The Chestnut Tree

by Charlotte Bingham

  The Gestapo officer looked startled.

  ‘Fräulein! Forgive me! I am so sorry! Of course, we had no idea. We were just so taken with your looks, and seeing that you live in this red light district . . .’

  ‘Perfectly understandable, but you know how it is. If you are reserved for the Top Command, you are reserved. The Führer is insistent that all near to him are clean and healthy at all times. Hence – I am reserved, I am afraid. Nothing to be done.’

  ‘Fräulein! Of course!’

  The Gestapo officer was now so distracted that he forgot he was the driver of the car, and stepped into the back of the Mercedes. Meggie turned smartly away, not wishing to add insult to injury by noticing, and hurried off to the restaurant.

  She had to leave Cologne tonight.

  She just hoped that it would be in time, that Heinrich had told her the truth, that the handsome, kind, sensitive man with whom she had been having an affair was not going to be found to have betrayed her. Ten hours was a very long time. By the time it was finally up Meggie knew, from painful experience, that it would seem to have been a thousand.

  INTERLUDE

  LONDON, MARCH 1944

  In the war room the men were grouped around a large rectangular table lit only by a low-hanging overhead lamp. They sat in silence as they read the papers in front of them. When they were all done, the siren-suited figure at the head of the table nodded towards one of the higher ranking officers at the other end of the same table, who took this as his cue to stand up to address them all.

  ‘As you know, thanks to Operation Fortitude and the information coming from sources behind German lines, we have successfully created the illusion that we wanted, which is that of a super-strong American force preparing itself in readiness in the south-east of England, directly opposite where the 15th Army is positioned. Furthermore, it would appear from one agent’s report that there could well be dissension in the enemy ranks as to the final control over Hitler’s crucial reserve of armoured divisions in France, sir. The Panzergruppe West.’

  ‘I should imagine that Rommel would want them as close to the beaches as possible, would you not say?’

  ‘I agree, sir. While it seems Rommel’s field marshal might prefer to hold them back to counterattack us should we successfully make it inland.’

  Someone else in the room now spoke and all eyes turned to him.

  ‘I have to say that in my opinion this information is invaluable as it confirms the apparent success of Operation Fortitude. This being so, the plan is to invade further west.’ The uniformed speaker got up and switched a light on above a wall-hung map of France. Taking a long ruler he pointed at given destinations along the coast, moving the ruler to each place as he spoke.

  ‘The plan is to land here – from as far west as Barfleur to approximately Villers, on the five beaches which have been unofficially code-named Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword. I think this is a correct procedure. From what we know from information coming out of Germany, this is what Rommel has in mind.’

  He continued in the fashion of generals everywhere to make what the Allied forces had in mind sound, as near as possible, like a bit of a tea party, while the figure at the top of the table seemed happy to remain silent until the end, whereupon he remarked, ‘However it goes, gentlemen, it is going to be a hell of a long day.’

  1944

  Chapter Sixteen

  Long before Rusty’s baby had started to make its presence evident, Rusty herself was contemplating moving to the next door village, if only for a little more privacy. She had a deep-seated desire to be alone, away from her parents – despite the fact that her mother’s arthritis had improved beyond recognition and she seemed happier than Rusty had ever known her.

  Rusty would have liked to put her mother’s happiness down to knowing she was to have a grandchild, but Rusty was not sentimental like that. She would have liked to put it down to knowing that, against all the odds, Mickey had succeeded in joining the army, and had looked well and happy in the newsreel. She would have liked to put it down to the fact that her father seemed much more cheerful nowadays, and was up and doing of a morning, making tea for Rusty and himself before she went off to her job, but Rusty knew all too well that to sentimentalise in that way would be ridiculous.

  The plain fact of the matter was that her mother’s arthritis had improved in leaps and bounds from being on the buses. She liked the life of a clippie, the odd hours, the companionship, the sense of freedom, the realisation that she was wanted and appreciated, far more than she had ever been as a mother. There was just no comparison to being at home peeling vegetables, sitting for hours knitting on her own, or waiting for Father to come back from the Three Tuns.

  The knowledge that independence had given her mother back her health did nothing for Rusty. She knew she should be happy that Mother was now much more relaxed, that she seemed well able to cope with her arthritis, not to mention her husband, but knowing that in three months’ time she herself would become the kind of person she had always pitied her mother for being – the kind of human being that everyone else felt quite free to despise, pity and love in seemingly the same measure – was not making Rusty at all happy.

  Of course part of her loved the idea of a baby, because she had always liked small things, but the much larger part of her hated the idea that she would become permanently tied to this tiny person who would, as is the way of things, become bigger and bigger, until finally he or she would look back on childhood as part paradise, part hell, and might even blame Rusty for both states.

  Motherhood, Rusty now realised, was all about becoming a prisoner, all about not being able to escape. Besides which, she also had the ordeal of childbirth to look forward to. It might have been easier if she had not already seen Mattie go through it, in graphic detail. If she had not seen how hard it was for a mother, alone, to cope with a fatherless baby. No one to hold your hand when you were anxious, no one to share a drink with you of an evening and listen to the day’s mishaps, no one to comfort you with love at night, when you had just been woken for what seemed like the hundredth time. Mr Eastcott might be doing his best for Mattie and Max, but the plain truth was that no grandfather, and no grandmother, could replace the strong shoulder to cry on that a young woman bringing up a child really needed. Someone of her own generation to whom she could turn for support and understanding, for love.

  For all these reasons, Rusty moved out of Bexham and into a small cottage in a neighbouring village, which was where she received a letter from Peter.

  Rusty dear, when I come back to Bexham, I hope you don’t mind but I would like to marry you. If this comes as a terrible shock, I hope it won’t. Please forgive this letter, we are on the move SOMEWHERE IN ENGLAND!!! I love you, don’t forget. Peter.

  The letter was not date stamped, nor was it marked, but it was extremely grubby, although blessedly free of the censor’s blue pencil. Her father, who had brought it over on one of his all too regular Friday afternoon visits, looked across at Rusty after she had finished reading Peter’s few lines for the sixth or seventh time.

  ‘Bit old, that letter, isn’t it, Rusty?’ he wanted to know, trying not to appear curious. ‘But that’s letters in wartime,’ he went on comfortably. ‘It was the same in the Great War, believe you me. Some of them arrived two or three years late. You’re lucky if that’s only six months out of date, mark my words. Letters. Some of them blow up, some of them get chucked in hedges, some of them get intercepted, and that’s letters. And of course, the trouble is,’ he took his pipe out of his mouth and waved it at the fire in front of which he sat as if the fire itself was another human being, not just a feeble little blaze made up of a few pieces of wood and coke, ‘the trouble is, letters is all about human beings and their lives. So that is another victim of war – letters.’

  Seated beside Mickey Todd’s chestnut tree by the village green Mattie rocked Max’s perambulator up and down, down and up. Her father was agog with excitement, all the re
gulars down at the Thee Tuns were agog with the same, and there were rumours flying about everywhere, but none of it meant very much to Mattie compared with the fact that Max had fallen fast asleep, at long, long last.

  That morning, she had received a parcel from the WVS – a parcel from America. It was ridiculous, but just seeing that American stamp on the precious brown paper had made Mattie’s heart turn stupid somersaults, which in turn had made her realise that Michael, wherever he was, still had a rather more firm grip on her emotions than she had known, or wanted. She could have kicked herself for feeling so happy and excited as she undid the already partially unwrapped parcel. But of course it was not from Michael, it was just one of many distributed by the WVS to women with young babies. It seemed that Mattie had been allocated two sets of rompers made by a lady in Connecticut.

  Instead of indulging in any more sentimental thoughts, she had pushed Max out in his pram to the village green. Above her was a clear blue sky, and beyond the mouth of the estuary lay a millpond of a sea. Sea gulls swooped and screamed around her, ducks shepherded their newborn along in perfect order. Further on, wading birds prodded the wet sand with their long curved bills, in search of tasty morsels of shrimp or grub, while where the water was deep enough a boy in a rowing boat sat patiently fishing for whatever might take his bait. The only difference between this day in wartime and any day in peacetime was the huge coils and runs of barbed wire along the shores of the estuary, the distant signs warning of mines on the beaches, and the concrete pill boxes and gun post towers dotted regularly along the lovely coastline. Yet so calm and peaceful was the day that Mattie found it almost impossible to believe the rumours that any moment now one hundred and fifty thousand men were about to land in France to begin an invasion that was meant to herald the end of the war.

  Not only were there rumours about an imminent invasion of France, however, there was also an excitement of a more personal nature that was involving the whole of Bexham. Something to distract everyone from whatever they needed to be distracted from, be it the pain of past or immediate loss, a relationship fracturing under the strain of constant deprivation, or just the news.

  Peter Sykes was about to return home a war hero, having won the VC in Italy in the second battle for Monte Cassino. It appeared that he had saved the lives of three of his comrades while under heavy enemy fire. It was also rumoured that he had been severely injured in the battle, and subsequently invalided out of the army. Mattie had seen Peter only once since he had joined up at the outbreak of war, despite knowing that he had in fact returned home on leave several times. Mattie had been in London. She had been with Michael. She had been behaving scandalously, having an affair with a married man. Remembering how much her parents had disapproved of young men like Peter simply because they ran such things as garages now seemed, in retrospect, both ludicrous and hilarious, particularly since she was now staring down at Max, the living image of his American father. She sighed inwardly. If only was ridiculous, but, in some ways, if only she had not gone to London, her life might have been a great deal simpler, but also, perhaps, a great deal poorer.

  By the time she had pushed Max’s pram back into the heart of the village what remained of the local brass band was making itself ready to play a selection of popular tunes in preparation for Peter’s arrival at the head of Bexham Quay – conveniently near to the Three Tuns. A table had been placed ready for the local dignitaries to welcome Bexham’s first VC. The church clock struck twelve and on cue a black Humber pulled up in front of the pub. Like everyone else Mattie strained forward to catch sight of the hero. At first all she could see was the army driver’s back bending into the Humber. A moment later a pair of arms was clasped firmly around the driver’s neck and the younger man was helped out of the car. His appearance was greeted at first in total silence, as both band and crowd watched in dismay while he was assisted on to a set of crutches and it became clear that Peter Sykes VC had lost most of his right leg.

  Finally the silence was broken by the sound of the fanfare, cued in too late by the bandleader with the result that what had been near perfect in rehearsal now sounded at first as if it was being improvised. The bandleader tapped his baton on his music stand to cut short the cacophony and allowed his players a second bite at the apple, a chance that mercifully they fully embraced, so now the quayside echoed with familiar airs, like the National Anthem, of a type that everyone would know at least the opening verse. As soon as the fanfare was over, the crowd broke into spontaneous applause, applause that swelled as the onlookers were rewarded with the very broadest of smiles from the homecoming hero.

  With his weight on his left leg, supported by the sturdy crutch under his left armpit, and with some difficulty, Peter took off his military cap and held it in the air by way of both a salute to his birthplace and thanks to all those present. Standing by her pram, Mattie found herself amazed at how well he looked, in spite of his incapacity, suntanned, strong and even more good-looking than the day he had left Bexham to join up as an ordinary foot soldier. Miraculously he had survived campaigns in France and Africa as a member of perhaps the most vulnerable of all fighting regiments, the infantry – gun fodder as Mattie’s father always called them, having served as a rifleman himself in the Great War. Not only had Peter survived, he had proved to be a brilliant and courageous soldier, as shown by his promotion from private to first lieutenant, by the coloured stripes of service decorations sewn on to his uniform above the breast pocket, and by his winning of the greatest accolade of all, the Victoria Cross.

  Not that he needed to win a medal to prove to Bexham that he was the epitome of a true hero. He was one of them, a young man in his prime, a man who without any thought for himself had saved the lives of three of his fellow soldiers. Returning again and again, constantly under heavy enemy fire, he had dragged each wounded rifleman back to the safety of a dugout, where other members of the same regiment lay sheltering themselves.

  Home had come the hero, perfect and untarnished in every way, save the loss of one of his limbs. In the eyes of his proud village, long before he joined the army Peter had been a great sportsman, the captain of the village football team and the very devil of a fast bowler for the Bexham XI. Now they saw with cruel reality that he would never kick a ball or bowl one for fun ever again. Never go on long, joyful walks with his dog, or – perhaps worst of all, Mattie thought, staring across to where he stood – captivate and charm the young women he took in his arms to lead elegantly around the village hall dance floor.

  Pretending to check that her baby was still sleeping soundly, Mattie bent over the pram and wiped the tears from her eyes with the edge of his pram sheet. When she looked up she found Peter was looking directly at her. As she caught his look she smiled, and after only the slightest hesitation Peter returned the smile, and made his slow and doubtless painful way over to where she was standing by the pram.

  Rusty too was watching the ceremony, half hidden by the crowd on the other side of the quayside. Seeing Peter crossing over to kiss Mattie on the cheek, she slipped away, back to her cottage.

  ‘You got to tell him, love,’ her mother had said, not once but about twenty times. ‘You’ve got to. No good hiding out in the next village hoping that something will happen, because being war, most likely nothing will. You have to tell him. It’s only fair.’

  ‘No “got to” about it. I’ve thought about it a lot, Mother. I know I have changed, for better or for worse, it’s just a fact, so why should I think that he hasn’t changed too? It’s the war, one minute people are one thing, and the next quite different. If I have changed, why not Peter? Specially now he’s coming home a hero. Besides, I don’t want him to think he’s “got to” marry me. That would be worse than anything. No, I’ll tell him, if I think it’s right, and not otherwise, Mother.’ And then as always by way of distraction Rusty asked, ‘Heard anything from our Mickey?’

  INTERLUDE

  ST AUBIN, NORMANDY, JUNE 1944

  Mickey was ce
rtainly in no frame of mind for heroics. Having endured a beach landing in a craft half full of water from seas that on first sight every fighting man considered were far too rough to suit the intended invasion, and having seen three-quarters of his companions cut down by machine gun fire the moment the landing craft’s flap fell with a mighty crash into waves well over head height, all he could think of was self-preservation. Sheltering up against a breakwater while all hell broke loose around him, Mickey who was normally as brave as the soldier next to him found himself shivering with terror as men with whom he had been sharing cigarettes and tea only a matter of an hour earlier were literally blown to bits around him.

  He had now seen plenty of action but nothing quite as hellish as this. He had never seen or heard fire like it. It was as if God had become sickened with this terrible war and determined to exact His revenge on His creation by unleashing every thunderbolt in heaven.

  Somehow he had to survive this holocaust. He held on to his sub-machine gun for dear life. Somehow he had to do his duty as a soldier too, but first he had to survive. He had not come this far to die at the eleventh hour, which he most certainly was going to do if he stayed where he was, fighting for self-control in the shadow of a large hulk of timber that was slowly being shot to bits around him.

  But how? Orders that moments ago had seemed crystal clear now in the light of this sheer mayhem seemed quite nonsensical. This was obviously the moment that every fighting man dreaded – the moment when strategy and tactics went out of the window and it was every man for himself.

  Taking a quick peek round what he hoped was the safe side of the breakwater Mickey caught a brief glimpse of someone he thought was his sergeant signalling for his men to take position around him, only to see him blown to pieces the very next moment, as were most of the soldiers kneeling and lying close to him.