A Song At Twilight

by Lilian Harry

‘Us’ll see about that when ’tis done,’ the old man said easily, but Alison shook her head.

  ‘No, you’ve got to say a fair price and let me pay it, or I won’t bring them. You all do far too much for us as it is.’ She lifted her chin and Mabel, coming in with more cocoa, laughed at her determination.

  ‘Met your match there, you have, Father. Now, here’s me been chattering on about us and never asked you how you were. How you’m feeling in yourself, maid? Keeping well, are you? Feeding yourself right? Eating for two now, you be.’

  ‘I think I’m eating for three or four,’ she said, smiling. ‘Poor Andrew would be starved if he didn’t get fed in the mess.’

  She stayed for a while longer, drinking cocoa and talking to William about the books they were reading, and then she wrapped herself and Hughie up in their coats and scarves again and set off for home. The clouds had lifted a little and the air felt milder. Suddenly, it seemed as if there were a touch of spring in the air.

  ‘Look, Hughie,’ she said. ‘Some of the leaves are starting to come out along the hedge. And there are some snowdrops – see those little white flowers? And the birds are starting to sing as well.’

  ‘Will summer come back?’ he asked, trudging along beside her. ‘Does it come every year?’

  ‘Every year,’ she said, and felt her heart lift. ‘Spring comes every year and so does summer.’

  Now that she had seen the first signs of spring, there were others – the bright colours of some early crocuses along the edge of someone’s vegetable garden, a few primroses like golden coins on a bank. A blackbird sang from the corner of a roof. It all seemed to add up to hope.

  She thought of Ben, mourning his brother, and Stefan who didn’t even know if his family were still alive, and wondered whether spring would bring them such comfort.

  Chapter Sixteen

  In all these weeks, Stefan had not come near Alison. It was, she thought, as if he regretted their conversation; she wondered a little sadly if he wished he had not opened his heart to her.

  He came at last, on a bright, windy afternoon with shreds of clouds flying like clean white washing across a pale blue sky.

  Alison and Hughie were just about to step out of the front door when he opened the garden gate. They stood staring at each other for a moment, then she began to unwind her scarf.

  ‘Stefan! How nice to see you. Come in.’

  ‘No.’ He hesitated, his hand still on the gate. ‘You’re just going out.’

  ‘Only for a walk. Come with us if you like.’ She smiled, feeling unexpectedly glad to see him. ‘Then we’ll come back here and have some tea. Please.’ She held out her hand.

  ‘Yes,’ he said after another hesitation. ‘I’d like that.’ He stepped back and she and Hughie followed him. They walked along the road, passing the entrance to Buckland Abbey where once Sir Francis Drake had lived, and then turned down a lane that curved between high Devon banks. The lane was as deep as if it had been trodden for centuries, with hedges growing from the tops of the banks, sprinkled thickly now with primroses and tiny wild daffodils. Looking up through the branches of the trees, still waiting for their canopy of new leaves, Alison could see the wide blue sky and hear the sound of birdsong.

  ‘It’s very beautiful here,’ Stefan said. ‘And very peaceful too, when the planes aren’t flying.’

  ‘I know. But it must have been very noisy once. There were mines all around here, you know. I’ve seen some of the adits in the woods.’

  ‘Adits?’

  ‘The openings of the shafts. Not big ones, going straight down like coal mines. Just like small tunnels, going into the sides of the hills. They used to mine tin and copper, I think, and arsenic as well. Oh, and someone told me there were silver mines not far away.’

  He nodded. ‘It would have been very busy. We have mines in Poland as well. Coal, mostly. They’re not pleasant areas to live in.’

  ‘Like South Wales, I suppose, and the English Midlands. I heard the other day that some of the boys being called up now are going to work in the mines instead of going into the Forces. They don’t have any choice – it’s being decided by ballot. The luck of the draw.’ She shivered. ‘It would be bad luck for me. I’d hate to work underground.’

  ‘I’ve never really thought about it, but I think I would, too,’ Stefan said. ‘Perhaps that’s why I like flying.’ He looked up at the feathery white clouds. ‘To be up there, all alone in the blue, is a very wonderful thing. To ride your aeroplane like a horse amongst the clouds; to play between the thunderheads; to dance with the stars. It’s like a miracle.’

  Alison stared at him. ‘You make it sound like poetry.’

  ‘It is like a poem,’ he said simply.

  They walked in silence for a few minutes, with Hughie running ahead along the quiet lane. The February air was mild, the rawness of the winter softened for the time being. No doubt it would come back, Alison thought. There was still the rest of this month and most of March to get through before you could really say it was spring. But today, here in this sheltered lane with only the softest of breezes blowing, you could almost imagine that summer itself was around the corner.

  Another summer of war.

  After a moment, she asked, ‘Have you heard any news of your family?’

  ‘No.’ His tone was abrupt and she stole a glance at him, hoping that he wasn’t offended. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘I didn’t mean to pry. You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to.’

  ‘It’s all right.’ He paused for a moment and then went on, ‘I would like to talk to you. I haven’t come before, because I felt it was wrong to burden you with my troubles. But I keep thinking about it. I keep thinking about you. I feel that you would understand. I feel that I can tell you what is in my heart.’

  ‘Oh.’ Alison was a little startled by his intensity. Then she reminded herself of his words about flying. He was different from the Englishmen she knew, more passionate, more poetic, quite unlike the practical, pragmatic Andrew. And he had kept whatever memories he had to himself all this time. He must be burning up inside.

  ‘You can tell me whatever you like,’ she said.

  ‘We lived in the city of Warsaw,’ he began. They had come back to the house and Alison had lit the fire and made some tea. Hughie was curled up in the corner of the sofa, looking at the Rupert Bear annual he’d been given for Christmas. He loved the stories of Rupert and firmly believed that he lived nearby and that one day he would be lucky enough to meet him.

  Alison waited. She knew it wasn’t easy for Stefan to begin his own tale and she could only let him tell it at his own pace and in his own way. He had fallen silent already, his eyes full of memories as he gazed into the fire, and she wondered what had happened that made it so painful for him to talk about. Even now, she wasn’t sure that he would be able to tell her.

  ‘My father was a music teacher,’ he went on, breaking the silence. ‘He taught in one of the big schools and he also played in the city orchestra. The violin was his main instrument but of course he could play many others – the piano, the harp, all the stringed instruments. He taught us all to play. It was as natural as learning to read.’

  ‘Did your mother play too?’

  He nodded. ‘The flute. Our house was always full of music. My father, learning a new melody on the violin. Or the sound of my mother’s flute, like the silver water of a cascade. And every day was a party in our house. My mother was so full of life, always inviting people in, and she’d make little sweetmeats and biscuits to serve with their wine, and we children would have to give little concerts.’ He smiled. ‘It was how I imagined our life would always be, with more children coming along and learning their own instruments until we had enough for an orchestra of our own!’

  ‘It sounds wonderful,’ Alison said, and he nodded.

  ‘We did not know how wonderful until it came to an end.’

  He fell silent again, and Alison refilled his cup. Hughie asked for anothe
r biscuit and she looked in the tin to find one he liked. Stefan reached down to the log basket and put another piece of wood on the fire, which crackled and flared as the flames caught the slivers of bark.

  ‘We knew it was coming to an end, of course,’ he said at last. ‘We had watched Hitler march over Europe all that year. We saw him enter Prague in March, stripping the banks of their gold to rescue his own destitute economy. We knew he was coming closer to us.’

  ‘You knew that he would invade Poland?’

  ‘Those who understood the situation did. Others buried their heads in the sand and refused to see the signs. And we were unprepared. Our army relied on cavalry still, and our air force had only antiquated planes. We could never stand up to an attack.’

  ‘Wouldn’t Russia help?’

  He made a swift gesture of repudiation. ‘Poland has been dominated by Russia before! We didn’t want them on our soil.’ His shoulders slumped a little as he added, ‘Perhaps that was a mistake. But whatever might have happened, Germany invaded on September the first and so it all began. A second world war, only twenty-one years after the end of the first.’

  There was a short silence, broken only by the crackle and hiss of the fire and the soft murmur of Hughie, telling himself the stories as he gazed at the colourful pictures in his book. Alison said, ‘What happened then? After the invasion?’

  ‘We were prepared, up to a point,’ he said. ‘Our army was in position along the borders, ready for defence. But how could we, with our old-fashioned methods and equipment, hope to stand up against the might of the Germans with their tanks and their armaments? By the end of the month, they had completely overrun our country. Along with many others, I came to England and I’ve been here ever since.’

  ‘And you’ve never heard from your family in all that time?’

  ‘No. How could I? They are in enemy hands.’ A small spasm of pain twisted his features. ‘But we hear things. We hear of the atrocities being committed there. People starving. People killed for no reason. There are many of these stories.’

  Alison thought of her own parents, living comfortably in Lincolnshire in their own home. Like everyone else, they were deprived of many of the pleasures of peacetime, but they had enough to eat and sufficient warmth. They might be bombed from the skies, but they could feel secure within their own community. They weren’t afraid of soldiers in the street. They didn’t have to live behind high walls.

  And she would hear very quickly if anything happened to them.

  Silently, she reached out and touched his wrist. He turned his hand over so that their palms met, and he curled his fingers around hers. She felt their warmth and strength, felt the sensitivity in his long, musician’s fingers, and a strange, warm ache ran up the inside of her arm directly into her heart.

  It was growing dark when they stirred at last. Hughie had fallen asleep over his book and the only light in the room came from the smouldering fire. Alison, feeling as if she had woken from a deep sleep, turned her head and looked into Stefan’s face. He was lying back in the chair, and she knew that telling his story had been almost too much for him.

  He had stopped talking at last, and laid his head back in the chair, drained and exhausted, and Alison had remained quiet, feeling his hand in hers and not wanting to let it go. But now it was almost dark and she knew she must move.

  Gently, she withdrew her hand and murmured, ‘I have to draw the blackout curtains.’ She stood up and drew the heavy curtains across, then switched on the lamp. Hughie, feeling the light on his eyelids, moved and whimpered a protest, and she laid her hand on his cheek. Stefan sat up slowly and looked at her.

  ‘I’m sorry. I’ve taken up your whole afternoon, and made you unhappy.’

  ‘No. You’ve made me sad, but not unhappy. And I’m glad you told me. I’d like you to come again, and tell me more. Talk for as long as you like.’ She looked down at his pale, tired face. ‘I’d like to hear more about your family.’

  ‘Thank you.’ He leaned forward and put another log on the fire. ‘And now I think I should go.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ she protested. ‘Stay for supper. Andrew will be home soon – he’s not on readiness tonight. He’ll be pleased to see you.’ She hesitated, then said quietly, ‘You said once you would like to play on our piano, but you never have. Would you like to play now – some of your favourite music, the kind you used to play at home? Would it be any help at all for you to do that?’

  He was silent for so long that she feared she had offended him. Then he nodded his head.

  ‘Yes. I would like to do that. It would be good, I think.’

  He went over to the instrument and lifted the lid. For a moment or two his fingers drifted softly over the keys, barely touching them. Then he sat down and began to play.

  From the first note he struck, Alison recognised that this was no ordinary piano-player. Stefan was a true virtuoso. She listened, enthralled, as he went into the intricacies of one of Beethoven’s sonatas, and even Hughie stopped his game and fell silent. From there, he moved on to some Chopin and then, lightening the mood, to some jazz. And then he struck a note that went straight to Alison’s heart.

  It was the piece written especially for his country – for his city. A piece that had been written after the war had begun, a piece that his family and all those at home – if they were still alive – had probably never heard, and yet it seemed to speak both to them and of them, and of all the dangers they had faced and were still facing.

  It was the Warsaw Concerto.

  Chapter Seventeen

  ‘You’m keeping well,’ May observed one morning as she threw used tea leaves on to the living-room carpet. ‘Were you like this with Hughie?’

  ‘Mm, I hardly knew I was expecting.’ Alison touched her swelling stomach. ‘Except for this, of course, and all the kicking. They’re both going to be either footballers or boxers, I’m sure.’

  ‘Everyone always thinks that,’ May said. She knelt on the floor and began to brush up the tea leaves, bringing dust and fluff up with them and leaving the carpet clean and bright. Andrew had suggested a month or so ago that Alison should ask her to help with some of the housework, and May had been pleased to do so for a few shillings a week. She had several jobs around the village now, as well as her war work sewing for the Marines and her voluntary work, but she always seemed to have time for a cup of tea and a chat, and she often took Hughie for a walk to give Alison a rest.

  ‘Have you thought of any names yet?’ she asked, sweeping the tea leaves into a dustpan. ‘I expect you’d like a little girl this time, wouldn’t you? Pigeon pair.’

  ‘I don’t really mind. I like little boys.’ Alison looked through the window to where Hughie was playing in the back garden. It was a fine March morning, with a light breeze tossing the yellow-headed daffodils in a ballet dance beneath the hedge. She was darning Andrew’s socks as she spoke, May having firmly taken away the newspaper with which she’d been about to polish the windows. ‘I think Andrew would like a girl, though.’

  ‘Ah, men like to have a pretty daughter.’ May sat back on her heels. ‘And you stay friends with your daughter, too. You know what they say: A son’s your son till he takes him a wife. A daughter’s a daughter the whole of her life.’

  ‘Oh, I can’t believe I’d ever lose Hughie,’ Alison protested, looking out of the window again. Hughie was crouching down, watching something in the grass – a beetle or a worm, probably. He was fascinated with all wildlife just now. ‘In fact, Andrew says he’s too much of a mummy’s boy.’

  ‘I’m not saying you’d lose him. Just that he’d have to put his wife first and she’d go to her own mother. ’Tis only natural.’ May glanced up and saw the expression on Alison’s face. ‘Here, don’t you go looking like that! ’Tisn’t going to happen next week. You’ve got twenty years or more before young Hughie starts to think about getting wed.’

  Alison laughed. ‘I know. It’s just that I can’t quite bear to think about him growing up a
t all, let alone leaving home. Well, all I can say is that when he does think about getting married, I hope he finds someone as nice as you, May. I’m sure I’d be very happy about that.’

  May smiled but then got up and picked up the dustpan, taking it outside to tip the contents into the bin at the bottom of the garden. Alison watched her pause to talk to Hughie, stooping to examine whatever it was he had found, and then return to the house.

  ‘You’ll never believe what that boy’s studying. It’s a snail with its horns out. He says it’s his pet and it’s called Oscar and he’s going to keep it in his bedroom.’

  ‘Oh, is he indeed? I’ll have to search his pockets when he comes in.’ Alison looked at her friend. ‘May, I hope you don’t mind me asking, but you looked a bit odd when I mentioned Hughie marrying someone like you. Have I touched a sore spot?’

  May began to shake her head, then sighed and went to put the dustpan and brush away. She came back and sat down opposite Alison.

  ‘To tell you the truth, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that. I didn’t know how to put it, like, but now you’ve brought the subject up …’

  Alison stared at her. ‘Don’t tell me you’re asking for Hughie’s hand in marriage! You’ll have to wait a while, I’m afraid.’

  May laughed a little and said, ‘No, it’s not that. It’s about Ben.’

  ‘Ben Hazelwood?’ Alison remembered May’s mother asking her if May had said anything to her about him. ‘Are you having any problems with him?’

  ‘Not problems, exactly. But us’ve been out a few times together – to the picture show on the airfield, and he’s taken me to a couple of dances, and us goes for a walk now and then. And – well, us likes each other.’ Her cheeks coloured. ‘Us likes each other a lot. But I don’t know if I ought to let it go on. I mean, I’m just an ordinary maid, I don’t have no education or nothing. I don’t even talk right, I know that. I couldn’t ever fit in with his sort of life.’

  Alison looked at her thoughtfully. May was sitting upright in her chair, her fingers busy pleating the folds of her pinafore. Her face was pink and her eyes very bright.