Widowland

by C. J. Carey

  Towards the salmon-pink and cream cobweb of Albert Bridge, recently repainted for the Coronation, traffic slowed. Most London bridges had guard points now, to check cars and prevent those intent on suicide. A year ago, a bomb had been placed beneath Hammersmith Bridge, primed to explode as troops were crossing. News of it made the deep inside pages of the newspapers beneath the terse headline Terrorist Outrage, but the extent of the carnage went unreported. No mention of the dozen killed or the soldiers still maimed by the bomb blast. The bridge had subsequently been closed for months and the remains of an upended troop carrier still rested on the riverbank.

  The Opel was picking up speed, weaving through the traffic so that it was only a few feet behind them.

  ‘Where are the others?’ muttered Oliver under his breath. ‘Keep looking.’

  Rose studied the pedestrians anxiously, peering into each face for evidence that they might be watching, checking their direction of travel. All the ordinary kinds of people passed by – men in suits and uniform, anonymous types in trilbies and mackintoshes; women of all ages and castes.

  ‘I can’t see anyone at all. Or rather, it could be anyone.’

  ‘Look for those who are doing nothing. Anyone reading a newspaper on a bench. Girls window-shopping. Doing nothing is the hardest thing to pretend.’

  All along the Embankment a series of coaches was parked and droves of fresh sightseers were climbing out, lugging camping chairs and rolls of bedding, backpacks and baskets containing sandwiches and thermos flasks. The tourists had come from all over the country, to judge by their mix of accents: Midlands, Northern and West Country voices mingling in the air, all of them excited for Sunday’s big event.

  Beside her, Oliver was walking briskly, yet forcing himself to keep to a steady pace. Tension radiated from him as he searched the road ahead for evidence of a tail, glancing down in car wing mirrors for a backward view.

  Then, a break.

  Behind them, a lorry carrying a consignment of troops parked up, temporarily blocking the traffic as the soldiers jumped down, unlatched the tailgate and began to unstack metal crush barriers onto the pavement. Cars travelling southwards began to back up, and a swift glance confirmed that the Opel, too, was stuck in the queue.

  ‘We’re changing tack. We need to be quick.’

  Darting across the road, Oliver led them towards the narrower streets that ran away from the river. As they passed a parade of shops, Rose noticed him glance in the windows, checking for repeated faces or any obvious surveillance.

  Urgently, she tugged at his sleeve.

  ‘I’ve had a thought. We should go to my parents’ house. My mother is with Celia so it’s empty.’

  ‘You think they don’t know that? They’ll be waiting for us.’

  Her throat constricted in alarm.

  ‘Then perhaps my sister . . .’

  ‘Your sister will also be due a visit.’

  With horror, Rose pictured the police arriving in Celia’s quiet Clapham street, Geoffrey at the door negotiating in a bluster of threats and denials, her sister cowering behind him and their mother sobbing and wringing her hands.

  ‘Where can we possibly go then?’

  ‘Nearest station, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Is that wise?’

  Although there were spies everywhere in the Alliance, railways stations, like anywhere that people might meet, were especially infested with them. In addition to those almost certainly on their tail, there was every chance that other watchers would be sprinkled among the railway staff.

  ‘We have no choice. We need to get away. It’s harder for them in a crowded area because they have to get closer. We should be able to lose them.’

  A towering bronze statue of the original Klara stood on the forecourt of Victoria station, a pigeon on its head. To birds, there was no distinction between effigies of the regime and the pewter-faced statesmen who had populated London for centuries. Essentially, they made much the same perch, except that sitting on Klara was a little more troublesome. Among the women of the Alliance a superstition had arisen that the Leader’s mother possessed supernatural powers to confer fertility and, for that reason, this particular statue had become an unofficial meeting point. Any pigeon seeking peace was regularly interrupted by passing women rubbing Klara’s outstretched hand for luck.

  ‘Here’s a good place to wait. I’ll get tickets.’

  Oliver left and Rose positioned herself beneath Klara’s maternal bronze arms. This day, the station seemed busier than ever, swollen with sightseers arriving with canvas bags and suitcases and Coronation hats. She watched as hundreds of people crossed the forecourt, weaving around the workmen erecting extra loudspeakers onto lamp posts, gantries and departure boards, preparing to broadcast an entire day’s output from the BBC.

  The appeal of Klara’s statue was clear. For some women the ritual appeared to be automatic – they brushed her burnished hand as they passed. Others darted forward quickly, as though shy of broadcasting their heartfelt desire to the world. Rose wasn’t the only woman lingering, as if issuing a private prayer to the Leader’s mother. On the other side of the statue another girl was standing, face squeezed in supplication, hands clasped across her heather-grey suit.

  It was a suit Rose had seen before.

  There was no time to alert Oliver. Turning sharply, she allowed herself to be subsumed into the crowd. She moved blindly, weaving in zigzag fashion left and right, dodging behind newspaper stands and shoe polish stalls, until she found an alcove in the brick wall, drab with decades of soot and pungent with urine. Pausing for a moment to look around her, she saw directly opposite the dingy white and gold frontage of an Alliance coffee house.

  Back when Rose had visited these cafés as a child they were called Lyons Corner Houses. Now they had been liberated from their Jewish owners and rebranded, though their waitresses still wore the distinctive black and white uniform that had been created for Lyons’ ‘Nippies’. The Nippies were selected for their looks and deportment, so their marriage rate was higher than among the rest of the Gretl population and their friendliness made the cafés congenial places to linger. If you ignored the dismal offerings on the menu and the dishwater coffee, you might idly imagine yourself back in another age, had that kind of imagining not been expressly forbidden.

  Rose chose one of the prestige tables reserved for men and Class I females. It offered a superior view, looking out over the station forecourt, rather than the lower caste tables squashed towards the back of the shop, and it was the only way she could think to look out for Oliver, while escaping the attention of the watchers.

  In a corner of the bar, a television set had been installed and was broadcasting a programme of music specially selected for the Coronation: Wagner, Strauss and Beethoven – all conducted by Herbert von Karajan. It wasn’t the perfect background for morning coffee, and as usual in public places, the volume was a little too loud. A constant wall of sound was the norm in the Alliance, almost as though the regime wanted to drown out any ideas people had for themselves. Whenever the loudspeakers in the streets and cafés stopped relaying speeches and ordinances, they switched to music, usually bands of every kind: dance bands, brass bands or marching bands, but on really special occasions, opera was called for.

  Settling down beside a man who was consuming treacle sponge and custard, and concealing her face behind the menu, Rose scanned the station outside.

  ‘I said, what would you like, miss?’

  Rose jumped, as the Nippy beside her raised her voice against the rising strains of Die Meistersinger.

  ‘Nothing. I mean, a cup of tea, please.’

  She fixed her gaze on the flow outside, the dense mass of people moving like one organism, a single pulsing palette of greys and browns.

  Nothing out of the ordinary.

  Towards the end of one of the platforms she noticed a trainspotter, his flat cap and beige trench coat buckled tightly. He was holding a notebook and glancing up and down the carriage
s, as if registering their liveries and model numbers.

  Except that he could not be a trainspotter, because that hobby had been outlawed on grounds of national security.

  Even as Rose remembered this, she saw the man glance at a pedestrian making his way along the platform, then wave a notebook discreetly.

  Oliver’s anxiety was there in the set of his shoulders, but his face was a perfect blank as he walked purposefully towards the station entrance, glancing around him as if he were any other commuter, mildly irritated by the surging crowds who were slowing his habitual commute. He must have noted Rose’s absence and drawn the obvious conclusion.

  Leaving a five-mark note on the table, she slipped out of the café and made her way briskly towards him.

  ‘Hey!’

  The other half of the passionate couple – the man with the chiselled face and thinning hair – had broken cover and hailed her openly. Passers-by looked around in alarm.

  Fear rose in her throat, but Oliver had seen her and sprinted in her direction.

  Seizing her hand, he darted across the forecourt towards a train that was starting to move away from the platform and, wresting open the door, bundled her inside and followed.

  ‘Don’t look down. That’s what my mother used to say. Like a tightrope. You’ll manage if you don’t look down.’

  The train began to pull away and behind them the followers stalled, frozen with indecision, before hastening backwards.

  As the train picked up speed Rose leaned back against the nicotine-stained upholstery, waiting for her heartbeat to slow. Her life had slipped its moorings now. Amid the sea of posters, advertising hoardings and Coronation flags she was adrift from everything she had known.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  They were going to Oxford, Oliver said. He’d explain later. They had to change twice before they found the right train and this one seemed to be slow on purpose. It trundled along the line, stopping at every station and halt, hauling itself at glacial speed between them. Every station platform fluttered with bunting and every newsstand advertised commemorative editions of magazines and journals for the Coronation. At Reading, Rose even glimpsed one of the calendars she had helped compile, complete with an inspiring motto and a Technicolor portrait of a different senior man for each month: Joseph Goebbels relaxing on his yacht. Rudolf Hess leaning against his aeroplane. Hans Frank silhouetted against the battlements of a castle. April was Heinrich Himmler, harshly shaven and weak-chinned, his pale eyes staring myopically into the camera through his wire-rimmed spectacles.

  There must have been plenty of households looking forward to turning that page.

  Outside the smeared windows, the roads were crammed with cars, trucks and buses making their way towards London. Very little traffic was headed the other way. In a first-class carriage, reserved for men and elite females, Rose and Oliver found themselves alone.

  He sat opposite her, so close that their knees were touching, and took her hands. He hadn’t had time to shave and his chin was covered with a light stubble. The sight caused her a sudden, physical pang and made her wish she was still in bed, pressed against his naked form.

  ‘I’m sorry about that,’ he said. ‘The station was a calculated risk and I thought it was worth taking. As it is, we can’t count on evading them for long. They’ll have circulated our pictures everywhere. Our details will have been telexed to every police force. They’ll man the stations and ports.’

  Although her insides plunged in fear, Rose attempted to keep her voice level.

  ‘So, why Oxford? You said you’d explain.’

  ‘When I was last there I told you I was researching in the archives. In fact, I was searching for something else.’

  Along the corridor a compartment door slammed. Although they were alone, he started and looked around him. After a moment’s silence, he said, ‘I was searching out a good spot for a gun.’

  Gun. The word fell leaden amid the soft chunter of the train’s wheels. Oliver brought his face very close to hers.

  ‘Specifically, a semi-automatic pistol. A Walther PPK with a .380 ACP calibre bullet.’

  ‘What are you talking about? Are you saying you have a gun on you?’

  ‘Not me. My Hollywood friends. The film crew who are making a documentary about the Queen. Except they’re not, of course. Their camera is a modified Arriflex 35. The box where the film is kept has been fitted with a quick-open catch and clips inside to secure a gun and spare magazines. It’s the perfect hiding place. No one ever looks inside a camera box because if you let any light in, it will expose the film. The cameraman in question has been training for months. He’s an extremely accurate shot.’

  Martin’s words rang in her head.

  Some charlatan astrologer has told him his life’s in danger.

  ‘The Leader was warned about this.’

  Oliver sat back in alarm.

  ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘By his psychics. Martin said they’d forecast an assassination attempt. The Leader almost cancelled the trip.’

  Oliver relaxed visibly.

  ‘Is that all? People have been trying to kill him since 1933. You don’t need to be psychic to predict that.’

  ‘Was this your idea?’

  ‘No. Not at all. The whole thing started last year. One of the big American studios got in touch with the Ministry about a slate of possible co-productions and there was a historical movie among them. Obviously, it was essential any potential movie should conform to Alliance historical theory so I was seconded to meet them. They were staying at Browns Hotel, just off Piccadilly, and this producer – at least I thought he was a producer – took me for a walk in Green Park. He said he wanted to see Buckingham Palace, but what he really wanted was to talk without anyone listening. He explained he was a friend of my father’s and he had a message for me. As I told you before, there’s a considerable lobby gaining support in the States for intervention in the British territories. He couldn’t tell me how or when it might be, but he needed to know if I would be involved on the ground. To help smooth arrangements should the opportunity present itself. The time might never come, but if it did, they needed to be ready.’

  Rose looked at Oliver and thought, the whole of humanity is divided between those who don’t hesitate to act and others who stop and calculate the consequences.

  ‘What did you say?’

  He frowned. ‘I said yes, of course. And from that time on, I was ultra-cautious. But a few months ago, I realized it wasn’t enough. The authorities were watching me. They obviously had wind of something. Then, when Stalin died and the Coronation was announced, my American friends got in touch again. They had devised a plan. A small documentary crew would be coming over to make a film about Wallis. American Queen. It was the perfect strategy, and it very nearly went wrong.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Leni Riefenstahl began to complain about foreign camera crews in London, so I suggested they relocate to Oxford. It’s the Leader’s first stop. He visits the Radcliffe Camera tomorrow at nine a.m. precisely. All traffic will have been halted from the night before. The whole city centre will be closed off, but the camera crew have authorization to film on the route.’

  Rose sat very still as she absorbed what he was telling her. The immensity of the plan, and the ambition of its consequences, were almost too great to take in. If the Leader was to die, how would the police and army react? Back in 1942, when Heydrich had been killed, the regime’s blood-crazed vengeance had consumed an entire village. What greater punishment would lie in store for those who assassinated the Leader himself?

  The consequences were unimaginable.

  Suddenly a crazy spirit of levity possessed her and she said, ‘Do you know, when we met in Oxford, I assumed you were following me.’

  His eyes widened for a second, then he broke into a grin.

  ‘Officially, you mean? As an emissary for the Alliance Security Office? How could you have thought that?’ He stopped himself, a
nd shrugged. ‘But of course you thought that. What else would you think? And why would you want to chance a drink with one of those low-lifes who lurk around spying on other people?’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t worry. My evening wasn’t entirely wasted, as it happens. After you’d left me that evening, something curious did happen. You see, I was restless – all stirred up and not ready to sleep – so I decided to chance the curfew and go for a walk. I went north, towards the parks. I thought there would be less chance of being stopped there. By sheer chance I came across someone I knew. A woman. It was dark, and she was wearing black, so I didn’t see her in the shadows, but she called out to me. I almost didn’t recognize her – in fact, I never would’ve if she hadn’t addressed me by name. She used to live opposite our home in Kensington.’

  ‘In the Time Before?’

  He nodded. ‘She’s a Frieda now, living in the Widowlands. She was probably the last person to see my mother.’

  ‘Were they friends?’

  ‘My mother died in her arms.’

  Rose saw a spasm of pain cross his face as he stared down at his shoes. Then hoarsely he said, ‘She was shot on the barricades, alongside this woman’s own husband. Apparently, my mother was brave. She ran out into the streets without a thought for her own safety.’

  Rose was quiet a moment, then said, ‘What was your mother called?’

  ‘Marina. I have a photograph of her . . . Here.’

  He reached into his chest pocket and pulled out a small leather case. The woman who looked out from the oval frame had full lips and a finely chiselled nose. Her glossy hair was parted centrally and pulled back low on her neck, and her dark, intelligent eyes were guarded.

  After they had gazed at it briefly, he tucked it away.

  ‘You remind me a little of her, actually. That’s the first thing I thought when I saw you. That reserve of yours. The way I never knew what you might be thinking, though I was always trying to guess.’