Page 67 of The Ship of Brides
‘He was the first person to tell me he loved me.’ Her eyes glittered with tears. ‘No one ever told me that. Not my mum. Never even met my dad.’ She pushed her hair off her face. ‘Nope. I got nothing back there, nothing. He’s the best man I ever met.’
They had sat, in near silence, for almost half an hour more, Margaret calling to the traders to come closer, to take these back, bring those over. She had bought, at ridiculous cost, two necklaces for Letty, telling herself they would be a lovely gift, knowing it was a feeble attempt to atone. As the heat grew fiercer, and the sun moved across, taking their vantage-point out of the shade, she thought about moving. But no entertainments had been planned for the day, owing to the former expectation that they would be ashore, and the thought of them bickering with each other in the little dormitory was unbearable.
She was squinting listlessly at a small propeller craft humming towards them, the naval cap of its skipper, the clumsy grey shapes on board, watching them become increasingly distinct as it drew closer. She heard exclamations along the length of the ship as other women realised what it was.
‘Girls!’ she yelled. ‘It’s the post! We’ve got post!’
An hour later, they sat in the canteen, the normally cabbage-scented air now thick with anticipation, as a Red Cross officer collected all mail to be sent and distributed small bundles of letters from a trestle table at the end. The announcement of each name was greeted with squeals from the recipient and her friends, as if she was being called up to collect an award, rather than correspondence. Around them the windows were propped open to allow the sea breezes to penetrate the room. The light bounced off them, echoing the glimmering ocean low.
Jean had been among the first called to the table: her impressive seven letters from Stan had restored some of her vitality. She had handed them to Frances, who read them aloud in her low, sonorous voice, while Jean puffed nervously at a cigarette. ‘Did you hear that?’ she kept interrupting. ‘My name tattooed on his right arm. In two colours! And it hurt like buggery.’
Margaret and Frances had exchanged a glance. ‘And,’ Frances continued, ‘he’s won four pounds in a boxing match. He says the other fellow’s idea of boxing involved trying to block Stan’s punches with his nose.’
‘Hear that?’ Jean nudged Margaret. ‘Trying to block punches with his nose!’ If her laughter was a little too high to suggest genuine mirth, no one said anything. It was enough that she was laughing at all.
Later Frances would confide that she had left out several paragraphs: those that warned Jean to ‘behave herself’, and the story of a sweetheart deserted by one of his friends once he heard she had been ‘playing fast and loose’.
‘Margaret O’Brien?’
Margaret was out of her chair with a speed that belied her cumbersome frame. Breathless, she launched herself at the sheaf of letters proffered towards her, and returned, glowing and triumphant, her failure to get ashore forgotten. She wondered, briefly, whether she could go to the cabin and read them in private without causing offence. But just as she was about to ask, she heard a chair scrape back, and looked up from the envelopes to see Avice seat herself carefully in front of them.
There was a brief pause. Margaret, a little taken aback that Avice had chosen to seat herself among them after the previous evening’s quarrel, wondered if she might be about to apologise.
‘I’ve got news,’ Avice said.
‘So have I,’ said Jean. ‘Look. Seven letters. Seven!’
‘No,’ said Avice. She had a contained smile on her face, as if she harboured some great secret. It was a different Avice from the furious, tight-lipped girl who had left their cabin several hours earlier. ‘I have real news,’ she said, her chin jutting out. ‘I’m expecting.’
There was a stunned silence.
‘Expecting what?’ said Jean.
‘A baby, of course. I’ve been to the doctor.’
‘Are you sure?’ said Frances. ‘Dr Duxbury doesn’t strike me as... the most reliable...’ She thought of the last time she had seen him, singing blindly into a stores cupboard.
‘Oh, so nurses know more than doctors now, do they?’
‘No, I’m just—’
‘Dr Duxbury has taken a blood test, but in the meantime he asked me lots of questions and did an examination. He’s pretty certain.’ She smoothed her hair and glanced around, perhaps hoping to impart such momentous news to a wider audience.
‘I guess it makes sense,’ said Margaret, ‘now I think about it.’
The two other women looked at each other.
Avice couldn’t retain her composure. Her face lit up, cheeks pink with excitement. ‘A baby! Can you imagine? I knew I couldn’t be seasick. I’ve been yachting loads of times and that didn’t make me ill. Margaret, you must tell me everything I need to buy. Do you think they sell baby clothes in England? I shall have to get Mummy to send over all sorts of things.’
Margaret stood up and reached over the table to hug her. ‘Avice,’ she said, ‘it’s great news. Congratulations. How wonderful for you both.’
‘Strewth,’ said Jean, wide-eyed. ‘So all that seasickness was really you expecting?’ She looked genuinely pleased. Frances hasn’t told her of Avice’s betrayal, Margaret thought, and felt suddenly sad for her.
‘He thinks I’m already nine or ten weeks along. I was rather shocked when he told me. But I’m so excited. Ian’s going to be thrilled. He’ll be such a good father,’ Avice trilled, one slim hand resting on her flat stomach, already lost in a vision of future family life.
Margaret marvelled at her ability to wipe out the events of the past hours.
‘Stan got a tattoo of my name,’ Jean told her, but Avice didn’t hear.
