The Air Raid Book Club(17)
On Sunday morning, Gertie tapped against Hedy’s door at a little after eight o’clock. “Good morning, dear. I’m making breakfast for us. Something to set you up for the day before you head off with Betty.”
There was a grunt from the other side of the door.
“It will be ready in about half an hour.”
Half an hour came and went, and Hedy failed to appear. Gertie stood at the bottom of the stairs. “Breakfast time!” she cried with barely masked impatience.
A minute or so later she heard Hedy stomping down the stairs. She was wearing her dressing gown and a scowl as she sat down at the table. Gertie placed the plate in front of her.
“Kippers,” she said. “They’re an English delicacy.”
Hedy stared at the plate in bewilderment. “I am not hungry,” she muttered.
“You have to eat,” said Gertie. “And we can’t waste food.”
She picked up her knife and fork and began to attack the rubbery fish. As she placed a forkful into her mouth, her eyes widened. She’d forgotten how horribly bony they were. It was as if her mouth were full of smoked shoe leather.
“Excuse me,” she said, rising to her feet and hurrying from the room. When she returned, Hedy’s plate was empty, and Hemingway was looking very pleased with himself.
“Delicious,” said Hedy with an innocent expression.
“I tried to feed her kippers, Charles,” she wailed into the telephone after Hedy had left. “I don’t even like kippers. What is wrong with me?”
“Nothing, Gertie. You’re trying your best. Perhaps you’re trying a little too hard. It will take a while for you to get used to having another person in the house, and it’s difficult for Hedy too.”
“I know. I know. I’m sorry. I need to give it time, but you know how impatient I am.”
“Are you, Gertie Bingham?” teased Charles. “I had no idea.”
Gertie laughed. “That’s enough about me. How are you?”
“Busy. I’m going back to Germany next week to help bring over another trainload of children.”
“You’re a good man, Charles Ashford.”
“And you’re a good woman, Gertie Bingham. Give it time with Hedy. You’re still getting to know each other. It’s been a while since you’ve had to share your living quarters with anyone. You’ll be firm friends in no time.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“Trust me. I know you.”
Gertie sensed he was right about that part at least. She had always felt as if Charles Ashford knew her better than she knew herself. It was as if he could see into people’s souls. Her brother, Jack, had summed it up perfectly when Gertie introduced them amid the opulent luxury of the Savoy’s River Restaurant many moons ago.
“It’s strange, but I feel as if I already know you,” he said as they shook hands. “Or rather, you already know me.”
They had been there to celebrate Gertie’s twenty-fourth birthday. Her parents had been out of town at the funeral of a distant relative, so Jack had been sent to chaperone Gertie. She had swallowed down her irritation and persuaded her father to let her invite Charles to make up a four with Harry.
The evening hadn’t been the rip-roaring success that Gertie hoped. Encouraged by her mother, she had worn an uncharacteristically showy cream silk gown decorated with cascading lilac wisteria and sage-green foliage. She had felt like an empress as they swept in through the entrance of the Savoy and then immediately peeved when Harry didn’t tell her that she looked like one. He was too busy tugging at the collar of the evening suit he’d borrowed from Charles’s brother with obvious discomfort and proclaiming astonishment at how expensive everything was.
At the end of the evening, when Harry went to fetch their coats and Jack predictably disappeared to the American Bar after spotting an old chum, Charles turned to ask if she’d enjoyed her evening. Gertie had looked into his engaging blue eyes and bared her soul: the fact that she was still very young, that Harry seemed so uncomfortable in this world, and her worry that life was moving a little too fast toward the inevitability of marriage. She was almost breathless when she finished. Charles had smiled with careful kindness as he spoke.
“My dear Gertie, I can’t tell you what you should do, but I do know this.”
Gertie straightened her shoulders, ready to listen.
“Firstly, and I confess I’m a little envious of this fact, I can’t remember ever meeting a couple who fit so perfectly together. And secondly, I can honestly say, hand on heart, that there is no kinder, truer, finer man anywhere than Harry Bingham.”
“Gosh, that was a hairy moment. I thought they’d lost your shawl, Gertie,” said Harry, returning from the cloakroom.
As their eyes met, Gertie realized two things: she would never find a man who loved her as much as he, and Charles Ashford would always tell her the truth.
“I do trust you, Charles,” she told him now on the phone. “And I’ll do my best to be patient.”
“You’ll be marvelous, Gertie. You always are.”
Later that afternoon, Gertie went into Hedy’s room to dust. She was impressed by the way her guest had made her bed with neatly folded corners, pillows plumped, and the eiderdown smoothed. It was clear that Else Fischer had taught her daughter well. Gertie was also pleased to see the upside-down copy of Pride and Prejudice by her bedside, although she couldn’t resist marking Hedy’s place with a ribbon from the dressing table before closing it again. Gertie’s vision of hell was a shelf-lined room full of books with cracked spines.