The Pathfinder (20 page)

‘What a dreadful job.'

‘She doesn't seem to mind too much. The idea is that Berlin will be built again from the bricks they reclaim. It must make it seem something pretty worthwhile, at least.' Useful was the word she had used. He could see her, in his mind's eye, sitting at the wobbly dining table. ‘It won't last for ever. So long as the western Allies can hang on in Berlin, the city has a reasonable chance of economic recovery. There'll be decent jobs eventually. She's well educated so she should be all right. The kid brother's the real worry. He's pretty ill. I doubt he's going to make it through the winter. I'm trying to arrange for him and the grandfather to be flown out, along with the other children and old people we're evacuating from our sector.'

‘That's good of you, Michael.'

He shook his head. ‘I'm not sure it's even going to be possible. They live in the wrong sector: the Russian one.'

Celia's parents' large Georgian house was on the other side of the village. He delivered her to the door and politely refused her mother's enthusiastic invitation to go in for a drink. She was as keen on an engagement, he suspected, as his own mother.

As he turned in through the gateway to his own home and saw the lights shining in welcome from the windows, he was conscious, again, of how fortunate he was. He had been born in the house, born with a silver spoon in his mouth some might say, and lived a privileged life of comfort and stability with devoted parents. He hoped that he had never taken it all for granted.

His mother had opened the front door before he got out of the car, his father close behind her. The dogs came to greet him – Muffy the ancient Labrador arthritically, Brandy the new liver and white springer spaniel puppy bouncing around as though she had springs on her feet.

A log fire had been lit in the drawing-room fireplace, the silk-shaded lamps switched on, the long chintz curtains drawn against the dark. His father opened a bottle of champagne. The return of the son: the only son and now the only child. He glanced at the silver-framed studio portrait of Elizabeth, Harry and Benjy in their prominent place on the sofa table. His sister sat with Harry beside her and Benjy on her lap and they were all smiling straight at him. He turned away. Even now, nearly eight years on, he found it painful to look at them.

The fishmonger had come up trumps with some sole fillets for dinner and there were fresh potatoes and vegetables from the garden and an apple charlotte afterwards. His father had opened a bottle of Pouilly-Fuissé. He ate and drank appreciatively, knowing the trouble that had been taken for him. It wasn't long before his mother brought up the subject of Celia.

‘How was she, darling?'

‘She seems very well.'

‘Did you have dinner?'

‘Yes. At a French restaurant. It was pretty good.'

‘That must have been very nice. She's been promoted recently – did she tell you?'

‘No, she didn't mention it.'

‘I'm sure she's frightfully clever at her job – whatever it is. Just the sort of girl they like to have. She's coming on Sunday, isn't she?'

‘Yes, she said she'd love to.'

‘Her parents are coming too, so it will be rather a lovely get-together.'

She was watching him covertly for any hopeful sign; any hint he might drop that an engagement was in the offing. He wished very much that he had been able to give her that pleasure. Instead, he changed the subject.

After dinner, when his mother had gone to bed, he sat by the fire with his father, smoking and drinking a brandy saved for special occasions. They talked of Berlin – military talk that his father craved since his retirement: tactics, strategy, means. His father expounded his theory.

‘The big mistake we and the Americans made was letting the Russians take the city. We were lagging behind them, of course. The German counter-offensive in the Ardennes in December had held us up and they gave us a real mauling there, but then the Americans found that bridge intact at Remagen and were over the Rhine by mid-March. The Germans had started surrendering in their thousands and by the end of the month we were only two hundred miles from Berlin. We should have pushed straight on. Top speed.'

‘Was it as simple as that?'

‘Yes, it damn well was. Montgomery wanted to go on and take the city but Eisenhower vetoed it. For some reason he didn't consider it strategically vital and he listened to Stalin. Excellent chap, Eisenhower, in many ways, but Stalin had him tied up in knots. So the Russians went in full steam ahead and the damage was done.'

His father saw the airlift as a military operation that would stand or fall by its efficiency. ‘And there's no room for any compromise or shilly-shallying with the Russians, Michael. Pointless trying to placate them; they're slippery as hell. If they ever get control of western Berlin, the city's completely finished.'

He said, ‘So far as I can see, the Russians want a separate Communist East German state with Berlin as the capital.'

‘Damn right they do. Do you think the western Allies can hold out over the winter?'

‘I believe so. If the weather gives us half a chance. The will to is certainly there.'

‘How about the Berliners? The ordinary civilians? Are they going to cave in if the going gets really rough?'

‘I don't think so. A few of them don't believe we've a hope of getting through the winter and are ready to give up. You know the sort of defeatist attitude: better a live dog than a dead lion . . . that kind of thing. But I think most of them will hold fast. They've had plenty of blandishments served up by the Russians to try and persuade them to give up the fight but, so far, they've resisted.'

His father grunted. ‘Well, you have to hand it to them for guts, that's true. I'd never deny that. Fine soldiers. Bloody brave. Never cared much for them as a race, though – arrogant bastards. Can't trust them any more than the Russians, in my view. Of course, I can see the sense in propping them up against the Commies, but I must say it sticks in my craw a bit the way the Allies are falling over themselves to nursemaid them. The Yanks are handing out shoals and shoals of dollars to the very chaps who got us into the bloody mess in the first place. All this country got left with for its considerable pains was the Lease-Lend bill and a mountain of debts. It'll be years before we're back on
our
feet.'

He went on at some length, delivering judgements and putting the world to rights. Harrison wondered if he would eventually, in his turn, become like his father – entrenched in his views. Set, like concrete, in his ways. Whether he wasn't, in fact, pretty much like him already? Another brandy and the subject of Celia came up again. His father didn't waste time beating about the bush.

‘Your mother's keen for you to settle down, of course. Perfectly natural. She seems to think you and Celia might make a go of it.'

‘I'm afraid I may have to disappoint her.'

‘Rather a pity. She's a first-class girl. You'd be a fool to pass her up, in my opinion, but, of course, it's entirely your call. You can't marry someone just to please us.' His father sighed. ‘The trouble is your mother's never really got over losing Elizabeth and the boys, you know.'

‘I realize that. None of us has.'

‘Quite. Only, unfortunately, she's pinned all her hopes on you and she's very fond of Celia. Well, we both are. Very fond. The only thing I would say, Michael, is for God's sake be careful to pick the right one. If you want to get on in your career, don't go and marry some woman who's going to be a disadvantage to you. Know what I mean?'

He knew exactly what his father meant. Changing the subject, he said, ‘I ran into a chap in Berlin who was at school with me. Someone called Nico Kocharian.'

‘Odd name.'

‘His father was Armenian. He speaks about eight languages and says he worked for British Army Intelligence Corps during the war. Would you be able to check up on that for me? Find out if he really did.'

‘Something fishy about him?'

‘I'm not sure. He's started up some kind of publishing business in the Soviet sector, doing school textbooks. It seems genuine enough, on the face of it, but he's an odd bird and I'm rather curious. I mentioned him to our Intelligence lot, of course, but they didn't seem too worried.'

‘They're a law unto themselves, in my experience. You won't get anything out of them, either way. Play their cards close to the chest. But I can at least find out if he
was
with the Intelligence Corps. I'll get on to one of my contacts. Still keep in touch as much as I can. A finger on the old pulse. I'll let you know what I turn up.'

Before he went to bed Harrison stopped by the bedroom that had belonged to Elizabeth. It was much the same as when she had occupied it: the same furnishings and furniture, her books in the bookcase, the same pictures on the walls. He stood for a moment, remembering. She had been eight years his senior and he'd worshipped her devotedly when he was a child, trotting around after her like a small dog. As he had grown up, the devotion had stayed because she was one of the best people he knew. And when she had married and Harry and Benjy had been born, he had become a devoted uncle, revelling in the role. On leave from the RAF one day in January 1941 he had gone to visit them at their house by Wimbledon Common. He'd taken a present – a box of tin trains and track that he'd managed to find in a toyshop. He could see the boys running full tilt to greet him – and how excited they'd been about the trains. He'd got down on his hands and knees with them on the sitting-room floor. They'd built a long tunnel from books and a platform from wooden bricks and co-opted lead soldiers as passengers. The game had gone on until their bedtime. He remembered how reluctant they'd been to stop; how they'd called good night to him through the banisters as they had trailed upstairs; how they'd smiled and waved as they had reached the landing, before they turned away. He'd left later that evening to get back on duty. By midnight the London air raid had taken place. The house had received a direct hit from a high explosive and all three of them were dead: Elizabeth, Harry and Benjy. Tom, Elizabeth's husband, had been away serving in the Navy. A few months later he'd been lost at sea when his ship had been torpedoed by a U-boat and gone down in the Atlantic.

He shut the door on the room and the painful memories and went on to his own room. In bed he lay awake, thinking about Lili. His father would certainly place her in the category of women who would be a disadvantage to his RAF career. Not just a foreigner, which would be bad enough, but a
German.
A former enemy. A girl who worked as a labourer on the streets, who had a brother who was a black-marketeer and who lived in a rat hole in Berlin. His mother would be dismayed and appalled; his father trenchant in his disapproval. But whatever they might think made no difference to him. It was, as his father had so correctly pointed out, his call.

Saturday passed agreeably. He slept late and strolled down to the pub for a pint before lunch. No matter how long he had been away or however grim his experiences, the ‘White Hart remained the same. Same greeting from the same landlord, same regulars, same sort of talk, same sense of well-being and a mutual understanding that never needed putting into words. At lunch his father noticed the German watch and disapproved. ‘Wouldn't be seen dead wearing that, if I were you, Michael. Not very good form.' He went on wearing it, nonetheless.

On Sunday they went to church and sang familiar and well-loved hymns, ‘Praise my soul the King of Heaven', ‘Thy hand, O God, has guided', ‘Now thank we all our God', and listened to the vicar who had so annoyed his father by saying special prayers for the people of Berlin. This time he was preaching on the safer subject of faith, assuring his congregation that faith could move all obstacles in its path, even mountains. Harrison only half listened, his mind not in a fourteenth-century church in the English countryside but miles away in the ruins of Germany.

His mother had invited a dozen or so locals in for drinks after church, including, of course, Celia and her parents. He circulated dutifully, refilled glasses, lit cigarettes, made pleasant and innocuous conversation. Celia's mother buttonholed him for some time. He liked her well enough but he sensed that she was demonstrating a special claim on him and, after a while, he excused himself and moved on. Across the room, he could see Celia talking to his father and laughing at something he had said; it was very obvious that they got on extremely well and it was equally obvious what was expected of him, what they all hoped. Mrs Millis, the doctor's wife, fully recovered from her gallstone operation, laid an inquisitive hand on his arm.

‘Is this little gathering for something special, Michael? I heard a rumour . . .'

‘Not as far as I know,' he said. ‘Can I get you another sherry?'

When the others had left, the two families sat round the table and his father poured his best claret. The butcher had excelled himself with a joint of beef. Roast potatoes, Yorkshire pudding, Brussels sprouts, queen of puddings to follow. A celebration. They raised their glasses to him, smiled at him:
welcome back, Michael
.

After lunch, his mother asked him to take the dogs for a walk. ‘They could do with a run, poor things. Celia will keep you company while we old fogies sit down together.'

He concealed his irritation at the blatant manoeuvre with some difficulty. She meant well, but he was selfishly glad that the weekend would soon be over and he could escape back to London. They set out across the field behind the house with the two dogs. Celia had borrowed a pair of his mother's wellingtons and had tied a scarf round her hair – an expensive silk scarf that she wore loosely knotted at the point of her chin. She matched his pace, striding freely along beside him with her hands dug deep in her coat pockets. The field was surrounded by gentle hills and wooded valleys and the dying sun, with the fireglow light of autumn, had turned the trees to copper and gold. There was nothing in the world, he thought, more peaceful and lovely than the English countryside. During the war, the mere idea of it being desecrated by German tanks and jackboots had often spurred him on; he imagined that others had felt the same. Old Muffy stayed at their heels but the puppy raced off to explore the hedgerows. They reached the far end of the first field and stopped at the closed five-barred gate. Celia leaned against it, admiring the view. This is where I'm supposed to propose, he thought wryly. Not on bended knee in the mud, perhaps, but it would be the perfect moment and a perfect place to bring up the subject. He wished he could think of something decently truthful to say that would not hurt her feelings.