Never Forget Me

by Marguerite Kaye - Never Forget Me

  Corporal Bellingham was well liked by all his comrades, and an asset to the Company. He was mortally wounded on 16th November by German fire during an advance through the Ancre valley. I am informed by those who were with him that he died instantly and suffered no pain. Unfortunately, we have so far been unable to locate your husband’s mortal remains for burial.

  Again, assuring you of all our sympathy in this difficult time.

  Yours sincerely,

  Robert J. Carmichael, Capt., ASH

  18th December 1916

  My dear Sylvie,

  A few lines only. Hopefully you will have had my last three by now and perhaps even in an order that will make some sense! You must have quite a collection—assuming you keep them. Do you? I keep yours. The paper is worn from my reading them.

  I got yours of the 10th and 16th this morning. I can see from reading them that at least one has gone missing. I write because there’s a small chance of leave. Two days only, Christmas Day and the day after. I can come to Paris. Can we meet?

  I shall telegram when I know—so don’t panic when the boy arrives at your door.

  Robbie

  24th December 1916

  My dear Robbie,

  Can we meet?! As if there could be any answer save YES, YES, YES.

  Just tell me when and where and I will be there, though I don’t expect you’ll get this in time.

  I’m watching for the telegram boy.

  Sylvie

  28th December 1916

  My dear Sylvie,

  You will have received my telegram by now. I cannot say how sorry I am. There is a chance my leave may be rescheduled for next week, perhaps even Sunday, which is New Year’s Eve.

  I expect you’ll have plans, but I’ll telegram once I know, and I’ll come to Paris, anyway.

  I would march all the way to Berlin for just an hour in your company.

  Robbie

  Chapter Five

  Paris—2nd January 1917

  Sylvie stepped farther back from the mirror and eyed her reflection critically. The dress was new, an extravagance bought in the excitement of thinking she would be spending Christmas with Robbie. A black, tight-fitting bodice with a square neck and a high waistline, and the narrow skirt was in the new fashion, grey wool with a wide border of the same black forming the hem, which sat just below her calves. Her stockings were also black, and her buttoned boots with their French heel made her feet and ankles look elegantly narrow. The slim line of the gown would have sat better on a less curvaceous woman, but for once she looked chic, in that indefinable Parisian manner. A pity that she had to conceal it under a coat, and her outmoded grey flannel one at that, but needs must.

  She was far too early. Even if his train did by some miracle arrive on time, and even if, by an even greater miracle, he was on it, she would be at the restaurant at least half an hour before him if she left now. Sylvie peered out of the window. It had been snowing again. She took the telegram from the mantelpiece and read the contents once more.

  Sorry leave cancelled again. Lunch Tuesday 2nd. 1300 hours, Chartiers? Third time lucky? Robbie.

  Would it be, though? She had heard so many tragic tales of loved ones failing to return on leave because they had been wounded or killed. But it was stupid to think that way. Apart from anything else, Robbie was not a loved one.

  ‘Oh, it doesn’t matter what he is,’ Sylvie exclaimed, jamming her hat over her carefully brushed hair. ‘He probably won’t turn up, and it’s incredibly stupid of me to care whether he does or not.’

  * * *

  By the time she got to Chartiers, her stomach was churning. Words and phrases from her letters to him kept popping into her head. Silly things she had told him about her childhood. Even more embarrassing, the way she had poured out her innermost feelings. The things that made her cry. Her anger, her pain. She’d even told him about her dream. It was as if the Sylvie and Robbie who wrote so candidly to each other were different people from the ones who were about to be reacquainted in the flesh. Perhaps it really would be better if he didn’t turn up. And if he did—would he expect her to take him back to the apartment, to pick up from where they had left off the last time? She stopped abruptly, right outside the glass doors to the restaurant, appalled by the shivery heat of desire that clutched at her belly. Non. He had not once referred to it, even obliquely, after that first letter.

  Nervously checking her make-up in her compact mirror, she pushed open the door and entered. The restaurant was crowded, as it always was, for the food was cheap and consistently good, despite the shortages. She was led past several empty tables to the back salon, where the huge globe lamps that hung from the distinctive glass ceiling were already lit despite the early hour. On the back wall, the mirrors reflected the hive of activity as waiters worked the long gallery like ballet dancers, moving fluidly between the tightly packed tables, taking orders, pouring wine, ladling soup, imperiously ignoring requests for the bill.

  She didn’t see him at first. She was so convinced that he would not be there that when the waiter paused in front of an occupied table, she started to apologise. Then he got to his feet and her mouth went dry. She had forgotten how very, very attractive he was. ‘Robbie,’ she said, staring stupidly.

  ‘Sylvie.’ He hesitated, then kissed her, Parisian-style, once on each cheek. His fingers tightened briefly on her shoulders. ‘It is very good to see you. I only have a few hours. Let me take your coat.’

  He put it up beside his own coat and hat on the coat rack, which was suspended above the tables, and pulled out a chair. By some miracle, or more likely with the aid of a few francs, he had managed to secure a corner table, where they could watch the room but could also talk in relative privacy. She was quite unprepared for the surge of emotion that shook her. His hair had grown, the scar was no longer visible, though there was a new, freshly healed scar on his cheek.

  ‘A flesh wound,’ Robbie said, spotting the concern on her face. ‘So trivial I didn’t think to mention it.’

  He looked tired, but had lost a little of the haunted look that had first drawn her to him. Nor did he look quite so gaunt. ‘At least they are feeding you,’ she said. ‘That is more than I can say for the French army, from what I hear in the club.’

  ‘By all accounts, your lads took a hammering at Verdun. Sorry, I know your brother is there.’

  ‘I haven’t heard anything. I have to assume no news is good news.’

  ‘My train got in early, would you believe,’ Robbie said, picking up the menu before putting it down again distractedly. ‘You’ll think me an idiot, but I’m actually nervous. I’ve told you things in my letters that I’ve never told anyone, and now you’re sitting right opposite me looking so much more beautiful than I remember, and I feel like I’m naked.’

  Sylvie laughed. ‘I know exactly what you mean. I was standing outside the restaurant just a moment ago thinking, he knows that I am a thief....’

  Now Robbie laughed. ‘You were only eight, and you came out in a terrible rash.’

  ‘I thought that was my punishment for stealing the strawberries from our neighbour’s garden. Like you being sick after sneaking a drink of your father’s whisky.’

  ‘I was ten! Maybe that’s where my preference for wine stems from. Talking of which,’ Robbie said, pouring her a glass from a dusty bottle, ‘I confess, I paid an obscene amount for this renowned vintage, but it is a very special occasion. A belated happy New Year, Sylvie. Sláinte, as we say back at home.’

  * * *

  He watched her as she sipped her wine and scanned the menu, ordering quickly but with assurance. Could she really live up to his expectations, and he to hers? But here they were, and she was very beautiful, and they had only a few hours, and he was dammed if he’d waste them on futile speculation. What mattered was now. This was the only reality.

  ‘Robbie?’

  ‘Sorry, I was in a dwam. Daydream,’ he translated, when she looked at him blankly.

  ‘Is t
hat a Scottish word?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Aye,’ she repeated mockingly, smiling at him over her glass. ‘Tell me more about your home. Glen Massan. Tell me what you would be doing now, if you were there. It sounds so romantic, this castle of yours.’

  ‘Not mine, my father’s. And right now, it belongs to the army. My mother tells me they’ve converted it into some sort of convalescence home. I don’t know what they did for Hogmanay—that’s New Year’s Eve—this year, but before the war, there was always a big party. Provided it did not fall on the Sabbath, of course, in which case the ceilidh—the dancing—couldn’t start until after midnight.’

  He talked. She laughed, asked more questions, and he lost himself for the first time since he’d arrived in France, in talking about the old days, before all this. Their lunch arrived, clean plates disappeared, but he didn’t remember what he ate. The wine went down slowly. He was fascinated by her smile, by the fan of lines around her eyes when she laughed, by the way she communicated with her hands, those curious little Gallic shrugs of hers. He liked to make her laugh. Today, it was not forced. Today, she smiled as he had imagined she must have, before. As he was doing, too, talking about Glen Massan. He’d forgotten how fond he was of the place after all.

  ‘It must be difficult,’ Sylvie said, ‘having your home taken over by the army.’

  He was about to shrug, as he always did when asked, but the trite response refused to appear. ‘I’ve not been back. I couldn’t bear to see it so changed.’

  ‘There is no going back for me now. Not even after the war, I think.’

  He could have kicked himself. ‘I’m sorry. At least my home is still standing.’

  In the silence that followed, Sylvie picked up her coffee cup and drained it in one gulp. ‘Whatever is left back in Picardy, it is no longer my home. I think we had better get the bill.’

  Robbie looked around the empty room in some surprise. The waiter, who had been lurking with intent for some time, making a show of polishing glasses at the nearest counter, came immediately. ‘My train doesn’t leave for an hour or so,’ Robbie said, checking his wristwatch. ‘We could go for a walk, have a digestif somewhere.’

  ‘I would like that,’ she said, handing him his cap. ‘I wish you did not have to wear this uniform.’

  ‘Not half as much as I do,’ he said bleakly.

  Outside, the afternoon was overcast but dry, the flurry of snow already melted from the pavements. They wandered through the faded glamour of the Galerie Vivienne with its mosaic floors and high glass canopy, down towards the Palais Royal, where the silence between them became uncomfortable. Though Robbie had promised himself an interlude from the war, the very clothes he wore made that impossible. They were at the entrance to the Tuileries. It was too cold to sit, but he drew her over to a bench all the same. ‘Sylvie, I didn’t join the army to satisfy some sort of bloodlust, you know.’

  The animation had gone from her face. Her skin was pinched, pale with the cold, her eyes bleak with something else. ‘But you knew when you enlisted that you would have to kill. And you joined of your own free will, Robbie, you were not conscripted.’

  She had made her views very clear the first time they’d met, and they were implicit in her letters, but her determination to see the war only from her own, simply defined point of view made his temper rise. ‘True, I wasn’t conscripted. I happened to believe that I was doing the honourable thing by volunteering.’

  Something in his face or his tone must have alerted her to his feelings, though he had tried to keep his voice level. ‘You think I am mistaken, don’t you?’ she asked him.

  ‘I think you see things very much in black and white. War is wrong. Killing is wrong. It would be better if we all shook hands and made up.’

  ‘I know it’s not so simple, that there are treaties and pacts and alliances and— I have read the papers, Robbie, I know how all this came about, but you did not have to join in, any more than my brother did. If only there had not been such an appetite for warmongering—all the flag waving, and the jingoistic songs, and the generals rubbing their hands together because they hadn’t had a war in a while and now they’d get a chance to try out their new guns, and all the men rushing to leave their families and all that nonsense about how we would teach the Bosche a lesson and be home for Christmas.’ Sylvie scrubbed angrily with her gloved hands at the tears that had gathered in her eyes. ‘If any thought had been given to the people who would be caught in the crossfire, the hundreds of thousands of people who have no home, no family, the refugees who camp out in the streets here in Paris, who are shipped off to England to live off charity—but no one gave any of it a thought. If we had women in charge of the governments, then maybe...’

  Robbie laughed bitterly. ‘You and my sister, Flora, would get along very well.’

  ‘Yet she is here in France, isn’t she? Helping the war effort?

  ‘Easing the suffering,’ Robbie said. ‘There’s a difference.’

  Sylvie bit her lip.

  He took off his cap. His scar itched, as it always did when he was upset. He could feel a headache coming on. ‘When this war started, I thought it was a just one. Right or wrong, that’s what I thought. And I’ve been raised to believe that I owe a duty to my country. Again, right or wrong, it’s what I believed. I didn’t realise that doing the right thing would oblige me to do so many wrong things. Things that keep me awake at night, Sylvie.’ The dull ache had quickly become a stabbing pain, but he was determined to finish, acknowledging it might well finish things between them. At least it would end as it had begun, on an honest note. ‘Every day, I’m forced to break my own moral code in the name of duty. Do you think I find that easy?’

  Sylvie shook her head. She was even paler now, her eyes wide, her hands clutched tightly together.

  ‘I can’t be neutral about this war, Sylvie, don’t you see that? All this bloodshed, all this suffering, I can’t let it be for nothing. I have to believe I’m fighting for something important. And if that makes me a murderer in your eyes, then so be it.’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘But you think it,’ Robbie said harshly.

  ‘Not about you,’ she replied, her voice barely more than a whisper. ‘You think that wartime is no place for principles, non?’

  ‘If anything, I’m a bit envious that you have managed to retain yours.’

  ‘I think you are being very much too kind,’ she replied, her voice trembling. ‘It is easy to have the luxury of principles when they are not challenged. I am not the one in the trenches. I feel...’ She shook her head. ‘You have made me feel very small.’

  ‘Sylvie, that’s the last thing...’ It was the way she refused to cry, the way she was biting her lip, struggling for self-control, that was so difficult to witness. He offered her his handkerchief and she took it, dabbing frantically at her eyes, looking off into the distance where the Eiffel Tower stood stark against the fading light.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said finally. ‘You’ve given me a lot to think about. I hadn’t realised— Oh, Robbie, I just wish...’

  ‘Don’t.’ She looked so tragic and so lovely. He felt drained, and yet looking at her, he remembered that first time, and desire caught him in a fierce grip. ‘Don’t wish for anything except what we have, Sylvie,’ he said, unable to resist tucking the silky curl of hair, which was always escaping, back behind her ear. ‘I’m here because I want to be with you. I don’t hate you for what you believe in, I admire that you can still believe in something.’

  ‘I think you do, too, Robbie, though you’re reluctant to admit it.’ She touched his face, her gloved fingers lightly tracing the tiny new scar, then the line of his old one. ‘You believe something good will come of all this.’

  Her touch was distracting. The throbbing in his head had faded, giving way to a latent throbbing in his groin. He wanted to trace the lovely line of her throat, the questioning arc of her brows. He wanted to run his fingers through the da
rk, vibrant curl of her hair. She wore a coat of grey wool, a garment more practical and not as stylish as her dress, but the poor cut merely drew his attention to the desirable body underneath. ‘I have to, or I couldn’t go on.’ He’d forgotten how delightful the scent of her was, that mix of flowery perfume and warm skin and intense femininity. She wasn’t wearing lip rouge. Her lips were so soft. He could feel her breath, cold on his cheek. ‘Sylvie.’

  ‘Robbie?’

  He meant to say, ‘Let’s not talk about it anymore.’ He meant to tell her that she had given him much to think about, too. Instead he groaned and pulled her into his arms.

  * * *

  His lips were soft, his kiss tender, so very different from the last time. Sylvie closed her eyes, wrapping her arms around his neck, drinking in the taste of him, the warmth of him. His kiss was like the kind of summers she remembered from before the war, soothing warmth building slowly to strength-sapping heat, drugging her and at the same time fluttering life into her, making her shiver for more. His tongue swept over her lower lip. His hands were in her hair, cupping her face. Small kisses now, on her eyelids, on her cheeks, back to her lips. Their tongues touching, retreating, touching. So sweet, like the strawberries she could not eat, teasing her, rousing her into a languid, sensual state in which she could not tell whose lips or tongue were whose, merely that they kissed. And kissed. And kissed.