Rhanna at War

by Christine Marion Fraser

  Tam’s face was red with importance. ‘We will do a good job, you can be sure of that, sir. We will make damt sure Mr Bugger will no’ run away.’

  ‘And we will make sure that Behag is getting her signals right in future,’ Robbie put in, his round face completely cherubic.

  ‘You will all get your signals correct in future!’ Dunn said sternly. ‘No more crossed wires . . . do you hear?’ His face relaxed suddenly into a wide grin. ‘Thanks, lads, for a great time . . . we’ll maybe come back one day for a drop more of the water of life.’

  ‘You’ll no’ be tellin’ a soul – over there,’ Tam said anxiously, nodding towards the horizon as if he were referring to another planet.

  ‘Not a soul – scout’s honour,’ Dunn said solemnly.

  Jon Jodl was sitting quietly beside Ernst in one of the dinghies. He looked at the green water lapping the edge of the sand. It was a peaceful morning filled with the tang of peat smoke and salt. Even the seabirds were in a placid mood. A curlew poked for small crabs in the shallow pools; a colony of gulls flopped lazily on the gentle swell of the waves. Above the cliffs the sheep cropped the turf with unhurried intent and two Highland cows watched the scene in the bay with silent interest. Jon looked at it all and swallowed a lump in his throat. For a little while he had found peace on the island. He felt lulled in mind and body. No matter what his future held now, he knew he would never cease to bless the reprieve that the landing on Rhanna had given him. The warmth of tears pricked his eyelids and he swallowed again. ‘Farewell Paradise,’ he thought sadly. The memory of Anton strayed into his mind. Dunn and Anderson had escorted him over to Slochmhor before dawn. For a brief moment Anton had opened his eyes as Jon stood over the bed. ‘You take care, Jon,’ he had whispered. ‘I’ll see you – sometime.’

  ‘Soon – soon, sir,’ Jon had said and left quickly with the Commandos to meet the traps coming down from the Manse. In a way, Jon envied Anton his prolonged stay on the island but he was immediately ashamed of himself for thinking in such a way. Anton was still very ill. The doctor had made a fine job, but Anton had lost some of his fingers. That was not a thing to envy. It could have been him lying there, his fingers gone . . . a musician needed all his fingers to play the piano, the fiddle . . . ‘God forgive me,’ Jon thought. ‘And let Anton get better so that he can enjoy this place the way I have enjoyed it.’

  Suddenly he got to his feet, making the dinghy tilt alarmingly. ‘Slainte!’ he cried wildly. ‘To Anton!’ His blurring gaze swept over the homely faces of the people who had been so kind to him, and a sob caught in his throat. ‘Slainte!’ he cried again and Ernst was beside him, echoing the words, quietly at first, then in a great surge of sound.

  ‘Heil Hitler,’ Zeitler muttered, but no one heard him because Jon’s cry was echoing out joyfully from the gathering on the shore. ‘Slainte, Jon! Slainte, Mr Foch!’

  Dunn was politely thanking the minister for his hospitality but the great swelling of the Gaelic ‘Health!’ bouncing from the pillars of the cliffs and reverberating through the caves, drowned his voice. Dunn turned and stepped into the nearest dinghy and he too took up the cry. Then the crowd rushed to the water’s edge to wave and shout and the Rev. John Gray stood alone.

  ‘Slainte!’ He heard Jon’s voice above the rest, and a hot flush of shame darkened his face. He had been on Rhanna for more than twenty years and never in all that time had he uttered one word of the Gaelic. Jon’s stay had been a matter of days and he was proudly shouting the Gaelic to the skies. The dinghies were now little dark blobs on the sun-flecked sea, yet still the cry of ‘Slainte’ tossed back at the crowd surging round Aosdana Bay.

  ‘Slainte,’ the Rev. John Gray whispered and turned abruptly on his heel to hide the red face of humiliation from the world.

  Having forgotten now about the goings-on at Portvoynachan, Fiona snuggled against Niall contentedly and thought about Anton alone in the adjoining room. She opened her mouth to tell him how much she liked the young German but her better senses warned her against it and she said instead, ‘I like Babbie being here, she’s nice and she says funny things. I let her see some of my spiders and she didn’t scream like some of these silly big girls do. That stupid Agnes Anderson screams all the time, especially if there’s boys around. I love Shona for that too. I’m glad she’s home. It means she’ll be here a lot because you’re here too. I’ll hate it when you’re married though and likely leave Rhanna. It’s a pity people have to get married all the time. I don’t think I ever will, you have to do awful things like wash your husband’s socks and drawers and some of them have terrible smelly feet. Johnny Taylor is only nine and his feet are . . .’

  ‘Weesht, you wee chatterbox,’ he scolded gently. ‘You’ll wake Mother then I’ll get skelped lugs for encouraging you.’ The child’s mention of Shona had brought back all his doubts and self-recriminations. He knew he was the one in the wrong. That it was he who ought to make the first move and go over to Laigmhor to tell her he was sorry. But then he would have to explain about Babbie and at that moment in time he felt he wasn’t prepared for more emotional questions, upsets – perhaps even tears. He was too tired mentally and physically to sort out other people’s feelings, let alone his own . . .

  Half an hour later the house was up and bustling. Elspeth always came at eight o’clock sharp to help Phebie prepare breakfast. With the household’s vastly increased numbers there was more work than ever to be done. Elspeth grumbled a good deal over this but her efficiency couldn’t be denied and Phebie shut her lips and let the housekeeper ramble on.

  A sparkling-eyed Fiona danced up to Niall’s room with tea and toast. ‘Mother is walking with me to school because she wants some things at Portcull. Elspeth’s moaning about the rationing again so Mother’s going to try and wheedle some stuff from Merry Mary. Babbie’s going over to Tina’s to see to her ankle. I think really she’s getting out the house quick before Prune Face turns up. When she does you’ve to tell her to go over to see Todd and Biddy. Mother says it will serve you right for lying in bed!’

  ‘Won’t Father be here to tell her?’

  ‘No, he’s been called out to Old Malky at Rumhor who sent word that he thinks his leg is going to drop off at any minute with pain . . . so you’ll be in the house with Prune Face and Elspeth.’ She snorted with ecstatic laughter at the look on his face and didn’t hear him mutter, ‘Not forgetting Jerry next door.’

  Babbie looked in a few moments later to bid him a hurried goodbye and then went to Anton’s room, staying there for quite some time before her footsteps clattered away downstairs.

  With everyone gone the house seemed very quiet. It was a dewy morning with banks of mist lying in the hollows of the moors and clinging to the mountain tops like big lumps of fluffy cotton wool. Niall felt very peaceful lying there in his own familiar bedroom at Slochmhor. It was what he needed, to be alone, to have time to sort out his thoughts and feelings . . . but it would have been more peaceful still if Anton hadn’t been in the next room. Returning from the ceilidh the night before Niall had been tired and drunk yet unable to sleep. Shona, Babbie, Ma Brodie – Anton – they had all crowded into his mind till his head had whirled and he had felt sick, hate curling his stomach into a tight knot. He had never hated anyone before and the things it did to him had frightened him. Yet all through the feeling he had reasoned that he didn’t know Anton enough to hate him, it was what the young German stood for that he hated: Britain was at war with the Germans; the Enemy were to be despised for the things they did; Anton was the Enemy – he was to be despised . . .

  A terrific thud from the room next door shattered his thoughts. He sat up in bed, his heart hammering into his throat. There was the sound of scrabbling now, and the unmistakable moans of someone in pain. Niall quickly got out of bed, rushed out to the landing, and threw open the door of the spare room. Anton was on the floor, on his knees, his hands clawing frantically at the bedclothes in an effort to get back into bed.

  ‘Christ
Almighty!’ Niall exploded. ‘What in heaven’s name are you playing at, man?’

  ‘Playing – no – and certainly not on my knees – praying!’ Anton gasped. His face was a ghastly white colour. ‘I reached – for a glass – of water – I fell.’

  Niall was across the room in seconds, trying frantically to pull Anton upright. Once deposited back on his bed, Anton lay sprawling and panting, his mouth twisted in pain, his bandaged hand groping inadequately for something to hold on to to aid himself upright. Niall saw with alarm that blood was seeping through the wadding across his middle and he said harshly, ‘You’ve hurt more than your pride, Jerry! You’re bleeding!’

  Anton closed his eyes as he struggled to regain his breath but a bitter little smile twisted his fine mouth. ‘Do not concern yourself for me. No doubt it hurt you very much to have to lower yourself to help a Jerry, as you call me, but you do not have to go beyond the call of human decency to do any more for me. Leave me alone now.’

  ‘Too bloody right I will!’ Niall said, but with uncertainty rather than anger. In a flash he saw not a German but a fair-haired, blue-eyed youth, very badly injured and undoubtedly in great pain. Then he saw the Iron Cross on the bedside table and his hatred returned anew. ‘At least you’re lucky you’re alive and bleeding! Dead people don’t bleed! It congeals too damned quickly once the heart stops beating! You’ve spilled plenty of blood in your time, now it’s your turn! It’s called poetic justice!’

  As Anton struggled for breath, he allowed Niall to go raving on and heard the words being lashed out at him but did not really take in their meaning. His head felt light, there was a queer sensation in his belly, a feeling of nausea, of burning, of tearing apart. At first his mind was filled only with the sufferings of his body, but at Niall’s last words the sufferings of his emotions took precedence. He could take no more: no more hate, accusations, rejections. He felt himself trembling but could do nothing to control it. He shook his head from side to side on the pillow in a demented silent torture of body and soul and gritted his teeth to stop from crying out, but it was useless.

  ‘Will you stop it!’ He screamed the words at the ceiling. ‘You talk about justice! What the hell do you know about justice? Was it justice that killed my mother, my father? Two little girls who were too young and innocent to think they would ever be killed by a bomb? I loved my family, I still love them! Only they are no more! I will never see their faces again! I will never hear my mother singing or watch my father working in the fields – ever, as long as I live. Heidi – my youngest sister – she was like yours – playing with spiders and frogs and loving her life! I go to bed at night and I see her face, her smiling face! I hear Olga talking about her ambition to be a nurse, to help people who are suffering! I see, I hear – and I cry . . . do you hear me? I cry!’ The tears were running unchecked down his face, drenching his neck. He struggled to sit up and even though his eyes were swimming the blue hurt and pain in them seared Niall’s soul. ‘You are a very angry young man, Niall McLachlan! But I too am an angry young man . . . angry and lonely and wishing at this Godforsaken moment that I had crashed to my death up there in the mountains! What is left for me? Tell me that! Tell me that if you can, damn you!’

  Niall put his fist to his mouth and squeezed his eyes shut. ‘Oh God! God!’ he whimpered in utter despair. He fell to his knees by Anton’s bed and buried his head into his plaster-encased arm. His sobs were harsh and dry at first, but then the tears came, flowing endlessly, while his shoulders shook and he rasped for breath. His heart was so full that it felt like bursting, but the tears were like a balm, and the more he cried the calmer his heart and mind became. They cried together for what seemed eternity but what in reality was but a few minutes, Niall on his knees by Anton’s bed, Anton lying back on his pillows letting the pent-up tears of many months course freely till the pillows and the collar of his pyjamas were soaked in them.

  Anton drew a shuddering breath and choked out, ‘Our cup runneth over. We are indeed a lucky pair of fellows.’

  The remark was both apt and silly. Niall choked on a mixture of laughter and tears. He lifted his head and looked at Anton’s swollen eyes beginning to twinkle in his chalky white face. ‘Not a word to anyone about this – do you hear?’ Niall said. ‘If the lads of the island heard about it I’d never live it down.’

  ‘Do you take me for a fool?’ Anton returned, drawing a hand over his eyes. ‘Am I going to tell – Babbie for instance – or Doctor McLachlan that while they are out of the house I cry my eyes out . . . “Oh, don’t worry about me, Doctor, I pass my time nicely while you are gone – I weep like a baby.” He would think I am insane above all else.’

  Niall got up from the floor and sat shakily on the edge of the bed. ‘You know, old Mirabelle was right,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘She used to say, “A good greet cures a host of ails”, and she’s right, it does. I feel as if a lot of poison has just been washed out of my system.’

  ‘A – good – greet?’

  Niall laughed, his brown eyes, though swollen, shining for the first time since his return home. ‘A Scottish way of saying a good cry cures a lot of troubles. You know, maybe that’s how girls get things into better perspective than we do, they cry a lot and seem to see the world through a clearer pair of lenses.’

  ‘Then – perhaps Fräulein Babbie would be the better for a good cry. She smiles her smiles of sunshine but inside – she bottles up.’

  ‘You see a lot of people’s feelings, Büttger.’

  ‘I see in her what is inside myself – too much keeping in the thoughts that hurt – that is, until this morning when I had my good greet.’ He smiled and his keen blue eyes looked straight at Niall. ‘Please, do not call me “Büttger” or, worse, “Jerry”. My name is Anton. I think friends should call each other by their Christian names.’

  Niall took Anton’s hand and squeezed it firmly. ‘All right – Anton – later we’ll talk some more, keep each other company while we’re both convalescing, but right now I’d better get dressed and get downstairs to meet Prune Face and give her the morning’s instructions.’

  ‘Prune Face?’

  ‘Nurse Millar,’ Niall chuckled. ‘Fiona christened her Prune Face which is appropriate, if unkind.’

  ‘Ah, yes, I know the one. She came up to look at me yesterday and I really mean look. She just stood in the doorway with her hands folded very primly over her stomach and just looked at me. I felt like some sort of exhibit, tagged and laid out for inspection.’

  Niall shuffled uncomfortably. ‘Ay, well, Nurse Millar isn’t the only one guilty of prejudgement – anyway, I’d better get washed and dressed or Mother will come back and clout me on the lugs for being lazy.’

  But Babbie’s arrival into the room delayed his departure. She looked at the sheepish, tear-stained faces of the two young men and knew immediately that they had made up their differences. She was surprised at the relief she felt, and it added to the sense of well-being she had come away with after her visit to Tina’s cottage. The young woman had greeted her with easy-going pleasure and had admitted her into a cluttered small world of lazing animals, jumbled furniture and drowsing peace. But Babbie’s professional composure had almost failed her when, over a strupak, Tina had observed casually, ‘I am hearing that you are doing a grand job sleeping wi’ the German laddie.’

  ‘Not sleeping with him,’ Babbie had spluttered into her tea, ‘sleeping beside him, in the same room, to be near him the first night he was so ill.’

  ‘Ach, well, is it no’ much the same thing?’ Tina stated placidly. ‘And working so close to him, healing him and talking with him you will be seeing another side to him that maybe no’ even his Jerry friends ever saw when they were all fightin’ together. He is just a human being like the rest o’ us and though some of them are real Nazis and never think about anything else except killing and winning, this one is quite a young gentleman from what Matthew was after telling me. He will likely be more an ordinary laddie than he is a Hun.
It will make it easier for you to forget he is a Jerry, him bein’ so nice – and good-lookin’ too from all accounts . . .’ Tina’s eyes sparkled. ‘You had better watch out or he will be after fallin’ in love wi’ you. Men always fall for good-looking young nurses.’

  Babbie had said nothing but unworldly Tina had given her much food for thought. They were true, the things Tina had said. Babbie was beginning to forget that Anton was a German. In fact she was at the stage when she had to keep reminding herself of the fact in order to remain impersonal towards him. With the passing of the days she knew all too well that his charm was bewitching her, and doubly so because it was a natural rather than a calculated charm, a personal charisma that seemed to reach out and embrace her every time she entered his room. But she had to keep herself aloof, there was no room in her heart for sick young men, no matter how handsome or charming they might be.

  Anton’s face had lit up at her entrance and his blue eyes had become bluer and deeper as he gazed at her.

  ‘I bumped into Nurse Millar downstairs,’ Babbie said lightly. ‘She was full of moans about the walk from Biddy’s house and told me that she ought to be staying here to be right on hand and that I, if I had any common decency, should pack my bags and move back to Laigmhor. I didn’t think poor Phebie or Lachlan would take too kindly to the idea of Nurse Millar under their roof, and just stood there, not knowing what to say, when old Elspeth came to the rescue. She said Nurse Millar was welcome to stay at her house, which isn’t too far from here, and the old dear jumped at the offer. I think really she feels too isolated at Biddy’s house and as she and Elspeth seem to have become friendly, the arrangement suits them both. They can moan at one another to their hearts’ content. Now Nurse Millar is away over to see to Todd and Biddy with something on her face that could actually be described as a smile!’