The Shadow of the Sycamores (31 page)

‘That’s awful sudden,’ Henry commented. ‘Where, how and why?’

Max’s laugh was somewhat self-conscious. ‘I was quite content with my job, really, but Nora kept pushing me to find something better. You know how women are. I wasn’t really going to do anything about it but I got speaking to a man in visiting his mother and he was interested to see the Bentley. He was thinking of buying some kind of automobile and was looking for a driver. I just about fell over when he said what he’d be paying – nearly twice what I’m getting now – with a four-roomed house on his estate, just south of Aberdeen on the coast road to Cove. Well, he was needing an answer right away and I knew what Nora would say so I jumped at the chance.’

‘And Nora was pleased?’

‘She threw her arms round me and kissed me. He’s sending a lorry first thing tomorrow to collect our things so it’ll be all go the whole day.’

‘I’m happy for you,’ Fay put in now. ‘Tell Nora I wish you good luck and good health.’

‘Aye, that’s the main thing, isn’t it?’ Max nodded. ‘Well, I’ll have to go for we’ve still a few things to pack. I don’t suppose I’ll be able to see you so often now but, no doubt, Nora’ll be writing to you, Fay, to keep you up to date on what’s happening.’

‘Yes, we’ll keep in touch,’ Fay smiled, giving him a warm kiss on the cheek.

Henry went out to the little black Ford with his friend. ‘I feel a bit jealous of you, Max,’ he admitted as the engine was cranked into life. ‘I was perfectly happy till …’

‘I’m sorry if I’ve unsettled you but I couldna go without telling you.’ Max lowered himself into the driver’s seat.

‘I’d never have forgiven you if you hadn’t come by,’ Henry smiled as they shook hands. ‘All the best to you and your family, man.’

‘Thanks.’ The car moved off, rattling loudly, with Jerry waving to his parents from the passenger seat.

Henry could see that Fay was downhearted when he went back inside. ‘Max won’t be all that far away,’ he consoled, although he did feel a touch jealous, ‘and he’ll likely get the use of a car at the new place and all.’

‘I wouldn’t care about Max going away,’ she said sadly, ‘except … he won’t be there to keep an eye on Jerry.’

Relieved, Henry said brightly, ‘You don’t have to worry about Jerry. He’s quite sensible – not like …’ He stopped, ashamed at what he had been about to say.

‘Not like Andrew, you mean.’ Fay shook her head. ‘That’s what worries me. Even if he was devil-may-care and took risks he shouldn’t …’ she said, blinking away her tears, before going on, ‘he had a cheeky resilience about him … but Jerry’s more sensitive. I don’t think he would cope very well if he came up against any kind of trouble.’

‘Now, now, my fretting Fairy Fay,’ Henry smiled indulgently. ‘I’m sure Jerry will face up to whatever fickle fate flings at him.’

His use of alliteration did bring a smile to her lips. ‘You are always the optimist, aren’t you, my darling Tchouki?’

She stood up to clear away the dirty tea things but he could see that she was no easier in her mind.

As anyone with any common sense would have known, when two impressionable, vulnerable, young people are constantly thrown together, the inevitable will happen sooner or later. Because it was Hogmanay, Jerry had asked Anna to meet him in the gardeners’ shed about half past eleven. ‘So we can see 1914 in together.’

‘But we’re not supposed to see each other after supper,’ she
had murmured, clearly wanting to agree but afraid to break the rules that had been laid down for them.

‘Nobody’ll know and I want us to be together at midnight. Maybe it’ll bring us luck!’

Jerry had gathered from Tina that Anna should not be at The Sycamores now – her brain was as clear as anybody else’s. It was only because her parents wanted rid of her that she had been there at all. There was nothing and nobody to stop him being friends with her. Starting the new year together would make that friendship more permanent, could even deepen it to something far more than friendship. Nothing could happen to spoil it.

At twenty-four, Samara Rae, generally known as Mara, was still very reserved, still shy of strangers. Nonetheless, she found it impossible to ignore the young man who had recently been sitting across the aisle from her in church. At the close of every service for the past three weeks, he had stood up when she stood up, grinning to her as she walked sedately past him behind her parents.

She had given no acknowledgement the first week – it would have been most unladylike since he was an absolute stranger – but she couldn’t help responding to his mischievous wink the following week and now she smiled back shyly. Having previously considered going to church a necessary chore, she would now do anything rather than miss even one Sunday. She dreamt of him every night, wishing that she knew his name, wondering where he had come from, what had taken him to Ardbirtle. Yet none of these things really mattered. As long as he still looked at her with those smouldering dark eyes and gave her that wonderful smile, she would be content.

She guessed him to be perhaps a year or two older than she was and a good six inches taller than her five feet six. His brown hair, not exactly curly, had a definite wave in it and was longer than normal, almost resting on his collar. Even knowing she would be too shy to answer if he spoke to her, she wanted to meet him properly and, as it happened, circumstances overtook her reserve. Late for her work in the solicitor’s office one rainy Tuesday morning, she ran out of the house, head down, full tilt into the man of her dreams.

‘Oh,’ she gasped, as his arms went round her to save her falling, ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t see you.’

‘Are you all right?’ His voice was soft, his eyes regarded her anxiously.

‘I’m fine. I shouldn’t have been in such a hurry but I’m late for work.’

‘Then I must not detain you any longer.’ Having said this, he still did not move. They stood facing each other, aware that the rain was drenching them yet unwilling to part. At last, the young man relinquished his hold on her arms. ‘I should have introduced myself, I am sorry. Leonard Ferguson, known as Leo, at your service, or I would have been if I had taken an umbrella with me.’ He regarded her with his eyebrows raised. ‘May I be so bold as to ask
your
name or is it a secret of the darkest kind?’

His jocular manner made her lose her shyness. ‘Samara Rae, known as Mara.’

‘Samara? How unusual … intriguing.’

When she told him that it originated from the winged seeds of sycamore trees, he said softly, ‘I will always think of you as Samara, then. It will remind me of how ethereally beautiful you are. You look as if a puff of wind would blow you away.’

Even the unaccustomed flattery did not faze her. ‘I’m much more substantial than that, I’m afraid, and I shall think of you as Leo because you have been like a strong lion for me.’

He pretended to growl and tucked her hand under his arm. ‘Will you allow me to walk you to your place of employment, Miss Samara?’ Before she could answer, he went on, ‘I am being most inconsiderate, however. Your clothes are absolutely soaking. You must go inside and change. I shall wait here for you.’

‘I couldn’t let you do that,’ she smiled. ‘My mother would think it very remiss of me if she knew I had left you standing in the rain.’

Opening the house door, she led him in through the porch, chuckling at the amazement on Fay’s face when they went into the kitchen. ‘This is Leo Ferguson, Mother. He’s waiting till I change into dry clothes.’

The young man held out his hand. ‘I am delighted to meet you, Mrs Rae.’

His firm handshake did much to banish her fears for her daughter. ‘You are soaking wet, too but I can’t offer you a change of clothes, I’m afraid. You are much taller than my husband but he does have a spare set of oilskins here and you are welcome to that. It will save you getting any wetter.’

‘But Samara should have it.’

‘Mara has a waterproof cape she can put on. She was in too much of a hurry to look for it before she went out.’

The girl’s first walk with Leo, therefore, was far more mundane than she had dreamt of but she was happier than she had ever been as they sloshed through the water-filled holes in the uneven pavement. Taking advantage of the empty street, he stopped at one point to kiss her and repeated it every time the chance presented itself. Both giggled at the rain running into their eyes and mouths because they were completely at one now and nothing mattered to them except each other.

By the time they reached her office, she was almost an hour late but Mr Kelly’s sarcastic rebuke about sleepyheads made no more impression on her than had the rain. She still knew nothing about Leo apart from his name yet she had agreed to meet him the following night for she had no doubt that he was a man she could trust.

*    *    *

Anna Cairns was blissfully happy. From the small beginnings of accidental touching of hands, her meetings with Jerry Rae had graduated to deliberate hand-holding, then arms around waists, then stolen kisses when no one could see.

The kisses themselves had become more ardent until one day she was conscious of his tongue prising her teeth open, which created such a weird, wonderful sensation inside her that she pulled back from him in confusion after a few moments.

‘Oh, Anna, I’m sorry,’ Jerry muttered. ‘I shouldn’t have done that. I hope you’re not angry with me?’

‘Of course I’m not angry,’ she breathed. ‘I … think I liked it.’

For once in her life, she was glad that it was winter. The weather was a good excuse for them to go to their ‘love parlour’ – Jerry’s name for the gardeners’ big shed. She hardly knew how she got through each day until it was half past five and she could meet him and ‘make love’ with him, this being what he called the peculiar kissing. It was the most natural thing in the world to her these days yet he seemed worried that somebody might find out. Anyway, what did it matter if anybody did find out? They were not doing anything wrong … were they?

What Charles had done once, some months ago now, had felt far more wrong than Jerry’s kisses. She had never been altogether comfortable with the man after he began to touch her, stroking her as if she were a favourite pet, and she had only put up with it because it seemed to give him so much pleasure. Then, that awful day when he got much rougher and invaded the private part of her body, she had tried to fight him off but it seemed that her struggles only served to give him more and more strength. She had hated feeling his hot, panting breath in her face while he pounded into her and it was so painful and disgusting that, when he finished, she had threatened to tell the Millers. He had pleaded with her to forgive him, that he couldn’t help himself, that he would never do it again.

She couldn’t forgive him but she hadn’t told the Millers, either. She had kept on seeing him because she would miss the company and, thankfully, he hadn’t broken his promise. She had been quite glad when Tina had told her she was to be allowed to go walks with Jerry Rae. She missed the interesting conversations she’d had with Charles, however, and being able to tell him all her worries. She didn’t feel comfortable enough yet with Jerry to do that.

*    *    *

Tina was growing more and more anxious. She kept a chart of the menstrual cycles of each of the female patients under the age of fifty – mainly to be sure of having the necessary cloths ready for them but also because there had been two occasions, some time ago now, when one of the men had been responsible for the fathering of a child. In both cases, the men had protested that the women had been willing or had even instigated the mating, which made no difference really. The thing was, it had to be discovered as soon as possible so that something could be done about it.

She had considered that Anna needed no supervision as far as that was concerned. The girl had been collecting her own cloths for ages but had always let her, as the nurse, know that her ‘show’ had come but she hadn’t mentioned it for quite a while. Tina had no idea how long it had been for she had never thought it necessary to keep a check on the young girl.

The poor nurse was torn apart with the worry of it. She had been so sure she could trust Jerry and he had let her down. Mrs Miller would likely sack her for throwing the boy and girl together. She should have known how it would end but, God’s truth, she had done it for the best. The poor girl, as sane as Mrs Miller herself, had been practically isolated in this prison of a place when she should have been mixing with others of her own age. It wouldn’t be right to put the blame on Jerry either. How could a young buck like him resist the temptation that Anna must be to him?

Tina sighed deeply. She had to do something, though it might be best to find out if her fears were justified before doing any confessing. Noticing that it was just after ten minutes to six, she went out by the gate to the gardens and walked slowly down the path towards the big shed where the gardeners kept their tools and anything else needed for their work. If anything was going on, that was where it would be taking place.

She was only a few feet away when the door opened and the two sixteen-year-olds squeezed through together, face to face, the boy’s lips on the girl’s. They had eyes only for each
other and, ashamed to be witnessing their love, Tina moved round the side of the corrugated iron construction.

‘Till tomorrow, my darling.’ That was the girl.

‘Oh, Anna, I love you so much. I just wish …’

‘What d’you wish?’

‘I wish we could be married but … I know they won’t let us.’

‘Couldn’t we just … run away?’

‘What would we live on?’

‘We could both get jobs. Oh, I’m sure we could manage, Jerry.’

‘Where would we live?’

‘We’d find somewhere.’

‘No, Anna, my dearest, sweetest Anna. It wouldn’t work. They’d find us and I’d likely be arrested for luring you away. We’ll just have to be content with what we’ve got. At least we have half an hour together every day.’

There was a short silence – the goodbye kiss, Tina supposed – before the footsteps went their different ways and she let the girl get slightly ahead before hurrying to catch up with her. ‘Anna.’