For All Our Tomorrows (51 page)

‘Mummy! Mummy!’ Drew was jumping up and down with frustration, desperate to gain her attention. ‘You don’t understand, Mummy. Daddy was a
spy
.’

‘Don’t be silly darling. Look, you really should go to bed. You too, Jenny.’

Drew ignored the instruction. ‘He let me look through his telescope sometimes, though he would never take me up on the headland. That’s where he used to watch for enemy ships and submarines, and the French navy, no, no the French fishing fleet. Boats that caught men instead of fish. Would they use nets, do you think, Mummy? And he used to come and tell me all about his ‘ops’ when he came home. He told me once that he could get shot for what he’d done. Did he do something really nasty, do you think, Mummy?’

A small silence stretched out for several long seconds after this somewhat garbled explanation, then Hamil Charke calmly remarked, ‘Watch what you say, son.’

‘But the war’s over now,’ Drew said in his piping, innocent voice, ‘so I don’t have to keep it a secret any longer, do I? It doesn’t matter any more.’

‘It does if you tell porkies, darling. I’m sure Daddy didn’t do any such thing. Spy indeed! You’ve been reading too many adventure comics.’

The little boy was appalled that no one believed him. ‘But it’s true. It is, it is. He said that he went over to France lots of times on trips in his boat. Dozens and dozens. Rupert Bear flies to France in his little plane. I like listening to stories about Rupert Bear. Does Charlie fly a plane, Mummy? Did Daddy do a bad thing? He wasn’t a traitor, was he? I read about traitors in my William books.’

Sara hunkered down. ‘Hush Drew, darling. You’re getting overtired and rather excited. The French were on our side during the war, so how could Daddy be a traitor? And it would be much too far for him to go over in his boat to France, not as often as you say. I think you must’ve misunderstood.’

‘No, I didn’t!’ Drew gave a weary sigh as if in despair over the stupidity of adults. ‘He saved lots and lots of lives. British pilots escaping from the Nazi’s. He told me.’

Cory said, ‘The boy might be right but this radio transmitter does seem to indicate something much more serious than saving British pilots. Somebody should p’rhaps talk to Iris. Where is she? I haven’t seen her around for a while.’

‘Gone home to Truro to live with her mother.’

‘Or so we’ve been told,’ said Hamil darkly.

Drew piped up again, determined to be heard. ‘He used to get cross with me when I asked why I couldn’t go with him instead of Iris, but once he brought me back a French flag, for my collection. I’ve still got it in my room, so I
know
he went to France, all the time. He helped agents escape the Nazis. He called them evaders. Except one time he must’ve done something wrong, cos they all died. The only good thing, he said, was that they weren’t British, they were only Americans. He didn’t like Americans. He told me, Mummy, he did, he did. He said he was glad he’d killed them. Pow! Pow! Do you think he used a gun? He made me swear to keep it a secret. And I have Mummy, I have.’

 
Sara was staring at her son in dismay, struggling to understand the full implication of what he was saying, but something was buzzing in her head, like an angry bee, and she couldn’t seem to take in a single word.

Cory instructed Jenny to be a good girl and go and fetch her mummy a small glass of sherry. ‘She’s had a bit of a nasty shock.’ Then he patted the boy’s head kindly. ‘Don’t worry, we believe you, son. Your dad is a very brave man, and no, I don’t think for one minute he shot any one with a gun, not even a Yank. Now look at what Grandpa has fetched for you, a nice sherbet dab from the corner shop, one each for you and Jenny. Now do you take that up to bed with you, for a treat.’

‘Ooh, thanks Grandpa, can I, Mummy?’

Sara nodded, too numbed to speak. The only rational thought in her head was a question, quite a silly one in the circumstances.

Had it all been innocent then, all those hours he’d spent with Iris? Perhaps they hadn’t been having an affair at all, but working together as British agents?

If that was so then she was the one entirely in the wrong, the one who had betrayed and ruined their marriage, just as Hugh had accused her of doing. And her husband was a hero, after all. But what was all this about dead Americans? Sara didn’t seem able to take any of that in, not properly. She just felt sick, dreadfully, dreadfully sick.

‘Goody, goody, come on Jenny.’ Drew was saying, then just as he turned to run off upstairs, he delivered his final bombshell. ‘I don’t know what Iris was saying on the wireless, Grandad, ‘cos she was using funny words.’

Cory softly enquired, ‘Do you mean funny French words, like the fishermen who come up the river, son?’

‘No, course not,’ said Drew with weary impatience, already unpeeling the paper off his sherbet dab. ‘She talked to the wireless transmitter thingy in German, like that man on the proper wireless does sometimes. Iris was a
German
spy, Grandpa, not a French one. Come on, Jenny, don’t take all day.’

Chapter Fifty

‘Where are you staying tonight?’ Bette asked Chad, quite casually, as she shut up the salon.

Chad cleared his throat. ‘I was thinking mebbe I’d find me a room at some hotel or other in town. Where do you suggest?’

‘You gotta be joking. You couldn’t afford the charge. This ain’t some two-bit, one-horse town, ya know?’ Her mock American accent was strong and he glanced at her in pleased surprise.

‘Hey, you got that real good.’

‘Maybe I’ll make a Yankee war-bride after all, ‘cepting that, strictly speaking, we aren’t man and wife yet, not so’s you’d notice.’

‘We been through the ceremony.’

‘There’s a bit more to being married than that, wouldn’t you say?’

‘Uh-huh! What do you reckon we ought to do about that? Don’t want to scare you off.’

She was leading him up the stairs. ‘Who said I would be? I don’t scare easy.’

Big Fat Josie had insisted on minding Matthew for the evening. ‘It’ll give you young ‘uns time to talk,’ she’d said. Without all that fussing and wailing from the nipper. I’m only next door, so I’ll bring him over later. Much later.’ And she’d given a huge, roguish wink.

Chad was following her into the tiny living room. ‘I was worried you might prefer to go back to England and marry Barney instead.’

‘If I’d wanted Barney, I’d have stayed and married him when I had the chance. Probably would have been a big mistake but I wasn’t quite so stupid as to make it. Anyway, we’ve been through all of that. Why bring Barney into it all over again?’

‘He’s a real man. He’s got two arms.’

Bette drew the blind and the room was bathed in a cool, green glow. Chad wasn’t looking at her but she would have been a fool not to recognise the heartrending vulnerability in those words. This was obviously still an issue for him, still creating a block. ‘When did it take two arms to make love to a woman?’

‘Aw, Bette. Don’t make fun of me.’

She pulled him round to face her, grasped his face between her two hands. ‘Look at me, Chad Jackson. You’re my man, right? I’ve travelled half round the world to be with you, borne your child, survived your family’s maltreatment of me, and I’m still here. I’ve stuck around. Does that convince you that I’m not leaving? Not now, not ever.’

As she talked, she was unbuttoning his shirt, sliding it off his shoulders.

‘Hasn’t it occurred to you that maybe I hung around because I was still hoping that you’d come calling one day? So don’t for one minute imagine that you aren’t the handsomest man in the whole world to me, and the number of arms you happen to possess, doesn’t matter a damn.’

She was tugging off the vest he wore underneath the shirt, before turning her attention to the buckle of his trouser belt. It wouldn’t come loose and he had to help her. And all the while she was kissing him, sliding her mouth over his, pressing herself close against him.
 

‘Barney Willert still doesn’t get a look in, however charming he might be. Maybe when we first got together, you and me, we were both a bit insecure, me having left home and family, you with your injuries.’

She pushed him down on the bed and he gave a low moan. But she didn’t lie down next to him. Not yet. It was a warm, sunny day in June, the semi-tropical heat turning their bodies slick with sweat in seconds whenever they moved. She slid out of her cotton frock in seconds and sat astride him clad only in her French knickers. ‘But that’s all in the past. Now we have a second chance, an opportunity to get it right this time, and, thanks to Big Fat Josie, pretty good employment in the form of a business to run. What could be better?

She chuckled as she said this. ‘okay, I can think of one or two other things which might be a bit more exciting that we could be doing right now.’ Bette wasn’t even wearing a brassiere in the heat, and lifting his hand she smoothed it over her firm young breasts, hearing the low groan deep in his throat as he did so.
 

‘So can I.’ He reached for her then but she leaned away from him, making him wait. ‘I should have said rather than serving behind the counter in a general store, but I’m sure we can make something of it, if we work together, don’t you reckon?’

‘Aw, Bette, I’d do anything for you. It sounds great.’

She sank on to him now, rubbing herself against him, skin to skin. ‘And we can always find something more interesting to do to pass the time when we’re not working.’

She helped him to take off the false limb, unstrapping it above the elbow, and when the purple-scarred, floppy, loose section of boneless flesh which had embarrassed him so deeply was finally revealed, she kissed it. She stroked the severed stump, the scarred flesh, heard his small sob as she did so. She knew that it pained him still, for all the arm no longer existed. She remembered how she would often wake to hear him quietly crying in his sleep, or jerking and sweating and fighting the bedclothes as if he was batting out a fire. She’d calm and quieten him, hold him close and even sing softly to him as she would a child, until he slept peacefully again.

She didn’t try to soothe him now but deliberately set out to excite and captivate him. Bette kissed and fondled him, took his penis in her hand, savouring the velvety feel of it even as it hardened to her touch.

She stood up above him, slid down the satin knickers, then tossed them to one side. ‘Can’t you see anything about me that might interest you? Nothing at all worth touching, even after all this time? Don’t you know what an agony it was, Chad, sleeping beside you night after night and you not laying a finger on me? I began to despair that you ever would touch me. It’d drive any girl wild.’

She dropped her voice to a seductive purr. ‘And like I say, you’re still a handsome man, arm or no bloody arm.’

He reached for her then, pulling her hard against him so that he slid inside her as sweetly as she remembered. She rocked and pushed and felt him throb inside her, his hand still roving over her, caressing her breasts, her neck, her throat, his eyes greedily taking in every detail of her lovely body, marvelling at her beauty, at the satin smoothness of her milk-white skin, the pinkness of her flickering tongue as he kissed her over and over again.

Chad didn’t know how he’d resisted her all those long and lonely nights, so fearful of her revulsion and rejection he’d put all hope of love making from his mind. Now he couldn’t get enough of her, wanting, needing her more than seemed right and proper.

He pulled her beneath him, taking her with such force that Bette gasped with shock and the sheer pleasure of it.

That afternoon, they reached heights of passion she’d only ever dreamed of. Afterwards, replete and entwined, they slept a little until the cool of evening woke them. Then Bette sat up, her expression thoughtful.

‘There’s just one thing left for you to do. Don’t move, don’t get dressed, just wait for me here.’

She pulled on her cotton frock and skipped down the steps. Within minutes, she was back. In her arms was Matthew. Chad made to get out of the bed but she ordered him to stay put. And he did, his eyes fixed on the baby as Bette placed the infant on his knee.

‘There you are, Chad Jackson. Meet Matthew, your son. That’s what we are after all, your family.’

He gazed upon the child, ran a finger over the soft curve of his cheek, gazed into the wide brown eyes, alert with curiosity, and so like his own. ‘Aw Bette, did a guy ever have as sweet a gal as you, and as fine a son as could be found anywhere in the country, in the whole damn world. Have you any idea how much I love you both?’

Bette chuckled as she pulled off the dress once more and snuggled in beside him. ‘I hope I’m going to have many years in which to discover how true that is.’

Chapter Fifty-One

It was the longest night Sara could ever remember. She’d talked to her father about these revelations for some hours before, finally, he and Hamil had gone off to inform the authorities. In any other circumstances none of them would have paid any credence to the ramblings of one small boy, but the wireless transmitter was a physical presence before their very eyes, providing evidence for the child’s words.

Not that Drew understood the significance of what, exactly, he’d accused his own father of doing: that if Iris was a German spy, then Hugh might be too. Like all other small boys who had grown up during war-time, it had all been exciting fun, and fiction and reality had become rather mixed up.