A Gathering Storm

by Rachel Hore

  They arranged to meet again, and over the next few days at work she found it difficult to concentrate for thinking of him. Saturday afternoon came, and they tucked the baby in his pram and went to the zoo in Regent’s Park. Although there were some empty cages, it was surprising how many animals were still there.

  ‘Do you suppose they’re on rations?’ Rafe joked, when the sea lions all emerged from their pool and trailed hopefully behind them round the enclosure.

  ‘If they’re eating what’s considered inedible by us they must be in a bad way,’ Beatrice said, thinking of the gristly chops Dinah had recently wrestled out of the butcher, part of their meat allocation for the week.

  ‘You don’t suppose he finished up on our dinner-plates, do you?’ Rafe whispered, seeing that the giant panda’s cage was empty.

  ‘Eugh! That’s horrible,’ Beatrice cried. She lifted the baby out to see the monkeys, but regretted it when some primal instinct sent him rigid with fear. She cuddled him into her shoulder.

  For lunch they ate thin soup and rice pudding at a café near the park. The waitress, a maternal-looking woman with a pillowy bosom, cooed at the child and told Rafe, ‘How very like you he is.’

  ‘That would be a miracle,’ Rafe retorted without thinking. Beatrice was hurt by this casual rejection and by the shocked look on the woman’s face.

  Outside, she turned away, angry with Rafe, to clip the boy into his pram.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Rafe said, contrite. ‘He is particularly handsome. It would be natural to note a likeness.’

  ‘Oh, you,’ she said in a dull voice. She pushed the pram briskly ahead, her heels clicking on the pavement. How could he still have this power over her? She thought she’d come so far, grown up so much. But despite all that had happened, he’d spied the hole in her armour, and through it pierced her heart. This time, she would not lie bleeding and helpless. She’d survive.

  Still she couldn’t hide her hurt and, as she scrabbled for the front-door key in her handbag, he reached out and touched her cheek.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ he said.

  ‘Why should there be anything the matter?’ she said, pushing him away. She couldn’t work the key in the lock and smacked at it angrily, then rested her cheek against the door and closed her eyes.

  ‘Let me,’ he said, his voice firm, and he took the key, unlocked the door and held it open for her to wheel the pram inside.

  She shut the door and in the dark and echoey hall, he took her in his arms and held her close. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ he whispered into her hair. ‘I can’t help saying the wrong thing.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be stupid,’ she said fiercely, holding him tight. ‘It’s just everything’s so difficult.’

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘No, how can I be? You’ll be going away.’

  Behind them, the baby started to wake and she scooped him from the pram. Tired and cross, he threw up his arms and butted her with his small head.

  ‘You’d better go,’ Beatrice said, trying to calm the child. ‘I’ll see you soon, shall I?’

  ‘Tomorrow,’ he replied, opening the door. ‘Can I come tomorrow?’

  Dinah would be out until the evening. ‘Come in the afternoon,’ she said. ‘Is two o’clock all right?’

  He was nearly an hour late. She went to the window a dozen times to look up the road, whipping herself into a state of worry at the thought of all the things that might have happened to him. The baby, who was teething, rolled fretfully on the rug, batting at his rattle with angry cries. When the bell of the street door rang at last, she picked him up too roughly and the stairwell echoed with his wailing.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Rafe apologized, when she opened the door to him. ‘Family visitors. I couldn’t get away.’ There was tenderness in his expression and sadness, too. ‘Hello, you,’ he said to the child, tickling the tiny naked feet. The baby whimpered and buried his face in her shoulder.

  Upstairs, when she’d put the baby down to play once more, Rafe came to her and kissed her; her mouth opened to his in astonishment. His lips moved over her face. He drew the tip of his tongue down her neck, which made her whole body tingle. Slowly they drew apart.

  If you’ll watch him, I’ll put the kettle on,’ she said, not trusting her voice to be steady.

  ‘Of course.’ He peeled off his jacket, threw it over the back of a chair and knelt down by the child, waving the rattle a few inches above his face. The baby stared at it with solemn eyes then slowly reached a starfish hand towards it. Rafe moved the rattle slowly to one side, so the child had to roll to reach it. Beatrice laughed, watching them together for a moment, then went to make tea.

  When she came in with the tray he said, ‘Oh, I forgot,’ and stretched up to pull his jacket from the chair. It fell, and a pen rolled out. He shoved the pen back, then burrowed in a pocket and drew out a cylindrical paper packet. ‘Mother’s American cousin brought ’em. This is my whack. Would he be allowed one?’

  She set the tray on a side-table, lifted the fallen jacket, and laid it once more on the chair as he unfolded the packet.

  ‘Chocolate cookies. Oh, Rafe, how marvellous. Why not?’ she said. ‘Who knows when he’ll get another.’

  ‘Here we are. One each to start with.’

  She sat on the sofa holding her own cookie, breathing in the scent as though it were some rare, expensive spice, too precious to actually eat. Together they laughed at the baby’s attempts to suck his and the wondrous expression in his eyes at his first taste of chocolate.

  ‘Who’s the American cousin?’ she asked, closing her eyes in delight as she bit into hers and the butter, sugar and chocolate melted over her tastebuds.

  ‘A Lootenant George Kennedy from Montana,’ he said, mimicking the accent. ‘His grandmother’s sister married my mother’s grandfather. Something like that. He was told by his mother to look up his English relations and I’m very glad he did.’

  ‘A useful man to know if it means biscuits.’

  ‘Yes – it’s just a shame I won’t be around to benefit.’ He said this lightly. There was a silence whilst Beatrice took it in.

  ‘The summons will come soon, Bea, very soon.’

  ‘Oh, Rafe. Where are you going?’

  ‘I can’t tell you. I wish I could. I’m sorry, but that’s all there is to it.’

  ‘It’s something frightening, isn’t it? I can see it in your face.’ The sweetness of the biscuit was treacherous now. She stared at it, forced herself to eat.

  ‘Bea, this is hard for us both. I can give you nothing, promise you nothing. It would be wrong of me.’

  He turned around until he knelt at her feet and laid his head on her lap. She stroked his dark gold hair, felt his soft warm breath on her thigh, tasted the sugar in her mouth. Then she bent and wrapped her arms around him, holding him tight.

  ‘You won’t go without saying goodbye, will you?’ she whispered.

  All covered in wet biscuit, the baby managed to roll over twice and wedge his leg under a table. Astonished to be trapped, he let out a yell, so Beatrice never heard Rafe’s reply.

  It was after he’d left, and she was sweeping up crumbs, that she found it, caught in the lace of the chair cushion. A small embroidered badge. It was in the shape of a pair of wings, the symbol of a trained parachutist. It must have fallen out of his jacket. She knew at once what it meant. That he would be passing into terrible danger.

  At work, two days later, Daisy, the petite receptionist, came across to where Beatrice was frowning over her typewriter and handed her a note. With one wary eye on her supervisor, Miss Goodwin, she read it quickly. It was from Rafe. Meet me at lunchtime at the statue.

  She thought it was him in the distance, sitting on the steps where she’d seen him before, writing on a pad balanced on his knee. Then a group of office girls milled past her, blocking her view, and when she looked again he was gone.

  Had it been Rafe or someone else? She waited there, looking around, wondering if thi
s was indeed the statue he meant, so she walked round the others she could see, in an increasing panic. He did not come, and finally she had to return to work. It was the longest afternoon she had ever spent. She tried to reassure herself that he’d contact her again, that he wouldn’t go without seeing her. Three times she made an excuse to go out to ask Daisy if anyone had been asking for her. ‘I promise I’ll come and tell you,’ Daisy insisted, troubled that someone as quiet and collected as Beatrice Marlow was in so anxious a state.

  When she arrived home in the evening there was no note waiting. She cursed the silence of the telephone in the hallway below. Eventually, she rang Angie, and got the number for Rafe’s mother. When she dialled, it was Rafe’s stepfather, Colonel Armstrong, who answered.

  ‘We’ve not the blindest idea where he is. Who did you say you were? Wait a minute, will you, I’ll fetch my wife.’

  After a moment she heard Rafe’s mother’s elegant drawl: ‘Amanda Armstrong here. Who’s that, please? Oh, Beatrice Marlow – yes, I do remember you. My dear, we know nothing, only that he’s gone.’ The woman sounded so composed. ‘Yes, it was very sudden. I’m so sorry if he didn’t get to say goodbye.’ Only on the last word did that elegant voice tremble.

  Chapter 24

  Days passed, weeks passed. There was no letter from Rafe, no phone call, no message via Daisy from reception. The spring of 1942 was changing into summer, but Beatrice hardly noticed. As the hope of hearing from him faded, fear sprang into its place. She avoided reading the casualty lists in the papers; she hated answering the phone if it rang. Every time the post came, the faithful letters from her mother, with whatever she could afford that week, it brought back that awful day when she heard about Guy.

  ‘What happened to your young man?’ Dinah asked, and when Beatrice told her, ‘Oh, you do have bad luck.’

  She was around more lately. Beatrice wondered if she’d quarrelled with her lover.

  ‘Why don’t you give yourself a few days away?’ Dinah went on. ‘You don’t look well.’

  Staring at herself, whey-faced and spotty, in the bathroom mirror, Beatrice decided Dinah was right. She was under-nourished. It wasn’t just the limited diet but the long days at work followed by childcare and housework that were wearing her down. And with Rafe’s disappearance, the spark he’d rekindled had been snuffed out.

  In June she took the baby on the train to stay with Angie. She’d negotiated a whole week’s holiday, largely on the basis of poor health.

  Angie was six months pregnant now and possessed a glossy sheen that Beatrice rarely saw in the city any more.

  ‘It’s those awful eggnogs Nanny makes me drink,’ Angie told her. ‘I can hardly get them down.’ There were plenty of eggs, for they kept chickens now, also rabbits, which it was Hetty’s job to look after. She kept heartless little notes in a book of their names and broods and dates of slaughter. Even Angie could wring a hen’s neck now without being squeamish.

  They were all delighted with the baby, so that Beatrice hardly had him for herself. He found Angie enchanting, and they smiled and chatted at each other like lovers. Nanny looked after feeding and naps, and when she was allowed, Hetty would bear him away to look at the animals or to play on the grass.

  There was something magnificently contented about Angie, these days. She was loving being married to a man who adored and cherished her, and full of joy about the baby. ‘I know people say it’s a terrible world to bring a child into, but life has to go on, don’t you think? There has to be hope.’ Gerald came home for a couple of days every fortnight or so. Angie told Beatrice he was working at something terribly important with the Americans but she couldn’t breathe a word, even if he told her anything, which he hadn’t anyway.

  There did have to be hope, Beatrice agreed, but she found it irritating how insular Angie was becoming. Perhaps it was to do with her pregnancy, a sort of survival mechanism to protect the baby, but she allowed little to ruffle her serenity.

  Beatrice avoided speaking about Rafe. Angie could no longer be regarded as a rival, but her feelings about him were too deep and precious for exposure to anyone, let alone Angie, who might not be able to resist interfering in some way.

  ‘I do wish you’d come down more often,’ Angie said, at the end of their stay.

  ‘I will, of course I will,’ Beatrice said, pressing her cheek to Angie’s. She did feel protective of her friend. That’s how Angie always made people feel.

  ‘Goodbye, little sweetheart,’ Angie said, kissing the child as she strapped him into the pram. ‘Be a good boy, won’t you? And come and see Auntie Angie soon. Oh, he is sublime, Bea, you’re so lucky. You know we’ll have him anytime if you need a break.’

  ‘He’s no trouble, are you, little poppet,’ Nanny declared, ‘but he must keep his little sunhat on as Nanny tells him.’

  It was hard returning to the routine. She felt much better physically, but the break made her see how frustrated she was with everything. She hated Mrs Popham’s disapproval, the boredom of the job, the powerlessness of her position. She was learning to live with the fact of Rafe’s absence, but lately she’d lain awake at nights thinking about Guy, realizing she’d never had a proper chance to mourn him, and wondering how his family were getting on without him. Perhaps she’d write to them again.

  She was considering this one lunchtime in July, walking back to the office up Whitehall, when a car drew up on the opposite side of the road and a man put his head out of the back window and called her name. It was Michael Wincanton. Asking his driver to pull in, he stepped out and waited for her to cross.

  Michael, in his fifties now, she guessed, was still handsome in that broad-shouldered, square-faced kind of way.

  ‘Mr Wincanton – how do you do? And how is Mrs Wincanton?’ she asked.

  ‘Very well, I think. She and Hetty have been staying in Cornwall – that little house in Saint Florian she’s rented while Carlyon Manor is being requisitioned. It’s useful having her down there, to be honest. I can’t get down to the constituency myself much these days and she keeps an eye. Also, she needs a rest from London.’

  Poor Oenone. ‘And Peter? I haven’t seen him for a long time. I hope he’s not in any trouble.’

  ‘Not that we know of, though he has some queer friends – some of these greenery-yallery types. It doesn’t look good, not in his line. Not that I’m suggesting he’s up to anything unBritish, but there are some communist sorts about.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, appalled. ‘Well, I’m sure Peter isn’t one of those.’

  They chatted briefly about Angie and the forthcoming baby. ‘It’ll steady her, having a child,’ her father said. ‘Gerald’s a good husband. They talk most warmly about your little boy. He’s well, I hope?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she said. ‘We’re going down to visit them again shortly. He loves it down there, he gets so much attention.’

  ‘How are you managing with money? It can’t be easy.’

  ‘It isn’t always,’ she said, standing up straighter. ‘But I assure you he’s being well looked after.’

  ‘You’re a plucky girl,’ Michael said quietly. ‘I don’t know that you made the right decision keeping him, but part of me admires you for it, you know.’

  ‘Thank you, but I don’t need admiration.’

  He laughed. ‘Damned if you don’t,’ he said, almost to himself. Then ‘Tell me, do you ever hear from that boy Rafe?’

  ‘Not for ages,’ she said, astonished at the change of direction. ‘I’m quite worried about him, actually. I don’t know where he is or what he’s doing, but I think it’s something very dangerous. Do you know anything?’

  Michael Wincanton ignored her question. ‘You’re very fond of him, aren’t you? Saved his life once, I recall. As I say, you’re a plucky girl. What is it you’re doing now?’

  ‘Typing at the War Office. I should be looking around really. Seeing if I can’t be more useful.’

  ‘Oh, it’s all useful, my dear. God knows, we’re all
cogs in a giant wheel. And that wheel will turn to crush the Nazis, we’re determined.’ He took her hand, kept it for longer than was polite. ‘Please convey my best wishes to your parents. Can I offer you a lift? No? Well, goodbye.’

  She watched with a feeling of unease, as he got in and the car pulled away. Their conversation had seemed on his part purely a courteous act towards a young family friend. Yet beneath the surface it was as though he had been testing her responses. What his purpose was she had no idea, but he’d stirred up something in her, a troubled feeling. She turned and set off in the direction of the office.

  Several weeks passed and life went on as before, until late one evening, Beatrice was woken by the faint but insistent ringing of the phone downstairs. It stopped mid-ring, and a moment later there came a knock on their flat door. ‘Mrs Elphinstone says it’s for you. Hurry up,’ came Dinah’s muffled voice. Beatrice crawled down to the end of the mattress to avoid jolting the cot and stumbled downstairs in the soft darkness to the phone.

  ‘Beatrice, it’s Gerald, can you hear me? I’ve some bad news, I’m afraid. Damn, this place is so noisy, you’ll have to speak up.’

  Gerald was telephoning from a hospital in Sussex. Early the previous day, a month earlier than expected, Angie’s labour pains had started and once they’d gained in strength and regularity, Nanny had called the hospital. What followed was a nightmare of pain and panic, for what no one had known until then was that Angie was carrying twins.

  ‘Something wasn’t right – the poor little blighters were the wrong way round, something like that. Beatrice, the pips are about to go, there’s no time to explain.’

  ‘Is Angie all right, Gerald? Gerald!’ Beatrice had slid down the wall, was now crouched on the floor, her eyes closed in anguish.

  ‘What? No.’ Gerald was almost shouting, against a clanking sound somewhere in the background. ‘That is, she’s alive, thank God, but she has to stay in hospital. Bad way. Lost a lot of blood. Look, it’s pandemonium here. Can you tell her parents? Their line was engaged.’