The Forgotten War

by David Fiddimore

  Nancy must have been listening, and appeared as he spoke. She looked about seventeen, had short dark hair, heavy top hamper, and wore pre-war black to the knee, with a white pinafore. She gave me a quick curtsy.

  ‘There have been some additions to the staff since your time, sir,’ Barnes said.

  ‘Good morning, sir.’ Nancy had a nice smile but didn’t hang about, spinning on her heels and marching off. She clearly expected me to follow her. Times change. The last time I was there, any servant under sixty-five was considered one of the youngsters.

  The Orangery was full of plants: just like orangeries should be. There were giant trees like palms, and bamboos. It was like a bloody jungle. The temperature was high enough to have bred monkeys in. I had last seen the huge room in wartime, when it had been empty apart from a large ill-tempered horse kicking chunks from the polished pine floor. Mrs Baker sat on freshly painted garden furniture in a clearing cut into the centre. She was wearing a light summer dress. A couple of brightly coloured birds argued in the foliage. Condensation ran down the windows and walls. I took off my flying jacket and dumped it on the floor as I approached her. She held her cheek up, and closed her eyes for a kiss.

  ‘Charlie, darling.’

  ‘Mrs Baker.’

  ‘Adelaide or Addy, Charlie. I’m sure that I told you that before.’

  ‘Addy, then. You were drunk; I wasn’t sure that you meant it.’

  ‘I was always drunk, wasn’t I? We’re very proud of you, you know.’

  ‘I don’t know why. Are you still drunk?’

  ‘No; I’m cured. I drank my way through it, and out the other side. I stick to champagne these days.’

  ‘And Lord Peter? Do you stick to him as well?’

  ‘Don’t be silly, darling. That would be stretching the point too far.’

  ‘Where did you get all these trees? The place was empty when I was last in here.’

  ‘Some of them came from Kew on loan; Peter twisted their arms. The others were given by the Germans, I expect: war reparations. We got some tremendous stuff over there – especially paintings. We were just told to go over and pick out what we wanted.’

  ‘You mean you stole it.’

  ‘No, darling; heaven forbid. Everyone with a house this size went over to help themselves. War reparations for being good. I brought eight Germans back as well, to work on the farm and in the house.’

  ‘And I suppose that everyone living in a council house in Streatham was given the same opportunity.’

  ‘Do they have council houses in Streatham? Don’t be a prude, Charlie. Each of those grubby little soldiers coming back from the war had his own kitbag full of loot. Why shouldn’t we have had our share?’

  ‘Because your lot’s share is invariably larger than anyone else’s. Besides: they fought for it. They earned it.’

  ‘So did I, Charlie.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘I can’t remember that much. I think that I was looking after the Americans, remember? Gave them a warm bed on a cold night, happy memories of Old England, and a belief that their cause was worth dying for.’

  ‘How many of yours really died, Addy?’

  ‘Three, actually.’ She was immediately subdued. ‘I still dream of being in bed with them. How can one dream of making love with dead lovers?’

  ‘Is that American, Washoe, still around?’

  ‘No – he went home to his wife, children and a legal practice: a tradesman! Ugh! How could I?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Addy.’

  ‘So am I. Maybe he’ll be my last. Would you like a cup of tea now?’

  ‘No, he won’t be your last: nothing like . . . and yes, I’d love a cup of tea. It’s good to be back again.’

  ‘You’re a strange man, Charlie Bassett. The rest of us feel trapped here, and we can’t wait to get away.’

  The only thing that we had in common was Grace, and neither of us had mentioned her. That was funny.

  They put me in Grace’s room, which was unfair. I had memories of play-fighting her on that heavy wooden bed under its dark canopy. Making love with Grace could be like fighting her. She would strain against me sometimes, and punch my chest as if the act of love was an act of violence, and I was her worst nightmare. Who knows? Maybe I was. Then something would happen inside her face, and her arms would loop around my neck, and she would love me again. Yes: unfair memories.

  Nancy had pressed my uniform. It lay across the bed like a corpse. I think that there is something about Crifton which plays to the dark side of my character. Maybe that’s where Grace belongs too.

  Dinner was a strained affair. I sat at a round table which wouldn’t have fitted into any house I’ve ever lived in. I was placed between Lord Peter Baker and his secretary, and Adelaide and her secretary: the umpire’s position for a set of mixed doubles. It hadn’t occurred to me that a woman without a job would need a secretary.

  Lord Peter’s secretary was a tall bosomy woman in her early twenties. She had long blonde hair, and laughed at his jokes. Adelaide’s secretary looked like a young Guardsman. He was tall and muscular with closely cropped fair hair. His slight accent made me suppose that he was one of her new Krauts. He laughed at none of Lord Peter’s jokes. The two secretaries obviously fancied each other . . . so I guess that it was a draw.

  Peter Baker told us that the Labour Party was ruining the country, and selling the Empire for a handful of beads. Adelaide Baker told us that the Conservative Party was organized to promote the interests of pederasts and fascist peers.

  He said that the Labour Party would end up in the hands of trade unionists, or maybe teachers and lawyers. She parried that the Tories would end up represented by crooked car salesmen, or maybe doctors and lawyers. They’d both obviously had a recent problem with lawyers: it was all they agreed on. All women were sluts. All men were lechers.

  The secretaries looked down at their plates, smiled and shovelled away: they’d heard it all before. How early can I get away tomorrow morning? I asked myself

  Adelaide took the women away. She could have concealed her eagerness to leave us a little better. Lord Peter’s secretary wore a bouncy cream cocktail dress: she flung a lingering smile back at the men as she left, but it wasn’t for me.

  Peter Baker poured me a whisky big enough to swim in, and took me over to stand at the fire. We could have stood inside the huge fireplace. I enjoyed the heat from the logs radiating through my trousers. Addy’s secretary stayed at the table. Baker said to him, ‘Karel?’

  ‘Yes, Lord Peter?’

  ‘Get lost – there’s a good chap.’

  ‘Yes, Lord Peter.’

  We waited for the door to close behind him.

  ‘Can’t bear that fellow, Charlie. Think he’s tupping Adelaide.’

  ‘Aren’t you?’

  ‘Good lord, no! A filly my own age? Give me credit!’

  ‘Then it’s not all that much to do with you, is it, sir?’

  Nothing. Then Baker laughed. It was a new thin, reedy sound which surprised me, coming from him, because he was six and a half feet tall. Had he always laughed like that, or was he simply getting old?

  ‘What?’ I asked him.

  ‘Forgotten that you spoke to me like that.’

  ‘Does you good now and again, sir, I expect. Do you want me to shove off now?’

  ‘You’re a little bastard, Charlie Bassett.’ But he smiled as spoke.

  ‘I hadn’t noticed that, sir. I hadn’t noticed I was little.’ He laughed again. I asked him, ‘Does that radio I repaired for you still work?’

  ‘I don’t know, Charlie. I haven’t been up to that room since the war ended. We won’t need it again until the next war, will we?’

  We sipped the whisky. It had been fiery before I’d slopped some water into it.

  There was something on Baker’s mind. I suppose that if you were that wealthy there would always be something on your mind. After a while I felt the tension I’d brought into the house with me ebbing aw
ay. Whisky can be good at that sort of thing.

  I said, ‘You did invite me here . . .’

  ‘Did I? Are you sure that it wasn’t Adelaide?’

  ‘Yes, Lord Peter, I’m sure. She wouldn’t mind if she never saw me again.’

  ‘You’re probably right. First I wanted to say sorry for the mess we got you into in ’45. We made some terrible choices, and you suffered.’

  Was that how things worked in their world? You just said sorry, and made friends again? One of their bad choices had been asking an American copper to kill me, and the bastard had nearly succeeded.

  ‘I also wanted to say thank you for getting Grace out of the hands of that bunch of parasites she was staying with last month. Before we saw her arrest splashed all over Pathé News or the Mirror.’

  ‘They weren’t parasites,’ I told him. ‘Just ordinary people without roofs over their heads. There are thousands of them, and she was helping them out.’

  ‘Well, now she’s gone and so are they. I don’t know how you managed it, but that was a brilliant resolution. Thank you.’

  ‘That’s all right, sir. You did as much as me. Where will she be based: here or overseas?’

  Baker looked at me as if I’d said the wrong thing. ‘Sorry, Charlie; I didn’t follow that. What did I do?’

  ‘Got her a job flying for Donald Bennet. Her eyes lit up when I told her, but she hadn’t said yes before I last saw her.’

  ‘She didn’t say yes at all, Charlie – didn’t you know? She sailed off to Palestine with some hairy great Dutchman. They’ll build the new state of Israel there, if only we’ll get out of the way and let them.’

  The noise that I heard inside my head was the sound of a penny dropping. ‘Let me guess: they took a ship called the Polly B? I was on it with Grace, but I didn’t tell anyone. It was loaded with all sorts of odds and ends.’

  ‘That’s right: I knew that you must have had something to do with it. They took a load of homeless people as well, and ran the blockade in the Med. They ran their ship straight up onto an empty beach . . . and unloaded it before the Allied patrols reached them.’

  I shook my head in wonder at Grace’s scheming. ‘I didn’t know they were going to do anything like that.’

  ‘People may not believe that, Charlie. Some departments are furious. They feel they’ve lost face, and your old civil servant doesn’t like losing face: it’s worse than if you ride his missus. You could be in for a rough one – ride, I mean.’

  I probably nodded glumly. I do that sort of thing at times of stress.

  ‘It doesn’t matter if Grace is safe and happy, does it? Can I have another drink?’ I needed to think. No: cancel that. I needed to drink.

  ‘You’re a good man, Charlie. Help yourself.’

  I didn’t feel like a good man. I felt like a fool again. At least I knew why Piers was spitting red stuff: our next meeting would be interesting. I refilled both our glasses from the ship’s decanter on a side table. Baker kicked one of the logs; sparks danced in the fireplace and swirled up the chimney.

  I said, ‘When I was a boy my mother would tell us that the sparks were fairies, and that the wandering red lines you sometimes saw on the soot at the back of the fire were fairy writing.’

  Baker didn’t respond to that. He said, ‘There were civil servants who got it all wrong. They thought that the Commies organizing homeless people to occupy big empty houses was less about getting new homes built quickly in London, and more about getting Communism another toehold in the LCC. It wasn’t, of course: they fooled us. Being Commies wasn’t important to that mob at all. It was all about getting breeding stock together for a new country in the Middle East. They have enough men over there for the time being, apparently: most of the survivors of the death camps were young males. What they lacked were functioning wives and families. Women who knew how to make homes, and children who would grow up to work the farms and carry guns. Seed corn.’

  ‘I wonder how they convinced them to go?’

  ‘Offered them husbands, and fathers and land. Somewhere of their own for free. Land’s a powerful pull, you know: everything is different when it comes to owning land. You’ll kill to keep what you have. Way of the world.’

  ‘I’ll take your word for it.’

  ‘If Grace is in the middle of all that, and if it comes off, she might even be remembered as a heroine one day.’

  I let that lie for a bit before I trusted myself to reply. I know that I spoke quietly, looking at the fire, not at Baker. He had to lean closer to hear me.

  ‘Don’t you realize that she already is a heroine? For Christ’s sake, sir – she flew deliveries for the ATA for five years, until she was exhausted. Then she flew trips over Germany with us, after our own gunner had run away. Then she nursed her way across Europe as Germany collapsed in front of her. She is a heroine: the genuine article. The only one I’ve ever met.’

  ‘You really believe that, old man?’

  ‘Of course I do, Sir Peter. She’s remarkable: the most remarkable person I’ll ever know, even if I live for ever. One day someone will make a film about her, and she’ll be famous in the best possible way. Every teenaged girl in the country will want to be just like Grace then: you’ll see.’

  Baker prodded the logs again. One tumbled, but he kept it in the grate with his foot. Sparks careered upwards and out of sight. He flicked something away from each of his cheeks, looking away from me. ‘Wish her mother had heard you say that.’

  But Adelaide’s voice behind us said, ‘She did.’

  Karel can’t have completely closed the door behind him, and neither of us had heard Addy come back into the room. She crossed over to the fireplace and stood on tiptoe to plant a kiss on Baker’s cheek. ‘Silly old thing. Why don’t you two come in and join us? I’ll put some music on and we can dance.’ Try a little tenderness.

  If I didn’t know better I could have sworn that they were still in love. I remembered how Grace had cried when she’d learned that Sir Peter hadn’t sent me to bring her home. Maybe they all deserved each other.

  Someone had beaten Addy to the draw: the music came towards us as I followed them to the door. An old 1920s dance band was playing ‘Pasadena’. There was a glorious rising trumpet solo at the end of the second chorus.

  That was how I learned that they’d begun to establish the State of Israel, despite my best efforts. Not many people know that. I still had to face Piers, so life is never that simple.

  In the morning I had breakfast with the staff. It was a noisy, cheerful bun fight in the kitchen, with Barnes singularly failing to keep order. Afterwards, I walked up over a flat hilltop where Grace had once found the body of a wireless operator whose parachute had let him down when he’d most needed it. That made me think of the jump that I’d just made, and the missing gunner whose name I forgot. Maybe God had owed the Bakers a wireless operator.

  Barnes accompanied me. The only concession he made to being outside was a pair of wellingtons over his formal working clothes. He looked comical. The field had just been ploughed when the late WO crashed feet first into it, killing himself and turning into Toulouse Lautrec at the same time. It didn’t bear thinking about. Now it was down to grass: a lush green hump that dominated the countryside. The dew hadn’t burned off, and my feet inside my shoes were soon wet.

  ‘Miss Grace loved coming up here when she was younger,’ Barnes puffed. He was too old to work, really, but no one would have dared to say that to his face.

  ‘I know. She once told me that you could see into three or four counties from here.’

  ‘Three.’

  There was no marker in the field to show where the airman had fallen, but there was a faded bunch of flowers tied to a gatepost. I stopped to check it on the way back down. Its cardboard label bore a man’s name, rank and number and RIP – all in childish handwriting. There was also a drawing of a cross that looked like a medal. It had been done in indelible pencil, and must have been rained on a few times, because th
e cross stood out as a stark, purple-black shape on the curling card.

  ‘Was that him?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Charlie.’

  ‘Who put this here?’

  ‘His mother, and his very young brother. They came to see where it happened.’

  ‘He was a decorated man, then?’

  ‘I believe not, sir, but I supposed they felt that he deserved one.’

  ‘They all did, Barnsey. Every last one.’

  ‘Madam has ordered that it is not to be taken down.’

  ‘Never?’

  ‘That’s right. She says that the weather will take it in time. God will decide when.’

  A lark rose from the grass and began to pipe out its song above us.

  ‘A long time ago someone told me that you were a Commie, Barnsey: you don’t believe in God.’

  ‘Not only do I believe in Him, sir, but I am convinced that God is also a Communist. It is the only way that things make sense.’

  Barnes insisted on carrying my travelling bag to my car. I was frightened that his arm would come off, but he was one of the old school – you did things his way. The last thing he said was, ‘What did the Master want with you this time, Mr Charlie? If you don’t mind my asking.’

  ‘He wanted to say sorry.’

  Barnes looked away and then back, and closed the car door for me. ‘About fucking time if you ask my opinion, sir.’

  Addy wasn’t up yet, Sir Peter was chasing the serfs around the manor on horseback. I turned the Singer north and west. I found that I couldn’t wait to get away from the bloody place . . . and it wasn’t the first time that had happened, either.

  26. Goodbye, Dolly

  I waited in the doorway of the Lamb until Miller drove up in their Standard. She parked away from the light. I walked up to her, kissed her and wrestled her into the back seat where we went at each other like tigers. She left scratch marks on my neck. When I got the power of speech back I said, ‘I love you, Miller.’

  ‘Christ, that was good, Charlie! I’ll miss that.’ Then she added, ‘I love you too.’ Bit of a bloody afterthought.

  ‘Leave him, and come away with me.’ I didn’t have to say who I was talking about.