The Victors

by Max Hennessy

  ‘Sir!’

  I stopped and turned.

  ‘They say she’s been very ill, sir.’

  My heart sank again. For some reason it had never occurred to me that she’d been transferred to the hospital as a patient. Somehow I’d thought only that she’d been sent there to do menial tasks as part of her punishment, because the Germans had always rounded up civilians in occupied territory and put them to work for them.

  ‘What was wrong with her?’ I said quietly.

  ‘It seems she had the Spanish influenza like so many other people.’

  ‘Go on.’ I knew there was more.

  ‘It turned to pneumonia and, with the Germans more concerned at the time with retreating than looking after people, it became rather a bad dose, sir. I gather she came pretty close to—’

  ‘Right,’ I said quickly. ‘Never mind. And thank you again.’

  Fatface slammed up into a salute that would have done credit to a guardsman as I swept out. I suspect that afterwards he flopped into his chair and said ‘Phew!’ But he’d done his stuff. With a firework under his behind, he seemed to know how to go about things.

  I drove to Douai like a lunatic, threading in and out of the traffic. Several times soldiers I jostled to the ditches shouted out angrily at me and once a military policeman ordered me to pull into a side road to allow a battery of field guns to go past. I ignored them all, slipping under the tossing heads of the gun teams and round the backs of lorries smelling of hot oil. Once a red-tabbed officer bawled furiously at me because I pushed in front of him but I decided that if he’d made a note of the number on the car he’d be able to sort it all out with the major when I returned it. I had a feeling that the major would back me up, too, because he didn’t have much time for red tabs either. Though he’d probably be biting the carpet about the car being missing – especially if he’d been intending to use it for something himself – I felt sure he wouldn’t let me down.

  Fatface was right about the policeman. There he was, standing in the middle of the Grande Place directing the traffic as if he were in Piccadilly. And he did know where the hospital was. Five minutes later I had left the car outside the door and was arguing fiercely with the English nurse in charge of admissions. She didn’t want to let me in because, she said, visiting wasn’t permitted. I told her I wasn’t leaving until I’d seen whom I’d come to see and that if she were difficult I’d just stamp in, anyway.

  In the end, she got on the telephone and rang someone up and five minutes later the sister, an older woman with a kinder face, appeared.

  ‘The civilian part of the hospital has nothing to do with us,’ she said. ‘We have no authority over it at all.’

  ‘Look, sister,’ I begged. ‘I have to see this girl. Can’t you arrange it for me?’

  She gave me a long curious look. ‘Does she mean a lot to you?’ she asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Not yet. I only know that when I was taken prisoner with my major by the Germans last year it was entirely due to her that we managed to escape. They tell me the Germans found out what she did and imprisoned her for it. She caught influenza and it’s been a life and death case for a bit. When we escaped I didn’t have the chance to say thank you to her but I always promised I’d come back. Well, I’ve come back and, whatever happens to her, she’s got to know I’ve come back.’

  She studied me for a while then she nodded. ‘The doctor in charge is a kind man,’ she said. ‘He’s a Belgian and he’s grateful for what we’ve done. I think matron might be able to arrange something. Just wait here.’

  I waited for what seemed hours, watched curiously by the nurse, then the sister came back with a Belgian soldier who limped and used a stick.

  ‘The orderly will take you to the nurse in charge of the ward,’ the sister said. ‘I think it’ll be all right.’

  She was still watching me curiously as I went off after the limping orderly. Despite his bad leg he moved fast and we walked down what seemed miles of corridors. The British army had taken over the best part of the hospital for the wounded and the civilians had all been pushed into temporary quarters at the back, and we climbed stairs and crossed lawns and eventually arrived at the entrance to a hut. A Belgian nun with a wide-winged headdress was waiting for us.

  ‘S’il vous plaît,’ she said, indicating a door.

  The ward was big and bleak and bare, as though the Germans had stolen everything worth stealing, and there was a squat stove in the centre with an iron guard round it and a few women patients sitting knitting and sewing. Curious faces stared at me from pillows as I clattered down the ward, then the nun pulled a screen aside.

  ‘Enfin!’ I heard her say softly. ‘Il arrive!’

  As Munro had suggested, Marie-Ange wasn’t as beautiful as I’d remembered her. Even allowing for her wasted frame and pale sunken face, I knew at once that I’d been seeing her through rose-pink spectacles ever since the previous year. As I sat down on the chair the nun pushed forward, I saw her head turn. There was a curious calm in her face that I thought might be the approach of death and her eyes were huge and black against her pallid cheeks.

  ‘L’aviateur aux grands pieds,’ she murmured, and at first I couldn’t think what she meant. Then I remembered the huge farm boots she’d found for me to wear in place of my flying boots, and the way she’d pulled my leg about them.

  ‘Oui.’ I lifted my foot. ‘La même chose exactement.’

  Her pale lips moved and she managed a twisted smile, then her hand moved across the bedspread and grasped mine as I put it out.

  ‘You came back,’ she said.

  Chapter 8

  The major was sympathetic when I got back, and I began to realize that because I’d been so long at the front they were all giving me special treatment. He just waved his hand when I told him why I’d taken his car and asked if I’d found what I was looking for.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ I said. ‘I think she’s probably dying.’

  ‘Like a day or two off flying?’ he asked. ‘To sort things out. It can be arranged.’

  ‘It would help,’ I said. ‘I think I – we – all of us – owe it to them.’

  ‘I think so, too,’ he agreed. ‘There must be dozens of people like her and if nothing else it’ll be good for Belgian-British relations.’

  He even lent me a motor bike and sidecar so I could move about as I pleased. I was glad of that because I also felt I ought to go and see Charley and tell her how things had turned out. She’d always been interested in Marie-Ange.

  She seemed surprisingly poised as she came to meet me. It was a warm day and she led me out into the grounds where we could talk without being overheard.

  ‘I think she’s been waiting all this time for me to come back, Charley,’ I said uneasily. ‘What ought I to do?’

  ‘Go back,’ she said at once.

  ‘I’ve been.’

  ‘Well, keep on going. Until she’s better.’

  ‘Suppose she—’ I paused ‘—suppose she’s expecting, well, what you suggested.’

  ‘Marriage?’ She chuckled. ‘I’ll be a bridesmaid, if you like.’

  I glared at her. She didn’t seem to be discussing what seemed to be a serious matter in anything like the right spirit. I felt about sixteen and like a schoolboy caught out in a misdemeanour. It would have done Fatface good to have seen me just then.

  ‘I wish you’d stop being an ass, Charley,’ I said irritably.

  She was still studying me with an amused light in her eye. ‘When are you going to pop the question?’ she asked.

  ‘Pop the question? I’m not.’

  ‘What if she expects it?’

  I felt trapped, as though things were closing in around me. I hadn’t expected to pop the question to anybody for a long time yet.

  Charley smiled. ‘You have the look of a man condemned to death,’ she said.

  I turned to look at her. She seemed terribly adult all at once and I realized suddenly that all those old affecta
tions of hers had been gone for some time. Her enthusiasm was still as great as ever but it was under control now and her voice was no longer the unrestrained yelp of an excited girl but the quieter, more confident address of someone who was bewilderingly mature.

  ‘I don’t really want to get married yet, Charley,’ I said slowly, ‘and when I do, I’d begun to think perhaps, well—’

  She studied me calmly. ‘Spit it out, old thing,’ she said.

  I’d realized for ages now that just being with Charley, just walking with her, made me feel alive because she was invariably warm, satisfying and eager without archness, as though it were the most natural thing in the world that we should enjoy being together. She’d always made me feel the cleverest chap in the world, and when we’d held hands, as we did occasionally – not with sentimentality, but because we were happy – it had slowly become an unconscious caress that I’d barely noticed because it had become so normal, and the idea had been growing in me for a long time that what lay between us had become something a lot deeper than friendship.

  She was still waiting for an explanation.

  ‘Charlotte—’

  She looked startled. ‘Pardon!’

  I frowned. ‘I said, “Charlotte”—’

  ‘My word!’ Her smile was gently mocking. ‘We are serious, aren’t we! You’ve never called me that before.’

  ‘Well, I am doing now,’ I snapped, not wishing to be interrupted at what seemed a portentous moment in my career. ‘We’ve known each other a long time—’

  ‘Who have—?’

  She didn’t seem to be responding properly to the cues.

  ‘Charley,’ I fumed. ‘Shut up!’

  ‘Sorry.’

  There was a pause while I drew another deep breath, ‘I’ve always thought a lot about you—’

  Her temper flared. ‘No, you didn’t, you fibber!’ she said hotly. ‘There was a time even when you thought I was about the stupidest girl in England.’

  My jaw dropped. ‘Charley, I didn’t—’

  ‘Yes, you did!’ Her face was pink with chagrin. ‘Ludo told me I hadn’t a chance.’

  ‘Did you ask him?’

  ‘Yes. And he told me what you said when he made a few discreet enquiries on my behalf.’ She stared at me, her eyes frank and honest. ‘And you were probably right, too, because all I can remember thinking about in those days – years ago—’

  ‘Last year.’

  ‘That’s years ago these days, isn’t it? All I thought about then were clothes and tea-dances and the latest fad and the newest hairstyles. I must have bored you to tears.’

  I grinned. ‘You did a bit at times. Not much, though, and never now. You’ve changed.’

  ‘It must be the war,’ she said wonderingly. ‘It does things to people.’ She grinned, suddenly enjoying herself. ‘Do go on. You were just beginning to sound interesting.’

  I hesitated then blundered on again. ‘Well – I hadn’t thought – not yet, of course, because, well, there’s a long way to go—’

  ‘But you want someone to cherish you and all that rot, but you don’t want to be tied down too much. Is that it?’

  She was gazing at me with the clearest of blue eyes. I stared back at her, startled at her perception, then I gave a sheepish grin. ‘I suppose that’s about it. Because I’ve got to decide what I’m going to do when the war’s over first.’

  She gave me a sly look. ‘Suppose someone else comes along?’ she asked. ‘Someone who’s a bit older than you. Twenty-one, say. Suppose he asked me? Hospital makes them sentimental.’

  ‘It does?’ I gaped at her. ‘What do you do?’

  ‘Take violent evasive action. It’s the nurse’s uniform, y’see. It does things for a girl. Makes her even seem attractive.’

  ‘You are attractive.’

  ‘Go on! I’ve got a face like a horse.’

  ‘No you haven’t.’

  ‘And a loud voice. It’s a bray, I think, really. Happens to all well-bred girls from county families. Comes from going to too many horse-shows.’

  ‘Charley, I think you’re terrific.’

  She beamed. ‘Honest?’

  ‘Yes. But I’ve got to get a career first because I haven’t a bean.’

  ‘That makes two of us. Neither have I.’

  ‘I thought the Sykeses had plenty of money.’

  ‘Not our branch of the family. We’re as poor as church mice. All we’ve got is a family tree that goes so far back it disappears into the mists of time, and a house that was built in the eighteenth century, neglected in the nineteenth, and started to fall down in this one, because we’d no money to keep it up. All that and an inbred snobbishness that enables us to go on thinking that, despite everything, it’s still worth the proletariat’s while to get hitched to us.’

  I grinned. ‘It is.’

  She studied me cautiously. ‘Sure you’re not letting yourself be carried away a bit?’

  ‘No,’ I said. Actually, I was, because I’d never really intended to tell her what I thought of her – not for years – for the simple reason that I couldn’t afford to, and I’d thought it best kept to myself until the right time. But it was out now, and that was that, and I found I didn’t mind.

  Charley didn’t seem to mind either. Quite the opposite, in fact, because she was blushing like mad suddenly and with all her poise gone. ‘Sorry I pulled your leg,’ she said. ‘Actually, it’s rather spiffing, and I’m pleased as anything.’

  ‘You are?’

  ‘Why not?’ she said. ‘I can’t think of anyone I admire more. And that’s important, isn’t it? And what’s more—’ she tapped the medal ribbons I wore ‘—when this stupid war’s over you’re not the type to go round living on those things. You’re a nasty stubborn type, Martin Falconer, and even though you still always manage to fall over the carpet every time you come into a room, I dare bet my savings, which aren’t much, heaven knows, that twenty years from now you’ll be someone.’

  ‘Think so?’

  ‘I’m sure.’ She smiled at me. ‘You know, I never thought you’d get around to it – in spite of the hints I kept dropping.’

  ‘Did you drop hints?’

  ‘Like mad. I had a terrible crush on you. I even kept all the letters you wrote. Tied up with blue ribbon at the bottom of a drawer. Soppy as anything.’

  A slow smile spread across my face. This was a Charley I didn’t know and I felt flattered, because I’d never done much to deserve such devotion. Charley was looking at me, shy for the first time since I’d known her. ‘I’m glad you finally caught on,’ she said.

  I kissed her. Same as always, except that this time it seemed rather more important and we were a little less perfunctory. It went very well, I thought, though our noses got in the way at first, and this time, too, she put her arms round me and hugged me. As she released me, her eyes were sparkling and I wasn’t sure if it weren’t with tears. I grinned at her, not knowing what to say because it seemed such a big step to take, even though it was still only in the planning stage, and we both still seemed a bit young for it.

  ‘Ludo always said you’d marry a duke,’ I pointed out.

  She chuckled. ‘By the time we’ve managed to save enough money,’ she said, ‘you’ll probably be a duke.’

  We stared at each other a moment longer, neither of us knowing what to say next, then I took a deep breath. ‘That’s it then,’ I said. ‘We’ll just have to wait a bit, that’s all.’

  ‘There’s just one thing,’ she said, suddenly sober and solemn and all the smiles gone from her face.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘You’ve forgotten Marie-Ange de Camaerts. I think that’s what you came to tell me about, isn’t it? Not your suddenly discovered affection for me.’

  * * *

  It worried me all the way back to the squadron. I realized now that Marie-Ange hadn’t really meant all that much to me. I’d admired her and been deeply in her debt for what she’d done for us, but now, thinking a
bout it, I could only put it down to youthful sentiment. Sykes and I had been cold, tired, hungry, miserable and frightened of being stuck in a great wire cage somewhere in Germany for years, and the fact that she’d taken pity on us and helped us to safety had made me see her as a sort of Joan of Arc in shining armour. I think I’d fallen for a funny accent and the way she wrinkled her nose when she laughed at my leg-pulling, and, looking back on myself as I’d been the year before from the enormous height of twenty, I was able to see myself as a callow youth a mere nineteen years old, shy, over-emotional, easily impressed, and just a bit silly.

  It continued to worry me, though, and there was plenty of time for it to develop because when I went to see Marie-Ange again several days had passed and there had been a lot of fighting. By now it really did seem that we were out to win the war and nothing else. No nonsense about pushing out a salient or nipping off a bulge. Victory was the aim now, as certain as it was that the sun would rise the next morning, and we were already reaching out towards Sedan, and the French civilians near the airfield were almost speechless with joy at the liberation they’d almost ceased to hope for.

  The Germans were by no means driven from the sky, however. They were as vicious as they’d ever been, as though their air force, which had not been born before the war, was determined that if it were to die after the war, it was at least going to leave the scene with some honour.

  The second time Marie-Ange looked less worn and even a little better but the nun still warned me I wasn’t to tire her. She didn’t seem to want to talk, however, and just grasped my hand in silence.

  ‘I was sorry to find out about your mother,’ I said.

  ‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘She was very old and very fragile.’ Then she promptly went to sleep, so that I just sat there staring at her, my mind full of bewilderment.

  The nun put her head in from time to time and beamed at us understandingly, as if she knew exactly how I was feeling, and once she even brought the mother superior.

  ‘Qu’elle est belle,’ she said. ‘Et Monsieur le capitaine, qu’il est héroïque.’

  When she’d gone I took another look at Marie-Ange. She wasn’t really beautiful – any more than I was heroic – and the thought worried me all the way back to the squadron as I tried to decide what love was. Was it familiarity, acceptance, easiness, comfort, a whole lot of ordinary-sounding emotions that went to make up something more? Or was it what everyone said it was, what all the novelists and song writers made it out to be? As I wondered if you could live with someone for the rest of your life without having to feel they were the most beautiful girl in the world, I began to think of the song that Munro was always pounding out on the mess piano.