Spring Will Be Ours (55 page)

‘This is it.'

They were standing before one of the porticoed houses: on the black front door a metal plaque was nailed, announcing
Ogniske Polskie.

‘The Polish Hearth,' said Jerzy, and they climbed the steps and pushed open the door.

Elizabeth stepped into a high-ceilinged hall, brightly lit and spacious. On their right was a lobby, where a woman waited to take their coats; beyond a glass-fronted bookcase, mounted on the wall, rose a wide, curving staircase. From the left came the chink of glasses and murmured laughter: they walked through the doorway into a large and beautiful room, running the depth of the house. There was a bar at the end where the windows overlooked the street, and at the other end a restaurant, lit by a chandelier. The tall french windows were hung with heavy, faded curtains, the tables covered in snowy linen. Many of the diners were white-haired: Elizabeth had an impression of correctness, uprightness, dark suits and elegant dresses; nods and smiles and expensive make-up; neat black evening bags snapped open, hands kissed; assurance, courtliness.

A waitress was approaching them.

‘
Dobry wieczór, panu
– good evening. You have reserved a table?'

Jerzy nodded. ‘Prawicki.'

‘Proszę.'
She led them to a small table for two by the far wall. A menu and wine list lay on the snowy cloth.

‘Hungry?' asked Jerzy, as they sat down.

‘Er … no,' said Elizabeth. ‘But this is a lovely surprise.'

‘The place, or my bringing you?'

‘Both. Thank you.'

‘What we really need, after today, is a drink. Yes?'

‘How right you are.'

The waitress smiled at them expectantly. Jerzy ordered white wine. ‘And I should ask you what you want to eat,' he said, ‘but I'd like to choose for you.' He scanned the menu. ‘How about
śledzie
to start with, followed by
gołąbki?
With a salad.'

Elizabeth laughed. ‘Go on – tell me.'

‘Herrings in sour cream, followed by stuffed pigeons.'

She groaned.

‘And
nale
niki
for pudding. Stuffed pancakes.'

‘Stuffed … I tell you what, Jerzy, would you be very hurt, after going to all this trouble, if I said I couldn't touch any of it?'

‘Not even the salad?'

‘Not even the salad.'

He pulled a face. ‘We could just go and sit in the bar. Not so –' he gestured – ‘not so
fin de siècle
, but … they have comfortable seats.' He took her hand across the table, and raised it to his lips. ‘Come on.'

The bar was softly lit; they sank into plastic-covered chairs.

‘
Proszę, panu
…'

Their waitress had followed them, questioning, bearing a small round tin tray, with their wine.

Jerzy explained; she nodded, not quite mollified, and poured out their wine into glasses from the bar.

‘
Dziękuję
…'

‘Na zdrowie, panu.'
She took away the small tin tray.

Their glasses brimmed and shone.

‘
Na zdrowie
, darling.'

‘
Na zdrowie
, Jerzy. And thank you.' Elizabeth sipped and leaned back, watching the to and fro of dinner guests, so dignified, and so at ease. ‘My God, I'm tired.'

‘We've all worn you out.'

‘You have. Never mind. Tell me what else goes on here.'

‘There are discos – Ewa and I came to one once, years ago, but I was so shy I could barely get myself inside the room.'

‘Not like now.'

He smiled. ‘Of course not. And what else? There are conference rooms, and upstairs they play bridge. All afternoon, elegant old Polish ladies in hats sit at green baize tables and play. There's another painting for you.'

Elizabeth moved closer, and took his hand. ‘It sounds like it,' she said. ‘And when you say that, I remember why I love you.'

‘And why is that?' He put down his glass and gently separated her fingers, running his thumb up and down each one.

Elizabeth closed her eyes.

‘Tell me why you love me.'

‘Because of the way you … do that. And because –' she opened her eyes, and looked at him. ‘Because I know you'll make me a better painter – you know already what I want to see, or should see. And I know you'll know. We're very close, aren't we?'

‘In spite of the yawning chasm of history which divides us?' he said, raising an eyebrow.

‘In spite of it.' She put his hand against her cheek. ‘Your mother asked me if I wondered what I'd walked in to.'

‘Is it too much?'

‘I don't think so – only time, as they say, will tell. And after all – I might be too much for you, and you haven't met my family yet.'

‘I don't want to.'

‘Thank you.'

Jerzy took her other hand, and put it against his own cheek, so that they were facing each other, and very close. A discreet cough came from near the bar, but they ignored it.

‘Shall we for the moment forget our families entirely?'

‘Please,' she said.

‘Well, then … You said to Ewa that no one was talking about marriage.' He hesitated. ‘Is anyone … thinking of it?'

Elizabeth felt a sudden, unexpected chill run through her.

‘I … I … oh, Jerzy. Not yet. Forgive me … No.'

He dropped his eyes, flushing. ‘I'm sorry …'

‘Please don't be. Please. I'm surprised myself, at feeling so … wary.'

He took his hand away and leaned back against the plastic seat.

‘It is too much for you. I knew it was.'

Elizabeth thought: I don't like this. I want it to be just us, as we were. Melancholy was settling over Jerzy's features like a mask. And that's one reason I'm wary, she thought: he shuts me out when he's like this. Utterly. He's too vulnerable, and I'm too afraid of it. It isn't anything to do with our families, or the yawning chasm of history – he was so dry and charming when he said that: how is it possible for someone to be so light and so unhappy within moments?

‘Jerzy, please …'

He shook his head. ‘I shouldn't have asked.'

‘For heaven's
sake.
Have I said no for ever? Have I said I don't love you? I love you, I love you, I've only just told you …'

The bar was filling up; two more couples were sitting near them now. Jerzy shifted uneasily, and finished his drink. Then he took her hand again.

‘I'm sorry. May I ask one other thing?'

‘Please.'

‘Would you like us to live together? For now?'

‘We do live together.'

‘You know what I mean. Should we find a proper flat together? I mean – you would still have your studio …'

‘What about your darkroom?'

‘If there's just a cubbyhole I can use, like now … I just want to be with you. In a double bed. Our bed.'

‘Ah. Well … yes. That would be …' She made a rueful face. ‘Our lovely shabby house.'

‘I know. But we could look. Shall we?'

‘Yes. Yes. Let's look.' She leaned across and kissed him lightly. From the next table came another cough.

‘Come on.'

They fetched their coats and went out into the street, where a cold rain had begun to fall, and people were hurrying from the Albert Hall, hailing taxis. They ran through the rain to the station, and caught the train home.

Hampstead village was brightly lit; they walked up the hill past the restaurants and boutiques and through the side streets to the house behind the church. Bare trees tossed in the wind on the heath.

‘Come upstairs,' said Jerzy, and they went up to his room, and and switched on the electric fire, shivering.

‘How have we survived a whole winter like this?' asked Elizabeth.

‘I survived three others before you arrived,' said Jerzy. ‘I can't imagine how. Come here. Come here.'

They switched off the lamp and kissed, clinging to each other, then undressing quickly in the burning light of the fire. Jerzy lit a candle, and put it on the floor by the bed; they huddled under the bedclothes, kissing and stroking each other until they were warm.

‘I love you.'

‘I love you.'

They made love at last with aching slowness.

An evening in mid-October, cold and wet. Anna hurried up the street under her umbrella, stepping aside to avoid being splashed by a passing car. She was tired; she could feel the beginning of a cold. She was supposed to be going to supper tomorrow with Jerzy and Elizabeth, who had rented a flat in Gospel Oak, near Elizabeth's studio. She thought she might have to put it off: it was too much on a weekday, though she enjoyed seeing them.

‘Anna! Anna!'

She looked up and saw Babcia waving from their window, open despite the rain. Unheard of for Babcia to lean out and call like that into the street: had something happened to Dziadek? She began to run, stopped outside their house and called up: ‘What is it? Are you all right?'

‘The Pope!' Babcia called down, but a car drove past, and Anna couldn't hear what she said next and wasn't even sure she'd heard correctly. She unlocked the front door, shook and furled her umbrella and hurried up the stairs. Above, she heard the door open, and Babcia call down again: ‘The Pope! He is Polish!'

‘What?'

As she climbed the last flight she could hear the grandparents' radio and the six o'clock news. Then she had reached the top, and saw Babcia and Dziadek standing in their doorway, with tears in their eyes.

‘He is from Kraków,' Dziadek said. ‘A Polish Pope …'

‘I don't believe it,' said Anna, but she felt a great wave of happiness and excitement rush through her. ‘Come in,' she said quickly, and unlocked her own door and ran to the sitting room. She switched on the television, and a light, and they stood watching film from Kraków and Warsaw, and the picture of a man with a strong, quiet, smiling face flash on to the screen. Babcia burst into tears, and then the telephone rang. Anna went to answer it, as the television abruptly switched to the next item.

‘Hello? Ewa? … yes, yes, we've just heard. Isn't it wonderful?

… Yes, do come over. And will you ring Jerzy? All right … see you in a little while …'

She hung up, and went back to the sitting room, just as the phone in the grandparents'flat began to ring.

‘The whole world is on the telephone,' said Dziadek, and he went out to answer it, smiling, moving like a man of forty.

Jerzy and Elizabeth were sharing the couchette compartment from Hook of Holland to Warsaw with four Poles: a middle-aged husband and wife, who looked like farmers; a thin single man in his sixties with a bulbous nose and red, sweating face; and a grandmother who sat surrounded by a heap of bulging plastic bags. Elizabeth watched Jerzy helping to heave their companions'suitcases on to the luggage rack, and gestured to the old woman.

‘Shall we … your bags …'

She shook her head. ‘Thank you … I keep them.'

‘What about this?' Jerzy asked in Polish, indicating a worn cardboard suitcase by her feet.

‘Yes, yes, that, please …'

He swung it up to the rack, and looked around. ‘Anything else, anyone?'

The man on his own said something Elizabeth couldn't understand, and Jerzy laughed. He sat down, opposite her; she shifted on the plastic seat and looked at her watch.

‘We'll be moving in a minute.'

‘How about something to eat?'

She opened her shoulder bag, brought out sandwiches and Thermos. The single man watched, got up again and reached to the luggage rack, snapping open a plastic suitcase. Looking up, Elizabeth saw he had a hole in his throat, a clean, round, unmistakable hole. A tracheotomy? A bullet wound? She kicked Jerzy gently across the narrow space between the seats, but as he raised an eyebrow the man turned round, and she felt embarrassed, and shook her head. ‘Never mind.'

The man waved a bottle of vodka at them, and a glass.

‘Aha,' said Jerzy. ‘That's more like it.'

He poured a shot and raised the glass, grinning.

‘Na zdrowie.'

‘
Na zdrowie
, said everyone.

There was a shunting and clanging and the carriage jerked. Then the door to the corridor was slid open with a bang and their courier beamed at them from behind Edna Everage spectacles.

‘You all have everything? Tickets, passports, your badges? We are about to leave. Ah – I see the celebrations have begun already.' They all laughed. Pani Maria was enormous, kindly, had marshalled them all at Victoria Station, Dover, disembarking. She cast a glance at the old lady, then at Jerzy and Elizabeth. ‘You will take care of little Babcia?'

‘Oh, yes.'

‘Very good. If there is anything you need, I am in carriage D.' She banged the door across again, and moved heavily along the corridor. The train began to move.

There was a general shifting and settling in the carriage.

‘Happy?' Jerzy asked Elizabeth.

‘Very. And you?'

He nodded, and she thought: he looks more relaxed than he has for months – perhaps than I've ever seen him.

The train gathered speed, and she sat looking out of the window, as they moved through towns and villages, past trees just turning yellow, through, a flat landscape under a grey late afternoon sky. It was five o'clock; they had left Victoria at nine, oversleeping and almost missing the train after having supper with the family the night before and staying up late to finish packing. In Jerzy's case was an empty jam jar.

‘What
are
you taking that for?' Elizabeth asked, as he brought it back from the kitchen, washed and dried, and slipped it in between two pairs of jeans.

‘Polish earth,' he said, putting a sweater on top. ‘Dziadek asked me to bring him some. He was half-joking, but …'