‘Well,’ said Gracie, suddenly at a loss for words. ‘Well!’
‘It makes a change to go out, don’t you think?’
‘Yes. Yes, it does indeed. That would be very nice. Thank you.’
The very next day, since Gracie had the afternoon off, they went to see Noel Coward’s
In Which We Serve
, and Gracie wept, thinking of poor Gordon and how on earth Lou would survive if his ship went down too, just as HMS
Torrin
had done during the evacuation of Crete.
‘It’s only a film,’ Adam said, offering her a hanky to dry her tears.
‘But it isn’t, is it? Not really. This sort of terrible thing happens all the time. It’s so easy to forget there’s a war on, when we’re in the forest and the sun is shining, and we’re happily felling or lopping the trees. But then something happens to remind me, like this film, like an air raid I was in once in Exeter, and I remember. It comes back to me, all in a rush, why we’re doing what we’re doing. It’s all so awful,’ and the tears flowed more than ever, so that Adam felt bound to put his arm about her shoulders and comfort her.
‘There, there, it’s all right. Don’t take on so. We’ll win. See if we don’t,’ and she gave him such a lopsided, watery smile that he put his mouth to hers and kissed her. It was only meant to make her feel better, and it did. It was a soft, sweet kiss and although there were still no fireworks, as Lou had predicted, she managed to dry her tears, accept the ice cream he bought for her and relaxed sufficiently to enjoy the rest of the picture.
After the film, as they sat and enjoyed spaghetti on toast in a nearby cafe, Adam asked about the air raid and Gracie told him. She related the full horror of that night in Exeter for the first time, freely admitting how badly it had affected her, how she’d suffered nightmares for weeks afterwards, waking in a sweat as she saw again the dead baby, the children strewn across the playground. Even now she wept as the images replayed in her head but he didn’t interrupt. He let her talk and when she was done, she felt cleansed, as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. She hadn’t even realised how much it had been pressing her down, like a great black shadow. He was so kind and sympathetic, so easy to talk to, that Gracie wondered why she’d ever felt shy with him.
‘We must do this again some time,’ he said, as they drove back to Beech Tree Cottage.
‘Yes, I’d like that,’ Gracie said, and right then, at that precise moment, she truly meant it.
The following Saturday Adam again offered to take Gracie to the pictures. She accepted, for all a part of her felt an odd sort of reluctance. Though why this should be, she didn’t wish to investigate too closely.
This time it was Ronald Coleman and Greer Garson in
Random Harvest
; a wonderful love story of a music hall star marrying an injured ex-serviceman. Love among the cherry blossom in a wonderful English spring, so that Gracie didn’t object when Adam put his arm about her shoulders. Could she fall in love with him? Did love feel like this? This nervous, heavy feeling, almost of foreboding, deep in her stomach.
On the drive back to Satterthwaite, Adam stopped the car by a gate and turned off the engine. Gracie sat absolutely still, saying nothing, wondering what he might do next. Would he kiss her? Did she want him to kiss her? She wished that she knew how to flirt with a man, as Lou seemed able to do with such confidence. Of course, Lou was older and had more experience. She was also safely married, so nobody took her teasing and flirting too seriously. Except for poor Luc, who’d soon learned the error of his ways.
‘Would you like me to kiss you?’
In all of Grace’s romantic dreams, and she’d experienced plenty of those in her young life, she’d never imagined being asked this question. She’d always believed that kisses should be stolen. Nor could she think of any proper response. If she said yes, that might sound too forward. If she said no, too discouraging. Her mind whirled. ‘Um, well, I don’t think I’d mind,’ she said. There, that left the decision to him, didn’t it?
He pulled her into his arms, placed his mouth firmly against hers and began to kiss her. Gracie held her breath, half wondering how she should respond, and half hoping the kiss would be over soon before her lungs quite exploded. She was almost grateful when it did end and he began to nuzzle her neck. She supposed this was all part of the rigmarole of courting as well. Gracie wasn’t sure whether she liked it. His chin felt rather rough and scratchy and she had to concentrate very hard so as not to giggle. If only she’d asked Lou for advice on what one ought to do.
Should she stroke his hair perhaps, or put her arms about his neck? She could smell grass on him, the cigarette he’d just smoked, and animal feed. Not unpleasant exactly but not quite as she would expect Ronald Coleman, for instance, to smell.
Nor did she recall Ronald Coleman bothering to ask Greer Garson, come to think of it, before he’d kissed her. They’d just seemed to melt together. Gracie felt far from melting. She felt cold and awkward in the car. The gear lever was poking into her knee and something even colder was pressing against her breast. With a slight shock she realised it must be Adam’s hand. Somehow he’d slid open the buttons of her blouse, eased up her brassiere and was kneading her breast as if it were made of dough. She felt her cheeks start to redden. This wasn’t at all what she’d expected. So methodical and detached, clinical almost. Not in the least bit romantic. And Gracie felt frighteningly vulnerable, as if she were pinned against the leather seat by that hand, the skin so hard and rough she was quite sure she’d be bruised by it. He must have felt her stiffen because he suddenly jerked away from her, as if he’d been stung, and abruptly sat back in his seat.
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to cause offence. I thought - I thought you wanted - would expect me to do that. Most girls do, don’t they?’ Gracie had no idea what most girls did, so she said nothing. Some part of her stunned brain noticed that he didn’t seem particularly excited. Not like Ronald Coleman at all.
Finally she gathered her wits and said, ‘I’m afraid I don’t know what I want. I’m not very experienced at - these sort of things, you see.’
‘Yes, I see. Of course, I do see that.’
They both straightened their clothing and sat staring out of the misted windscreen. Abject misery settled heavily around Gracie’s heart. What had she done wrong? Why couldn’t she relax? She’d ruined everything now, by being stupidly shy and girlish.
‘Perhaps we’d better get back,’ Adam said, reaching to start up the engine. It refused to fire on the starter and he had to get out and crank it. It had begun to rain and he was soaked through by the time they set off. Gracie sat hunched in her seat and wished herself invisible.
On this same Saturday, Lou and Gordon were enjoying a blissful weekend in Southport. The boarding house where they stayed could hardly be called classy but it was clean and the landlady not the interfering type, which was just as well since they spent most of the weekend in bed, where Gordon thrilled her with his kisses and his love making, as always.
‘You’ll have me up the spout, if we go on like this,’ she gasped and insisted they take a brief spell of fresh air. They walked along Lord Street in the sunshine, dreaming of one day buying the carpets and furniture they could see through the taped up windows of the expensive shops, when they had a little house of their own. They kept well away from the wide expanse of sands where coils of barbed wire could clearly be seen, so that they could pretend there wasn’t a war on at all.
On Saturday night they went dancing in the Winter Gardens, which cost three shillings for the pair of them. They swayed in each other’s arms to the strains of
We’ll Meet Again. Don’t know where, don’t know when
,’ and Lou wept on Gordon’s shoulder, overcome by the prospect of yet another parting. Then he blew another five bob on fish and chips in one of the national restaurants. He talked very little; telling of having once been involved in ‘some tricky stuff around Crete,’ and the huge tonnage of shipping consumed during the Africa campaign the previous year. Then, quite bleakly, he said, ‘This spring saw the worst losses of the war so far. We need more bombers on escort duties. I’m lucky to be here,’ after which confession he fell silent for a long time.
Lou asked no questions, partly because he wasn’t allowed to say much, but also because any details frightened her. She preferred to simply post her letters to the same place and have the authorities send them on to him, and not think too clearly about where exactly he might be when he received them, or what he might actually be doing. She didn’t want to know about bombers, torpedoes and battles in the Atlantic, or the threat of U-boats. She just hoped that Gordon blasted them all out of existence and came home safe and sound.
Grizedale Hall was set deep in the forest. Once the home of Harold Brocklebank, a Liverpool ship owner until his death in 1936, it was an ideal location in which to accommodate high ranking U-boat and Luftwaffe Officers. Surrounded by barbed wire and guarded by sentries, there had been one or two escapees but even the most daring rarely got far. They faced walking over miles of rugged fells before reaching the north-west coast and generally ended up lost, wet and cold, happy to be recaptured. Since it housed generally high ranking German Officers, locals had dubbed it “Hush-Hush Hall” or “U-Boat Hotel”. They spoke of a darkly brooding, strangely sinister air about a place which still boasted fine oak panelling, billiard room, library, drawing room and all the other accoutrements of country life that a wealthy gentleman had once enjoyed, as well as glorious stained-glass windows bearing mottoes, one of which read: “
The whole world without a native home is nothing but a prison of larger room.
”
This Monday morning, as on many another, the two girls rode their bicycles along the quiet, winding country road, singing:
Wish Me Luck as You Wave me Goodbye
. Lou was smiling and singing while tears dripped off the end of her chin. The paint cans containing the white paint they daubed on the trees rattled and clanged on the handlebars, not quite in time.
She broke off, mid-song, to ask Gracie if she’d told her all about her weekend in Southport. Gracie agreed that she had, several times in fact. ‘But don’t let that stop you.’
It didn’t. Within seconds, the tears had been swept away and Lou was happily chattering twenty to the dozen, describing in detail the excitement of her “blissful” weekend. She was still talking as they approached the post box where she meant to pop in her latest letter to Gordon, written only last night, just hours after they’d parted. Beside the post box stood a wooden sentry box, one of several in the locality. Another stood by the barrier close to the hall itself. The soldier inside was usually a veteran from World War I who knew every villager by name. Nevertheless, even to post a letter meant everyone had to identify themselves.
‘Halt, who goes there? Friend or foe.’
‘Friend,’ Gracie automatically responded, struggling not to smile. She rather guessed that the old soldier quite enjoyed it whenever someone happened along, as carrying out sentry duty for hour upon hour in this remote spot, must be exceedingly boring.
‘Advance friend to be recognised.’
Lou instantly halted her tale as Gracie provided the necessary identification. Lou rarely said a word during this ritual, for no matter how many times she came close to the high perimeter fence around the compound she always felt a chill between her shoulder blades. These men were there because they’d been captured while attacking our boys. Every night when she went to bed, Lou silently prayed for Gordon’s safety. It was wonderful that, for once, she knew her prayers had been answered, even if he was leaving for some undisclosed destination within the next few days. As always, she’d made up her mind not to think too closely about this, but simply to pray all the harder.
A detail of prisoners-of-war marched past, boots ringing on the rough stones of the lane as they headed down the road, no doubt on their accustomed exercise drill to the village and back. One of them called something out to the two girls but the guard in charge barked at him in German, probably to order him to behave, or to keep ‘eyes front’.
‘You’re even being propositioned by the enemy now,’ chuckled Gracie, and Lou rolled her eyes in despair.
‘Never!’ The very idea filled her with horror.
The girls wheeled their bicycles on, well away from the high gates of the grey stone mansion where other prisoners would be playing football, strolling on the terrace, digging the garden or taking part in some form of drill.
It didn’t seem right, somehow, that these men, the enemy, should be free to play games while Gordon could, at this very moment, be steaming back into danger. Lou averted her eyes from the marching PoWs and started up her story again. ‘Soon as he left me, he was off for a quick visit to his mam. Don’t worry love, he says, the war’ll be over in no time, everyone says so. This is the last push, then they’ll hang up their hats and surrender. Do you believe that, Gracie? Do you think the war will soon be over?’
Gracie wasn’t properly listening. Her head was filled with the surprising turn her own life had taken this weekend. The trip to the cinema with Adam had been an eye opener in so many ways. She felt as if her depression over the air raid had finally lifted, as if she had found a friend. But was it the kind of friendship that could grow to something more, into something special?