He had only been in Harrogate for a few hours, and yet he felt completely at home, all anxieties over what he had endured in XE 16 banished from his mind.
A door opened, and he turned to see Decia watching him. She was wearing pale jodphurs and a green jersey, and her face was flushed with the cold.
‘That’s better.’ She smiled at him. ‘You look almost human.’
She had suggested he should change into slacks and sweater as soon as he had arrived. It had sounded like a command.
‘Now.’ She sat down on a long sofa and crossed her legs. ‘Tell me about Dick.’
Drake moved away from the fire, off balance at her tone. There was no concern, and not much interest. Just something which had to be said. Got over with.
He shrugged. ‘He was under water for a long time.’
She smiled, her eyes very direct. ‘But he is a diver, surely?’
Drake felt cornered. ‘It was pretty dicey. I thought he’d had it.’
‘Bad as that?’ Her eyes widened. ‘Daddy said it was just shock and a few scratches.’
Drake replied bluntly, ‘Your father doesn’t go much on Richard, does he?’
‘You are observant.’ She wriggled her body, curling up like a cat. ‘I like that.’ She pouted. ‘But you’re probably right. I think that’s why I got married so soon. I like to have my own way.’
He grinned. ‘You do surprise me.’
Decia tossed her head. ‘Well, I’m fed up with this war. I’m so bored. Everyone else seems to be having such a splendid time. Even Daddy is getting involved with the Ministry of something-or-other over wool production.’ She laughed. ‘He’s after a knighthood, if you ask me!’
Drake stood looking down at her. ‘You’re not that hard, surely?’
She lay back, her lips slightly parted. ‘Don’t you be beastly, too. I couldn’t stand it. What with one thing and another, and then Moonshine pushing me against a rail in the stables, I’m really not at my best.’
She looked like a wanton child. Drake felt clumsy, lost for words.
‘Horses don’t like this sort of weather,’ he said.
‘I’m not joking, you know!’ She tugged urgently at her sweater and pulled it above the waistband of her jodphurs. ‘See for yourself, you horrible New Zealander!’
Drake sat beside her and looked. There was a dull red mark on her skin with a tiny red scratch in the middle.
He said, ‘You’ve got a splinter.’
He was trying to sound unruffled. Matter of fact. But the sight of her smooth skin, the way she was watching him, teasing him, made his blood pound like a pressure pump.
He bent over and touched the bruise, feeling her stomach muscles tighten, her knees coming together as if expecting a blow.
‘God, you’re lovely, Decia.’ The words came out calmly, in spite of his reeling senses. ‘Don’t you know what you do to a bloke?’
She said, ‘Take the splinter away, will you?’ She winced as he pinched the skin together. ‘Lucky you’re not a vet. Any horse would kick you where it hurts, you sadist!’
He plucked the splinter out and threw it towards the fire.
‘You deserve a reward.’ She thrust her arms around his neck. ‘Just this once.’
Drake felt the power in her, pulling him down. He expected her to push him off at the last moment, torture him with a laugh or a mocking reprimand.
If she wanted to play, so then would he.
But it was no game. As their mouths touched she pressed her face against his, her mouth opening wide, consuming his breath, and rousing his desperate want of her. He felt her lips, then her tongue darting into his teeth, while her body moved beneath him, inflaming still further, if that were possible.
Drake felt his hand groping under her sweater, as if it belonged to someone else. Up and across the smooth skin until he was cupping her breast, pressing it under his fingers until she moaned with pain.
He pulled back, breathing hard. ‘God, I’m sorry. I don’t know what the hell came over me.’
She watched him, her eyes wide, her mouth glistening in the firelight.
‘You’re not, and you do!’ Her arms dragged at him again. ‘I want you. Here, by the fire!’
Drake said huskily, ‘What about Richard?’
She slipped her hands down around his waist and touched him.
‘You want me too!’
It was then Drake knew he was lost.
The police sergeant rested both hands on the polished counter and regarded the petty officer gravely. There was so much to do, what with shortages and partly-trained War Reserve constables and Specials to chase and watch over. But he was a kindly man, and had never got hardened by the demands of war.
Jenkyn looked at him dazedly. ‘Night before last, then?’
The sergeant nodded. ‘Jerry dropped a stick of bombs right across the main railway line. All the way from Nine Elms yard.’ He lowered his eyes. ‘To your street.’
Jenkyn thought of the shock, the stunning disbelief, when he had passed the shabby but so familiar corner shop. In the centre of the terraced street was one great gap. As if it had been gnawed out.
The sergeant added, ‘Old Mrs Templer was looking in to see your ma. Bloody miracle she wasn’t killed, too. Direct hit.’ He shook his head. ‘I dunno. Can’t grasp any of it nowadays.’
Jenkyn put down his little case and stared around the police station. Notices about air-raid precautions. About ration books and hostels. A different existence from his own. A message would have gone up north to Loch Striven. We regret to inform you …
‘Mrs Templer, did you say?’
He caught another picture. A grey, owl-like old girl, whose husband had worked on the buses.
‘Yes. She used to drop in. Make tea. Try and cheer your ma up. She never got over losing your dad and brother, did she?’
Jenkyn shook his head. Seeing the table laid for tea. Glad she was not alone when hell had burst into her empty life.
‘I was away. At sea.’ Why had he said that?
The sergeant smiled. ‘It’s not only the armed forces who have to take it, y’know.’ He added suddenly, ‘Old Mrs Templer mentioned something strange when I visited her in hospital.’
‘Strange?’ Jenkyn tensed. Ice-cold. Knowing somehow what was coming.
‘Yes. She said your ma was re-setting the table, like she always did. Not saying much. Then, all at once she looked up and said something like, “They’re back! They’re coming home at last!” Then she ran to the front door. Just as the bomb hit the house. She wouldn’t have felt a thing.’
Jenkyn picked up his bag. She must have known. Sensed the exact moment.
He said, ‘I’d better go and find somewhere to kip.’
The sergeant said, ‘I can fix you up, if you like.’
‘No.’ He forced a smile. ‘I’ll book into the Union Jack Club until I’ve settled things.’
The sergeant saw one of his men fidgeting with his notebook. A motoring offence, a death to be notified, someone caught out on the black market. It never stopped.
He said, ‘Sorry it had to come from me. Another day and your commanding officer would have had the job of telling you.’
Jenkyn shook his head. ‘Better from you, mate. I’ve known you a long time.’
The constable watched the petty officer, small but smart in best blue, and gold-wire badges, leave the office.
‘Ma Jenkyn’s son?’
‘Yes.’ The sergeant did not want to talk about it.
‘How did he take it, Sarge?’
He thought about it. That was odd. Jenkyn had been shocked, but in some way relieved, too. Especially when he had told him about old Mrs Templer.
He snapped, ‘How the bloody hell d’you expect? Now give me the notebook and shut up!’
Outside it was already dark, and the rain was getting heavier. Jenkyn followed his feet around the corner and into the street again. He stopped opposite the gap where the house had been. Where he had been b
orn.
It was roped off, the shattered brickwork swept back to the edge of the crater.
The realisation struck Alec Jenkyn like a clenched fist. There was nowhere to come home to any more.
Brokenly he exclaimed aloud, ‘God, I’ll miss you, Ma.’ Then with the rain hitting his shoulders he turned and headed for the railway station.
‘The fact is, David, things are a bit awkward, if you get my meaning?’
Seaton leaned against the dark-wood bar of the Snug and watched his father wearily. The pub was not very busy. The customers were probably waiting to see if it would be a raid-free night before they decided to come or stay home in their shelters or under the stairs.
His father seemed to have grown older. It was ridiculous in so short a time.
He explained, ‘I didn’t know I was getting leave again either.’ No, I thought I was going to he killed. He asked, ‘What is awkward?’
‘I’m supposed to be meeting somebody.’ He shook his head. ‘I know what you’re thinking, my boy, but this time you’re wrong, entirely wrong.’
Seaton looked away. His father’s hand was shaking badly, he must have been at it all day. Why should it matter? Any more than any other time? Yet he felt cheated in some way.
He said bitterly, ‘I’m glad for you.’
His father moved round him, filling his vision again. ‘You don’t know. Wait till you get a wife. Then you will.’ He coughed violently and spilled some gin down his tweed suit. ‘They live off you until you’re too worn out to protest. They drag you down, and keep telling you what they could have been, but for looking after you all those years, cooking and working for you!’ He waved his glass to the barman. ‘You see if I’m not right!’
What about you? What did you give her? Seaton said, ‘I’m tired.’
His father seemed to see him properly for the first time. ‘You do look a bit done in. Been on manoeuvres or something like that?’
Seaton smiled. ‘Something like that.’
He thought of Jens, and the strange man, Trevor. Of Venables, and his secrets about rockets and devastating new weapons.
Here, in the Snug, it didn’t seem to count for anything.
He said, ‘I’ll buy you a drink. Sorry I couldn’t let you know about the leave.’
Then he saw his father’s eyes and turned as he greeted his new friend.
Seaton felt sick. The woman was old enough to be his mother, but had dyed red hair and a great red slash for a mouth. Funnily enough, her bright clothes and make-up only made her look older.
His father was saying thickly, ‘Er, this is, er, my son, David.’
She fixed her eyes on his. ‘I can’t believe it! You with a grownup son!’ But her eyes gave Seaton another message entirely.
It would almost be worth it, he thought savagely. Take her off him, just so he could see what he was doing to himself.
No wonder his sudden arrival had made things a bit awkward.
‘I’ll stay at an hotel, Dad.’ He picked up his case. ‘You have a good time. I’ll phone you.’
‘If you’re sure, David?’
Seaton grinned at him. Poor, pathetic old boozer, But he was all he had.
‘Quite sure.’
He pushed out through the bar and took several deep breaths. A good sleep and tomorrow it might all seem different.
As sirens wailed their nightly air-raid warning over southern England, Seaton sat on the side of an hotel bed and poured himself a large gin. He had had several, but they did not seem to make any difference.
Near Waterloo Station, Jenkyn passed the time with two other petty officers, tracing patterns in spilled beer on the table, swapping yarns which each of them had heard many times before.
In the naval hospital at Rosyth, Niven lay with his fists clenched at his sides, staring at the ceiling. The ward was dark but for the night sister’s little lamp, and if he moved his head he could see her white cap as she drowsed over a book.
Near his bed, hidden by screens, he heard a man’s gentle moaning. It had been going on since his arrival. Regular, unhurried. When it stopped, Niven knew it would seem louder. The man was dying.
Further south, and somewhere in between the scattered members of XE 16’s company, Drake lay on his back, listening to the rain and the girl’s deep breathing beside him.
He felt completely spent, but knew that if she needed him again he would be unable to resist. He could feel the press of her breast against his skin, the heat of her leg thrown carelessly across his own.
She stirred and reached out to touch him. To hold him until he was fired almost to madness.
She whispered, ‘Darling?’
He looked at her pale outline in the darkened room.
‘Yes?’
‘Now.’
9
One Down
AT THE END of a week’s leave Seaton was almost thankful to receive a summons to the Admiralty. He had spent the days walking around London, going to cinemas and theatres, anything to keep his mind off the war. But, if anything, it made matters worse. It was all escapism, a delusion which he was unable to share.
The streets were always full of uniforms. Americans, Poles, Free-French, Canadians, it was like a foreign country. Against their restless searching for enjoyment, the real Londoners made a drab but defiant backcloth.
Seaton often wondered how they put up with it. And the war showed itself in various guises. Like the morning after a bad raid, when he saw a double-decker bus standing on its nose against a shopfront, as if placed there with infinite care by a giant.
Or the time he had been sitting in the companionable warmth of a West End cinema watching Gary Cooper in For Whom The Bell Tolls. Without warning a young soldier had jumped to his feet in the next row and had screamed, ‘You don’t know what the bloody war is about!’ He had been sobbing like a child when somebody had fetched a couple of military policemen to remove him.
At the Admiralty, Seaton waited for a sentry to check his identity card against a list of names. It was the same man as before, and he had the mad idea that Venables and Niven’s father, and the newly appointed Air Marshal Ruthven, had not left the bunkers since his other visit.
‘Right, sir. You can go on through.’ The man watched him incuriously. Lieutenants, even those with decorations, were two a penny.
‘Hello, Dave!’
Seaton turned with surprise and saw Drake rising from an uncomfortable bench inside the waiting room.
They shook hands warmly, and Seaton asked, ‘Did they send for you, too?’
‘That’s right. So I came a-running. Something’s in the air maybe?’
They fell in step and penetrated deeper into the building.
‘How’s Richard?’
Drake glanced sideways at him. ‘I waited until he came down from Rosyth. Then I went to see a friend in Leeds. Chap I met in Malta.’ He shrugged. ‘Richard was fine. A bit wound up. But he’s like that on the surface.’ He changed the subject. ‘What’s it like here? Full of brass and brains?’
‘Some of each.’ Seaton showed his pass to another man at a desk. ‘The Intelligence chief is Richard’s father, by the way. Rear Admiral Niven.’ He looked at him meaningly. ‘Didn’t want you to put your great hoof into anything!’
‘Thanks.’ Drake grinned. ‘It has been known.’
A lift carried them swiftly down to the concrete bunker, then into Venables’ outer office where three shirt-sleeved Wrens were hammering typewriters as if their lives depended on it.
A bored-looking lieutenant said, ‘Wait here, please. The captain is engaged.’
Drake raised his eyebrows. ‘Who’s the lucky girl?’
But the lieutenant merely gave him a frosty stare.
They sat down and waited. Then Seaton asked, ‘Did Richard’s father-in-law make you welcome?’ He saw the guard drop.
Drake answered, ‘Well, he was away, as it happens. On some government commission.’
‘Just you and Richard’s wife?’
‘Right.’ He turned and dropped his voice. ‘Look, take it easy, Dave. It just happened.’ He sounded bewildered. ‘I still can’t believe it.’
‘Does Richard know?’
‘For God’s sake!’ Drake lowered his voice again as all three typewriters fell silent. ‘I’d not want to hurt him. I don’t think she would either.’ He was very serious. ‘If you’d like me to request a transfer, I will. I don’t see why you should get involved because of me.’
Seaton smiled gravely. ‘Captain Venables says no transfers. Teamwork comes first.’
Drake shifted uncomfortably. ‘Sod him.’
‘What’s she like?’
Drake spread his hands. ‘Lovely. Full of life. Fantastic.’ He looked away. ‘I’m not proud of myself. I’d kill the bastard who did it to me. I should never have gone there.’ He ran his fingers through his fair hair. ‘Christ, what a bloody mess!’
‘You sound like my father.’ Seaton stood up. ‘Come on. We are being called.’
Venables greeted them formally and shut the door.
‘I would not have recalled you unless I considered it necessary.’
Good beginning, Seaton thought. No arguments for that.
‘The operation I hinted at last week has become suddenly urgent. I have made a signal for your E.R.A., er, what’s his name, Jenkyn? He will be on way to the base, I should think.’
Drake said, ‘Niven’s only just come out of hospital, sir. Not much of a leave for him.’
‘Quite.’ Venables tapped his desk with a ruler, as if trying to make up his mind. ‘I am well aware of that. But we need a boat like yours. Pity about Niven, but it can’t be avoided. I don’t want any changes at this stage.’
Drake was unimpressed. ‘But what about the others, sir? They’ve had the same experience and training.’
Venables eyed him bleakly. ‘XE 19 has been playing-up with mechanical failure. Lieutenant Allenby requires another week at least.’
He walked to a wall map and touched it vaguely. ‘In fact, orders were sent to XE 17. Lieutenant Vanneck seemed most suitable.’
Seaton felt his mouth go dry. ‘Seemed?’
‘XE 17 was reported missing. No survivors.’ He sighed. ‘That’s all I can tell you at present.’
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