The Novel in the Viola (28 page)

Mrs Ellsworth tutted softly. ‘Mr Wrexham won’t like it one bit,’ she complained.

‘Well, you tell him that if he won’t let me, I’m going straight to the dairyman to offer my services for the milking of cows. In fact, I’m not sure that wouldn’t be more fun . . .’

‘No, no, miss. I’ll tell him,’ said Mrs Ellsworth, shooting me an anxious glance. ‘But it’ll never do. You’re not to do any cooking. And you’re not to set a foot in my kitchen.’

We sat before the hulking kitchen range, Mrs Ellsworth demonstrating the correct technique for the peeling of carrots. ‘It’ll be over by Christmas,’ she announced, snatching the peeler out of my hands. ‘Like this, stop scraping at it. Or spring at the latest,’ she concluded, moving seamlessly between the prognosis of war and vegetable peeling.

‘Such a to-do. And the digging up of all those potatoes for an air-raid shelter,’ she snarled. ‘What a waste! What’s Mr Hitler want to bomb a potato patch for? He won’t do very well in the war if he goes around bombing people’s onions and taters.’

I did not try to explain. Mrs Ellsworth remained convinced that the Anderson shelter had to be dug in the potato patch because that was the most likely target of attack, rather than because the sheltered kitchen garden was the safest place.‘All this disruption. Gives me the collywobbles.’

I said nothing, and let her rattle on. Mrs Ellsworth was tired. The kitchen boy, who it turned out was eighteen despite the skinny legs and pimples (or else taking the opportunity to escape the most horrid job in the house) joined up at the first instant and disappeared in the night. We never heard from him again. It meant that Mrs Ellsworth had a great deal more to do in the kitchen, and my helping became a necessity. Several of the farm boys volunteered early for service, not waiting for their call-up, and the dairyman required his daughter’s assistance, which meant that we were down to one daily maid. Then Henry the footman joined up, and marched off for training in Wiltshire on the 12th of September, much to Mr Wrexham’s disgust. ‘One week’s notice. That’s the legal requirement,’ the old butler complained, when the footman appeared in his parlour, dressed in his new green uniform, and handed back his once treasured footman’s livery, now shoved into an unwashed bundle.

Henry shrugged. ‘Don’t pay me my last week’s wages then. But it’s not very patriotic of you. There’s a war on, you know.’

Of course, Mr Rivers would not hear of Henry not being paid his last week’s wages, and would have ordered the motorcar to take him to Dorchester, if it weren’t for the rationing of petrol. Only essential journeys were to be taken by motorcar, but then Mr Rivers and Kit always seemed to prefer travelling with Art and Mr Bobbin, so there wasn’t much difference. I listened to Mrs Ellsworth chatter and hum along to ‘The Frog King’s Parade’
on the wireless. I liked being in the kitchen. It reminded me of home and hours spent getting in Hildegard’s way as she baked
sachertorte
or diced steak for a
goulash
. The smells in Mrs Ellsworth’s kitchen were different – pears, suet, sizzling bacon, kippers, scones and baked custard – but I liked them just the same. I’d just made my first fish and parsley pie and was feeling rather proud of myself. Mrs Ellsworth took it out of the oven with a hiss of steam, and placed it on the top of the cooker.

‘Very good. Nice and brown. Go and wash, now. Mr Wrexham will ring the bell for lunch in five minutes.’

There was no use objecting. I hurried out of the kitchen and went to straighten my hair and splash water on my face. Despite the lack of staff, and the inordinate distance between kitchen and dining room, standards had to be maintained. The digging up of the potato patch and the disappearance of the under servants had disturbed Mrs Ellsworth, and she sought reassurance in the details of luncheon in the wainscoted dining room at one o’clock. Mr Wrexham, walking past the kitchen door with his laden tray and perfectly starched shirt, proved to her that England was mighty and indestructible. Wars might be declared, kitchen boys vanish to join the navy, blackout curtains smother the French windows, and previously reliable footman leave without notice, but lunch would be served at five minutes past one and the butler would wear white cotton gloves.

‘Lulcombe Castle has been requisitioned by the army,’ announced Mr Rivers. We sat taking tea on the terrace in the late afternoon. It seemed a lifetime ago that I had broken the porcelain teacup when serving the gentlemen. Today, Mr Wrexham carried the tray and I poured tea for three and spread butter upon the scones. It was warm for late September, the sky a watery blue unmarked by cloud, and only the purple leaves fluttering to the ground from the flowering plum showed it to be an autumn day.

‘I offered Lady Vernon and the Hamilton girls refuge here while the Dower house is being prepared for the family.’

Mr Rivers paused, smiling at what must have been my stricken expression, while Kit shot me a sideways glance. I hated Diana and her aunt, Lady Vernon, terrorised me with her mastery of English subtext. Her words were unfailingly polite, but they were entirely separate from her meaning. On catching me one afternoon using my fingers to lift sponge cake to my mouth, she enquired, ‘Miss Landau, would you care for a cake fork?’ in a tone that clearly stated, ‘You uncouth continental, my miniature pug has superior table manners.’ Once on my way back from the sea, I passed her motorcar parked outside the Tyneford post office, and she called me over to remark upon my lack of hat. It had just blown off into the surf, and choosing not to place the dripping cloche on my head, I carried the sodden bundle in my hands. ‘My dear!’ she called, beckoning me over with a thin, gloved hand. ‘No hat! Such daring. How I admire you. So self assured, you can walk around hatless!’ Her tone conveyed that she would have sooner discovered me outside the post office quite naked than in my present state of semi-undress. I knew she detested me because of Kit. She considered him too poor to be a good match for one of her nieces, but she would have liked Diana to have had the opportunity of refusing him.

Mr Rivers gave me a wry smile. ‘No, you’re quite safe. She’s not coming to stay. Though I fear we may have to invite them to dine rather more often than we might wish.’

‘Let’s hope that Tyneford’s not requisitioned,’ said Kit, licking jam from his finger and ignoring the scone.

‘Yes, indeed,’ replied Mr Rivers. ‘But it doesn’t seem terribly likely. There’s no decent road and we’re simply too far from the station. Besides, the house isn’t big enough for an officers’ barracks.’

‘What about the schools? I heard Flo say that some of the country houses are being taken over by the London schools,’ said Kit, lighting a cigarette.

Mr Rivers shook his head. ‘We’re too close to the coast. It’s much too dangerous here. No point being evacuated from London into another danger zone.’

He folded his paper and placed it upon the table. ‘Best thing we can do is help on the estate. Half the farm lads have already joined up, and the rest will get their call-up in a month or two. I’ve not driven a plough since I was a boy. I’m rather looking forward to it.’

I stirred my coffee with a silver spoon, watching the milk marble and then disappear. ‘Mr Rivers, mightn’t you be called up?’ I asked, wondering whether I was being rude. The English were so strange about age.

‘I rather doubt it. I’m over forty. So they would have to be pretty desperate.’

I smiled. He made it sound like he was an old man, which having seen him stride across the hills I knew was nonsense. I tended to agree with Anna – forty for a man was still perfectly youthful. Kit surveyed his father in silence for a minute, and then said with studied casualness, ‘Will’s joined the 2nd Dorsetshire. They sound all right. Thought perhaps I might too.’

Mr Rivers set his cup on the table. He turned quite white, almost as if he were struck by sudden seasickness. ‘Not the army,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t bear the army. You don’t know what it’s like. It’s not some boyish adventure. It’s hell.’

Kit took a long drag on his cigarette, trying to select words that would not further antagonise his father. ‘It’s different now. War is different. It won’t be like it was for you.’

‘You might be right, but please, Kit, no.’

Mr Rivers’ eyes held a look that I had not seen before. A film of sweat coated his top lip. Kit reached out and brushed his hand, the first physical contact I had ever observed between them.

‘All right. Not the army.’

Mr Rivers sat back in his chair and took a sip of tea, and his hand shook ever so slightly. He turned to me. ‘Served for six months in 1918, when I was a year or two younger than Kit. God-awful. Hellish. Makes a mockery of the words one uses to describe it. All I can say is, it’s something a man never wants his son to see.’

Kit proffered his cigarette case and Mr Rivers took one and struck a match, the only time I had ever seen him smoke. I toyed with the crumbs on my plate.

‘My father’s elder brother served for three years. He was killed at Flanders in 1917. Julian’s first novel was about it,’ I said.

Mr Rivers stared at me for a moment with an odd expression, then gave a short laugh. ‘Fighting for the Kaiser, of course.’

‘Yes.’

Silence fell between us, as we sipped tea and nibbled scones and contemplated the fact that twenty-five years ago we’d been at war on opposite sides. A large white gull landed on a terracotta flowerpot and eyed the cake hungrily. Kit broke off a corner and tossed it onto the lawn. A moment later a flock of gulls descended onto the grass in a blizzard of white wings, the air filling with their hollow cries.

‘The navy. It has to be the navy. If I’m to be away from Tyneford, I want to be at sea.’

A fortnight later, Mr Rivers and I stood in the driveway and watched as Art guided Mr Bobbin out of the yard, Kit seated beside him. The bus would take him from Wareham all the way to Hove and naval officer’s training. We watched in silence as the horse lumbered along the green lanes. A fine drizzle began to fall, but we stayed watching, determined not to miss the last glimpse of our boy. I remembered Anna, Julian and Hildegard waving goodbye on the station platform, all resolutely not crying. The station hummed with hissing steam, baying porters, squalling babies and whispered goodbyes. I shivered and wrapped my woollen cardigan around my shoulders. An icy wind trilled through the eaves, carrying with it the comforting scent of wood smoke and peat. I imagined the sound to be the house itself calling some kind of farewell. At a bend in the track, Kit gave us a cheerful wave as he jumped down from the cart to open the first of the seventeen gates leading to the ridge and the world beyond Tyneford. Mr Rivers and I stayed as the figures became dots on the horizon, barely distinguishable from the stripped trees or the cattle scattered about on either side of the path. The cart inched along the top of the hill and then disappeared into the dark tunnel of trees, heading for Steeple, Wareham and a bus to another world.

‘Mrs Ellsworth says the war will be over before Christmas,’ I said. ‘His training will take a while, so it’s possible he’ll never have to serve.’

‘I hope Mrs Ellsworth is right. Shall we?’

He stood aside, allowing me to lead the way back into the house. I lingered in the quiet of the hall, listening to the whirr and tick of the death-watch beetles in the heavy beams overhead. A vase of brown tipped roses stood on the table, and a stray withered petal had fallen onto the surface. Any other day Mrs Ellsworth would have ensured they were instantly replaced – petals were barely allowed to drop before they were tidied away – but the instant of Kit’s departure the house had assumed its forlorn air. The dying flowers left in their vase. A smear of polish on the parquet floor. The damask curtains beside the front door no longer appeared genteelly worn; they were shabby and old.

‘I’ll be in the library,’ said Mr Rivers.

He strode away and I heard the door click shut and, a second later, the clink of the whisky decanter. I sat down on the bottom stair, resting my chin in my hands, and listened to the silence echo in the afternoon. I felt a long way from everyone I loved. I’d listened to Kit talk with the other boys, and they were all so eager to fight. ‘Let us at him,’ they clamoured, as though the minute they joined up they would be presented with a string of enemy soldiers ready for a good thrashing. I wished I could talk to my father. I knew he’d say something to comfort me, or at least make me smile. I hadn’t spoken to Julian for two years, but if I went upstairs, I could break the viola and take out the pages. His novel lay there waiting for me to read.

In my old attic room, I retrieved the viola from its hiding place and sat with it on my knees, feeling the strange weight in its belly. I picked it up by the neck and held it aloft for a moment, ready to smash it down on the edge of the iron bedstead. And then, instead, I slotted it under my chin and, clasping the bow, drew it across the strings. For the first time in fifteen years I played the viola. I had not played since I heard the miracle of Margot’s music. That was how the viola was supposed to sound, not the schoolgirl tunes that I could wrench from the strings. But this viola was different. It could only sound strange with the novel inside and I need not feel ashamed of my inability to produce music like my sister.

The tone was soft, as though the viola could only whisper. I tried a simple Mozart melody. It was thin and sad – the voice of a choirboy as opposed to the rich chocolate of an operatic soprano – and it suited me. Music isn’t just notes; it’s also filled with rests or measured silences. We wait during the pauses, listening to the possibility of music. I wanted to play into the gap left by Anna and Julian and fill up their silence, but their silence was not a rest. No black mark on the page told me when the sound would begin again. Their silence was not musical but a vacuum – a void where no sound can exist. I played another nocturne, but this time I could not hear the tune, only the pauses between the notes.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

The Anna