by Erica James
‘Must be fair odd for you toing and froing between here and there,’ said George, looking back up at the house behind them. ‘Like having two homes.’
‘That’ll all change when you have a baby,’ said Ruby with a meaningful look, ‘and stop working.’
From nowhere, the arrival of a grandchild had suddenly become important to Ruby, as though she saw this as Florence’s sole purpose. She made no bones about hinting that they should get a move on and produce one. A baby was the last thing Florence wanted any time soon, especially now that Miss Romily had confided in her about her plans for the future. But she wasn’t about to admit any of that to her mother-in-law.
Nor was she prepared to admit that she and Billy had yet to get anywhere near making a baby. Poor Billy had been too shattered by what he’d seen at Dunkirk to want to have sex with her. While a part of her had felt just a little bit rejected when he’d wanted to do nothing more than hold her, she’d known better than to push him.
‘A baby will happen soon enough, I expect,’ she said brightly to Ruby, and before the conversation could go any further, she left her in-laws and went to serve the other guests.
With only a handful of guests left now, Hope studied Arthur, unable to figure him out.
Her brother was a different man to the one who had spent a week here last year to fulfil the wishes of their father’s will. Not a vindictive word of scorn or criticism had he directed at Hope or Romily today. Could it be that the prospect of fatherhood was having a positive effect on him?
But when Hope thought of the day in London with Edmund when they had seen Irene with another man, she experienced the unknown sensation of actually feeling sorry for her brother. If Irene had been indulging in an affair, Hope wanted to believe that it would be short-lived. But more importantly, she wanted very much to believe that the child Irene was expecting was Arthur’s. Even after the extensive catalogue of terrible things he had done over the years, Hope couldn’t bear the thought that he could be made a cuckold in so cruel a fashion. Particularly so if it meant that unknowingly he ended up raising a child that wasn’t actually his.
And who, she thought with a stab of incredulity, would ever have thought she would feel a trace of sympathy towards her elder brother? Maybe it was because with Allegra and Kit gone, it was now just the two of them left.
She was about to answer Arthur’s question regarding the publication of her children’s book – he’d said he wanted to be the first to have a signed copy, for his child – when in the distance she noticed the figure of a man slowly limping across the lawn. The brim of a peculiarly large floppy hat hid his face; it was the sort of hat an artist might wear to protect his eyes from the glare of the sun while painting. She owned one not unlike it herself.
There was something oddly familiar about the man, and as he came nearer, the sensation of familiarity grew stronger, but at the same time every ounce of her reason told Hope she was mistaken. But suddenly, when the figure raised a hand in the air as if in acknowledgement of her, she knew she wasn’t wrong.
It was Kit, her dear, dear brother!
Chapter Seventy-Two
With the guests all magically gone, and exhausted and overcome by the reaction his appearance had caused, Kit sank gratefully into a chair in the shade of the apple tree, and dabbed lightly at the sheen of sweat on his face with a handkerchief.
He’d been told not to overdo it, and now he saw the sense in the advice he’d been given, and which he’d chosen to flout in his haste to return to Island House. He was used to people staring, especially strangers, but it was hard to bear the scrutiny of those who knew him – those who knew how he used to look. He didn’t blame them for being shocked, or even repulsed; it was, as he’d been told, something he would have to learn to live with for the rest of his life. A life he was lucky to have, he’d also been repeatedly told.
‘I still can’t believe it’s really you,’ said his sister, kneeling on the grass in front of him. Her face was flushed, her eyes still shining from the tears she’d shed. In the chair next to Kit, Evelyn sat very still. He hadn’t yet looked her directly in the eye, knowing that he would see a brave attempt on her part to hide her revulsion.
‘I can’t believe I’m actually here,’ he said to Hope.
‘But why didn’t you let us know you were on your way, or more to the point that you were alive?’
‘I did. I sent you a letter.’
‘When?’
‘A few weeks ago.’
Hope tutted. ‘It must be that new lad who’s taken over from Will Capper; didn’t I say he looked decidedly wet behind the ears? Your letter has probably ended up in a hedge somewhere.’
‘Never mind the post boy,’ said Arthur, seated in the wicker chair to Kit’s left, and as a result, the one closest to the grotesquely scarred flesh of his face. ‘Tell us exactly what happened to you. How the hell did you survive the sinking of the Arcadia and then not surface until now?’
It was a question Kit had often asked himself: just how the hell had he survived? With painfully deformed hands – his fingers had practically melted and fused together when the flames had engulfed him – he took the glass of barley water Romily passed to him from the tray on the table. ‘My memories are still patchy,’ he said, ‘and it’s anybody’s guess whether I’ll ever remember everything. My last memory is of being blown off my feet and feeling I was being burnt alive. The next thing I knew, I was waking in a hospital bed covered in bandages. Apparently I’d been as near to death as one can be without actually being dead.’ He took a sip of the refreshing drink, placing the glass against what remained of his lips, keeping to himself how he’d screamed with pain every time the doctors and nurses had moved him. Or how he’d cried like a baby when his dressings were changed, despite the gentleness of the nurses who took care of him.
‘I’m told an American merchant ship on its way back to New York picked me out of the water,’ he continued, ‘and took me to a hospital when they reached port. They did their best to dress my burns, and to treat the infection and raging temperature I then had, as well as try to figure out who I was, but I had total amnesia. They said it was the shock; my brain had shut down. It’s working better now. For instance, I know I went to Canada to learn to fly, but I have only fleeting memories of doing so. And I have no memory of the Arcadia sinking, or of being in the water. That part’s a blank.’
‘Perhaps that’s just as well,’ said Evelyn quietly.
Kit turned his head and from beneath the brim of his ridiculous hat – which he wore not so much to hide behind as to protect his damaged skin from the sun – forced himself to look at her, to see how pitifully the girl he had hoped might one day come to love him now regarded him. He knew that wish would never come true now. Nobody in their right mind would love or marry him. He found Evelyn’s gaze fixed on his, cool, assured and unflinching. Its directness was unnerving; he’d grown more used to people not being able to look him in the eye. Had come to expect it.
Throughout his long journey back to England, he had encountered any amount of stares, and on his way here from the train station, a couple of young boys with fishing rods slung over their shoulders had gawped at him in fascinated horror, then sniggered when they’d passed by. At least they hadn’t run off screaming that they’d seen a monster, which was how he’d thought he looked when he first saw his face without bandages. His righthand profile was not much altered, but the left side of his face was hideously distorted. The doctors had carried out skin grafts to try and salvage what remained of his ear, cheek and jaw, and all the time Kit, still suffering from amnesia, had viewed the disfigured face in the mirror as that of a stranger. His body had suffered too, particularly his legs, which was why he now walked with a limp. Once he’d been able to get out of bed in the hospital, the nurses had helped him to regain the use of his legs. Initially the pain had been so great he had been overcome with nausea and exh
austion. It would all take time, the nurses had encouraged him, he would have to be patient.
‘I think you’re right,’ he said finally in answer to Evelyn’s remark. Then in an effort to lighten the intensity of the mood, he said to the group as a whole, ‘Well then, tell me about this memorial service you held in my honour. I do hope nice things were said of me. Do you suppose people will feel cheated that they gave up their valuable time for a fraud?’
‘My dear boy,’ said Roddy, ‘that will be the very last thing they’ll feel.’
‘We’ll get your old room ready,’ said Romily. ‘You must stay with us for as long as you want.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Hope. ‘No rushing back to London. I won’t hear of it.’
Kit thought of London and his old life there. While he could not remember the sinking of the Arcadia, he could recall in detail how bored he’d been working at the Imperial Bank and how excited he’d been to embark on the journey to Canada to learn to fly. If only he’d listened to his sister and been patient enough to bide his time as a reservist and wait for the RAF to call him up. But no, his foolishly eager need to jump the gun, to be seen to be doing something, coupled with the need to impress Evelyn, had been for naught.
As often happened when he was exhausted and began to rue the day he’d left England for Canada, he felt the dark cloud of depression descend, bringing with it the familiar feeling that he was as good as useless now; that it would have been better had he died in the Atlantic with the rest of the men on board the Arcadia.
Part Three
The New Chapter
‘Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.’
Winston Churchill, 20th August, 1940
Chapter Seventy-Three
December 1940
It was Boxing Day afternoon and Romily was home on a three-day pass. She hadn’t expected to be able to get away, but fortunately the rota had enabled both her and Sarah to have a short break; it was the first Romily had had since joining the ATA. Her friend had warned her that the hours were long and tiring, and so they were, but despite existing in a state of perpetual exhaustion, not for a very long time had Romily felt so energised or alive.
She had joined the Air Transport Auxiliary exactly a year to the day since Jack’s death, and she liked to think he would approve and be cheering her on. Her initial training period had coincided with the Luftwaffe targeting airfields in southern England, followed by an all-out attack on London when bombs rained down on the city. It had started with more than three hundred German bombers, escorted by over six hundred fighter planes, coming up the Thames and bombing Woolwich Arsenal and the docks, a gasworks and a power station, leaving hundreds dead and many injured. Since then the East End of London had suffered nightly bombing raids, while thousands of people crowded into Underground stations to sleep in safety.
Last month Germany had undertaken a new tactic, that of bombing provincial cities in order to wipe out British industry and a number of ports. The devastation and death toll served to confirm that Romily had done the right thing in leaving Hope in charge of running Island House, with Florence taking care of the children. It had not been an easy decision leaving Isabella; after all, she was the child’s guardian while Elijah continued to serve in the Suffolk Regiment, but her conscience simply would not have allowed her to remain living a life of comfort and ease while so many were suffering, not when she had a genuine skill to offer.
Weekly letters from Hope and Florence had kept her abreast of life in the village, how the LDV had become the Home Guard, and how Stanley’s mother had written to say that she knew exactly where her son was and that they were welcome to him – good riddance to bad rubbish was the general gist of her scribbled note, according to Hope. The spite of her message was kept from Stanley; instead he was told that his stay at Island House was now official and came with his mother’s blessing. Not that Stanley gave a hoot. As far as he was concerned, Melstead St Mary was his home; he was happy there, especially as he now had a new friend, an evacuee from the East End who’d arrived with a new influx of children. The village school was full to bursting and Hope was helping out with art classes, as well as listening to children read.
Now, as Romily circulated amongst the guests at the party Hope had organised for the village, she came across Roddy alone by the fireside. ‘You look thoughtful,’ she said, squeezing past Miss Gant and Miss Treadmill to join him.
‘I was thinking of the transformation you’ve wrought here,’ he said.
‘Me? Oh no, Hope is responsible for putting this party together. I didn’t do a thing.’
‘That’s my point,’ said Roddy. ‘Poor Hope was so deeply mired in her grief for Dieter and her bitterness towards her father, she would never have been able to do something like this, not until you came into her life.’
‘I refute that entirely. It’s down to the passing of time, nothing to do with me.’
Roddy shook his head. ‘No, my dear, you must take your share of the credit. Take a look around you; the evidence is plain to see. There’s Arthur with his wife, and now the proud father of a fine baby boy. And there’s Kit in front of the Christmas tree with Evelyn and her brother. Admittedly Kit’s not yet fully back from the brink, but that girl is working her firm but loving magic on him, just as I suspected she would. Hope too is allowing herself to fall in love again, with Edmund. Just look at the expression on her face. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her looking more confident and assured of herself. This is all down to you, Romily; you brought this family back together – back to life – just as Jack wanted.’
‘They did it themselves, Roddy. I merely welcomed them to treat Island House as their true and proper home, so perhaps it’s the house that should be thanked. I know that for myself it was a great comfort being here after Jack died. I wish he was here to see this,’ she said, her voice suddenly sad and her gaze falling on Elijah with Isabella in his arms. He could not have looked a more proud father as he showed the little girl off to Billy and his parents. ‘Allegra should be here with us too,’ she said quietly.
Roddy sighed. ‘Poor Allegra, all that radiant beauty and shining talent. I still rail at the unfairness of her death. I was so very fond of her. I saw in her something I felt we had in common, that we were only ever on the periphery of the family, outsiders looking in.’
Romily looked at him, shocked. ‘Oh Roddy, you can’t possibly mean that. Jack never regarded you as an outsider; you know jolly well he thought of you as a brother. More so than his actual brother.’
‘I know that, but Allegra and I were adopted into the family, and that makes a difference to how one sees oneself within it.’
‘Then maybe the same goes for me. After all, I’m only a Devereux by marriage.’
‘You always have an answer for me, don’t you?’ Roddy said with a smile. ‘But talking of marriage, what do you think to your wing commander and Sarah announcing their engagement earlier today?’
Romily glanced over to where Sarah and Tony were talking to Lady Fogg and her husband – Sir Archibald having finally returned to Melstead Hall when the Blitz took hold of London. Romily knew from Mrs Partridge that there had been mutterings in the village that the man had only come home because he was a rotten coward and was afraid of being bombed at his club.
‘I couldn’t be happier for them,’ Romily said quite truthfully. ‘And really, it’s high time you, and everybody else stopped referring to the poor man as my wing commander; he was never any such thing.’
Roddy stared at her thoughtfully. ‘You don’t think you might have been happy with him yourself?’
She laughed. ‘Goodness, no. Not so soon after Jack. I’m happy as I am, Roddy, really I am. You don’t need to worry about me.’
‘Somebody has to,’ he said with a gentleness to his voice that touched her. ‘I shouldn’t say this,’ he went on, ‘but I will anyway, since it
’s Christmas, a time I always think is made for heartfelt confessions. The thing is, if I had met you before Jack did, and had I been younger and more dashing, and not a dull old solicitor, I might have tipped my hat in your direction. But alas, compared to the dazzling brightness of Jack’s star, I would not have stood a chance. But then the strength of Jack’s character had the ability to eclipse most men, so I hold no grudge towards him in that respect. I still miss him, you know.’
Romily slipped her arm through his and kissed him affectionately on the cheek. ‘I know you do, just as I do. You’re the dearest man alive, Roddy, and for that I’ll always love you. And for being such a loyal and supportive friend, not just to Jack and his family, but to me. Which I hope will always be the case.’
He patted her hand. ‘In that, you can be absolutely sure. You only have to say the word, Romily, and God willing, I shall be there for you. Now tell me some more about your work with the ATA. Jack would be so proud of you. And jealous too!’
‘Oh, he would have leapt at the chance to join, and long before I did.’
‘Much good it would have done him when he couldn’t fly.’
Romily laughed. ‘Do you suppose a little thing like that would have stopped him?’
They were both laughing as, over on the other side of the drawing room, one of the guests wound up the gramophone player and the sound of Al Bowlly’s soft-toned voice singing ‘The Very Thought of You’ filled the room. The first time Romily had ever danced with Jack, it had been to this song. Holding her firmly against him, their bodies almost as one as they moved together, he had brushed her ear and neck with his lips as he sang along. It had been one of the very many intensely sensual moments between them.
Now, hearing those same words, her heart grew heavy with longing for Jack.
