When the Sky Fell Apart (38 page)

But at some moments when they exchanged meat for money, with a queue of bone-thin faces clamouring outside the shop, something had passed between them. A look of perhaps not camaraderie but
comprehension
.

Carter went to Hacquoil's early in the morning, once the usual post-curfew rush had died down.

Clement didn't look up from sharpening his knives when Carter entered the shop.

‘Bouônjour.'
The butcher's water-logged voice crackled but Carter had become accustomed to ignoring these sounds that punctuated his speech.

‘Good day, to you, Clement. How are you this morning?'

‘Weary, Doctor. It's this arm, keeping me awake. I thought scars had no feeling in them, but these itch in the night. I have to wear mittens to keep from scratching myself raw.'

‘I'll see what I can do. It may be that Edith Bisson has something to help you.'

‘I appreciate that, Doctor. Thank you. I'll have a half a chicken sent over to Royal Square later. Can't spare a whole one, but the Commandant will be happy with half. And I'll let him know it's on account of you. Your help.'

‘Many thanks, but that won't be necessary. I don't find myself at Royal Square much these days.'

Clement stopped sharpening the knives for a moment. ‘Oh?'

Carter affected a light-hearted tone. ‘Yes, he has no…need of me at present.'

‘No
need
of you?' Clement leant across the counter. His fixed grin gave the impression that he found everything amusing, but his eyes were dark. ‘That's not a position you want to find yourself in, is it?'

Carter managed to squeeze a chuckle through gritted teeth. ‘Oh, I'm not concerned.'

Perhaps it was just the slant the scars lent his face, but Clement suddenly seemed to be assessing Carter, weighing him as one might judge a lamb shank. Then his lips stretched as wide as his tight, shiny skin would allow.

‘Good man. Can't change a thing by worrying, can you? So, what can I do for you then, Doctor?'

Carter drew the shoes from his medical bag, placed them on the counter, between the chicken necks and the pigs' trotters.

‘I wish to exchange these for as much meat as you can give me. Preferably dried stuff.'

Clement laid down his knives and looked at Carter as if he had never seen him before.

‘And what would I be doing with those fancy shoes then? Up to my ankles in sheep guts in finest leather? A right picture I'd make.'

Carter flushed. Why was the man being so obtuse? Perhaps this was some sort of test?

‘Well, of course I did not…intend them for
you
. I merely hoped you might be able to…
trade
them. On the black market. For some decent meat.'

Clement glared. ‘I don't know what you're on about, Doctor. Now, I'm busy, if you don't mind?
À bétôt
.'

And damn the man if he didn't turn and walk back behind the curtain and into his own house. Left Carter standing there, staring at those bloody shoes. It was as if Carter had proffered the decomposing carcass of a rat, squashed by a bicycle.

Briefly, he considered shouting after Clement, but instead he made an obscene gesture at the curtain and felt immediately foolish, even though the shop was empty. He stuffed the shoes back into his medical bag and left.

Once outside, a sudden chill twisted his guts. He leant against the wall and wondered how he could have committed such a grave error. If Clement was not involved in the black market then he'd essentially just incriminated himself.

You damned fool.

He was under enough suspicion because of the sulfa tablets. Once news of this event reached the Commandant's ears, Carter's death sentence would be expedited; he was quite sure of it.

But
how
could he have been so misinformed? Before the islanders had stopped coming to him altogether for medical care, numerous patients had mentioned Clement's involvement with the black market. And Carter himself, while he was collecting meat for the Commandant, had seen Clement whispering to islanders: the sort of back-alley mutterings that had left him in no doubt that an illicit bargain was being made.

He began perspiring most unpleasantly, a trickle of sweat creeping down his spine. He removed his coat. However, the sun wasn't yet up and the sea seemed to radiate cold. He quickly grew chilled and began to shiver as he walked home.

Along the seafront, the sky was a tarnished, metallic grey, and the land, too, seemed to be shaded a dull monochrome: loops of barbed wire marked the
verboten
areas, overgrown by sprawling weeds; nature cared nothing for man's edicts. The wire was coiled in neat spirals: a jagged reminder of the unspooled viscera of Hitler's dream.

Suddenly, Carter felt a hand tap on his shoulder. It was Hacquoil's young daughter, a small, sickly looking child, who had run barefoot after him and now stood, shivering.

Her voice was barely more than a whisper. Carter strained to hear her above the wind.

‘Does your mother or father need me?'

He pointed at his medical bag and mimed putting on a stethoscope, as though he was talking to a deaf-mute.

She shook her head. Carter leant in closer and caught her words: ‘Papa says to come now. But through the back door, sir. Into our house, not the shop. Don't be seen, he says.' And then she ran back, her feet slapping on the cobbles.

Carter stared after her, then glanced about. The street was quite deserted.

After a jittery minute of hesitation, he walked around to the back door of the butcher's house. It was bordered by a small garden, immaculately kept rows of vegetables, untouched by the soldiers. He knocked lightly on the door, which was opened immediately by the same girl.

Hacquoil was seated at the table in the cramped kitchen, staring off into the distance. He rubbed at his hands repeatedly, at that skin that had melted and fused together.

‘Doctor,' he said, standing up. ‘You're a bright man and I owe you my life…but what on
earth
were you thinking?'

‘I don't follow.'

‘Coming in like that. Setting your shoes—
those shoes
, which the Commandant gave you—on my counter, bold as brass, and then shouting about the black market for all to hear.'

Carter's stomach dropped. ‘Forgive me. I've clearly misunderstood. I believed you had dealings with the…black market. I apologise if…'

‘For Christ's sake man, stop quibbling. Sit down.'

Hacquoil wiped his chin and gestured at the chair opposite him.

‘You've not caught the wrong end of the stick. I buy and sell and trade without the Germans knowing—or sometimes with the soldiers themselves. It takes all sorts.'

‘I see.'

‘But there's a
way
of going about it. What if some fellow had seen those shoes—'

This was too much; the butcher was treating him like a bloody idiot. ‘But there wasn't a soul there, Hacquoil. I made sure of that. What sort of clown do you take me—'

‘And what if someone had walked in at that moment, eh, with us having a cosy chat about the black market, and
those
shoes, those
bloody
shoes, sitting on the counter?'

A vein pulsed at Hacquoil's temple. On his disfigured face, it gave the impression that the thickened skin itself was shifting.

‘So,' he said, finally. ‘It's meat you're after then? Dried stuff, you say?'

Carter felt a hot surge of relief. ‘Oh, so you
will
trade then? Thank you.'

‘I'll do what I can. No promises. It's short notice.'

Carter nodded vigorously. ‘Of course.'

‘It's risky. Putting a rush on things. But as it's you and…' He held his hands out again, gestured at his distorted face.

‘Thank you. I'm most grateful.'

‘You haven't seen what I can find you yet. But it's meat you're wanting?'

‘Yes, yes…ah, mostly. Dried—cured where possible. In any case, meat which won't spoil easily.'

Silence for a beat or two, Hacquoil's eyes suddenly watchful. ‘Need it to last a while, do you?'

Carter leant back in his chair, tried to look nonchalant. ‘Putting a bit by, you see, for winter. But I'd like a decent amount. Enough to give out to patients, if they need it.'

Hacquoil blinked.

‘Or anything you can find,' Carter said, hurriedly. ‘I know times are hard.'

The butcher drew out a pencil and notepad from a drawer and, after wedging the pencil into his shiny claw, scribbled a few notes in what looked to be some sort of shorthand.

‘Tomorrow morning,' he said, ‘before curfew—so you'll need to tread quietly, keep a lookout.'

Carter nodded, mouth too dry to speak.

Hacquoil narrowed his eyes and gave him that measuring look again. ‘You could have it over a few weeks, you see, the meat? You'll get a good amount for shoes like those. The parcel will be heavy.'

Carter squared his shoulders. ‘I would like it all together, please. I will manage.'

Hacquoil nodded, scribbled something else illegible. ‘Off on your travels somewhere then, are you?'

Carter went cold. Then he saw Hacquoil had shaped his face into the grimace that now passed for a smile. Carter forced himself to chuckle.

‘Haha! Ah, yes. Fancied a short holiday—while the weather holds.'

They laughed together at that, though Carter felt queasy.

Despite his trepidation, the next morning went smoothly as Carter collected the large, heavy parcel and returned home. He walked briskly and managed to avoid the patrols.

Once home, he drained the dregs of his last bottle of whisky. High tide was two days away.

THE day before they were set to leave, Edith walked halfway around the island, seeing as many folk as she could. She gave Mrs Fauvel some bladderwrack for her arthritis. The old woman wheezed and scowled as she told Edith that Lucy Tadier had been caught sheltering a Russian prisoner of war.

Mrs Fauvel's hands were like claws. They quivered as she spoke and her eyes were bright with horrified excitement.

‘Battered her door down in the middle of the night, if you'd believe it? Hundreds of soldiers, so they say. Dragged them out into the street—her kicking and screaming; him yelling fit to raise the dead. They'll shoot him and it'll be a boat to Lord knows where for her, poor love. Bailiff Coutanche tried to persuade the Commandant to send her to Gloucester Street Prison instead, but he was having none of it.'

Edith tried to keep her face smooth, but the tale cut close to the bone, and her voice sounded too high-pitched—she knew it.

‘How did they find out? The soldiers?'

‘Ha! Well, how does anyone find anything out these days, my love? There's those with poison pens that spend their days writing letters to the Commandant.'

Edith hurried home to make sure a hundred soldiers hadn't battered down her door in search of Gregor. But all was quiet, apart from Maurice fretting, packing and repacking.

The darkness plummeted from the sky, same as ever. Edith wondered if it would do the same in England, or if she might have to live the coming months and years without watching the sun sinking into the sea every evening, as if the ocean were extinguishing it. Long ago, people on the island used to believe that the sun drowned itself daily and was born afresh each morning. Did English folk have such beliefs thrumming in their blood? She'd never asked any of the sunbathing tourists, before the war.

When Edith tried to talk to Maurice about how things might be in England, he grunted and kept on with his fussing. About the children giving everything away with noise and chatter, and how they were going to gather enough food to last the journey and so forth.

In the end, Edith said, ‘The children will hold their peace and we've plenty of food. Stop faffing.'

But when she thought on it, taking Francis with them was foolishness. Besides, they'd be stealing him from his mother and the idea didn't sit well with her.

She found Claudine out in the living room: the girl was using scraps of fabric to teach Francis his colours but he shouted ‘Bloo!' for every colour and then Claudine tickled him under the chin.

Edith took Claudine's hand and told her, without mincing her words, that Francis would stay. Edith had expected hysterics and protestations and bargaining, but she'd forgotten how quickly the war had forced Claudine to grow up.

The girl nodded. ‘I knew we couldn't take him.' She used her grubby sleeve to scrub the tears from her cheeks. ‘I
knew
… I just wanted to make believe for a while.'

Edith leant in and kissed her wet cheek. Her heart could have cracked in two at the girl's bravery. ‘He will be safe here. Hans won't hurt him. And we'll come back one day, you'll see.'

The darkness in Claudine's eyes struck Edith to the quick. ‘Make-believe is for children.' She wiped her eyes again and gave a shaky sigh. ‘I'm not a child anymore.'