by John Wilcox
On the fourth day, rifling through the pockets of his flying suit looking for a pencil, he discovered the strange stone or hard wood object that had saved him from strangulation as the parachute canopy dragged him along the ploughed field. He had forgotten about it but now examined it anew with great interest. It was about an inch and a half in length and perhaps an inch wide at the bottom. Curved and narrow at the top, like a hook, there was a deep incision across the inside curve at the top and the base had been hollowed out to take some sort of shaft, so that he could easily insert his middle finger in it. It had probably once been highly polished and was as hard as steel. He rubbed it vigorously with his handkerchief and held it to the light. Ah, of course, it was horn – he ran his thumb over the smooth surface with tactile pleasure.
His talisman of France and… then he realised that his hand was shaking. From far away – very far away – he heard again that strange thudding noise and a feeling of elation mixed with fear began to creep over him. He sat down on the bed to make sure that he did not collapse. The noise did not grow louder nor did the earth shake this time but that distant thunder remained there with him in the cellar. Concentrating hard, he could just detect that the low rumble was interspersed with faint clashes of metal on metal, sounding like a kettledrum tenor above a deep base timpani. Gladwin picked up the horn and held it to his ear, conch-like, to see if in some ridiculous way the noise came from within. But it did not, for the sound seemed to be all around him and to emanate from no particular quarter of his stone prison. On instinct, he put down the horn, wedged his crutch under the arm and hobbled away from the bed. Immediately, the noise ceased. Apprehensively, he picked up the horn again. There seemed but a faint tingling in his hand this time, but nothing more. Whatever energy was contained in that small object had been disseminated, it seemed – for the moment, at least.
Gladwin sat on the mattress again and found that he was perspiring. What strange alchemy was being produced by this peculiarly-shaped object? Clearly it was the catalyst for the noise and the shaking of the ground, but what was it? And why did he feel both frightened and elated when he heard the noise and experienced the vibrations? Where did this haunting – if that’s what it was – come from?
His conjecturing was interrupted by the familiar scrape as the trap door was pulled back and, as he hobbled round his barricade, his heart leapt as he saw that it was Marie this time bringing down the steps the paraphernalia for dressing his ankle. He hopped and skipped to meet her and was met by a dazzling smile.
“I thought that I had offended you, and that you had deserted me,” he said, as much in truth as jest.
She tilted her head to one side in that familiar half-teasing, half-wondering gesture that he realised he had missed so much. “I will never desert you, Will Gladwin,” she said. Then, as though feeling she had revealed too much, she dropped her eyes and became very officious, insisting on helping him back to his bed and laying out her bowl, compress and bandage with swift efficiency.
The changing of the compress was quickly accomplished and both of them were glad to see that the swelling around the ankle had subsided almost completely, leaving a sullen, purple bruise. Adjusting the safety pin on the dressing, Marie looked up and noticed the horn tip that Gladwin had thrown onto the bed.
“What is that?” she asked.
“Oh, it’s nothing,” said Gladwin. How could he begin to explain the noises and the rumbling without seeming mad? Then he paused and some instinct within him made him reconsider. The very other-worldliness of this haunting creature sitting at his feet fitted so well with whatever wizardry was being produced by the horn tip that he felt impelled to share the experience with her. Choosing his words carefully, for he did not wish to exaggerate, he told her the whole story, ending with the evocation produced only a minute or two ago in the cellar.
To his surprise, she seemed unconcerned – almost uninterested – in his account. She nodded when he had finished, as though confirming the story.
“Let me see it,” she said, holding out her hand. She examined it. “Ah yes. I know what this is.”
“Well, do tell me. I am fascinated by it – and half frightened of the damned thing, too.”
She looked at him through her lashes and smiled. “You have no need to be frightened, Will,” she said. “It is a perfectly ordinary thing and I will tell you about it soon, but now I must go, for I have work to do.” She stood and wound the old bandage into a ball and picked up her bowl.
Gladwin put his hand on her arm and she turned, put down bowl and bandage and helped him struggle to his feet. They stood together for a moment and the Welshman felt a slow but deep arousal of desire. Perhaps Marie sensed this for she remained perfectly still, looking at the floor. Was this the moment to declare himself? Gladwin gulped and turned away. He must not, he must not, betray the hospitality of this house. “Thank you for looking after me so well,” he muttered and sat down on the bed again.
“It is nothing,” she murmured and quickly turned – was it with an air of relief? – and slipped away through his narrow doorway of barrels.
*
Four more days passed, days of stultifying boredom as he lay on his bed working his way through the French-English dictionary and trying to remember from his schooldays the basics of the grammar and finding, rather to his surprise, that he had retained more than he thought. There was nothing else to do anyway but the thought of what awaited him once he left the comparative safety of Tramecourt was incentive enough to press on and every time his mind wandered he forced himself back to the task in hand until he felt he was really making progress.
Marie came less frequently now to bring his meals and change his dressing and Gladwin, disappointed at the appearance of Josephine to carry out these chores, did not have the will to attempt to engage the old lady in primitive conversation. They merely smiled and nodded at each other. Throughout this time, de Vitrac did not appear in the cellar and Gladwin began to wonder if something had gone wrong with the preparations for his departure. He forced himself to treat Marie with distant courtesy and, whenever her face danced into his thoughts, he willed himself to recall how Kathleen looked and reacted in various circumstances. But the cause seemed hopeless. The very claustrophobic nature of his surroundings, and the unreality of his life in the cellar, forced her presence into his mind, as though he was in a constant, waking dream, riven with aphrodisiacal tension. Gladwin never regarded himself as a highly-sexed man; indeed, he had listened and watched with silent disapproval and even astonishment as the lusty libidos of his colleagues in the mess were paraded so openly. Now, however, desire for the young French woman consumed him completely – a desire that was physical and urgent and yet somehow also ethereal and impalpable. Yet how could this passion be worthy, given the circumstances of it? Gladwin, alone in his cell, felt as though he was being torn in two.
Marie herself seemed to sense and share the pressure for, on the few occasions when she visited him alone, she was subdued and often monosyllabic. She rarely engaged him in eye contact now. It was as though she was waiting for something, not with anticipation but with anxiety.
On the eighth day after his arrival at the farmhouse, Gladwin could restrain himself no longer. Marie had wrapped the bandage around his ankle and pinned it with an air of finality and stood to leave. Gladwin rose with her.
“Marie,” he whispered. “Won’t you stay with me a while? Please. Please.”
She looked at the floor with that familiar air of awkward modesty. “I am sorry, Will,” she said. “I cannot. I have much to do and Henri is waiting for me.”
“Then come back as soon as you can. I must see you.”
She lifted her head and looked at him directly, her face alight. It was as though she had been waiting for just this moment.
“Do you really wish me to come to you, Will?” she asked softly.
“Oh God, I do. I know I shouldn’t but I do. I wish it more than anything in the world.”
S
he nodded slowly. “Then I shall,” she said. “Henri must go to Hesdin this afternoon. I will come to you then.” She kissed him swiftly on the lips, picked up her things and was gone.
*
Marie returned some two hours later. Gladwin struggled to the corner of his hideaway as soon as he heard the trap door open and stood watching, his mouth dry, as she carefully replaced the hatch and then descended the steps. At the bottom she paused for a moment and looked at him. Her face – now quite beautiful to Gladwin – expressed neither elation nor apprehension. Instead, she seemed almost solemn as she regarded him with those wide brown eyes, like those of a doe emerging from a thicket, and puzzled at what she saw. Then she ran across the stone flags and flew into his arms, her fingers caressing the back of his head, her lips on his, her tongue questing deeply into his mouth.
Such passion took Gladwin by surprise and his eyes were wide and he was passive for a brief moment before he flung away his crutch and began kissing her in return, equally ardently, and then running his hand down her spine and pressing her close to him. They stood there, swaying, before she broke away and, taking his arm, helped him to hop to the bed. As he sat, she began slipping his sweater over his head and then took off his shirt and undervest. Gently, she pushed him back onto the bed and lay over him, kissing his mouth, his neck and his chest before sitting up and, with quick fingers, unbuttoning his trousers.
They made love urgently, as though they had both been celibate for years and with a passion that hardly left room for time or tenderness. Marie was dominant, whether from consideration for his injured ankle or from sheer desire was irrelevant, for he was happy to revel in her amazing wantonness. All deference left her as she straddled him, looking down at him as she writhed with that expression of puzzled wonder that sat incongruously with the expertise she now displayed. When they had climaxed she crumpled and folded herself beside him on the narrow bed, taking care to avoid his injured ankle. They lay without speaking, perspiring and breathing heavily.
Eventually, Gladwin pulled her towards him, kissed her gently on the cheek and said, “my love, this is my fault and I feel very, very guilty but I have no regrets. I just know it had to be.”
Marie pulled back and looked at him. “Do you really think that, Will – that it had to be?”
“Oh yes. I don’t really know what the hell I’m talking about, but I do know, deep down inside, that my making love to you was inevitable. Hang on, I’m talking rubbish.” He grinned up at her. “I didn’t make love to you. You made love to me. Oh, shucks, it doesn’t matter. Either way, I know it had to be – and, my love, it was bloody marvellous.”
“Oh yes.” She nodded her head with that air of solemnity which somehow made her seem even younger. “I thought I knew, when I first saw you, but then I had doubts. It has been such a long time.”
He looked puzzled. “A long time. Do you mean… er… Henri and you?”
“Oh no. He is impotent, anyway.” She made the disclosure in such a matter of fact manner that it seemed to Gladwin that it was of little concern to her. “No, I mean you and me. I have been waiting so long.” And she nuzzled her nose under his chin and then laid her head on his chest.
Gladwin blew out his cheeks and stroked her hair. “Marie,” he said, “half the time I don’t understand what the hell you’re saying to me, but I don’t care a jot. I just know that I love you.”
“And I love you, Will Gladwin,” she said, “and always have.”
They kissed again and then, as if the flame of a delayed action fuse had at last reached his brain, he suddenly raised himself on one elbow. “Impotent!” he exclaimed. “Impotent – de Vitrac is impotent?”
“Oh yes. This is why we have no children. He finds it difficult to accept, I think, but I know it is so.”
Gladwin frowned as a dark cloud of disappointment crept over him. “Is that why… is that why… er… you wanted me?”
She suddenly realised the import of the question and a look of anxiety flooded across her face. “No, no, Will. It was not that, although I enjoyed you and will wish to have you again when you have… ah… recovered in a moment or two. If, that is,” she added anxiously, “you desire it, Will.”
Gladwin grinned and kissed her chin. “Oh, Will will desire it, all right, don’t you worry.”
She pouted for a moment. “You make fun of me, I think.”
“Yes I do and I am sorry.” He pulled her to him and kissed her once more and again they lay companionably together, without speaking. He stared at the dark stone wall beyond her head, aware of a feeling of deep contentment. So this is what love was like – real, fundamental love: carnal but sensitive, passionate but gentle, involving but protective. This young Frenchwoman with her idiosyncratic English and her androgynous body was the person he had been looking for all his life without realising it. He had thought his destiny was set: locked in a loveless marriage, condemned to live out the tragedy into which his inexperience had led him. This was love, this lovely creature whose head now lifted on his chest in rhythm with his breathing. Then slowly, almost imperceptibly, reality crept back into Gladwin’s mind, bringing with it the sour undercurrent of guilt. Whether he loved her was immaterial. Love her or not, he had committed adultery with de Vitrac’s wife under the Frenchman’s roof. He was now cuckolding him and the fact of de Vitrac’s impotence compounded the sin. He was betraying his protector, a man with a sad disability – and this after the man had rescued him from the Germans, given him refuge and was even now making plans, at considerable risk, to enable him to return home. Home: back to Caitlin and Kathleen. He could not stifle the groan.
“What is it? What is it?”
“Oh, I am sorry, Marie, but it is such a mess. We are all in great danger, I have a wife and child and you have a husband. I do not see how we can be together, however much we love each other, and even if we survive this bloody awful situation.”
She kissed his ear and whispered, “this time it will be right, Will, I know it. We will have to wait a little longer, that is all. You will escape, that is certain, and then, when the war is over, you will return here and claim me. That is how it will be. That is how it was meant to be.”
He could not help but smile at her certainty. “My darling love, you sound like some fair ground fortune teller.” And then added as she looked sad at his jibe, “but just about the prettiest fortune teller I have ever seen.”
She did not smile but looked at him quizzically, as though she was weighing something with great care. “Will,” she said eventually, “do you think that your ankle will be recovered sufficiently for you to take a short walk outside with me tomorrow afternoon?”
Gladwin raised himself onto his elbow again with surprise at the incongruity of the question. “Of course – I will have to be careful, but I can manage quite well with the crutch now. God, I would love some fresh air! But do you think it will be safe to go out?”
“I think so but we must be careful. We will go into the woods very near the house and Andre and Josephine can keep watch. Henri will be away tomorrow afternoon again – he has a lot of business in Hesdin at the moment – and I think it best not to mention this to him.” She regarded him again with that almost mock air of solemnity. “I believe it is time now that I showed you something.”
Gladwin bit back a jocular retort, for he realised that this passionate girl-woman, with her gentle and knowing air, existed in a world that owed nothing to the smutty cut and thrust of a squadron mess – and he hated himself for even thinking of it. “Of course,” he said, nodding his head. “I will come with you, if you think it safe.”
“Bien. Now,” she said, looking up at him through her lashes, “does my darling Welshman feel sufficiently recovered to… er…?”
“Yes, my darling girl, ” said Gladwin, pulling her to him.
*
They crept out of the house in the early afternoon of the following day. It was crisply cold and clear and Gladwin drew in deep breaths of the winter air as the
y made for the fringe of trees at the back of the house. The garments which were supposed to make a Polish workman of the Welsh rear gunner had still not arrived, so Marie had found one of Henri’s old overcoats to cover his uniform and a large scarf to wrap around him. At the edge of the wood Gladwin stopped and, leaning on his crutch, looked back at the house. The fitful moonlight on the night of his arrival had given him little idea of the place and he was anxious to see what kind of house Marie lived in.
It was bigger than he thought and old, very old. Built of stone, with lichen-covered tiles forming a swooping, low roof, the house was L-shaped and tucked its longer arm under a gentle, grassy hill. Sheep were grazing on the hill and, to the right, the silver of a narrow stream gleamed through the trees. It could have been the home of a well-established yeoman farmer in the Beacons. He sighed and turned and followed Marie along the little path through the wood that he had first trodden so painfully a week or more ago.
She waited for him and intertwined her fingers through those of his free hand. “Not far, mon cher. Does your ankle hurt you?”
“No. I’m fine.”
Eventually, they came to the far side of the wood and Gladwin realised that he was now glimpsing through the trees the ploughed field on which he had landed.
“Is this your land?” he asked.
“Oui. But it is difficult to work now, with just Andre, Henri and me. That is why Henri has gone to Hesdin. He is asking the Germans for permission to employ one other man – if he can find one.”