Do the Birds Still Sing in Hell? (37 page)

As the whiskey hit the back of Horace’s throat his mind went back to Ibstock, to Pretoria Road and those special Christmas mornings. The taste of whisky would always remind Horace of Christmas mornings, of birthdays and open log fires. He drained the glass in two large gulps and slid the glass forward as his eyes pleaded for a refill.

General Parker complied with his wishes and filled the glass.

Horace allowed himself the luxury of dreaming of the future as he drifted away on the effects of the strong alcohol. He wondered if it was too much to ask, too much to dream that the next Christmas Day would be spent with the woman he loved.

Freddie Rogers and Dave Crump left at dawn the next day, 2 July, and Flapper Garwood and Jock Strain the day after. There were emotional goodbyes. Horace loved every one of them like a brother. They’d stuck together through thick and thin and the hell of a war that nobody wanted. As Horace lay on his bunk he thought of the men who hadn’t made it. Although he’d spent five years undergoing every torturous emotion a man could handle, he reminded himself that he was one of the lucky ones. He, Jimmy White and Sergeant Major Harris dozed on their bunks in the empty dormitory. There was nothing else to do.

Suddenly the door opened and Jimmy White was told to report to the airstrip on the far side of the camp within 20 minutes. It was as quick as that. The goodbyes were even quicker as neither man wanted to linger in the past. Now it was time for the future. What they had achieved between them was simply monumental. Strangely, none of them even mentioned it.

Two hours later Sergeant Major Harris and Horace received their instructions too. They were flying to RAF Royston in Hertfordshire. From there they would be sent on a train to their nearest home town stations.

The Dakota had been crudely redesigned and altered to accommodate 30 troops. Fifteen strangers sat on either side of the plane, a loose rope resting on their laps, the only thing that resembled any sort of safety belt. It was all rather nerve-wracking for Horace, as it was the first time he’d ever set foot
on a plane. Sergeant Major Harris sat opposite, but the noise of the two Pratt & Whitney radial piston engines drowned out any meaningful conversation.

An hour and 20 minutes into the flight the pilot’s voice crackled through the intercom. His voice could just be heard. He informed the passengers they were approaching English soil and a spontaneous yet muted round of applause broke out among the men.

‘And now,’ announced the captain, ‘the white cliffs of Dover.’

The plane went into a steep dive as the engines seemed to lose power. Horace was aware of his last meal pressing at the top of his stomach. The Dakota levelled out and they heard the pilot’s voice once more.

‘Here goes.’

With a grinding sound and a chunky clunk the huge bomb doors in the bottom of the plane simply fell open. There was nothing between Horace and the white cliffs of Dover but a hundred feet of fresh air. Horace clung to the thin piece of rope for dear life. It was a nice gesture and a great view of the chalky deposits of the southern coast of England. But on reflection, Horace would have preferred to focus on the balding pate of Sergeant Major Harris.

The plane touched down at Royston aerodrome just before nightfall. The men underwent a 50-minute welcome speech from one of the officers, who filled them in on all the latest developments of the war and in particular, the momentous Victory in Europe day. They were billeted for the evening, given as much free beer as they could drink, and sent to bed after a fish and chip supper.

At noon the next day a convoy of Land Rovers took them to the train station at Stevenage and eventually, after more bureaucracy and roll calls, the men were placed on trains to
Northampton and Coventry, Ipswich and Oxford, Birmingham and yes, Leicester.

Leicester station hadn’t changed. Miraculously, it seemed to have escaped the Luftwaffe bombs. Horace was the only man to alight there. He stopped on the platform and took in the ambience of the station. Holding his head high, he breathed in the air of Leicestershire as a solitary tear trickled down his cheek.

The civilian sent to collect Horace didn’t have a difficult job to spot him.

‘Are you Joseph Greasley?’

Horace nearly said no – he hadn’t heard that name since it at had been used in the recruitment office in King’s Street.

‘Jim… er, Horace Greasley.’

The civilian looked down at his clipboard. ‘It says Joseph here.’

‘It’s Horace.’

The man looked up and smiled. ‘Horace it is, then.’ He held out a hand by way of a greeting and Horace reached out and took it.

‘Horace. I’m Bert, and I’ve come to take you home.’

CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT

I
t had been a long day: the long wait at Stevenage station and the stop-start, never-ending journey up to Leicester on the train. By the time the car pulled into Pretoria Road it was dark.

Mum and Dad, Sybil and Daisy just sat and stared. They stared at Horace for an eternity, just glad to have him back. He was thinner than when he’d left for France, maybe three or four stones thinner, but that was to be expected. The prisoner of war camps were never mentioned that evening, as if the family sensed the returning prisoner would talk in his own good time. Horace climbed the stairs to look at baby Derick in his bed. Baby Derick was now a seven-year-old boy and even though Horace stroked his hair, he slept on.

Back in the kitchen they talked about the war and the future and work and the farm, and they talked about Harold who was still in Africa tending the sick and wounded. He’d been made a sergeant, his mother announced. He had done really well in his role as a medic, and the higher rate of pay she received from the War Office had been more than welcome. He was due back home any time. He had applied for compassionate leave when he’d heard Horace was on his
way home and it had been granted by the Regimental Sergeant Major. Good old Harold, thought Horace. Despite the war he had done really well for himself.

They talked. They talked and Horace listened.

He decided to wait until the morning to tell his parents about the girl who had helped him make it through the war.

‘She’s still a bloody German, Horace!’ his father bellowed as they sat at the breakfast table. His mother sat with a white linen handkerchief and dabbed at the tears rolling freely down her cheeks.

The day had started so well. A cup of tea with a drop of whisky in it. Dad’s way. Then bacon and eggs and hot buttered toast. Horace had told them all about the young German girl and about the food she’d supplied and the radio parts too. He said she was a heroine and if it hadn’t been for Rose he doubted whether he would have made it back in one piece. The family had sat and listened. He’d been convinced his parents would understand. Why did he have to tell them he’d fallen in love with her? Why did he have to tell them he wanted to start a new life with her?

Still his father ranted on. ‘The bastards have stolen five years of my sons’ lives and bombed the hell out of our country and you take up with one of them.’

Horace wanted to tell his parents more, that she wasn’t a German, she was a Silesian. But he didn’t have the energy. The last thing he wanted to do was argue with his family on the first morning he’d taken breakfast with them for five years.

Father wasn’t finished. He went on to say that if ever Horace brought that Hun back to Ibstock, his son would be out in the street with a suitcase looking for a new place to live.

Horace was shattered. But strangely enough, he understood.

His mother woke him just after 7.30. The warm summer sun
had filtered through the thin cotton curtains and already the east-facing bedroom was hot. ‘There’s a cup of tea in the pot, Horace. You might want to take a look at this before you come downstairs.’ His mother handed him the letter. ‘Dad doesn’t know it’s here. Best if we keep it our little secret.’

Dear Jim

I made it. I just hope that you did too and that it is your handsome eyes reading this letter and no one else. My journey was not without danger and some day I might find the courage to tell you about it.

I am tired but alive and I made it through to the Americans who have treated us well. I was picked up in Czechoslovakia and taken to Germany by truck. I am living in an American air base in a small dormitory with five German ladies. I have been here one week now and yesterday I was given some writing paper and told I could send a letter to my family. The American man in the posting office thought it strange that a German girl was writing to an Englishman. I told him I was a Silesian not a German.

It is strange, I have so much to tell you but when my pen touches the paper the words will not come. I want to tell you so much, so many things that are important to me – important to us both. Perhaps I will find the courage next time.

My feelings for you are as strong as ever, I believe you English have a saying that absence makes the heart even fonder. This I can now understand.

I will close now.

I love you more than ever. Please write back and tell me the same.

Your English Rose.

At the bottom of the letter was written the address of an American airbase near Leipzig, together with a seven-digit number. Horace’s reply was in the postbox at the end of Pretoria Road by noon. He had to wait an agonising three weeks before the next letter arrived. The postman came between 6.30 and 7.00 each morning, seven days a week. Horace was always at the garden gate to greet him.

My Darling Jim

My heart is bursting with pleasure and relief. I am so happy to have received your letter and your words made me cry with joy.

I swear I am the happiest girl in the whole of the world and cannot wait to begin our life together. I understand why we cannot live in England. Germany too is in a mess with soldiers of many nations everywhere. On our way to the American camp we travelled through Berlin. The city is in ruins and it seems that the Russians have taken their revenge on many people, I do not like the Russians, Jim, and I feel it will be many years before it will be safe again. I will write for more information on New Zealand. We must be patient as travel at the moment is still impossible. Perhaps in a few months things may return to normal and we can meet once again, though it matters not, I will wait forever. I am writing this from my bed at the moment as I have been a little ill this week. I do not know what is wrong with me but I feel a little better today. Perhaps tomorrow I will get up and take some fresh air.

I miss you more than you can imagine. As always I send you much love.

Rose.

Two weeks later a different letter arrived, this time from the War Office in London. Horace was asked if he could confirm that a certain Rosa Rauchbach, a Silesian citizen, had helped the prisoners in the camps by supplying food and radio parts as she was claiming. Horace was only too happy to write back and tell the War Office that it was all true.

Four weeks later another letter from Leipzig arrived. Rose was ecstatic. The War Office in London had replied to the Americans’ request and stated that Private J H Greasley of the 2nd/5th Battalion Leicesters had confirmed that her extraordinary tales of assisting the Allied prisoners in Poland were true. Rose had been rewarded with a well-paid job on an American airbase near Hamburg.

By this time Horace had opened his own barber’s shop with the money his parents had put away during the war. The money was rolling in; between the two of them they were saving nearly ten pounds each week. Nothing could now stand in the way of their plans to emigrate to New Zealand.

Rose and Horace corresponded right up to Christmas 1945. And then the letters from Rose stopped. Horace sent more than a dozen letters to the airbase in north-eastern Germany, but they were never answered. He tried and failed to get to the airbase in Germany. He was told again and again that civilian trains and aeroplanes were not yet up and running so soon after the war. In desperation he even hitchhiked to Dover and stood for three days begging to be let aboard one of the few boats and ships making their way across the English Channel. In the end he was forcibly removed from the port under threat of arrest and had to make his way back to Leicester the same way he’d come. It had all been to no avail.

EPILOGUE

I
n December 1946 Horace received an envelope postmarked Hamburg, Germany. His hands trembled as he slid a kitchen knife under the flap and slit it open. But even before he noticed the unfamiliar style of the handwriting, something in his heart told him it was not from Rose. The letter was brief and to the point. There was no return address.

Dear Mr Greasley,

I regret to inform you that my dear friend Rosa Rauchbach passed away in December of 1945, nearly a year to the day of writing this letter. Rosa died two hours after childbirth, and her baby boy, who she named Jakub, died soon after. I received a box containing Rosa’s personal possessions two months ago in which I found some of your letters.

I could not help but read them, please forgive me for intruding into your privacy but it was clear you loved her a great deal. I realise that the news of her death and that of her son must come as a great shock. I am sorry that I have had to be the one to break the tragic news.

Margit Rosch

It had been a year since Horace had received anything from Rose. He thought the time that had elapsed would have lessened the pain a little. It hadn’t. There were so many unanswered questions. He thought about the last time they’d made love, the last time he’d gazed into her eyes and the last time he’d held her close. He thought about New Zealand and their plans and the irony of making it through five years of hell, of the dangers they’d faced day in day out, and then this…