by Peter Rimmer
“Does your wife know?”
“Don’t be bloody stupid. She thinks I can’t get it up anymore. How’s Gillian?”
“The same. Spent every penny I’ve made.”
“Tell me about it. Good sex costs money.”
Without the price of a round of drinks in his pocket there was nothing he could do. The worst sin in Bruno’s eyes was leaving a drinking session when it was his turn to pay for the round. He had never done it, and despite Arthur Bumley’s suggestion to talk to his American colleagues he went straight home to find Gillian grinning all over her face, a sure sign she wanted something.
“Marvellous dinner party at Jacob Rosenzweig’s residence. Hollywood. Publishers. Max will be there. And we’re invited. You are so clever writing books about the famous. Vida phoned. She’s such a dear. Bet she’s glad to be out of Germany. They don’t like Jews in Germany I’m told. I’ve just got to have a new dress. At that kind of level you can’t be seen in the same dress twice. I’ll stun them again. There’s a lovely shop on Fifth Avenue. Has just what I want. I’m sure Vida will be showing off a new piece of jewellery. Jacob’s so generous. Well, I’ll just have to settle for a nice new dress. Jewellery like hers is out of the question for the moment. Maybe you’ll write a bestselling novel about the rich and famous. All our new friends.”
“We don’t have any money.”
“Just enough for a dress, Bruno. You know how nice I can look.”
“We don’t have any money.”
“Ask that nice man Max Pearl for an advance on the new L’Amour book.”
“Gregory’s pulled it.”
“What on earth for? Then the one you’ve been talking about. Who’s this one about? You don’t have to keep secrets from your wife. I hope the person is very famous. The more famous they are the better it sells. Max is rolling in money.”
“I don’t have a new book.”
“But you told everyone you did.”
“I lied.”
“Well, you’d better think of something sharp. There are lots of famous people in New York.”
“Don’t you think of your parents in London?”
“Of course I do but they’re there and I’m here. What can I do? Father’s a grocer. Everyone has to eat.”
“There’s food rationing.”
“What can I do about it, Bruno? I get us an invitation to a top-notch private dinner party at a rich banker’s home and you’re more worried about my mother and father than you are about what your wife’s going to look like on Friday night!”
“There’s a war raging over England. You’re English. My father’s Latvian and I worry about England every moment of the day. Arthur Bumley says the war’s coming to a head. We may lose. Instead of arguing with you about some stupid dinner party I should be right now getting my American friends in the Fourth Estate to write about England, to call for help from America. Convince the American public it’s going to be them next if we lose the air battle raging over England. It’s your bloody country, Gillian. Arthur’s worried out of his mind, thinks Germany’s about to bomb the centre of London, not just the docks. That’s right, London docks. They bombed the East End last night.”
“Art the Bumley’s an ass.”
“Don’t you call him that!”
“How dare you shout at me. Get out. Go and get drunk with your low-class friends. See if I care. All I want is a damn dress. Is that too much to expect from your wife? Sometimes I wonder why I bothered to marry you, Bruno Kannberg. There were dozens of men I could have married.”
“Shorthand typists marry clerks, live in semi-detached houses in Wimbledon if they are lucky. Spend their entire lives paying a mortgage and scrubbing the floors.”
“Some of them would have got rich.”
“None of them. I’m going where I should have been in the first place. Earning my salary by doing what I was told by my editor.”
“So I don’t get the dress?”
“No, you don’t.”
“Then get out. You’ll regret this, Bruno. You’ll pay for this. Mark my words.”
When Bruno came home drunk four hours later having borrowed twenty dollars from a friend in the bar, Gillian was in bed, sitting up, polishing her nails. Without looking at his wife, Bruno got in the other side of the bed. For the first time since meeting Gillian West he had no desire to make love to her. Turning his back, Bruno went quickly to sleep, his mouth wide open, ready to snore. In the night he dreamed of London and the bombs coming down.
In room twenty-eight at the Independence Hotel, Robert St Clair woke in a cold sweat. In his dream the bomb had made a direct hit on Barnaby’s town house in Piccadilly, blasting out the wall of the bedroom and sending Robert down the stairs atop the grandfather clock as it shot downwards to the ground floor of the house, bouncing off the wooden bannisters. Still alive at the bottom, Robert found the blast had taken off his left foot. Then he woke screaming, Freya trying to hold him down.
“I’ve lost the other foot, Freya.”
Carefully, slowly, cold sweat soaking the sheets, Robert felt down with his right hand looking for his only foot.
“It’s still there.”
“Of course it’s still there. What’s the matter?”
“Barnaby has taken a direct hit. I was in the house sleeping. It’s all back. The funk. Reading London’s being bombed. The same stench of the trenches. Rats, water, and bodies decomposing in no man’s land.”
“I’ll make us some tea. They have a tea maker somewhere in the cupboard. The man who showed us the room said we don’t have to call room service. Some of the guests prefer their privacy. You’re shivering.”
“I was always shivering in the trenches. We all were. From cold and fear. You never got used to it. Merlin said the same. In the desert it was just cold fear before an attack according to Barnaby. You didn’t know where they were in the folds of sand.”
“You’re not going. That settles it.”
“You can’t boast about your brave ancestors half your life and leave England in the lurch when it matters.”
“What can you do for them in England? You should stay with me and the children.”
“You’re American. The children are too small. You’ll be all right with your parents in Denver. I’ll give the family moral support. If we don’t all do our bit, England will go down. I’d phone Barnaby now if I thought I could get through. The tea machine’s in that cupboard, I think. The bellboy was pointing that way when I gave him five dollars for bringing up the bags. Oh no, I must go home. They expect it of me. I’ll do some writing for the propaganda department at the War Office. All that morale building. It was so real. The dream was so real.”
“I’m coming with you on the boat. You stay or I go. Who’s going to make you tea in the middle of the night?”
“The children need you.”
“So do you. Mother can cope. Give her something to do. Don’t argue, Robert. Either you stay or we both go. We can both stay with Barnaby.”
“If my brother still has his townhouse. It was so vivid. I came down the stairs on the grandfather clock that stands on the second floor landing. What time is it?”
“Three in the morning. A nice cup of tea will get you back to sleep.”
“You sound like Mrs Mason at Purbeck Manor.”
“I know. Wipe yourself with the towel. You’re drenched in sweat.”
“You always think of me and the children.”
“That’s my job. It also gives me pleasure. I like looking after the people I love.”
“It was nice of Gerry Hollingsworth to come all the way from California to see me off. With his wife. You know Sir Jacob’s married? She lives in London. Jacob’s wife never visits America. A marriage of convenience for family financial reasons that didn’t work.”
“To see us off, Robert. I’m coming with you on Saturday.”
“You don’t have a ticket.”
“Then I’ll smuggle myself onto the boat. Chances are it’s hal
f empty. They’re all coming this way away from the war. I’ll phone my mother in the morning. Do you really want tea?”
“Not anymore now I found my one good foot. Turn out the light and give me a cuddle. If I start sweating again, wake me up.”
“I don’t think he’s brought his wife.”
“We’ll find out at Jacob’s dinner party on Friday night. Do you mind my only having one foot?”
“It’s not the foot that counts. Come here, lover. They say people make love more often in wartime.”
“Now I know why you’re coming.”
Down the corridor in room thirty-six Glen Hamilton was sitting up in bed talking to his wife. As was their habit, they talked to each other about what was worrying Glen in his job.
“It’s three in the morning. You need some sleep, Glen. For tomorrow. You can’t function on three hours’ sleep.”
“He’s right. Bruno is right. If Germany wins the Battle of Britain we’ll all be living in a fascist world.”
“Fascism. Communism. Capitalism. They’re all the same, a way to make money for the few and keep the masses under control when built-in religion doesn’t work anymore. The Catholics have the answer. Put the fear of God into a child before he is seven and the man will behave himself. Now Darwin has come along and tried to prove we evolved from the slime so the power-hungry are trying something else. Religion was the best. Self-policing. God all around you all of the time. You can hide from the police but not from God. And make them all give ten per cent to the church for its trouble.”
“That’s really cynical, Samantha.”
“I hope so. Wouldn’t it be awful if it was the truth? That religion is one big confidence trick which you only get to prove when you’re dead and can’t argue with the church or get your money back.”
“Democracy is better than fascism.”
“Plato, I think it was, the philosophers all blend into one in my mind, said the next worse thing to tyranny was democracy. All those stupid people voting to get what they want for themselves. Democracy is just as easy to abuse. All you need is a sleazeball with a big, persuasive mouth. Sound familiar, Glen? That sermon on Sunday was bullshit.”
“It’s in America’s best interest to help England.”
“See, what I said. All you have to do is convince a gullible public and we’re off to war in our chariot. If the spoils are worth it and the price in blood and treasure minimal, everyone cheers. That’s democracy. No sane man volunteers to go to war. Do any of them know what they are fighting about? The governments, I mean. The man in the street never knows. War, an extension of diplomacy someone said. If he won’t give you what you want, give him a belt round the ear. We’re just fine in America as we are, leave them alone. When they’ve finished struggling with each other to find out who’s the big gorilla we’ll see what’s in our best interest. Don’t let Bruno Kannberg get you writing pieces telling everyone we should go to war.”
“And if Hitler invades America?”
“It’s a big pond.”
“Or the Japs?”
“What have the Japs got to do with it?”
“We’re stopping them getting oil in their fight against China. You corner a rat, it turns on you. What else can it do from a corner when its lifeblood is threatened?”
“Your imagination is running riot again, Glen Hamilton. Freya has the right idea. If Robert wants to run back to England and put his head in the noose, let him. She’s got the kids.”
“Robert’s English. Very old English. They have deep patriotism bred into them.”
“Still doesn’t mean America has to go to war. All we have in common is the language. The rest of America is a melting pot of every tribe on earth. Why it works. We don’t have clans. Factions. We all want one thing, the good life. Most of us have it. Everyone has the same opportunity. Let the Europeans scratch each other’s eyes out. They wanted the fight, let them have it. A second time. You’d think they’d done enough damage to each other the first time. Russia’s keeping out of it. So must we. Now there’s a problem for the future. Communism.”
“You just said they’re all the same.”
“Communism threatens the American dream of all having the chance to get rich.”
“Now you are yanking my chain.”
“Probably. No one ever solved the world’s problems for very long, certainly not at three in the morning. There’s always a new one. Go to sleep. I love talking to you, Glen, but a girl needs her beauty sleep. You think the kids are all right?”
“Of course they are. Goodnight. Thanks for listening. Sometimes I like to get it off my chest.”
“I know. We’ve been married a long time. We’re interested in each other’s problems. Not just our own. That’s why we work, you and I.”
2
Genevieve watched the Pacific roll into shore all morning, only one thought in her mind: Tinus was fighting for his life, the only hope in her future about to be destroyed. The letter from Uncle Harry was wet in the sand at her naked feet, the phone call in her mind, cut off in full flight, Uncle Harry sounding cheerful compared to her own mental misery.
“There’s no contact on a daily basis with Tangmere at the moment. Keep your chin up, Genevieve. He’s a good pilot.”
“Is he all right?”
“Nothing comes out. Security.”
“They’d tell you.”
“It’s a bit hectic at the moment. The RAF has its hands full. I’ll give him your love when I see him. They won’t let me fly in combat.”
“Thank God for that.”
“Silly, really. I test flew the Spitfire before it went into squadron service. Now they say I’m too old. Too old when they’ve ironed out the problems! I’ll try again if it gets any worse.”
“What do you mean ‘any worse’, Uncle Harry?”
“We’re losing pilots. The Germans more than us.”
“I’m going to be sick.
“Just keep your chin up.”
There was a click and the line had gone dead, leaving Genevieve the rest of the day to ponder on her own, rereading Uncle Harry’s old letter in reply to her own, looking for solace where none could be found. All day the blue sea had rolled in, not once penetrating her thoughts as the fear and misery ebbed and flowed through every portal of her mind.
“There you are, Genevieve. They’ve been looking for you all morning.”
“Leave me alone.”
“He’ll survive. I’m trying again to go over.”
“Then you’re as big a fool as Tinus. He was in Rhodesia. All he had to do was stay put.”
“Anyway, they won’t let me. I’ve joined an American ancillary squadron. We’ll be in the war soon, you’ll see.”
“Gregory! Do me a favour? Go away.”
“You can’t mope all day. Come and have some lunch. Get drunk. Do something other than worry. He’s a good pilot. The best pilots came through the last war.”
“What do you know about it?”
“Only what I heard from Harry Brigandshaw. He should know. Twenty-three kills.”
“And all dead. Germans or English what’s the difference? Uncle Harry said he’s going back into combat if it gets any worse. He’s over fifty. How bad has it got when old men have to fight?”
“At least have a drink. When it’s all over you’ll laugh at yourself for moping on the beach all morning.”
“When’s it going to be over, Greg? You know the papers are calling it the Battle of Britain. Britain fighting for survival. I want to go home.”
“What can you do?”
“Be nearer. Not knowing is horrible. I can make them smile.”
“Not with a face like that you won’t. Why don’t you go to New York to see off your uncle if you want to go to England? Could have caught the same boat. Why’s he taking a boat anyway?”
“Doesn’t like flying.”
“The Atlantic is swarming with U-boats.”
“Now you’re really helping. Uncle Robert goes all the
way through the trenches and drowns at sea. All right then. Let’s you and I get drunk at the hotel. If anyone tries to talk to us, punch them in the face. Everybody wants a fight these days. He’s going to die, Greg.”
“No, he’s not. Most soldiers survive wars. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t fight wars. There are always survivors or where are the heroes? Don’t you remember anything about our films? The swelling music when the victor triumphantly returns from the wars to the love of his life?”
“That’s comforting. Do you realise what you just said?”
“Sort of. I’m trying to help.”
“I know you are. Why don’t you find yourself a girlfriend?”
“I don’t want one. You know that.”
When they arrived for the dinner party at Abercrombie Place, Bruno Kannberg gave his first genuine smile in the presence of his wife since getting into bed next to her drunk. Vida, literally, looked down her nose at Gillian wearing the same old dress, Gillian’s stare fixed with envy on the diamond drop earrings, missing the contempt in the other woman’s eyes.
“It is so nice of you to come,” said the banker’s mistress in her German accent that some men found attractive.
“We always try and help. Just a few flowers for you, Vida,” said Bruno.
“How is your new book?”
“Coming along just fine. Hello, Robert. Not like yours of course. You remember my wife, Gillian?”
“What a lovely dress,” said Freya, unaware she had put her foot in her mouth.
“Ah, Mr Kannberg,” said Sir Jacob Rosenzweig. “We wanted to thank you for your articles praising Holy Knight. All publicity is good publicity but yours went beyond the call of duty. Yours was more than we might expect. The same magazine as Gregory L’Amour. When’s the book version coming out?”
“Hello, Bruno,” said Max Pearl. “This is Marsha. He’ll come round when he’s short of money. They all do. Money always talks. Marsha is a friend of Petronella who is here with Gerry Hollingsworth. Don’t you remember Petronella from the Thespian restaurant? You wanted a loan, I seem to remember. Gillian! Ravishing as usual. Do you like Vida’s new earrings? So pretty. So expensive.”
Bruno listened to the flow of trivia wash all round him, very few words meaning what they said. They drank cocktails handed them by a maid in a short black dress that flared at the knees. The cocktails were in tall glasses with cherries on sticks. Bruno watched his wife drink the first one straight down and take another from the tray when the girl wasn’t looking, offering the tray to the wife of the man who had directed Holy Knight, the film.
