Between Friends Page 25

  But how to say this to Meg without making her think he was deserting Tom, the Tom who had never yet been left out of any of their excursions, at least not deliberately but Meg saved him the dilemma of it by clapping her hand to her head.

  ‘Oh, I forgot! He told me he had to go over to the home farm. I can’t remember what for but he’d promised Jack Tabner …’

  ‘Oh, what a shame, but never mind, Meggie. He can come next time for there will be a next time, don’t you fret. We’ll make a pact that when I’m home we’ll all go to the “Delly” for a slap-up meal, on me of course,’ he finished magnanimously.

  They lingered, as seemed to be the way of those about them, over their coffee. The lights were soft and the diners, mellowed perhaps by the magnificence of the food they had eaten and the fine wine they had drunk talked quietly. The laughter was muted, the waiters hovered attentively, unobtrusively, ready, should they be needed to pour another cup of coffee, to light a cigar. They were easy with one another, their long association as children and through their adolescence giving them the unruffled facility to talk, or not; to laugh together over half-forgotten memories, to be unhurried, companionable, to listen.

  ‘And your designing, Martin?’ Meg said at last, her tawny eyes dreaming through the candlelight into his. ‘What of that? Will you spend more time on it or are you to go on racing?’

  Her world away from this one with Martin was momentarily forgotten, her anxious dread of Benjamin Harris, her unease for Tom’s safety, her absurd – she was certain of it – belief that Harris might harm them both, were all put aside in the wonder of these incredible hours Martin had created for her. It was enchantment, a magical span of time cut out of the routine of the days and weeks of her life, polished and glittering and unique and she meant to remember it, cherish it, to put it away carefully with her other few, lovely memories. Like the bicycle ride to the Wirral Peninsula and Tom with buttercups in his hair; the first birthday she had spent in Great George Square when Mrs Whitley had made her a birthday cake with eleven candles on the iced perfection of its top, the first she had ever had; the Shrove Tuesday fun at Lime Street station! Not many yet but she would have more, many more, she knew she would. When she had drawn together all the threads of the ideas she had been weaving for the past few months in her active mind. She might present a submissive, obedient face to those for whom she laboured but behind it her brain was not docile, nor stagnant and when the time came, she would be ready with them.

  She watched Martin’s face change at her question. The ease in it altered and formed into an ambiguous hesitation, not of purpose for that would never vary, but of direction of that purpose. In just that fraction of a second it was all there to see but Meg was not yet mature enough to read it.

  He sighed pensively, leaning back into his chair and a shadow blurred his face to a gypsy-like darkness. ‘I love racing, Meg, I really do! You have no idea of the … the feeling you get when you know you are moving faster than man has ever moved before. Not just the thrill of it but the knowledge that it’s you who is in control of the machine which is moving you at such speed. That it is your skill … and daring, I suppose, that is the source of it. We are unique, you know,’ it was said without arrogance, or even pride, just a statement of fact, ‘those of us who race. Not many can do it. Not many have the guts to do it,’ he smiled, ‘or the sheer bloody madness, but … well … I don’t know how to describe it. It … it gets into your blood and before you know it you can’t seem to do without it. It distracts you from what you really want to do …’

  ‘Build your own motor car?’

  ‘Yes! You have no conception Meggie, no man has who hasn’t done it, even Mr Robert, of the … the intoxication, the sensation, Jesus, and then when it’s over and you’ve won … they go wild, those who come to watch you. They treat you like a god … wanting to … to touch you and … give you things … presents. It’s hard to remember sometimes that this isn’t really what I set out to do. I thought it would be a step towards it. A means of getting into motoring, making money, making a start on my own ideas, and it has been. I’m very grateful to Mr Robert, believe me but somehow I’ve been side-tracked, led down another route …’

  He made an impatient gesture with his hands and shrugged his broad shoulders. His face was pensive, irritable almost. ‘I’ve got to make up my mind to it. I’ve got to convince Mr Robert that though it’s very enjoyable, great fun really, especially for him because it’s his hobby, it’s to be my work. I’ll have to be quick, Meg. The trouble is there are so many in it now. America, Italy, France, Germany and here. So many new, good designs. Ten years ago, when it was just beginning … if I’d been old enough then …’

  ‘But surely you can’t mean that there’s no room for you …’

  ‘No … it’s not that but …’

  ‘Well what then?’

  Meg looked bewildered. All her life she had listened to this young man who sat across the table from her agitating the very air about him with his determination to ‘be in on it’ in the world of motoring. He had worked towards nothing else. He had lived, breathed, eaten, drunk and dreamed about the automobile and it’s potential to change the world, his potential to change the world and now he seemed to be saying he was – surely not? – having doubts! Was that what he was saying? She couldn’t believe it! Dear Lord, Martin would not be Martin without his head beneath the bonnet of a motor car, his hands covered in grease, a spanner in one and whatever tool mechanics used for whatever it was they did, in the other, his face serious and stern in the business of maintaining, cleaning, building the machines he loved!

  He leaned across the table and took her hands in his and his face was rapt and she felt herself drawn closer, a magnet compelled to another, her own will submerged by his. His voice was soft as he spoke.

  ‘I’ve got an idea for a new racing car. She’s a machine with formidable power with a capacity of ten and a half litres. She could travel comfortably at under twenty miles an hour in top gear and pull away while the engine is still turning over at a little over a thousand revs per minute.’ Whatever is he talking about, Meg had time to wonder wildly when he was off again.

  ‘She’ll have disc wheels, a radiator cowl and a stream-lined body which will give her the advantage of tremendous speed. The “Darracq” we’ve been racing, the one we call “Hemingway flyer”, is superb and she’s won us a few trophies but I want to design and race my own car …’

  ‘Well, why shouldn’t you, Martin?’ Meg hung on his every word in the most gratifying way but Martin’s young, joyous face became solemn, scowling almost and he sighed heavily. Leaning back in his chair he looked down at the table and began to fiddle with the silver spoon in the saucer of his coffee cup. His left hand was pushed deep in his trouser pocket and he gave the impression of a small boy, truculent and slouching, who could not get his own way.

  ‘Money! that’s why, Megan, bloody money!’

  ‘But Mr Hemingway …’

  ‘Needs a lot of persuading! He loves racing and he’s as proud as punch when the “Flyer” wins but he can’t see any reason to design a car of our own. It would take time, you see, time we could spend racing and that’s what he hasn’t got! The season starts soon and he wants to be there, wherever there’s a race, flags flying and him hopping up and down like some elderly small boy. Oh, I can see his point but I’m not in my seventies! I’m nineteen with my life before me and I’m going to make my mark on it. I’ve got to persuade him, Meg, I’ve just got to but whatever I say he just puts me off. And then there’s flying!’

  ‘Lord save us all …’

  ‘Have you heard of the Wright brothers, Meggie?’

  ‘No, I can’t say I have …’

  ‘No, you wouldn’t! Not many have … it’s so new really …’

  ‘What is?’

  ‘Flying!’

  ‘Flying?’

  She was hypnotised, her eyes unblinkingly held by the power of his.

  ‘It’s f
ive years now since they flew their aircraft, a controlled flight, you understand, in North Carolina, but it’s still young, flying I mean. It’s only this year that the first recognised flight was made in this country and that was by an American! Orville Wright took his first passenger up last week, Meggie, and they covered almost two and a half miles in three minutes and forty seconds. A passenger, a paying passenger. Can you not see where it will lead? Dear Sweet Lord, the potential is overwhelming! Passengers, freight, going … well … all over the world!’

  ‘Martin …!’

  He squeezed her hands until they turned white and his excitement was a living thing. ‘I love the motor car, Meg. I always have and at first I couldn’t understand why it was I had been … diverted, first by racing and now by the idea of flying. Then I realised that the two are really the same in a way. It’s not the automobile, nor the airplane but the engine, the movement, the structure!’

  He stopped suddenly, aware that around him people were beginning to turn their heads, to stare in astonishment at the young man who was raising his voice so unusually. He had been carried on the cresting wave of his own joy in the discovery of his purpose in life.

  He looked superb that evening in his black dinner jacket which was now increasingly fashionable, replacing the tailcoat. It had wide, pointed, double breasted lapels and beneath it he wore a white piqué waistcoat, a white pintucked shirt and a black bow tie. The trousers, without turnups and decorated down the outside seam of the leg with a row of black braid, matched his jacket. He had bought the outfit ready made, the jacket costing him 1.15.6d and the trousers 1.13.11d. Both fitted as though they had been made for him. When he leaned towards Meg the muscles across his back and shoulders were clearly outlined beneath the smoothness of the twilled worsted and as he stood when Meg left the table it was noticed that he had exceedingly shapely calves! Though he was with an extremely pretty girl – and not a few ladies envied her – numerous pairs of feminine eyes glanced slyly in his direction, watching his mobile, smiling mouth, his firm brown skin warmed in the candlelight and the movement of his long fingered hands as he caressed the brandy glass he held. His masculine vitality coursed just beneath his skin, restrained by the occasion and his surroundings but it was very evident in the narrowed depths of his brown eyes, in the graceful indolence of his long, hard body, in the tumble of his thick brown hair which he flicked carelessly back from his forehead that in different circumstances and, those who watched him covertly were certain, with a different partner, Martin Hunter would be a superb lover. They could not have said exactly why, though he was a remarkably attractive young man, but in that inexplicable way some men – and women – have, an excitement which is completely of the flesh, he seemed to tell every woman how it would be for them – with him!

  ‘I’m going to fly, Meggie,’ he whispered. ‘That’s what I’m going to do. Find out what holds it up! What makes it lift itself into the air. I know about engines and construction so what’s to stop me from finding about that too?’ He leaned further forward until his nose was almost in the fluttering flame of the candle and Meg’s eyes reflected the dancing glow in their depths and for a breathless moment Martin’s attention was diverted from his own bewitchment and he found himself wondering … wondering … what was it that he wondered about …?

  ‘What is it, Martin?’ she breathed, breaking his oddly confusing thoughts and putting them back together.

  ‘In January we were in California. We’d gone to a circuit there, a race meeting but in the evening Mr Hemingway had to see someone. I can’t remember what it was … or who … so I was on my own. There was an aeroplane meeting organised by the Aero Club of California at a place called Dominguez Field in Los Angeles.’

  He paused and the whole room seemed to hold its breath, waiting one supposed, on the stupendous confidence he was about to divulge.

  ‘I went, Meg. I went to see what it was all about and that was it! I was … enchanted!’ He looked shame-faced for it was such an absurd word for a grown man to use then his face cleared and he lifted his head, his expression perilous as though daring anyone, anyone to laugh.

  ‘I’m going to design that racing car, Meggie, and build her and I’m going to make Mr Robert see what a glory she will be! But first I’m going to get him up in an airplane because after racing a motor car I believe flying must be the nearest thing to … to …’ He could find no word to describe what he was feeling. He was a young man, articulate, confident, more and more at ease with those he lived and worked beside but now he was speechless, mindless almost at the need which was in him and he could do no more than stare across the table through the candle’s flame into Meg’s wide, brilliant eyes and in them he saw her positive understanding, her absolute belief that he would do it!

  He relaxed, the tension draining out of him, his dreams resting peacefully now within him, the sureness that he would bring them to life strengthened by this girl who knew him so well and who had always, always believed in him. He wondered why it was she had the ability to bring him such release and he also wondered, smiling inwardly, how Jenny would have reacted if he had poured out his heart to her as he had just done with Meg!

  ‘Megan Hughes,’ he said and his strong face was quite gentle now and the affection he felt for her shone in his eyes. ‘Megan Hughes …’ He shook his head, smiling.

  She smiled too. ‘What now?’

  ‘You’re a sight for sore eyes, d’you know that, our Meg and although you’ve not said much except “oh Martin” …’ he began to laugh, ‘… you make me feel there’s nothing in this world I can’t do!’

  ‘There isn’t, Martin.’ Her face was quite serious.

  ‘And you, Meggie? What are you going to do?’ He leaned towards her and his commanding face, so often concerned only with what Martin Hunter wanted, was genuinely concerned for her. ‘Will you stay at Silverdale and become housekeeper and have all the servants running after you, shaking in their boots at the sound of your voice?’

  ‘Oh no!’

  ‘You sound very certain.’

  ‘I am!’

  ‘Go on then. Tell me what great plans you’ve got …’

  ‘Don’t laugh, Martin. I didn’t laugh at you.’

  Instantly he was contrite and he reached across the table for her hand but she was offended now and drew back.

  ‘I’m sorry, Meg. Don’t pull away. I meant no harm and I wasn’t laughing at you. It’s been such a … a grand evening. I feel good, Meggie and when I feel good I smile and say daft things. You know that!’

  She relaxed, flattered somehow by what he said and she put her hand back in his, then grinned and he knew he was forgiven.

  They talked easily for another half hour, forgetting the time and when they remembered it in the bustle of attending to the bill, of running hand in hand to the Vauxhall, of starting her up and singing all the way back to Silverdale, Martin completely overlooked Meg’s failure to answer his question.

  Chapter Seventeen

  IT WAS TWO weeks before her seventeenth birthday when she finally made up her mind to speak to Mr Hemingway. They were home again, he and Martin from God only knew where this time, somewhere up north doing trials in readiness for the French Grand Prix she had heard, but if she did not look sharp Mr Hemingway, who was to be home for three days only would be gone again and her opportunity missed. She did not know why she did not consider Mrs Hemingway. Perhaps it was the old lady’s vague though kindly manner, her quaint state of always appearing to be in another world, an unworldly world in which she would not have the slightest idea on advising Meg how to go about it.

  Young Mr Hemingway, Mr Charles Hemingway – who had never been as interested as his father, nor did he have the time, he said, to chase about the world in the pursuit of the thrill of racing – was a distant figure in Meg’s world, seen only at the dinner table where she served, aloof and somewhat forbidding, and his wife, young Mrs Hemingway was the same. There was often talk, respectful naturally, in the kitche
n, on the difference between father and son and the two Mrs Hemingways, but then the old gentleman was retired and had time for a chat and a joke with his servants and Mr Charles was concerned, as head of a vast shipping empire, with its daily running and could not be expected to do the same. So Megan waited, knowing instinctively that it was the old gentleman she should speak to. The months had gone by, the months in which her fear of Benjamin Harris, when he had made no further attempt to interfere in her life, had dwindled. It was a year since that day in the spinney and she let out her breath thankfully on the realisation that he really was gone, finally, from her life. She had seen Mrs Whitley housed and content. She had watched Tom settle like a dog in the sunshine, turning about a time or two but finding his place at last and Martin, well, she had no part in his life, in the making of it, nor in the defending of what he had already made of it. Her actions made no impression, had no influence on his and whatever she did, wherever she went, his work would continue just as it had for the past three years.