A Song At Twilight Read online

  ‘No, I can’t do that.’

  ‘You can,’ Andrew said firmly. ‘Look, I’ve told you all, this is open house. I dare say some of the others will drop in later anyway, since there’ll obviously be no flying tonight. No point in you going back, only to turn round and come straight out again. We’ll put a few records on.’

  Stefan looked towards Alison, and she nodded. ‘Yes, please stay. And call in any time you like. As Andrew says, the door’s always open to you.’ She smiled at him, hoping that he understood that she would be ready to listen to him whenever he felt like telling her about his family. ‘You could come and play the piano, if you wanted to.’

  And as he gave her a small nod and the little half-bow that was so characteristic of him, she knew that he did understand; and that he would return.

  When Ben came back to Harrowbeer, he came as a changed man.

  ‘I just feel so angry,’ he said to Tony. ‘I know I’ve seen lots of blokes go down – friends of mine, most of them. I’ve seen them crash into the sea or over land. I’ve seen them shot down and I’ve been bloody nearly shot down myself. And it’s always made me all the more determined to get the buggers who did it, or some like them. It’s them or us, isn’t it? But this was my brother. He taught me to climb trees and swim. He showed me how to kick a football and hold a cricket bat. He used to take me to collect conkers and he showed me the stars at night. He knew all the birds we ever saw, and he’d sit for hours at night, watching for badgers. He was Head Boy at school, and cricket captain. He got a Blue at Oxford …’ The hand holding his pint tankard was shaking, and he set the glass down on the table and clenched his fists together. ‘And now it’s gone. All of it – gone. Lost for ever. Just because of some madman wanting to rule the world. Just because we didn’t stop him sooner. And now all these lives are being thrown away, wasted, before they’ve had a chance to be lived.’

  Tony looked at him. Ben’s face was drawn together in a dark scowl, his body tight with anger. He said, ‘How about your people? How are they taking it?’

  ‘How d’you think? Mother’s nearly out of her mind. I mean, she’s always known it could happen, but up till now we’ve all got through OK. Now one of us has gone, and she’s terrified it’ll happen to the rest of us as well. That’s when she’s not just crying her heart out over Pete. I tell you, Tony, she’s completely broken up. She won’t even go to church.’

  ‘But your father’s a vicar, isn’t he? Can’t he help?’

  ‘Doesn’t seem like it,’ Ben said gloomily. ‘He’s just as upset, but going to church seems to help him. Well, you’d expect that, wouldn’t you? But Mum – well, she seems to be angry about that too. As if she thinks he’s abandoned her.’

  Tony hesitated. He went to church because they were all expected to, but left to himself he wouldn’t have bothered. He wasn’t sure how Ben felt about it; religion wasn’t something they’d ever discussed between themselves. After a moment or two, he said, ‘What about you? What do you think?’

  ‘I just think,’ Ben said in a quietly ferocious tone, ‘that I want to get up into the sky and kill as many bloody Jerries as I can. I just wish I could have a go at the Japs as well – they’re the ones that sank Peter’s ship. But since I can’t do that, I’ll go for the Hun. They’re the ones who started it all.’

  Andrew saw the change in Ben and watched him carefully.

  ‘He’s like a piece of thin, brittle glass,’ he said to Alison. ‘He could break at any minute. Or he could be fired into something really tough. It could be the making of him as a pilot.’

  ‘That seems an awful thing to say,’ Alison said. ‘As if his brother getting killed is a good thing.’

  ‘I’m not saying that, but when a man gets the kind of anger Ben’s feeling now – well, sometimes it seems to concentrate his mind even more. I’ve seen it before. It makes a good pilot a fine one.’ He paused. ‘I’ve felt it happening to myself as well. I’ve seen so many pilots die, but when Tubby went – it was different. I feel much angrier over his death, and it’s made me even more determined.’

  ‘Determined to kill,’ Alison said.

  Andrew looked at her. ‘Yes. That’s what we’re here for. It’s war, darling, you know that. It’s not new.’

  ‘I know.’ She felt suddenly very tired. ‘It’s been going on for too long, that’s the trouble. She laid her hand on her stomach. There was no swelling there yet, not even the smallest flutter of movement, yet she knew that there was a new life beginning deep inside her. ‘It makes me feel different too. I can understand how all those mothers feel – Ben’s and Tubby’s and all the rest. I just don’t know how I could bear it if our children – Hughie, and this new one coming – had to go off to war. I really don’t, Andrew.’

  There were tears in her voice and Andrew pulled her into his arms. ‘Hey, come on, darling. That’s not going to happen. This war will be over long before they’re grown up. It’ll be over even before they start school. The tide’s turning, you know that. It’s just a matter of time now.’

  ‘And is this going to be the last war?’ she asked. ‘There have been two already this century. How can anyone say there won’t be more, and worse ones? When Hughie’s twenty-one and the new baby’s eighteen – it’ll be 1961 then. How can anyone say we won’t be at war again?’

  ‘I hope to God we’re not,’ he said. ‘And it’s up to us to make sure we’re not. We need to finish the job that didn’t get properly finished in 1918, and make sure the Germans don’t get another chance. And that means killing now. Killing as many as we can.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said sorrowfully, ‘that’s what it comes down to, isn’t it? Killing as many people as we can. Never mind who they are – men, women, children, tiny babies. Just so that in the end one side will give in, because they haven’t got anyone left to kill.’ Her slender body trembled in his arms, and then she said, ‘I’m sorry, darling. I know you have to do it and I’m proud of you, I really am. It’s just that sometimes it all seems so futile.’ For a moment, she sat silently looking into the fire, then she withdrew from Andrew’s arms and stood up. ‘I’m just feeling a bit low, that’s all. I think I’ll go to bed.’

  She left the room quietly and closed the door. Andrew heard her footsteps on the stairs and then overhead as she went softly into Hughie’s room to see that he was asleep and covered up. After a few minutes, he heard her go into the bathroom and then to their own bedroom.

  He sat for another half-hour, watching the fire go down. Tomorrow night he would be flying, escorting bombers to deal death and destruction to innocent people in foreign cities. Without any doubt, they would be attacked themselves and he would make every effort to shoot down the enemy planes. To kill. And, quite possibly, to be killed himself.

  Alison knew all this as well as he did. He knew that she supported him in his work. She knew that the war must be won, and what they must do to win it. Yet he could understand her feelings, her fears and her sorrows. It was part of the burden of being a woman.

  It made no difference to his determination to hunt and shoot down every enemy plane that came within his range.

  Chapter Twelve

  By Christmas, Bomber Command had spread its grey wings over all of industrial Germany, and the fighter squadrons were kept busy escorting vast formations of bombers on their deadly missions.

  Andrew and Ben, both still burning with white-hot anger, felt no mercy for the pilots they sent to their deaths, nor for the people below who received the fury of the bombs themselves. They knew that many of those killed must be innocent, helpless to affect the war one way or the other, yet somehow they were able to set that knowledge aside, as if thrusting it into a darkened room and slamming a heavy metal door on it. They ignored it because they had to, in order to do their job, and because they needed to avenge those they had lost. One day, perhaps, they would have to take it out of its dark, silent room and look at it again, but that day was somewhere in the future, and might never come.

  O
n the morning of Christmas Day, Andrew came home exhausted, just in time to see Hughie open his stocking. He watched the little boy’s delight as he pulled out the few bits and pieces they had been able to find for him – a wooden model of a Typhoon, a bag of marbles, some plasticine, a few sweets and an orange which was tucked into the toe. He had some bigger presents too, pushed into a pillowcase which bulged excitingly – a couple of picture books, a toy train which had been Andrew’s, a tennis ball, some crayons and a colouring book. May had knitted him a bright red jumper, made with wool unravelled from an old pullover of her father’s, and a pair of mittens to go with it, and these he insisted on wearing at once, when Alison took him down to the village church for the service.

  ‘I won’t come if you don’t mind,’ Andrew said. ‘I’ll get some sleep, or I’ll be fit for nothing later on.’

  ‘That’s all right.’ Alison looked at his grey face and red-rimmed eyes. They had invited some of the squadron to come round in the evening and no doubt they too would be spending most of the day in bed. ‘You sleep as long as you like. We’ll have dinner when you wake up.’

  There was no turkey this year, nor even a chicken. The Government had promised that every American serviceman in the country would have turkey, to remind them of home and thank them for their presence, and civilian quotas had been so small that even the large town butchers were getting fewer than a dozen birds. The Prettyjohns were having one of their own fowls, fattened especially, and had been apologetic that they couldn’t offer Alison one as well, but she’d brushed aside their regrets.

  ‘We can’t expect you to feed us. You’ve only known us a few months.’

  ‘It’s just that we promised Uncle John and Aunt Betty one as well, and then there’s Mum’s cousin over to Sampford Spiney, she always has one, and we only had the three cock birds spare. We haven’t even got an old hen.’

  ‘I told you, it’s all right. You’ve got your own family to think of. We’ll be quite happy with whatever we can get.’ Rabbit again, she thought, but was grateful for it. At least there were plenty of them out here in the country, eking out the meagre meat ration.

  The sound of the little bell ringing in its turret welcomed Alison and Hughie to the church. The ban on bell-ringing, declared soon after the war had started, had been lifted once the threat of invasion was thought to be safely past and a few months ago it had been announced that church bells could be rung again on special occasions. Even so, a lot of churches remained silent because there were no ringers, but the bellrope at Milton Combe needed only to be pulled, and the choirboys competed for the honour. Today, the young son of one of the local farmers was tugging away at it, a beaming smile on his face, and as the parishioners walked up the church path, they turned, wishing each other a happy Christmas, and Alison smiled back, feeling warmed by their friendliness.

  Most of those at the airfield would be at Yelverton, where there were a Methodist chapel and a Roman Catholic church as well as St Paul’s, but Alison liked to join in whatever went on in the village. She had already begun to wonder if she and Andrew might settle here once the war was over and he left the RAF, but that seemed to be too far in the future to consider seriously. All the same, she played with the idea that she belonged here, in this pretty, stone village, and that these people singing carols with her really were her friends and neighbours.

  May and her mother and grandfather were just across the aisle. They nodded and smiled as Alison and Hughie took their seats, and she felt warmth and peace touch her heart. There was something about this small church that gave her comfort in an increasingly troubling world, and she knelt to pray, with Hughie beside her.

  Afterwards, she walked up the steep hill with the Prettyjohns. They parted at the corner with a kiss and good wishes, and then Alison and Hughie walked on alone towards the cottage.

  ‘Uncle Stefan!’ Hughie said suddenly, and she looked up to see the tall, fair-haired Polish pilot strolling towards them. She quickened her pace and they stopped, facing each other.

  ‘Happy Christmas,’ Alison said, and he nodded and bowed his head slightly.

  ‘And I wish you a happy Christmas too, Alison.’ He glanced down at Hughie. ‘And did Saint Nicholas come to visit you last night?’

  Hughie looked doubtful. ‘Is that the same as Santa Claus?’ His face cleared when Stefan nodded, and he said eagerly, ‘Yes, he did. He brought me lots of presents. I’ve got a Typhoon, look.’ He took the wooden toy from his pocket and swooped it through the air. ‘I’m going to have a real one when I grow up, like my daddy.’

  Stefan looked down at him gravely and Alison caught the thought behind his eyes. ‘I know,’ she said quietly. ‘I hope not, too.’ She hesitated, then said, ‘Weren’t you flying last night? I’d have thought you’d be in bed now, making up for lost sleep.’

  ‘I slept for a few hours. Then I woke up and thought, It’s Christmas Day. I began to think about home …’ He paused. ‘When that happens, I find it’s best to go for a walk.’

  ‘Oh.’ Alison looked at him. The pale face was drawn and the fine grey eyes shadowed. ‘You’re thinking about Christmas with your family.’

  He inclined his head again. ‘I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t help remembering happier times, when we all spent Christmas together. The decorations, the music. It all seems so far away – so long ago.’

  Alison rested her hand on the top of the gate. It was a cold morning. The ground was hard and frozen, and a bleak wind blew across from the Sound. She looked at the pilot and said, ‘Why don’t you come in? I’ll make some coffee. We’ll have to be quiet, because Andrew’s asleep, at least, he was when we went out, but we can talk in the living room.’

  He hesitated. ‘I don’t want to intrude on your Christmas.’

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ she said warmly. ‘You’ve been invited to come this afternoon anyway, and I expect some of the others will drop in too. We’re hoping for a party tonight. It will be nice to hear more about your Christmases at home – that’s if you don’t mind talking about them.’

  His eyes met hers. They were the colour of ice on the sea – a pale grey with tiny flecks of green and blue somewhere in their depths. He looked away from her, out towards the broad, cold horizon, and then said simply, ‘No. I don’t mind talking about Christmas at home. Perhaps it will bring my family closer for a while.’

  They went through the door and Hughie immediately tugged Stefan by the hand, taking him into the living room where Alison had set up their tiny Christmas tree. There were no lights, but there were a few bright glass baubles kept from former Christmases, and she had made ginger-bread biscuits and hung them amongst the branches, together with a few scraps of coloured paper cut into the shapes of stars. The room was strung with paperchains that she and Hughie had spent hours glueing together during the past two or three weeks, and there was a row of Christmas cards propped along the oak beam over the fireplace.

  When she came back from the kitchen, bearing a tray with coffee and warm milk, Hughie was still showing Stefan his presents. She set the tray down.

  ‘Do you have Christmas trees as well?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ he said. ‘We have very tall ones in all the public squares and smaller ones in our homes. All of them are lit and decorated – we use biscuits, like these, and wrapped chocolates and fruits and nuts. And on the top we put a shining star. The star is a very important part of Christmas, because it was a star that led the Three Kings to the stable where Jesus was born.’

  ‘And do you have presents on your tree?’ Hughie asked. He cast a longing look towards the tree standing on the deep windowsill. ‘There are some presents on ours, but Daddy says we’re not to have those until tomorrow.’

  ‘That’s just because he thinks it will be nice to have something else to look forward to,’ Alison told him and he pushed out his lips but said nothing.

  Stefan said, a little apologetically: ‘We have presents from our tree on Christmas Eve. Saint Nicholas comes to us then – he’
s dressed in the same way as your Father Christmas, but we call him the Starman. We have our main celebration then, you see – Wigilia, we call it. The whole family comes together to eat good food at supper. We begin as soon as the first star appears in the sky. Remember that the winter is very cold in Poland, with deep snow on the ground by Christmas, so many of the guests will arrive by sleigh.’

  ‘With real reindeer?’ Hughie asked, his eyes enormous as he listened, and Stefan laughed.

  ‘No, we use horses, with little bells fastened to their heads.’

  ‘Jingle bells!’ Hughie cried, hopping up and down with excitement. ‘I know that song!’

  ‘I do too,’ Stefan said. ‘The others have been singing it in the mess.’

  ‘Do you have carols? We’ve been singing carols in church. I like “Once In Royal David’s City” best, because it’s about a boy,’ Hughie said, and when they both looked at him he added impatiently, ‘The boy David. He killed a giant.’

  ‘Well, not at Christmas,’ Alison began, but Stefan laughed and she decided to shelve Hughie’s religious instruction for the time being.

  ‘Yes, we have carols. We call them Koledy.’

  ‘Tell us some more about – what was it you said Christmas Eve was called?’ Alison asked.

  ‘Wigilia,’ he said. ‘Well, there’s a lot of preparation for it, just as there is here. We start during Advent, with special church services every morning at six. And the women bake the peirnik – a honey cake which they make in all kinds of shapes, like stars and animals and hearts, and little models of Saint Nicholas himself. We hang mistletoe over the door to ward off evil, and place wheat in the corners of the room to drive away unhappiness and to remember that our Saviour was born in a stable. And the Gwiadorze – the star-scarriers – wander from village to village, singing carols or putting on puppet shows and nativity scenes.’