by Mary Nichols
She knew it would be hard; she had already seen poorly children on the wards and it had almost broken her heart, but she stiffened her spine and they saw only a pretty, smiling nurse who would make them all better. Her time off was precious for recharging her batteries and if she did not have time to go home to Nayton she would go and see Lucy and they would take young Peter out in his pram and enjoy a meal together afterwards. She loved her nephew and was very fond of Lucy and disgusted with her brother for not making an honest woman of the girl. And she hated keeping secrets from her parents. She resolved to have it out with Jack.
She did not see him again until the beginning of September, when they were both together at Nayton for a few days’ leave. The weather was glorious and the harvest in full swing. The reapers and binders were working all the daylight hours there were and the air was full of a hot, oily, dusty smell. The children were on holiday and both Edmund and Bernard, armed with stout sticks, were determined to catch the rabbits that fled from the last few yards of standing corn. Amy and Jack had been for a walk and were standing leaning over the field gate watching them. She was in a printed cotton frock and he had left off his jacket and tie and rolled up his sleeves.
‘Peaceful, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘You’d never believe there was a war on.’
‘Not here, no. Plenty of places where you can’t get away from it, though. We’re lucky we have this to come back to.’
‘But it’s not going to be the same is it? Not after the war, I mean.’
‘No, I suppose not. There are bound to be changes.’
‘I shan’t come out, for a start. There’s no point, when I’ve been working in the big wide world for ages. It’s an anachronism. Class distinction and all that will disappear …’
‘Not altogether.’
‘Perhaps not, but it will be replaced by something more equitable, based on worth – and I don’t mean wealth. I mean our worth as individuals.’
‘That’s very profound, little sister. What’s brought that on?’
‘I was thinking of Lucy.’
‘What about her?’
‘She needs you, Jack, and so does little Peter. You ought to tell Mama and Papa about her and marry her. The way you treat her is awful.’
‘Has she complained of my treatment of her?’
‘No, she never complains. She accepts the way you are because she doesn’t think she is worth anything better. But she is, you know. She’s worth a hundred Belinda Davenports.’
‘What do you know about Belinda Davenport?’ he asked sharply.
‘She’s my friend, she writes to me, you know.’
‘Oh.’ He took a moment to digest this information. ‘So you know she’s got a job at the Admiralty and lives in her family’s London apartment?’
‘Yes, her father wangled it. And I know you’ve been seeing her.’
‘Nothing wrong in that, is there? I can easily get up from Biggin Hill if I’m not on standby.’
‘I bet you haven’t told her about Lucy and Peter, have you?’
‘Of course not.’
‘And Lucy doesn’t know about Belinda?’
‘Don’t be daft!’
‘You know, if anything happened to you, and I pray it does not, Lucy would be in poor straits. She’s not your next of kin and there’d be no war widow’s pension for her.’
‘I give her a more than adequate allowance.’
‘No doubt that would stop if you haven’t made proper provision. Mama and Papa would help her, but how can they, if they don’t know about her and the baby?’
‘Amy, stop lecturing me. I’m not in the mood for it. And if you say one word to Belinda, I’ll never speak to you again.’
‘Course I won’t. What do you take me for?’
He sighed and turned from the gate to go back to the Manor. Amy walked beside him, not speaking. She had had her say and made him feel thoroughly uncomfortable.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ he said, a few minutes later. ‘We ought to try and find Lucy’s mother for her. It would be wonderful if they could be reunited.’
‘I thought she was dead. According to Bert Storey, she is.’
‘Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he? He wanted to marry his buxom widow. According to Lucy her mother just upped and left.’
‘Really? You mean Bert Storey is a bigamist?’
‘It wouldn’t surprise me.’
‘Well, I’ll be blowed! What hidden stories there are in our quiet village. But do you think Lucy would like us interfering?’
‘I’m sure she would be glad. At least that way she would have someone to turn to.’
‘Oh, I see. You are trying to abrogate your responsibilities.’
‘Not at all. It would please Lucy.’
‘Supposing her mother doesn’t want to know. After all, she abandoned her.’
‘I think it would help Lucy to come to terms with it, if she knew the truth.’
‘How would we go about finding out?’
‘I’ve no idea. I’ll have to think about it. You could try asking about Mrs Storey in the village, discreetly, of course.’
‘I’m not at home any more often than you are, Jack. When am I going to have the time? Why not tell Mama and Papa about Lucy and get them to help? I’m sure Papa would know how to go about it.’
‘Do you never give up?’ He swished angrily at a tall clump of cow parsley with a stick he had cut from the hedge. Its petals flew about scattering strong-smelling pollen.
‘All right, I’ll say no more. I’ll leave it to your conscience.’
The trouble was his conscience was bothering him. He enjoyed going out with Belinda, she was light-hearted and fun and she had no hang-ups over their relationship. He could easily imagine himself married to her, idly enjoying the social whirl: parties, tennis, yachting, shooting game, all the things the upper crust had taken for granted before the war. She wouldn’t even bat an eyelid if he occasionally strayed, so long as he did it discreetly. She would probably do the same. What she would say if she learnt about Lucy and Peter was another matter.
Lucy was a different case altogether. She was loyal, serene, and hard-working. Her very devotion flattered him, but it was more than that. When he was exhausted, stressed by the work he did, miserable after watching a pal spiral down and crash in a ball of flame, it was to Lucy he went for solace. Belinda would be hopeless in that kind of situation. Two women and he needed them both.
Bernard and Edmund raced home in glee. They each had a dead rabbit suspended on a stick by its hind legs, which they intended to give to Mrs Baxter to cook for dinner. Jack and Amy were both on leave and there would be extra people to feed.
‘Do you reckon your brother knows what happened to that girl?’ Bernard asked, when he caught sight of Jack and Amy walking ahead of them.
‘What girl?’
‘The one who used to open the railway gates.’
‘Lucy Storey? Why would he?’
‘You know why. I told you. I reckon the baby’s been born by now.’
‘So?’
‘I just wondered. I bet your sister knows.’
‘Well, I’m not going to ask her, if that’s what you’re thinking. Anyway, if you’re so keen to know what happened to her, why don’t you ask Frank Lambert?’
‘He wouldn’t know; she wouldn’t have told him what she was going to do. Anyway, I don’t trust him, nor Mr Storey, come to that.’
‘Why not?’
‘I don’t know. I just don’t. Did you ever find that picture?’
‘No. If you ask me it never existed.’
‘Oh, yes it did. I saw it. It was this big.’ Bernard spread his arms wide, dropping the rabbit. He bent to pick it up. It was still warm and soft to the touch, though its head was a bloody mess where he had hit it. ‘If it’s not in the house, then Lucy must have it and that means your brother gave it to her.’
‘Why are you so interested in her?’
‘It’s a mystery, that’s why. I
like solving mysteries. I think I’ll be a detective when I leave school.’
School was a sore subject with him. The head had been to see Lady de Lacey, and after they had been talking for some time, he had been sent for and told he should not be leaving school at fourteen, but sit the entrance exam for the Grammar School in Swaffham. ‘Miss Graham thinks you have great potential,’ her ladyship had said. ‘I know you did not sit the scholarship when you were eleven, but it’s not too late to transfer.’
He had been torn between his desire to be a grown man, earn his own living and help his ma, and his growing taste for learning. He was always top of the class and he loved to read, which was something he had never done at home. Books cost money and they had never had enough for luxuries like that. Nor had he ever been in a library until he came to Nayton. The fact that Edmund obviously knew so much more than he did was an added incentive.
‘Me ma couldn’t afford it,’ he had told them.
‘You wouldn’t have to pay if you passed the scholarship,’ Miss Graham had said. ‘It wouldn’t cost anything except for your uniform.’
‘Shall we ask what your mother thinks?’ Lady de Lacey had suggested.
The upshot of that was that Ma came down and talked to Lord and Lady de Lacey and instead of leaving school and going home, he was going to Swaffham Grammar School the following term. Lord de Lacey was going to pay whatever was necessary, and for a tutor to give him extra lessons so he could catch up with those who had gone to the grammar school the previous year. ‘It’s no big deal,’ had been Edmund’s comment when he told him. ‘I’m going to university when I’m eighteen. You could come too.’
That was so far beyond him he didn’t even consider it, but the idea of doing something more interesting than labouring on the docks, appealed to him.
‘You mean like Sherlock Holmes?’ queried Edmund as they slowed down behind the couple ahead of them.
‘Something like that. I could catch spies and get a medal and go to Buckingham Palace and have it pinned on by the king.’
Edmund laughed.
‘Well, why not?’ Bernard demanded.
‘There aren’t any spies round here.’
‘How do you know? Anyone could be a spy, ordinary people like Frank Lambert and Mr Storey.’
‘All right, then,’ Edmund said, still laughing. ‘You prove it and I’ll believe you.’
Chapter Nine
Max followed two other would-be agents, Etienne Ambrose and Anne Barnard, over to where a tethered balloon strained at its moorings. He was a bundle of nerves, unsure whether he had the guts to do it. It was all very well to jump from the tower in the hangar where their descent was controlled by a fan and they were not subject to the vagaries of wind and weather, but jumping from a balloon cage a great deal further from the ground was another matter. Neither of the others was showing any sign of nerves so he gritted his teeth and followed them into the cage where they sat round a hole in the floor and fastened their static lines ready for the off. They had been kept apart from the usual intake of trainees and their period of training was shorter, intended to give them the confidence to jump safely and no more. He did not doubt the instructor knew they were destined for something special, but no one mentioned it.
The dispatcher closed the gate, the mooring lines were released and the balloon began to ascend. Above him the late autumn sky was marred only by a few vapour trails left by aircraft. Below him through the hole in the floor, he could see the airfield with its runway and hangars and tiny dots that were the people on the ground. At eight hundred feet, the dispatcher sent them out. ‘Number One, go!’ Etienne disappeared through the hole. ‘Number Two, go!’ Max didn’t have time to think, let alone hesitate, and he was in the air and his parachute had opened above him and he was drifting down, trying to remember his drill. He heard one of the ground staff with a megaphone shouting at him to keep his ruddy feet together, and then he was on the ground, rolling as he had been taught. He sat up and began gathering in his parachute just as Anne landed not far away. All three safely down. They were all laughing with the sudden release of tension.
The next day they jumped from a Whitley bomber and two days later made a night jump because they would undoubtedly be landing in the dark. It was the scariest thing he had ever done, but he was rapidly learning that every day brought a new challenge, a new fear to conquer and he knew there was more to come. The clandestine part had yet to be mastered.
After passing out, all three reported back to Orchard Park, where Major Buckmaster interviewed them one by one. He had the reports from their instructors in front of him. Max, trying to read his upside down, managed to decipher: ‘A dependable man, a little staid, not given to high jinks, but not without humour. Hides his feelings well.’
‘Something distracting you, Captain?’ the major enquired mildly.
‘No, sir. I was wondering …’
‘About your report? It is perfectly satisfactory, no black marks, so I’m passing you for the last part of your training. Present yourself to the officer in charge at Beaulieu tomorrow. There you will take on your new identity and learn to convince whoever asks you that you are who you say you are. Miss Atkins will give you a travel warrant.’
‘No leave, sir?’
‘Not yet. Later perhaps. Off you go and good luck.’
At Beaulieu, he was soon practising how to survive in a hostile environment without being detected, and resisting interrogation if captured. Giving in meant the lives of everyone with whom he was connected would be in danger. It was one of the reasons why the people in each group, called a circuit, never knew those in other groups.
The circuit he was going to set up would be referred to as ‘Oberon’. The time for action was getting very close and as each day passed, so the tension built up. Until it was time to go, he had to get used to his new identity. Using the name Justine had invented for him, he was Antoine Descourt, born of a Canadian father and a French mother. His parents had brought him to France at the end of the Great War when he was ten and both had died in the flu epidemic shortly afterwards. He had been brought up by his mother’s sister, but she had fled to Algeria when war was declared in 1939 and so he had no immediate relatives in France. He memorised his fictitious birthdate, his parents’ names and ages and anything else he might be asked so that he could answer without hesitation. All conversations were now held in French and his fluency had come on by leaps and bounds. The slight accent he still retained was accounted for by his early years in Canada.
His new alter ego earned his living as a travelling salesman, dealing in paint and wallpaper. He would be given money, brochures, colour charts and business cards, but his samples would have to be purchased in France. He was learning how to deceive, how to make himself look insignificant, wearing an ill-fitting suit and down-at-heel shoes. He could be stopped at any time and asked for his papers and interrogated, and though his interrogators at Beaulieu were English, they made it as uncomfortably realistic as possible.
‘It’s important to hold out for at least forty-eight hours,’ he was told. ‘News of your arrest will have gone round the network and that will give everyone time to get rid of incriminating evidence, close down letter boxes and safe houses and disappear.’
When he was as ready as he would ever be, he was given a few days’ leave which he spent with his sister, days in which he began to live another lie, one for the benefit of those at home. ‘The regiment will probably go abroad,’ he told her. ‘So you mustn’t worry if the mail is held up. You’ll learn soon enough if anything happens to me.’
Leave over, he found himself standing on the grass of the airfield adjacent to Newmarket racecourse, looking at the black-painted Lysander which was to take him to France. He was going in alone and being dropped on a field in the grounds of a chateau belonging to Count François Mollet, who was a patriot and prepared to turn a blind eye to the sudden activity on the far side of his estate.
‘You will be met by someone from th
e Prosper circuit and taken to a safe house,’ Buckmaster had told him. ‘After that initial contact you will have no communication with them except in the direst emergency. As soon as it is safe to do so, you are to approach Ma’amselle Clavier for help.’
‘Justine?’ he queried.
‘Yes. You said you thought she would be willing …’
‘So I did, but this is altogether more chancy than simply helping one or two people on their way to a neutral country.’
‘We know that. If she is reluctant you are on no account to coerce her. You can use Prosper’s wireless operator to report your arrival and if all goes well, we’ll send you your own operator.’
‘And if it doesn’t?’
‘You will be recalled until we can put something else in place.’
‘Ready?’ Vera Atkins stood beside him to see him off. She had conducted his last interview, had inspected all his clothes to make sure there were no telltale English labels in them, had asked him one more time if he was sure he wanted to go and, on being answered in the affirmative, had given him a packet of Gauloise cigarettes, a recent French newspaper and a suicide pill. He could not imagine a situation in which he might want to use that, but it certainly brought home to him the risks he was taking.
‘Yes.’
‘Then good luck.’ She offered her hand, he shook it and then hefting up his equipment, he strode over and climbed into the aeroplane behind the pilot. The engines, which had been idling, sprang into life and the aircraft began to move. A minute later they were in the air. This was what all the training had been about. It all seemed surreal and he found it difficult to believe it was really going to happen, that very soon he would be on French soil, to all intents and purposes Antoine Descourt.
As the Lysander flew steadily on its way, he had time to reflect on all he had learnt since that day, months ago now, when he had been interviewed by Major Gielgud. His life seemed to have taken on a different meaning, geared to what he was being trained to do. Cool, in command of himself, lying to order, he felt his personality was already subtly changing. He was not the same man who had fought at Dunkirk, nothing like the shy young man who had courted Elizabeth de Lacey. He wondered if she would notice the difference when they were eventually reunited. Would she still love him and want to marry him? It was a pity he could not tell her what he was doing.