In Love and War

by Liz Trenow

  ‘Have you any family at home? Someone we could contact?’ Tubby asked.

  The man shook his head wildly, accompanied by a number of involuntary twitches and shudders which then stilled suddenly, his gaze distracted and shifting beyond Tubby, towards the doorway. They turned to see an older gentleman, short and burly, accompanied by a woman dressed entirely in black, being prevented by the tiny nun from entering the ward.

  Tubby rose and strode towards them, asked some questions and remonstrated with the nun. After a moment it became clear that he’d managed to make himself understood, because she seemed to relent.

  He brought them to the bedside. ‘These excellent people are farmers, and they’ve been sheltering our friend,’ he explained. ‘When he disappeared, a few weeks ago, they were too frightened for their own safety to look for him. I’ve reassured them we won’t do anything to harm the lad.’

  Ruby shook their hands in turn.

  ‘They’ve brought this.’ Tubby held out a simple brown octagonal tag, just like Bertie’s. He examined it, squinting through his thick round glasses. After turning it over and squinting some more, he held it out to Ruby.

  ‘It’s no good. You have a go. Your eyesight’s probably better than mine.’

  She peered at the rough, unevenly stamped lettering. PVT J CATCHPOLE. It was when he handed it to her that she could now see the part that Tubby’s fingers had been covering, and her heart seemed to stop. Across the top of the tag, separated by the hole for the string, it read SFK RGT. She gasped. Bertie’s regiment.

  She gathered herself to ask, and heard the shake in her voice: ‘Is this you, Private Catchpole? You were in the Suffolks?’ The answer was more of a tilting of the head than a full affirmative, but it was enough.

  ‘I’m from Suffolk too.’ The glimmer of a smile turned up the corners of his mouth.

  ‘You’re safe now, Private Catchpole,’ Tubby said. ‘We will contact your family and try to get you home.’ The smile evaporated instantly, and his head began to twist violently from side to side, his limbs trembling.

  ‘Nnn, nnn, nnn,’ the man stuttered, clasping the tag to his chest with whitened knuckles, violently shaking his head. Tubby mouthed, ‘Deserter.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he added quickly. ‘We won’t do anything you don’t want us to do. I promise.’

  After a brief conversation with the old man and his wife, Tubby translated for Ruby: ‘Private Catchpole turned up in October last year, raving and exhausted, with some minor injuries which they tended to. They took him in and fed him, let him use their barn to sleep in, but he would not tell them who he was. Just a few days ago they discovered that he’d gone, leaving a note of thanks saying he was going to try to make it back home.

  ‘It was only after that they found the tag he had left behind in a bag under the straw he’d used as a bed. They were very worried for his safety as they were pretty sure he was a deserter and everyone knows what happens if they’re caught. Then yesterday they learned about a soldier who’d turned up here, and felt they must come to make sure he was safe. They’ve been travelling since dawn.’

  ‘What kind people.’

  ‘Their own son was killed,’ Tubby added, in simple explanation.

  They returned to the man’s bedside. ‘What does the J. stand for on your tag? Is it John?’ she asked.

  He shook his head.

  ‘Joseph?’ He seemed to hesitate, but then shook his head again. She hoped it wasn’t going to be an obscure name like Jeremiah or Jeffrey. They could be here for hours.

  ‘James, then?’

  At last, an affirmative nod. Ruby and Tubby exchanged triumphant smiles.

  ‘Do they call you Jimmy?’

  Tears glittered in the corner of his eyes. Ruby leaned forward again, taking his hands in hers. Her touch seemed to calm his tremors. ‘You want to go home, Jimmy, don’t you, to your family? But we need to know your address. Can you try to tell us?’

  He breathed in, and sighed out, ‘Umb, umb, huh.’

  ‘Take another breath and try again,’ she urged.

  ‘Umb, umb, baa. Umb baah.’

  She nodded encouragingly. ‘You’re nearly there.’

  But he shook his head and closed his eyes, resting his head back on the pillow. It was too much effort. Reaching into his briefcase, Tubby pulled out a pencil and an old envelope. ‘Perhaps you could try to write it down?’

  The effort of controlling the pencil was clearly exhausting as the tics took it off into wild loops and arcs, but eventually some legible numbers and words appeared.

  ‘A hundred and thirty-four Humber Lane? In Ipswich?’

  ‘Is that your parents’ address?’ Tubby asked.

  Another slow nod.

  ‘Then we shall get in touch with them as soon as we can. You’re going home, laddie.’

  This time it was not a distorted grimace but an almost natural smile. Tubby explained to the Belgian couple, and their weather-beaten faces became wreathed in smiles as they shook the chaplain’s hand, and then Ruby’s. ‘Merci, monsieur, mam’selle, merci mille fois.’ The man clapped Jimmy on the shoulder with a gruff ‘Bonne chance, mon vieux.’ She watched them trying to control their emotions as they turned and walked slowly away down the long ward.

  *

  ‘Where are we going, Tubby?’ Once more Ruby found herself skipping to keep up with his purposeful stride.

  ‘We’re going to telephone the Ipswich exchange and ask directory enquiries. If there’s no number, we’ll get them to send a telegram. It’ll be quicker that way, we’ll avoid the Belgian authorities and there’ll be fewer eyes to read it.’

  ‘We can telephone, across the Channel?’

  ‘They set up the lines under the sea during the war, and there’s a link to the town hall here, because it was the Allied headquarters,’ he said. ‘The army’s all gone now, of course, but I know the mayor, and he owes me a few favours.’

  She recalled Major Wilson telling them what else the town hall had been used for. ‘Do you really think he’s a deserter?’

  ‘Sure as I can be, from his reaction,’ Tubby said. ‘They didn’t look kindly on men with shell shock. Just told them to pull themselves together and sent them back into battle. If he’d been caught, he’d probably have been shot. I did my best, but the high-ups didn’t usually listen.’

  She sensed it from the passion of his words. ‘Was that something you had to get involved in, Tubby?’

  He strode onward, his jaw working.

  ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked.’

  There was a longer silence. Then he stopped and turned to her. ‘It was the worst duty of all for an army chaplain and I prayed I would not be called on, but it came to me once. Just the once, thank the good Lord, but that was enough.’ He wiped the sweat from his brow. ‘They had to have a chaplain to spend the night with the poor bastard in the cell before the execution. I snuck in a bottle of brandy that night, to make it a little easier for him. It was a long night, I can tell you. Some of them used to like to sing hymns, they said, but my laddie just wept and wept, and cried out for his mother. The army said it was all about setting an example. Typical of their ruddy blinkered thinking, ’scuse my French. I can’t think of a worse example of man’s inhumanity to man.’ He sighed, starting to walk on. ‘War’s a brutal thing, Ruby, whichever way you look at it. It tests your faith to hell and back.’

  She didn’t know much about faith but she’d certainly been tested to hell and back. And still there were no answers, none of the ‘making sense of it all’ the major had promised.

  *

  The mayor welcomed Tubby like a long-lost friend. They jabbered in French for a while before he ushered them into a stuffy cubbyhole just large enough for a couple of chairs and a desk on which sat a large black Bakelite telephone. On the wall was an empty board peppered with the marks of drawing pins that, she imagined, must once have held vitally important communiqués.

  It took several minutes for the operator
to contact the London exchange. Tubby asked them to put him through to Ipswich and then handed the receiver to Ruby. ‘You speak to them,’ he said. ‘You know his address.’ Moments passed as the line crackled and creaked. She imagined the cable, threading through the mud and seaweed deep beneath the grey waters of the English Channel. What critically important information had these lines carried, throughout the war?

  A voice answered, a soft, distant voice with that gentle Suffolk lilt so familiar that it gave her a pang of homesickness. What a miracle to be talking to someone in her home town from so far away.

  ‘Ipswich exchange ’ere. Can oi help you?’

  She gathered herself to speak. ‘We are looking for the telephone number of a Mr Catchpole who lives at one-three-four Humber Lane, please.’

  Another long pause, more crackles and creaks. The operator returned. ‘We’ve got a J. Catchpole at that address. Would that be the one?’

  It was all Ruby could do to contain her delight. You’re going home, Jimmy, she said to herself, giving Tubby the thumbs up. ‘That’s right.’

  ‘No telephone number, miss.’

  ‘Then could you send a telegram, please?’

  Tubby handed her a piece of paper on which he had hastily written: PVT J CATCHPOLE SAFE HOPPESTADT HOSPITAL STOP SEND FAMILY MEMBER ASAP REV P CLAYTON STOP

  As she read it out, slowly enough for the operator to write it down at the other end, Ruby allowed herself to imagine the reaction of the people receiving these words: shock, astonishment, disbelief, a slow understanding, followed by excitement and pure joy.

  It was not her Bertie. But at least someone’s son, brother, perhaps even husband, was alive.

  *

  ‘Let’s have a beer to celebrate,’ Tubby suggested as they walked back across the square. ‘I think we’ve made a family very happy today.’

  ‘How do you think Jimmy will fare, when he gets back home?’ she asked. ‘I keep wondering whether his family have seen the telegram yet, and what it must be like in their household, getting that news. I’m envious, I suppose.’

  He paused for a second. ‘His family will wrap him in love and creature comforts, but after all these months of living rough, hand to mouth, he’ll find it very difficult to adjust.’

  ‘I hope they’ll be patient with him.’

  ‘He’ll need it. But at least he’s been given a second chance.’

  ‘If he doesn’t get caught.’

  ‘To be honest, what with all the other things they’ve got on, demobilisation, repatriation, dealing with the wounded, war pensions and the like, the army has greater problems than chasing up deserters these days. I reckon that if he lies low for a year or so, they’ll just forget all about him. He’ll miss out on the war pension, of course, but I suppose that’s a small price to pay for his freedom.’

  ‘How wonderful if he could just go back to a normal life, perhaps get married and have children.’

  They sat in companionable silence as the sun lowered in the sky, leaving the square in shadow, watching the lights going on, one by one, in the windows. Ruby couldn’t help being reminded of her own village, where few drew their curtains of an evening except against the cold. Lights in windows signified home, family, safety.

  Being away in this foreign place had made her all the more appreciative of those things she’d failed to value while so consumed by her own grief: the love and generosity of her mother, the support of Bertie’s family, her friends, her colleagues at work.

  She wasn’t sure where it sprang from but the question – that question which, looking back at that moment years hence, would change her life – seemed to come out before she’d had time to think about it.

  ‘That organisation you’re setting up to help returning soldiers?’ she asked. ‘Is there anything I can do to help, once we’re back home, do you think? I have a job to go back to, of course, but in my spare time . . .’

  Tubby’s grin seemed to split his face in two. ‘My dearest child, we would welcome you with open arms. I feel so strongly that we must help those who survived, to bring them together and help them find a way forward in life. We owe it to the memories of those who didn’t make it. I have a day job too, of course, but this is what I plan to dedicate my life to in the future. And there is so much to do: writing letters, knocking on doors, raising funds, organising events. Would that sort of thing appeal?’

  ‘It appeals very much, thank you.’ She felt flooded with excitement, with a sense of purpose that she seemed to have lost since Bertie died.

  A figure emerged out of the dusk. ‘Appeals very much? S’pose that’s me you’re talking about.’

  She laughed. ‘Not you, nosy parker. Stop picking up fag ends.’

  Freddie’s eyes twinkled with mischief. ‘Shame. Thought I might be in the running.’

  ‘Come and join us,’ Tubby said.

  ‘Don’t mind if I do,’ Freddie said. ‘I’ll just get in a pint. Another one, Ruby? Reverend?’

  While he was at the bar, Tubby whispered, ‘Don’t say anything about Jimmy, will you? The fewer people who know, the better.’

  Freddie returned, Ginger arrived with the drinks and they all raised their glasses.

  ‘Cheers,’ Tubby said.

  ‘Here’s to peace,’ Ruby said.

  ‘About ruddy time,’ Freddie said, taking a long draught.

  ‘And forgiveness in our hearts,’ Tubby added.

  Ruby told Freddie she was planning to help Tubby with his new association to support returning soldiers and Freddie said he’d be happy to get involved too, ‘so long as I don’t have to turn up in church’. Tubby laughed and promised there’d be no expectations. Then, after a brief lull in the conversation, he said, almost musing to himself, ‘I wonder whatever happened to that poor Swiss woman?’

  Ruby could have kissed him. As far as she was aware he had no idea that Freddie had proved unwilling to help – certainly she had not mentioned it – but he seemed to know, from careful observation, listening and intuition, how to ask just the right question at exactly the right time. Freddie remained silent, apparently engaged in reading the advertisement for a beer company engraved into the side of his glass.

  ‘I suppose no one wants to be seen at a German graveyard for fear they might be considered sympathisers,’ she said, playing Devil’s advocate.

  ‘Or just ’cos they hate Germans,’ Freddie muttered.

  Tubby folded his hands together and closed his eyes, chin resting on steepled fingers. Here’s the church, here’s the steeple, open the doors and here are all the people, Ruby recited silently to herself. ‘It is time for reconciliation,’ he said, quietly but firmly. ‘If we don’t start forgiving each other, we will never find peace in our hearts.’

  In the long, weighty silence that followed, she caught Freddie’s eye. He flushed and grinned back, a little sheepishly. Then he cleared his throat. ‘It might . . .’ He faltered, and stopped.

  Tubby opened his eyes. ‘Go on.’

  ‘It’s just possible . . .’ They waited, while he gathered himself, clearing his throat again. ‘There’s a vehicle I might be able to borrow.’

  She beamed a grateful smile.

  ‘I’m not promising anything,’ he said, blushing more. ‘Can I let you know tomorrow?’

  She leaned forward and took his hand. ‘Thank you, Freddie. You’re a . . .’ She struggled for the right words.

  ‘A diamond geezer?’ Tubby suggested.

  ‘One of those, with bells on,’ she said.

  20

  MARTHA

  Martha slumped onto the bed and closed her eyes, miserable and defeated. Monsieur Vermeulen’s words, so eloquent in his evident hatred, rang in her head: fears turn into whispers, whispers soon become rumours, rumours fuel suspicions, suspicions lead to official accusations. The image appeared before her eyes of Madame Peeter’s ravaged face, red and distorted with fury: Kraut murderer.

  She understood why they were so angry, especially now that she’d seen for hers
elf the state of their country, their wrecked towns, the mud and destruction and the countless graves. But at least things were improving here. Food imports were easing their hunger, businesses were starting to recover, farms beginning to increase production, plans for rebuilding the towns and villages underway. These people could imagine a future.

  But it was hard to imagine a future for her beloved Germany, which would be saddled with debt for decades to come under the terms agreed by their treacherous politicians at Versailles. Whatever sort of country would it be for Otto as he grew up? Its people were so crushed, so hungry, so poverty-stricken, so locked in revolution and rebellion. The old order was broken but no one knew what the new order, enshrined in the constitution over which they’d been battling in Weimar for months, might bring.

  It was only now that she began to understand that her sense of urgency, her burning need to come here just as soon as travel restrictions were lifted, was more to do with resolving something inside herself, trying to find her own peace of mind, than any sense of duty towards her husband or her dead son.

  Life in Germany was so grindingly miserable, so lacking in any hope. She’d been driven by the belief that seeing Heinrich’s grave would bring her heart some ease, and perhaps allow her to plan for her own future, and Otto’s.

  Yet, however difficult this trip was turning out, she did not regret coming. They may have endured suspicion and even the threat of violence, but had also, she reminded herself, encountered great kindness from people whose countries she’d learned to hate. The English chaplain and the girl, even the American woman who had at first seemed so hostile, had freely demonstrated their compassion, comforted them, given food and money.

  It was so different at home. In Berlin, everyone was afraid of everyone else, and violent gangs roamed the streets. Hardship and misery had left no room for considering the plight of others.

  She glanced at Otto, sitting on a chair by the open window, reading his book and swinging his legs as though nothing untoward had happened. His cheeks were lightly pocked with the scars of an earlier outbreak of acne, a soft fluff covered his chin. How mature he had shown himself to be this afternoon, keeping his head and remaining calm, trying to comfort her when she’d broken down and wept in that desolate street. She prayed that he was not too traumatised by the experience of seeing his mother so humiliated and helpless.