Wartime Family (22 page)

She judged it to be about forty feet long, made of wood and more generally termed a gentleman’s motor yacht. It had a wheel house standing proud of a teak deck. Its hull was white, relieved with stainless steel stanchions and a broad mahogany toe rail.

Guy took their bags, threw them aboard, and then turned to help her on. Lizzie shivered.

‘Are you cold?’ he asked as he took out a key.

‘A little.’

He smiled. ‘Never mind. You’ll soon be warm. I’ll turn on the gas and rustle up a cup of tea. OK with you?’

‘Lovely.’

The inside of the boat was surprisingly cosy. It had a small stove for heating and cooking.

‘I keep mostly tinned stuff,’ he said, opening and shutting cupboards as though food was of the utmost importance.

She stood watching him, aware that his action was based on nervousness more than hunger.

‘Why have you brought me here?’

‘I told you. We both need a change.’

‘You’re out to seduce me.’

‘Don’t be silly.’

‘You can stop pretending.’

‘Pretending? What do you mean?’

‘You can stop pretending that you’re intent on cooking up a meal. Anyway, I’m cold, not hungry. I want to be warm. I want to be cosy.’

He stopped what he was doing. The strong face was soft with surprise and a hint of indecision. The wing commander – the organizer – looked unsure of what to do next.

‘I’m cold,’ she said again, wrapping her arms around herself and holding his eyes with her own.

‘Are you sure?’ he said softly.

She nodded.

Falling into his arms was easy. Falling into bed was just as easy.
It’s only afterwards that things will get difficult
, Lizzie thought. But for that moment they were in a world of their own. There would be time for guilt afterwards – tomorrow or the day after that.

His voice had deepened to a brandy-brown rasp as his hands explored her body. He was slow and gentle, almost as though he supposed it was her first time, which, of course, thanks to Peter, it was not.

Anticipation had covered her body like a smattering of dew before the sun sucks it dry. His thighs were rough against hers, his loins applying pressure, easing off and applying again as he eased into her.

His hair fell over his forehead. She licked at his chin as he moved above her, relishing the hardness of his body against hers.

‘Don’t ever regret this,’ he said between deep, captured breaths.

His eyes held hers. At first she considered it an odd thing to say. Later she would understand.

The cabin was dim, but a small porthole let in enough light by which to study his features. He buried his face against her neck, the rhythm of his movements breaking up as he began to lose control. A similar sensation travelled over her body, throbbing and pulling him inwards until they finally shuddered to a nerve-tingling halt.

They lay replete, studying each other’s features, touching each other’s hair, each other’s lips; each other’s throat.

‘You have lovely hair,’ she said, coiling a loose lock around her finger and drawing it into her mouth. ‘I think it was your hair I fell in love with first,’ she said languorously. ‘Though it might have been your eyes.’

He had a relaxed smile and his eyes were half closed. ‘You don’t sound too sure. Now I know beyond doubt that it was your feet I fell for first.’

She laughed. ‘My feet?’

He cupped her face with one hand. ‘That first day you were lolling on a bench with your shoes off. I saw your feet before I saw the rest of you.’

‘That’s hardly the stuff love songs are made of – “I fell in love with your feet!”’

He frowned and tried to look grim, though a smile flickered at his lips. ‘Then the songwriters and poets of this world need to look at feet more closely. Surely there’s at least one who’s moved by the sight of a girl’s wriggling toes? Come on. Think of all the poems you’ve read. There must be one.’

Mentioning poetry brought Patrick to mind. He was the only poet she knew, the only poet whose work she’d read without having to, simply because she enjoyed it. The guilt came too, and Guy saw it.

‘You knew a poet?’ His voice softened.

‘Yes. A friend.’

He ran his fingers down the length of her spine. ‘Do you still hear from him?’

‘Sometimes,’ she whispered.

She flexed her spine, surprised at how quickly she was becoming aroused, wanting him all over again.

‘Is he …?’

‘Shush,’ she said, placing her fingers over his lips. She didn’t want to hear this; she didn’t want to be reminded that she and Patrick had had something of an understanding.

‘Make love to me again,’ she said, kissing him.

Much later, food was again suggested.

‘Tinned beef, tinned beans, and fresh bread,’ he said, handing her the cans from the cupboard.

She heated up the food on a small gas ring while he buttered the bread and laid the table.

‘You’re very domesticated,’ she told him.

‘Practice,’ he said with a smile.

She eyed him knowingly. ‘That’s what I thought.’

Once he’d realized what he’d said, his smile melted. ‘Yes. I’m married, but …’

Lizzie had a great urge to put her hand to her heart. Had it stopped beating? She held her breath as she waited for him to continue, aching to hear the words that came after the ‘but’.

‘We got married just as war was declared. It was kind of a spur of the moment thing. Since then we’ve both realized that marrying was a mistake. So now we aim to do something about it.’

‘I see.’

He passed a plate to her. She filled it with the contents from the saucepans.

‘You know you’re not just a passing fancy,’ he said, the fingers of his free hand encircling the nape of her neck.

My, it feels so delicious!
Of course she wasn’t just a passing fancy. She closed her eyes, wanting this moment to go on for ever. Never mind food. Never mind anything. All she wanted was him.

She waited for him to say the word she wanted to hear.

‘We’re going to get a divorce.’

Lizzie refrained from sighing but a great sense of relief swept over her. He had said it.

The whole car-driver unit had been transferred to Ainsley Hall and Lizzie was again sharing a room with Margot. As she tiptoed across the cold floor in the early hours of Monday morning, Margot’s head popped up.

‘You’re back.’ She rolled over and switched on the light. ‘My, you look rosy faced. Did you have a good weekend with your brother?’

The question took Lizzie off guard. ‘What?’

‘You told me you were off to see your brother.’

Margot adopted a searching gaze when she guessed she wasn’t being told the truth. Her eyes darkened as she focused thoughtful attention to the shifty way Lizzie tried to collect herself.

‘Have you got something to tell me?’

‘Of course not,’ said Lizzie, shaking her head.

Margot propped herself up that bit more. ‘Well, I’ve got something to tell you. Bessie’s had a miscarriage, poor thing, and lo and behold, the silly girl contacted her ex and suggested that they get back together.’

‘She’s willing to forgive him?’ Lizzie was a little surprised, but if Bessie cared for the chap that was her business.

‘She was indeed. Unfortunately his wife wasn’t.’

‘His
wife
?’

‘That’s right, my dear girl. Our Romeo had a wife that he forgot to mention. Not that I’m that surprised. A virile man can suffer severe memory loss when there’s no wife to rein him in.’

‘You make men sound like horses,’ said Lizzie as she began to unbutton her jacket.

‘Absolutely, darling,’ said Margot with a wry smile. ‘Stallions. They’re all stallions.’

Lizzie felt Margot’s eyes following her around the room, but refrained from meeting her enquiring gaze. Her whole body was tingling in the aftermath of Guy’s lovemaking. Yes, he had a wife, but as he’d told her himself they’d married in haste at the outbreak of war and now they wanted a divorce.

‘Well, I say, that’s not army issue,’ said Margot once Lizzie was stripped down to her underwear. She was wearing a soft pink bra and French knickers that Peter had given her, taken from stock at his family’s haberdashers and ladies’ outfitters.

They were far skimpier items than the army was ever likely to issue. She bent her head so that Margot wouldn’t see her blushing.

‘I brought them with me.’

‘They’re very delicate.’ Margot’s eyes continued to follow her with the kind of scrutiny usually reserved for only the best from Harrods. ‘Difficult, I should think, when you’re in a bit of a hurry.’

Lizzie folded her blouse and put her jacket on a hanger. ‘Difficult? Why do you say that?’

Pulling the bedclothes more closely around her, Margot began to settle back down. ‘Because you’ve put them on back to front.’

Lizzie gasped and slumped down on the end of her bed.

‘Are you sure there’s nothing you’d like to tell me?’ asked Margot, peering at her from over the bedclothes.

Lizzie groaned. ‘Oh, Margot!’

Margot sat up, the bedclothes pulled up to her chin. ‘Come on. Tell me all about it.’

Lizzie covered her face. ‘I’m a fool. I’m a bloody fool!’

Margot didn’t contradict her but sat silently, waiting for her to explain. Margot was a good listener and knew when to keep mum.

Their eyes met, not so much in mutual understanding, but as though they knew the time was ripe for secrets to be shared.

‘I think it was the way he looked at me over undrinkable cider that finally swayed me. And his voice, of course.’

She held back on the more intimate details, like the way his voice dropped an octave lower when aroused, or the way he’d driven the car that day, one hand draped casually over the wheel.

Margot eyed her silently.

‘Am I a fool?’ Lizzie asked her.

Margot thought about it for a moment. ‘Yes,’ she said at last. ‘You are. But then, you’re not the first and you won’t be the last.’

‘Don’t ask me not to see him again.’

‘I won’t. You must please yourself.’

‘I will,’ said Lizzie with a firm thrust of her chin. ‘I love him and he says he’s getting a divorce.’

‘Fine,’ said Margot, tucking a strand of escaped hair back into her hairnet and snuggling back down.

‘You don’t sound as though you believe him.’

‘Of course I do, darling. And by the way, Patrick phoned.’

‘Patrick? What did you tell him?’

‘Exactly what you told me, that you’d gone away for the weekend with your brother.’

The tingling that had lasted until she’d got into bed suddenly vanished. Whatever happened she had to keep Patrick away from Harry, at least until she’d had a chance to straighten things out.

Michael read the letter from his Marianna more closely and more often than he did the German transcripts he was expected to translate. His brows furrowed in a deep frown and the fact that he hadn’t heard the command to fall in brought him to the attention of Major Swinburn, Head of Section.

Even when the major’s shadow fell over him, his thoughts were still in Bristol.

‘Are you with us, Maurice?’

Michael looked up and blinked.

The major smiled like a snake with lockjaw. ‘Bad news from home, Maurice?’

Michael slid the letter back into the envelope and the envelope back into his pocket as he got to his feet. ‘Just a personal matter, sir. I’m sorry.’

The major rolled his shoulders and jerked his head forward until their noses almost touched. ‘You will be!’ he snarled. ‘Now salute, you Kraut bastard. Salute or I’ll have your stripes.’

Michael didn’t want that to happen. Recognizing the quality of both his work and his leadership, he’d been awarded a corporal’s stripe a few months after arrival. He’d been complimented on his dedication to duty, sometimes working until late in the night to get a job done. A few of the others in his unit were also of German extraction, though none had got caught up in the tide of events in Germany as he had. Nowadays he felt ashamed for having loved uniforms so much; perhaps it would have been different if he’d confined his obsession to Boy Scout uniforms, but in Germany things weren’t like that. One uniform had led to another. Eventually he’d found out what that uniform had stood for.

The major was not his favourite person and the major’s feelings were likewise. There was something about the major’s whispery-thin moustache, the light blondness of it, the mean amount of hair above an equally thin set of lips.

The translation unit was attached to the Bletchley Park complex. Harry, who had always been good at crosswords, worked in the code-breaking department and they sometimes met in the canteen.

Harry greeted him jovially, but his smile vanished once he noticed Michael’s grave expression and the letter clenched in his hand. Michael did not protest when Harry took the letter from his hand and read it.

He shook his head and eyed Michael across the table. ‘She can’t be serious.’

Michael shrugged. ‘Absence does not always make the heart grow fonder. Sometimes it breaks things apart.’

‘But to go back with my father?’

‘For the family’s sake, she says.’ Michael shrugged. ‘I suppose I can understand that.’ He hid his face in his hands. ‘Damn Hitler! Damn Churchill! Damn the bloody lot of them!’

Harry glanced nervously around him. ‘Steady on, mate. You can damn Hitler all you like, but don’t let anyone hear you doing the same to Churchill. You’ll be hanging from a gallows before you know it.’ Harry laughed as though it were a huge joke.

Michael couldn’t bring himself to laugh. ‘I have to see her,’ he said, his blue eyes meeting those of the son of the woman he loved.

The laughing stopped. Harry eyed Michael thoughtfully. Her mother deserved this man and this man really did love his mother.

‘Can you get any leave?’ he asked, his expression serious now.

He sighed heavily and shook his head. ‘There’s too much going on at the moment.’

‘I know,’ said Harry. ‘What with a war at sea and people sick with the flu. This winter was very cold.’

The two men exchanged the same conspiratorial look; the Bletchley nod as some people called it. Each knew what was going on in radio chatter and coded messages, but only their own small part in it. Exchange of information between sections was not encouraged.