The Soldier’s Wife. Margaret Leroy
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more about all of you,’ she says. Moving on to safer things.
‘Blanche is unhappy,’ I tell her. ‘She terribly wanted to go.’
‘Well, she would, of course,’ says Gwen. ‘There isn’t much here for young people, you can see how she’d long for London. And Millie?’
‘She’s being ever so brave, though she doesn’t really understand.’
‘She’s a poppet,’ says Gwen.
‘And Evelyn—well, I’m not sure she’s quite right in her mind any more. Half the time she seems to forget that Eugene joined up …’ I see the shadow that rapidly moves across Gwen’s face, at the mention of Eugene, then fades away just as quickly. I wish I hadn’t eaten the Battenberg cake: the sweetness of the marzipan is making me feel slightly sick. ‘Sometimes she asks for him,’ I tell her, ‘as though he’s still at home.’
‘Poor Vivienne. Your mother-in-law was never exactly the easiest of people,’ says Gwen carefully. ‘You’ve certainly got your hands full.’
We say goodbye. Gwen leaves, and I go to the Ladies. I wash the marzipan from my hands, push my brush through my hair, take out my compact to powder my face. My hands have a clean, astringent smell from Mrs du Barry’s carbolic soap. Then I go back to the table to pick up my cardigan that I left there.
All the china on the tables begins to rattle violently. There’s a roaring noise from outside; at first, I can’t work out what it can be, then I think it must be a plane—yet the sound is too sudden, too loud, too near, for a plane. Fear surges through me: if this is a plane, it will crash on the town. Everyone rushes to the window at the back of the shop, which looks out over the harbour. The air seems too thin, so it’s hard to breathe.
‘No no no no,’ says Mrs du Barry. She’s standing close to me; she clutches my arm.
We see the three planes that are flying over, swooping down over the harbour: we see the bombs falling, shining, catching the sun as they fall. They seem to come down so slowly. And then the crump of the impact, the looming dust, the flame—everything breaking, broken, fires leaping up, loose tyres and oil drums flung high in the air by the blast. I hear the ferocious rattle of guns. I think, stupidly, that at least there are soldiers here after all, the soldiers haven’t left us. Then I realise that the guns I hear are German guns, in the planes. They’re machine-gunning the men, the lorries: there’s a ripping sound, a flare of fire, as a petrol tank explodes. The men on the pier are scattered, running, crumpling like straw men, thrown down.
Fear floods me. My whole body is trembling. I think of my children. Will the planes fly all over the island, will they bomb my children? And Gwen—where is Gwen? How much time did she have? Could Gwen have got away?
I stand there, shaking. Someone drags me under a table. We are all under the tables now—the elderly couple, Mrs du Barry, the mother clutching her child. Someone is saying Oh God oh God oh God. There’s a shattering sound as the window blows in, shards of glass all around us in a dangerous, glittering shower. Somebody screams: it might be me, I don’t know. We crouch there, wait for the end, for the bomb that will surely land on us.
Suddenly, amid the clamour, the air-raid siren goes off.
‘About time,’ mutters Mrs du Barry beside me. ‘About bloody time.’ I hear the sob in her voice. Her fingers dig into my arm.
The elderly woman is gasping now, as though she has no breath, her husband holding her helplessly, like someone holding onto water, as though she might slip from his grasp. The young mother presses her baby tight to her chest. The sounds from the harbour assault us, the boom and crash of falling bombs, the growl and scream of plane engines, the terrible rattle of guns. More windows shatter around us. It goes on and on, it seems to last for ever, an eternity of noise and splintering glass and fear.
And then at last the sound of the planes seems to fade, receding from us. I find that I am counting, like you do in a storm—waiting for the thunderclap: expecting them to circle back, more bombs to fall. But there’s nothing.
A silence spreads around us. The tiniest sound is suddenly loud. I hear a splash of tea that spills from a table onto the floor: there’s nothing but the drip drip of tea and the pounding of blood in my ears. Within the silence, the baby starts wailing, as though this sudden stillness appals him more than the noise.
I look down, see that a piece of glass is stuck in my hand. I pull it out. My blood flows freely. I don’t feel any pain.
I crawl out from under the table, leaving the other people. Not thinking at all, just moving. I get to my feet and run out of the door and down the High Street and through the arch to the covered steps that take you down to the pier. The steps are dark and smell of fish and the damp stone is slippery under my feet. I have only one thought—to look for Gwen, to see if Gwen is alive.
At the bottom of the steps I come out into sunlight again, on the Esplanade that runs along the harbour past the pier. All the horror of it slams into me. Everything is on fire before me, I can feel the heat of it here, but the fire seems unreal, as though it couldn’t burn me. There are bodies everywhere, lying strangely, arms and legs reaching out, as though they were flung from a great height. The lorries are all burning. Tomato juice and blood run together over the stones, and there is grey smoke everywhere—smoke from the fires, and a smoke of dust—and smells of burning and blood, and a terrible rich charred smell that I know must be burning flesh. The body of a man has dropped out of the cab of his flaming lorry—it’s an ugly, broken, blackened thing. I hear a cry, and it chills me—it’s like an animal blind with anguish, not a human sound. I rub my eyes, which are stinging, as though the sight of the fire is hurting them. Everything is so bright, too bright—the red, the flames, the blood that streams on the stones.
I look up and down the Esplanade, but I can’t see Gwen, I don’t think Gwen can have been here. I’m praying she got away in time. I walk out onto the pier. Heat sears at my skin as I pass a smouldering lorry. My foot slips in a pool of blood. I have some vague thought that perhaps I could help—I can do a splint, a neat bandage, I know a little First Aid. Yet even as I think this, I know how pointless, how useless, it is—that everything here is utterly beyond me.
I come to a man who is lying on the pier beside his lorry. His face is turned away, but something draws my eye—the check cloth cap on the ground beside him. There’s some significance to this, but my thoughts are so heavy and slow.
‘Oh God,’ I say then, out loud. ‘Frank. Oh God.’
It’s Frank le Brocq.
I kneel beside him. I can see his face now. At first I think he must be dead already. But then his eyelids flicker. I cradle his head in my hands.
‘Frank. It’s Vivienne. Frank, it’s all right, I’m here …’
But I know it is not all right. The one thing I know is that he cannot live with such wounds—the blood that seeps from the side of his head, the blood that slides out of his mouth. I feel a heavy, passive helplessness: so any gesture, any word, takes all the strength I have.
He’s trying to speak. I put my ear close to his mouth.
‘Bastards,’ he whispers. ‘Fucking bastards.’
I kneel there, holding him.
I try to say the Lord’s Prayer. It’s all I can think of. My mouth is stiff and I’m afraid that I won’t remember the words. But before I get to the power and the glory he is dead. I carry on anyway. For ever and ever. Amen.
He’s staring at me with empty eyes. I reach out and close his eyelids. Then I just kneel there beside him. I don’t know what to do now.
A shadow falls across me; someone is bending down to me. I look up—it’s a fireman. Behind him, I see the single fire engine that’s come.
‘Excuse