‘I’ll just go and see if your soup is ready, sir.’
The waiter returned with the soup and left Lewis to eat it. When he came to retrieve the bowl, Lewis said, ‘The Somme? You had somebody there?’
‘Yes, sir. A son.’
The blue eyes switched from Lewis to looking out onto the estuary.
‘He died, sir. On the first day. Today, sir. It’ll be three years today.’
That stupid first day. The number of times Lewis had heard people say this. Nearly twenty thousand dead. Nearly sixty thousand casualties in total. In one day. Because the Staff had thought that volunteer soldiers couldn’t be taught to do anything other than walk towards the enemy carrying impossible burdens and that a sufficiently long barrage would guarantee a walkover. Stupid bastards.
‘I’m really sorry,’ said Lewis.
Despite himself, he felt guilty. He wished there was something he could do, something he could say. But he had written too many letters to parents about their sons. That well was dry.
‘His mum took it hardest,’ said the waiter. ‘He was an only child.’
The man shook his head and ambled off slowly to the kitchen. From the back he looked terribly old. Defeated. How many families were there like this all over England? And what had it all been for? What had been gained? In comparison to what had been lost.
Later, when the waiter was pouring the coffee, Lewis heard himself saying, ‘I’ll be going back to France before too long. Do you know if your son has a grave?’
‘Oh yes, sir. We know where he’s buried. They were very careful to tell us that.’
Yes, thought Lewis, they were very careful about organising things like that. Pity the stupid bastards couldn’t have been a bit more careful organising the battles that had caused all of those graves.
‘Well then, if you – or his mother – wanted to, I could put something on the grave. Flowers. A letter. Something …’
It sounded hopelessly inadequate.
‘Oh sir, we couldn’t impose on you like that.’
‘Really, it would be no trouble. I have a camera – if you wanted to, I could take a photograph of his grave and where he’s buried. I don’t know if you’ll get out there yourselves any time soon’ – Lewis knew that they probably never would – ‘so until then, this might do.’
In the end it was all agreed. Lewis was staying one more night. The man whose name was Henry Harris, would go and talk to his wife. Tomorrow evening he would bring the details of the location of their son’s grave plus whatever they wanted to leave there.
As Lewis went out on the balcony for a smoke after dinner, he felt that it was another good omen. It had been a good thing to do and tomorrow, it would all come right because she would be there. They would meet and it would be as it was before. They would hold each other and the reason for her disappearance would not matter now because they were together again. They would go back to the hotel. They would bathe – together – and have dinner. They would have wine and there would be time for talking and explaining and laughing. Henry would give Lewis his mission and then he and Helen would watch the sun set from the terrace. Later they would go up to bed and make love and the following day they would begin their new life. Maybe she would come with him to France while he served out his two years. What a way that would be to begin again. He had always thought that he would revisit the places where he had fought, but to do it with her – and to see where she had been. It would be a trip that would lay whatever ghosts needed to be laid. It would bond them together for the rest of their lives.
Lewis woke with a start. He was sweating. He had been having a nightmare but already it was fading from his consciousness, like water slipping through his hands. The dreams often ravaged his night’s sleep.
He lay in the dark and stared up at the ceiling. This quest was ridiculous. She would not come and he would never find her and life – the life that had been handed back to him, after being held hostage for over a year and a half – would be empty. He would slide down to death uncaring. Coming to Cornwall in the hope of picking up her trail? That wasn’t a plan. That was the sort of plan that the Staff put together – bombard the enemy trenches, send lots of men over the top, fingers crossed and see what happens.
When he’d gone to bed last night, he’d felt confident that it would all work out. The gods – or whatever he believed in – that had brought him safely through the War were smiling on him. Surely they would restore the life he had had; make up for what the War had taken from him.
Now, he knew it wasn’t so. Maybe the fact that he had come through the War when so many others hadn’t, was as much as he was going to get. It was a hell of a lot more than many others had been given. Now it began to dawn on him until it became an incredible certainty that he would never find her, that he would never see her again. He turned on his side, drew his knees up to his chest and began to cry uncontrollably.
47
In the morning, Lewis had a quick breakfast, picked up the sandwiches and a couple of bottles of beer which he had ordered the previous night, and headed out to Readymoney. The day was fine and he had thought of going for a swim but he didn’t want to be all wet and tousled when he met her. So instead he brought a book – he had just started Under The Greenwood Tree by Thomas Hardy. The beach was crowded when he arrived. He found a spot that was shady and settled down to wait.
The sun shimmered on the water and spears of light danced from its surface. A couple of people walked along the water line and stopped. Their silhouettes were black against the dazzling water and he had a sense that their bodies were about to melt. After a while they moved on. He closed his eyes and immediately everything went red. He listened to the seagulls. A long way off – or so it sounded – children were calling. Lewis breathed in lungfuls of the pure air. He picked up some sand in his hand and let it slip through his fingers.
It occurred to him that this was the second time in his life that he had waited for a woman he loved to come back to him. He remembered the night of his mother’s funeral; the wardrobe door; the nights that had followed until gradually the realisation had dawned that she wasn’t coming back at all. How strange that he was in the same situation now. Did the gods do this as a joke? Hardy had a book of poems called Time’s Laughingstocks. Was that what he was?
But wasn’t there also something about how life kept sending you the same challenges until you did the right thing about them? Actually, it was Helen who had told him about this. What had he done wrong then as an eight year old that this situation had not been resolved and had reappeared in his life? Had wanting to see Mum one more time, to say goodbye, been the wrong thing to ask for? And what should he do this time? Surely it couldn’t be wrong to want to be with someone you loved so much? Was it because she was married? Or older than him? Is that what made it wrong?
He switched his mind to other thoughts. He wondered if she would get here early. It all depended, he supposed, on whether she had travelled today or yesterday. But that was assuming she was coming from London. Maybe she was already here. That hadn’t occurred to him and he suddenly wondered, with a jolt, whether she was already at the cottage. Had she rented it again? What a perfect surprise that would have been – to suddenly see her walking down the beach and hear her say, ‘What are you doing down here, silly? Tea’s ready.’
He wasn’t really that convinced that she was there but he thought he should go and check anyway. Putting his things into his pack, he stood up and hurried up the beach. It was after midday now and very hot. He could feel the sweat on his face and pooled in his armpits. He approached the cottage up the narrow lane and realised that his heart was pounding. Eventually he saw its chimney through the summer foliage and then its roof and then he was standing outside it.
The hedge had grown considerably in the three years. There had been no attempt to trim it and so he had to look over the small wooden gate to see in. The white paint on the gate had flaked – it looked like it hadn’t been touched in t
he intervening time. The cottage itself was much as they had left it, although – as far as he could see – the vegetable garden was gone to ruin. The windows were open so there was obviously someone inside. Lewis heard the sound of the head of a brush knocking against something wooden – a table leg perhaps. The smell of cooking came to him on a whiff of breeze. He realised he was holding the top timber of the gate tightly with his hands.
But then he heard a scream. It was a scream of delighted fear and two small children appeared round the side of the house. They looked to be both under five, one girl and one boy. The girl carried a ball and was running away with the boy in pursuit. She screamed again, doubled back, wrong-footing the boy. Then he turned and they both disappeared round the back of the house. So she wasn’t here.
He returned to the beach. He set out his towel again, and sitting on it ate his sandwiches. He began to fret about whether his letter to her had arrived. But he realised there was no point in thinking about that. He had learned the lesson in the Army. If you couldn’t influence it then no point in worrying – just get on with it.
The sun tracked on. People came and went. The water was crowded in the mid afternoon. Lewis kept looking to the spot where people coming from Fowey first became visible, expecting to see her appear there. But it was always somebody else. A biplane flew overhead at one point and Lewis remembered how the infantry in the trenches had envied the fliers the cleanliness of their war. He tried closing his eyes, holding them shut and saying to himself, ‘She’ll be there when I open them’. But she never was.
The beach began to empty and the heat from the sun became a little less intense. The wavelets broke ceaselessly on the shore. They arrived, fell on the wet sand as though exhausted, spread out and slid up the beach. Then they withdrew, whispering gently away. Now that there were less people in the water, a couple of gulls had come down. They ran about in the shallow surf, the water surging around legs that seemed impossibly thin to hold such powerful bodies. Several boats were beached by their owners. Lewis turned his back to where she would come from and imagined her hand landing softly on his shoulder like a bird, and her soft voice saying, ‘Hello, Lewis’.
He tried to think about something different. After he finished his remaining time in the Army, what then? The more he thought of going to university the less he liked the idea. He pictured Oxford or some place like that. She would be working and he studying. They would be living in a small rented house. They would spend all day apart and then he would come back in the evenings to food and firelight and making love. But no, he didn’t want that. He wanted to be with her all the time. So maybe they could buy a plot of land, maybe down this way somewhere, maybe here in Cornwall. They would work together. They would raise something – he didn’t know what – but maybe crops, not animals. He had seen enough slaughter and didn’t want to have anything more to do with it. Herbs, maybe. Or flowers.
He liked this idea. They would live and work together, growing their own food. Their days would be full of laughter and happiness and work would seem like fun rather than work. Perhaps she might have a child, his child. And their nights would be nights of starlight seen through lozenged windows and warmth under bedclothes and nakedness and holding each other.
He had been reluctant to check his watch but he did so now. It was just before six. A spasm of anxiousness rose in his belly but he quietened it. There was still time. If she was catching the train from London, the bus from Truro – there were all sorts of possible delays along the way. Even now she could be hurrying out of town to meet him.
There were only a few people left on the beach. It was strange, he thought. All of these people were enjoying the simple pleasures of a sunny day by the sea. They were swimming, making sand castles, eating their picnics and unaware of the huge drama that was being played out here. He wondered. Maybe there were other dramas happening here as well. Between husbands and wives. In children’s minds. Maybe love affairs were starting or finishing or people were tormented by love or basking in it. He looked around to see if he could get any sense of these things anywhere, but suddenly found he didn’t care. Not about these people. Not today.
The minutes crawled now as he constantly looked at his watch, willing her to appear, not wanting to have to leave this place without her. He remembered the morning after that third night in bed when he was eight – the feeling of emptiness, of loss, of huge, overwhelming grief. The feeling that he had lost everything that mattered and that he would never be happy again. He could feel tears smarting in his eyes. If she came he would have to tell her that they were tears of happiness.
It was at eight that he decided that she wasn’t coming.
‘All the day dreams must go; it will be a wearisome return.’ He walked back to Fowey through the honey light of evening. A phrase had begun going around in his head. ‘Yes, but under very different circumstances from those expected.’ It chased around his brain, cannoned off the inside of his skull, refused to stop. ‘Yes, but under very different circumstances from those expected.’ He looked down the long tunnel of the years ahead and saw nothing but emptiness. Loneliness. Desolation. How would he be able to get up tomorrow and begin another day without her? And the day after that? And the day after that? What would he find to fill his days? He might have been able to bear it had she been dead but to know that she was alive. People would see her, meet her, speak with her, be friends with her. They would hear her voice and her laughter. They would enjoy her company and love being with her. ‘Yes, but under very different circumstances from those expected.’
At the hotel he checked at the reception desk but nobody had left any messages for him. He wanted to just go to bed and never get up again, but he had to go and get the things from Henry, the waiter. Steeling himself, Lewis went down. He made an excuse about not having dinner, saying that he had had ‘a bad night’. He had to say no more than that – Henry understood.
He gave Lewis a small canvas bag and a piece of paper. The bag contained an aged bouquet of roses, brown and dusty and an envelope.
‘This was his mother’s wedding bouquet,’ explained Henry. ‘She kept it all these years but now she’d like you to put it on his grave. The envelope has a letter from the pair of us to him. If you could leave that at the grave too, it would be much appreciated.’
‘Would you like me to read it to him?’ asked Lewis.
Henry’s eyes brightened.
‘I think that would be a really nice idea, Mr Friday. You wouldn’t mind doing that? You wouldn’t – I don’t know, feel awkward or stupid —’
‘Henry, I’d be proud to do it.’
‘These are directions as to where his grave is. I copied them out from the letter the War Graves people sent us.’
‘Will you give me your address?’ asked Lewis. ‘Then I can send you a picture of the grave.’
‘But we’re imposing on you too much, sir —’
‘It’s nothing. He died a hero. They all did. We have to remember them. To recognise what they did. Your son died. What are a few photographs against that? Just put your address on here.’
Lewis handed him the piece of paper and Henry wrote the address with his waiter’s pencil. When he had finished, Lewis read it aloud just to make sure he had it correct. Then he folded it carefully and put it in his inside jacket pocket. They shook hands and Lewis headed up the heavy staircase. In his room he took off his shoes, lay on the bed and eventually fell asleep.
He woke some time in the middle of the night. For a few moments he wasn’t sure where he was but then he remembered and the huge crushing boulder of loss rolled back onto him. It couldn’t be true. This had to be a terrible dream from which he would wake. Why had he survived the War just to end up with this? He tried to go back to sleep but it was hopeless. His mind was too full of everything he had lost. Little scenes of his life with her kept coming back into his mind and refused to be banished. He would stop one but then another would suddenly appear, playing out like a little film. He would
rip that reel from the projector but another would start up from another projector. He wondered if he was going insane.
Later, he became aware of the first brightening of the sky. His mind seemed to slow down, to become a little quieter. He heard the first birdsong of the day. Slowly – very slowly – he began to think about the situation. Do what he had done in the trenches. Do what had helped him to survive. Try to solve the problem.
She had not come. So either she didn’t want to see him or she hadn’t known about the rendezvous. He found it hard to imagine her not wanting to meet, given everything they had shared together. Surely she would have come – if only to draw a line under it, to close the circle. Anyway, logically, there was no point in thinking about that. The other possibility was that she hadn’t known about the rendezvous.
If she hadn’t known about the rendezvous, then she hadn’t received the letter. So now he would have to go to France. He would go to General Hospital No. 24 and either find her there or, failing that, pick up the trail. Maybe she was sick in Hospital No. 24, maybe that’s why she hadn’t been in touch. Or lost her memory or had a breakdown due to the stress of the kind of work she was doing. There were all sorts of possibilities but there was no point in thinking about them now. The important thing was to get there. He felt easier. He had a plan. People didn’t just disappear. He would find her.
48
Lewis packed for a trip of a week and caught the steamer from Dover to Calais. It was a day of yellow sun and blue sky but there was a strong wind on the Channel. He sat in the lee of the ship’s superstructure and read. From Calais he took a train to Amiens arriving there towards evening. The city was crowded with visitors. It was three years since the Somme battles but the first year when civilians had been able to come here. They had come in their droves. There was a sad, lost air about many of the people he passed – middle-aged couples, lots of women in black, singly and in groups of two or three.
Starlight (The Four Lights Quartet Book 1) Page 24
