The FitzOsbornes at War

by Michelle Cooper

  ‘Toby?’ I whispered, my heart pounding painfully. ‘Could it really be him? After all this time?’

  ‘Now you understand why I didn’t want to tell you,’ said Veronica. ‘Because I just don’t know. It could be someone who knew Toby, or knew about him, and stole his identity. But after he said “Montmaray”, one of the guides said, “I know about Montmaray.” And it was because his little cousins had been sent to England during the Civil War, and they met Carmelita and her family at Stoneham Camp and kept in contact with her. So, after that, the Basques felt a bit more friendly towards him, and eventually, they sent off a message to Captain Zuleta, who lives further up the coast –’

  ‘But what about Toby?’ I cried. ‘Where is he? Is he in Spain now?’

  ‘I’m getting to that. The man – if he is Toby – is still in France. By the time they’d finished questioning him, it was too late for him to cross the border with the Americans. He had to wait for the next lot, and then the river flooded, so nobody could get across the usual way, and after that there was an incident in which a guide and an American pilot died. Either they drowned, or they were shot by guards on the Spanish side. No one knows. So Allied escapes over the border have practically stopped for the moment, although local people are still traversing the mountains. The Basques in France thought Michael ought to know about all this, especially as this man, whoever he is, gave my name and said I was associated with the British Embassy in Madrid. So, they sent the captain’s nephew over with a message.’

  She sighed.

  ‘And that’s as much as I know. I asked them to move this man, whoever he is, over the border as quickly as possible, and Michael’s waiting for him in San Sebastián. If he’s an impostor, or if it’s all just some terrible misunderstanding, then we’ll find out pretty soon. Michael wanted some questions he could ask the man, things that only Toby would know, so I said to ask what our sword was called. Do you think that’s all right? I didn’t want facts that anyone could find out easily, like our birth dates. Oh, and I said to ask about old George from the village, and what breed Carlos is, a few things like that. And that’s it. Now you know as much as I do.’

  But I wanted to talk and talk about it, even though there wasn’t much else to say. We both agreed we shouldn’t mention it to Aunt Charlotte, or anyone else, until Veronica received confirmation of the man’s identity from Michael. I felt like a balloon that had just been inflated – buoyant, bobbing about happily on the ceiling, but aware I could pop at any moment. By the time we’d talked ourselves hoarse, it was dark, and Daniel said he’d take us out for dinner, as there wasn’t anything edible in the flat.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said to Veronica, as we were brushing our hair and putting on some lipstick. ‘I did mean to arrive here earlier and do some food shopping.’

  Then I told her about Rupert – not that I’d suddenly fallen in love with him, but that I’d realised I’d been gradually falling in love with him for years, and that, even more amazingly, he was in love with me. Veronica was delighted, although she didn’t seem all that surprised.

  ‘Well, of course he loves you,’ she said. ‘Why wouldn’t he?’

  I could think of lots of reasons why someone might not love me, but I certainly didn’t want to win a debate about it. Mostly, I was pleased that she approved. It would be very uncomfortable to fall in love with someone she didn’t like – well, I’d had some experience of that, even though I’d never called what I’d felt for Simon ‘love’. For that matter, I don’t think Veronica would have lasted long with someone I disliked or distrusted. Luckily, Daniel and Rupert are both perfect for us in their own unique ways, so it’s all worked out brilliantly.

  We ended up at a dimly lit Turkish restaurant, where we ate some sort of lamb casserole and then a delicious pudding that tasted of honey. Veronica and I fell to discussing Toby again, but Daniel firmly steered us both off the topic.

  ‘You’re going round in circles,’ he said, ‘and simply making yourselves more anxious, when there’s nothing more you can do for the moment. Michael is working on it, and he’ll let you know as soon as possible, won’t he? He seems a very capable and trustworthy man.’

  Which was really quite generous of Daniel, given how jealous he’s been of Michael in the past, as well as being a very sensible thing to say. Veronica smiled at Daniel and agreed he was absolutely right, then asked what had been happening in politics since she’d been away. He started telling her about some by-election that a Socialist friend of his is contesting, and I was only half-listening when I heard a familiar name.

  ‘Hang on, did you say West Derbyshire?’ I said to Daniel. ‘Isn’t that where Billy Hartington is running as the Conservative candidate? Kick’s going up there to help him canvass for votes.’

  ‘Billy Hartington?’ said Veronica, astonished. ‘Running for Parliament? I thought he was in the army.’

  ‘He was, but he’s resigned his commission,’ I said. ‘His father must have pulled strings so he could leave the army. Apparently their family’s held that seat in the House of Commons for centuries.’

  ‘Then it’s about time it was won by a man of the people, someone who’s actually had to work for a living,’ said Daniel. ‘What’s Hartington like?’

  ‘Gormless,’ said Veronica.

  ‘Veronica!’ I protested. ‘He’s really very sweet.’

  ‘There you go, he’s sweet,’ Veronica told Daniel. ‘That’s all you need to become a Member of Parliament, if your father’s the Duke of Devonshire. You don’t need to be intelligent, or understand the needs of the electorate, or have ever demonstrated the slightest interest in politics.’

  ‘Well, it doesn’t really matter what he’s like,’ said Daniel, ‘because he’s going to lose. Charles White has planned a terrific campaign.’

  ‘But a Socialist, winning West Derbyshire?’ said Veronica dubiously.

  ‘He’s running as Independent Labour, and he’s got Common Wealth backing him. There’ll be dozens of trained campaigners canvassing voters, a press agent, a nine-point manifesto based on the Beveridge plan – the Conservatives won’t know what’s hit them. What have they got to offer, except more of the same? A rich old family that thinks it ought to rule, simply because it always has ruled? Why are we fighting against dictatorships on the Continent, when there are people like the Duke of Devonshire trying to do the same thing here?’

  ‘You ought to go up there yourself and help with the campaign,’ said Veronica.

  ‘I will, if I can get any time off work,’ said Daniel. ‘This by-election is going to be a turning point for Britain. The people are sick of war, and they want to know that the new world will be a better, fairer place. They don’t want yet another duke’s son lording it over them.’

  Poor Billy. He’s only running for Parliament because his father made him – which does imply a rather weak character, I must admit. And if he can’t say no about this, then how likely is it that he’ll defy his father to marry Kick? Oh dear, why can’t everyone be as happy in love as I am?

  17th January, 1944

  IT IS TOBY! It really is him, after more than a year and a half! Michael spoke with him when he arrived in Spain, and he’s all right, not injured or sick or anything, and now he’s in Gibraltar, waiting for a ship to bring him home, and Veronica has just gone to telephone Aunt Charlotte and Barnes!

  I am too excited to write any more!

  28th January, 1944

  I HAVE SO MUCH TO SAY, but don’t even know where to start. My emotions have been lurching about so violently over the past fortnight that I’m not sure whether I’m up or down right now. I keep saying to myself, ‘At least he’s alive. That’s the main thing. Toby’s alive and he’s in England. He’s home now –’

  But then I get stuck, because I’m not sure he feels he is home. He isn’t the same. I don’t know who he is, and I don’t think he knows, either. Everything is such a mess – although that’s partly the result of our great expectations. We were so happy to hear
that he was all right, so thrilled that he’d soon be back with us. It is just too cruel, to have this happen when we all believed our worries were over . . . But I ought to start at the very beginning. Write it all down, in the hope that it will make some sort of sense.

  Well, Toby made it across the border into Spain. However, he and the four Americans with him were picked up almost at once by the Guardia Civil. The Basque guides managed to escape, thank Heavens, but the airmen were all marched to Irún, a little border town, and were locked up in the prison there. Fortunately, they arrived at the same time as a Red Cross official who was conducting his weekly prison visit. He sent word to the British Consulate, and within hours, Michael had turned up, interviewed Toby and driven him to San Sebastián, having already organised for the American consul to collect the other airmen. The next day, Toby was taken to Madrid, and from there, to Gibraltar, where he was questioned by British military intelligence to confirm his identity and make sure he wasn’t some Nazi double agent. After that, it was simply a matter of completing his paperwork and waiting for a ship to bring him to England. Apparently Allied servicemen are often transported back by plane, but there were a lot of Americans waiting in Gibraltar by that stage, and it seemed more efficient to move them all by sea. Michael had sent a message to Veronica from San Sebastián about all this, and then he telephoned her when Toby arrived in Gibraltar. Everything seemed to be going smoothly.

  But in wartime, nothing ever goes to plan, and the Atlantic Ocean is as deadly a place as any in Europe, especially at night. Less than half an hour after setting sail, Toby’s ship was torpedoed by a German U-boat. It was lucky, the authorities said afterwards, that the ship was so close to land. Lucky that many of the men were still on deck, close to the lifeboats. Lucky that they were hit just off the coast of Spain, rather than in the middle of the icy North Sea. Lucky the weather was calm; lucky the survivors were picked up so quickly.

  Nothing about it seems lucky to me. And we still don’t know exactly what happened to Toby.

  It seems he was thrown straight into the water by an explosion. Was this when the torpedo hit, or later, as the ship’s fuel tanks went up in a ball of fire? How did he manage to swim, with his terrible injuries? How long was he in the water before he was dragged into a lifeboat? What sort of medical treatment did he receive in Gibraltar before he was flown to England with the worst of the wounded? No one seems to know.

  We didn’t realise any of this until it was all over. We were waiting in London – not even worrying, just impatient to see him – when Veronica received a message at work, saying there’d been an ‘incident’ on board the ship and that Toby was in hospital in London. There followed a frantic few hours of telephone calls, of trying to find out where he was, how badly he’d been hurt, whether he was out of surgery, if he was permitted visitors. Thank Heavens for Julia and her comprehensive knowledge of London hospitals. She came round in a taxi and whisked me off to the correct hospital, where she waylaid a doctor who’d just finished his ward rounds, and then charmed a nurse into allowing me a brief, unofficial visit.

  I think I was still in shock when I sat down at his bedside. It seemed incredible that Toby was here, in London. But then to have just been told – in a fairly offhand manner, by an overworked doctor who no doubt saw far worse injuries every day – that my brother had been badly burned, that they weren’t sure if he’d lose his sight, that part of his leg had had to be amputated . . . I sat there, staring at the unconscious figure lying on the bed, and felt nothing at all. I wasn’t even certain it was him. His head was shaved, his face was wrapped in bandages, the rest of him was covered in a sheet – it could have been anyone. It could have been a waxwork dummy, or some grotesque, life-sized doll.

  When Veronica came home from work, she bombarded me with questions that I found impossible to answer. I just kept shaking my head, until Julia put her arm round me and said, very calmly, ‘Look, no one knows much at this stage. He’s in a stable condition, they said. He didn’t have any head injuries or internal bleeding, and that’s the most important thing. I expect he’ll need some skin grafts for the burns on his face and arm, but they have specialist hospitals for that now, and the staff in those places are very good. They’ve had so much practice at it these past few years, you see.’

  Her level voice went on, oddly reassuring despite – or because of – its frankness.

  ‘As for his leg – well, I know it seems awful, but I think it’s actually much better this way. I know someone whose leg was horribly injured by shrapnel, and he’s had a dozen agonising operations to try and fix it. It took months and months, and at one stage, he got an infection and nearly died, and he still needs a stick to get around. An amputation below the knee really isn’t so bad. As soon as it’s healed, they’ll give him an artificial leg and most people learn to manage them fairly quickly. It’s just a matter of finding the right rehabilitation hospital. Daphne’s cousin’s a physiotherapist – I’ll ask her. Or my boss at the station might know about it.’

  And then she made us eat some sandwiches, and rang Barnes to give her an update, and promised to track down Rupert the next morning to tell him, and was altogether an absolute angel.

  A few days later, we received word that Toby was sitting up and talking, so I went to see him again. It was better and worse this time. Better, because I could recognise him as Toby; worse, for the same reason. His eyes were still bandaged, his throat was raw, and the medicine he’d been given for the pain had him drifting in and out of coherence. I held his hand and tried to converse in Julia’s calm, reassuring manner, but it didn’t work very well. Too much of my concentration was taken up with trying to hide from him how upset I was. I did tell him how pleased we all were that he was back, and how much we’d missed him, and (less truthfully) that we’d never given up hope that he’d return. But was that any comfort to him? Perhaps it only reminded him of the terrible time he’d had before he’d reached Spain – and who knows what had gone on during all those months?

  So it was with some relief that I heard Veronica’s raised voice in the corridor. I’d left a message at her work, but hadn’t been sure she’d be able to get away. Then we heard the Sister in charge say, very loudly, ‘Only immediate family are permitted to visit patients on this ward!’

  ‘Fine!’ came Veronica’s exasperated reply. ‘I’m his fiancée!’

  Toby gave a little huff of amusement. ‘Julia tried that one,’ he rasped. ‘God knows what the nurses will think of me now.’

  But Veronica was already marching in. She caught sight of us and I watched the emotions battle across her face as she took it all in – the bandages, the rubber drainage tubes, the frame holding the blankets up off his poor mutilated leg. It was over in less than a second – her step barely faltered – and then she was pulling up a chair and leaning over to kiss an unbandaged bit on the top of his head.

  ‘What a dictator that woman is!’ Veronica said. ‘Immediate family, indeed. I should have told her we were twins, that would have thrown her.’

  And somehow the conversation went on much better after that. There was one dreadful moment, though, when Toby said, ‘Where’s Henry? Why isn’t she here?’

  And Veronica and I stared at each other, stricken, unable to say a word. Toby couldn’t see our expressions, thank Heavens, but he picked up on the silence. ‘Expelled again, I suppose,’ he said, then started to cough. At that point, the horrible Sister bustled in and announced, with apparent satisfaction, that we’d exhausted the patient and would be held responsible for any subsequent problems with his recovery, whereupon she threw Veronica and me out of the ward.

  We made it down the corridor and around the corner, before turning and clinging to each other. A minute later, a porter came whistling by, and told us we were in the way.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Veronica, brushing her eyes and leading me over to a bench along the wall. We sat down. ‘Sorry,’ she said again, but to me this time. ‘Now I understand why you couldn’t tell me a
nything about him before. It’s a shock, isn’t it? Seeing him like that.’

  I nodded, frowning fiercely to stop myself bursting into tears.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I’ll tell him about Henry.’

  ‘No, I will,’ I said. ‘Only . . . not right now.’

  ‘No,’ she sighed. ‘No, not now.’

  Then she said she had to get back to work, and I returned to the flat to telephone Aunt Charlotte. I’d decided to try to dissuade her from coming up to London until at least the following week – I thought it might be easier for her once some of those tubes and bandages had been removed. But in fact, she was the one who came up with a lot of reasons she should stay in Milford. She was coming down with another cold, she said, and didn’t want to pass it on. Also, one of the stable girls had just run off with Mr Wilkin’s son-in-law, so things were very unsettled and busy. Besides, Aunt Charlotte really felt she ought to attend that district WVS meeting on Tuesday. She also asked me twice whether I was certain it was Toby. The whole story seemed so unlikely, she said. It simply didn’t sound like him.

  And all of this was before he went berserk and attacked an officer.

  Not that I blame Toby one bit for that – it was entirely the fault of the hospital and the military authorities. What on Earth were they thinking? Yes, I know it’s routine for British servicemen who’ve escaped the Nazis to attend a debriefing session when they arrive back in England. I can see it would be useful, especially now the Allied invasion of the Continent is imminent and they need all the information they can get about Nazi operations in France. But surely they could have waited a few weeks longer? At least until he’d recovered his voice completely, and wasn’t needing constant injections for the pain? But no, a hospital orderly simply wheeled Toby off to some deserted office and dumped him there without a word of explanation, and of course, he couldn’t see a thing with his eyes bandaged. Meanwhile, the man from military ‘intelligence’ got lost in the hospital corridors, and when he finally arrived, one of his first questions was why it had taken Toby so long to get back to England.