by Lilian Harry
Ben felt guilt wash over him. ‘Dad, I don’t know what to say.’
‘You’ve probably said enough already.’ The vicar sighed and turned back from the window to face him. ‘Oh, it’s not your fault, Ben. You’ve got your own life to live and you couldn’t know how this would affect your mother. I realise you expected her to be pleased, but the truth is that nothing can please her at the moment but having Peter back. It’s not that the rest of you don’t matter – you matter even more. But she’s so exhausted by her grief that her mind just can’t take in new ideas. She’s confused. All her reactions are wrong, and she knows it and is even more distressed by it. And then there’s Jeanie, of course.’
‘I’ve never given Jeanie any cause to think—’
‘I know you haven’t. But she may have thought it all the same, and that’s partly due to your mother’s encouragement. You see, with the rest of you away, Jeanie has been the only young person in the house and she’s been with us so long now we look on her almost as a daughter. What’s more, she’s been such a tower of strength and such a comfort that I think your mother has made some assumptions that perhaps she shouldn’t have made. But it’s understandable, I think.’ He looked at Ben as if pleading with him to understand.
‘Yes, I suppose it is. I have talked to Jeanie this morning, Dad. Things are all right between us.’ He met his father’s eyes. ‘You will like May too, you know.’
‘Yes, I’m sure we will. But I’m afraid I can’t give you permission to marry.’
Ben’s heart sank. He had begun to think, from his father’s sympathetic tone and his mother’s apparent good humour, that they had decided to agree. ‘Why not?’
‘Because of your mother. Don’t be fooled by this brightness of hers. As I told you, it could break at any moment. Bring up the subject of May and marriage again, and that will send her right down.’ He compressed his lips, then said, ‘Look, Ben, I know this is hard for you and I know you find it difficult to understand why she’s so upset about this – I barely understand it myself – but take it from me, if you persist you could bring about a complete breakdown. At present, between us, Jeanie and I are managing to keep her head just above water. I really don’t want anything else happening to upset her.’
‘Yes,’ Ben said in a dull voice. ‘I can see that.’
‘It’s not so very long to wait, is it?’ John asked persuasively. ‘You’ll be twenty-one in June. You can do as you like then.’
‘Can I?’ Ben asked. ‘If it’s going to tip Ma into a breakdown now, is it going to be any better in June? As you say, it’s only two months away. Won’t she be just as upset by my getting married the minute I don’t need your permission? Couldn’t that be even worse?’
‘Yes,’ John said quietly. ‘It could. But that will have to be your decision.’
Ben stared at him. Then he turned on his heel and left the room.
Chapter Twenty
‘Bombing targets are to be switched from now on.’
The Squadron Leaders on Harrowbeer Airfield sat listening as the new strategies were outlined to them at their briefing. ‘We won’t be aiming at German cities and factories any more. Our main target will be the French and Belgian rail system.’
‘Railways,’ Andrew said afterwards as they sat in the mess over pints of beer, passing the new orders on to their pilots. ‘And not even the German ones. We all know what that means.’
‘Invasion,’ Stefan said. ‘It won’t be long now.’
‘I can see that they want to prevent easy transportation for the enemy,’ Ozzie Mason said, ‘but won’t that backfire on our troops? They won’t be able to use them either.’
‘Grow up,’ Andrew advised him. ‘Our men aren’t going to be queuing up at the ticket office to buy day returns to Berlin! They’ll have tanks and lorries and God knows what to transport them.’ He filled the bowl of his pipe with tobacco. ‘Wonder what old Bomber Harris makes of it.’
Robin Fairbanks strolled over to join them, a tankard in his fist. ‘From what I’ve heard, he’s not too pleased. Doesn’t think an invasion will work. He says too many men will be killed, like in the First War and at Dieppe.’
‘And not enough are being killed now?’ Ozzie said cynically. ‘Look at us – we take off night after night and only half of us come back. What more does he want?’
‘He reckons we ought to go on flattening German cities with area bombing,’ Robin said. ‘I bet there have been a few up-and-downers between him and Churchill over this! And some of the Yanks agree with him – they think we ought to be going for the oilfields.’
‘Well, someone’s overruled them, then,’ Andrew pointed out, ‘because those are our orders. Probably Eisenhower. I think he’s right, too – if we don’t get rid of the transport facilities, the troops won’t have a chance. The Jerries will be lined up on the beaches waiting for them with open arms.’
They stopped talking about it then and drifted into different conversations. Stefan sauntered outside to sit at the rickety trestle table that had been carried out, and after a few minutes Ben joined him. They smoked in silence for a while.
‘Something is wrong,’ Stefan said at last. ‘You are not happy, I think.’
Ben gave him a quick glance. ‘Is it that obvious?’
‘Only to one who looks. Most people don’t, but I’ve seen you when you think nobody is watching you. There’s something on your mind – something you cannot resolve.’ Ben sighed. ‘I don’t suppose I’m any worse off than a lot of people. No, I know I’m a hell of a lot better off. I’ve got no right to be fed up.’
‘ “Right”? Does that come into it?’ The Pole regarded him thoughtfully, then leaned forward. ‘We each have a right to our own feelings. Sometimes it is the only right we have left.’ He laughed suddenly. ‘Right – left! Your English language is very strange at times.’
Ben grinned. ‘I know. It’s what makes it such a good language for puns and cryptic crosswords. Luckily, we can usually tell what the words are intended to mean.’
‘You may be able to. It’s sometimes confusing for us.’ Stefan paused. ‘Do you want to talk about what is wrong, or should I mind my own big business?’
Ben grinned again. ‘Just “business” is enough! I don’t know, Stefan. I don’t think continually chewing it over helps, really. Anyway, why should you bother with it? It’s nothing in comparison with your problems.’
‘That doesn’t make it any less to you. It helps me too, to think about someone else for a while.’ He waited for a moment, then leaned forward again. ‘I think you should talk to someone. But if you don’t want to talk to me, why not go to Alison? She’s very sympathetic and very wise. I have shared some of my problems with her and she is a comfort.’
‘I couldn’t bother her. She’s not far off having her baby.’
‘And does that affect her mind? I think she would welcome your company.’ The Pole gave him another quick look. ‘I have seen other young men with the same look in their eyes that’s in yours now, Ben. It comes when troubles grow too great to be borne alone, and it means danger. I would not want you to be one of those who do not come back.’
May was spending as much time as possible now with Alison. With the birth drawing nearer and with the squadron on almost permanent readiness, Alison needed company, and although she enjoyed walking to the cottage, she felt more secure at home. Hughie had been born a fortnight early, and she was a little afraid that this baby would be even earlier.
‘How are you and Ben getting along now?’ she asked one afternoon. ‘Didn’t he go home last weekend to see his mother?’
‘That’s right. She’m not well at all, he says. Still grieving over her other boy.’ May chewed her lip for a moment, then said, ‘I wanted to talk to you about that, but I’ve been putting it off. But seeing as you’ve brought the subject up …’
‘What is it?’ Alison, who had been lying back on the sofa, struggled to sit up. ‘Is something wrong, May? He hasn’t given you up, has he?
’
‘No. Leastways, I don’t think so. But since he came back, well, he don’t seem the same and that’s the truth of it. There’s something bothering him, I know that.’
‘Have you asked him what’s wrong?’
May lifted her shoulders. She was sewing a nightdress for the new baby, smocking it across the front with tiny stitches. ‘I tried but he just sort of turned me aside. Changed the subject. And that’s what worries me most,’ she said, laying her work down and gazing at Alison with anxious brown eyes. ‘Us’ve always been straight with each other. That’s one of the things I’ve always liked about him. Now, there’s something he don’t want to tell me, and that can’t be good, now can it?’
‘No, it can’t.’ Alison looked at her thoughtfully. ‘But it doesn’t mean he wants to finish with you. I’m sure if that were the case he’d have said so.’
‘I don’t know,’ May said. ‘It’s just that this is only since he went home. And I’ve been thinking …’ Her voice faded and stopped.
‘Thinking what?’ Alison prompted gently.
‘Well, there’s this other girl, that lives with his parents. Jeanie, she’s called. Got a little girl – he’s her godfather. You can see what I’m worrying about, can’t you? Suppose when he went back he realised it was this Jeanie he really wants? I mean, you know what Ben’s like, he wouldn’t want to hurt nobody. I know there’s something upsetting him, something he don’t want to tell me, and it don’t need much of a brain to work out what it is, do it?’
‘Oh, May, surely not! After all, he must have known her for years – she went to live with them before the little girl was born, didn’t she? I’m sure there can’t be anything between them. He’d never have started to go out with you if there had been.’
‘Well, if it’s not that,’ May said miserably, ‘what is it?’
Alison could find no answer. They looked at each other for a moment, then she swung her legs off the sofa and heaved herself to her feet.
‘I’m going to make a cup of tea,’ she said firmly, ‘and you’re going to stop worrying about it. And the next time you see Ben, you’re going to ask him straight out what’s the matter. It’s the only thing to do, May.’
‘Yes,’ May said, picking up her work again. ‘Yes, you’re right. I’ll talk to him the very first chance I get.’
But her heart thudded uncomfortably at the thought. Suppose it really was all over between them ….
Ben thought about Stefan’s words as he went through the next few days. They were now escorting the bombers over the new targets, attacking French and Belgian railways, and as he stared down at the long lines of track, glittering in the moonlight, he wondered how it had come to this – wiping out the vital links of a friendly country already suffering under German occupation. What sort of world were they creating – or, rather, destroying – and how could it ever be rebuilt once the war was over? The devastation he had seen, and taken part in, was almost too vast to imagine, and yet he knew that was only a small part of it. And all because of one man’s evil ambition.
Yet if it hadn’t happened, he wouldn’t have met May. His love for her shone so brightly in his heart that it seemed impossible that it had come about through such evil. It was beyond understanding.
He thought about his mother and her pain. Somehow, she had been knocked off balance, and although his father was sure that she would slowly regain her health, he also believed that Ben’s marriage could destroy it completely. Another thing that was beyond understanding, Ben thought hopelessly. It wasn’t even a matter of waiting for his twenty-first birthday – she would still feel the same, still be as distressed. He might wait years before she could accept it. He might wait for ever.
And I can’t wait for ever, he thought, driving his aircraft fiercely through the night sky. I won’t wait for ever!
Yet he could not bear the thought of hurting the mother he had always adored. He could not face the possibility that he might drive her into a complete breakdown – a breakdown from which she might never recover.
He knew that Stefan was right in saying that his problems would affect his flying. But he didn’t think they were making it more dangerous. Instead, he felt driven by a new anger, a frustration that he could take out on the German fighters. It was his duty to protect the Allied bombers, to drive off the enemy, to shoot down as many of their planes as he could. He took a ferocious pleasure in chasing the interceptors through the sky, in firing his guns and seeing his target suddenly burst into flames or spiral out of control into the ground far below. He thrust out of his mind the knowledge that there were men in these planes, young men like himself who were defending their country; to pilots in the sky, humanity took a back seat. The enemy was made of metal and wood, Perspex and fabric; skin, bone, muscle and blood could be forgotten – had to be forgotten.
That was what war did to you.
When he landed safely, he gave no thought to the dangers he had faced, merely felt joy as he claimed another ‘kill’, maybe two or three. All he wanted was a pint in his hand, a meal inside him and then to see May.
May. May. May …
As soon as he was on the ground, she filled his thoughts once more, and the problem of his mother began to circle yet again in his head. Round and round and round, with no solution.
Since coming back from Hampshire, he had wanted desperately to talk to May about his mother and all that had happened at home, but he hadn’t been able to find the right words. None of it would matter anyway, if she didn’t want to marry him, and with all these problems in his mind he didn’t know how to ask her. He was aware that if she had even the faintest idea that their marriage might cause problems, she would refuse and he wouldn’t be able to persuade her.
In the end, he decided to take Stefan’s advice and talk to Alison.
He cycled round one morning after a fairly quiet duty, when he knew that May would be working at one of her other jobs. Alison was indoors with Hughie, making Cornish pasties, and came to the door wiping floury hands on her apron. She smiled a welcome at Ben and invited him in, leading the way back to the kitchen.
‘You’ll have to let me go first,’ she joked. ‘You can’t possibly squeeze past me now, I’m so huge. Sit down. I’ll just finish this and then I’ll make some coffee.’
‘Don’t hurry. I like watching. It reminds me of when I was a little boy, watching my mother make cakes and things.’ A slight shadow crossed his face.
Alison noticed it but said nothing. She turned back to her work, rolling out the pastry and cutting it into circles which she covered with a mixture of minced meat, turnip and potato already prepared in a bowl. She damped the edges of the circles with a pastry brush, then folded them over into half-moon shapes and crimped them with the back of a knife. Then she dipped the pastry brush into a saucer of milk and brushed it over the bulging pastry.
‘We always used to use egg to do this,’ she remarked. ‘It makes the pastry look lovely and golden. But we can’t afford to use eggs for that now, even in the country.’ She lifted the pasties on to a baking tray and slid them into the hot oven, then dusted the flour from her hands. ‘There, that’s done. You’ll stay and have one, won’t you? I’ve done plenty. Andrew loves them, and I never know who he might bring home with him.’
‘Well, if you’ve really got enough …’
‘Of course we’ve got enough. You needn’t worry about taking the rations – there’s hardly any meat in them anyway. As May’s mother would say, someone must have stood on top of Cox Tor to throw that in!’
Ben smiled, then said, ‘As a matter of fact, that’s why I’ve come to see you. To talk about May, I mean. I need some advice.’
‘Oh.’ Alison was at the stove, pouring hot water from the kettle into two cups with a spoonful each of Camp coffee at the bottom. She turned to look at him. ‘Just a minute, while I get the milk.’
Ben waited while she went out to the meat safe by the back door and came back with a bottle of milk. She poured som
e into each cup and some more into Hughie’s mug, then took the bottle back again. ‘We’ll take it into the front room. Carry it carefully, Hughie, and then you can come back for the biscuits. And you’re not to eat any on the way! He will, all the same,’ she added to Ben as they made their way to the living room. ‘He thinks I don’t know, but those crumbs don’t jump up round his mouth all by themselves!’
Ben grinned, remembering doing the same thing himself as a small boy. All the little mischiefs and passing disobediences that he now realised his parents had known all too well and allowed him to get away with, while still making sure he understood right from wrong. And he was never, ever, allowed to get away with lying!
They sat down with their coffee and Alison glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. ‘I mustn’t forget the pasties. Now – what is it you want to talk about, Ben?’
He looked down at his cup, uncertain how to start, and after a moment, she said gently, ‘May has talked to me a little, you know. She’s told me what she feels about you.’
‘Has she?’ He looked up with sudden hope, then let his head droop again. ‘That’s not really the problem, though. I know how she feels – at least, I think I do. We love each other.’ A flush crept up his cheeks. ‘I want to marry her, Alison. But—’
‘But it isn’t that easy, is it?’ She looked at him with sympathy, remembering the wait she and Andrew had been compelled to endure before they could announce their engagement. And then the long time before the wedding, with plans being made, parties held, the church and the reception to organise. ‘It’s not like it was before the war.’
‘No, it isn’t. And that’s what my parents don’t seem to understand. Well, Dad does – up to a point. But that’s the least of the problems.’ He shook his head slightly and fell silent again. ‘To tell you the truth, Alison, I just don’t know what to do.’
Alison waited a moment, then said, ‘I’m not sure I will either, Ben. But if talking about it helps – and if I can make any suggestion – well, here I am. And it is why you came, isn’t it?’