Rosie Thomas 4-Book Collection: Strangers, Bad Girls Good Women, A Woman of Our Times, All My Sins Remembered
ever happened to me.’
He had grinned back and drawled, ‘Wait till you see the Inferno.’
But in the long progress over the Channel and across France impatience had replaced the first exhilaration. She paced up and down the corridor, anxious for the new experience to begin now, at once, while Josh dozed in his corner seat. She stared at him, baffled. The train slowed and stopped in the middle of a wide, empty field. Josh opened one eye to look at her. ‘Relax,’ he murmured.
But Julia lay awake for most of the night in her couchette berth, listening to Josh and the other passengers breathing through the unhypnotic rattle of the wheels. And now they were almost there.
Josh turned and hoisted the rest of their bags into the train. ‘Let’s go,’ he called to her.
They climbed in and skiers in knitted caps and nylon anoraks crowded in after them. The train jerked forward, nosing the ski wagon ahead of it. It reared upwards, climbing at a sharp angle.
Julia leaned forward, pressing her face against the window. Black-limbed trees poked up out of folds and curls of snow along the track. The trees slid past and fell away behind them. Julia watched mesmerised, only half hearing the babble of French and German around her. The train climbed on, higher and higher.
As it shuddered to a halt at the upper station the sun came out. Black and white changed instantly to blue and silver. Julia looked up, through air that seemed to glitter with crystalline specks, and saw the Eiger pointing over her. She stumbled down the steps of the train into the snow.
‘Wengen,’ Josh announced unnecessarily.
Julia looked at the little wooden houses, each with its three-cornered hat of snow. It was like a toy village handed to a child. She thought she had never seen anywhere so pretty, or so unreal. It was enchanting to have arrived here, of all places, with Josh.
Julia’s everlasting memory of her first days in Wengen was of being wrong, conclusively wrong in the big things and on, down to the smallest detail. Her appearance was wrong, her voice and her manners were wrong, her clothes and her opinions and her inability to ski were laughable, but most unforgivable of all was the fact that she was with Joshua Flood.
Frau Uberl was a square, motherly Swiss widow who ran her chalet as an informal guesthouse for English girls race-training with the British-run Downhill Only Club. Frau Uberl and a flinty Scots matron inappropriately named Joy chaperoned the girls between them. On that first morning Frau Uberl showed Julia to her bed in a wooden-floored four-bedded room under the sloping eaves. The window looked over its balcony to the Eiger. Julia wanted to rush across and fling it open to gulp in the air and the view, but her room-mates were eyeing her suspiciously. They had names like Belinda and Sophia, and they wore thick patterned jumpers that clung to their bosoms, and tight Helanca ski-pants. Julia noticed that they all had enormous bottoms and she told herself in an effort at superiority that she wouldn’t wear pants like that if she was half their size.
Belinda perched on the end of Julia’s bed to watch her unpack. Out came the silk blouses and tweed jackets from Brick Lane, home-made evening dresses and Jessie’s scarlet kimono, her adored jet jewellery. Julia picked up the long earrings and fixed them in her ears, tossing her head to make them swing.
There was nudging and muffled giggling behind her back. If only Mattie was here, she thought grimly.
She turned round sharply and caught them at it. The youngest pinched her nose to stop the laughter exploding.
‘I don’t ski, you know,’ Julia said loftily, to forestall them. ‘I’ve only come out here to see Josh win the Inferno.’
That silenced them for a moment, but Sophia announced, ‘He won’t win, of course. He’s only an amateur, even though he’s pretty good. Really good, actually, for an American. He might scrape in tenth or twelfth, if he skis brilliantly. What was his place last year, Bel? Twentieth?’
Julia shrugged, and went back to unpacking. She knew they wouldn’t be able to resist asking, and sure enough Belinda was the one who came out with it. ‘How long have you known Josh?’ ‘Oh, months now. Let’s see. He took me flying for the first time in the autumn … yes, it’s ages. It’s getting quite serious, I’m afraid.’ She laughed apologetically. They stared at her enviously.
‘How funny that you don’t ski,’ Sophia murmured. ‘When it’s so important to him.’
‘Is it?’ Julia shook out the last blouse and hung it up in the communal wardrobe. It was full of large, sensible tweed skirts and three almost identical taffeta dance dresses. ‘Do you all ski?’ It was as if she had asked, Do you all breathe?
‘You don’t need taffeta dresses to ski in.’
‘Oh no. Those are for the Swann Ball. Everyone goes.’
Julia didn’t enquire any further.
Julia went slowly downstairs to the kitchen, where she found Frau Uberl. The Swiss woman beamed at her, and Julia, with relief, recognised foreign impartiality to class and probably ski-competence as well.
‘You will be wanting something to eat, no?’
‘Yes please.’
The plate that was put in front of her was piled up with meatballs and sauce and potatoes smothered in cheese. Julia stared at it in amazement. ‘Frau Uberl? Thank you, but I can’t possibly eat all this.’
‘Ach, you will. You are as thin as a pin. You will need it if you ski this afternoon.’
I doubt it, Julia thought, but she struggled with it as best she could. The Frau clucked over her left-overs, but then Josh arrived to rescue her.
He was wearing navy ski pants and a light blue padded jacket with a knitted collar and cuffs. He had laced ski-boots and a navy knitted cap with a tiny US flag stitched to it. He held his skis over his shoulder with one arm curled lightly round them, and he looked absurdly handsome. Julia followed him down the path.
‘Let’s go and rent you some skis.’ He looked her up and down. She had changed into the nearest approximation of ski-wear that her wardrobe would yield, and Josh nodded briskly. ‘That’ll do for the nursery slopes. Are you going to ski in those earrings?’ ‘Bloody nursery slopes,’ Julia snarled under her breath. ‘Yes, I’m going to ski in these earrings. I’m probably going to die in them as well.’
Josh grinned. ‘You won’t die. You’ll enjoy it.’
He set off with Julia panting along beside him. She felt possessive and greedy and afraid and inadequate all together, and it was galling that she could hardly even keep pace with him through the slippery snow.
‘Josh! Why have I got to stay with these girls? I can’t bear them. I want to be with you.’
He looked faintly surprised. ‘I told you why. It’s important to appear to behave, at least. Look, when I first came out here I thought the English and their little clubs were so goddam snooty that I skied alone for a month. But once you get to know them, they’re okay. Obey their rules, that’s all, and they’ll be your friends.’
As if to prove his point they came down to the railway track where another fussy little train was waiting to climb on upwards. People leaned out of its windows and shouted, ‘Coo-eee! Josh, we heard you’d arrived. We’re going up to Black Rock, are you coming?’
He waved back, grinning. ‘No, I’m going to the nursery slopes.’
‘Ha ha ha. What’s the secret? Hiding yourself until Sunday?’
‘Wait and see.’
Julia plodded on, thoroughly disheartened. ‘I’m cramping your style,’ she said. ‘I shouldn’t have come.’
He put his free arm round her shoulders. Julia managed to stop herself burying her head against his anorak. ‘I’m glad you’re here. We’ll have a good time, you’ll see. Sophia Bliss and the others are nice girls. Just not very much like you.’