When the Tripods Came (11 page)

• • •

Martha sold more gold to get Swiss money, and we took a train to Interlaken. The track ran beside the lake, which stretched as far as the eye could see. The day had started cloudy but now both sky and lake were clear and blue, with just a few clouds over the mountain peaks on the far side. Pa had a relaxed look. There was plenty to relax from—the hijack, fear of the plane crashing, and then the business at the airport. Things were different in real life from television—the gunshots more deafening, the blood brighter red and spurting horribly.

As I was thinking there was also, for him, the prospect of being with Ilse again, he said to Angela, “We’ll see
Mutti
in a few hours. I wonder if she’ll recognize us after all this time.”

“Of course she will,” Angela said. She was eating an apple. “It’s not that long.”

Martha was looking out of the window. Between us and the lake there were houses, with children playing, a frisking dog, smoke rising from a chimney.

She said, “It has a nice safe look. Do you think we’ll be given that extension?”

Pa stretched. “I’m sure of it. You get the bureaucrats at airports. Local police are different.”

The train stopped at Lausanne, where the timetable scheduled a thirty-minute wait.

I asked Pa, “Can Andy and I have a look around? We’ll be back in plenty of time.”

“Better not, just in case.”

I thought quickly. “I’d like to see if there’s something I can get as a present for Ilse. It’s her birthday next week.” Angela wasn’t the only one who could play that sort of game.

He hesitated, but said, “All right. As long as you’re back in a quarter of an hour.”

Martha said, “I don’t think you’ll be able to buy anything with English money.”

“I was wondering if you’d change some for me?”

“And how long before I’m able to use what I change?” She smiled and fished in her wallet. “But I suppose I asked for that. Twenty francs—it’ll have to be something small. You’d better have a bit to spend, too, Andy.”

Angela said, “And me.”

I said, “No. You stay here.”

“If you’re going, I can.” Her eye had a steely look. “It isn’t fair if you get a present and I can’t. She’s my mother!”

I argued, but didn’t expect to win. Martha gave her twenty francs as well, and she tagged after us while we explored the station. We found a little shop, and I wondered whether to get Ilse chocolate, or a doll in peasant dress. While I was deciding, Angela bought one of the dolls, so it had to be chocolate. There were two sizes, at nine francs and nineteen.
I asked for the smaller, then changed my mind and picked the other.

I’d been vaguely aware of people gathering near us. The voice immediately behind startled me.
“Sales Anglais!”
I knew that was French for “dirty English,” but if I hadn’t, the tone of voice would have given me a good idea.

He was about sixteen, tall and dark-skinned, wearing a red jersey with a big white cross, the Swiss national emblem. There were others with similar jerseys in a mob of a dozen or more, mostly about his age but a couple younger, and one man with a gray beard who looked about fifty. Those that didn’t have jerseys wore red headbands with white crosses.

Andy said quietly, “Let’s get out of here.” He moved towards the platform, but the tall boy blocked his path.

Another, shorter and fair-haired, said,’“What are you doing in our land, filthy English?”

Andy said, “Nothing. Going back to the train.”

Someone else said, “Filthy English on clean Swiss train is not good.”

“Look,” Andy said. “That’s twice we’ve been called filthy English.” He’d raised his voice. “The next one gets hit.”

There was silence for some moments. I thought he’d got away with it, and Andy must have, too. He pushed forward against the tall boy, forcing him to give ground. A gap in their ranks opened, but only for a second. One grabbed his arm and swung him
round; another kicked his leg viciously, bringing him down.

As he fell, Angela screamed. I caught her arm and pulled her in the opposite direction. They were concentrating on Andy, and it looked as though I might succeed in getting her away, but Angela yelled again and I saw the man with the beard grabbing her from the other side.

After that there was confusion in which I kicked and punched at shapes around me and got kicked and punched in return. One blow to the neck made me stagger and struggle desperately to keep on my feet. I’d had a glimpse of Andy on the ground, grunting as they kicked him.

I had my arms over my face, trying to protect myself. There was shouting, mixed up with the boom of a loudspeaker announcing trains. I realized the punching had stopped, but flinched as someone seized me roughly. I opened my eyes to see a gray-uniformed policeman. Two others were lifting Andy, and the red jerseys were scattering into the crowd.

Angela seemed unharmed. Andy was bleeding from the mouth, and there was a cut over one eye and another on his cheek. When I asked him how he felt, he said, “No sweat. I’ll live. I think.”

The police escorted us back to the train. I told Pa what had happened, while Martha cleaned Andy up. The police demanded details of our journey, and checked passports.

During the scrutinizing, Pa asked, “What are you going to do about them?”

“These children are your responsibility,” the senior policeman said. He had a round face and small eyes, and spoke English slowly but well. “You have permission to proceed to Fernohr. Report to local police on arriving.”

“I wasn’t talking about these children.” Pa was chewing his lip again. “The ones who attacked them—what are you doing about
them?”

“We do not know their identities.”

“Did you make any attempt to find out?”

“And we do not know if there was provocation.”

“Provocation! The children were buying presents for their mother—who happens to be Swiss—when they were called filthy English and set upon. I thought this was a civilized country.”

The policeman cocked his head, small eyes staring.

“Listen, Englishman. This
is
a civilized country. And a country for Swiss people. We do not need foreigners here. Do you wish to make a complaint?”

Martha said, “Forget it, Martin.”

The policeman rocked on his heels. “If you wish to make a complaint, you must leave the train and come with me to police headquarters. You will stay there until my superintendent is free to see you, and discuss this complaint. I do not know how long that will be, because he is a busy man. Well, Englishman?”

Pa said, tight-voiced, “No complaint.”

“Good. Make sure that no one of your party causes more trouble. I wish you a safe and swift journey—back to England.”

As the train started, Pa said, “I don’t understand it.”

Martha said, “I never did like the Swiss.” She added, “Apart from Ilse, of course.”

Andy said, “I did say I’d hit anyone who called us dirty English again. That’s when they came at us. I’m sorry if it caused the trouble, but I didn’t see how I could have just listened and said nothing.”

“No,” Pa said. “I know what you mean. But we may have to do just that—listen and say nothing—in future. It’s a different kind of xenophobia from the brand we found in Guernsey, but it’s still xenophobia.”

Angela asked, “What’s zenner-foe-be-ar?”

“Fear of foreigners. Fear and hatred. It can be valuable, protection for the tribe, and it can also be nasty. It’s a funny thing. On the surface what we saw in Guernsey seems better—people just wanting to be left alone to live their own lives—while here it’s aggressive: a positive urge to attack foreigners. But this one’s healthier. The Swiss have wrapped themselves up in being Swiss and hating anyone who isn’t. It’s tough on us, but it may be a good protection against the Tripods.”

He and Martha went on talking about it as the train picked up speed. We could see the lake again, flat, calm and peaceful, with two or three small boats
and an old-fashioned paddle steamer making stately progress towards Geneva. I was thinking of my part in the proceedings. I’d tried to get Angela away because she was a girl (and my half sister) and needed protecting. That had also meant leaving Andy to the mob; I hoped he understood why. One eye was nearly closed from the swelling round it. He saw me looking, and winked with the good one.

• • •

Pa had telephoned Ilse from Geneva, and when the train stopped at Interlaken she was on the platform. She kissed Martha and hugged Angela, but her eyes over Angela’s shoulder were on Pa. Then she and he moved towards one another slowly. She put her hands out, and his hands took them. They stood close together, smiling, for some moments before he kissed her.

It was Ilse who eventually broke away. She was smiling and crying at the same time. She turned from my father to look at me.

“Lowree,” she said. “Oh, Lowree, I cannot say how good it is seeing you again.”

She came towards me, and I put my hand out.

“Good seeing you, too.”

It was funny. I’d put my hand out so she wouldn’t kiss me, and I hadn’t thought I meant it about being glad to see her. But in a way I was.

Fernohr was a little mountain village, built round a single road with a wooded slope above it on one side and a staggering view down into a valley on the other. The road from Interlaken ended there, or practically ended. It continued up the hillside as an unpaved track, giving access to half a dozen dwellings, and finally to the Gasthaus Rutzecke.

The first Rutzecke house had been built by Ilse’s grandfather as a vacation spot for the family, but between the world wars her father rebuilt it on a larger scale, as a guesthouse. It had eight bedrooms and a couple of lounges, and a terrace in front where there was a telescope and a pole flying the Swiss flag.

The Swigram had stopped operating it as a guesthouse when the Swigramp got ill. The only person living there apart from family was a handyman called Yone, even older than the Swigramp. He also
looked after the animals—chickens and two cows that ambled round the sloping meadows with bells round their necks—and shot game for the pot. He had an old shotgun he tended lovingly.

The Swigram was white-haired and plump. She spoke little English, and seemed a bit in awe of Pa and more so of Martha, who spoke to her kindly but rather in the way she’d spoken to the daily help back home.

There was snow the second day, but it thawed almost immediately. Ilse said it was warm for the time of year. I looked longingly at the rack of skis in one of the sheds, and meanwhile Andy and I explored around. The terrain was fairly dull above the chalet, cropped grass and boulders, but more interesting below the village, where there were pine woods and some good climbs. The lake was visible down in the valley, and we could watch boats crossing, through the telescope. It was coin-operated, but the box was open; so you just put the same twenty-centime piece through over and over again.

We also helped Yone with the chickens and cows. The chickens sometimes laid astray, and we had to hunt for the eggs. And the cows had to be found and brought in at night. I tried to talk him into letting me use the shotgun, but he wouldn’t. It wasn’t a wildly exciting life, but pleasant enough. The Swigram was a better cook than Martha, too.

Her husband, the Swigramp, lay all day in the big double bed in their bedroom, except in really good
weather when she and Yone moved him into a daybed on the balcony. I sat with him sometimes but never knew what to say, and he didn’t talk either. But he always smiled when Angela came into the room. I didn’t know if he had any idea what had brought us here, or if he even knew about the Tripods.

Swiss radio and television were in French and German; Ilse had to tell us what they said was happening in the outside world. It seemed that in most places the Capped were now in charge, but the Swiss weren’t worried. For hundreds of years they’d been surrounded by dictatorships and empires and such, and had managed to disregard them. They had the protection of their mountains, and an army in which all male citizens served. The Tripods were a nuisance, but so had Napoleon and Hitler been. They felt all they needed to do was sit tight and go on being Swiss.

They were taking some precautions. They’d rounded up their local Trippies at the beginning and put them into camps under armed guard. The few who had escaped the original sweep and tried to distribute Caps were quickly caught and imprisoned. Ilse, who had only seen things from the Swiss viewpoint, was sure the Tripod craze would soon die away. Pa wasn’t so optimistic, but hoped the Swiss might be able to cut themselves off from the rest of the world, as an oasis of freedom.

In the village we at first encountered similar anti-foreign
feelings to those in Geneva and Lausanne. The villagers made a point of ignoring us, and the shopkeepers—there was a combined dairy-bakery, and a general store—were surly and unhelpful. When it came to renewing our permit, the village policeman, a man called Graz, hesitated a long time. In the end he said he would stamp a renewal only because we were related to the Rutzeckes: the Swigramp was well known and respected.

Some of the local boys carried things further, and followed us, chanting insults. One of the leaders was Rudi Graz, the policeman’s son. He was only thirteen but well built, and he picked on Andy in particular.