by John Masters
‘All right,’ she said, ‘that’s a nice name.’
He got up, his legs feeling suddenly weak, and stumbled over to her, and knelt at her feet, one arm round her, one caressing the dark baby. ‘Oh Stella, I love you,’ he whispered. She bent her head, sighing. God, where was she? What was it like, where she went once a day, for how many hours? What was it like, coming back? How could he love her, so that she would not want to go, and one day would not go, again, ever?
John’s sister Betty lifted the half-pint of beer, drank, set down the tankard beside her plate and said, ‘Dad wants me to go home. He told me to pack!’
‘What did you tell him?’ John asked. They were in the saloon bar of the Lord Nelson in Hedlington, where Betty was having her lunch, as she often did since Fletcher Gorse had introduced her to the cosy comfort of English pubs, and the simple delights of a good pub lunch – in her case today, a big bread and butter sandwich of Cheddar cheese, Dutch greenhouse tomato, and pickle.
She said, ‘I told him I was not going to leave until Fletcher came back from the army, and perhaps not then.’
‘Did he know about Fletcher?’
‘A bit. I suppose Aunt Isabel told him … I said that Fletcher had asked me to marry him, and I had decided to wait till the end of the war to give him an answer.’
‘What’s it going to be?’
She drank again, and looked at him carefully – ‘I don’t know, John, I honestly don’t. I love him … I am totally, blindingly in love with him … as far as I know. I was when we last met. I still am, I think … but there was the war … death … he in the middle of it … I waiting, waiting. Would I ever see him again? He is so beautiful, would he come back with his face smashed, his eyes torn out, a leg and arm ripped off? What about his mind, his soul – the person behind the skin? Would he have become a killer, a rapist, perverted to violence for its own sake? I don’t know.’
John said, ‘He’s not an educated man, is he?’
She said sharply, ‘No, and we don’t believe in the class system, do we?’ She stopped, and put a hand over one of his, ‘Sorry, John … No, he’s not educated, and I have to think, what will we do, talk about … what things we can share, apart from lovemaking.’ She glanced up, daring her brother to comment – ‘Though that’s important.’
‘Of course,’ John murmured.
‘So … I must wait.’
‘How long?’
She shrugged – ‘Heaven knows. The Government here’s got some cockamamy scheme to do with “key men” – men they think are needed in industry at home, who will be released from the army first. As some of them will only have been out a month, while others, who are not considered “key men”, have been out since 1915, they’re asking for trouble … Anyway, I have to stay, to try to modify the Buffalo for civil air service. We’ll get help from the Air Ministry. Guy was down here, flying Buffaloes on all sorts of tests, until just before Christmas, and he told us the Air Ministry will do whatever they can to help, if they get the money. They want a British civil air industry just as much as we do, otherwise the French and Americans will have a monopoly.’
‘Are you going to get Frank Stratton back?’
‘Probably, soon. He’s been classified as a “key man”, which is fine from our point of view, if there are to be such people. But he may refuse to accept it, he’s such a stickler for fair play.’
‘But he has been in the army since 1914 … Stella won’t leave England … the Weald, really.’
‘I thought she wouldn’t. What are you going to do?’
‘Come back to HAC. The day after tomorrow.’
‘Good! We’ve all missed you. And Ginger didn’t relish the thought of taking over, at all. Dad has asked him and he said he would if he had to … but he’d rather stick to designing. And he’s right. It’s a big job to alter the Buffalo. It’s so large … money and fuel didn’t matter when it was a bomber, but for a commercial passenger and goods service, they would. And we have to build in some more safety devices, in case we have to land in fog or bad weather. Crashes may have to be accepted in war, but not for peacetime fare-paying passengers.’ She stood up – ‘I have to get back to work.’ She reached up and kissed him on the cheek – ‘Be patient with Stella. And think … find something that will really challenge her. She is at her best, she is most her real self, in danger, hardship, emergency.’
He nodded – ‘I know.’
Stephen Merritt faced Virgil Kramer across the table in the small, very expensive West End restaurant. The waiter had just served them their first course – real turtle soup; in spite of the war, and rationing, and shortages, you could still eat well in London, if you paid for it.
Stephen said, ‘John can’t get Stella to move. So he’s definitely staying.’
Virgil said, ‘What can be done about her? Is John to be saddled for the rest of his life with a wife who is a drug fiend … and with that black baby?’
‘Drug fiend,’ Stephen muttered. ‘It conjures up such a picture … Chinamen lolling on bunks in underground dens of iniquity … a person crazy for the drug, whatever it is … I suppose Stella was like that, when she ran away. At least now they realise that she is sick, not evil, and that the only way to treat her, at the moment, is to give her regulated doses of the drug, under some sort of supervision.’
‘They don’t allow that at home,’ Virgil said. ‘Heroin has been classified as a dangerous drug and it’s totally forbidden – and that’s that.’
‘So people who crave it will kill for it, rob … prostitute themselves. My God, Virgil, I can’t bear to see my son, my only son, in this ghastly trap … And Betty apparently determined to marry this Fletcher Gorse fellow.’
‘He’s a poet, Stephen, and a good one. I have his first book of poems, At the lip.’
‘Poets don’t make any money,’ Stephen growled. ‘She will have plenty of her own, of course … and he’ll batten on her.’
‘I doubt that … Look, we’ll all do what we can to help John and Stella, but the fact is that no one else can really help them. They can only get out of the trap by themselves, their own efforts, guts – and love. I think John has them all. The way he has accepted that baby is extraordinary, and very, very brave. Peace Merritt … a good name … When are you going back Stateside?’
‘Soon. Isabel shouldn’t be left alone too long, after losing Walter.’
‘And pining for Christopher Cate.’
‘Yes.’ Stephen leaned back, ‘To change the subject, have you seen anything of Richard Rowland?’
‘A little,’ Kramer said. ‘He’s been up here two or three times about shipping space for your Jones & Gatewood radial engines … And Armbruster engine blocks from Columbus for his trucks. Why?’
‘Our British plants have been having labour trouble, and I get the impression from Overfeld that Richard is partly responsible.’
‘What are you going to do about it?’
‘Go down and see for myself … talk … listen. But everyone over here’s been under such an incredible strain, for so long, that it would be a miracle if there wasn’t any such trouble. Before I do anything drastic I’m going to tell Richard to take a long vacation … In fact, I shall send him to the States, so that he can look at Henry Ford’s operation at first hand … meet the other members of our board … but above all, have a rest and a change. His wife’s American, from California, so she’ll be pleased.’
‘I got the impression that he thought he was indispensable.’
‘He’s not,’ Stephen said grimly. ‘And he shall take a holiday.’
John Merritt walked up and down the edge of the airfield, between that part actually used for landing and the buildings of the Hedlington Aircraft Company. At his side walked the Chief Designer of the company, Ginger Keble-Palmer. The two young men walked with heads bent, John with his hands clasped behind his back, Ginger with his habitual stoop and ungainly stride, like a disjointed rag doll. ‘I’ve been working on the problems ever since Augus
t, really,’ Ginger said. ‘After we won that great victory … I’ve cut down petrol consumption four per cent by altering the design of the carburettor. But that isn’t enough. The Buffalo’s just so big.’
‘We can’t go back to the Lion,’ John said. ‘And I don’t think that size is the problem. We shall fill the aircraft if we can make the flights regular, dependable, safe, and punctual.’ He broke off, looking at his wristwatch – ‘Guy’s late.’
Ginger said, ‘He must have been held up.’ They resumed their pacing. Ginger broke the silence – ‘Betty’s been very helpful to me all along. Especially since we started looking to peace.’
He said, ‘That’s natural.’
Ginger said, ‘She’s in love with Fletcher Gorse – Whitman, he’s been calling himself – you know?’
‘Yes. She told me.’
Ginger said in a low voice, ‘I prayed that he would be killed … then perhaps I’d have a chance. That’s what love did to me. Because you know, of course, that I love her, too?’
John said, ‘Yes.’
‘Do you think she will marry him?’
‘I don’t know. Nor does she.’ They both heard the distant throb of aircraft engines and stopped, looking towards the west. The sound grew and the machine came in sight, huge, dark, four-engined, a thousand feet up.
‘Handley Page V/1500,’ Ginger said. ‘Our competitor … look, four engines, mounted back to back in pairs, just like ours, only theirs are liquid-cooled and ours are radial …’
John said, ‘Ours is a little squatter, I think, and two or three feet shorter, perhaps.’
‘Three feet one inch,’ Ginger said. The machine was circling at the downwind end of the field, banking gently, now on its landing run, south-west into the damp, strong wind. Three minutes later it was down and Guy Rowland was waving to them from the cockpit, a lieutenant beside him and a sergeant in the rear cockpit. John ran up close as Guy cupped his hand and shouted down, ‘Want to see how the competition flies?’
‘I’ve flown one,’ Ginger said. ‘You go up.’
John clambered up a step ladder on to the wing and thence into the cockpit, squeezing into the co-pilot’s place as the copilot joined the sergeant behind them. Guy pushed the throttles open, and taxied the machine downwind to the far end of the field, turned again, opened the throttles wide, and took off, climbing gently towards the west. The wind blew the roar of the four Rolls-Royce Eagle VIII engines to the rear, and Guy, leaning close to John, shouted, ‘She’s pretty good … six hours radius of action, without extra tanks.’
‘Cruising speed?’
‘Ninety, at 6000 feet. She weighs 29,937 pounds, fully loaded for take-off.’
‘The Buffalo’s nearly forty pounds lighter,’ John said.
‘And carries the same payload. There’s nothing in it between them there …’
Guy swung the Handley Page southwards – ‘Haven’t had time to say welcome home,’ he shouted after a time. ‘You’re staying now?’
John nodded, and Guy said, ‘Good … I’ll come down and visit when I can. I have things on my mind these days.’ He did not elaborate.
So do I, have things on my mind, John thought; and Guy was acknowledging their kinship. He would not have to hide anything from Guy. And some day Guy would tell what his own problems were … perhaps to do with finding out who he was, now that the killing was over. It was a pity that he had to drink so much champagne in the search: his breath reeked of it.
John stood in the door of the little house, and listened to the sounds of a grinding mangle, through the slightly open window. He had knocked half a minute ago and now someone was coming. The door opened, and a girl of about twelve stood there, eyeing him up and down. Her clothes and shoes were torn, but clean.
John said, ‘Can I see your mother?’
‘Mum’s washing clothes, working the mangle. You can ’ear it.’
John said, ‘I’ll go through. I don’t want to interrupt her.’
The girl stood aside and John walked through the crowded little parlour to the kitchen behind. The table was piled high with dirty laundry, more filled the sink, and Mary Gorse was working the mangle. She was thin, gaunt almost, her dark-rimmed eyes shining as she turned to look at him, never stopping her work. John started: there, in a battered old armchair in the corner, was Willum. He was sitting in the chair, but his legs did not reach the floor: he had no legs, only six-inch stumps, the trousers cut off and tied neatly round them.
Mary said, ‘Sorry I can’t stop, Mr John … We heard you were back.’
Willum said, M can’t get up, Mr Johnny … see what happened to me!’ He laughed, without bitterness. ‘Look what the Germans did! Still, they didn’t kill me, like they killed Colin Blythe, did they?’
John said, ‘When did you get home? My sister wrote and told me what had happened to you.’
Willum said, ‘Why, them Jerries took me and put me in an ambulance and next time I woke up I was in a hospital with nurses and clean sheets … the nurses was Jerries, too, fancy that! Women speaking that funny! And I didn’t have no legs, but I didn’t know that for three weeks, ’cos my legs kept aching, like, so I knew they was there … but they wasn’t!’
The mangle kept grinding. The girl and a smaller boy lifted the squeezed sheets and pillow cases and took them out into the tiny yard behind, hanging them up on the jammed rows of laundry lines. Each time they went in and out a wave of raw, damp air filled the room.
John said, ‘Can you move about at all?’
Willum said, ‘They made me a little trolley, dolly, like, I can sit on, and pull myself along by my hands.’
‘Do you get a pension from the Government? Your army pay still?’
‘Ten shillings a week,’ Mary cut in.
‘Why, that’s …’ John bit his lip. He had come, first to confirm that Willum was back from Germany, and to see if he could offer him a job. But it was impossible. He could not raise himself high enough to put sweepings into the bins, if he were to be given back his old job as floor sweeper and cleaner. He couldn’t be a night watchman. He simply did not have enough mobility to do any job in a factory, except a clerical one – and he was all but illiterate. He’d see old Mr Harry: but Mr Harry had retired and was living in Devonshire. Someone called Wilfred Bentley was the new Member of Parliament, a Socialist … he should have some special feeling for the working man; but perhaps he was one of the pacifist-anti-war people, who would feel that what Willum had got was entirely his own fault, for taking part in a capitalists’ war …
The mangle ground on. He turned to Mary – ‘Is there anything I can do, Mrs Gorse? Are you short of money?’
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘always. But I don’t want none of yours, Mr John.’ She smiled wearily, ‘We’re not starving … the girls bring in a little … run errands, you know. We’re not ready for the Workhouse yet. And Willum’ll get a job one day … you’ll see.’ She plunged her chapped and reddened hands once more into the sink, pulled out a sheet, and expertly fed it into the mangle – ‘You’ll see.’
Daily Telegraph, Saturday, January 18, 1919
FATE OF LIEBKNECHT AND ROSA LUXEMBURG
THE FORMER SHOT, FEMALE ANARCHIST LYNCHED
HORROR IN BERLIN
From Leonard Pray, Rotterdam, Friday.
News and comment from Berlin makes the fact startlingly clear today that the announcement of the deaths of Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, though heard with satisfaction by a few of their bitterest opponents, was received by the public generally with emotions in which fear and horror predominated – horror at the circumstances, fear of possible consequences. The city is described today as being in the same state of nervous tension as it was on the eve of the Bolshevik rising, when everyone felt that civil war was in the atmosphere … The whole liberal press condemning the deed and even the Vossische Zeitung declares:
Nothing can justify this exercise of lynch law, even against the author of the recent regrettable events. In the name of humanity we
protest against it. It should have been left to a court of justice to make them harmless for the future …
Garrod came in and said, ‘Mr John is in the hall, sir.’
‘Bring him in, of course,’ Cate said; and a moment later John walked in, still wearing his overcoat. ‘Good morning, Father Christopher,’ he said, ‘I thought I’d drop by on my way to work to tell you that we’ve spent our first week back in the Cottage very peacefully. Stella seems very happy there. And Peace slept like a log, all night, every night. He’s quite over the drug intoxication he got in the womb.’
‘Good, good … but Walstone isn’t on your way to the HAC.’
‘Not really,’ John said, ‘but – to tell the truth – I wanted to be sure you don’t mind my taking Stella away from here, the Manor, which was her home for so long and which she loves so much.’
‘Of course not, my boy! You must. It is you she must learn to depend on, and look to, not me … Have you breakfasted? Seen the paper? Miserable business in Berlin, isn’t it?’
John said, ‘It is. Though our fire eaters will say they deserve whatever they get.’ He leaned over Christopher’s shoulder and turned the page – ‘Look!’ Cate read:
PARIS-LONDON BY AIR
A REGULAR SERVICE
L’Auto states that the official trial trip of a ‘Giant’ Farman aeroplane, intended for service between Paris and London, will take place tomorrow, Jan 18, from the aerodrome at Toussu-le-Noble, near Versailles …
‘Look below,’ John said; and Cate read:
AEROPLANES DELUXE
The London News Agency announces that a regular air passenger and post service between Paris and London in connection with the Peace Conference at Versailles is to start shortly … These D.H. 4 peace machines will be of a specially luxurious as well as speedy type …
‘See?’ John said. ‘We have no time to waste … even though our sights are set a long way farther off than Paris.’
