6

      The Peddlesbury raid was over and forgotten and a five-minute wonder, folk said, though they’d been shocked at the suddenness of it, with no time for the alert to be sounded. Nasty, how that Heinkel had managed to sneak in, but count your blessings, they said; no one hurt, this time. And the damage to the runway could easily be repaired, though not too quickly, Kath hoped, since Roz had said it was more the pity that all three bombs hadn’t dropped there, and made a proper job of it.

      Today Roz was happy. Tomorrow Paul would return from leave and her world would be perfect – until the runway was seen to, that was, and the Lancasters able to take off again.

      She must, Kath decided, include Paul in her Sunday prayers. Kath prayed often – a habit, really. Prayers all the time at the orphanage and obligatory church attendance during her in-service years – and in her own time, too. But her prayers held substance now, because she had someone of her own to spend them on: Barney and Roz and everyone at Home Farm. And Paul, too.

      Funny how almost everyone went to church these days. It had taken a war to fill the churches, for now almost everyone had someone to commend to divine keeping; everyone had urgent need to beg the Almighty to choose between them and us, and let our side win.

      She still regretted not being married in church. To Kath, a church wedding was more permanent somehow, but their small wedding-party would have seemed out of place in such a great loftiness. Only she and Barney there had been, and Barney’s reluctant mother and Sylvia who worked at the house next door, and Barney’s witness. The Registrar too, of course. Short and businesslike, their joining; a lonely wedding, really. Lonely, but legal.

      But this was not a day to think too much on what might have been; this was a rare day that hinted of spring to come. This day was warm from the touch of a wind from the south and a sky so blue it could have been stolen from April. A weather-breeder Mat said it was, and not to be trusted.

      Kath held her face to the sun, walking carefully with the near-full jug held between gloved hands.

      ‘Pop over with Marco’s drinkings, there’s a good lass,’ Grace had asked. ‘What with Jonty away to the farrier’s and Mat wasting his time at the War Ag. and Roz seeing to the calves –’ Best keep Roz and Marco apart as much as possible, Grace had long ago decided; best not upset the Mistress more than need be. ‘He’s working at the game-cover; take along a mug for yourself and have five minutes in the sun. Lord knows, it’ll likely be snowing tomorrow.’

      The prisoner was working alone, cutting down the smaller, spindly trees in the little wood, dragging them clear with the tractor, stacking them against the time they could be chopped into logs and laid to dry for next winter’s burning.

      ‘Marco! How’s it coming along?’

      ‘I think we finish, on time. This scrub makes trouble, but we manage okay.’

      ‘Jonty said you’d drag the tree roots out with the tractor.’

      ‘Si. We fix a chain.’ Smiling, he took the mug she had filled for him. ‘You stay, Kat?’

      ‘For five minutes.’ She settled herself beside him. ‘Jonty’s taken Duke to the smithy to be shod. I asked him if he’d bring back one of the old shoes for me – for a souvenir, and for luck. In this country a horseshoe brings luck, you see.’

      ‘In my country, also. But this morning you smile, Kat. You have had a letter?’

      ‘No. Not for a week. I think I’m smiling because it’s such a lovely day.’

      ‘And tomorrow, maybe, a letter come and you smile some more.’

      ‘Well – at the moment I’m afraid I’m not looking forward to letters. I’m afraid that I – well, I deceived my husband, and –’

      ‘Deceive him? You have a lover?’

      ‘No! Nothing like that!’ Why had she started this conversation?

      ‘You tell him lies, then?’

      ‘Not even lies. I’m just not, I suppose, telling him the truth.’

      ‘There is a difference?’

      ‘There’s a difference, Marco.’ She had said too much; talked about things that should be private between man and wife, talked about them what was more to one who was an enemy. ‘Five minutes, Grace said. I’d better go. Bring the jug back later, will you?’

      ‘No, Kat. Wait!’ He took her hand and she didn’t know whether to snatch it away, or leave it. ‘You must tell me why you do not speak the whole truth. If you have sadness it is best you talk about it.’

      ‘All right, then.’ She took a deep, defiant breath. ‘When I write to my husband it isn’t what I write but what I don’t write. I don’t tell him things because he’d be annoyed with me. I haven’t told him about you, yet. I can’t, because he doesn’t like –’

      She pulled in her breath sharply, wincing at her stupidity, closing her eyes tightly as if to block out the words.

      ‘He does not like Italians and I am Italian, and working here?’

      ‘Something like that.’

      ‘And?’ he prompted softly, his eyes on hers.

      ‘And I can’t tell him that Jonty isn’t in the forces; that a man so young is still a civilian. He thinks all young men should be called up.’

      ‘Your husband is a strange man, Kat.’

      ‘No! That isn’t true. It’s just that he feels strongly about things. And I’ve upset him, too, because I joined the Land Army without asking him. He doesn’t like to see women in uniform. Well, you wouldn’t like it either, would you?’

      ‘If I had a wife and she went to work in the fields for her country, I would be proud of her. Your man spends much time being angry. It is not good.’

      ‘No,’ she whispered, eyes downcast.

      ‘It is not good that he makes you sad; not good he does not trust you, though that is to be understood. He is jealous, you see, because his wife is beautiful and he fears other men will admire her.’

      ‘I’m not beautiful! I’m – oh, we shouldn’t be talking like this!’

      ‘No, we should not. This morning, you see, I have a letter from home. My mother is much sad. She writes that my cousin Toni is missing. Toni is a soldier, fighting in the desert. My aunt fears he is dead.’

      ‘Marco, I’m so sorry. Wars are wrong, and cruel!’ And that was a strange thing to come out with, wasn’t it, to one who was her sworn enemy. But what else was there to say – that they should have stayed out of the war, not thrown in their lot with the Germans nor invaded Abyssinia, either. But young men like Toni and Barney and Paul and Marco didn’t start the wars – only fought them. ‘I’m truly sorry,’ she whispered, ‘and especially for your aunt. My worries are nothing compared to hers.’

      ‘Si. Is called making a big hill from a little hill, yes?’

      ‘A mountain out of a molehill,’ she said, smiling gently. ‘And you will forget what I told you? It’ll work out. I know it will.’