The Officer's Wife by Lynda Cowles

My husband’s name is Alistair Trent. He’s not Scottish but his mother was. He is an officer in the Royal Navy and he likes to smoke a cigarette after every meal. So far, that is everything I know of him. As we board the train that will take us to our honeymoon, I am content that it is more than enough for now.

Of me, he knows almost everything. In the café where we’d arranged to meet, he passed an hour asking me questions, reading them from a square of paper taken from his coat pocket. Most I had anticipated: What line of work is your father in? (He’s dead.) Can you cook well enough to entertain several high ranking naval personnel and their wives? (Yes.) Have you ever been married or engaged before? (No.) Other questions were more testing: Do you speak any languages? (Yes, French and a little German.) What is the capital city of Burma? (Rangoon.) Do you believe the death penalty should be abolished? (No.)

He took the issue of my suitability very seriously, something I found at once frustrating and endearing; with every answer I gave he made a tick or a cross with a sharp pencil. As expected, I passed his test, although I was as honest as I could be under the circumstances

Our wedding was a hurried and clumsy affair. I wore a borrowed cream dress and carried lilies-of-the-valley stolen from the cemetery. He wore his naval uniform. Our rings were second-hand: the cheapest he could buy from the pawn shop we passed on the way to the church. Even my name – Margaret Elizabeth Sellers – was a false, English version of the name I grew up with. Yet moments after I heard it spoken in the hollow shade of the chapel, that girl and all her spring-coloured days were gone. I am Mrs Alistair Trent now; my only job is to play the perfect wife.

I grow bored of watching the flat green fields trundle by and turn to study my husband again. He is reading the newspaper. He has it folded into a tight rectangle so only the pertinent article faces him. His left leg is crossed over his right knee; I can see a sliver of ankle above the hem of his grey sock as his foot nods in time with the train’s conservative rhythm. His mouth is pressed in a rigid line. I imagine the article he’s reading to be about the Prime Minister or foreign policy, though I don’t know his mind on either of those subjects.

I wonder how old he is. When we met, I thought he must be at least forty five; now I think he may be younger. His eyes are a soft pigeon grey and although his forehead is pinched in the effort of thought, he bears very few lines otherwise.

He must feel me staring because he lowers his newspaper. “Is everything all right?” he asks.

“Yes,” I reply. “Quite all right.”

He glances up the carriage to where a girl is pushing a trolley.

“Would you like anything to eat or drink?”

“No. Thank you.”

He stares at me for a moment longer than is comfortable then returns to his article.

We are met at a tiny Devon station by pouring rain and a driver who stows our two small suitcases in the trunk of the car then spends the entire journey studying us in the rear view mirror. Finally he says: “Newlyweds, eh?”

“Yes,” I reply. “How can you tell?”

My tone of voice is more cheerful than is necessary but I am genuinely curious. Alistair and I are at opposite ends of the seat; there is enough room between us for a chaperone though clearly no need for one. I wonder if there is something in our faces that betrays us as husband and wife despite our marriage being a sham: some shared characteristic that formed the instant we exchanged rings. I hadn’t wanted to marry in church but Alistair had insisted.

Now I imagine this is God’s way of punishing us: we will forever be branded with the likeness of each other, long after I have finished with him. The driver laughs. “Mrs Newton told me you were honeymooners.”

I am disappointed and it surprises me. Then Alistair does something that surprises me even more: he reaches over and takes my hand from my lap, clasping it in his. His grip is strong; I couldn’t take my hand back if I wanted to.

“We were married this morning,” he says, looking at me. “Weren’t we darling?”

I nod and smile radiantly, first at him then at the rear view mirror.

“Well, congratulations,” the driver says, beaming. “I bet you had a beautiful wedding.”

“Yes,” I say. “It was lovely.”

In our room at the Newton Bed & Breakfast, Alistair is all business. I stand at the foot of the bed, holding my suitcase in both hands as he closes the door. I was warned this would be part of the job and it didn’t faze me: I am far from innocent. Yet in the pink haze of a room with marionette dolls lining the dresser and a poodle painting above the bed, I am briefly lost, and Berlin couldn’t seem further away.

Alistair locks the door with a long brass key then removes his jacket as he considers me. I do nothing except squeeze the handle of my suitcase. I am to appear inexperienced and naïve; anything else is unacceptable. He walks over to me and eases the suitcase from my hands, placing it on the floor next to the foot of the bed. I am unsure what to do with my arms so let them hang uselessly at my sides. He loosens the belt of my coat and it falls to the floor then he starts unbuttoning my dress. As his fingers work their way down my body I study his face. The crease between his eyes is gone now; his jaw is set and he has a look of absolute certainty and authority. I am his to do with what he wants.

I stand with my dress unbuttoned to the waist. He places one hand on my neck and runs a finger from my throat to my breastbone. A fingernail grazes my skin and makes me flinch. He looks up, his grey eyes somehow darker now. With both hands, he frees my shoulders from my dress and slides the fabric over my hips until it pools at my feet. Then he scoops me up and carries me to the bed.

As he lays me down on the faded quilt, I reach up and stroke his hair. The act feels empty. How do other married couples do it, I wonder? Do they fall together the moment the door closes, crashing to the floor without even making it to the bed? Does love tell them what to do, those pristine virgins? I know the mechanics – too well – but I have never known love. Even so, I think I could have played a woman in love if it had been required. I would have liked to try.

Alistair has removed his shirt and is pulling his vest over his head. He has a strong chest; the muscles in his shoulders and arms twitch as he leans over me, his body almost touching mine. I arch ever so slightly as he reaches to unclasp my bra. He slips the straps down my arms and tugs off my underwear and suddenly I am naked.

He is moving faster now. He unbuckles his trousers, stepping out of them along with his shorts, and lies on top of me as though he thinks I might break. He braces himself on one arm and then with the flat of his free hand explores every part of my body that he can reach. He grabs my thigh and pulls it toward him, pushes up to my hip and my waist, grasps my breast. We both cry out as he presses inside me and it is only then that he kisses me.

Afterwards, lying on his stomach, he leans over the side of the bed and retrieves a pack of cigarettes from his trouser pocket. He offers me one and I take it. I lie on my back and smoke, staring up at the ceiling. He props himself up on one elbow and I feel him watching me. It makes me uncomfortable; he seems like a different man without the rigid uniform.

Finally, he asks. “Why did you answer my advert? Was it for the money?”

“No,” I say.

“For the prestige of being an officer’s wife?”

I shake my head.

“Then why?” He relaxes his head onto his arm and I sense a change in him again. Now he is not the stiff English Naval Officer I married, nor the intense, serious man I just slept with. Now he is something else – something warm and defenceless. “Wouldn’t you rather marry for love?”

“Wouldn’t you?” I reply quickly.

He doesn’t answer straight away. Instead, he rolls onto his back and releases a long slow curl of smoke into the air.

“Love is a selfish indulgence. There’s no place for it in this world.”

He sits up and squashes his cigarette into the ashtray on the bedside table then lies back down with his arms behind his head. I move closer and rest my head against his chest. Outside, the rain has lightened; it steals down the window pane and floats to the ground with a shhh. I listen for a while until Alistair’s breathing slows and he is no more than a soft, grey wolf beside me.

As my eyes close, I turn the same thought over and over in my mind, feeling the shape of it, testing it for weight and clarity, examining it for flaws. It is extremely flawed and yet I find myself reluctant to discard it. I think of the work I must begin tomorrow – the watching and listening, the seemingly innocent questions - and it tires me. For now, at least, I am Mrs Alistair Trent. My only job is to play the perfect wife.