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‘Not too badly. He asked prayers for them all at early Communion and for the two aircrews who died. He’s over Creesby way tonight. A young wife six months pregnant in need of comfort, he said. She got a telegram this morning. Husband killed in the Middle East. Should have gone myself. I know what the poor woman is going through,’ she said flatly.
‘Of course, love,’ Alice said gently. ‘I went through it as well, ’cept that Tom came back. I took flowers to the graves this morning – had a little weep. And I won’t forget Lady Helen, either.’
‘It was a swine of a week, wasn’t it? Four deaths and two of our bombers, then Mother died too, just days after. It was as if the old ones had had enough. Two wars in anyone’s lifetime is cruel.’
‘I’ll be there if you want me, Julia, like always – if Nathan won’t think I’m interfering, that is.’
‘He won’t. You and me have always remembered things together. Mother’s first anniversary isn’t the time to stop. And I’ve booked a call to Montpelier Mews; told the exchange that if no one answers at Rowangarth I’d be here – that’s okay, isn’t it? Don’t want to block your line or anything.’
‘You won’t be. Daisy got through half an hour ago to let me know she hadn’t forgotten – sent her love to you, too. And I’m glad you’re ringing London. Folk are inclined to forget Tatty and her airman. She’ll be a long time getting over that night. By the by, Daisy met Drew and Kitty; briefly, she said. They were both fine, though Drew will be back at sea now.’
‘And Kitty away to London. Well, at least she’ll be good for Tatty, and Sparrow will have two of them to fuss over.’ Julia pushed back her chair as the phone in the passage outside began to ring. ‘That’ll be my call.’
‘Then remember me to them all – and say special love from me to Tatty, won’t you?’
Alice filled the kettle and set it to boil, wondering how many times she and Julia had shared a comforting cup.
Too many to count, she thought sadly. Far, far too many.
9 (#ulink_0c28bdf0-c106-56e9-95ee-49468362da5c)
‘There now, lovely girl!’ Lyn Carmichael was kissed and hugged. ‘Home for a week this time, is it?’
‘A week and a day, Auntie Blod. Am I welcome?’
‘As a pound of black-market butter! Of course you’re welcome, cariad. There’s foolish to ask!’
‘No butter, I’m afraid, but I’ve got a card for a week’s rations with me. Oh, it’s good to be home!’ Lyn hung up her raincoat. ‘I’ve brought some dirty shirts and collars, if you don’t mind …’
‘I’ll do all your stuff on washday. Get yourself upstairs and out of that uniform. And where on earth did you get that hat?’
‘It’s a cap, not a hat – our new, official-issue Wren-type headgear. Like it?’
‘No, I can’t say I do. The old hats were more ladylike to my way of thinking.’
‘And very fuddy-duddy. We all think the new ones are cute, sort of.’
‘Saucy! But I’ll bring you up a jug of water for a wash. Want it out of the tap, or the butt?’
‘The butt, please.’ Lyn liked to wash her face in rainwater.
‘I’m out of toilet soap, cariad. Mine’s down to a sliver.’
‘I’ve brought my own and there’s a soap coupon with the ration card. Oooh, Auntie Blod – let’s pretend the war is a million miles away? Let’s shut it out for eight nights and seven days, shall we? Let’s you and me just talk and talk?’
‘We’ll do that, merchi. Talk about everything under the sun.’
And about Kenya, too, she thought grimly, because ever since she had known the truth about, well – things, Lyn had clammed up when Kenya was mentioned, just as she went all poker-faced when Drew Sutton’s name came into the conversation.
Talk, because there were things to be brought into the open whether the stubborn little miss liked it or not. And before so very much longer, too!
Keth sat in the back of the camouflaged army staff car feeling distinctly uncomfortable. Beside him was a fresh-faced lieutenant and driving them, a staff sergeant who looked as if he’d be a good sort to have beside you in a backs-to-the-wall situation, Keth decided.
The man at his side he wasn’t so sure about. A youngster, really, who would doubtless report back to the stone house that Gaston Martin had been safely delivered to the 15th Submarine Flotilla.
Keth studied the passing scenery. It was especially beautiful to one who was to leave it. Bracken and heather were taking on their autumnal colours; the hills shaded from grey to purple to black, with slants of sunlight slicing between them to glint on the little loch to his right.
He was no longer afraid. He had asked for a posting home and was given it, with conditions attached. This was where the pay-off started, and after his first wave of terrified disbelief, Daisy was still worth it.
The car slowed and pulled over to let a farm tractor pass. It was driven by a land girl and she smiled and raised her hand. Not unlike Gracie, he thought, wondering at the normality of the encounter; trying to imagine what the girl would think could she have known that inside that car was a man who was on his way to occupied France. But everything about this morning was precious and normal save Gaston Martin.
Last night, instead of sleeping, he had carefully calculated Daisy’s watches and was almost sure that until Friday she would be working a week of nights. Which meant, of course, that on Friday morning, instead of sleeping, she would be on the train, heading home on one of her unofficial weekends.
They all did it, it would seem, after a week of night duties. Authority turned a blind eye to an entire watch disappearing without trace and without a leave pass, too. Perhaps they accepted that it was only a matter of time until one of the miscreants was stopped by a naval patrol, and that would be that. In the rattle, Daisy said, for going absent without leave and AWOL usually merited at least one week’s stoppage of privileges and extra duties in quarters. But until someone was caught, then what the heck, she had laughed. Live dangerously! And for the coming weeks, Keth Purvis would be living dangerously, though if he were caught it would be something altogether different.
Yet why should he be caught? He had worked out the odds against it and they were in his favour. He had also accepted there were millions of men and women doing military service with all its attendant dangers: young girls on gun sites, or manhandling barrage balloons, and men and women of the fire service and rescue teams, who put out fires or dug with bare hands to free women and children from shattered houses even though bombs were still falling.
It was all a question of which way the dice fell and your name and number. It had been the same in his father’s war. ‘If your name and number was on a bullet, lad,’ he’d once said, ‘it would find you sooner or later. No use worrying meantime.’
Keth smiled inside him as a clump of late-flowering foxgloves slipped past the window to remind him of Brattocks Wood. They comforted him, too; made him think that Someone up there was wishing him luck – Godspeed, he supposed.
Yet did God exist? Most times, his father had said, you didn’t believe – especially when you’d had near on four years in the trenches and blamed God for letting it happen. Yet there came a time to believe, Dickon Purvis had conceded gravely, and that was when you were in a foxhole in the middle of No-Man’s-Land with shells screaming over your head. God was a good sort then to have beside you.
So now that Gaston Martin was on his way Keth felt calm and glad, almost, that from here on every passing day was one day nearer to lifting the phone and whispering, ‘Hullo, you. Guess who loves you?’ And now he had accepted that he was just as brave and every bit as afraid as millions of other men and women, he would do his best – better than his best – to get back safely with the Enigma machine our merchant seamen were so desperately in need of.
‘Nearly there, sir.’ The driver put an end to Keth’s broodings.
‘Where is there, Sergeant?’
‘Am I allowed to say?’ The question to the young lieutenant.
‘Don’t see why not. We’re about two miles from Loch Ardneavie. Once there was a thriving yacht club there – sailing boats and dinghies – but it’s all changed now. No more pretty little yachts nor weekend sailors messing about in boats since the Admiralty collared the entire loch. It’s bursting with submarines, now. HMS Omega. The Fifteenth Flotilla, and to which Staff and I are to deliver you.’
‘You seem well informed,’ Keth observed drily.
‘I’m not telling you anything Gerry doesn’t already know – sir.’ He emphasized Keth’s rank after the mild reprimand. ‘Anyway, that’s just about it. What happens when you get to Omega – well, your guess is as good as mine. And I’m well informed because I’ve been here before. The last time was with a woman – a WAAF officer.’
‘And a real good-looker, wasn’t she, sir?’ the staff sergeant offered.
‘They send women!’ Keth was shocked.
‘Why not, if they volunteer? But look over there.’ He pointed in the direction of a shimmer of water below them. ‘We’re missing the town. Coming in the top way. That’s the head of the loch you can see. Saw some smashing Wrens at Omega last time we came.’
‘Surely they don’t have Wrens on submarines?’ Keth was becoming uneasy.
‘No! They have them on the mother ship, though,’ the lieutenant laughed. ‘And they crew the dinghies and launches. Lovely little bottoms …’
‘My fiancée is a Wren,’ Keth said stiffly, ending the conversation abruptly as they dropped speed to drive through a small village, then on to the loch where the car drew up at the head of a long jetty.
The sergeant opened the rear door and Keth got out to stare across the vast stretch of water, his shabby suitcase and the carrier bag at his feet.
All at once it was very real and he knew there was no going back. And all at once he knew he didn’t want to call it off. He wanted to go; get it over with. Luck didn’t enter into it. Now he felt no fear; merely a vague apprehension and a niggling irritation that getting to this point of departure had been such a long-drawn-out affair with everything checked and checked again. Just as if he were a village idiot from wildest Yorkshire and had to be watched every inch of the way.
The lieutenant tapped on the door of a low, square building at the top of the wooden jetty. It had a small sliding hatch in it which was immediately opened.
‘Good morning, sir.’ The face of a Wren appeared. ‘Can I help you?’
‘You can indeed! Will you let someone know we would like to get on board.’ He nodded towards the great ungainly ship at the centre of a cluster of submarines. ‘Transport for three if you’d be so kind, Jenny Wren.’
‘Don’t let him fool you,’ the sergeant said softly to Keth. ‘He likes to put on a Jack-the-lad act but he’s a damn fine operator. Been to France three times already. Not as stupid as he makes out.’
‘Can do, duckie?’ smiled the lieutenant.
‘Can I have your names?’ asked the Wren.
‘No names, sweetie; no pack drill. Just let your lot know we’re here. They’re expecting us.’
‘Very well. I’ll get a signal over to the bridge. You can walk down the jetty if you like – the gates are open. Watch out for the iron ladder when you climb down into the launch, sir – the rungs are very slippery.’
The hatch was slammed shut and a bolt pushed into place. One smashing Wren was having no truck with the charming lieutenant.
‘Send a signal to Omega, will you?’ she called to a signalman. ‘Shore Station to quarterdeck. Please send boat. Two pongos, one civvy.’
The sergeant picked up Keth’s luggage, then fell into step as they walked briskly down the jetty. From behind them came the flashing click of an Aldis lamp; ahead of them lay the 15th Submarine Flotilla to whom he would be handed like a parcel, Keth thought wryly, for onward transmission to France.
The air that swept the sea loch from the mouth of the River Clyde was salty and fresh, and it made him wish that Daisy could be here and not three floors underground where most times the air was stale and dusty.
Unspeaking, he followed the progress of a launch as it rounded the stern of the mother ship. It was crewed by women, dressed in sailor’s trousers and thick, navy sweaters. All were undeniably attractive. They handled the launch that bucked through the waves as if they had been born to it and when one of them jumped ashore, rope in hand, Keth noticed she did indeed have a lovely little bottom. All at once he was glad that Daisy worked three floors down in Liverpool and out of the gaze of lecherous lieutenants. And he was even more glad that just as soon as he got back from France they would be married. When he got back – not if!
Mealtimes, Blodwen Meredith considered, presented the best opportunities for what she called essential chats because if what she said didn’t suit Lyndis, it was hardly likely the girl would flounce off in a huff, leaving a half-eaten meal on the table. And today was the day for such a chat.
‘Well, that’s the last of the tomatoes till next year I shouldn’t wonder.’ She placed a bowl of salad on the table. ‘Remember once you could buy them all the year round.’
‘So why didn’t you tell me you’ve been writing regularly to my father since –’ Lyn left the sentence hanging in the air, concentrating on cutting a piece of cheese.
‘Well, you know now,’ came the defensive reply, Blodwen wondering how it was that her daughter seemed able to read thoughts. ‘I told you last time you were home we’d been in touch.’
‘But not regularly. Are you having an affair with him – again, I mean?’
‘Affair! How can we have an affair with me here and him there? And as for again – well, since it never finished as far as I was concerned, you can call me an old fool.’
‘No, cariad, I’d never call you that. Do you remember once telling me that you can’t stop loving someone to order? Well, you were right.’ Lyn gazed at her plate. ‘I won’t ever stop loving Drew, so who am I to say you shouldn’t still love my father – though what you see in him is a mystery!’
‘But you’re not me, are you? And you might as well know we’re going to be married.’
‘Married! Then why didn’t he tell me when he wrote?’
‘Because he doesn’t know. He won’t have got my letter yet. But I reckon the time has come, now that our Fan is gone, God rest her, for him to make an honest woman of me.’
‘You’d propose to him?’ Lyn speared a forkful of lettuce with great concentration.
‘I would. I have. I wrote a while back, suggesting it. When I get his reply I’ll know if he still wants me.’
‘B-but what good would it do either of you?’ Lyn spluttered. ‘You just said it yourself; you’re here and he’s in Kenya.’
‘Not a lot at the moment, I’ll grant you that, our Lyn. But this war isn’t going to last for ever and I’ve always had a fancy for your father; never wanted anyone else.’
‘So you’d marry a man who was engaged to one woman and carrying on with another? Because that’s what he was doing!’
‘Yes, but it takes two to make love, merchi, and I didn’t say no to Jack even though he and my sister had named the day. And I couldn’t tell him about you being on the way because I didn’t know till they were married, and him gone to Kenya. So I’m not losing him again. As far as I’m concerned, I’d have him tomorrow if he’s willing. Can you understand?’
‘Yes, I can. I know that if Kitty Sutton ever ditched Drew I’d be there waiting, pride on my sleeve – damn fool me!’
‘Well, that’s the way it goes. There’s no pride in loving. And I’m sorry about your Drew.’ She pushed back her chair. ‘Oh, come you here and have a bit of a cuddle. Your Auntie Blod understands how it is and she’d give anything to see her girl happy.’
‘I know you would,’ Lyn sniffed. ‘And I’m glad you’re my mother. I truly am.’
Keth looked again at Gaston Martin’s cheap watch, then lay back on the narrow bunk, hands behind head. This cramped sleeping space was where he had spent the better part of four nights and three days since sailing from Loch Ardneavie. It stood to reason. A submarine was a tight ship to run and there was no room in all the clutter of wheels and tubes and wires and instruments for a wandering civilian.
Soon they would be there, off the French coast. Enemy-occupied France. HM Submarine Selene had brought him safely this far and in a few hours he would be put ashore.
He would be glad to see the last of this bunk; had endured near-claustrophobic conditions only because he knew they could not last and because each night the submarine would surface to recharge the batteries and listen-out for any signals bearing Selene’s call sign.
That was when the welcome rush of cold air filled the boat, replacing air gone stale; was when submariners walked the upper casing, filling their lungs with damp salt air.
Some remained within the confines of the conning tower to smoke the cigarettes forbidden them when submerged. Everyone kept a careful lookout for intruders; for swift enemy E-boats and reconnaissance aircraft. At such times, when it seemed they were the only beings on a never-ending sea, Keth would close his eyes and let the quiet of the night wash over him, his mind a blank.
Few spoke when Selene rode on the surface. Sound carried far at sea. Some believed you could smell a man sucking a peppermint almost a mile away or see the glow of a cigarette end.
Keth blinked into the darkness, trying to define where the horizon merged with the land mass. A scudding night cloud covered the moon and someone said softly, ‘That’s more like it.’ Moonlight was not always a friend.
‘How far away now?’ Keth asked of the First Officer.
‘Far enough, but until we take you in we’ll stay in water deep enough to dive in.’
Number One. That really was his name. Not Tom nor Dick nor Harry. Not even Sublieutenant Smith, or Jones. Everyone with whom Keth came into contact was nameless and he, in return, was called Captain. Best that way, he supposed. What Gaston Martin didn’t know he couldn’t tell.
‘Do you want to eat, sir?’
Keth shook his head. Lately, he hadn’t even thought about food. These few remaining hours his thoughts were of the pill hidden in the cuff of his shirt; that obscene, fifty-seconds death pill. He thought, too, about Omega, the safe and solid mother ship, far away now in Loch Ardneavie and to which, before so very much longer, Selene would return. Without him.
Dot-dash-dot. Dit-da-dit. The letter R flashed from the shore and to which, when he landed he would reply with four short flashes: H – his own sign. For Hibou, owl, Gaston Martin’s codename. Someone, code-named Hirondelle would meet him. Hirondelle, a swallow. He wondered who thought up codenames.
‘I think you should eat, Captain.’
‘Maybe you’re right.’ Best he should. Only God knew when his next meal would be – and where. Keth felt his way carefully down the conning-tower ladder, then made for the galley.
‘Fancy something hot, sir, or a sarnie?’
