Someone Special (75 page)

‘Tell on; by the time dawn breaks you and I will know more about each other than we know about our own parents,’ Anna said cheerfully. ‘Another tot of your delicious coffee would go down well, too. Hold still, I can reach the flask without moving. Now … tell on, Scheherazade!’

Dawn comes early in June, even when the sky overhead is grey and a fine, misty rain is falling. As the scene before them began to lighten, the two girls turned and smiled at each other.

‘Well, what a night! It’s been fascinating, and our talk has taught me quite a bit,’ Anna said. ‘I’ve been awfully silly to believe that I couldn’t make a go of marriage because my parents made such a mess of it, for one thing. I mean, your parents managed to muck up and then they got together again and everything was fine. And you love being married to Snip, don’t you, and you miss him quite horribly and want him back; isn’t that right? Yet you drove him away because you were all mixed up over Dan Clifton.’

‘I love Snip so much that I can’t even imagine wanting to see Dan again,’ Nell admitted. ‘I don’t give a tuppeny
damn for anyone else, I just want my Snip back. If it takes me the rest of my life I’ll find him though, and beg his forgiveness for the stupid things I said. Oh, Anna, don’t fall in love, it’s – it’s so dreadfully painful when things go wrong!’

‘I think it’s better to fall in love and suffer, rather than never to fall in love,’ Anna observed softly. ‘I know very well that a part of me loves Dan very deeply indeed, but I was afraid of being hurt so I pushed him back. After tonight, I won’t do that. If you want the glory of love you’ve got to take the pain as well. Isn’t that right?’

‘Yes, that’s right,’ Nell said, after a short pause. ‘But that doesn’t mean you have to enjoy the pain when it rakes at your heart and curdles your stomach. You put up with it because of the good times, and even suffering must have a purpose. It makes love more wonderful by contrast, I suppose.’

‘I’ll remember that. Nell, we mustn’t lose touch, we must stay friends. After all, we were born on the same day! Will you come to my wedding, if Dan and I finally get together and I find the courage to tell him I’ve never loved anyone but him? You and Snip, I mean.’

Nell gave Anna her sweet, three-cornered smile.

‘I accept; for both of us, naturally. And now shall we have some breakfast and take turns to stretch our legs? People are beginning to stir.’

It began at last. From a very early hour the peers and peeresses, the clergy, the heads of government and members of the civil service, all the hundred and one officials and those who were to watch or take minor part in the ceremony, began to make their way into the abbey. Minor royalty swept in, smiled, gave a small wave. Familiar faces, creased with anxiety or pale from unaccustomed early rising, passed through the crowd. Anna and Nell were among the most knowledgeable of royalty-fanciers,
but if they failed to recognise a face someone near them unerringly remedied their lack.

Excitement mounted as the abbey slowly filled. The Lord Mayor of London’s procession seemed a marvel, then it was eclipsed by the royals, by the representatives of foreign states, by Princess Margaret and the Queen Mother in the glass coach. The rain eased, then stopped. Anna and Nell took down their canopy and put on their coats, folded their blankets and sat on their possessions until the murmur of the crowd told them the great moment had arrived.

‘Here she comes … here she comes!’

First the Household Cavalry, the Foot Guards, the Welsh and Irish Guards. Then the King’s Troop, the Royal Horse Artillery – and the gold coach with that small figure in white, her face drained of colour, serious, remote, then waving to them, trying to smile.

Anna cried first, the tears running down her cheeks as the small figure was swallowed up by the vastness of the abbey.

‘She’s only our age – how can she bear it?’ she asked her friend.

‘She’s got him to help her bear it,’ Nell answered. Her eyes were brimming with tears. All that pomp and circumstance, all the trumpets and finery, the flags and bunting, the terrible responsibility and the weight of her people’s trust and love, must surely crush that small, straight-backed figure in the heavy white gown encrusted with precious gems, going with such courage and dignity to meet her fate.

‘Here somes the rest of the procession,’ Anna said, having gained control of herself once more. She took Nell’s hand, squeezing it tightly. ‘Oh Nell, I wouldn’t have missed this for the world!’

It was over. The loudspeakers had broadcast the trumpets,
the choral singing, the deep voices of the clergy, the small, clear voice of the new Queen, as calm and matter of fact as though she were crowned every day and took it in her stride.

The girls held the ground-sheet over themselves, all their belongings packed away in their big shoulder bags, the flasks empty, the rugs rolled, the umbrellas furled. The rain stopped, started, stopped again. Queen Salote of Tonga swept past and was cheered because she kept the hood of her carriage down and just brushed the rain out of her face when it began to blur her vision.

‘There’s Winnie, three cheers for Winnie. Here come the children, three cheers for the littl’uns!’

Soldiers marched, trumpets blared, flags were unfurled and displayed bravely despite the wet. Anna laughed at dripping bearskins, Australians whose odd slouch hats funnelled the rain on to their shoulders. Nell jumped up and down and clapped when the Welsh Guards strode by, tall and elegant even in the downpour.

‘They’ll be on the balcony soon. Can we get to the palace?’ Anna shouted as the crowd began to surge unevenly after the procession. ‘Oh, it’s been so wonderful, so unforgettable, I can’t bear today to end!’

‘We can try,’ Nell shouted back. ‘We must try. Hold on to me though, don’t you dare let go!’

‘Let’s take a short cut, see if we can catch up with the tail of the procession,’ Anna shouted at one point. ‘See that road ahead? The one that’s closed off? If we can climb over the barrier …’ They climbed over it, ignoring a policeman who shouted and lunged after them. They tore along the wet and shining pavement, giggling like naughty schoolgirls, and wriggled through the barrier the other side. They emerged on another street, still lined with people, for the tail of the procession had yet to pass there.

‘It’s stopped raining,’ Nell said, as they stood at last
at the back of the crowd. ‘Here, lend us your glasses, I think it’s the Welsh Guards again. If I can just check …’

Anna handed her the precious glasses and Nell raised them to her eyes and swung them to look up the street. Yes, it was the Guards, marching with their chins up and their arms swinging, though they must be just about worn out. She was lowering the binoculars, starting to hand them to Anna, when something caught her attention. She swung the glasses up again.

He was there! She had no doubt about it, no doubt at all. Directly opposite them, perched halfway up a lamp-post, his wet hair slicked to his head and his good arm clinging to the lamp’s cross-bar, was Snip.

Nell fought her way through the crowd, using fists, feet, anything which would get her to the front. And there he was, not looking towards her, looking up the road, to where the procession was approaching.

She ran out into the carriageway, not hearing the roar of horror from a hundred throats, not heeding Anna’s sharp, appalled cry. She ran straight in front of the foremost horses, felt the sharp, buffeting blow of hoof and fetlock, felt the road swing up and slap her hard in the face … and felt nothing more. She didn’t hear the dreadful, cracked shriek from the young man clinging to the lamp-post, or the scream of a terrified horse as its rider tried to rein it back, causing it to cannon into the animal behind. She knew nothing of the chaos which followed.

He must have snatched her right from beneath the horse’s hooves, Anna thought as she sat in the ambulance, holding Nell’s small possessions and her own and trying to see whether her friend was still breathing. But it was difficult, because the young man who had rescued her hung over the narrow bed, murmuring beneath his breath.

‘You damned little fool, what did you do that for?
Don’t you know you’re the only thing on this earth that I care about? What good is my life to me if you aren’t a part of it? Half killing yourself without a thought … oh Nell, my little sweetheart, don’t die, don’t die!’

‘Is – is she very bad?’ Anna asked timidly after a moment. ‘There’s blood in her hair and she looks so pale.’

The young man swung round. ‘She’s going to be all right,’ he said fiercely. ‘She’s got to be all right. If only the bloody crowds would let us through! I dunno what’s broken … heads do bleed, though. If this bloody ambulance stops once more I’ll get out and carry her to the hospital, I swear I will. Ah, that’s more like it.’

The vehicle had moved forward, jerked, and set off at a respectable speed at last.

‘We must be through the crowds, or perhaps we’ve got a police escort,’ Anna said. ‘Don’t worry, Snip – you are Snip, I take it? – we shan’t be long now.’

Nell woke. She ached all over and her head was splitting; she tried to open her eyes and only one of them obeyed her; even when it was open she could see scarcely anything, only a dim light and the shape of someone’s head.

But it was the right head, the head of the person she most longed to see. She tried to move her hand, to speak, but her hand was heavy as lead and her voice seemed to have disappeared into some far place. However, she must have made some noise, because the head, which had been in well-remembered profile to her, turned abruptly, came closer.

‘Nell? Are you awake, darling?’

She wanted to nod, to speak, but nothing would come. But she could smile; she felt the smile spread across her face, wall-to-wall sunshine.

‘Anna had to leave, she was due back in France two
days or so ago. I promised to let her know the moment you came round. She left me an address and telephone number. Oh Nell, darling, you’ve had us so worried!’

He lifted her hand. She felt his fingers on hers, damp with excitement, the best, the nicest fingers in the world. She moved her head again and this time it responded. She tried to open her mouth to tell him she loved him, to ask him never to leave her, to explain … but only a croak came out.

‘You want a drink,’ Snip said lovingly. ‘Here – lemon barley water. What a treat, eh, after days of a tube in your arm and nothing by mouth? Don’t try to move, I’ll spoon it in.’ He spooned the lemon barley water into her eager mouth; she was very thirsty, dry as a desert. Then he ran his hand gently over her face; part of her face. There was a bandage or something over the rest of it. She made another of her incoherent noises, then the words were there, as though her mouth had been waiting for the lubrication of the barley water before it could make itself work.

‘Snip, what’s happened? Don’t leave me!’

‘As if I would! As for what happened, don’t you remember? You ran in front of the horses, darling, and one of them trod on you. I fished you out and Anna and I brought you here in an ambulance.’ He smiled at her lovingly, taking her hand and moving it gently up and down as he talked. ‘You’ve had concussion, but you’re much better now.’

She frowned. Ran in front of what horses?

‘You still don’t remember. You came up to see the Coronation, and …’

He went on talking, but there was no need. She remembered now, remembered perfectly! The girl Anna, their talk through the long night, the excitement and pageantry of the processions – and all the time, nagging away in the back of her mind, the urge to find Snip, to
explain, to show him that she would be his wife now in every way, with no holding back, no secret dreams. The secret dreams had had no more substance than dust, no more importance than … than dreams. Snip was her reality, her lover, the person she wanted to spend the rest of her life with.

‘… So you see you’re quite famous,’ Snip was saying. ‘The Queen and Prince Philip sent you some flowers and a message before they went off to tour the country and there have been piles of letters and telegrams and good wishes. They put your picture in the papers, and Matthew and Hester came rushing down to see you were being treated right. They went again, darling, as soon as the doctors said you were out of danger, because they knew it would worry you to know they’d left Pengarth to its own devices.’

‘Is – is Mum all right?’

‘She’s fine, absolutely fine. Now you sleep for a bit, darling. I’ll still be here when you wake up, don’t worry about that.’

She meant to say she wasn’t tired, didn’t need any more sleep. She wanted to ask what day it was, to find out how long she had lain here, see for herself the flowers sent by the Queen, ask a hundred thousand questions. Instead, she just closed her eyes for a moment and then it was such trouble to open them … she felt her lips curve into a smile of contentment, then gradually relax.

Anna had waited at the hospital until they were told that Mrs Morris would be all right, that she had come round, briefly, and was shocked and still concussed but would be fine. Then she left.

Her mind was in a turmoil. She had seen love in action at close quarters and she would never again believe that life could be as good without it. You must have been stark, staring mad, Anna Radwell, to let Dan go, she
scolded herself, hurrying through the London streets and heading for Auntie Ella’s flat. A man like that, so loving and giving, and you turn him down! Madness was the only answer, and even that was not good enough. Now all she could do was try to see Dan before it was too late.

The coronation was over, so she went straight to Liverpool Street Station and caught a train to Norwich Thorpe. Dan would not stay in London any longer than he need, she was sure of it. Arriving at Thorpe station, she caught a Number 90 bus to Ipswich Road, got off opposite the Norfolk & Norwich Hospital, and walked across to Sandringham Court and her mother’s flat. It was six in the evening and a drizzly day, but Constance’s welcome was warm and her understanding of the situation immediate.

‘You left in a hurry last time because of Dan,’ she said, giving her daughter a hug and leading her into the kitchen. ‘My darling, I was a fool to say Dan was anything like your father. He came around next day and talked to me: he loves you very much, but he didn’t intend to force himself on you. He’s a delightful young man, and obviously sincere. If you love him then you must tell him so, only don’t expect him to be surprised, because I believe he knows you as well as I do – and we both think you’re someone special. Now how about a bite to eat? And some hot coffee to help you get over the journey. I’ve still got some of those marvellous French beans you brought me, all ready to grind.’