Survivor Read online

  ‘I’m s-s-s-sorry,’ she stammered out, partly from being cold but also because she was in trouble. ‘I wanted you to be proud of me, that I could sail so well.’

  ‘You’d make us much more proud of you, if you were obedient,’ Belle said, getting up to start the engine. ‘If it wasn’t for Miss Quigley spotting you, we wouldn’t have known you were out here until it was too late. I hope you’ll take this as a warning and never go off anywhere again – in a boat, a car or walking – without first asking either me or your father if it’s alright.’

  ‘I won’t,’ she sobbed out. ‘Please don’t be angry with me.’

  Belle looked back at her daughter. She had snuggled into Etienne’s side, the way she used to do when she was five or six. Her hair had been pure blonde then but, in the last few years, it had become more coppery and curly and Belle kept it plaited tightly or it became an unruly mop. She had mastered a wide-eyed, butter-wouldn’t-melt look from an early age, which Belle and Etienne found endearing but sometimes worrying because she played both them and others with it. She was truly penitent, for now, but Belle was well aware that she was the kind of child who would never be meek and obedient. The very next time she took it into her head to do something that she shouldn’t, today’s lesson would be forgotten.

  When they’d been choosing a name for her and Etienne had suggested Mariette, because it was his mother’s name, he had laughingly told her it meant Little Rebel. Was it the name that made her behave that way?

  No baby was ever wanted more. Belle had been told when she lost a baby while married to her first husband, Jimmy Reilly, back in England that she was unlikely to be able to have any more children. As things turned out, with Jimmy being severely wounded in the war, and all the problems that brought with it, Belle accepted that she was never going to be a mother, and she tried very hard to put babies out of her mind. But she had never quite succeeded. It was always a sore place inside her, a constant source of sorrow.

  Then, right at the end of the war, Spanish flu flared up and, along with tens of thousands of others, Jimmy caught it and died, as did his Uncle Garth, Mog’s husband.

  Belle and Mog came to New Zealand to start a new life. And yet, young as Belle was, she had no expectations of finding another man to love. She once heard someone refer to her and Mog as the ‘Two English Widows’, and she guessed that was what everyone called them. She thought then that they would grow old together, making a living at dressmaking and millinery, and that the closest they would get to a child would be watching out for their neighbours’ children.

  Then Etienne, a man she had loved and thought had been killed in France, turned up looking for her. To this day she still considered it a miracle; she had accepted at that point in her life that she was never going to feel love and passion ever again.

  She had shocked the people of Russell by failing to hide her desire for the gallant Frenchman, but she didn’t care. She thought God – or just fate – had stepped in to make up for all the sorrow in the past. She was four months pregnant when they married, and no bride in history could ever have gone to the altar so proudly or joyfully.

  So much had happened since then – hardships, disappointments, periods of great anxiety. And yet, having Etienne at her side, and the joy that came with each of their three healthy, beautiful children, made even the most troubled times seem insignificant.

  But now, as Belle glanced over to Mariette again, she realized that children could bring even bigger heartaches than any of the bad things she’d experienced in the past. Mariette was far too brave and reckless for her own good, and as headstrong as both her parents. By the time she was fifteen or sixteen, her boldness and sense of adventure were likely to make her rebel against the quiet, sedate life here in Russell and search out excitement elsewhere. Belle knew only too well what dangers lay in wait for young girls, and just the thought that Mariette might be subjected to some of those made her blood run cold.

  Mog had taken the boys home, and left two blankets on the jetty. Etienne wrapped Mariette in one of them, put the other around his bare shoulders and, after securing the boat, he lifted Mariette into his arms to carry her home.

  Back at the house in Robertson Street, Mog and the boys were waiting on the veranda. The binoculars on the table were evidence that they’d been watching the rescue anxiously from the shore and had only returned home when they knew Mariette was safe.

  Mog was never one for dramatics; she just held out her arms for the shivering child and said she had a warm bath ready for her and that Etienne should get in it afterwards.

  ‘Are you going to smack her bottom?’ seven-year-old Noel asked, somewhat hopefully.

  Both boys had Belle’s dark hair, and their eyes were cobalt-blue, darker than hers, but they had their father’s facial expressions – suspicious, watchful. Yet neither of them was as adventurous as their elder sister. Etienne always laughed when that was remarked upon, and said, ‘Give them time!’

  ‘Don’t be silly, Noel,’ Alexis said. ‘She’s had enough of a fright nearly getting drowned.’

  Belle smiled at his superior tone. He used it often, as if to point out to Noel that he was a year older. He reminded Belle of her late mother, Annie, with his strong features and the same tendency to be frosty. But, fortunately, Alexis was sensible and could always be relied on to do as he was told.

  Later that evening, after the children had eaten their supper and gone to bed, Mog fetched the bottle of brandy she kept in the pantry, and poured a measure into three glasses.

  They were in the kitchen, the washing-up done and put away, darkness had fallen some time ago, but the golden glow of the oil lamp made it snug and conducive for a family talk.

  ‘I know you’re both worried about Mari,’ Mog said as she handed a glass each to Belle and Etienne. They had both been ominously quiet throughout the evening meal; all three children had picked up on it and had gone to bed without the usual delaying tactics. ‘But perhaps it was a good thing she had a bad scare today. I doubt she’ll be so quick to take such a risk again.’

  Mog had bought the little clapboard house when she and Belle first came to Russell, but Etienne had extended it considerably since he married Belle. They were still waiting for electricity to come to Russell, but the kitchen was now much bigger and there was a separate wash house with a copper to heat up water for both baths and washing clothes. Etienne had built two rooms on to the side of the house for Mog, which she could access from either the hall or from the veranda along the front of the house. Above Mog’s rooms were two new bedrooms, the boys sharing one and Mariette in the other.

  They told people Mog was Belle’s aunt, which was a far easier explanation than the truth. Mog had, in fact, worked as a maid for Annie Cooper, Belle’s mother, and had virtually brought Belle up. Years later, Mog had married Garth Franklin and Belle had married Garth’s nephew, Jimmy Reilly. Except for a couple of years when Belle was in America and Paris, and the time she spent as an ambulance driver in France during the war, she and Mog had always lived together. To Belle and Etienne’s children she had the role of much-loved grandmother. As such, her opinion about the children – or, indeed, any other family matter – was always valued.

  ‘I agree, Mog.’ Etienne nodded. ‘A bad scare is one of the best ways to teach a child about danger. Luckily, no real harm was done today, except to we adults. I think I would sooner be back in Ypres again than relive those heart-stopping moments while I was searching for Mari in the sea. I know it was the same for you on the shore, Mog, and poor Belle still looks shaken up.’

  ‘We should get rid of the dinghy,’ Belle burst out. ‘Maybe Mari will be too scared to do it again, but one of the boys might try.’

  Etienne took Belle’s hands in his and smiled in understanding. ‘We live in a place where the sea is an ever present danger, and we rely on boats to get about. It was the same for me as a boy in Marseille. I know it is far better to teach them to respect the dangers of the sea, and to handle a boat
well, than to try to keep them away.’

  ‘I agree. There is danger everywhere for children,’ Mog said. ‘Climbing trees, strangers who might wish to harm them, picking the wrong berries, infectious diseases, the list is endless. We can’t protect them from everything. You know that better than anyone, Belle!’

  Belle sighed. ‘Yes, I do, but I thought that by bringing our children up here, in such a beautiful place, the chances of anything bad happening would be lessened. Do you know what Mari said to me as I tucked her in tonight? “I’d like to be a heroine like Grace Darling, or Joan of Arc. I don’t want to work in the bakery or sew dresses.” If that’s the sort of thing she daydreams about, how on earth can we hope she’ll marry a good, hard-working man and have a parcel of children?’

  Etienne laughed. ‘She’s only eleven, Belle. I bet you had such daydreams too at that age.’

  ‘Only about making beautiful hats,’ Belle retorted. ‘I didn’t imagine rescuing people in a rowing boat, or leading a country to war.’

  ‘I used to dream of meeting Queen Victoria,’ Mog said. ‘What about you, Etienne?’

  ‘Having lots to eat,’ he said. ‘But then I was half starved most of the time.’

  ‘So you two achieved your dreams,’ Mog laughed. ‘I didn’t, I couldn’t even face the crowds to watch Queen Victoria’s funeral procession. You shouldn’t worry about Mari daydreaming of being a heroine, it won’t hurt her to aspire to something brave and good. Besides, wait till the boys get bigger, they’ll do things that will turn your hair white. You can’t wrap any of them in cotton wool. You just have to teach them the right values, point them in the right direction and pray! One day, you’ll sit out on the veranda with one of your many grandchildren in your arms and feel really smug because everything turned out well.’

  Mog was always the voice of reason, and both Belle and Etienne loved her for it. It didn’t matter what happened – Etienne losing money in an ill-fated attempt to start his own vineyard, a fire in the kitchen that meant they had to rebuild the house, or even the cow that wandered into the garden while they were out for the day and ate most of the plants and vegetables before they returned home and chased it out – Mog could always find the silver lining in the cloud. Belle remembered, after the fire, Mog saying that it was a good thing as they’d always planned to extend the house anyway. She even joked that if the vineyard had been a success, they might have all started to drink too much.

  She was a happy soul with a simple philosophy that as long as she had her beloved family around her, enough food to eat and a roof over her head, nothing could hurt her. At fifty-nine she still had the energy of a woman ten years younger. She might wear glasses now, her hair might be snow white and her face wrinkled, but she was still a force to be reckoned with. Even now, when banks were foreclosing on mortgages and there was a worldwide depression, she remained optimistic, convinced nothing bad was going to happen to them.

  ‘It’s the years before the children settle down with children of their own that worry me,’ Belle said. But she said it with a smile because, with Mog and Etienne beside her, she mostly felt invincible.

  As the three of them sipped their brandy, Mog looked at Belle appraisingly. At thirty-six Belle was still a very beautiful woman, her curly hair as dark and luxuriant as it had been at twenty, and the few laughter lines around eyes, and the few pounds she’d gained in the last few years, added to rather than subtracted from her attractions. She was a woman men lusted after, and because of that some of the matrons of Russell watched her like hawks. But they didn’t need to, Belle’s heart was firmly in Etienne’s keeping, she had eyes for no one else. Belle was safe with him too, he had no interest in other women, and only a complete fool would dare risk Etienne’s wrath – one look at his cold blue eyes, the faint scar on his cheek, was enough to know he wasn’t a man to upset.

  Mog could remember only too well her reservations when he first turned up here to find Belle. He might have been a hero in the war, but the way he’d lived before that didn’t bear close scrutiny. But she saw the light in Belle’s eyes when she looked at him, sensed that he was her destiny, and so Mog had to accept him.

  She loved him like he was her own son now. And he had proved himself again and again. He was strong, dependable, loving and faithful, with a wonderful sense of humour that never left him even in the most difficult times. Whether he was fishing to bring food to the table, doing building work, clearing land, or rocking one of the babies to sleep in his arms, he gave it his all. So maybe his plan of planting a vineyard had failed – something some of the more spiteful people in Russell liked to remember with delight – but, on balance, he’d been a good provider, and he was well liked in the community.

  ‘What are you thinking about?’ Etienne asked, looking at Mog with one fair eyebrow raised quizzically.

  ‘Only how glad I am that it worked out for you two,’ she said. ‘We all did the right thing in coming to New Zealand, didn’t we?’

  ‘We certainly did,’ Belle said with a smile. ‘When I despair of us ever getting electricity here, modern plumbing and decent roads, I think of how cold and wet it would be back in England.’

  ‘Times are going to get harder for us all, though,’ Etienne warned. ‘It’s two years now since the Wall Street crash, seven million out of work in America, and things are getting as tough here. With farmers getting nothing for their produce, and factories in Auckland folding, the ripples will soon spread out to us.’

  ‘It won’t stop rich people coming here to fish and sail, though, will it?’ Belle asked. Over the last ten years, they’d seen a big increase in the number of people arriving for the summer, mainly due to the American writer and sportsman Zane Grey coming to Russell in 1926 to catch marlin. The Duke and Duchess of York had spent a few nights in the harbour on HMS Renown the following year, and there had been scores of other rich and important people coming ever since. Mog and Belle had benefited from these visitors, mostly carrying out alteration work on clothes they’d brought with them, but Belle had sold quite a few hats and Mog had made shorts, skirts and blouses for wives who found their clothes were too formal for Russell.

  As for Etienne, he’d taken out countless fishing parties on his boat, whole families wanting to picnic on a beach, and acted as a ferry boat for holidaymakers. Earlier in the year, the road from Russell to Whangarei had been completed, and this summer was the first when visitors would be able to arrive by road, even if it was as winding as a corkscrew.

  ‘Maybe rich people will still come, but the little campsites all around here are already feeling the pinch now that people in the cities are losing their jobs,’ Etienne pointed out. ‘We may have to tighten our belts before long.’

  ‘We’ll be fine,’ Mog said firmly. ‘We might not have any money in the bank, but we have no debts and all three of us can turn our hands to anything. But what we should be doing now is deciding how we are going to handle Mari. By tomorrow she’ll have forgotten what a close shave she had, so she ought to be punished in some way to remind her how serious it was. She is also a little too big for her boots. Miss Quigley was right in saying she’s defiant, and that isn’t good in an eleven-year-old.’

  Belle bristled. ‘She’s just confident, that’s all. I won’t bring her up like you and Annie raised me, virtually a prisoner.’

  ‘That’s unfair, Belle,’ Etienne spoke out. ‘Mog had to keep you close as a child because there were dangers all around you in London. Mog doesn’t want to do that with Mari.’

  ‘Of course I don’t,’ Mog said. ‘All she needs is some gentle curbing. She’s been coming and going as she pleases for some time now. She should be helping around the house more, learning cooking and sewing, not climbing trees and playing ball with boys all the time. Another four years and she’ll be a young woman, and I don’t have to tell you, Belle, what dangers that can bring.’

  Belle pursed her lips.

  ‘Oh, don’t give me that holier-than-thou look,’ Mog said impatiently. ‘Le
t’s face it, between the three of us we know every last kind of trouble young people can get into. There’s a lot less temptation here than there was back in London, or in Marseille. But it may be too dull for our youngsters. That will make them look for mischief.’

  Etienne grinned. ‘You are right, Mog, as you always are. I’d be happier if Mari daydreamed of having a hat shop, or becoming a ballet dancer. But as that is unlikely, then we’ll just have to steer her towards something safer than becoming another Joan of Arc.’

  ‘Who told her about Joan of Arc anyway?’ Belle looked accusingly at Etienne.

  He did one of his Gallic shrugs. ‘I tell the boys about King Arthur, so I tell Mari about a peasant girl who led her countrymen into battle. I thought you wanted equality for women?’

  ‘I did. I do. But once you have a daughter, you just hope she’ll marry a good, kind man and live happily ever after.’

  ‘I hope for that too,’ Etienne agreed. ‘But I also want Mari to aspire to bigger things. She is clever, maybe her path is to be a doctor, a lawyer, or to succeed where I failed, with her own vineyard. We must do all we can to channel her strengths in the right direction.’

  2

  1938

  Mog was in the workroom sewing pearls on to a wedding veil when Mariette came in, dressed to go out. She was wearing the green and white candy-striped dress Mog had only recently made for her, and she looked a picture.

  Mog had always maintained Mariette would become pretty once she grew into a young woman, and she’d been proved right. At eighteen, five foot six, with an hourglass figure and stunning long, curly strawberry-blonde hair, she was the envy of her girlfriends and, no doubt, an object of desire to most men. Today she had her hair pinned up at the sides with two green ribbons.