by Adele Geras
He lowered himself down awkwardly next to her and sat with his leg stretched out in front of him. ‘So happy, so happy to be going to France at last!’ he said. ‘Wanted to fight like any man. Army turned me down. Have this gammy leg, you see.’
Kate nodded, embarrassed. It was as if he had been reading her mind. He was obviously embarrassed too; keen to put her right. His speech was jerky and breathless, as if he was anxious and ill at ease.
‘Can’t run. Can’t kneel. No good for a soldier – even though most of the poor blokes come home worse than me. Couldn’t live with myself, stuck at home while pals were off to France. But God gave me a voice. I can use it to help somebody through a bad time. Like you. The boys will love you. Excuse me. Don’t mean to embarrass you. Please call me Donald. There!’ He patted her hand lightly, and she nodded her thanks.
I don’t want anyone to love me, she thought. I just want to breathe the air that Fred breathed.
‘What made you decide to come over, may I ask? You’re so young. It’s very brave of you.’
She looked away. No, she wasn’t ready to tell anyone about Fred, not yet. The words wouldn’t come. ‘Like you,’ she muttered. ‘I just wanted to help.’
She stood up quickly, forcing back the familiar surge of tears, and went to look over the ship’s railings. On the distant horizon, a dark lumpy shape was looming through the mist and spray.
‘France,’ said Donald, joining her. ‘We’re nearly there, at last!’
The company finally staggered out at Boulogne; Mr Poacher and Mr Castleton supported Miss Rumble, who was dabbing at her mouth with a handkerchief. Charlie the Chuckler tottered down the gangway like a drunken man, exaggerating his relief at being on dry land. Donald smiled at Kate. ‘All right, Miss Hendry?’
‘Fine, thank you.’ She clenched her hands together. I’m here! she thought. Fred, if only you knew! I’m with you!
They were met by an army truck and driven to the stationary hospital at Harfleur. Kate sat next to Miss Rumble, who overflowed her portion of the seat and spent the journey pitching her rolling body against Kate’s. It rained torrentially all the way there, and when they arrived the whole camp was like an estuary at low tide, sticky with thick mud. Mr Poacher supported a gasping Miss Rumble as they clambered over the slippery duckboards that led to the concert shed. Kate felt Donald’s hand touching her arm, just briefly, just enough to steady her. Mr Castleton and Charlie the Chuckler and one of the officers struggled to carry Little Peter, which tinkled protest at every step. Exhausted, they sank it onto the rickety tables that had been lashed together to form a stage.
‘We’ll never fill this place,’ Kate said, gazing round the lofty shed.
‘Oh, you will,’ the officer assured her. ‘The men have been talking of nothing else for days. I’ll send soup and sandwiches for you, and I’ll leave you to tune up and whatever it is you do before a concert. I tell you, we’re so grateful to you for coming. All of you.’ Kate noticed how he glanced at Donald, his face clouding slightly, and how Donald looked away, uncomfortable. ‘It’ll make the world of a difference to our lives out here.’
Kate was prickly with nerves. Charlie the Chuckler prattled through his jokes at top speed, pacing up and down the stage, gesticulating wildly, throwing in the occasional imitation of cows mooing and dogs barking. Miss Rumble appeared to be sleeping, breathing deeply and slowly, but every now and again her hands opened out expressively, like flowers, as though she was silently performing her repertoire. Arthur Poacher, the bass, played a solo card game. Donald hummed his way through his tunes. He smiled every time he caught Kate’s glance. ‘Don’t be nervous,’ he said. ‘Once we get this first full concert over, we’ll be fine.’
The officer who was looking after them put his head round the door. ‘Thirty minutes to go,’ he told them. ‘Some of the men are on their way already.’
Miss Rumble opened her eyes. She caught hold of Kate’s arm and pulled her towards the screen that had been set up for them. ‘Get your stage frock on, young lady,’ she ordered. ‘Never let an audience see you in your day clothes. It spoils the illusion.’
Almost immediately, the soldiers began to flock into the shed in loud, excited groups. Kate peeped through a gap in the screen. The officers filled up the first rows of seats. Behind them came the men, a never-ending stream of them, some bandaged, some walking with sticks, some being helped along. Soon all the seats and benches were filled. They squatted in the gangways, stood in crammed, jostling packs at the back; able-bodied men clambered onto the shoulders of others and swarmed up onto the rafters, swinging along the beams and dangling their legs over like huge spiders. The doors at the back of the shed were pinned back wide to allow for hospital beds to be pushed into the gap. There was no longer a gap, and still men kept coming. The rain drummed onto the roof and spat between the cracks, and the air was hot and buzzing with expectation and excitement.
Candles had been lit along the front of the stage, and one by one the lanterns that hung from the rafters were extinguished. The audience fell completely silent. Miss Rumble slid her sweating hand onto Kate’s arm. ‘If you’re wondering why we do this,’ she whispered, ‘you’re about to find out, Miss Hendry.’
The piano played the opening chords of ‘God Save the King’, and every man in the audience who could do so scrambled to his feet, took off his hat, and sang the national anthem. Kate had never heard such a swell of sound. Her throat clenched with unwonted emotion. Rowena Rumble let go of her arm and walked onto the stage. She sang ‘Annie Laurie’, and there wasn’t a breath of sound from the audience. Rowena was overweight, greasy with sweat, well into her fifties, and full of self-importance – and she was magnificent. The applause at the end was like thunder.
It was the same for Mr Poacher, and for the duets he sang with Miss Rumble. In rehearsal they had never performed so well. Charlie the Chuckler trotted onto the stage, tripping over his trouser legs, which were far too long. His jokes had everyone groaning; the audience loved him. How wonderful it is, Kate thought, listening to the surge of laughter. They’ve all been through so much darkness, and yet they can still laugh at Charlie.
Now, it was Donald’s turn. Like Kate, he had never been in one of these concert parties before. She was aware of the bristle of his nerves as he stepped past her. ‘Good luck,’ she whispered involuntarily. There was a quiver and murmur among the audience when he first appeared, and then as he crossed to the centre of the stage to stand beside the piano she noticed that his limp had worsened, was exaggerated even.
Then she began to relax and so did the men in the audience. Donald’s voice was very fine – much better than Fred’s, she thought sadly. Fred. Fred. Why didn’t I write to him again? Why didn’t I ever tell him how I felt about him?
On Donald’s third song some of the audience began to hum quietly along with him, and when he lifted his hand to encourage them, they joined in the chorus. At the end of his first set they cheered and stamped, won over with the power of music.
At last, it was Kate’s turn. She pressed her hands to her face. ‘This is for you, sky dancer,’ she whispered. She took a deep breath, and as she stepped on stage there were low whistles of approval. Night had fallen fully. All she could see of the audience was the loom of white faces, like moons, along with a blue haze of tobacco smoke, and the glowing eyes of cigarettes and pipes. And right at the back of the shed, surely, surely, the ghost of Fred, smiling, encouraging; and she sang to him. She sang a song that every person in the hall would know, ‘Ave Maria’. Her voice was full and rich; she no longer held it back. She had a natural power that amazed everyone in the room. She amazed herself.
The sound of the roars and cheers was never to leave her, nor the cheering at the end of the show, nor the babble of voices as the men left the shed and made their way, humming and whistling the tunes they had heard, back to their sleeping quarters and their lonely dreams.
‘I can’t thank you enough,’ the officer told them as he helped th
em to load their luggage onto the army vehicle the next morning. ‘Some of us have been to hell in the last few weeks. Some are waiting to go back there, and are bored with waiting, and frightened. Some of us will never see home again, and we know it – but you brought a piece of home to us last night. For three whole hours we forgot our misery.’ He saluted them. ‘Come back soon!’
There was a roaring sound in the sky; the throaty rumble of an aeroplane. Kate stood with her hands shielding her eyes, peering up into the sun that was blinding her. A triplane hovered like a moth before it disappeared into a cloud.
‘Come on, come on!’ Miss Rumble called to her. ‘What’s the matter with you, Miss Hendry? Time to move on.’
Kate was deeply moved by what the officer had said. They all were. As soon as they left the Harfleur Valley, the enormity of what they were undertaking seemed to overwhelm them. It was easy to forget the War when they were in England; to talk about it as though somehow, really, it had nothing to do with them. Now it had everything to do with them – it was part of their lives. They drove in silence through villages where every house was riddled with bullet holes; buildings destroyed, fields laid waste with muddy trenches. They saw horses covered with white blankets, silent and still, waiting to be taken to the fighting lines. They passed a long line of men, walking, muddy and ragged, some of them limping. They were coming back from the Front. How old they look, Kate thought. Old men. They look like a bunch of scarecrows. That’s what the War has done to them.
Wherever they went, they had the same rapturous reception, whether they were in base camps or in hospitals. Sometimes their concerts would be in the open air because there was no room big enough to house all the men who were well enough to come. The flaps of the hospital tents would be pinned back so the patients in beds wouldn’t miss anything. In other places they did two or three performances a day inside cramped huts. Kate finished each one dripping with perspiration, and by the end of the day she was completely exhausted. Her throat was tight and clenched with overuse and the stench of cigarette smoke.
Rowena suggested one evening that maybe they could take the music to some of the men who were too ill to be brought to the concert.
‘Is anyone else willing?’ she asked. ‘Mr Poacher?’
The bass singer, Arthur Poacher, puffed out his cheeks. ‘Matter of course, my dear Miss Rumble. I’m sure we all feel the same. And Mr Bentley? What about you, Mr Bentley? I’m sure you could limp along to the wards?’
There was a frisson among the party; everyone stared at Donald. Kate tried to catch his eye, willing him to confirm to his colleagues that he was unfit to fight. She hated the way people looked at him wherever he went, as if they thought that he was malingering. What if he is though? she wondered to herself. What if he hates the thought of fighting so much that he’s just pretending to be disabled? She felt a stab of sympathy, then chased the thought away. You can’t just stand by and let other people do the fighting, she told herself. Fred didn’t.
‘Mr Poacher,’ said Donald, ‘I know what you are thinking. I know what everyone is thinking. All the young, fit men out there watch me walk on and think, Why isn’t he with us, fighting? He’s just a conchie. He’s a coward. He should be covered with tar and feathers. I’ve heard it all before, Mr Poacher.’
‘Now hold on,’ Mr Castleton said, embarrassed. ‘It’s the Hun we want to fight, not each other.’
Rowena Rumble cleared her throat, interrupting the unpleasant banter. ‘As I was saying, we could sing to the very sick men. The dying. How about you, Miss Hendry? Though I warn you, it may not be easy.’
Kate shook her head. All she wanted to do by then was to sleep. Besides, she hated the thought of walking amongst wounded and dying men. She would grieve for them; she would grieve for Fred. It would be impossible to sing.
She went out of the concert shed and made her way to her sleeping quarter. The sky was blazing with stars; lamps and lanterns glowed outside the sheds and tents. She could hear the low murmur of voices, the soft sound of someone playing a harmonica and, in the distance, the rich, full sound of Miss Rumble’s voice beginning to sing inside the main hospital shed. She paused, suddenly overwhelmed by the strange beauty of it all. And there it was again; barely perceptible, the throaty sound of an aeroplane crossing the sky over her head. But surely she was mistaken? Planes didn’t fly at night; she knew that. The sound faded away, and now she was aware of a dark shape moving towards her from the shadows. She gasped, clutching her hand to her mouth, haunted by ghosts.
‘Miss Hendry? Kate?’
‘Oh. It’s you, Donald. I thought you were going to the ward?’
‘I’m afraid Arthur Poacher and I do not get on well.’
‘I gathered that.’
‘You don’t agree with him, do you?’
Kate paused, a fraction too long. Doubt chased across her mind and away again. ‘I’m tired,’ she said. ‘Goodnight, Donald.’
He put his hand on her arm. ‘Has Miss Rumble told you about Miss Ashwell’s letter?’
Kate shook her head. She knew that there had been a letter. She had seen Miss Rumble deep in conversation with Mr Castleton and Mr Poacher about it. ‘Are we being called back home?’ She felt disappointed. I’m not ready yet, she thought. Not ready for that other life, that calm, distant world.
‘The opposite. I overheard her saying that Miss Ashwell wants us to go on from here to entertain the troops on the Front Line.’
Kate pressed her hands together with a thrill of excitement. ‘Really? How soon?’ She remembered how eagerly Fred had written about going to France after his training. Yes, yes, the Front Line. This was what she had come for.
‘You don’t have to do this, you know. In spite of what Miss Rumble says. Being near the Front Line will be a terrifying experience. Not a good place for a young lady to be. If you want to go home, you can.’
‘I don’t.’ Surprised by his suggestion, she swung back at him. ‘What gave you that idea? I want to go! All these soldiers – some of them are younger than I am. I don’t know what they really go through – none of us does – but I know enough now to admire their courage.’ She faltered. A burst of noise came from one of the barrack sheds; boys, they were, sporting and joking, laughing and scrapping like the boys at home. ‘They can’t go home, can they? However much they might want to.’
‘They’d get shot if they did. Look, Miss Hendry, I can speak to Miss Rumble for you, if you change your mind.’
She pulled herself away from him. She wished he didn’t treat her like this, as if he was forever looking after her, as if he wanted to be more than just a friend. She wasn’t ready for getting to know anyone else yet, not even a kind man like Donald. ‘Goodnight, Mr Bentley.’
As they neared the Front, every day, every performance, became more harrowing, more tiring – more rewarding. It felt to Kate as if this was the only life there was; making music on the fringe of a brutal war, living in the unlikely company of the concert party. At home she would have chosen none of them as friends, except perhaps Donald. Even though his protectiveness annoyed her, there was a fragility about him, a defensiveness, a frail kind of pretend bravado that drew her to him, made her feel that he was the one who needed protecting.
On the day of their journey to the Front they were all tense, all thinking privately about what might happen, thoughts too frightening to give words to. Charlie started rehearsing his act as he always did, muttering his jokes to himself at impossible speed just under his breath, punching his fists together to give energy to the words.
‘Give it a rest,’ Mr Poacher snapped. ‘You’ll never learn those jokes if you don’t know them by now.’ Abruptly he turned to Kate. ‘Did you lose someone, Miss Hendry? Is that why you’re here with us?’
‘There’s not one of us who hasn’t,’ Rowena told him sharply. ‘Not one of us. It doesn’t do to talk about it.’
‘Your young man, was it?’ Arthur Poacher persisted. ‘Was he a soldier?’
‘
He was an airman,’ Kate whispered. It was the first time she had spoken to anyone here about Fred.
‘God help the airmen,’ Mr Poacher sighed. ‘There’s courage for you. Or madness. Imagine – you’re in one of them kites up in the sky. Open cockpit. Sitting target. You get shot, your plane is on fire. Whoosh, up it goes. You can jump if you want to, but there’s no parachute, of course. Not allowed. You die with your plane. Go out like a blazing comet.’
Donald leaned forward and grasped him by the shoulders. ‘Enough!’ he hissed.
Arthur Poacher stared at him, amazed. ‘What do you know about it? Charlie here lost his brother and Mr Castleton lost his son, but they’d be out there on the Front Line if they were young enough to fight. So would I – I’d be willing to give up my life, if it came to it, just as Miss Hendry’s young man did.’
‘I say, Mr Poacher, I say,’ Mr Castleton put in mildly. ‘Not nice talk this, eh?’
Kate stared uncomfortably out of a slit in the canvas of the truck. It was an ugly argument; she didn’t want to have anything to do with it. She wished Donald would defend himself instead of letting Arthur Poacher bully him.
But Mr Poacher was like a dog who’d dug up a meaty bone; he wouldn’t let go. He glanced round triumphantly. ‘Why did you join this concert party, Mr Bentley?’
‘That’s enough!’ Rowena said sharply.
‘Has anyone ever seen how bad his leg is?’ Mr Poacher said. ‘Undresses in the dark, dresses in the dark. That’s what I’ve noticed.’
Donald stood up. His face was ash pale. He had a line of sweat on his upper lip. ‘Excuse me, Miss Hendry. Excuse me, Miss Rumble,’ he said. Very slowly, he began to roll up his trouser hem, right up to the thigh. His leg was made of wood. ‘I am not proud of this,’ he said simply. ‘I would dearly like to be whole again.’