to wear to the christening?’

‘Can’t say I’ve decided yet.’

‘Do you think one should avoid white, so as not to upstage the baby?’

‘I think it would be tactful, yes …’

We passed the St Mawes Hotel and the tiny post office with its racks of postcards and buckets and nets. We came to the harbour, where a small ferry was moored by the quay. A few people were waiting to board it.

‘Let’s see where that ferry goes,’ Honor remarked. As she went up to the ticket kiosk to ask, I noticed a cafe on the other side of the road. Sitting at a table in the window was Klara. She was with another silver-haired woman. As Klara leaned forward and dabbed at her companion’s jacket with a napkin, I realised, with a sinking feeling, that this was probably Jane. Suddenly Klara looked up. Her face broke into a smile, and she waved to me while the other woman followed her gaze with an impassive air.