The Forgotten War

by David Fiddimore

  ‘No words. You’re very good, you two. Have you worked together a long time?’

  ‘No,’ I told him. ‘It only seems like that.’ All three of us fired up smiles, so I risked asking him, ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Ari Spelling.’

  ‘Really?’ I noticed that Miller had magicked a notebook from somewhere, and was demonstrating that she knew better than me what to do with it.

  ‘No, not really. My name is Aaron Joopeman. Ari. I’m Dutch. When I was recruited by the British, the officer asked my name. I told him Joopeman, and he said “Spelling?” So I said, “Yes, that will do.” We both found it amusing.’

  He spent more time looking at Miller than at me. In his place I would have done the same, so I had to ask him, ‘Why did you ask for me?’

  ‘Because you’re messing us about, Mr Bassett, and my boss wants to know what for. You’re making our communications very difficult.’

  ‘I meant to. I wanted to get your attention. Why did you report here?’

  ‘Snap! It’s where you gave yourself up. We needed to get your attention. The boss said that your curiosity was bound to get the better of you.’

  Whoever his boss was knew too damned much about me. ‘Who’s your boss?’

  I didn’t expect him to answer, but he said, ‘Lieutenant Roland Rolfe – Roly Poly. It’s all in the files; no secret. We call him “Father” because he’s such an old worrier.’

  There was a light tap on the door, and the copper came in without waiting. It was his charge room in his police station, I suppose. He brought in a plate of freshly baked ginger biscuits, and said to me, ‘Excuse me, sir, but the gentleman was sick as soon as he’d finished his breakfast this morning, and the doctor said to give him little and often, and maybe he’d keep it down.’

  The sergeant’s interruption had done me no favours, but when I cast back in my memory I remembered that he’d been good to me too. He took his responsibilities seriously.

  I waited until he’d gone away again, and gestured at the plate.

  Joopeman took a biscuit and sniffed it. ‘I haven’t seen one of these in years. In the Netherlands we put a few drops of lemon juice in the recipe. It brings out the flavours.’ He took a bite, and smiled.

  Miller wrote something in the back of her notebook. I’d ask her about that later.

  ‘OK,’ I told him. ‘I’m Charlie Bassett and you’re Ari Joopeman. Now, here is the news. Our government wants you to pack up and come back. It is grateful for what you’ve done, and for your sacrifices, but enough is enough and it’s time to stop. I’m authorized to offer an unconditional amnesty, demobilization and help with resettlement, if your people come in.’

  I counted five clear seconds before he replied, ‘No, you’re not, Mr Bassett. Your beautiful colleague’s eyebrows climbed at least an inch when you said that. It was news to her too.’

  ‘She doesn’t know everything I know.’

  ‘But enough, I think.’

  Stalemate. We didn’t try to stare each other down, but we didn’t break eye contact either.

  ‘OK. I was going to go away from here, and negotiate that back to my bosses. I was going to tell them that those are your conditions for coming home. They will agree.’

  ‘Home? My home was in Groningen.’

  ‘When were you last there?’

  ‘1942.’

  ‘Then it’s time to go back, isn’t it?’ I didn’t say it was time to go back to his family. If he had been a Jew living in Holland there was a good chance that he no longer had one.

  He considered what I had said. Then: ‘So – you intended to speak up for us?’

  ‘If you had agreed, yes.’

  ‘We will remember that when we come in. You could be useful.’ That’s what Tommo had said of Piers. Thanks, pal! ‘But I am afraid I can’t speak for the units over there. Father will know what to do when I inform him. You may go now.’

  ‘Thanks.’ That was me. Even Miller thought that Joopeman was coming it a bit rich. You had to laugh: he was handcuffed to a table, and was telling us what to do. ‘Tell me something.’

  ‘If I can.’

  ‘How did you know who I was?’

  ‘You use “Charlie”, and a personal call sign that was issued to you in 1945. I expect Father got someone to look it up.’

  ‘Someone over here?’

  ‘I couldn’t say that.’

  ‘How did you know that I’d reported here?’

  ‘I expect—’

  I waved him silent. ‘OK. I get the picture. Are they all as hungry as you?’

  ‘We’re always short of money. In France there are good people who help us, but in Germany it’s difficult. No one has that much to spare. What will happen to me now?’

  ‘What they gave me was a few weeks in an old aircrew-interrogation centre in London. That was uncomfortable. Then they locked me up in a prison in Scotland. That was even more uncomfortable. I think I saw Lord Haw-Haw there.’

  ‘That’s not possible. He’s dead. He was hanged.’

  I’d wrong-footed him for the first time since I’d opened my mouth.

  ‘OK. Then maybe it was his ghost.’

  ‘Why are you telling me?’

  ‘It’s what your lot do, isn’t it? Your job? Catch war criminals, try them and execute them. If they send you to the same place I thought you might be just the right guy to check it out. You could earn a big tick from the teacher.’

  Joopeman leaned back in his chair. He spoke to Miller. He said, ‘You didn’t write that down in your book, did you, miss?’

  ‘No, Mr Joopeman.’

  ‘Good. No reason why we should all get in trouble.’ Then to me, ‘Now: shall I tell you what will happen to me?’

  ‘If you like.’

  ‘I will be back with my unit by this time next week.’

  ‘You’ll be too late. You’ll find that friends of mine have already been knocking on its door.’

  I was bluffing: I didn’t think that I could bring Tommo into play that quickly.

  Joopeman called me. ‘Care to bet on that? Five pounds English?’

  ‘Why not?’

  His right hand was free. We shook on it.

  ‘Leave the stake with the police sergeant. I will collect,’ he said.

  ‘What about yours?’

  ‘I have no money. You will trust me.’

  ‘I’ll have to, won’t I? If I have any more questions I’ll be back tomorrow.’

  ‘I won’t be here, Mr Bassett.’

  Cocky little sod, wasn’t he? Despite that rash. The police sergeant insisted on giving me a receipt for the five-pound note I left with him.

  Miller showed me how to put up the canvas on a jeep. I’d never done it before. Women with that sort of practical skill can be a little unnerving. I bet she knew how to change flat tyres as well. When we sat inside it she shook her head, and smiled.

  ‘We’ve been trying to get close to those Jedburghs for a year, and within weeks you’re sitting down and talking to one. Are you always that lucky?’

  ‘No. Personal magnetism. No one except you can resist me for long. What did you write down in the back of your notebook?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Show me.’ She shrugged, and passed it over. She had written: Drops of lemon juice in ginger biscuits and Bring out the flavours. ‘Good,’ I told her. ‘I wouldn’t like to have forgotten that.’ Her tight mouth showed it all: I’d forgotten that women didn’t like being laughed at. ‘You can drive if you like; then you won’t have a hand free to slap me with.’ That didn’t work either.

  Miller drove us less than half a mile: to a building that called itself the Bridge and which looked out on St Neots market square. It was old, and couldn’t make up its mind whether it was a hotel or a pub. I couldn’t see a bridge anywhere. I like places like that; they bring out the child in me. I asked her, ‘You think we can get in here?’

  ‘We already are. I telephoned yesterday. It’s a place that the
RAF uses at the moment. We have a small room for me, and a big one for you – benefit of rank.’

  ‘Are we going to use the small one?’

  ‘Not unless you snore.’ I just wished that she looked happier about it.

  Miller carried our bags, and walked behind me as we went up the steps to reception. I would have to be careful or I could get used to that. At the desk she took charge, signed the book, and presented a chitty that seemed to open all sorts of doors and wreathed the landlord in smiles. He looked like a Monopoly player who’d just bought Park Lane. I wanted to find my way straight to the hotel’s small bar, but had to go upstairs with her and the landlord while he showed us the ropes.

  My room overlooked the square. It was lined in dark wood boarding, had a window seat, and windows with heavy curtains. It was big enough to play rugby in, and contained a four-poster that you could have fitted at least one of the teams into. The floor was so uneven that if you’d put a golf ball in one corner it would have found its way to the opposite side and end of the room by gravity alone.

  Miller’s room was about as big as the average kitchen cupboard, had no windows, and a bed the right size for an immature Japanese. I hope that I didn’t smirk.

  Mine had a telephone on a small table alongside the bed. A small Bible lay on the thick brocade counterpane. I made a mental note to look up one of the Ten Commandments before I slept.

  When I mentioned the telephone our host said, ‘A lot of your senior officers stay with us, sir, and they need to keep in touch with their stations. It’s not the same telephone number as the hotel, so I’d be grateful if you could give me a note of any call you make before you check out – not the number, only whether it’s local, trunk or abroad. Just for the account, you understand?’

  I didn’t tell him that it was the first time I had seen a telephone in a hotel bedroom. I said, ‘Of course; I’ll make sure that my assistant has a note of that. Thank you.’

  Behind his back Miller pulled a face as if she was being sick. I enjoyed that. After he left us, walking backwards and tugging his forelock, I asked Miller, ‘Did you bring civvies with you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Go and change, then, and I’ll take you out.’

  She nodded once, slowly, and before she turned her back she smiled.

  From a man’s point of view, a problem with Miller was that she could step out on the street wearing nothing but a pair of last season’s old football socks and still look stylishly dressed. Some people have got it, and some people haven’t. When Miller came into a room you always felt dowdy beside her. I don’t think that this was deliberate – it was just that she put everyone else in the shade, and didn’t realize it.

  She came down in a pair of slinky black trousers with flappy wide legs, a cream silk shirt and the corduroy jacket that I had already seen. There were two other men in the bar. One was in his eighties, I’d guess, and the other a harassed council official of some kind – he had the look. The glances they gave her as she walked in said the same thing: they wanted her clothes to disappear. I made another mental note: to ask her if she knew that. I know. It’s ridiculous, but I was pleased.

  I took her to meet Black Francie at Everton. He’s my favourite corpse. We drank pints and ate pies at the Thornton Arms – and then sat outside in the graveyard on a seat in the sun. I knew how to show a girl a good time in those days.

  The row of RAF graves was longer than I remembered; Temps-ford must have had more bad luck before the end of the war. It looked as if one grave marker had recently been removed. Mine, maybe. I wondered if there was anyone down there. Francie’s grave had a proper stone now with Per Ardua Ad Astra and the old badge on it. Through adversity to the stars. No stars for Francie: he was rotting under our feet – cut into bits somewhere over Germany. There was a small dried-up bunch of violets on him. I had seen that before, and wondered who his girl had been.

  When I told Miller about him she said, ‘That’s a sad story. There are millions of sad stories in the country at the moment.’

  ‘I didn’t mean to make you sad. I thought that you’d be interested.’

  ‘Because you knew him?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose so.’

  The sun warmed our faces and our hands. In the village behind us someone was practising with a muted trumpet. The song was ‘Bye-bye, Blackbird’. The melancholy music swung. From further away the occasional voice in the air told us that a cricket match was in progress nearby. Music, beer and cricket: any government which provided that for the English wouldn’t go far wrong.

  Miller suddenly chortled. It seemed so out of context that I asked, ‘What?’

  ‘Do you know how many men have propositioned me since I was married, Charlie?’

  ‘Several thousand? When were you married?’

  ‘When I was eighteen. Too early, really. No, not thousands – don’t be silly. Although more than I realize, now you’ve made me think about it.’

  ‘What about them?’

  ‘Well . . . what you men always try is something interesting: something that makes a woman focus on you, or makes you stand out from the crowd.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘You’re the first man who’s tried to seduce me with a pie, a pint, and a corpse.’

  ‘A very superior class of corpse,’ I said firmly, as if it was the only thing which mattered. I wasn’t going to let her put Black Francie down. I let it lie there, then, ‘Did I succeed?’

  ‘Maybe you did. Tell you later.’

  ‘Would you like to walk on down to the airfield? There’s an old sunken lane just over there.’ There were also some huge patches of long grass, I thought. But she didn’t take the hint.

  ‘Would you mind if we didn’t? Why don’t you find us a river to walk by?’

  I took Miller to Granchester, and then to Cambridge. I showed her the pool in the Cam where Byron swam, and Rupert Brooke’s Old Vicarage. Kingfishers flashed above the water. But we couldn’t get away from it completely. In the pub I chose Grease had burned his name onto the ceiling in the back bar, and I couldn’t resist showing her.

  We didn’t go down for supper. She stood by the window of my room in nothing but her stockings, and my hands shook.

  When I opened my eyes in the morning she was sprawled across me, already awake, and smiling. Bene. I yawned, and smiled back, ‘If I thought that this was the last time I’d be with you . . .’

  ‘Don’t: it won’t be.’

  ‘You love sex, don’t you? I didn’t realize . . .’

  ‘Is there any reason why I shouldn’t?’

  ‘No. There never will be. Did I tell you . . .?’

  ‘Don’t tell me anything, Charlie; just roll on your back – over here. Girls on top.’

  Being ridden by Mrs Miller before breakfast is something close to going to heaven. My every sense was so heightened to a strange level that I’ll swear I could hear and see a hundred miles. Then she did something. Without breaking the pace she leaned over and placed her finger across my lips. She had long fingers; did I tell you that already? She murmured, ‘Sshh,’ and picked up the heavy telephone handset.

  She didn’t brain me with it; she phoned her husband and woke him up, wherever he was. Their exchange of words was affectionate. I don’t remember them exactly because I was rolling my head slowly from side to side, and my eyes were closed. We both came as she was saying ‘Goodbye’, and she collapsed with her face cuddled into me. I could feel our perspiration sticking her cheek to my neck. Her fringe was plastered to her brow. She let the telephone receiver slide onto the pillow beside me. Perfect. There was a bird singing out in the square: a blackbird or a thrush. Bye-bye, blackbird.

  When I opened my eyes again I said, ‘Thank you.’ So did she.

  My neck was still slick with sweat. I felt loved again, even if I was deluding myself. Sometimes life’s tight like that.

  20. Blues for Percy

  The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away. The rotten bugger took Percy, which was
a bit of a bummer. Even now I can remember the exact sequence of events. Our dour navigator had just click, clicked, cleared his throat and said, ‘Norwegian coast, Skipper: five minutes.’

  Turnaway clicked back, ‘Anything, Charlie?’

  ‘Negative, Skip. There’s a bit of gobble gobble, but unless the Russians are doing Norwegian these days it’s not them.’

  ‘Just say no, Charlie.’

  ‘No, Skip.’

  ‘What? Oh, forget it!’

  It was a particularly rounded oh. From one of those posh schools up in the bogs of Haggisland, I’d guess. There was a guffaw from somewhere. It was unusual to hear someone coming on air just to laugh. It turned out to be the last noise that Perce ever made.

  Something bumped against my right shoulder, just like someone tapping you to get your attention. When I turned round I found that it was Perce’s head. He was sitting upright in his seat but his head was lolling sideways and back.

  ‘You OK, Perce?’

  Tim came in with, ‘What was that, Charlie?’

  ‘Wait one, Skip. I think Percy’s passed out on us.’

  For once both the aircraft and Tim seemed to be in sync and not dancing about, so it wasn’t difficult to get out of my straps, stand up and turn round. Perce’s head still lolled. His eyes were wide open; he looked astonished. That wasn’t surprising because he was astonishingly dead. When I touched one eye he didn’t blink. I took off my silk glove and touched his exposed face. It was cold; colder than mine, I thought. So was the skin of his neck when I felt for his pulse. It was gone. I felt perspiration break out all over my forehead. That was pure funk – I could sweat at the North Pole if I was scared enough. I turned back to my station and clicked the office. ‘Charlie, Skip. Just how important is Perce to this trip?’

  I’m really good at the stupid questions: we were taking Perce and his radar array to the Kola Peninsula – really pissing in the Reds’ pyjamas this time.

  ‘Crucial, Charlie, you know that. Why? Isn’t he OK?’