Even now he could recall their names, like a litany.
Dickinson, Knowles, Stillman, Ormerod, Bowker, Rose, Grace, Hicks, Clark and MacWilliams, the last two both called Paddy since they were Irish.
The reception had been brilliant, with James making a good fist of the best man’s speech, leaving him writhing in embarrassment at some of the schoolboy things he’d got up to, especially the time he’d put black soot on all the eyepieces of the binoculars and telescopes at the annual school regatta.
The thrashing he’d received from the headmaster who, an hour before, had looked like a panda, had been exceptional. Happily, in anticipation of what was coming, he’d slipped two slices of ham from the school kitchen under his shorts. It took some of the sting out of the cane, and still made the right noise – as did he.
The good news had been announced on the wireless while they were changing to catch the London train. Agreement had been reached at Munich – no details as yet.
As they stepped into the car taking them to the station, and rice was thrown over them in great handfuls, the whole wedding reception knew the good news. An air of almost hysterical jubilation permeated the gathering.
With loud cheers, and a final rejoinder from Mr Peacock to ‘Take care of her now Biff,’ they swept away.
Almost immediately the quietness descended and they were left all on their own, the driver on the other side of the Rolls’s thick glass screen.
They looked at each other.
She was dressed in a pale silk coat, and wearing a tiny little hat with a net veil that covered her eyes.
Their hands met on the seat. He covered hers and squeezed.
‘Hello, Mrs Banks.’
She smiled, and put her head on his shoulder.
‘Hello, Mr Banks.’
Most of their luggage, including her trunk, was taken on to Victoria Station. They only retrieved an overnight bag each, which were placed in their room by a porter summoned by the concierge.
Biff tipped him ten bob – way, way, over the odds even by the Connaught’s standards, but he was feeling almost light-headed with expectancy.
They had a suite, so they had their own bathroom and separate lavatory.
In the elegantly decorated dining room they had a light supper; in fact, after the blow-out of the wedding breakfast he wasn’t hungry at all.
When the time came at last he coughed and said: ‘Perhaps you’d care to go up first? I’ll have a last cigar.’
She flashed him a coy look.
‘Don’t be too long now. Fifteen minutes will be quite enough, or you might find me asleep. It’s been a long day.’
With that she pushed back her chair, picked up the keys, gave a little wave of her fingers and left.
Biff went out into the lounge, ordered a brandy and selected a cigar from the humidor held by a waiter.
He stepped out on to the hotel’s terrace. Somewhere he could hear music and a crooner softly singing of love.
All of a sudden he felt very happy. He was married to a beautiful girl, he was a pilot in the Royal Air Force, and he was about to go on honeymoon in a world that at least for the foreseeable future was at peace.
‘What more could a man ask for?’
He tapped lightly on the door, but found it was not locked. When he entered the lights were down low, and there was a lovely smell of Chanel No. 5 in the air.
‘Rosemary?’
‘Come in, darling.’
He closed the door and locked it. Through the half-open bedroom door he could see the bed, but it was only when he eased the door gently open that Rosemary was revealed, sitting up, her creamy white shoulders and neck in contrast to the dark mahogany headboard and the straps of her black-silk nightdress.
Biff took a step towards her.
‘Hello Biff, old chap, how are you getting along?’
It was the high sheriff in all his finery, black velvet jacket, white shirt with ruffles and cravat, silken breeches and black hose. Each holder of the office had to buy his own formal dress at a cost of several thousands of pounds. His was still in a back bedroom somewhere, together with his sword.
Biff smiled back at him and started to get up to shake hands. ‘High Sheriff….’
‘No, no.’ The high sheriff crouched down beside him. ‘Just came over to see how you are getting on. Glad you could make it today.’
‘Thank you for including me, Richard.’
It was customary for past high sheriffs to be involved, but it was nice to be invited; after all, it had been a good many years since he had held the office.
‘I meant to come round but I’ve been so busy….’
Biff nodded. ‘I understand.’
The high sheriff and his friends were all one generation, so it was not as if he saw them regularly on a social basis – those days were now long gone. Although he was well known, he was now a lonely old man, left behind really.
They chatted for several minutes before the high sheriff straightened up. ‘Right, I’m going off to get comfortable before the speeches. These button flies bring back memories, eh, Biff? Wish I’d gone for the zip option.’
Left on his own again he nodded. Yes, he remembered when his hands were freezing in the war, and it was bloody impossible to do them back up in a hurry, the fingers just didn’t work.
Fingers. He remembered cool soft fingers, doing things to him that nobody had ever done before. Rosemary had certainly been a shock. Unfortunately he’d disgraced himself, unable to control his own body. Fortunately, and with the vigour of youth, later in the night he had at last managed to hang on long enough for Rosemary to get involved.
He shook his head in wonder. Nobody ever talked about difficulties in those days. It was all supposed to happen just like that, and also it was the girl who was supposed to be apprehensive. He grinned inwardly. In their case it was Rosemary who had certainly taught him a thing or two.
He was aware of the room settling down again and of some of the diners turning their chairs towards the top table. He glanced at the menu card. The judges always spoke first, in this case it was his Honour Judge Richard Gordon.
Biff knew him to be a soft-spoken man, but he had a wicked sense of humour, not always appreciated by the miscreants before him on the bench.
Somewhere, somebody banged a table several times and a loud voice carried in the quietening room.
‘Your Grace, lords, ladies and gentlemen, His Honour, Judge Richard Gordon, QC, who will propose the toast to the high sheriff.’
The clapping started all around him.
Biff shouldered through the crowds on the platform at Victoria Station, searching the windows of the yellow and brown Pullman cars of the Golden Arrow express.
After they had settled into their first class seats he had, much to Rosemary’s annoyance, insisted on getting off again to get the papers, the Daily Telegraph for him and Daily Express for her. She didn’t seem to care much about the momentous news scrawled in black on all the newstands: Peace in Our Time.
He’d meant to get them as they had followed their porters, with their luggage on barrows, past the W.H. Smith kiosk, but had been distracted by the station announcer’s voice echoing incoherently around the glass-and-iron vault of the station roof, just as an engine’s safety valve lifted and blasted steam, so that he couldn’t hear exactly what was said, but it was something about the Channel. Was it rough? He wasn’t a good sailor.
In the event it was to do with workings on the permanent way to the coast – adding some ten minutes to their journey.
He suddenly saw her, waving in the window of a coach called Annabel, steam rising from somewhere beneath, obscuring her for a second.
As he boarded at the end door whistles shrilled on the platform and doors slammed.
He slumped into the seat opposite her and took off his trilby hat, just as the coach gave a lurch forward.
‘Phew, that was close.’
Rosemary raised an eyebrow and said sarcastically: ‘That
would have been fun, wouldn’t it? I have a husband for just one night, then he stays in London while I go off to the most romantic city on earth. That’s a dangerous way to treat a girl, isn’t it?’
He leant forward over the table and kissed her on the tip of her nose.
‘Just as long as you behave yourself, Mrs Banks.’
She put the tip of a finger on his forehead and pushed him away.
‘Mr Banks, you’ve started a fire in me that only you can put out.’
He went bright red.
All the way down to Dover, through the Kent countryside with its tall hop frames and apple orchards, he read the news. There was a photograph of Mr Chamberlain, stepping off the plane at Heston, waving a piece of paper with apparently Herr Hitler’s signature on it.
As he read further it became apparent the Sudetanland was being transferred to Germany. Edvard Beneš, Czechoslovakia’s head of state, had protested at the decision, but Neville Chamberlain had told him that Britain would be unwilling to go to war over the issue: after all, they were German-speaking peoples.
Eduard Daladier, the French President had agreed and Mussolini was being praised for setting up the four-power meeting and acting as an ‘honest broker’.
Biff gave a little grunt at that. For a start, he hadn’t even invited the Russians, who had more of an interest in the region than either France or Britain, they being fellow Slavs.
He read the full statement dated 30 September 1938.
We, the German Führer and Chancellor, and the British Prime Minister, have had a further meeting today and are agreed in recognizing that the question of Anglo German relations is of the first importance for the two countries and for Europe.
We regard the agreement signed last night, and the Anglo German Naval Agreement, as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again. We are resolved that the method of consultation shall be the method adopted to deal with any other questions that may concern our two countries.
As he read on it became apparent that the Munich Agreement, as it was being called, was popular with the press and the public, who perceived it as having prevented a war with Germany. The editorial in the Daily Express pretty well summed up how everybody seemed to feel. He read:
Be glad in your hearts. Give thanks to God. People of Britain your children are safe. Your husbands and sons will not march to war. Peace is a victory for all mankind.
If we must have a victor, let us choose Chamberlain. For the Prime Minister’s conquests are mighty and enduring – millions of happy homes and hearts relieved of their burden. To him the laurels.
And now let us go back to our own affairs. We have had enough of these menaces, conjured up from the Continent to confuse us.
Biff bit his lip. It seemed a great relief, but he only hoped that they would continue to build up the strength of the Air Force from the perilously low state to which it had been allowed to slump.
For heavean’s sake, the Navy still seemed strong enough.
Apart from Anthony Eden resigning earlier in the year as foreign secretary in protest at the policy of appeasement, on the day, only Winston Churchill raised a dissenting voice.
Whatever, it was a lovely start to their honeymoon.
He turned the page. Inside were splendid photographs of the launching of the new liner, the Queen Elizabeth, at Clydebank.
On the sports page was an article on Don Budge who had become the first tennis player to achieve the Gland Slam. After that he dozed for a while. The last few days – and one night, had been quite draining.
The Channel was calm, and Biff stood on the stern of the steamer with his arm around Rosemary’s waist as they watched the white cliffs recede. She turned her face to his.
When he kissed her he could taste the salt on her lips.
That night they dined in the Ritz’s ornate restaurant, and drank wine the like of which he had never tasted before. He felt a bit guilty because his father-in-law was paying: it had been set up beforehand as part of their wedding gift.
Maybe it was because they were tired from travelling, or were suffering from the excess of wine and food, but they didn’t make love that night. Nothing was said or decided. They just fell into bed and went straight to sleep.
In the morning there wasn’t time for such dalliances, as they overslept and had to be awakened in a hurry in order to get the Rome express. He managed to get that very day’s Manchester Guardian, of all things, from a new arrival at the Ritz, who’d flown to Paris that morning. They jumped into the taxi the doorman was holding for them.
On the way through the Paris streets he noticed that the newsstands carried more München announcements, only this time the name Daladier featured more prominently.
Settled on the train, so excitingly and distinctlively foreign from the ones at home, Rosemary was absolutely in her seventh heaven.
‘Oh, I’m so glad we came, aren’t you darling? Fancy being stuck in the cottage in the Gloucestershire rain.’
He chuckled. ‘Oh, I don’t know. We could have had more fun this morning if we had been.’
She gave him a stern look, but her eyes were twinkling. ‘I haven’t married a monster, have I?’
He grinned. ‘We shall have to see.’
As they rolled through the flat lands and wide fields south of Paris he began to read the paper.
No stranger experience can have happened to Mr Chamberlain during the past month of adventures than his reception back home in London. He drove from Heston to Buckingham Palace, where the crowd clamoured for him, and within five minutes of his arrival he was standing on the balcony of the Palace with the King and Queen and Mrs Chamberlain.
The cries were all for ‘Neville’, and he stood there blinking in the light of a powerful arc lamp and waving his hand and smiling. For three minutes this demonstration lasted.
Another welcome awaited the Premier in Downing Street, which he reached fifteen minutes later. With difficulty his car moved forward from Whitehall to No. 10. Mounted police rode fore and aft and a constable kept guard on the running board of the car.
He looked up, watched the steam drifting away across the fields as they picked up speed. It had obviously been a dreadful worry to many people, more than his young generation had realized. He read on:
Everywhere people were cheering. One of the women found no other words to express her feelings but these. ‘The man who gave me back my son.’
Mr and Mrs Chamberlain stood for a few moments on the doorstep acknowledging the greeting. Then Mr Chamberlain went to a first-floor window and leaned forward, happily smiling on the people. ‘My good friends,’ he said – it took some time to still the clamour so that he might be heard. ‘This is the second time in our history that there has come back from Germany “peace with honour”. I believe it is peace for our time.’
It was all very encouraging. As he lowered the paper his eyes found Rosemary. She looked radiant, and happy. At least she would have the honeymoon she had dreamed of. That, at least, for the moment, was something to be thankful for.
Chapter Four
Everybody seemed to be laughing. Biff suddenly realized that it was evoked by the senior judge, making his speech at the luncheon. He’d just told an anecdote where the ceremonial splendour of judges and high sheriff in procession at an opening of the law year somewhere, had taken the wrong turning, and filed in solemn, glorious order through a working court, and out through another door, much to the sitting judge’s amazement, to say nothing of that of the terrified defendant.
The speech ended with a toast to the high sheriff. Biff tried to get to his feet, but they were all too quick for him. The woman put her hand reassuringly on his shoulder and gently restrained him. ‘It’s all right. They don’t expect it.’ She meant well, but it left him feeling sad and old; old and lonely. He looked around the room. Apart from Jimmy on the next table there was nobody left from his generation. He shook his head sadly and reached for his glass of wine. Nob
ody.
He didn’t count those lost during the war of course – how could you, that was different – and unforgettable – but afterwards, when they had been starting out afresh. To begin with you lost the odd friend – illness or accident when you were in your forties. Nothing happened then for twenty years, until slowly the Grim Reaper started his work, and at last it dawned on you that there were an awful lot of faces suddenly not around any more. Then death began to get closer, personal, until finally … even now he got he got a lump in his throat. Maybe it was his age: he was an old man who couldn’t control his emotions.
‘Dad – you all right?’
It was his daughter, who had quietly come across the room, looking concerned.
‘Yes, dear – just thinking of your mother.’
He patted her hand as it rested on his shoulder.
The high sheriff moved to the microphone, shuffled his notes. ‘Your Grace, my lords, ladies and gentlemen.’
His daughter scuttled back to her seat.
He remembered his own speech, back in 1988, with his wife watching him from the other side of the table. He’d spoken of tradition, of men who should have been there, who had been denied their life, denied the chance to have children, to see them grow up, go through school, university, marriage and have grandchildren. And the tragedy was on the other, enemy, side as well – whatever the circumstances, whoever was to blame. He had glanced across at his wife who nodded, as if to say thank you for not forgetting.
The taxi picked its way through the bustling streets of Sorrento, the driver honking his horn, gesticulating and shouting at anyone holding up his progress.
Rosemary clung to his arm.
‘My God – does he think this is a race or something?’
Biff grinned. ‘I can see why they love their Grands Prix.’
His gaze went back to his window. Little restaurants and cafés were everywhere, occupying any part of the pavement that was allowed.
Tears of Autumn, The Page 4