by Tim Jeal
‘She asked me not to.’
He shook his head sadly. ‘But my dear Andrea, by attributing the leak to me and some nameless dockyard fitter, you’ve given him the impression that there’s virtually no security down there. If Harrington insists on an investigation, he’d be a hundred per cent right.’
While conceding that Peter had good reason to be annoyed, Andrea found his ‘more in sorrow than in anger’ tone needlessly humiliating. ‘Okay, I guess I’ve made a big mistake,’ she admitted breezily. ‘So I’ll see him and fix things.’
Later, when Peter moved towards her in bed, making clear what he wanted, Andrea didn’t feel able to refuse him. To give him another opportunity to look misunderstood and long-suffering was absolutely out of the question.
CHAPTER 7
‘How can we catch a fish without a rod?’ asked Leo as he and Justin trailed after Rose.
‘Don’ ’ee worry ’bout that, my dear,’ she said, looking back at them as they pedalled after her – or, more accurately, as Leo pedalled after her. Justin was sitting in idleness behind him, perched on the saddlebag bracket. Rose’s offer to take them fishing had surprised Leo, considering how angry she had been with Justin for the past few days. But maybe mum had told her about ‘the poor boy’s loss’.
After scrambling over numerous hedges, the boys found the river disappointingly narrow, little more than a brook, and hemmed in by alders and willows. At any rate it was shallow enough to wade across and quite fast-flowing. As Rose strode ahead, she looked odder than ever in her wrinkled brown stockings and long black dress. On the riverbank she took off her rose-trimmed hat, and, lying on the grass, pulled up her sleeves. She gestured to them to do the same.
‘You mean we’ll catch a fish in our hands?’ gulped Leo.
‘I don’ know what you’ll do, boy, but I’ll tickle ’em with mine.’
‘Won’t they bite us?’ asked Justin.
‘Course they won’. Them never bin frighted by gentle hands. Hands ain’t like a hook in the jaw.’
Following her example, the boys lay down and, reaching cautiously with their fingers, began to feel under the bank, which, to their surprise, went back almost a foot among the tree roots. Keeping their hands open and very still, as Rose had told them, they waited. Apparently, the fish would not swim away even when they stroked them, provided their hand movements were smooth and slow.
‘What will they think our hands are?’ asked Justin.
‘Sticks or tobs.’
‘Tobs?’
‘Lumps of earth.’
When Leo touched his first fish he was too excited to speak. The electric thrill of it was like nothing he had ever experienced.
‘I’m touching one,’ he whispered at last. ‘What do I do?’
‘Thumbs behind his head and fingers under. Then hold ’im tight and lift.’
As Leo raised his hands above the surface, the fish struggled so fiercely that he lost his grip and it slipped between his fingers. He made a desperate last attempt to catch it one-handed as it shot into the air but the next moment it hit the water and swam away, leaving only a trace of slime on his fingers.
Minutes later, Rose caught a trout and made it look insultingly easy to hold him until she knocked his head on a stone. Nor did Justin muff his chance when it came soon afterwards.
But nothing destroyed Leo’s recollections of the moment when his hands had first closed around that sinuous living thing – not even Justin’s triumphant whoops as a small spotted fish lay flapping at his feet.
*
‘Who is it?’ called Peter from their bedroom. His leg was bad again after all the dam-making and messing about with the waterwheel.
‘It’s for me,’ Andrea shouted back from the hall, covering the receiver with the palm of a hand. Mike Harrington was offering to take the boys sailing at noon and Andrea could not think what to say to him. They had gone somewhere with the maid, she explained, and might not be back in time. ‘I guess another day might be better,’ she added, allowing her voice to tail off uncertainly. A strange panic gripped her. What if he never called again, either because this conversation discouraged him, or because he was killed; how would she feel? Terrible. For the boys? No, for herself. She really needed to be nice to him after getting him so wrong.
His disembodied voice was saying, ‘Why don’t I drop by anyway, and if they turn up that’s fine, but if they don’t, it won’t be the end of the world.’
‘You may be wasting your time. But if you don’t mind the risk …’
‘That won’t kill me,’ he said with a rueful laugh, and she understood at once what he meant. Other risks he had to take were the kind that really might kill him. ‘I’ll see you soon,’ she heard him say, and then a click. Slowly, she replaced the receiver.
So what to do? Change her clothes? She had looked like a windswept Campfire Girl on top of the upturned boat. But she really shouldn’t get too excited about the way she looked. He was just a young man in the navy – about four years her junior – about whom she knew nothing, except that his work was dangerous enough to make her feel anxious on his behalf. Anyone knowing what he did would feel the same. She decided not to change her clothes, though she did revive her make-up.
Harrington parked at the end of the lane, so she did not see him until he had almost reached the door.
‘Any sign of them?’ Mike Harrington asked cheerfully. He was dressed in a pair of old flannels and a thick blue sweater that made him look less willowy than she remembered.
‘No sign yet. I’m really so sorry.’
‘Not your fault.’
‘Come on in.’
He sat facing her in an armchair with his back to the French windows and remarked, after a silence, ‘I meant to tell you something at Elspeth’s that time.’ He said this almost humbly. After the tense atmosphere of their earlier meetings, she was completely unprepared for the change of tone. If it heralded some kind of romantic admission (and what else could explain his suffering smile) what would she say? As his expression changed to open admiration, her heart began to thump. He said quietly, ‘Because I can’t play an instrument myself, I suppose I’m overly impressed by people who can. But you caught the fizz and sparkle of that music perfectly.’
Andrea laughed more loudly than she had intended. She felt relieved and yet disappointed, too. ‘Why didn’t you come over and tell me? Musicians love compliments.’
‘Tony and I were rather down in the dumps.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that.’ And she really was. There was something dreadfully poignant about his tired handsome face. Nothing pretty or boyish about him. In fact he rather reminded her of an ageing leading man: his forehead lined, cheeks starting to redden a little under his tan, hair receding slightly – making him appear to be in his mid-thirties, though, actually, she was sure he was younger. She tried to imagine his looks before the war: heartstopping, she guessed. Anxiety could be cruel. It probably also explained the remoteness she sometimes sensed beneath his easy manner.
His present silence was like that, disturbing because unexpected. Maybe this was the moment to make her own confession. ‘Oh dear,’ she said, ‘this is kind of embarrassing, but I have to do it sometime. I told you something pretty dumb in the boat.’
‘I don’t remember anything like that.’
‘I said my husband told me about your work but, really, Mrs Lowther did.’
‘Did she say you weren’t to tell me she’d spilled the beans?’
‘Yes. I promised.’
‘Did she say who’d told her?’
‘Her husband. And he’d gotten it from a surgeon in Falmouth.’
‘That makes sense.’ His face relaxed and he smiled at her with unembarrassed satisfaction. ‘Frankly, I’m not sorry you found out.’
‘You’re not?’
‘Because now you know the truth, you won’t think I’m a complete waster.’ His happy smile bemused her. Was he really thrilled that she might think better of him? If Sally
was right, and Mike still loved his faithless wife, he was only playing games.
She asked sharply, ‘Why do you give a damn what I think?’
He ran a hand through his wavy black hair. ‘Because you know how to ask terrifying questions like that.’
‘Which you’re too scared to answer? Don’t tell me.’
‘I will tell you,’ he murmured, his expression suddenly matching the seriousness of hers, ‘because it’s true.’
The door was open. Thinking of Peter lying in bed upstairs, Andrea got up and closed it. Returning to the sofa, she said more gently, ‘Local heroes don’t scare that easily.’
‘I’m not a hero, local or otherwise.’
‘Boy, do I smell false modesty!’
‘It’s not false.’ His brown eyes met hers so candidly that she felt sorry she’d been sceptical. He said gently, ‘Want to know why?’
‘Sure.’
‘I’m often in danger; that’s not in question. But it doesn’t make me a hero – not like the agents I take to France. When they risk their lives, it’s their own free decision to do it. Because they’re completely alone, nobody would have a clue if they made up an excuse for failing to keep a rendezvous. For me, it’s quite different. Every moment of the Channel crossing I’m surrounded by people who look up to me and expect me to behave well. So turning back isn’t an option. Bravery doesn’t come into it.’
Andrea shook her head doggedly. ‘I bet there are times when you can turn back without getting blamed.’
‘Sometimes I do turn back. Like when we’ve been seen by enemy spotter planes. But even then, if my orders are to collect agents from a beach, I’ll probably risk carrying on.’ He grinned at her knowingly. ‘You think that’s because I’m the local hero? Think again. It’s because if I fail to show up, they’ll be shot, along with the locals who helped them. And if that ever happens, I won’t be able to look Tony in the eye, or any of my crew. That’s why I do the decent thing, week after bloody week.’
‘Why did you tell me this?’
‘You don’t remember? He looked genuinely astonished. ‘You said I wasn’t the kind of man to be afraid of a woman.’
‘I did?’ she echoed.
‘That’s right. So I needed to prove you wrong.’
Just then, before she could ask him why, she heard the boys’ shrill voices in the lane. Mike heard them too and looked at his watch.
‘If we’re on the water for an hour,’ he said, ‘we won’t be back much before two.’
‘I’ll serve lunch later.’
‘Are you sure that’s convenient?’
‘Would you rather not come?’
He gazed at Andrea with a gentle smile. ‘I think you know the answer.’
When Mike and the boys had gone, Andrea went over their conversation in her mind and felt the same mixture of fear and elation she had known while it had been going on. Could she have imagined the intense, almost beseeching way he had sometimes looked at her? The adolescent nature of her own feelings suddenly overwhelmed her. I’m thirty-five, married, with a son who needs me. How could I endure the lies of an affair, the feigned indifference in public, while actually longing to kiss and touch?
In the past, whenever she had fantasised about falling in love – and she had done this quite often when neglected by Peter – Andrea’s greatest hope had been that the unknown man’s thoughts would mirror and complement her own. She had certainly never dreamed that she might one day be drawn to someone whose mind was a mystery to her, and to whom she was attracted mainly for physical reasons. Until meeting Mike, Andrea would sooner have imagined herself intimately involved with a conscientious objector than with an officer, even a volunteer naval reserve one.
When Peter had been in hospital recovering, a friend with a warped sense of humour had shocked Andrea by giving him a novel about a French businessman crippled by myelite whose wife had promptly begun a passionate affair with a tennis professional whom she happened to meet on the beach at Juan-les-Pins. Her choice of an athlete’s body had added to her husband’s misery. It occurred to Andrea that the real-life wife of a crippled non-combatant scientist would cause only slightly less hostility if falling for a fit and youthful serving officer. What kind of woman would do that? Only the empty kind that loved magazine romances in which crisp bemedalled uniforms made a girl’s knees tremble. So was there no morally acceptable course for such a wife to take if she needed love? Yes, indeed. She should leave her husband for a man even more damaged. The magazines knew the sort: a blinded officer with half a face.
*
Despite the painful stiffness of his leg, Peter was determined to come down and meet Mike. He was delighted to learn from Andrea that she had already come clean on the subject of how she had heard about the local flotilla’s French missions.
‘Damned shame we can’t grill Harrington about his near scrapes, but pas devant les enfants and all that,’ muttered Peter as Andrea helped him tie his shoe laces. ‘To be honest, I’m damned envious of him.’
‘For his better chances of dying?’ suggested Andrea, squinting up at him as she fastened his final lace.
‘Be honest, Andrea. Women are just as fascinated by soldiers and warfare as men are.’
‘Not this woman.’ The words were out before she could even blush. Not that he was looking at her any more. Now, he was trying to choose a necktie.
‘Think of Spain, Andrea. We both know several wives of pacifist dons who …’
‘We know one wife, Peter.’
‘Okay, one wife, who definitely misbehaved with her husband’s pupil as soon as he’d volunteered – and another wife who may have done.’
‘Wasn’t that left-wing solidarity?’
‘It was women being driven crazy by male self-sacrifice.’
‘Is that why you envy Harrington?’
‘Don’t be silly.’ Peter chose a bow tie, and began to knot it. ‘I wouldn’t want to admit this to Leo – so don’t give me away – but those little warships are something special. The camaraderie of their crews; their sleek lines and speed. Imagine roaring home successful at dawn, your signal mast shot away, decks full of bullet holes.’
‘Like your crew?’
He gave her two claps of silent applause. ‘Oh very well, I know I’ve been indoctrinated. But it’s pure hypocrisy to deny the lure of it.’ He pulled a face. ‘Though that’s what I did with Leo – denied it. Well, I’ve had time, plenty of time, to think.’ He sighed heavily. ‘Believe me, my sweet, doing important work like mine is not everything.’ He adjusted his tie and stared at his reflection in the small dressing mirror. ‘Given the life he leads, it’s really jolly decent of Harrington to devote his spare time to the boys.’ He combed his hair thoughtfully. ‘I wonder what he did for a living in civvy street.’
‘Something frivolous and selfish, I hope,’ said Andrea, finding Peter’s sudden enthusiasm for Mike embarrassing and unwelcome. ‘Too much dash and heroics can soften the brain.’
Peter chuckled to himself. ‘For God’s sake, don’t tell him that. Rumour has it that he’s just won the DSO.’
‘Doesn’t he wear it?’
‘And give the whole game away? Tsk, tsk.’ Andrea watched her husband limp to the bedroom door, where he paused and sniffed appreciatively. ‘Mmm! That smells delicious. I must be one of the few men alive who actually likes kedgeree.’
‘Let’s hope Commander Harrington is another.’
‘My liking for it even survived the terrible stuff they passed off for the real thing at school.’
‘Perhaps his school was better.’
‘In terms of cookery, quite possibly,’ conceded Peter, whose loyalty to Uppingham amused Andrea, not because she knew much about the precedence of English public schools, but because the intricate web of trivial distinctions which differentiated these extraordinarily similar institutions for their alumni had always struck her as humorous. Given the universal awfulness of most English food, the quality of a school’s kitchens probabl
y conferred kudos in inverse proportion to their merits. It was strange to think that, though she had been living in England for a decade, she had made little progress in the art of placing Englishmen in whatever positions in the class hierarchy their socially aware countrymen would instantly pigeonhole them. Mike Harrington was a case in point. His accent, an occasional diphthong apart, was very like Peter’s – but whether this reflected badly on one, both, or neither, she could not tell.
The round table in the dining room was small but just large enough for them all to squeeze around. The boys were euphoric after their sail, and Mike Harrington was generous with his praise for their ‘hard work’. Andrea was immediately struck by the way Justin looked at him – attentively and without any of the reserve he displayed when talking to Peter. The boy wouldn’t like him, would he, unless Mike was a sympathetic person?
While they were drinking Rose’s vegetable soup, Justin begged Mike to tell them about fighting in MGBs.
‘It might bore everyone else.’
‘No, it won’t,’ exploded Leo.
So Mike gave a deliberately vague account of the cat and mouse tactics employed against E-boats in the North Sea. If the navigator’s calculations for direction and speed were even fractionally wrong, the enemy’s boats would be missed by many miles. When the boys had finally stopped pestering him to describe being hit by bombs, Peter said quietly that he was working on a weapon that would make air attacks on small warships much less likely.
‘Tell us about it, dad,’ cried Leo.
‘Of course I can’t. But I do promise Mike will be pleased when he gets one.’
‘How soon will that be?’ asked Mike, smiling.
‘A couple of months if you’re lucky.’
While they were all eating their kedgeree with differing degrees of enthusiasm, Peter asked Mike how he had first become involved with coastal forces.
‘I was teaching at King’s, London, but when war broke out I joined the Crown Film Unit. One of my first jobs was to make a short film about the motor torpedo boats at Great Yarmouth. I was hooked from the moment I went out in one.’