Work Text:
Chapter 17
A decision had been made and was never to be regretted. Through the crisp air of early morning, Laurie returned to hospital incandescent and lit up at both ends (as Alec had once said of Ralph), and found himself hard put to simulate the concern that one would expect from a man called away to a family emergency. Later that morning, Alec dropped by. Hardly anything was said: the look in Laurie’s eyes was enough; and there were too many people around. However, later in the afternoon, when he headed out for his usual walk, the tall Sister stopped him to say that Mr Deacon had arranged a late pass, adding that she hoped his great-aunt would soon be better. He managed to mumble something suitable, and suppressed his laughter until he was most of the way down to the ground floor. There he paused in the stairwell until he could straighten his face to walk through Casualty to the street.
As he took the short walk to Ralph’s flat, he did not see the gloom of the unlit streets. By now, he was familiar with the route, with the narrow bay windows at the front of the house, with the ring of the bell, with the call to come up—uttered solely for the sake of the landlady, for the door was always unlocked at this time of afternoon. It opened for him, and he walked into Ralph’s arms.
Later, much later, as they lay together under the sheets, he remembered the great-aunt. Ralph laughed.
“So Alec knows.”
“About us?” Laurie paused thoughtfully. “We didn’t exactly have the opportunity to talk; but….”
“He sees further than most.”
In the gloom of the black-out curtains, Laurie dimly saw Ralph reach to the bedside table, and then the flash of his lighter. The glow of the cigarette beside him seemed comfortably familiar: two lovers in bed, as if they had been together for years. He saw their future with a newfound clarity.
“At some point,” he said, carefully casual, “we are going to have to think about dinner. I came away before the hospital meal (not that that’s a loss); and I don’t imagine you’ve eaten either.”
He expected another restaurant, and was surprised when Ralph took him round to the local chippie. They walked back through the chill, the heat of the fish warming their hands through the newspaper, and ate quickly and easily in Ralph’s rooms, with greasy fingers and time to tumble into bed and make endless love.
The next two days split his life. The dawn broke over his iron hospital bed; and he chatted over breakfast with Mervyn, whose mother came by during the morning visiting hour to briefly and dutifully make her usual promise to take him home tomorrow. He discovered a common interest in cricket with the horsy little man (who did not, he found, have anything to do with stables, but was a carpenter); and struck up a long discussion of the Cotswolds with a middle-aged salesman, struck by a lorry during the black-out, for whom he fetched a glass of water while the Sister was out of the ward. The post arrived, though rarely with a letter for him. And, in the afternoon, there was his regular session with Miss Haliburton for massage and electrical treatment, after which his leg felt delightfully relaxed for his walk to Ralph’s.
“I’ve been assuming I can move in here for a few weeks once I’m discharged,” he said, curling an arm round Ralph’s shoulders in bed. “That’s if there won’t be trouble with your landlady.”
“There’s no sofa,” said Ralph consideringly, and Laurie thought of the two overstuffed tapestry armchairs in the other room. “On the other hand, offering a bed to a wounded warrior—just the sort of thing to appeal. I’ll scrounge round. Someone’s bound to have something we can use.” Laurie thought of the daily subterfuge of rumpled pillow and folded blanket, then realized how out of keeping that would be. Any place where Ralph lived would always be ship-shape and bristol fashion.
“Once term starts, it’ll be another matter,” he said.
“The course will be over in mid-January, anyway,” said Ralph. “Whether they’ll send me for more training or I’ll get posted, I don’t know yet.”
“I’ll have to send for my books—I told my mother not to unpack them, I knew I might need to. I’ve a lot of catching up to do.” Laurie smiled in the dark. “Give me something to do each day till you come home,” he added, and leant over to kiss Ralph’s shoulder. “Better things after that,” he murmured. Ralph laughed, put a hand under his chin to lift his head, and gave him a kiss. One thing led to another; and, late pass or not, Laurie almost didn’t make it back to the ward before lights-out. The Night Sister looked at him gently and asked after his great-aunt; and it took him a moment to remember.
It was the following day, mid-morning, when he was summoned to the Almoner’s Office. Wondering what this might be about, he found a small, bird-like woman with a brisk forceful personality, who informed him brightly that his transfer back to the E.M.S. hospital would be on the usual six-thirty bus. “And you don’t need to worry. I’m forwarding your stepfather’s letter,” she added. Laurie lost this in the shock of the news.
“I thought I was being discharged,” he said, drained to the lips.
“From the hospital, dear, yes.” She looked at him closely. “Did you bang your leg? You look a little pale.”
For a mad instant he was tempted to say that he’d injured himself coming down the stairs and had to remain for more treatment. He thought better of it: Miss Haliburton (to whom, he was told, he should report for one last session) would detect no knot in any muscle, and no doubt clear him for departure.
He would, he thought once safely on the other side of the door, have just enough time to tell Ralph in person. Fortunately, nothing held him up at the station.
“It buggers up everything,” Laurie finished, dismayed by their shattered plans.
“That’s the army for you,” said Ralph, stifling his own regrets. “As far as they’re concerned, you’re still a soldier serving your country, under orders to go where you’re sent. Not,” he added ruefully, “that the Navy’s any different.”
“I assumed, when they said ‘discharged’, it would all be over and done with.”
“Well,” said Ralph, “you can’t expect the army to take a civilian doctor’s word for it. Major Ferguson didn’t actually give you your papers when you came into Bridstow, did he?”
It was a real question, and Laurie shook his head. “I just assumed.”
“There’s no way that Bridstow General Hospital can release you from the army,” said Ralph, a little amused. “I’m sure it’s in the works; but you were, after all, sent here for intensive treatment, it’s done you a world of good, and now they want to take a look at you and see for themselves.”
“He operated on me himself,” Laurie said scornfully. “Does he think my leg’s suddenly grown an inch back on it?”
“No, but I’m sure he has paperwork to fill in—and rules and regs to follow.”
Ralph’s tone was that of a man with inutterable patience, and Laurie snapped.
“It’s not bloody fair!”
“Oh, if you’re expecting fair,” said Ralph dismissively.
It was all acutely frustrating. There was no time for all they would have liked to say, nor do; yet Laurie lingered as long as he dared, knowing that he did not need to return to pack. The sum of his personal possessions amounted to little more than the few precious letters tucked in his pocket and a book or two; and he walked to the bus with his new kit bag slung half-empty over one shoulder, the better to manage with the cane. He still had not been issued a greatcoat to replace the one lost during the evacuation at Dunkirk, and might never walk fast enough to keep warm in the winter. The bus was a welcome sight, already loading when he got to the square.
He found a seat, spotted two men he knew from Ward B, and made the inevitable joke about bad pennies before anyone else could. To his surprise, Rodgers remembered that his mother had been about to be married, and asked how the wedding had been. He obliged with a few choice words about his father-in-law and details of the food at the reception. This segued naturally into reminiscences of pre-war culinary delights that would never come from the kitchen at the E.M.S. hospital, and from there they shifted to the shops in Bridstow. More than one man had been hunting a suitable gift to send to his wife or girlfriend, parents or younger siblings, and deplored the war-time selection.
The bus jolted along the country lanes to the hospital through a gloom made darker by the blacked-out windows. When it drew up by the gates, the others made their way up the path and dispersed to the huts; and Laurie reported in. To his shock, he was told he’d been reassigned to Ward A, his bed having already been filled by a new patient. Ward A had its own routine, its own society. “Won’t make much difference,” said the Staff Sergeant, with a remarkable lack of feeling. He had, of course, spotted that the limp and the cane were still present. “You’re bound for discharge anyway.”
Laurie crossed the asphalt to the other hut, knowing that Rodgers and Lowell would have already told Ward B of his return. The Night Nurse pointed him to an empty bed near the end, and he dropped his bag on the familiar, shrilly new, red-and-blue patterned counterpane, the same on each bed in each hut. Faces were turning to the newcomer. He realized that he knew most of them, though those chronically bedridden were less familiar and he was unsure of all the names. He was greeted; they were friendly, and seemed not to have heard the rumours that had poisoned the last couple of days before his transfer to town. How long it would be before they were told about him, he didn’t know: it would happen sooner or later, he knew; he supposed he would learn when their faces changed and they stopped talking.
Early mornings were always taken up with breakfast, ward minutiae, and small talk; and patients were discouraged from wandering until after rounds. Laurie had nursed hopes that this would bring Major Ferguson, an examination of his leg, and the swift rubber-stamping of his discharge papers. Being an old hand, he was not desperately surprised that it did not. It was, however, rather irritating to find that rounds were taken by one of the junior doctors, with the Major nowhere in evidence. Nor, of course, was there an explanation of his absence (hospitals do not explain to patients, nor the army to a mere corporal), and a tentative query about his own future merely brought a brisk and cheerful assertion that all was doing well and they would see when the Major got back.
When Laurie finally was free to wander over to Ward B, he found it changed. A fair boy with a pug nose lay in the bed by Reg’s that had once been his; and darker skin lay greenly drained against the white pillow where Charlot had slept. From the door, he saw Neames, and Jansen, and Edwards; saw thrown back sheets on the bed that had once been Willis’s; and looked for Reg, who would also soon be going home. For a moment, not seeing him, he feared that their ships had passed in the night—that he, like Willis, had already got his discharge papers and left. Then he heard Reg swear, down at the end of the hut.
Laurie started down the aisle between the beds, fielding grunted greetings from people he had once known for months. At the sound of his voice, Reg rose to his feet.
“Hey, Laurie. Heard you were back. How’d you like your taste of civvie street?” The tone was unexpectedly genial; and Laurie realized that, in his absence, a status quo ante had somehow been re-established.
“Oh, there’s no place like home,” he said, and heard no irony.
At the end of the hut were several pages of painted newspaper lying on the floor. Precisely where the red and green pigments had come from, he could not imagine. Lowell was squatting down, slicing even strips into piles; Reg had clearly been pasting them into interlocking loops.
“It’ll look great,” he said, holding up a length of garland proudly. “Ward A has nothing so good yet.”
This was undoubtedly true, as Laurie could attest. Reg set aside the garland, which Jansen took over, and the pair of them went outside. Laurie said what he’d been thinking, that it was still a little early to be putting up decorations. “I’d have thought Christmas Eve,” he said. It was two weeks away and more.
“Ah,” said Reg, and his face fell. “That’s for young Silverstein. Chap in Charlot’s old bed. You saw him?”
Laurie thought of the green-faced boy. “He looked in a bad way.”
“Too true. Some are even saying there’s a curse on that bed. Unlucky, you know.”
Laurie nodded, without comment.
“We thought getting the decorations hung might cheer him up. Brighten the place, give a bit of holiday spirit. Put some iron in his pecker, you never know.”
The notion rather startled Laurie. “You do realize,” he said tentatively, thinking of the name, “that he’s probably Jewish. They don’t celebrate Christmas.”
“Oh, sure,” said Reg, quite unconcerned. “I know that, of course. Hanukkah, that’s what they have. There’s a Jewish couple has the shop on the corner of our street at home. But since none of us here know much about how they keep their holidays, we figured we’d give him some of ours, instead.”
It was clearly well meant.
“Didn’t expect you back, though.” This was said in an oblique way that clearly invited more.
“You know the army. Crossed wires, red tape.”
“Too true,” said Reg, and added, “Must be odd seeing the old place…with someone else taking your bed, like.”
“Been a few changes here, I agree.” It was trite, but safe.
“Haven’t there, though! You’d never think it’s just been a couple of weeks. Place is damned quiet without Willis around, let me tell you. Left on the afternoon bus, same day you did.” Laurie nodded. “Be going myself the day after tomorrow,” Reg added with no little satisfaction. “Be home for Christmas.”
Though Laurie could see no blessing in coming home to Madge, he had no doubt of Reg’s delight in the resumption of his marriage. In any case, he would naturally want to see his son.
“Took a pass into town a couple of days ago,” Reg confided. “Got presents, an’ all. Not much in the shops, but picked up a nice bottle of perfume on the cheap. Found a second hand train for our boy.”
“That’s bit of luck,” said Laurie, knowing that toys must be in short supply with the war on. He did not comment on the cheap scent, though it struck him as quite suitable for Madge, who would no doubt be delighted. “I might be out of here by Christmas myself, don’t see why not.” The probability of returning swiftly to Bridstow and Ralph lifted his spirits.
There seemed surprisingly little more to say. Their farewells had already been made; and each, in his own way, had already moved on.
Heading reluctantly back to Ward A, Laurie was walking along the covered way, barely needing the cane on the asphalt surface, when he was hailed excitedly from across the square. He turned, looking past the ambulatory patients taking exercise on the sere grass, to see Nurse Adrian almost breaking into a run as she came towards him. She was pathetically glad for his transfer back to the E.M.S. hospital; and her overbright smile and little light, involuntary pat on his uniform blouse as they talked reminded him why picking up their acquaintance was not, perhaps, really all that wise. She wanted to know all about the wedding; and her ‘all’ was rather more comprehensive than Rodgers’ had been on the bus the previous night. He found himself trying to recall exactly what his mother had been wearing. Indeed, ‘wearing,’ he thought, rather described the whole conversation. By the time her duties pulled her away, he was hard put to it to remember that, only a couple of months before, she had been the confidant with whom he could talk most readily and easily in the days before the c.o.s had become fixtures. Andrew had changed all that, he thought as he walked on. Andrew had changed a lot of things.
According to Nurse Adrian, Major Ferguson had gone into Bridstow for a meeting with his opposite number at the general hospital. Privately, Laurie was annoyed by this (though he said nothing to her) for the man could surely have fitted in a brief examination of his leg at the same time and spared him the absurdity of these transfers back and forth. The inefficiency of the army struck him again, as it had many times before: as always, there was nothing he could do about it. By mid-afternoon, the Major still had not returned, and his leg had still not been examined for the record.
It was starting to get dark, and Laurie returned to the ward, setting his stick against the locker by his bed. Like the other ambulatory patients, he made himself useful around tea time, even helping to shift dirty crocks to the kitchen, though he was nervous lest he trip and smash the lot. There, he found Derek, washing up. The scene was painfully reminiscent, in a way that the little c.o. could never have intended. He turned, wet cloth in hand, to smile at Laurie, who felt compelled perforce to pick up a dish towel to assist.
“Oh, you don’t need to do that,” Derek exclaimed.
“I used to help Andrew,” Laurie said.
“Yes, of course you did.” Whether this was mere conversation or actual knowledge, Laurie couldn’t tell; but, with a pang, he recalled other instances where Andrew had passed on to his friends news and knowledge that he himself had thought private to them both. Yes, he wouldn’t be surprised if Derek did know: the gist of their friendship, if not the details of its conclusion. Dave, after all, had been aware of rather too much.
“You know Andrew’s not here any more,” Derek said. It was not really a question: Laurie had, after all, arrived the previous evening; he would have sought out Andrew immediately, and long since been informed of his departure. “I think he sent you a letter: did you get it?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, that’s good.”
Laurie was silent; and Derek gave him a keen glance. “He was rather troubled just before he left. You know that?”
“Yes, it was in the letter.”
“I am not sure that London is the best place for him right now, in this frame of mind,” Derek went on, thoughtfully. “Not that it was my place to convince him to stay, of course, not if he felt called there.”
“I doubt if I could talk him out of it,” Laurie said, a trifle sharply. Precisely why it would be so impossible was not something he could explain; and none of this was Derek’s business.
“If you couldn’t, then no one else could, certainly,” Derek agreed. “I just wish he could have managed a pass to Bridstow to see you in person.”
“I’m not sure he tried.”
At his tone, Derek put down the plate he was wiping. “Did the two of you have a fight?” he asked, with a touch of incredulity. “Was it over your transfer? No,” he shifted quickly, “it couldn’t have been. That came from town, it wasn’t your doing.” He looked puzzled.
“It was a private letter he wrote me,” Laurie said stiffly.
“Oh, yes, of course,” Derek said hastily. He resumed wiping the plate. Two cups later, he wondered aloud whether there was any chance of Laurie going up to London after his discharge. “I think Andrew has something he’s trying to prove,” he explained. “To his family, we thought. They said things, you know, when he refused to join up.”
Laurie nodded. Andrew had not told him details of the confrontation—details that, he supposed, he might well have shared with the Friends—but he could imagine the sort of things that his uncle and aunt might have said to him. Yes, Andrew probably did feel he had much to prove…to Laurie, not least of all.
After a moment, he said, “I did go up to London, actually—I simply had to after I got his letter—but I never got to see him. Dave thought it probably better not.” At this Derek frowned slightly. “But I heard him, upstairs before I left, and he seemed happy enough, all things considered. I mean, happy in so far as one can be in the circumstances,” he explained quickly. “With the Blitz and all that, of course, one can hardly be happy about working in the ambulance brigade.”
This was ingenuous enough to make Derek smile.
“I doubt if I’ll see him again,” Laurie said awkwardly. “Or write him, even—unless he decides to write me, that is.”
“I’m sorry,” said Derek gently. “I truly am. It’s pretty obvious that you don’t really quite fit in with most of the other patients. Andrew’s friendship meant much to you, didn’t it? And yours to him, I know. The two of you always seemed like David and Jonathan.”
“Yes,” said Laurie bleakly. “Dave said that, too. It’s not much help.”
“No. I don’t suppose it is.”
Laurie felt an urgent impulse to privacy, such as one could scarcely find around the hospital. It was too dark to go for a walk; and, in any case, he felt equally compelled to finish assisting Derek with the rest of the washing-up. Sympathetic as always to the mood of those he was with, the other man stayed tactfully silent until the last plate was dried and Laurie had hung the sodden towel up by the stove.
“Give it time,” he said. “I don’t know what Andrew wrote, but remember—he was pretty wrought up, whatever it was. I doubt he meant half of it.”
Laurie nodded, knowing better. The letter had been no more than the tip of a very deep iceberg in waters whose dark depths Andrew had to fathom on his own.
He returned to the ward, longing to call Ralph from the privacy of the telephone box down the road, but knowing that he’d never be let out of the hospital grounds at this hour. Instead, he had to make do with the common line, frustrated by the lack of privacy. At least, at his end, Ralph had the telephone in his rooms, which was something; but the mere sound of his voice gave Laurie a shudder of delight. They could not talk long (someone else came up after a few minutes), but arranged that Ralph would drive over the following afternoon from the station so that they might spend a few hours together. Laurie hung up, with an apologetic smile to the man waiting his own turn at the phone, and paid a longish visit to the lavatory before returning to the ward. Someone had turned on the radio, low enough for talk, but loud enough for him to pretend to be listening.
Sometime that evening, Major Ferguson apparently returned to the E.M.S. hospital; but the following day was not the usual one for his rounds, and he spent the morning in surgery. According to Reg, who was helping to pin up the now completed garlands, he was operating on young Silverstein; and, indeed, when Laurie looked back at the bed that had been Charlot’s, he realized that it was empty. Rather later, helping to gauge the mid-point of a garland so that Reg could tack the loops evenly, he heard sounds in the side ward, and knew that the operation was over.
Once the room had been decorated to everyone’s satisfaction, Laurie decided it best to make the necessary preparations for Ralph’s arrival. He was shocked to be reminded sharply by the Staff Sergeant that his passes had been cancelled for a month. The stricture had not applied in the civilian hospital in Bridstow; he had completely forgotten the penalty he had incurred for writing Madge, it seemed so long ago. The sergeant even refused him permission to walk the ten minutes along the road to the telephone box, for it was in the direction of the village and out of sight around a bend. Instead, he had to return to the lobby and use the public phone again, this time in the middle of the day, calling Ralph at the station. There was, as always, a wait while he was located, then the brief, embarrassing explanation. Ralph was crisply unsympathetic, and in a hurry. For the first time, Laurie thought as he hung up, he truly understood the frustration felt by Reg, and the other married men separated from the women they wanted to be with. He yearned for Ralph. It was absurd to feel so shattered when he had simply been denied a spin in the country.
The sergeant had told him that the instructions for exercising his leg still held: if he wished, he might go for a walk across the fields. Briefly, Laurie considered it, if only as a way to get away from the hospital by himself for a while. But he was bound by the sumptuary laws of the army. The men chatting in the square between the huts might wrap themselves in blankets or borrow overcoats from the c.o.s. to keep warm; but to go off the hospital grounds he must be properly in uniform. He thought of Eden, and its lost innocence from which he was thus still barred. “Been a long time, sonny,” Mrs Chivers would say, and hand him a tract; and he would walk among the apple trees, whose fruit would now long since have been picked, gathering the odd half-rotted windfall and tossing it. He wanted to walk there with Ralph, who would charm the old lady as Andrew never could; but he knew it would never happen.
I am in limbo, he thought. But to him, Limbo now meant blackberries and beech mast. It meant Andrew, and long talks on philosophy and family and war. He did not have Andrew, nor even the Phaedrus to while away the time: both book and boy were in the Blitz, and he would never see them again.
It was at this point, while he was seriously considering canvasing his acquaintance in search of anyone who did still have a greatcoat and was willing to lend it, that Richard, the orderly on Ward A, came with his summons to Major Ferguson’s office.
“Not bad, not bad,” the Major said, noting how slight was the limp with which Laurie entered. “Do you need the cane much, then?”
“Not around here, sir: the cement floors are quite flat and easy. Outside is a different matter.”
“Hmmm.” Papers were turned. “I have Miss Haliburton’s report: I see the new boot has been a great improvement. And the flexion is increased by nearly ten degrees, that’s excellent.” The Major looked up. “You plan to return to…Oxford, isn’t it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, I’ll put the paperwork in. It may be a while before it all goes through; but I see no reason why you shouldn’t start term in the usual way.”
“Thank you, sir.” Laurie hesitated. “Do you know when…what the plans are…for my discharge from here? How long I need stay?”
“Ah!” Major Ferguson visibly brightened. “Yes, of course. I got the letter.” He nodded. “I see no reason to keep you.” He looked at Laurie keenly. “You’re friends with Barker, aren’t you?” For a moment, there seemed almost a twinkle in his eye. “I do remember that little trouble a few weeks back. Well, he’s leaving tomorrow. Why don’t you catch the same bus?”
Laurie could hardly believe it could be so easy. “Sir?” he said, with a note of incredulity.
Major Ferguson opened a file and rummaged inside. “Your stepfather wrote: quite natural for him to ask the favour, and I see no problem.”
“I’m sorry?”
The Major found what he was looking for and held it out; Laurie took it automatically. Looking down, he realized it was a rail pass.
“You’ll be home long before Christmas.”
Laurie did not know how he left the room. He found himself, white-lipped and furious, halfway across the square, wishing he had his ‘stepfather’ in front of him so he could bash him with his stick. Interfering old bugger! What did he mean by it? Why couldn’t he leave him and his life alone? Wasn’t it bad enough that he’d taken Laurie’s mother from him? His foot caught on a tussock, there was a sudden stab, and he stopped, afraid that he might have wrenched his knee; but the pain subsided as quickly as it had come.
“Laurie! Laurie!”
It was Nurse Adrian, chasing after him again. He took a breath, composed his face, and turned. She hurried up.
“You went right past me! Oh, Laurie, what’s wrong? Is there anything I can do to help?”
“I’m leaving tomorrow,” he said, and her face fell. “Going home.”
“Oh, how lovely for you.” He could tell that this was sincerely meant, for all that she clearly wished, on her own account, that his discharge might be delayed.
“It appears,” he said, with barely suppressed savagery, “that my ‘stepfather’ has been writing to the Major, asking that I be sent home in time for a nice family Christmas.” His tone belied his words. She looked at him, bewildered.
“Don’t you want Christmas?” she asked. “Oh, I do wish that I could go home. But of course I’m needed here.”
“Well, I’m not needed there!” he declared.
Her face cleared with misunderstanding. “Oh, but they’ve had their honeymoon!” she cried. “Do you think you’ll be playing third fiddle? Your stepfather—Mr Straike, isn’t it?— ” He nodded. “—he’s the vicar, after all; he’ll be busy because of Christmas, surely. It’ll be so nice for your mother to have you there.”
He hadn’t thought of that.
“And just consider,” she went on, “when did the Major get the letter from him? When was it written?”
Vaguely, he recalled the words of the Almoner. The letter must have come to the hospital, for it had been sent on.
“He must have written it while they were still on their honeymoon,” Nurse Adrian declared. “How very thoughtful of him!”
Yes, he supposed, that would be the way most people would take it. Surely that had been Major Ferguson’s reaction—quite apart from doing a favour for a man of the cloth, as people tend to, if they can. It was all too clear to Laurie that he was going to get no sympathy: not from Nurse Adrian, nor Reg, nor any of the other patients or c.o.s. It was not as though he could explain.
He now had to tell Ralph. Finding some polite dismissal for the girl, he made his way to the lobby of the hut, where the phone was, blessedly, not in use by anyone else, and had the operator put him through. At least it was, by now, late enough for him to have returned home. The conversation was, in some respects, rather one-sided; but most of what Laurie had to say could be freely overheard by anyone. Ralph, who had met Mr Straike, readily filled in the other side of the conversation to Laurie’s full satisfaction.
“I’ve got a rail pass home,” said Laurie towards the end, “but I’m thinking I just won’t use it.”
“Don’t be a fool,” said Ralph briskly. “They’re expecting it to be used.”
He was still in uniform for the time being, Laurie supposed Ralph meant. Yes, the army expected him to use the pass, expected him to be at the vicarage. If they wanted (for some reason he couldn’t imagine) to get hold of him, then he had to be there or be deemed absent without leave. There was no point in getting crimed at this point.
“I just want to be with you,” he said softly, seeing no one in earshot.
“Enjoy your Christmas,” said Ralph, in a flat voice. Laurie remembered that, for many years, the other man had had no family of his own for the holiday—had, like as not, skipped it altogether, unless there were some shipboard celebration. Does Ralph envy me, he thought in wonder, interpreting the tone. It seemed impossible. Yet…it was true that the school hols had always been heaven. This, though, would be Purgatory, a time of endurance and waiting before he came to his true reward.
Chapter 18
Delighted to share each other’s company for the first leg of the journey, Laurie and Reg caught the early morning bus as dawn was barely breaking. It was filled with locals bound for town; but a large woman with a basket beside her shifted herself one seat to the rear so that the pair of them could sit together. Much of their talk was reminiscent: to the interest of those sitting near, they talked of Dunkirk, and waxed strangely nostalgic over the first chaotic days of the E.M.S. hospital. As they approached the outskirts of Bridstow, however, they fell silent. The bus jounced round twisted streets into the centre of town and deposited them at the railway station, where they shared dry slices of cake and cups of tea in the shop, before Reg’s train left.
Laurie then was left to kick his heels. He nursed a second cup for longer than would have been reasonable, save for the chill of the wind outside, and came out shortly before his train was due to find, to his surprise, that Sandy Reid was hanging about on the platform waiting for him. He was the last person Laurie had expected to see. For Ralph to come and see him off had been a slight hope (though he had known, really, that the course at the station would keep him busy). Even Alec, if his shifts had allowed.
“He’s in surgery,” Sandy said, “and Harrison’s letting him do more than assist; it isn’t something he can just skip.” He reached under his arm for one of the packages tucked there. “This is from us.”
Laurie took it, bemused. The paper had a pattern of diamonds and looked rather expensive, though it was a little wrinkled—clearly smoothed out pre-war paper being reused, not that there was anything unusual about that. Yet it was wrapped with a double band of kitchen string tied in a surprisingly fancy bow to which was attached a home-made label.
“It’s not much,” said Sandy, with a shy smile, “but it’s the thought that counts.”
Laurie opened his kit bag and tried to fit the box inside. It was too tall; and he was rummaging his clothes to the side to make room, as Sandy shifted the remaining packages to hold out to him. He did this rather awkwardly. Laurie noted suddenly that his right arm was heavily bandaged under the overcoat, which did not fasten properly. The incendiary in the raid, he remembered. It seemed oddly out of character that it could have been Sandy, of all people, to lift the thing on a searing metal shovel, dump it in a bucket of sand, and save the hospital.
“How’s the arm?” he asked, to be polite.
“Getting better,” Sandy said. “They still won’t let me on full duty, though. Third degree burns take time.”
The largest box, Laurie noted, was labelled neatly to Rev. and Mrs. Straike in Ralph’s writing, very proper. A combined wedding and Christmas present, he supposed, and wondered how Ralph had managed it on such short notice.
“This last one’s for you,” said Sandy. Laurie set the big box down and took it. Flat and oblong: a book, he thought. It slid easily into his kit bag; but, try as he might, he could not fasten the strap over the present from Alec and Sandy. That and the one for his mother (he avoided thinking of her as half of a newly married couple) he would have to carry. And the bag, and his stick—did people not think? He was surprised at Ralph. They could all easily have been posted directly to the vicarage.
His face showed none of this as he straightened and thanked Sandy. After all, it was kind of the man to make the trip to bring them to him at the station. Laurie would have the gifts with him when he arrived, no doubt they had considered that. As the train whistle blew, he shook Sandy by his left hand, the other being bandaged past the palm. His grip was stronger than Laurie would have thought.
It was a long journey. Besides changing trains, there were the usual wartime delays; and it was late afternoon by the time he put away his copy of Herrick’s poetry, fetched the kit bag and packages down, and disembarked at the station in the village. There had never been a regular taxi service, the place was too small, though Jonas at the garage would oblige when booked in advance. Laurie had not bothered, any more than he had for the wedding. The pavements were in reasonable repair.
He took his usual route through the square, which was actually more of an elongated triangle, but then—instead of going up the slight hill, past the lychgate, and home—veered right, passing the church along the far side of the graveyard. He remembered boyhood dares to spend the night (though in fact he never had, for it would have meant sneaking out, and his mother slept too lightly). Beyond the church was the vicarage, just as ugly as he remembered it, a large rambling brick house built during the worst period of Victorian architecture, chronically damp, impossible to heat, and absurdly expensive to run. It needed, Laurie thought, an army of servants accustomed to lightless rooms in the attics. Today, though, it got Mrs Timmings, who had agreed to do for his mother after the move; and she, of course, went home each evening.
Awkwardly, he shifted his cane to his other hand and lifted the latch on the gate.
Accustomed to being awoken early, at school or in the army, Laurie was first down in the morning. Mrs Timmings had not yet arrived. Hungrily, he cut two good slices off a rather grey-looking loaf and found the butter in the larder. Only after he had spread it on one of the slices did it occur to him to scrape half of it off and use it to cover the second slice as well. He was making himself a pot of tea when Mr Straike came downstairs in his dressing gown, having been awakened by the unexpected early noises.
“Laurence,” he greeted him. “Do please remember the rationing, my boy.”
“Is this too much butter?” Laurie asked. Accustomed to food provided automatically at the appropriate times, he was truly uncertain what the ration books permitted.
“No, no,” said Mr Straike, not presuming to check, “but do be careful in the future. It does so complicate the ladies’ lives when their supplies suddenly vanish.”
Abashed, Laurie asked how much tea was proper to put in the pot. Mr Straike simply said that he had no idea; but that breakfast was usually served after the housekeeper came.
“I’ll remember for tomorrow,” Laurie said carefully. He could not resist adding the observation that, in the army, they rose earlier than civilians—and hungry, to boot, being active and young. Mr Straike merely humphed at the pertinence, and went back upstairs to dress.
Laurie took the kettle off the stove, put away the caddy, and poured himself a glass of water, instead.
He spent the morning going through those possessions of his that had been moved to the vicarage. Some had gone to the attic, and he did not attempt to venture up. The boxes containing his books had, however, been stacked in one of the many empty bedrooms; the previous evening, his mother had suggested he use it as a study. There was no desk; but there was an easy chair and a side table, as well as a small bookcase. It would serve, he thought, for the few weeks he would be here. It was not, after all, as though he had essays to write. It was more a matter of refreshing his memories after a year and more in which to forget details, though perhaps he might also move ahead a bit.
When he opened the first box, though, he found it a dreadful jumble. The Lances of Lynwood shared space with Bacon; Horace nestled beside Dickens; and, slid down the side, he found two of Beatrix Potter’s little tales. He recalled that, before he had arrived for the wedding, Aunt Olive had already begun to pack his books. She had carefully shaken out all the inserts—he had gone through them personally, and thrown most of them out—but he had not thought to go through the boxes themselves to make sure they were in proper order.
Aunt Olive was to spend Christmas with them; she was due in a week. No doubt, her assistance to his mother would be invaluable. Laurie made a mental note not to mention the state of his books. It would be unkind: she meant well, after all. She always did. He would have to open each box, he decided. See what was where, sort things out, and fill the shelves. The children’s books could then join the rest of his paraphernalia in the attic.
It was thus his mother found him when she came to call him for lunch—sitting on the carpet, his stiff leg awkwardly in front of him. An empty box lay on the bed; a second, half-emptied was beside him. Their books were stacked in little groups in a wide semi-circle. He had stopped sorting a good hour earlier. Reminded suddenly mid-box of the party where he had met Ralph again, he was leaning back against the wall, lost in Treasure Island. She smiled at the sight. This was so much her little boy, back home again where he belonged.
That afternoon, he changed to mufti: not quite regs, of course, even on leave; but he was so close to his discharge, he thought it couldn’t matter. It meant, though, that it was possible for him to don his overcoat and venture out into the pale wintry light and keen wind to take his leg for exercise round the familiar streets of the village. He did not take the road past the cottage. If the Trevors had moved in, he supposed he would have had to, for politeness’ sake; but, when he had written to tell them they could have the lease, they had replied that they planned to have Christmas in their old home and move in the new year. Instead, therefore, he headed for the common. The rough ground required use of the stick, though on pavement he needed it only where there was a slope or a place needing mending. Still, almost…almost...he could stride out as he used to. He missed Gyp—he would always miss Gyp, for one never forgets one’s first dog—but the walk did him good.
Before returning to the vicarage, he stopped at the call box in the square. After the embarrassment of the butter, he did not want to presume on the vicar’s telephone bill. Nor, for that matter, did he want questions: he would phone Ralph, and he would phone him daily.
That evening, they sat for dinner at a table built for a large Victorian household, and ate shepherd’s pie made largely from carrot and turnip topped with a high pile of mashed potato. Mrs Timmings was a marvel, though: the gravy was delicious. For dessert there was baked apple (“from our own tree,” explained Mr Straike), though there was little sugar and no raisins, and a most curious ‘cream’ to pour over it.
They retired to the parlour. It was, Laurie thought looking round, a comfortable enough room if one liked heavy furniture. The seats of the chairs were well-stuffed, and high enough for him to get in and out of easily. Heavy brocade curtains were pulled shut to hide the black-out, incidentally also concealing the lancet windows. There was a large fireplace, though—despite the chill outside—no fire was lit, doubtless for lack of coal to spare; and a pair of vases flanked an antique clock on the mantel. A cabinet held bottles, with a pair of cut-glass decanters on top, each nearly empty.
Mr Straike offered a glass of port (“while it lasts”), but there were no cigarettes. It seemed he didn’t smoke. Laurie sipped slowly. There were still niceties to life, here in the vicarage. He wondered how long these could survive the wartime scarceties. It was sadly obvious that the conflict would be not over by Christmas this year. Maybe next, he thought. Maybe not. It looked as though they were set for the long haul.
“What are your plans for the next few weeks?”
He roused himself to answer. “Study, I thought. I’ll be returning to college when term starts, of course.”
“Well, if there are any books you need, feel free to have a look in my library,” Mr Straike said. “I have a fair collection, both Classics and Modern, besides the Theology, of course. You may well find what you need.”
“Thank you, sir.” Laurie was surprised—not that the vicar had a library, though he had envisaged him more of an outdoors type—but that he would make the offer.
On a demi-lune table were laid the presents he had brought from Bridstow. His mother, who had taken out her knitting, stopped for a moment to point to them and ask. He said simply that they were from people he knew; but that made her think of Reg, for she had met him at the hospital, and so he had to explain. She was delighted that he had made such respectable friends as medical students, rather than the hoi polloi of Ward B. He found this awkward: he still could not think of Sandy as even a potential friend, though Alec was another matter. Still, he had to let it go or explain even more, which was the last thing he wanted to do. As for Ralph, she had missed being introduced at the wedding reception, but remembered the tall fair naval officer who had attended.
“How very kind,” she said. “I do hope you thought to give them gifts, too, Laurie.”
He made a noncommittal noise, resolving that Ralph, at least, would certainly receive a parcel in the mail. It occurred to him, then, that he still had no present for his mother—and, indeed, that he would be expected to provide one for his stepfather, as well. Clearly, he would need to shop.
Over the next few days, Laurie’s life slipped into a new routine. He read systematically through the books that he had already studied and then ventured into the library, where he found others of interest. He took walks as long as his leg would allow, phoned Ralph each afternoon, and yearned for him each night. The shops in the village, however, proved to have little suitable for a grown man to give his mother, let alone an unwanted stepfather; and one day, therefore, he took the train to the nearest town. Guilt made him spend more than he ought, and he returned with a parcel of second-hand books, a pair of pheasants from the market, and a crystal vase that he had found in an antique shop. If it meant dipping into his grandmother’s legacy, so be it: this Christmas, he vowed, would be the last. Once he had left the army and taken his degree, he could get a job the far side of the country and ensure that circumstances made it impossible for him ever to return. This year, though, he would give his mother the perfect family holiday so that she would have memories to sustain her in her marriage.
Mrs Timmings took the pheasants with a cry of delight, and hung them in the larder. She had, she confided to Laurie, been thinking the vicarage would be eating stuffed mutton for Christmas dinner. Game would be unexpectedly festive. Dinner that evening, though, was rabbit stew.
While Mrs Timmings jointed the meat and chopped it, Laurie peeled potatoes. “Oh, I’m a dab hand, Mrs T.,” he said when she demurred. “The army will do that for a man, you know. We all did kitchen duty.”
“Well, then, you’ll be handy help when you marry,” she said with a smile. “Bring home the bacon and cook it!”
This was the sort of joke he could field—not unlike the banter of the barracks, though cleaner.
The stew turned out remarkably well, though Laurie did not mention at dinner that he had peeled the potatoes himself. The secret to good stew, after all, is plenty of meat. The fine plump bunny that had gone into the pot had been shot by Mr Straike himself, who had gone out with one of the local farmers, whose cabbages were being eaten. Congratulated by Laurie’s mother, he simply said that he’d always had a fair eye and practice makes perfect. It was Laurie’s success at bagging a brace in the market that he admired, he said: it was all very well for game to be off the ration; but it was too seldom available.
After the news about Manchester, everyone was braced for worse to come, though grateful that the village was nowhere near the worst of the bombing. Still, Laurie saw his mother check the black-out; and a little later Mr Straike did so too. It was the next day that Aunt Olive was to arrive; and, since the vicar was busy with parish duties, Laurie walked down to the station to meet her, and carried her suitcase back in his free hand. She exclaimed over the improvement in his walking, and asked after the naval lieutenant who had come to the wedding. “For don’t tell me you aren’t keeping in touch with R. R. Lanyon, for I won’t believe it,” she declared. “A man doesn’t get special leave to come to a friend’s mother’s wedding simply because he knew him back in school.”
“Ralph’s fine,” he said. “He sent a Christmas present to Mother, in fact.”
“Ha!” she said, “Ralph! I knew you were friends—on first name terms, too.”
A bit amused, but hoping she wouldn’t take the matter further, he put down the case to open the latch of the gate for her. As she went through, she turned and asked, “Now what is Ralph doing for Christmas?”
She meant well. Over the next day he clung to that. She meant well, and she had no idea what she was doing—she never did. The idea that his friend had no family to go to for Christmas stuck in her head, and she raised it at dinner. His point that the navy would scarcely give Ralph leave twice in quick succession was dismissed by all: it had been several weeks, for one thing; and, by his own admission, Ralph did not have proper duties but was merely on a course. The following morning, the vicar disappeared to his study for a while, and returned with the information that he had called the chaplain on the naval base (a revelation of the existence of a dog-collar network that Laurie had never suspected) who assured him that there was no instruction scheduled over the holiday itself, and all members of the course had three days leave. The next Laurie knew, he was on the phone himself.
“They want you—I want you—I mean, you are invited to—” He cast an anguished glance over his shoulder at the two women pressing rather too close, urging him on. (Mr Straike, mercifully, had remained in the parlour.) “Christmas here,” he said, inarticulately. “Join us. Day after tomorrow. If you can make it, get a ticket, a pass, a….” He gulped, with a sudden horrid thought. “That is,” he added, “if you want to.”
It was very quiet on the other end of the line.
“Are you alone? Can you speak?” said Ralph finally.
“Oh, everyone’s with me,” said Laurie, he could only hope with sufficient ambiguity.
“Whose idea was this?”
“I’m not sure,” said Laurie. “It seems to be sort of a group decision.”
Ralph sounded a bit amused. “Not your idea, then.”
“It would never have occurred to me,” said Laurie honestly. There was a glare from his mother, and his aunt looked reproachful. “Not that I don’t love the thought of sharing Christmas with you,” he said quickly. “You know that.” (Well, he hoped that was a safe enough thing to say in front of the women.) “We all want you to come,” he finished firmly.
“It sounds as though I don’t really have a choice.” There was definitely humour in Ralph’s voice. “Yes, tell your mother—no, no,” he broke off. “Put her on.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, certainly.” With mock sternness, Ralph added, “I have to accept the invitation from the person who really made it, you know.”
Silently, Laurie held out the earpiece to his mother. She looked at him questioningly, and then took it. Standing so close to her, Laurie could just make out Ralph’s words as she pressed it to her ear.
“Mrs Straike?”
As she picked up the phone, Laurie moved away.
The following day, unsure when Ralph would actually arrive, Laurie was in an agony of anticipation—though no one else seemed to notice his agitation. He skipped his books, knowing that he would never settle enough to absorb anything, and went instead for as long a walk as he could manage. He returned shortly before lunch, which proved to be boiled bully beef dumplings. Seeing him at a loose end, Mrs Timmings commandeered him to grate carrot and dice beetroot, for she was making as fine a Christmas pudding as she could manage in the circumstances. “Most of the raisins went in your mother’s wedding cake,” she said. “So close to Christmas! What a pity!” There were a few dates, which she quickly stoned and chopped. “Fortunately,” she added, “the vicar’s well thought of and Mr Podgett”—the butcher, as Laurie knew—“comes to service regularly. He let me have a nice bit of suet.” She set him to shredding it.
Mrs Timmings measured out flour, then baking powder, and a slight quantity of sugar, adding, from one little box after another, a judicious (but not quite adequate) amount of spice. Laurie was astonished to see her dip a tablespoon generously into a packet of gravy browning.
She turned and winked. “The secret ingredient,” she confided. “Don’t say, though. I know it seems funny. But it’s mostly just cornstarch and flour, you know, and there’s nothing odd about that in a cake. But it also has caramel…and that’s for colour, as well as flavour.” She turned back to the bowl, added the suet, and mixed it in lightly. “You want a nice dark pud for Christmas.”
She set the pudding in its basin, and then came with him into the parlour where they all listened to the carol service from King’s College, Cambridge on the radio. The afternoon wore on. Ralph’s train was due, then overdue, and snow was in the forecast. The pudding boiled gently, and Laurie sat at the kitchen table and watched it.
“If you’ve nothing to do, dear, help me get the decorations down from the attic,” said his mother, bustling unexpectedly into the kitchen.
He heaved himself up, and followed her out to the hall. Aunt Olive, spry as a schoolgirl, was up the attic stair before him. It was steep and narrow—rather too steep, he thought, looking up.
“Oh, go on, Laurie,” urged his mother, impatiently.
There was no banister. Though his aunt was unseen above, his mother would observe his every awkwardness. Urged from behind, though, he had no choice. He mounted the stairs with all the difficulty of the first weeks after his operation. Really, it was absurd of the women to expect him to do this, he thought. Couldn’t they tell? Still, he did understand that they wanted to keep him occupied.
Finally, he made it to the top, with his mother one close step behind the whole way.
“What are we looking for?” he asked. “The old trunk from home?”
“Yes, but also—” She broke off. “Ah, it’s over here.” She pointed to a dim corner, “Gareth told me they had one.”
Looking in that direction, he could see a…a fir tree, he supposed, about three feet high. What it was doing here he couldn’t imagine.
“Carry it down, will you, there’s a dear.”
Clearly, a tree that size couldn’t be too heavy, though it would be an unwieldy thing to carry. He walked over, his knee a little sore from the climb. The fir leaned against the wall on the lower side of the attic, where the roof came down almost to the boards. When he reached through the branches to grasp the trunk, he realized the textural difference; but it was only when, awkwardly, he had hauled the thing down the narrow staircase to the top floor hall and into better light that he realized that it was artificial throughout, with a thick dowel trunk off which spoked wire branches bristling with bright green needles.
“It’s made of feathers,” his mother informed him, coming a few steps down and leaning to catch his eye. “German…but we won’t tell anyone that.”
He looked at the thing. By firelight, with decorations, it would look quite like a real tree, he supposed.
“Don’t ask me how they do it,” she said. “Take it down to the parlour.”
As he carried it towards the end of the hall, he could hear from above his aunt calling, “Oh, Lucy! I’ve found the trunk!” Though how he was supposed to get that down, he had no idea.
In fact, shortly after the tree, with its carved wooden base, had been set on a side table, Ralph arrived. After he had been exclaimed over, Mrs Timmings returned to making dinner in the kitchen, whipping hard at a bowl of reconstituted dried egg; Mr Straike disappeared back to his study to put the finishing touch to his Christmas sermon; and Laurie’s mother showed Ralph up to the bedroom opposite Laurie’s, saying that she was sure the ‘boys’ would prefer to be well away from the ‘old folks’. A judicious minute after she left, as Ralph was opening his kit bag on the bed and taking out his shaving tackle, Laurie shut the door. Since the first sight of navy blue, he had been frustrated by so much company. Alone at last, he was finally able to greet Ralph as he wanted.
They clung for a long moment, and then Ralph gently stepped away. “You do know that we can’t stay up here,” he said. “They’ll be expecting us downstairs.”
“Yes, but—”
“You’ll just have to possess your soul in patience.” Wrily, Ralph added, “Next door to a church does seem like a good place for it.”
“Sorry,” said Laurie, answering the tone more than the words, and wondering what he was apologizing for.
“You go down, I’ll follow,” said Ralph; and Laurie left him fishing in his bag.
Once the trunk with the decorations had been brought down to the parlour, Laurie’s mother lifted out the paper garlands that had been saved from the previous year, carefully folded, and fastened round with paper clips so they wouldn’t spring open. As she sorted out which should be hung where, Aunt Olive went through them, mending torn tissue with cellotape, and Ralph put them up. Laurie simply stood below, as he had in Ward B, directing the placement of drawing pins so that the loops hung evenly. Once the rest of the ornaments were hung on the little fir tree, the packages that Laurie had brought were set underneath. His mother and Aunt Olive both disappeared upstairs to fetch their own contributions; and, alongside the other gifts, he saw Ralph lay the very package that he had mailed to Bridstow a few days earlier, returned to the house only slightly rewrapped. Beside it, he stood a second gift that Laurie was sure had to be a paper-wrapped bottle. Shortly thereafter, Mr Straike came out of his study, satisfied that his words were as well chosen as he could make them; and they lit the candles for a brief glory.
As Aunt Olive softly warbled an out-of-tune “Deck the halls” and the others dutifully followed suit, Laurie wondered. He was familiar with the bottles in the cupboard in Ralph’s rooms, and none of them was full; moreover, liquor was not only pricey but hard to come by. Then, as he automatically sang his tra-la-las, it dawned on him that a man who drank as much as Ralph might well have made his own plans for spending a three-day solitary Christmas.
Dinner proved to be toad-in-the-hole, with the sausages cut in chunks to spread them further. And then the bells in the church began to ring, and they went to Midnight Mass.
Once Laurie was sure that Aunt Olive had padded back and forth from the bathroom, visited the lavatory, and was settled for the night, he slipped across to Ralph’s room and knocked on the door.
“I just wanted to be sure you had everything,” he began, when Ralph opened.
“Well, almost,” said Ralph. He gave Laurie a meaningful smile. “Come in, come in. We haven’t had a chance to catch up.” This was said just a little loud—and he shot the bolt as Laurie came through into the room.
Later, in bed, having received from Ralph the very pre-Christmas present he had most longed for, he turned in the other man’s arms and said, “Do you mind?”
“Not this!” Ralph exclaimed, though he kept his voice low.
“But coming here like this, though,” said Laurie. “Sneaking about in the night.”
Ralph stroked his shoulder. “How else can we be together, Spud? This isn’t a fairy tale, after all. It’s the real world—and that’s how it is. What were you expecting?”
He wanted his love for Ralph to be pure, Laurie thought. Earthy, perhaps, but not…grubby.
He felt Ralph shift closer, stroking his body with cunning. It had been a long couple of weeks, and Laurie was long since recovered from his convalescence. He felt his own growing urgency.
“Would you rather wait until we can return to Bridstow?” asked Ralph meaningfully. “Or…I suppose your mother and stepfather are expecting you to stay here until you go up to Oxford: perhaps I should wait to get a two-day pass some time in February or March and run up to see you then.”
“No!” exclaimed Laurie.
“Ssssh,” Ralph hissed. In bed as they were, they could not afford to have someone come along asking if anything was wrong. “Keep your voice down,” he warned, in a hard, low voice. “You don’t want your aunt to hear us: her room’s just the other side of that ‘study’ of yours.”
“Or my mother and Straike, for that matter.” Ralph was right. They needed to be careful.
Ralph laughed. “Oh, as for them! There’s a reason their guests are all down the far wing of this mausoleum—not to hear the newlyweds in their marriage bed!”
“What?!”
Laurie pulled back, twisting up and round to look down at Ralph in such shock that he scarcely felt the twinge from his bad leg. With the black-out drawn, they had left the lights on, for it wouldn’t do for voices to be heard from a dark room. Laurie could see Ralph’s astonishment quite clearly: the other man must equally see his shock.
“Laurie,” said Ralph gently. “They’re a married couple. A just married couple. What do you think they’re doing right now?”
Ralph reached for him, but Laurie shifted away. He saw the other’s hunger, but his own had been dowsed.
“No, not now,” he muttered. “We need to get some sleep. It’s late, and we’ll have to go to church tomorrow, too, don’t forget.”
He swung his legs off the bed and scrambled for his clothes, which had fallen every which way over the rug.
The next morning he regretted his sudden departure; but there was no use repining. They had to get ready. The bathroom was rather too busy; he shaved in a hurry; and breakfast turned out to be a scratch meal, since there was an early service. As the vicar’s wife, his mother felt obliged to attend; Aunt Olive would have gone as a matter of course; and he and Ralph had, as guests, little option but to join the party. In the large grey church he rose and knelt to the best of his ability—always, always, aware of the uniformed body standing so close next to his in the pew.
Afterwards, Mr Straike and his wife stood in the porch, shaking hands with the parishioners as they came out; and Laurie perforce, as the stepson, had to be alongside making himself pleasant. Then the vicar went down the path to the lychgate to speak to one of his parishioners, and Mrs Straike turned to her son and guests and suggested they should be getting back to the house.
They got in to find that Mrs Timmings, who would have the next day off, was fixing their true breakfast ready for their return. Kippers, an unexpected treat. True, she had managed to procure four, while Ralph made five; but that could not be helped. Though Aunt Olive insisted that she didn’t really need…no, no, really didn’t like…kipper for breakfast, no one believed a word. Mr Straike came in, with a broad wink to his wife, just as the segments of fish were being distributed with judicious fairness. They then sat down to a blessedly short grace (for the vicar liked his kipper hot); and there was toast with real butter instead of marge, or—if one preferred—a scrape of the last of the marmalade.
After that, all retired to the parlour to open presents.
Laurie’s mother was thrilled by the crystal bowl, and her husband took his book of sermons with proper words of thanks. Ralph’s present to them turned out to be a large majolica jug. (Startled, Laurie could only assume that it was one of the objects that had been tidied into cupboards when Ralph moved into his new rooms, and he had talked his landlady into selling it. As Laurie knew, he could be very persuasive; and the argument that he needed a wedding present might well have held sway.) Laurie had given Ralph a copy of Mandeville’s Travels, and was not at all surprised to find that his present from Ralph was, indeed a book. He did not, however, expect to see another, unstained copy of the Phaedrus. He lifted his eyes to meet Ralph’s smile, and saw the promise it held.
As Aunt Olive tried on the cardigan that Laurie’s mother had knitted her and Ralph looked bemusedly at a pair of khaki socks from the same source, Laurie unwrapped the present from Alec and Sandy to find a carved wooden elephant. Mr Straike slipped out of the room.
“What on earth am I supposed to do with it?” Laurie said in a low voice to Ralph.
“Stash it in the lowest cupboard?” he suggested.
“Nonsense,” said his mother. “Put it on the mantel. Whatever you may think of it, my dear, they’ll expect to see it if they come round, you know.”
“It’s quite charming, in its own way, if a bit old-fashioned,” put in Aunt Olive. “Lucy, dear, thank you so much for the sweater. It’s just my colour.”
Looking at the plain grey wool, Laurie wondered. However, as his aunt busied herself positioning the small brooch he had given her, he could see no look of irony on her plain, kind face.
At this point, the parlour door opened, just a crack, and Mr Straike peered in.
“Lucy, my dear,” he began.
“Oh, yes!” Laurie’s mother got up, her air of anticipation quite unsuppressed. “Laurie, dear, we have a very special present for you.”
He had been wondering what they might have got him, rather suspecting something it might be something righteously timely, such as a war bond. That, however, could hardly be called ‘special’: the government had been trying hard for weeks to persuade people of the propriety of such a gift for Christmas.
His stepfather swung open the door and stepped in. A little shy behind him was a leggy, half-grown woolly pup.
“His name is Rover,” said Mr Straike, and handed Laurie the leash.
“We thought we’d get you an older puppy,” his mother put in. “One that’s already properly house-trained. You’ll be living in rooms, after all.”
“He’s learned all the basic commands,” said Mr Straike. “Comes from the same place your old Gypsy did, you know. Good breeding.”
Rover looked up at Laurie. Laurie looked back.
“I told you,” said Ralph behind him, after a moment, “I’m pretty sure I can fix things up at the station for a bit, if you need.”
Laurie, bent over the dog, holding his hand out for a good sniff, looked round to say, “Did you know about this?”
“Me? No, of course not!”
“Darling,” his mother cried reproachfully, “Gareth and I could see how very upset you were about poor old Gyp. We thought you’d like a new dog.”
Rover looked up at him trustfully. He was not, Laurie thought, another Gyp: he was brown, certainly, but with a dark patch sliding off one shoulder: he was Rover, his own young self.
He was not really ready for another dog but, “He’s a splendid young fellow,” Laurie said to his mother. “Thank you, sir,” he said to Mr Straike.
“Why don’t you take him for a walk and get to know each other?” suggested the vicar.
The snow had not yet come, but the sky was white with its promise. Laurie was conscious as he walked, both of the eager young dog at one side, occasionally nosing his leg, and the man on his other side, muffled under a greatcoat. For a time, they walked in silence, past the church and down the street, through the square, and off towards the common.
“I’d better not let him off the leash,” said Laurie at last. “Not until he knows me better.”
“He’d like a run,” said Ralph. “Would you like me to take him?”
He nodded, and handed over the leash. He saw that Ralph took it in his good hand, to be sure of his grip if the dog should bolt. There was a puzzled glance from the pup; but, at Laurie’s smile and nod, the pair were off, running across the tussocked grass. He stood and watched them. They ran free and easy, in a way he never would again.
With the fit arrogance of youth, Ralph took the dog in a wide circle at full clip and brought him back to his new master. Rover panted eagerly for more, and bounded around as the leash was passed over; but, at the command to heel, he fell in at Laurie’s side.
They headed back. As they came in through the kitchen, Mrs Timmings turned round from the counter. “I’ve made a bed for the dog in the scullery,” she said as they passed. “And put down some of those newspapers I was saving for the paper drive, just in case.”
“Why, thank you,” said Laurie. He took the damp cloth she fetched out from under the sink and wiped Rover’s paws. Mrs Timmings turned back to the counter, where she was stretching the pheasant to a fifth portion by mixing sausage with chopped apples and sage for a side dish. Ahead lay more potatoes to peel, parsnips to scrub, and chestnuts to shell. It would, Laurie thought, be a far more festive Christmas than he had hoped for.
Late that night, the snow started. Sure that all were asleep, they had finally turned out the light and opened the black-out: they saw the first flakes fall and catch in the corners of the panes.
“A white Christmas,” murmured Laurie. “How often do we have that?”
Ralph reached for his cigarettes.
“Mind the black-out.”
“Yes.” He put them back.
It had been a good Christmas after all, thought Laurie. Tomorrow, the world would go on; the war would resume; and he would slip secretly, silently out of Ralph’s room, shave and dress, and go down to take out young Rover. For now, though, Ralph was beside him where he belonged. He had come through Purgatory and reached his reward.
Quietly, as dawn comes up on the road ahead, the reins are picked up by the driver’s hands. The horses lift their heads from their pasturage, scenting their home. Eagerly, they set forth, rested from the long night, their struggle done, pulling in tandem. Together, in company, their task is light and their path short, until finally they reach home.