Night Over Water Read online

  There was another reason why her heart leaped at the prospect of war. It would surely mean the end of the narrow, suffocating life she lived with her parents. She was bored, cramped and frustrated by their unvarying rituals and their pointless social life. She longed to escape and have a life of her own, but it seemed impossible: she was underage, she had no money, and there was no kind of work that she was fit for. But, she thought eagerly, surely everything would be different in wartime.

  She had read with fascination how in the last war women had put on trousers and gone to work in factories. Nowadays there were female branches of the army, navy and air force. Margaret dreamed of volunteering for the Auxiliary Territorial Service, the women’s army. One of the few practical skills she possessed was that she could drive. Father’s chauffeur, Digby, had taught her on the Rolls; and Ian, the boy who died, had let her ride his motorcycle. She could even handle a motor-boat, for Father kept a small yacht at Nice. The A.T.S. needed ambulance drivers and dispatch riders. She saw herself in uniform, wearing a helmet, astride a motorcycle, carrying urgent reports from one battlefield to another at top speed, with a photograph of Ian in the breast pocket of her khaki shirt. She felt sure she could be brave, given the chance.

  War was actually declared during the service, they found out later. There was even an air-raid warning at twenty-eight minutes past eleven, in the middle of the sermon, but it did not reach their village, and anyway it was a false alarm. So the Oxenford family walked home from church unaware that they were at war with Germany.

  Percy wanted to take a gun and go after rabbits. They could all shoot: it was a family pastime, almost an obsession. But of course Father turned down Percy’s request, for it was not done to shoot on Sundays. Percy was disappointed, but he would obey. Although he was full of devilment, he was not yet man enough to defy Father openly.

  Margaret loved her brother’s impishness. He was the only ray of sunshine in the gloom of her life. She often wished that she could mock Father as Percy did, and laugh behind his back, but she got too cross to joke about it.

  At home they were astonished to find a barefoot parlormaid watering flowers in the hall. Father did not recognize her. “Who are you?” he said abruptly.

  Mother said in her soft American voice: “Her name is Jenkins. She started this week.”

  The girl dropped a curtsy.

  Father said: “And where the devil are her shoes?”

  An expression of suspicion crossed the girl’s face and she shot an accusing look at Percy. “Please, your lordship, it was young Lord Isley.” Percy’s title was the Earl of Isley. “He told me parlormaids must go barefoot on Sunday out of respect.”

  Mother sighed and Father gave an exasperated grunt. Margaret could not help giggling. This was Percy’s favorite trick: telling new servants of imaginary house rules. He could say ridiculous things with a dead straight face, and the family had such a reputation for eccentricity that people would believe anything of them.

  Percy often made Margaret laugh, but now she was sorry for the poor parlormaid, standing barefoot in the hall and feeling foolish.

  “Go and put your shoes on,” Mother said.

  Margaret added: “And never believe Lord Isley.”

  They took off their hats and went into the morning room. Margaret pulled Percy’s hair and hissed: “That was a mean thing to do.” Percy just grinned: he was incorrigible. He had once told the vicar that Father had died of a heart attack in the night, and the whole village went into mourning before they found out it was not true.

  Father turned on the wireless, and it was then that they heard the news: Britain had declared war on Germany.

  Margaret felt a kind of savage glee rising in her breast, like the excitement of driving too fast or climbing to the top of a tall tree. There was no longer any point in agonizing over it: there would be tragedy and bereavement, pain and grief, but now these things could not be avoided. The die was cast and the only thing to do was fight. The thought made her heart beat faster. Everything would be different. Social conventions would be abandoned, women would join in the struggle, class barriers would break down, everyone would work together. She could taste the air of freedom already. And they would be at war with the Fascists, the very people who had killed poor Ian and thousands more fine young men. Margaret did not believe she was a vindictive person, but when she thought about fighting the Nazis she felt vengeful. The feeling was unfamiliar, frightening and thrilling.

  Father was furious. He was already portly and red-faced, and when he got mad he always looked as if he might burst. “Damn Chamberlain!” he said. “Damn and blast the wretched man!”

  “Algernon, please,” Mother said, reproving him for his intemperate language.

  Father had been one of the founders of the British Union of Fascists. He had been a different person then: not just younger, but slimmer, more handsome and less irritable. He had charmed people and won their loyalty. He had written a controversial book called Mongrel Men: The Threat of Racial Pollution, about how civilization had gone downhill since white people started to interbreed with Jews, Asians, Orientals and even Negroes. He had corresponded with Adolf Hitler, who he thought was the greatest statesman since Napoleon. There had been big house parties here every weekend, with politicians, foreign statesmen sometimes, and—on one unforgettable occasion—the king. The discussions went on far into the night, the butler bringing up more brandy from the cellar while the footmen yawned in the hall. All through the Depression, Father had waited for the country to call him to its rescue in its hour of need, and ask him to be prime minister in a government of national reconstruction. But the call never came. The weekend parties got fewer and smaller; the more distinguished guests found ways to dissociate themselves publicly from the British Union of Fascists; and Father became a bitter, disappointed man. His charm went with his confidence. His good looks were ruined by resentment, boredom and drink. His intellect had never been real: Margaret had read his book, and she had been shocked to find that it was not just wrong but foolish.

  In recent years his platform had shrunk to one obsessive idea: Britain and Germany should unite against the Soviet Union. He had advocated this in magazine articles and letters to the newspapers, and on the increasingly rare occasions when he was invited to speak at political meetings and university debating societies. He held on to the idea defiantly as events in Europe made his policy more and more unrealistic. With the declaration of war between Britain and Germany his hopes were finally dashed; and Margaret found in her heart a little pity for him, among all her other tumultuous emotions.

  “Britain and Germany will wipe one another out and leave Europe to be dominated by atheistical communism!” he said.

  The reference to atheism reminded Margaret of being forced to go to church, and she said: “I don’t mind, I’m an atheist.”

  Mother said: “You can’t be, dear. You’re Church of England.”

  Margaret could not help laughing. Elizabeth, who was close to tears, said: “How can you laugh? It’s a tragedy!”

  Elizabeth was a great admirer of the Nazis. She spoke German—they both did, thanks to a German governess who had lasted longer than most—and she had been to Berlin several times and twice dined with the Führer himself. Margaret suspected the Nazis were snobs who liked to bask in the approval of an English aristocrat.

  Now Margaret turned to Elizabeth and said: “It’s time we stood up to those bullies.”

  “They aren’t bullies,” Elizabeth said indignantly. “They’re proud, strong, purebred Aryans, and it’s a tragedy that our country is at war with them. Father’s right—the white people will wipe each other out and the world will be left to the mongrels and the Jews.”

  Margaret had no patience with this kind of drivel. “There’s nothing wrong with Jews!” she said hotly.

  Father held a finger up in the air. “There’s nothing wrong with the Jew—in his place.”

  “Which is under the heel of the jackboot, in
your—your Fascist system.” She had been on the point of saying “your filthy system,” but she suddenly got scared and bit back the insult: it was dangerous to get Father too angry.

  Elizabeth said: “And in your Bolshevik system the Jews rule the roost!”

  “I’m not a Bolshevik. I’m a socialist.”

  Percy, imitating Mother’s accent, said: “You can’t be, dear. You’re Church of England.”

  Margaret laughed despite herself; and once again her laughter infuriated her sister. Elizabeth said bitterly: “You just want to destroy everything that’s fine and pure, and then laugh about it afterward.”

  That was hardly worth a response; but Margaret still wanted to make her point. She turned to Father and said: “Well, I agree with you about Neville Chamberlain, anyway. He’s made our military position far worse by letting the Fascists take over Spain. Now the enemy is in the West as well as the East.”

  “Chamberlain did not let the Fascists take over Spain,” Father said. “Britain made a nonintervention pact with Germany, Italy and France. All we did was keep our word.”

  This was completely hypocritical, and he knew it. Margaret felt herself flush with indignation. “We kept our word while the Italians and the Germans broke theirs!” she protested. “So the Fascists got guns and the democrats got nothing ... but heroes.”

  There was a moment of embarrassed silence.

  Mother said: “I’m truly sorry that Ian died, dear, but he was a very bad influence on you.”

  Suddenly Margaret wanted to cry.

  Ian Rochdale was the best thing that ever happened to her, and the pain of his death could still make her gasp.

  For years she had been dancing at hunt balls with empty-headed young members of the squirearchy, boys who had nothing on their minds but drinking and hunting; and she had despaired of ever meeting a man of her own age who interested her. Ian had come into her life like the light of reason; and since he died she had been living in the dark.

  He had been in his final year at Oxford. Margaret would have loved to go to a university, but there was no possibility of her qualifying: she had never gone to school. However, she had read widely—there was nothing else to do!—and she was thrilled to find someone like herself, who liked talking about ideas. He was the only man who could explain things to her without condescension. Ian was the most clear-thinking person she had ever come across; he had endless patience in discussion; and he was quite without intellectual vanity—he never pretended to understand when he did not. She adored him from the very start.

  For a long time she did not think of it as love. But one day he confessed, awkwardly and with great embarrassment, uncharacteristically struggling to find the right words, finally saying: “I think I must have fallen in love with you—will it spoil everything?” And then she realized joyfully that she too was in love.

  He changed her life. It was as if she had moved to another country, where everything was different: the landscape, the weather, the people, the food. She enjoyed everything. The constraints and irritations of living with her parents came to seem minor.

  Even after he joined the International Brigade and went to Spain to fight for the elected socialist government against the Fascist rebels, he continued to light up her life. She was proud of him because he had the courage of his convictions, and was ready to risk death for the cause he believed in. Sometimes she would get a letter from him. Once he sent a poem. Then came the note that said he was dead, blown to bits by a direct hit from a shell; and Margaret felt that her life had come to an end.

  “A bad influence,” she echoed bitterly. “Yes. He taught me to question dogma, to disbelieve lies, to hate ignorance and to despise hypocrisy. As a result, I’m hardly fit for civilized society.”

  Father, Mother and Elizabeth all started talking at once, then stopped because none of them could be heard; and Percy spoke into the sudden silence. “Talking of Jews,” he said, “I came across a curious picture in the cellar, in one of those old suitcases from Stamford.” Stamford, Connecticut, was where Mother’s family lived. Percy took from his shirt pocket a creased and faded sepia photograph. “I did have a great-grandmother called Ruth Glencarry, didn’t I?”

  Mother said: “Yes—she was my mother’s mother. Why, dear, what have you found?”

  Percy gave the photograph to Father and the others crowded around to look at it. It showed a street scene in an American city, probably New York, about seventy years ago. In the foreground was a Jewish man of about thirty with a black beard, dressed in rough workingman’s clothes and a hat. He stood by a handcart bearing a grinding wheel. The cart was clearly lettered with the words REUBEN FISHBEIN—GRINDER. Beside the man stood a girl, about ten years old, in a shabby cotton dress and heavy boots.

  Father said: “What is this, Percy? Who are these wretched people?”

  “Turn it over,” said Percy.

  Father turned the picture over. On the back was written: RUTHIE GLENCARRY, NÉE FISHBEIN, AGED 10.

  Margaret looked at Father. He was utterly horrified.

  Percy said: “Interesting that Mother’s grandfather should marry the daughter of an itinerant Jewish knife grinder, but they say America’s like that.”

  “This is impossible!” Father said, but his voice was shaky, and Margaret guessed that he thought it was all too possible.

  Percy went on blithely: “Anyway, Jewishness descends through the female, so as my mother’s grandmother was Jewish, that makes me a Jew.”

  Father had gone quite pale. Mother looked mystified, a slight frown creasing her brow.

  Percy said: “I do hope the Germans don’t win this war. I shan’t be allowed to go to the cinema and Mother will have to sew yellow stars on all her ballgowns.”

  This was sounding too good to be true. Margaret peered intently at the words written on the back of the picture, and the truth dawned. “Percy!” she said delightedly. “That’s your handwriting!”

  “No, it’s not!” said Percy.

  But everyone could see that it was. Margaret laughed gleefully. Percy had found this old picture of a little Jewish girl somewhere and had faked the inscription on the back to fool Father. Father had fallen for it, too, and no wonder: it must be the ultimate nightmare of every racist to find that he has mixed ancestry. Serve him right.

  Father said, “Bah!” and threw the picture down on a table. Mother said, “Percy, really,” in an aggrieved voice. They might have said more, but at that moment the door opened and Bates, the bad-tempered butler, said: “Luncheon is served, your ladyship.”

  They left the morning room and crossed the hall to the small dining room. There would be overdone roast beef, as always on Sundays. Mother would have a salad: she never ate cooked food, believing that the heat destroyed the goodness.

  Father said grace and they sat down. Bates offered Mother the smoked salmon. Smoked, pickled or otherwise preserved foods were all right, according to her theory.

  “Of course, there’s only one thing to be done,” Mother said as she helped herself from the proffered plate. She spoke in the offhand tone of one who merely draws attention to the obvious. “We must all go and live in America until this silly war is over.”

  There was a moment of shocked silence.

  Margaret, horrified, burst out: “No!”

  Mother said: “Now I think we’ve had quite enough squabbling for one day. Please let us have lunch in peace and harmony.”

  “No!” Margaret said again. She was almost speechless with outrage. “You—you can’t do this. It’s—it’s ...” She wanted to rail and storm at them, to accuse them of treason and cowardice, to shout her contempt and defiance out loud; but the words would not come, and all she could say was: “It’s not fair!”

  Even that was too much. Father said: “If you can’t hold your tongue you’d better leave us.”

  Margaret put her napkin to her mouth to choke down a sob, pushed her chair back and stood up, and then fled the room.

  They had been pl
anning this for months, of course.

  Percy came to Margaret’s room after lunch and told her the details. The house was to be closed up, the furniture covered with dust sheets and the servants dismissed. The estate would be left in the hands of Father’s business manager, who would collect the rents. The money would pile up in the bank: it could not be sent to America because of wartime exchange control rules. The horses would be sold, the blankets moth-balled, the silver locked away.

  Elizabeth, Margaret and Percy were to pack one suitcase each: the rest of their belongings would be forwarded by a removal company. Father had booked tickets for all of them on the Pan American Clipper, and they were to leave on Wednesday.

  Percy was wild with excitement. He had flown once or twice before, but the Clipper was different. The plane was huge, and very luxurious: the newspapers had been full of it when the service was inaugurated just a few weeks ago. The flight to New York took twenty-nine hours, and everyone went to bed in the night over the Atlantic Ocean.

  It was disgustingly appropriate, Margaret thought, that they should depart in cosseted luxury when they were leaving their countrymen to deprivation, hardship and war.

  Percy left to pack his case and Margaret lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling, bitterly disappointed, boiling with rage, crying with frustration, powerless to do anything about her fate.

  She stayed in her room until bedtime.

  On Monday morning, while she was still in bed, Mother came to her room. Margaret sat up and gave her a hostile stare. Mother sat at the dressing table and looked at Margaret in the mirror. “Please don’t make trouble with your father over this,” she said.

  Margaret realized that her mother was nervous. In other circumstances this might have caused Margaret to soften her tone; but she was too upset to sympathize. “It’s so cowardly!” she burst out.

  Mother paled. “We’re not being cowardly.”

  “But to run away from your country when a war begins!”