The Hills and the Valley

by Janet Tanner

  She perched herself on the edge of the trunk.

  ‘It is a story that takes a long time to tell.’

  ‘What’s time? It’s the one thing I have plenty of.’

  ‘You are lucky. Me – I rise each day before daylight and I do not go to bed until late. There is much to do on a farm. But then that is why I am here – to help my father. That is why I come home.’

  ‘Where were you then?’

  ‘Paris. I worked as a waitress. I met an Englishman there. We are friends. More than friends. I became his lover. He teach me English as I now teach you French. But I was more good pupil than you,’ she teased.

  ‘What was an Englishman doing in Paris?’ Huw asked.

  ‘He is an artist. He come to Paris to paint. But then the war come and he go home to England. I do not.: know where he is now. Maybe he is fighting. Maybe he is dead. I do not know.’

  ‘I see.’ Huw was surprised. If Yvette had been living in Paris two years ago she must be older than she looked. As if reading his thoughts she laughed.

  ‘I go to Paris when I am only sixteen years old. I was – how you say? – wild. I wished to see la vie more than just on this leetle farm. Per’aps I see more la vie than I expect. Then ma mère die. Papa wish me to come home. At first I say – Non, I stay here! Then the war come and David go back to England and Paris – Paris is not so nice any more. So I return home to the farm as Papa wish. Now I am glad I am not in Paris any more. Paris is full of Boche. Here at least they leave us in peace.’

  ‘Thank the Lord!’ Huw said with feeling.

  ‘Et tu? Have you a lover at home?’

  Huw hesitated. ‘I had a girl,’ he said at last.

  ‘She wait for you?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ he admitted and suddenly the hopelessness of it was claustrophobic. Would Barbara wait? She did not know if he was alive or dead, did not know he loved her even. ‘I think she may have found someone else.’

  ‘Then she is crazy!’ Yvette said.

  He looked at her. Her button-through dress had fallen open at the hem, displaying her legs. They were nice legs, a little sturdy perhaps, but long and brown. He dragged his eyes away from them.

  ‘She’s not crazy,’ he said. ‘It’s just circumstances.’ Then the other thought occurred to him, the one that had been haunting him, try as he might not to think about it. ‘In any case she wouldn’t want me now, would she?’ he asked. ‘Who would want a man with a scarred face?’

  ‘Oh!’ Yvette threw up her hands. ‘Now I think it is you who are crazy! If you love someone, what is a little scar?’

  His stomach fell away. So he was scarred. He had known he must be by the tight feel of the skin. But how badly?

  ‘Am I – a sight?’ he asked.

  ‘A little bit. But you are getting better. You have been lucky I think.’

  Lucky. Lucky to have been shot down. Lucky to be holed up here for weeks on end, alone and in pain. Lucky to be scarred for life. He could think of another word for it which had nothing to do with luck. But at the same time, perversely, he wanted to know the worst.

  ‘Could you bring me a mirror?’ he asked.

  ‘Mirror?’

  ‘Looking glass. So that I can see myself.’ He raised his bandaged hand in a mime of holding a mirror to his face.

  ‘Dr Jacques say no looking glasses.’

  His stomach dropped again. It must be as bad as he had feared. Worse. She saw the look in his eyes and stood up suddenly.

  ‘But that was weeks ago,’ she said simply. ‘Now it is better I think for you to look. I will get you a glass and you can see for yourself.’

  She slipped out through the door and he heard her climb down the steep stairs. Whilst she was gone he lay sweating for it suddenly seemed hot and airless in the attic. After some minutes he heard her coming back and tensed. Did he really want to see what he had become? But it was too late now to change his mind.

  Her head and shoulders appeared through the attic door. She lay the mirror down on the bare boards while she climbed up, then brought it to him, a large old fashioned glass in a wood frame. He took it, turned towards what little light there was, and looked. Although he was prepared for the worst the sight still shocked him. One side of his face was dark red, crinkled like old parchment, lips blurred into the mass, eyebrows gone.

  ‘Christ!’ he said.

  ‘You see it is not so bad.’ Her voice was determinedly cheerful. ‘And it will get better. Dr Jacques say that. It is still soon.’

  ‘Yes, but …’

  ‘You are still very handsome, I think.’ She reached out and touched the scorched skin. Her fingers felt cool. ‘What is a little bump here and there, huh? It shows you are brave. And you are still alive. Many would be glad of that.’

  He jerked his face away from her touch. He did not want her sympathy. She was right – he should be grateful to be alive – but just now it seemed scant comfort.

  She took the mirror from him. ‘You are alone too much, I think. Soon you will be well enough to come down and eat with us. Dr Jacques says you can do that as soon as you are well enough to come quickly back up the stairs if the Boche come. It will not seem so bad then. You want to try to walk?’

  He turned away from her. No, he did not want to try to walk. He had had enough this evening without the ignominy of being supported back and forth across the attic by this girl who felt nothing for him but sympathy.

  She shrugged. ‘Very well. But you cannot stay up here hiding forever. I go now. I have work to do. More important work than talking to a man who feels so sorry for himself. I will bring a drink when it is time for you to sleep.’

  When she had gone he lay for a while sunk in depression. Then the resilient side of his nature began to reassert itself. He couldn’t stay here pitying himself forever. That would do no good at all. The sooner he got himself mobile, the sooner they would send him back to England. Once there he would be able to see a plastic surgeon, someone who would be able to tell him whether a skin graft was necessary. They were magicians, those boys – and it could have been worse. At least the structure of his face was still there, unlike poor old Buster. They’d work wonders as long as it wasn’t too late.

  The thought spurred Huw to action. He pushed back the rug that covered him, rolled onto the floor and slowly levered himself to his feet. His legs felt shaky and he balanced himself against the sloping ceiling. So far he had only made it to the toilet bucket and back. If he was going to go downstairs he would have to make it much further than that. Teeth gritted with the effort he went back and forth, back and forth, holding onto the roof until he fell on the bed exhausted with the effort, then, when he had recovered his breath, he got up to try again.

  He was still at it when Yvette brought him his cup of chocolate. She paused, pushing her head and shoulders through the attic door.

  ‘I don’t believe it! I must be dreaming!’

  ‘You’re the one who told me to pull myself together and get my legs working again,’ he said grimly, hanging: onto an overhead beam.

  ‘Yes, but I do not say go on until you kill yourself!’ she exclaimed. ‘You look terrible!’

  ‘Thanks very much.’ He didn’t say that driving himself to exhaustion had given him something else to think about but she knew it instinctively all the same.

  ‘That is enough for one night.’ She climbed through the attic door, crossed to him and put her arm around him, supporting him. ‘Come on, come back to bed. I will help you.’

  He let go the beam, put his arm around her shoulders, and she supported him back to the bed. As he half fell, onto it she went down with him. She was very close. Her hair smelled nice, like the fresh air, sweet with the scent of wild flowers and new mown hay, in which she spent so much of her time. Her face turned to his. And suddenly, without meaning to, he was kissing her. The pressure hurt his still-sore lips but only added a new dimension to the pleasure of it. After a moment he drew away.

  ‘I’m sorry.’
/>   ‘Don’t be sorry.’ She was smiling, her hair falling rumpled around her face. ‘I thought you would never do that. I thought, oh it is true what they say about Englishmen – so cold. David, he was different. He was an artist. But you – just a cold Englishman.’

  ‘I’m not English,’ he said. ‘I’m Welsh.’

  ‘Ah! So there is Gallic in you. When you are well you will show me, yes? There is not much fun here on the farm with only my father and the old men. We will enjoy it. You will see. But for now you must rest. Drink your chocolate while it is hot.’ She put the cup in his hands and her teasing, patronising tone stirred something within him, something halfway between anger and the desire for her strong healthy body. The need to prove himself was suddenly much greater than the need to rest. It lent him new strength and he set the cup down untouched on the floor.

  ‘Who says I have to wait?’ he asked. ‘It takes more than a bit of practice walking to wear a Welshman down! Come here – I’ll show you now!’

  He pulled her down beside him and the touch of her body against his seemed to infuse him with new life. She was eager, yielding, a woman who had left her lover two years before and found no one to take his place. When his strength flagged she helped him and for a little while the world outside the attic ceased to exist. But afterwards lying with her head resting against his shoulder, one brown leg thrown carelessly across his, it began to intrude once more. He glanced at her face in the fading light, at the strong bone structure and the sweep of eyelashes lying on her cheek, and saw only Barbara’s rounded fairness. As he thought of her desire began again and with it impatience. He had to get back to her – had to see her again. Yvette had not found him repulsive, burns or no burns. Perhaps Barbara would not find him repulsive either. Beside him Yvette stirred.

  ‘That was nice, no? But your chocolate – it will be quite cold!’

  ‘Never mind the damn chocolate!’ he said, and there was a new and cheerful note in his voice.

  Although next morning Huw was weak and tired from his exertions it was as if a watershed had been reached. He grew stronger by the day. Soon he was joining the family in the farmhouse downstairs and each time he looked in the mirror he saw that the burns to his face were a little less noticeable. He and Yvette listened regularly to the broadcasts on the little radio and afterwards they would make love. He harboured feelings of guilt about this for when he was alone he thought of no one but Barbara, but Yvette asked for nothing beyond his company, never demanded more than he was prepared to give, and the union of their bodies in the small bed in the attic room had become as necessary to him now as the food and wine she had brought him when he was too weak to go downstairs and the medication Jacques had provided. It was all a part of the healing process, something as mechanical as it was pleasurable which fulfilled a need in her just as she fulfilled one in him.

  But with returning strength his impatience grew. How much longer would it be before he could get home? He couldn’t languish here for the duration of the war. In Yvette’s company he tried to hide his impatience but when Jacques visited he asked what plans they had for him.

  ‘It will not be long now,’ the doctor told him. ‘Things are in hand.’

  But a few days later Jacques brought devastating news. The Resistance cell which would have arranged for Huw’s exit from France had been penetrated and the leaders arrested. They sat around the table in the farm kitchen, talking of it in low voices.

  ‘They were betrayed,’ Jacques said. ‘The SS called at the house of M. Sambussi in the night. They found his radio set. He was arrested and taken away – his wife too. It will be a matter of days only, hours maybe, before the rest are arrested.’ His tone was matter-of-fact yet the words reminded them all of the constant danger they faced.

  ‘Thank God we had not yet told them of Huw,’ Raoul said in French.

  Huw was by now used enough to the language to understand him.

  ‘Did none of them know?’ he asked.

  ‘Only Father Leclerc,’ Jacques assured him. ‘We can only pray he is not taken – as no doubt he is doing himself! If he talks, then …’ He shrugged expressively.

  Huw stood up. ‘I must go – I’ll make my own way across country. I don’t want to put you into any more danger.’

  ‘No, my friend.’ Jacques laid a hand on his arm. ‘I have my ear close to the ground. If the good curé is arrested we must think again. For now it is safer for all of us if you remain hidden.’

  Reluctantly, Huw was forced to accept the logic of this argument. If he were caught without identity papers and if the Red Cross agreement was violated and he was interrogated he might very well be the one to betray these people who had saved his life.

  ‘What do we do then?’ he asked.

  ‘For the moment, nothing. As soon as things quieten down I will try to find a new contact,’ Jacques promised.

  For a few days they lived in fear and the sound of a motor vehicle in the lane would bring them out in a cold sweat. But the days passed and no black uniformed Germans came. Another week. Two. Blue summer was now turning to red and gold autumn. There was a nip in the air and Huw dreaded to think how cold it would be in his attic if he was still there when winter came. He was considering making a run for it by himself again when Jacques came with the news.

  ‘It is arranged, my friend. If all goes well you leave for England tomorrow night.’

  The blood began to pound at Huw’s temples. ‘How?’

  ‘Tomorrow night, a Lysander will come for you at a field not far from here. We will take you there. Be ready by ten o’clock. We must be there waiting for them. Any delay would be dangerous.’

  ‘I understand,’ Huw said.

  That night, Yvette came to the attic and he knew she expected him to make love to her one last time. He went through the motions automatically but it was an effort. He was too excited at the prospect of going home.

  ‘I shall miss you,’ Yvette said afterwards as they lay on the narrow bed.

  ‘You will be a lot safer with me out of the way.’

  She laughed softly. ‘Safer, per’aps, but also much more dull. Will you think of me sometimes?’

  ‘Of course.’

  She laughed again. ‘You are a liar, Huw. You will think only of your English girl. I know how it is with you.’

  He felt a flush of guilt. ‘Is it so obvious?’

  ‘Oui,’ she said. ‘Yes, it is. I hope she has waited for you. I hope you will be happy with her.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘So do I.’

  It was pointless to deny that now suddenly the hours until he could see Barbara again seemed to stretch ahead of him as long as the months that had already passed. Just the thought of her was making him close up inside with anticipation though it was no longer so easy to conjure up the image of her face. ‘Thank you for all you have done for me, Yvette,’ he said.

  She shrugged and he sensed her resignation, a girl in an occupied country, chained for the duration of the war to an isolated farm.

  ‘I wish it could have been more,’ she said.

  ‘Why don’t you fly out with me?’ he said suddenly. ‘I’m sure they could find room for you in the Lysander.’

  ‘And leave Papa to go on here with only Raoul to help him? I do not think so. And what would I do in England?’

  ‘I’m sure my family would look after you as you have looked after me.’

  ‘And your girl – she would look after me too? Oh no, Huw. That would not be good. Per’aps when the war is over if things do not work out for you with her you will come back. I would like that. But I do not expect it.’

  ‘I shall certainly come back if only to make sure you are all right,’ Huw told her.

  The next day he awoke to the sound of rain on the tiny attic window and his heart sank. If the cloud base was too heavy the Lysander would not come. But if they missed this moon it could be another month before another pick-up could be attempted. All day he watched the lowering sky, edgy now as a kitten.
He had waited so long, another delay now would be unbearable. The rain continued, driving down in thick persistent rods, dripping from the poorly maintained guttering of the old farmhouse and turning the yard outside into a quagmire. Nerves tormented him – he could never remember feeling so nervous, even when he had been flying nightly sorties. He could not eat, but chain smoked the pungent dark cigarettes which the doctor obtained for him. At around seven in the evening the rain eventually stopped and Huw’s practised eye noted that the cloud base was higher. Perhaps it would be all right after all. They had supper sitting around the big old scrubbed table and Huw managed to force himself to swallow the pork stew and chunks of bread so as not to be affected by the wine. He couldn’t afford to have that going to his head tonight! Across the table he felt Yvette’s eyes watching him and he smiled at her. She was to drive him to the pick-up field in the farm truck. There they would be met by the agent in charge of the operation.

  As the kitchen clock slowly ticked away the minutes Huw felt the knot of nerves tightening in his stomach. At a quarter to midnight Yvette stood up.

  ‘We go now.’

  It would take about an hour to reach the field, she had told him, and it was imperative he was there ready and waiting for the Lysander would be able to stay for only a few minutes.

  Yvette fetched her raincoat and tied a scarf over her long hair; Huw put on an old jacket which René had found for him.

  ‘I’ll try to send it back to you on the next drop,’ he joked.

  René nodded, not fully understanding. Huw thanked him and Raoul for all they had done for him and bid them farewell. Then they squelched across the farmyard to the truck. Raoul cranked the engine to life and Yvette shot it into gear. As they turned out into the lane Huw looked back and saw the two men watching them go. He had one last glimpse of the farm before the darkness swallowed it.

  Considering the condition of the roads and the truck’s unreliable state of repair Yvette drove fast and well but the effort required all her concentration and they talked little. In the narrow beam of the truck lights Huw tried to see something of the surrounding countryside. All these weeks he had been in France yet he knew nothing of it outside the confines of his attic room. But there was little enough to see. The fitful moon showed hedges and fields, all too bumpy or sloping to allow an aeroplane to land, and the occasional barn or cottage.