First Friends Read Free Page B

spend enough time with Mark to enable her to discover what lay beneath the veneer that the Navy had given him. She and Cass had been to balls and parties, all imbued with an aura of glamour and a sense of sacrifice and even danger. They were so proud to accompany these young men who were prepared to give their lives for their country.
    Kate remembered, too, their first clumsy attempts at lovemaking. Mark had once bragged about his various sexual exploits in Sweden which hadn’t helped, serving only to make Kate feel more shy, afraid that unfavourable comparisons were being made. It was only afterwards that she realised that it couldn’t have been of much benefit to Mark either since he seemed as inept and nervous as she was. She tried now, staring into the dark, to imagine him beside her but it was quite impossible. It would be like starting all over again from the beginning. A guest at the wedding had said that all the homecomings would be like lots of honeymoons which, at the time, had sounded exciting. Now it seemed merely terrifying.
    She slept fitfully, waking suddenly at intervals having dreamt that she’d overslept. Finally, wrapping herself in her dressing gown, she went into the kitchen to make a cup of tea and to struggle with the solid fuel stove. It was just six o’clock.
    By eight o’clock, she had prepared all the vegetables, made a pudding and had even set the table for dinner lest there should be no time later on. She dressed carefully and forced herself to eat some toastwhile she wondered how early she could telephone the base. Mark had told her that although the date of the submarine’s return was known, no one would know the time that it would actually arrive until the last moment. The form was, he explained, to telephone the hall porter in
Dolphin
, tell him who she was and give him the name of Mark’s submarine. He would give her the latest ETA to which she must add an hour to allow Mark to get away from the boat and reach home. He had not suggested that she should come to meet him.
    By nine o’clock she could contain her impatience no longer. She pulled on her old duffel coat and walked out to the telephone box at the end of the road. The hall porter’s voice was brisk and efficient as he took her call.
    â€˜That’s right, ma’am,’ he said. ‘She’s due back any time, isn’t she? Hold on a moment.’ She could hear the rustle of papers. ‘Here we are. Oh, dear.’ His tone changed to one of regret. ‘I’m sorry, her programme’s been changed and she’s spending forty-eight hours in Middlesborough on the way down. She won’t be in for another two days.’
    Kate tried to grapple with this totally unforeseen situation.
    â€˜Hello? Are you there?’ The hall porter sounded concerned. ‘It’s very disappointing but you’ll get used to it, ma’am. Didn’t your husband warn you that they rarely keep to their first ETA?’
    â€˜No. No, he didn’t mention it.’ She barely recognised her own voice. ‘Thank you so much. I’ll telephone on Thursday.’
    She went back home, barely aware of her surroundings. This moment had been the focal point of her existence for the last few weeks and the shock of the disappointment had the power to make her feel as though she had stepped into thin air, all her sense of purpose gone. In the hall she stood quite still, listening to the silence.
    How could she possibly exist through another two days? And why did two days seem so much longer and more impossible to survive than the two months she had already lived through? She went into the sitting room and put away the table settings and then changed out of her smart clothes, pulling on an old tweed skirt and a Guernsey. Finally, letting herself out of the flat, she walked slowly towards the sea.
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    â€˜Y OU’LL GET USED TO it,’ said Mary nearly a week later when, after more