The story continues from Tranche Twelve
Marcus has found a safe haven at Mrs Bettevant’s in Fitzroy Square and has begun to take charge of his life. He has made contact with Dr Callendar and plans to join her research programme which will give him at least six, and possibly a dozen, consultation sessions with her. On a whim he applied to join the Territorial Army (TA) and is considering whether to attend the Drill Night. He has also reluctantly decided to go home at the weekend to get the books and notes he will need when revision classes at the Poly start in a few days. In order to be able to support himself he must work and is about to start a clerking job in a furniture shop…
Thursday 1st September
The end of the first day at Waring & Gillow
He was tired. It had been a difficult day. Debbie Warriner had spent the first part of the morning explaining how the order system was supposed to work. In theory it was a simple system of multi-page order dockets where each coloured page had a specific purpose and destination, but, since the previous clerk had left over a month before, there had been three short-lived replacements each of which had been more skilled at creating chaos than its predecessor.
“You seem a bright boy, Marcus,” Debbie had said as she finished her orientation briefing. “I need you to get all this under control.”
The office that was now his was chaotic. Even the binders on the shelves behind the desk were higgledy-piggledy and the several stacks of orders heaped in three unlabelled wire baskets seemed to have no part in any logically organised system. How long was it going to take him just to sort out this mess?
“I have asked Mr Lewin, who looks after customer support, to help you. He has been struggling over the past month to make sure the system doesn’t collapse completely, and can help you get started, but he has to get back to looking after his own job as quickly as possible.”
Mr Lewin, or Mel, as he preferred to be addressed, was probably near sixty, had been in the furniture business all his life and immediately volunteered his help. Together they commandeered an empty office, and pushed several tables together to make a large surface on which they could sort the mountain of dockets. Mel’s cheerfulness and experience encouraged Marcus to believe he might be able to succeed at this job.
They spent the rest of that day sorting, organising and classifying the chaos of dockets into piles of different categories. A fair proportion, maybe as much as a quarter or a third, had in fact been completed but not filed away properly. As many again were loose ‘ordered’, ‘paid’ and ‘delivered’ dockets that needed to be married up to make completed sets. All the rest represented incomplete orders. By the end of the day they had created piles labelled ‘ordered/paid/received/waiting delivery’; ‘ordered/paid/outstanding’; ‘ordered’; ‘to be ordered’ and ‘PROBLEMS’ - a very substantial number - plus the few Mel advised would have serious consequences if not actioned immediately were put into the ‘NOW!’ pile. These, Mel advised had to be dealt with immediately.
“It’ll be a long slog lad but we’ll get it done,” Mel told him as they clocked out, adding apologetically, “I’d invite you for a drink, but I need to get over to Battersea.”
The evening after work
Marcus made his way back to Fitzroy Square arguing with himself about going to the drill hall. Was he really interested in the TA? Couldn’t it wait to next week, he had already handed in the application form? Surely it was better to get some rest? Why was he giving in? This was the problem that had cost him success at school – he didn’t strive or even try. No! He would go just to prove to that Staff Sergeant that he wasn’t a waster. He was first for supper that evening.
“How was your first day?” Dr Holbeek asked as she joined him at the table.
“It got better as it went on. They told me at the interview that there might be a backlog to clear because they’d had to use temps since the last clerk left a month ago…”
“So it was chaos?”
“It still is chaos, but the man who runs the customer care office saved my sanity.”
“Going back tomorrow?” Elaine asked.
“Don’t have much choice if I’m going to pay Mrs B,” he replied with what he hoped might be perceived as humour.
He felt accepted yet grateful to be left out as the people around the table were talking. Doctor Holbeek and Tancred were talking about William Morris; Elaine and Ambrose were discussing something technical about stage and studio lighting; Joshua was reading, not a book but what looked like a set of accounts. Marcus finished his supper, excused himself from an invitation to the pub without having to give a reason and went to prepare for his evening.
The Drill Hall
Marcus arrived at the Drill Hall with eleven minutes to spare.
“Sheppard! I wondered if you’d come back,” Staff Sergeant Abrams barked, his boots and brasses gleaming, his blanco’d belt and gaiters perfect, his battle dress pressed and razor creased. “You join the recruit squad with Bombardier Mackay. He’s in the hall, can’t miss him – big Jamaican.”
The drill hall was a vast shed. About a dozen men, most in uniform, stood around in clumps talking and smoking. At the far end were parked two lorries, a Landrover, a staff car and two guns, both under tarpaulins. The space smelled of cigarettes and diesel and canvas and dust. The Bombardier was easy to spot, he was at least six foot four!
“I’m Marcus Sheppard, the Staff Sergeant said I should join the recruit squad.”
Mackay regarded him. “You another student?”
“No. I work in Oxford Street.”
“Okay, well we parade in about ten minutes, know any drill?”
“I was in the cadets at school.” Don’t say too much warned the voice, “but I’ve probably forgotten it all,” he added, cautiously dissembling.
“You’ll be alright. These others are recruits too. Neilsen joined last week, Hambley should be attested tonight and those ones in uniform are Morton, Phillips and Zander. Best you get to know each other…”
Marcus had barely spoken to the others when the shouting began. Uniformed soldiers formed up in two ranks. Mackay attached his little squad to the end.
The first period for the recruits, after muster and inspection, was drill. The six of them managed to exasperate Mackay, reminding Marcus of CCF parades at school. He had forgotten less than he feared and was able to march off and respond correctly to the command ‘Squad… Halt!’ Left and right turns on the march, however, had been completely forgotten. The second period was spent in the range and there Marcus surprised Mackay and himself by twice producing tight groups that would have been contained in the bull, if the rifle had been properly zeroed to him.
At the final parade the Battery Sergeant Major reminded them of the range weekend on the last weekend of the month and the Regimental concentration at Stanford on the 15th and 16th of October; warned that maximum attendance was expected for the Lord Mayor’s Show on 12th November and finished by offering a day’s pay for volunteers to act as mess waiters for a Regimental cocktail party on the coming Saturday. Marcus wondered how long it would be before he would be able to attend weekend training: it would give him something to do other than mope; and the pay, although not much, would be welcome.
After dismissal Marcus was about to leave Sergeant Mackay’s recruit squad Phillips said to him: “We usually stay for a drink after parade - come to the bar?”
Why not? he thought, following Phillips and most of the others who had been on parade up the stairs into a panelled room. A clamorous crush of khaki besieged the bar. Many were a lot older with several medal ribbons. He was already feeling uncomfortable. Zander took orders and Phillips led him to a table by the window that Morton had commandeered with Neilsen.
“Are you a student?” Phillips asked immediately.
“No,” Marcus replied, “are you?”
“Yes. Engineering at UCL. Zander too. Second year… What do you do?”
“I work at Waring & Gillow.” Same age as me and starting second year, he thought. Then, resisting the impulse to apologise for himself that Armand had helped him recognise, he shifted the focus to Morton sitting opposite. “What do you do?” he asked.
“Work for the Underground at Russell Square,” Morton replied brightly, “But I’ve applied for driver training.”
Neilsen offered cigarettes. Marcus declined. “No thanks. What do you do?”
“I’m an engineering draughtsman. I work for the Transport Board at St Pancras…”
“In that place that used to be a hotel that Betjeman is trying to save?” Phillips asked.
“Midland Hotel. Yes. And he’s won”
Zander and Hambley brought a tray of drinks. “Drink up guys” urged Hambley. “Just been attested, so this round’s on me.”
The instinct to speak and act cautiously had helped Marcus survive school. It would be no different here, he thought. Ask general questions and stay away from the personal. The others were quite talkative which allowed Marcus to listen. Zander and Phillips had joined just after Easter, Morton just before Summer Camp, Hambley a month previously and Neilsen a week before Marcus. It might be a month or six weeks before he’d get his kit – maybe in time for the concentration weekend. It would be fun to go to Stanford again.
“You going for a Commission?” Zander asked.
“Doubt they’d want me,” Marcus replied, “my last school report said the only thing I was good at was leading people down the wrong path.” Turning to Neilsen he said: “I read somewhere there’s a huge beer store underneath St Pancras station.”
Neilson confirmed it and went on to shower them with facts about the amazing complex of goods yards not only under the station but next door at Somers Town and Kings Cross too. The conversation drifted from railways to football and Marcus decided it was time to leave.
Walking unsteadily back to Fitzroy Square he decided Drill nights and the odd weekend would be a change from dealing with sales orders all day. It would bring a little extra money and help structure his time when revision classes started while Annual Camp next Summer would be a goal to carry him through the winter slog of revising. Next time, though, he would drink halves instead of pints. On the other hand, he felt proud to have resisted the temptation to accept frequently offered cigarettes.
The house in Fitzroy Square was quietly welcoming as he tiptoed up to his room. The anaesthetic effects of alcohol subdued thoughts of what faced him in the office and he slept dreamlessly well.
Friday, 2nd September
Day two at Waring & Gillow completed
“You done well lad. Let’s go celebrate what we’ve achieved and worry about the rest come Monday.” Mel spoke insistently, shepherding Marcus out of the office.
Marcus complied because Mel was older and had proved himself over these two days to be a trustworthy guide. If he had been left to his own devices, he would have stayed and probably worked through the night. Without Mel’s help and encouragement, he would have believed the chaos was his fault. Why? At least he was recognising this immediate feeling of guilt was not unique to this one case. Maybe Dr Callendar could help him navigate these subliminal shoals of fear and guilt.
“I wouldn’t have known where to start without your knowledge and help,” Marcus said as they clocked out together.
“Good of you to say, but it’s self-interest really.”
“What do you mean? You’re the customer service adviser.”
“True; but most of the problems I deal with are almost always because of errors in the way salesmen record orders. You’ve already shown you can spot them and that’ll make my job easier in the long run.”
They entered the pub on the corner of Wells Street. Marcus felt he had to show his gratitude for Mel’s help. “What’ll you drink?”
The pub was filling and they took their drinks to a table as it was vacated. Mel lit his cheroot. “Strikes me you’re a smart lad and you’ll get on top of that job in a week. What are your plans?”
“Survive to next summer, pass my exams and… university maybe.”
“To do what?”
“I don’t know… Well… Everyone accuses me of being a dreamer – and I am – but no-one seems to want a dreamer… What about you? What did you dream about when you were my age?”
“My dream was to be another Hepplewhite.” Mel sighed, shaking his head. “My dad was a cabinetmaker and I was apprenticed the same. Got my articles just in time for the start of the great depression! So I got into antiques, doing them up, faking them, running an antiques business. Then the war came and I got involved with some mates making furniture for all the camps they were building. Bombed out twice. Then went back into antiques after. Never actually became Hepplewhite, but I was quite good at faking him! Dreams are important, Marcus. What are yours – young chap like you?”
Armand had shown him how careful questions could open doors. Marcus liked Mel but being called a dreamer had made him cautious. How should he answer? Lizzy’s effervescence had made her fun to be with, but how would he have answered this question if she had asked it? Christina’s lawyer’s mind, and perhaps the age difference too, had made it easier for him to accept her probes and challenges, but even with her he had been guarded. But Mel had answered honestly, so perhaps he owed him the same.
“My dreams?” He was struggling to find a way to dissemble and realising that was somehow more shocking than the fear of exposing himself in an answer. “When my brother and I were little we’d tell each other stories. We made them up based on things we read or heard on the radio… so… what I’d really like to be is… a story-teller.”
He had never admitted that before, not even to himself, and it felt shocking! He glanced at Mel who was regarding him steadily over the rim of his glass. What did it mean? It felt as if he were being appraised - like a piece of furniture perhaps?
“You know what you want, Marcus. Now you have to make it happen.” Mel grinned lopsidedly. “Have a good weekend. See you Monday.”
Saturday 3rd September
Going home
Marcus slumped into a corner in the compartment still feeling the effects of the night before, waking up late, getting breakfast only through Mrs B’s kindness, then packing and rushing to get to Liverpool Street in time for the train. Was he looking forward to going home? Yes, because he wanted to see his brothers; yes, because he wanted to see the new house; but he was ambivalent about his parents, especially his mother as she had been consistently less helpful than his father. Going back meant having to face the spectre of his failure twelve months previously, then giving up on the bank and having a series of dead end jobs with the end result that his father paid for his return from France. He did not want to have to attempt to explain any of that.
He left the train at Ipswich. The next train to Lowestoft was not yet in its bay. He felt the urge to cross to the London platform. I can’t keep running, he countered. Mum and Dad can’t have me at home when they are away. They don’t trust me and if I go back to London I’ll have done nothing to change that. The station Tannoy squawked an apology for the late arrival of the train from Lowestoft just as it crawled into the bay and squealed to a halt. Running away to France had been pointless avoidance and he had been lucky, very lucky, to have met people who did not avoid him.
Admitting he shouldn’t avoid his family just because they were unable to give him what he wanted was necessary, he told himself, boarding the train and finding a seat. Yesterday, in the pub, he had told Mel his dream. Achieving it wasn’t in anybody else’s gift. But was it possible? Of course it was! He spent the journey arguing with himself. By the time he got out at Halesworth he accepted the dream was guiding star, his Polaris. The first stage of the journey, putting failure behind him, could not be avoided.
“Mum’s waiting in the car,” called his brother standing by the exit.
“Sorry to keep you waiting, Mum. The train was twelve minutes late leaving Ipswich.” Marcus felt it necessary to explain his delayed arrival.
“What are you doing now?” she asked as she waited for him to close the door.
“I’ve signed up for re-sits at the Poly. That’s why I need to get my books and notes from school.”
“Good,” she said, driving off. “Where are you living?”
“I’ve got a room at Mrs Bettevant’s in Fitzroy Square. I’m sure I told Dad when I phoned…”
“Your father’s at the golf club. He told me you were in a lodging house and had a job - doing what?”
It was an effort to stop himself responding until he had had taken the time to breathe and shape a polite reply.
“Stock Order clerk at Waring and Gillow, Oxford Street.” He said. Sensing that was not enough he continued: “Not that well paid but it’s nine to five thirty and they can be flexible if I need extra study time, lab classes etcetera.” He paused to see what response there might be. When one still didn’t come, he added: “I’ll be having revision classes two or three nights a week.”
“Make sure you work this time.”
How to respond to that? He wanted to sound as though he was taking charge of his life this time but thought she might be interested to know something about where he was living.
“Amazing people in the house: there’s a writer and a man who designs film sets and another who works for Liberty’s, an anthropologist and an accountant who works for John Lewis, a student I haven’t met yet and a woman (he had been about to say ‘girl’) who makes historical costumes for films…”
When that brought nothing more than an ‘uh-huh’ he watched the hedges and fields slide past. He wanted to see the new house and town where she, his father and his brothers were living - but if it got too bad he could go back later today, no point making things worse for his brothers.
Their new home was in a row of old houses in the middle of the small town. The hall passage was red and black tiles. The sitting room was brick-floored and, his mother said, had once been the kitchen. The fireplace wide enough to roast a pig in contained an array of dried flowers in a blue and white pitcher. What had once been the scullery had become the kitchen. Outside was a walled garden and a coach house. His brothers took him to see their rooms, which must have been allocated on the basis of seniority as Rog had the smallest, Chris larger and Peter the biggest attic, where they gathered while lunch was being prepared.
“What do you think of this place?” Peter asked.
“Quite a change from Hill Avenue! You’ve got your own rooms now and I like the attics. How are things with you lot?”
“Mum doesn’t come up much – just some evenings to watch television in the other room. What are you doing now? What happened in France?”
“What happened in France? I was lucky. Made me think…”
“What about?” Chris asked.
“Mostly, I suppose, why I fucked up my A-levels. Don’t tell Mum, but a psychologist – a therapist – helped me see I had to deal with my stupidity. He recommended someone in London who I met on Wednesday. I’m hoping she can help.”
“How?” Roger asked.
Marcus laughed. It was a very sharp question. How indeed? “Dad had this book, The Power of Positive Thinking, and I took it literally – levitation is possible if you pull hard enough on your own shoelaces. What I learned in France is that I, we - you lot as well - never ask for help. I had to be made to ask…”
“By whom?” Peter asked.
“Someone you can trust.” Another sharp question echoing the tensions that had jangled their lives in the bungalow. The call to lunch was ringing through the house. “Let’s not be late!”
Their father had returned from a morning of golf. Marcus sensed tension as they took their places around the table in the dining room. He thanked his father for arranging his return journey from Nice and immediately regretted mentioning it when he saw the glances exchanged by his parents. What to say next?
“Dad, could you tell me where I can find my old schoolbooks?”
“Yes, of course.” His father seemed relieved by the simple question. “They’ll be in boxes either in the cellar or the cubby hole… I’ll show you after lunch.”
“Marcus is going to resit the subjects he failed last year.” It was a simple statement of fact delivered unemotionally and yet Marcus felt stung by his mother’s comment.
Better not respond to that, he thought. Let’s switch track! “The boys go back to school next weekend and you fly out later – is the house going to be shut up until Easter?”
As soon as he had said that he regretted it. His parents exchanged glances again. They were thinking he was angling to come back and live at home!
“It’s a good thing we’ll all be away,” his father said with a rueful smile. “We’re having some work done - rewiring, plumbing, night storage heaters and redecoration.”
Marcus nodded. “after you’ve helped me find my stuff; can the boys show me the town?”
It took an hour to search the jumble of cardboard boxes for what he needed. He decided on the very minimum as he was going to have to carry it back, but it gave him an opportunity to sort everything, throwing out old Airfix catalogues and plastic modelling magazines, passing on other toys and games to his brothers and repacking the books and things that still had some sentimental value. While sorting through boxes he found the hobnailed army boots he had had in the CCF. He added them to the books and files of notes he would need for revision.
“Anything else?” his father asked as they repacked boxes.
He remembered Dr Callendar’s request that he obtain parental authorisation. He had been uncomfortable with the thought of faking a signature, but hadn’t wanted to ask his mother.
“Would you sign something for me? I was recommended to see a psychologist - Doctor Callendar - and she will only take me on if I get a parent to authorise it. There’s no charge. It’s a research project…”
His father closed a box and slid it back among the others. “Will it help?”
“I hope so. She was recommended by the psychologist I saw in Nice. He certainly helped me…”
“Of course I shall sign. I am grateful to those who are helping you. I shan’t say anything to your mother.”
“Thanks Dad. I’ll just pack this stuff and then I’ll get it for you.” This confirmed that he could trust his father. “Can Peter and the boys show me the town?”
His father nodded. “Just don’t be late for supper!”
With the boots, books and files taken to his room and Dr Callendar’s papers signed he called his brothers. As soon as they were out of the house they became more relaxed and showed him a town of soft red brick houses with pantiled roofs and the ambience of Beatrix Potter and Kenneth Graham and Jane Austen surviving into the mid-twentieth century. There was a haberdashers and a corn and seed merchant and a Butter Cross on the Market Place. There were at least two coaching inns, numerous pubs, one church with a soaring tower, another in flint with a round Saxon tower, a Catholic church, several chapels, three, maybe four, banks, a Police Station, a Post Office, a printing works, a maker of sheepskin coats, a butcher, baker, greengrocer, newsagent, chemists, agricultural engineers, solicitors and garages, all clustering around the skirts of Bigod’s Castle. It was a surprise after the declining holiday resort cum fishing port that they had left.
As they roamed, Peter talked about wanting to go to art school and the arguments he had with both parents who were insisting he should want to go to university, preferably using his artistic talent to study Architecture. Chris, who would be taking Common Entrance in the coming year, wanted to go to Bedales like a friend, but their mother was insisting he follow his older brothers. Roger talked enthusiastically about Narnia and little else but Marcus felt sure he too was far from happy.
The atmosphere changed immediately they returned. His brothers went to watch television as Sandie Shaw would be appearing on Ready, Steady, Go! Marcus decided to offer to help his mother with supper.
“You said you have a job?” she said as he was peeling potatoes.
“Yes, I started on Thursday.”
“I can’t understand why you threw up your job with the bank – you’d be in the West Indies by now.”
“Not for at least another year, and then only if I’d passed all the banking exams.”
“Yes, but working in a furniture shop!”
The acid comment stung, as he guessed was the intention. “It’s just to keep me going while I take revision classes at the Poly.”
“And then what? I doubt they’d want you at medical school.”
He almost thanked her for that comment. He was reminded of a late-night conversation with Sophie in the sluice a year ago. She had not been surprised that none of the London hospital medical schools had offered him a place: he wasn’t the son of a doctor or been sponsored by one of their graduates. “I guess you’re right…”
“Then what are you going to do? You have to go to university.”
“You’re right,” he repeated.
“Good! But to do what?”
“I was interested in Archaeology at school…”
“Archaeology! What sort of profession is that? Your father would be horrified!”
“I didn’t say that was what I’m planning to do, Mum! The Poly has got careers advisers. I shall go and see them… And I’m thinking of joining the TA.”
“The TA? Why? Why waste your time on that?”
“You get paid …” Although initially surprised by her objection, it reminded him that she had opposed his joining the Army Cadets at the Grammar and not been at all happy when he joined the CCF after going to boarding school. He was definitely not going to mention Armand or Dr Callendar! “But maybe I won’t. Anything else you want me to peel or chop?”
After supper and washing up he and his brothers played Monopoly while she watched the Mike and Bernie Winters’ Show. They beat him and accused him of not trying hard enough. Nice irony he thought as he went to bed.
Sunday, 4th September.
Leaving home again
Marcus excused himself from having to go to church by saying the only clothes he had were those he was wearing and guessing that his mother would not risk small town disapprobation. He then asked if Peter might be excused to show him more of the town. Since they had seen most of the town the day before, Peter led him across the Common to show him where Rider Haggard had lived. They explored the derelict brewery in Ditchingham and the maltings that bore fading signs from its use as an ammunition store by the Americans in the war. They walked back along the abandoned railway, climbed the water tower at the derelict railway station and climbed over the ruins of Bigod’s castle that still dominated the town.
Sunday lunch was another fraught family meal. Conversation was mostly either transactional or disputatious, mostly friendly but never intimate. He could remember no time when it had not been like this - so why was he recognising it now? Probably because he had been away for a year, he decided. He had only been at Mrs B’s a few days but the talk around the table there was sociable while here it was like being at school when teachers join the table. This might be something to talk about with Dr Callendar?
After lunch he was taken to Halesworth station with his bag of papers and books in the boot and his brothers on the back seat. After they had dropped him off, they would continue to Sunday tea in Southwold. The twenty minute drive to the station was passed in tense silence punctuated with ‘are you sure you’ve got everything you came for?’ and ‘we’re glad you are stable again.’ He had had to breathe deep not to respond to that.
His mother and brothers came with him to the platform. The train was on time. He boarded and stood at the open window as the train began to move. He waved. His brothers waved back. His mother seemed not to see him and turned away towards the exit. He went to find a seat. The whole time he had been at home she had seemed animatedly distant, avoiding anything personal. He didn’t understand why she disliked him so much but whatever the reason, he had doubtless brought it on himself. Something else to discuss with Dr Callendar?
Fields slid past the window. Straw bales dotted the stubble. In one field men were piling them onto a trailer. In another smoke drifted across the line but in the next the stubble was being ploughed in, rather than burned. He was reminded of Geography lessons and Coke’s crop rotation and an agricultural patchwork of farms with grand barns and milking sheds surrounded by five and ten acre fields. As Marcus watched the countryside passing by there was little evidence of that remaining. Hedges had been grubbed up and the fields become prairies. That, he supposed, was progress.
At Ipswich he crossed the platform to wait for the London train. It was late and surprisingly busy. He sat on his two big bags in the vestibule, opened the window to clear the smell from the lavatory. By the time he got back to Fitzroy Square and carried the two increasingly heavy bags all the way to the top floor he was tired and annoyed with himself. It was a good thing that he met no-one on the stairs. As always, it felt as if the anger was trying to grasp something or someone that was just out of reach or, like an annoying child, too nimble to catch. Would Dr Callendar expect him to tell things like this? Or would she give him the inventories marked up and graded like exam scripts and classify him as a sex-obsessed degenerate?
Back at Mrs B’s
He dumped the two bags of Physics and Chemistry books and notes from school by the end of his bed and closed the door. Had his brief visit home been worthwhile? It had not helped him with understanding of the reason for his expulsion. That had to be about more than failing some exams, admitting to having had sex and receiving letters from girls. But that was something had not been able to bring himself to ask. He flopped onto the bed. How stupid was he? He looked at the bags of books and papers he had brought back and checked his watch - half an hour to supper - might as well start sorting them, he decided.
“Thought you’d forgotten us,” said Mrs B when Marcus rushed down late for supper. “How was your weekend – get what you wanted?”
“Yes, it was good to see my brothers too.”
“Good to hear. Soup’s Mulligatawny, should be some left. And Freddie Lehrman’s back from France.”
Doctor H was at the head, Elaine to her right, Ambrose to her left, Tancred next to him and a man with a lot of grey hair, steel rimmed spectacles and a green corduroy jacket at the foot.
“I’m Freddie,” the man said, holding out his hand as Marcus slid into the remaining empty chair. “Freddie Lehrman, number two. You must be Marcus. Mrs B told me you’ve just come from France too.”
“Yes,” Marcus nodded, serving himself from the tureen. “Just been to see my parents’ new house....” he added and, not wanting to elaborate, began to eat. The others were going to get their main course.
He finished the soup quickly, put the bowl on the trolley and went to the kitchen to be served.
“Glass of wine?” Freddie offered as Marcus sat down again. “Not a bad Bordeaux. Brought it back from Paris.”
“Thank you,” Marcus went to get himself a glass.
Freddie poured a generous amount. “Good weekend?”
“It was good to see my brothers before they go back to school.” Marcus put his head down and began eating. He didn’t want to appear rude, but he was hungry.
Mrs Bettevant had told him that Freddie’s pen-name was Julian Rattray, that he had written several books, pieces for magazines and newspapers, was a ghostwriter and had contributed to several films and television shows. What on earth could he say that might interest this man? He had to say something. It was very discomfiting being watched eating!
In desperation he blurted “you wrote Operation Telemachus didn’t you?”
“I did,” Freddie replied, the note of his voice changing, sounding cautious. “It’s been out of print for ten years. How did you come across it?”
“It was in the history section on the travelling library bus back home. I’d been reading Bagnold’s Libyan Sands and the blurb on your book said you’d been in the LRDG – did you know him?”
“Did I know Bagnold? He was a Brigadier and I had two pips. I knew of him. What did you think of Libyan Sands?”
“Amazing! What I remember is how he writes about the desert and how well prepared he was for his expeditions. Got me into reading people like Thesiger and Gertrude Bell – and Lawrence, of course.”
“So you’re a history buff? What do you remember of my book?”
“I didn’t know anything about Greek partisans. I’d read about the Yugoslavs and Tito, but I didn’t realise Communists were so strong in Greece. And I hadn’t realised we were so involved either. The massacres and betrayals shocked me.”
“Civil wars are never pleasant and Greece is still suffering… Anyway! I’m glad to have met someone your age who has read it.”
“I’m thrilled to have met the man who wrote it!” Marcus exclaimed. He sensed he had somehow embarrassed Freddy - but had no idea why. People his parents’ age never wanted to talk about their own youth. He had to shift the focus. “Mrs B says your new book’s doing really well.”
“That’s kind of her. But it is doing better than the previous two, so I shan’t complain.” Seizing the bottle by the neck and taking his half-full glass, Freddy stood up, his chair tottering. “I’m off to my room – but I’ll give you a copy, if you like?”
“Thank you.” Had he offended him? Marcus would have welcomed a conversation.
“Don’t mind him love,” Mrs Bettevant said as she passed with a pile of plates.
Her tone seemed protectively maternal, he thought, finishing the hotpot and turning his attention to a bowl of jam roly-poly. In the few days he had been living in her house he was noticing that she treated each of her residents like… not a mother hen… more like a curator … of what? Interesting people? And if that, he was the odd one out, the exception that proved the rule
Emerging from the basement stairs he reached the foot of the grand staircase just as Elaine came bounding down two steps at a time closely followed by Tancred. They looked like the wild children in the old edition of Peter Pan he had read in his lonely first weeks as a boarder.
“Marcus!” Elaine whooped the instant she saw him. “We’re going to Liza’s –come with us?”
Who was Liza? Were they going to a party? Elaine had ribbons in her hair and a dress seemingly made of coloured scarves while Tancred’s jacket had a sheen like neon silk. Marcus was embarrassedly aware that he looked more like an off-duty chartered accountant. “Thanks, but…” he pointed up the stairs.
“Next time then!” Elaine skipped past, heaving the heavy front door open, pulling Tancred after her.
Marcus has made progress but much work and some difficult decisions still lie ahead. For the present he is putting his effort into practical problems but there is still much to do, most especially to deal with his continuing emotional turmoil. His hope is that Dr Callendar will be able to provide the developmental support that Armand showed him was possible…
The story continues with Tranche Fourteen…