Bobby's War

by Shirley Mann

  The group of men turned to greet the new arrivals and Reggie introduced them with a touch of pride in his voice that he knew three gorgeous ATA pilots.

  Bobby clutched the stem of her glass tightly. One of them was Edward.

  They had not met for months and their last meeting had been re-played over and over in her mind, the embarrassment worsening every time.

  ‘Hello Bobby,’ he said, quietly. Outwardly, her unexpected appearance seemed to have no effect on him but inside, his heart was thumping.

  ‘Ah, you know one of these lovely ladies, do you, Turner? I might have known!’

  Sally immediately turned her attention to a tall, older man with a monocle. His distinguished looks suggested a large fortune. She turned triumphantly to the others, giving them a wink. Daphne was commandeered by Reggie and Bobby was left facing Edward.

  ‘How are you, Edward?’ she said, twirling her glass in her hand.

  ‘Fine, thank you. And you?’

  Bobby muttered something but she knew her cheeks were aflame and the words that came out were mumbled.

  He took her arm gently and steered her away from the group.

  ‘I’ve been wanting to contact you but it’s been a bit difficult – so much happening at the moment. Is there any chance you might be home a week on Saturday?’

  Bobby looked puzzled but searched mentally through her roster. ‘I think I could be, why?’

  ‘I may have something of interest to you and your family. It would be good if you could be there.’

  This man was so mysterious, she just could not work him out.

  ‘Good, I’ll see you then,’ she said. ‘But for now, why don’t we go and have a dance?’

  The lights swirled above the pair as they took to the dancefloor. She was amazed he was such a good dancer and not stiff like the men around her, who looked like penguins, she thought with a giggle. That drink must have gone to her head.

  His arm encircled her waist and his hand on her back seemed to burn through her dress.

  The band was playing Glenn Miller’s ‘Little Brown Jug’ and their feet had to move very fast. They both burst out laughing when Bobby stumbled and fell into Edward.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘I’m out of practice.’

  ‘No, it’s me and my clumsy feet,’ he gallantly replied, taking her in his arms once more.

  The band did not draw breath before launching into ‘In The Mood’ and the slower tempo made them each suddenly aware of the proximity of the other. Bobby closed her eyes for a moment and the room spun.

  ‘Bobby . . .’ he started, ‘I want to apologise.’

  She looked up and waited.

  ‘I am such a fool,’ he blurted out. ‘I don’t think I sounded enthusiastic enough about the chance of you having a job at the airfield when all this is over.’

  She stood back and looked him squarely in the face.

  ‘No, Edward, you did not. I’ve never pretended to be anything other than what I am and, believe me, I’m not the woman for you if you think I could ever be content with just being a housewife preparing cucumber sandwiches for Embassy suppers.’

  The vision that invaded Edward’s mind made him burst out laughing. ‘No,’ he said, with a grin, ‘I don’t suppose a pinny would suit you, would it?’

  ‘Not one bit,’ she retorted, starting to smile. ‘Look, I don’t think tonight is the time for any deep discussions, let’s just dance and have a bit of fun.’

  ‘That’s fine by me, work is just not allowing me a minute to think at the moment, and,’ he said, pausing to acknowledge her career too, ‘I don’t suppose yours is either.’

  It was step in the right direction, Bobby thought.

  Chapter 46

  It felt good to be heading out into the field again, Edward thought, automatically filling his bag with only the bare essentials. He needed to leave as much room as possible for some supplies for his friends. He felt the familiar calm confidence he loved so much when he was about to face the unknown. Edward had been moved from Whitehall to Baker St where the Special Operations Unit was based to focus on the work being done by this top secret organisation, but his prowess with Dutch and German and high level clearance meant that he was to be flown to Holland to coordinate the Dutch Resistance emergency food projects. He needed to get it up and running, aware that it was already too late for thousands of civilians in the Netherlands who had starved to death after the Germans had blocked supplies and flooded the land. The Dutch railway workers’ strike was intended to make life as difficult as possible for the enemy but between the weather and German retaliation, the Dutch were thwarted in their attempts to plant food in the waterlogged fields and the nation was suffering from an horrendous ‘Hongerwinter’. Frozen canals meant no barges could make winter deliveries and the population was now trying to survive on between 320 and 580 calories a day.

  Edward checked his notes. Flour had already been airlifted in from Sweden and there were two follow-up relief efforts planned – Operation Manna and Operation Faust. One was going to air drop food over German-occupied territory and the second was hoping to use 200 vehicles to truck food into Rhenen. Both areas were still occupied by the Germans and he sighed, knowing how much subversive coordination by the resistance networks would be needed to ensure all three operations got food through.

  During his time in the field in the run-up to the war, Edward had spent some time in Holland and spoke both Dutch and German well. He was a valuable asset in the complex negotiations. He was also hoping he could further another cause while he was there.

  He took the train to Lincoln and then a car was waiting to take him to RAF Scampton, where plans were being made for Operation Manna which would, as the Bible had described, drop food from the heavens.

  He was given a tour of inspection to examine the makeshift hammock-type arrangements that were to be attached to the undercarriages of Lancaster bombers so that ‘blocks’ of food could be carried across the Channel and he watched bemused pilots being sent out on low-flying missions without knowing why or what they were being trained for.

  A reconnaissance aeroplane was being sent over the Netherlands that night and it had been arranged that Edward would go with it. He did not feel any anxiety about being dropped so close to enemy territory. Edward Turner only felt nervous when dealing with women – landing near enemy-held territory just elicited an excited grin from him.

  The pilot was more on edge. Only two weeks before, nearly 200 Luftwaffe pilots had carried out a suicide mission, using their propellers as scythes and cutting into American bombers. A young man in his mid-twenties, Philip Howes had survived three tours and even though the gossip in the mess was that the attacks were a last-ditch effort to subdue the Allies, he was worried that his luck was in danger of running out, just before the war finally ended. He felt he was living on borrowed time.

  Helping Edward climb up the ladder at the back of the Lysander, Philip Howes looked at the civil servant with disbelief. There was no evidence of a slight tremor of the hands or a tiny twitch in his cheek – both signs he had regularly seen in men about to land in war-torn Europe. This man seemed to have a child’s enthusiasm for the task ahead.

  ‘More fool him,’ Philip thought, believing naivety to be the reason for his passenger’s phlegmatic approach. Edward smiled at Phillip and signalled to him to pass his bag up, but Philip paused, weighing it in his hands.

  ‘What on earth do you think you’ve got in here?’ he asked crossly, ‘the Crown Jewels?’

  ‘Worth more than the Crown Jewels to the people I’m going to see,’ said Edward, leaning across to take the bag from him, but Philip held it back.

  ‘Not on your life, sir. You can only take essentials. The landing is too soft, we need as little weight as possible.’

  He pointed to Edward to go back down the ladder and Edward had no choice but to obey. He took out some tins, milk and flour from the bag, just leaving some chocolate hidden under his smalls.

&nbs
p; Philip picked up the bag again and nodded, motioning Edward into the plane.

  ‘Sorry, sir, but I can’t risk your life for a few supplies. It seems you’re too valuable.’

  Edward sat silently in the rear of the plane, relieved that at least his flight was going to be followed so soon by the food drops. Philip flew low over to the Netherlands, sticking firmly to the areas that had been liberated by the Canadians. From the high position in his cockpit, he was able to get good photographs by moonlight of the land below. Edward peered out of the side window to see the shadows of ruined buildings and devastated landscapes. He remembered the colourful bulb fields and the gently-turning windmills and felt a huge sadness for the nation that had made a young man feel so welcome in the 1930s. The landscape looked ravaged – by nature and by man. Cities were flattened and proud buildings destroyed. Edward had seen Coventry and London but somehow, even in the reflection of the moon, this country below him looked more forlorn and desperate – as if the heart had been ripped out of it.

  It had been arranged that Edward would be dropped near to the finally-liberated Arnhem. He had to get as close as possible to his rendezvous point as there was no petrol for cars and the Germans had confiscated all bicycles. Everywhere was eerily quiet below him but occasionally he spotted a few bedraggled people, dragging one exhausted foot in front of another, on a desperate night march. They hardly had the energy to look up to check whether the plane above them was friend or foe, almost as if they were hoping an enemy plane would put them out of their misery.

  Edward scanned the map. ‘There’, he shouted forward, spotting the place he knew as Easter Meadow. ‘The Germans haven’t left much standing, but that’s the place, I’m sure of it.’

  ‘You’d better be,’ Philip replied. ‘It’s a long walk if you’re wrong. OK, I’ll circle, get enough height and then we can go in. I’ll have to be quick; I can’t risk getting waterlogged.’

  The pilot waited until he saw the signal, a powerful beam flashed the letter ‘X’. Once the lamps were turned on, Philip went down and touched at ‘A’, the first light, as he passed ‘B’ he noted that the colour of the ground had changed and he knew the meadow had been ploughed recently. He squeezed the brake lever as hard as he could, almost making the Lysander stand on its nose.

  ‘Please be as quick as you can, sir,’ he called back, but Edward was already out on the ladder and calling his thanks to his pilot.

  The aircraft immediately did a ‘U’ turn and taxied to take off, bumping along the furrows.

  Edward turned around to be greeted by a man in a traditional cap who ran out to meet him.

  ‘Hans!’ Edward exclaimed, taking a moment to recognise his friend before clasping his hand. He was shocked to see the man’s sunken cheeks and dark-rimmed eyes. He looked like a walking skeleton.

  ‘Edward, it’s good to see you. How are you?’

  ‘Better than you, I suspect.’

  Hans and Edward thanked the men with the torches, who turned to go back over the field to the village of De Praets and then Hans said abruptly, ‘When will food be coming?’

  ‘In two days,’ Edward told him, reaching in his bag to hand over the two bars of chocolate he had managed to stuff in the bottom.

  ‘Give this to Maria and the children,’ he said. ‘I’m so sorry I couldn’t bring more.’

  ‘Maria and Lotte are gone,’ Hans said in a voice devoid of expression, ‘only Markus and I are left now.’ There was a pause. ‘They found a bicycle hidden and they shot them. They knew that would be worse for me than to be shot myself. Markus was whisked away to safety by my friends but those bastards made me watch.’

  Edward did not know what to say. He reached out and hugged his friend, who held himself stiffly.

  ‘Come,’ Hans said, pulling back. ‘We go, they are waiting for us.’

  As they walked to a half-destroyed house, Edward thought how little the typing on a report had been able to express the hardships that the Netherlands had suffered. Everywhere, there were muddy tracks of refugees, fleeing from the enemy. The fields were invisible under several feet of water on either side of the dykes and the village of De Praets had nothing left except the apexes of houses pointing upwards like icebergs in a sea of rubble.

  They were greeted by five men, all looking as emaciated as Hans. They welcomed Edward enthusiastically with hope in their eyes. He was a herald of the longed-for Manna Operation. They stood in a circle; there were no chairs anywhere but someone produced some chipped cups and poured out weak, black tea for them all and they sat down on the floor.

  It was several hours later that the meeting finally broke up with all the distribution plans in place. Edward realised he was starving but that any food would stick in his throat. He only had another day to wait before he could be picked up and taken back to Britain, these men would have to wait a further twenty-four hours after that.

  Hans and Edward walked to Hans’s house; it was partially destroyed but the front room was still intact. The house was cold and Edward was struck by the sparseness of the rooms, with no sign of the coloured rugs that used to adorn its floors and walls.

  Edward remembered evenings spent laughing and joking over a bottle of wine with Hans and Maria, with the two little ones tucked up in bed in the loft above. He looked round for their little dog, Otto, but he was nowhere to be seen.

  ‘I’m sorry, we have to sit on the floor,’ Hans explained. ‘We had to burn the furniture. We even had to eat the dog; we have nothing left to give.’ He turned urgently to Edward. ‘Make it stop, Edward, make it stop.’

  Chapter 47

  The sun was shining when Edward woke the next morning. He stretched and groaned. His body felt wrecked from the bare floorboards but with the sun shafting though the skylight, it did feel like spring and brought an optimism he had not felt since he had arrived. Starting tomorrow, 141 sorties of bombers would fly low over the Netherlands bringing sugar, dried egg powder, margarine, potatoes, tinned meat and other essentials over a ten day period to the starving people below. He just wished it could be today.

  Hans was already up. He proudly offered Edward some dark bread that he told him with excitement, had been made with Swedish flour that had finally got through to the village late last night. He and the rest of the villagers had been up at dawn to queue outside the baker’s, revelling in the glorious smell of freshly-baked bread. Edward tried to refuse the bread but Hans insisted, pushing a still-warm piece over to him. It was his proudest moment of the last few months and his delight in being able to offer a guest something to eat was too palpable to deny.

  The small amount of food seemed to inject an energy into Hans and he grabbed hold of Edward’s arms.

  ‘Markus has gone to school. I was able to give him some breakfast. It’s almost like before,’ he said gleefully, but then his face darkened again as the reality of his shrunken family hit him in the chest.

  While Edward munched on the dry bread, Hans told him, ‘We must go now, I’ve heard we have your little friend’s mother and that she is safe.’ With that, he ushered Edward out of the door.

  His neighbours were all out on the streets, still looking wary about being able to walk around freely. A few Allied soldiers were on the corner, leaning against their trucks. They were disobeying orders and were handing out their own rations to the crowds of people who were clamouring against the vehicles.

  Edward and Hans made their way to the path alongside the river. The ruins of Arnhem could be seen on the other side, a grim reminder of the two battles it had taken to reclaim it. The rendezvous was arranged for ten o’clock. Edward scanned the horizon. In the distance, a handcart was being pulled along the towpath by two men. In it, there was a woman in a tattered brown coat. As the cart approached, Edward felt nervous. He had received news only a week ago that Elizé’s mother had been among those freed with the liberation of Drancy, just hours before she had been due to be transported to an extermination camp. The rescue plan he immediately put into place
was a tricky and dangerous one. She had had to be taken through the network in France and into the Allied-occupied part of the Netherlands and he had no idea what physical or mental state she was in.

  As the cart got nearer, Hans moved forward. He reached his hands out to help the woman but she sat, transfixed, unable to move from sheer exhaustion.

  ‘Come Madame Waters,’ Edward said gently. He too reached out his hands and she looked frantically from one man to the other, terrified to trust anyone.

  ‘We are going to take you to Elizé,’ Edward told her.

  At her daughter’s name, Rebecca lurched forward. Hans was used to emaciated bodies but Edward looked in horror at the thin sticks that served as her legs and arms.

  Hans and Edward thanked the two men who had pulled the cart ten miles that morning and they nodded in acknowledgment, then turned around to go back, but not before Hans gave them some bread, which they ate greedily.

  Rebecca could hardly walk and Edward was glad he had asked Mavis to organise a few days’ recovery time in an English convalescent home before he took her to Salhouse Farm.

  Edward checked his watch. They did not have much time before they were to meet the plane back at Easter Meadows and he took Rebecca by one arm, signalled to Hans to take the other and they made their way back to the flat landing area they had come from. The sun had mercifully dried it out a little, Edward realised, noting that his feet did not squelch quite as badly as they had the day before.

  The plane was already approaching so Edward hugged Hans by his bony shoulders and promised he would return to see him when the war was over. He thanked him from the bottom of his heart for his help and reassured him that, as from tomorrow, the Hongerwinter was over. Hans nodded, unable to believe his country’s nightmare was nearly at an end.

  The Lysander slowed but Edward had to get Rebecca on board fast so quickly helped her up the ladder. It was like pushing a feather. Philip Howes’s head popped out from the side window of the cockpit and he threw out a bag.