A Gathering Storm (54 page)

‘And fishing in the rockpools,’ Hetty said, her eyes shining. ‘And the secret steps from the cove.’

‘To Carlyon.’

Ah, Carlyon,’ Hetty said. ‘I can’t bear to think of it being gone.’

‘Nor can I,’ Beatrice said.

‘What happened to Carlyon, Hetty?’ Lucy asked softly.

‘Burnt to the ground,’ Hetty said, her expression clouding like a child’s. ‘And Mother with it.’ After a moment, she said, very slowly and clearly, ‘She was living there by herself, after the war when I was away at school. The doctor had given her pills, to help her sleep. She often complained she couldn’t sleep. She must have taken them and forgotten her cigarette. She sometimes did, you know.’

‘I remember, she did,’ Beatrice sighed. ‘Poor Oenone.’ ‘That’s so dreadful,’ Lucy whispered. ‘And it’s never been rebuilt. Who owns it now?’

‘Peter,’ Hetty said. ‘Though he never wanted it.’ Then she looked straight at Lucy. ‘Peter told me he was leaving it to Tom, but Tom’s dead. So, Lucy, Carlyon will one day be yours. Not long now, I shouldn’t think – poor old Peter.’

In the car on the way back to St Florian, Beatrice surprised Lucy by remarking, ‘You know, I’m thinking that I’ll drive over and see Hetty again. It might help her to talk more. She’s a crusty old thing, but she must be lonely. And she remembers, Lucy. It’s so nice when you’re old to talk to others who remember.’

That evening, after supper at the hotel, Anthony and Lucy took the narrow path over the headland to the beach as the moon was rising. She let him help her down from the rocks onto the sand. He put his arms around her and kissed her. Later they found the path over the dunes and walked back to the house where he was staying and up the stairs to his room. There, very gently, he made love to her.

It was as they lay together afterwards in the darkness that he finally began to tell her what he’d been through, hesitantly at first, but with more certainty, as he relived the events. She supposed it was the dark that freed him to speak. She lay very still, just listening; some instinct told her that he did not need her to ask questions or pass comment, only to listen. And anyway, she thought, compared to what he’d been through, what did she know about anything?

They’d been in Helmand Province, he said, guarding a dam. The area was particularly dangerous, everyone knew that, not only because of insurgents, but because of unmarked areas of landmines. They were of the type, it seemed, designed to maim rather than kill, and every few days there came some awful new tale. Who, after all, can stop children treating ruined buildings as a playground or taking a short cut home across the fields? Everywhere these things were hidden, undetectable until too late.

It was in response to an urgent call that they set out that afternoon, he driving, Gray next to him in the armoured vehicle, bucketing down a mountain road to rescue a patrol which had gone where they shouldn’t to help such a child – and had paid the price.

He should have seen it – how many times had they been warned, after all? – and he did, but not until it was too late. The glint of a wire stretched across the road teased his awareness for a split second. Then they were upon it.

The blast threw the vehicle up in the air. Somehow he was tossed clear, but Gray, poor Gray, was engulfed by a fireball. He didn’t stand a chance. Anthony would remember his friend’s screams for ever.

As Anthony lay in the field hospital, recovering from minor burns, from broken ribs and shock, he played over in his mind again and again what had happened, trying to make sense of it. He couldn’t.

Things he’d done or hadn’t done tormented him. If only he hadn’t been driving so fast. If only he’d been concentrating harder, maybe he’d have seen the tripwire in time. Worse, worse even than this, was the fact that some automatic instinct had made him turn the wheel – not consciously, he wouldn’t ever have done that – but he’d swerved, all the same, and it was Gray’s side of the vehicle that caught the full force of the blast.

They sent him to talk to someone. It helped, but not much. Eventually they’d packed him off home on three months’ leave and here he was, at the end of it, still bewildered and hating himself.

‘They’ve all been so bloody kind; I’ve been tortured by kindness,’ he said.

No one had blamed him, not even Gray’s family. Their acceptance and forgiveness were extraordinary. When they’d suggested he go and stay in their holiday house in St Florian he’d gratefully taken up the offer. Here he could feel a connection to Gray from happier days.

‘Do you feel ready?’ she felt able to ask. ‘To go back, I mean?’

‘In some ways yes,’ he replied. ‘I’m in a vacuum here. I need to do something.’

‘But in other ways . . . ?’

She watched him draw on his cigarette. For a while he said nothing, just lay thinking.

Finally he said, ‘Did Gray die for a just cause? It’s very hard to know. But I have to believe so or else I can’t go back. How could I?’

‘Do you have to go back? If you don’t want to, I mean?’

‘I do want to,’ he said. ‘I feel I owe it to Gray – and to all of them. It would be like deserting if I didn’t. I have to do it.’

Lucy sighed. She didn’t understand properly, how could she? But she thought she had an inkling. The things he was saying, well, it reminded her of Beatrice. It was all about duty, yes, but about love as well. About not putting yourself first.

‘Will you be all right?’ she asked.

‘I think in the end I will.’ In the dark she felt his hand find hers. ‘It’s odd. We hardly know each other,’ he said, ‘and yet I feel at some deeper level we do.’

He rolled across and she found herself looking into his face, felt his breath on hers. She reached up with her other hand and touched the sandpaper skin of his jaw, the softness of his lips.

‘Lucy, my Lucy,’ he whispered, taking her hand and kissing the fingertips. Then he bent his head and joined his mouth to hers. She drew him to her, and for a while there was no need to say anything.

Afterwards, falling asleep in his arms was the most natural thing in the world. She felt she was where she belonged.

Beatrice Marlow is a fictional character, but inspired by various real-life SOE agents, including Violette Szabo and Odette Churchill, who were mothers of young children. I am indebted to the many books that I consulted about the Second World War, and in particular about the SOE F-section (headed by Maurice Buckmaster with Vera Atkins), and the FANY. Among them are:
A
Life in Secrets
by Sarah Helm,
Carve Her Name With Pride
by R J Minney,
Odette
by Penny Starns,
Debs at War
by Anne de Courcy,
In Obedience to Instructions
by Margaret Pawley,
London at War
by Philip Ziegler,
How We Lived Then
by Norman Longmate and
Cornwall at War
by Peter Hancock. An article I found at
www.kentfallen.com
about the Pluckley Remount Depot was helpful, as was Emma Smith’s excellent memoir about growing up in Cornwall between the wars,
The Great Western Beach
.

Thank you to Bill Etherington, whose article in Eaton Parishes Magazine about the FANY set the hare running; to Frank Meeres of the Norfolk Record Office who was kind enough to read my script; to Sarah Hammond and Roger Pearson who advised me about sailing; and to my mother, Phyllis, who brought me up on stories of her wartime childhood, when the family had goats and, like Hetty, she kept a Rabbit Notebook.

Very many thanks to Sheila Crowley and her colleagues at Curtis Brown Literary Agency and its associates, to Suzanne Baboneau, Libby Yevshutenko, Clare Hey, Florence Partridge, Kerr MacRae, Jeff Jamieson and the rest of the team at Simon & Schuster, and to copyeditor Joan Deitch. Endless love and gratitude are due as ever to my husband David, and to Felix, Benjy and Leo.

Rachel Hore

Norwich, 2011