‘Well, at least it’s hot.’ Daisy joined in the laughter because you had to laugh. If you didn’t, then life would sometimes be simply unbearable.
‘I won’t come over tomorrow night, Drew. I think you should spend it with Aunt Julia and Lady Helen. I’ll be there on Saturday, though, to wave you off.’
The July evening was warm and scented with a mix of honeysuckle and meadowsweet and the uncut hedge was thick with wild white roses. Beneath the trees, on the edge of the wild garden, tiny spotted orchids grew, and lady’s-slipper and purple tufted vetch.
Drew reached for Daisy’s hand, remembering scents and sounds and scenes, storing them in his mind so he might bring them out again some moment when he was in need of them.
‘My ten days have gone very quickly. It seemed like for ever when I got on the train at Plymouth. I think Grandmother is feeling it. Her indigestion is playing her up again, but I’m not to tell Mother, she says. I think she’s had it for quite a while. It’s the war. I think she remembers the last one, and gets a bit afraid. You’ll always pop over to see her, won’t you, Daiz?’
‘Of course I will. I love her a lot, and she was once Mam’s mother-in-law and Mam loves her, too. We’ll see she doesn’t fret too much when you’ve gone back – and there’ll be Mary’s wedding in the afternoon to help take her mind off your going back.’
They skirted the wild garden and crossed the lawn to the linden walk. The leaves on the trees were still fresh with spring greenness and their newly opened flowers threw a sweet, heady perfume over them.
‘Just smell the linden blossom, Daiz. I think I shall take it back with me to barracks – maybe think of it when I’m at sea in a gale, and being sick.’
‘You won’t be sick! Where do you think they’ll send you?’
‘Haven’t a clue. They say big ships are more comfortable, but if I had a choice, I think I’d go for something small and more matey – perhaps a frigate. And having said that,’ he grinned, ‘I’ll end up on an aircraft carrier, most likely. Wouldn’t mind Ark Royal. There’s always been an Ark Royal in the British Navy. There was one, even, in Henry Tudor’s time.’
‘Drew! Don’t go for Ark! Every week, Lord Haw-Haw says the Germans have sunk her!’
‘And every week we know they haven’t. Still, I won’t have a say in the matter. I’m a name and a number for the duration. I do as I’m told. Chiefie in signal school told us to keep our noses clean and our eyes down and we’d be all right. And that’s what I shall do – and count the days to my next leave.’
‘Drew – do you remember how it used to be?’ They had reached the iron railings that separated Rowangarth land from the fields of Home Farm, and stopped to gaze at the shorthorn cows grazing in Fifteen-acre Meadow. ‘It seems no time at all since that last Christmas the Clan was together. Remember? Aunt Julia took a snap of us all. Keth, me, Bas and Kitty and you and Tatty. In the conservatory. We’d all been dancing …’
‘I remember. After that, Uncle Albert started getting a bit huffy about coming over from Kentucky twice a year, but that last summer we were all together was fun, wasn’t it – except for Aunt Clemmy and the fire in Pendenys tower?’
‘And Bas’s hands getting burned. I’m glad Mr Edward had that tower demolished – what was left of it.’
‘Poor Aunt Clemmy. It was an awful way to die. I think, really, it was because she took to brandy after Uncle Elliot was killed. He was her favourite son, Grandmother said. She never got over it. Elliot was her whole life, I believe.’
‘Yes, but I know Mam and Aunt Julia didn’t like him. Even now, if ever his name is mentioned, your mother screws up her mouth like she’s sucking on a lemon. I once heard her say he’d been a womanizer – but we shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, should we, and Tatty hasn’t grown up like him, Mam says. Tatty’s okay.’
‘Yes, but Tatty’s going to have to watch it. You know how strict Aunt Anna can be and Tatty has really fallen for that air-gunner. She said she doesn’t care what happens – nobody is going to stop her seeing him. She’ll have to sneak out, tell lies.’
‘Well, I’m on Tatty’s side. Tim’s a nice young man and someone should remind Tatty’s mam that there’s a war on and that young girls don’t need chaperoning now!’
‘But Tatty’s so innocent, Daiz. She’s always been fussed over and protected. And if Aunt Anna wasn’t fussing, there was always Karl in the background to look after her.’
‘Yes, and teach her to swear in Russian,’ Daisy giggled. ‘Don’t worry about Tatty. She’ll be all right. She’s good fun – away from home. But oh, Drew, I could stand here for ever. It’s all so beautiful I can’t believe there’s a war on.’
The distant sound of aero-engines at once took up her words and made a mockery of them. A bomber flew overhead, big and black and deadly.
‘Looks as if they’re going again tonight.’ Daisy looked up, preparing to count. ‘Take care, Tim,’ she said softly as another aircraft roared over Brattocks Wood. ‘Come home safely, all of you.’
Helen Sutton sat quietly in the conservatory, watching the sun set over the stable block. It tinted the wispy night clouds to salmon pink and shaded the darkening sky to red.
Red sky at night, sailors’ delight …
Rowangarth’s sailor had gone back to his barracks on the noon train from Holdenby. Soon now he should be in barracks, then where? She shivered as the short, sharp pain stabbed inside her chest. In yesterday’s papers she had read that Somewhere in England – They always called a place Somewhere in England when it suited them not to name it – close-packed German bombers with fighter escorts had attacked harbours, fighter stations and naval bases on the south coast.
Naval bases. Plymouth and Portsmouth must surely have been targeted by the Luftwaffe. It was a part, Helen was sure, of the softening-up process so there would be less resistance when the tides were right – right for the Germans, that was. In September.
Where would Drew be then? At sea, Helen hoped fervently. He’d be safer at sea. How proud she had been today of the son Giles never lived to see, tall now, and straight and Sutton fair, with eyes grey as those of his grandfather John; like his great-uncle Edward’s, too.
Drew would come back whole from this war. Fate could not be so fiendish as to take him. Besides, Helen had spoken to Jinny Dobb at the wedding this afternoon, with Jin asking why she was so sad; telling her she was not to fret over young Sir Andrew because his aura was healthy, she insisted, and was Jin Dobb ever wrong, she’d demanded.
‘Take care of yourself, milady,’ she’d urged. ‘He’ll come back safe to claim his own, just see if he doesn’t.’
Dear Jin. Those words gave her brief comfort, Helen smiled, for sure enough, Jinny Dobb could see into the future and read palms and tarot cards – with which she, Helen, did not entirely hold. But this afternoon, at Mary’s wedding, she snatched comfort from Jin’s prophecies and smiled and waved and threw confetti when Will and Mary left Holdenby for a weekend honeymoon in quite a grand hotel in York.
Mary had looked beautiful. Blue certainly suited her and she and Tom walked solemnly down the aisle to where Will and Nathan waited. How nice, those cosy country weddings.
The door knob turned, squeaking, and Tilda walked softly to Helen’s side.
‘I’ve brought your milk and honey, milady. Miss Julia asked me not to forget it.’
‘Tilda, you shouldn’t have bothered, especially as you’ll be managing