by Ben Stevens
Ethel Burrows had not stopped crying for a week, until even her mother had started to look a little grieved. When she’d finally managed to pull herself together she’d put the photos of him in a safe place and prepared herself for the spinster’s life fate had given her. The few other men who’d tried to woo her with flowers and promises had been firmly repulsed, and finally her mother had given up trying to convince her that there might actually be someone else out there…
Now that Miss Burrows knew she was not going mad and had not seen a ghost she felt a little more at ease. She firmly hoped that she would see the brother again, if only to see Jack’s face one more time in his.
2
Miss Burrows only just caught the train – it was running exactly on time, and she was running late – and she sat gazing vacantly at her book throughout the twenty-minute journey.
At work she had trouble maintaining her usual level of concentration, and consequently made several uncharacteristic mistakes. In her mind she kept hearing that laugh – the slow voice close to her ear, talking, promising...:
There’d been one or two men after Jack who’d done their best to court her. She’d been relatively pretty, with an attractive smile when she’d chosen to use it. Though, thinking back now, she’d not really smiled or laughed that much since 1943…
With a subsequent feeling of relief she considered that she’d avoided turning into an old prude; a bitter old spinster who despised any happiness that they themselves had never experienced, or had known briefly and then lost. Miss Burrows had done the best she’d been able to in order to live a satisfactory life, all the while lacking the one thing that was central to so many people’s existence: a partner.
It seemed an age until it was finally five o’clock, when she promptly left the office and walked the short distance to Waterloo station.
Then she saw him, walking onto the platform where the train she was due to catch waited. With a fluttering heart she followed him into a carriage, sitting two seats away and discreetly watching as he stared out of the window. The brushed-back hair was a clean white colour; his eyes sparkled and displayed an interest in everything they saw. His narrow lips twisted with the eternal half-smile she remembered had only ever changed into a full one.
Summoning all her courage she stood up as the doors beeped and then slid shut. The train began gathering speed as she said, ‘I’m sorry to intrude, but I believe that I may know you.’
The china-blue eyes stared politely but blankly back at her. Miss Burrows’ words stumbled over themselves in their haste to be spoken:
‘That is, that I know of you – I mean that I’ve heard of you –’
She paused, took a deep breath.
‘Are you Rupert Cundy?’
All of a sudden the happy face looked extremely surprised, as the familiar voice said, ‘This is incredible; I’m not Rupert, but I knew him very well – I’m his brother, Jack, y’see. Unfortunately, Rupert died three years ago: heart attack. It was very quick, at least.’
Miss Burrows almost collapsed onto a seat, her mouth gaping open.
‘But… I mean… Well, do you not recognise me?’ she demanded at last. ‘Your parents told me that you’d been killed during the war.’
The man looked more closely at the elderly woman. Surprise again showed on his face, but this time it was mixed with a little fear that gave it an unhealthily sly appearance.
‘Ethel, I can’t believe it...’
The man now looked very worried, and Miss Burrows finally understood what had really happened.
‘You lied to me,’ she said in a blunt, quiet voice.
‘I didn’t want to hurt you; it was better that way – ’
‘Stop that nonsense; I’m not eighteen-years-old anymore.’
‘I thought if I sent you that letter then you’d forget about me; it was easier if you thought that I was dead.’
Miss Burrows’ mouth, which had only just closed after the initial and colossal shock she’d received, gaped open again.
‘You sent it?’
‘Why, yes, of course I did. I could hardly write that I’d been killed and then sign the letter myself, could I?’
A furious swearword nearly escaped Miss Burrows’ mouth. Just controlling herself she replaced it with a milder one rarely used in this day and age. But it still carried an obvious vehemence.
‘You utter cad!’
‘Oh, please Ethel. You aren’t going to tell me that you’ve spent your entire life longing for me; it was just a bit of fun, after all.’
Angry tears sprang to her eyes: she’d never heard the beautiful voice being so cruel. She answered quietly, almost to herself:
‘Yes, I did. There was never anyone else. I stayed alone out of a respect for you, for what we’d had.’
The handsome face tried to look sincere, perhaps apologetic. But its eyes sparkled with the suggestion that the man found this scene faintly amusing and maybe even perversely satisfying. A woman had spent her whole life alone after spending just a few months with himself.
Miss Burrows recalled a term she’d once heard describing men who played ‘the field’; a term far more common in America than it was in England – a ‘Player’. Her mother had been right when she’d called her a ‘silly little girl’, all those years ago when she’d criticised Ethel for seeing the American airman. Jack had taken everything that had been hers to give.
At eighteen years of age Ethel had been as green as the grass she’d lain upon with Jack beside her, whispering his lies into her ear. If, later on, he’d at least been honest it might not have had such a devastating impact on her life; but she’d spent so many years mourning the death of a man who was in fact very much alive.
For a while Miss Burrows and Jack Cundy just stared at one another, as the train stopped at Clapham Junction and then at Earlsfield. Miss Burrows finally broke the silence with one word:
‘Why?’
Exasperation showed in Jack’s eyes. Their relationship had obviously meant nothing to him. ‘Oh, please don’t be such a bore. I’m sorry if I upset you.’
‘But why did you tell such a horrible lie?’
He evidently couldn’t answer that, and he looked away out of the window. Suddenly, almost vindictively, he declared, ‘I’m married, you know, to a British woman. She lives with me in South Carolina, but we’re staying with her cousin in Kingston upon Thames, near to where I was stationed during the war.’
‘I know where Kingston is,’ snapped Miss Burrows; then she said a little dreamily, ‘Do you still live on the farm?’
‘Hell no. I got into a proper business after I was discharged – ’
She looked keenly at him. ‘Discharged?’
Sneering, he answered, ‘I went to pieces, first mission I ever did. Could have happened to anyone. My nerves were shattered: I was a wreck.’
‘I see.’
Miss Burrows’ eyes now displayed a certain amount of humour, their shocked appearance fast diminishing. Jack looked away from them. She recalled him constantly talking about what he would do – the bombs he would drop, the risks he would take.
‘All to protect truth, life and liberty, sweetheart,’ he’d said softly, as Ethel’s heart thrilled at his brave words.
The dirty, cowardly liar.
‘She’s my third wife,’ he said proudly, and Miss Burrows nodded slowly. A faint smile appeared on her face, and if anyone had known her very well they would have said that she looked better than she had in years.
‘I bet she is, Jack. I bet she is,’ she said softly.
No more words were spoken by either of them until the train reached Teddington, and as it stopped Miss Burrows stood up. Her eyes sparkled, her face was radiant – and as Jack looked at this he appeared infinitely tragic.
‘Goodbye, Jack,’ she said gently, stepping off the train.
As she walked the short distance to her house her eyes seemed almost to drink in everything they saw, fully appreciating the simple beauty of a
world that people so often bemoaned when their own insignificant plans went awry. She longed for her kitchen and a cup of tea; and to spend at least part of this beautiful, slightly breezy evening in her garden.
Miss Burrows’ mouth smiled the elderly woman’s gentle tranquillity, and she was pleasantly surprised to realise that she looked forward to speaking with the man whose name she could now easily remember. The man whose company and words she found so comforting and pragmatic.
All in all, she concluded, it really wasn’t such a bad life. Far better than the one she would have had with a cad named Jack Cundy, in any case...
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