my shoulder as he bent over Kate to speak to her. I preened and there was a warm glow inside me. Michael was mine and no one was going to take him away from me. No one, not even my lovely sister Hari, however much she turned on her charms. I met her eyes and she looked away first, and then I knew there was a different feeling between my sister and me. It was probably called jealousy.
Seventeen
As Hari drove away from the farmhouse she knew she had felt the attraction again as she’d talked to Michael. He’d bent over her, his big shoulder touching hers, the magnetism between them almost palpable. Aunt Jessie didn’t like it, she made that abundantly clear.
And there was Meryl, she clearly thought herself in love with Michael but perhaps it did no harm. Meryl was still a child and Michael an honourable man. In any case Jessie would keep a strict eye on things.
Kate stirred at her side. ‘This is a bumpy road so it is.’ She shifted in her seat and Hari slowed down.
‘Sorry, I was going too fast. Habit I suppose.’ Last time she’d driven the jeep it was to take some messages to Bletchley Park in England. She had no idea what the messages contained as they were shut away in a leather bag with a lock on it and she was happy she’d been kept in the dark. She was in enough danger as it was without having secrets to hide. Any German would soon get the truth out of her. With a sharp pain she remembered that Michael was half German but then he was different from the ‘Huns’ and the cruelty they inflicted on civilians with their bombing raids.
Hari forced her thoughts away from the war. ‘How’s your tummy?’ She glanced down at Kate’s thin figure. Her belly bulged, still swollen, probably still swathed in bandages. Hari was only too aware that Kate was lucky not to have died in the explosion.
‘Still sore.’ Kate was listless and no wonder, she’d lost her sight, her baby and the man she loved. To add to her misery, her family had been bombed into oblivion in one of the raids. The only friends she had were Hari and Hilda.
‘Do you get on with Eddie’s mother?’ she asked.
‘Hilda’s kind,’ Katie said with a sigh. ‘I’m all she’s got left of her son. We share memories of him and it comforts us. She wishes we’d had the baby, a real bit of him but the Holy Mother didn’t will it so.’
Hari felt tears mist her eyes. ‘You’ll have other children, a new life after the war, you’ll see.’
Kate tried to be realistic. ‘I only wanted a baby by my Eddie and he’s gone, lost in some bloody field in a foreign land fighting to keep us free.’ She was silent for a moment. ‘Changing the subject so I am but do you think Michael is half German?’
Hari felt a chill run down her spine. ‘No! I’m sure not,’ she said firmly. ‘He would have been deported, sent to the Isle of Wight or where ever they put the Germans. No, I think he’s probably Norwegian.’
‘I expect you’re right,’ Kate said softly. ‘In any case you can’t hate a whole race for what one mad leader is doing.’
Hari drove in silence for a time as it was getting dark and it took all her concentration to negotiate the winding lanes towards Swansea. And then at last she came off the common with its vast pony-ridden land and saw a glint of the sea and a big white house on the horizon that she knew led to the coast road. She was home and she was glad.
The next day Hari was back at work; the factory had been quickly cleared up after the explosion but the gaping teeth of blackened wood showed where the shed containing shells had once stood and, as Hari passed it and made her way quickly to the warmth of her office, she shivered with an icy fear.
It was a wet day with sullen clouds lying low over the buildings of Bridgend and Hari was glad to be working indoors. Colonel Edwards nodded absently and continued to write in his neat, precise handwriting.
She sat at her desk, took off her gloves and watched him. He wrote something down in swift, precise handwriting.
‘How did you enjoy your trip to the country?’
‘Not bad, sir, I took my friend Kate with me, the girl who was in the explosion.’
‘All right is she?’
‘Kate is blind, sir.’
‘I’m sorry, fates of war.’ He pushed a piece of paper under her nose. ‘Do your best with this, there’s a good girl.’
Hari gritted her teeth; he could be so unfeeling at times. Still, he was efficient, and kind sometimes, hadn’t he arranged driving tuition for her? She’d gone through it very quickly, supervised by an army instructor. She could now drive the jeep and any other vehicle she chose.
Hari bent her head over the paper and began to work out the strange code, one she’d never seen before. She glanced over it. It wasn’t her job to interpret it, it was still in some form of more complicated code, but it was ready now for the colonel.
Later he came into her office with the familiar pouch of leather.
‘An important missive,’ he said, looking at her from under bushy eyebrows. ‘You must take this to the prime minister at once.’
‘Winston Churchill, sir?’ Hari had never had such a request before; it was an honour and she knew it. She looked at the colonel; he was pale; this was an important matter of war and she wished she knew what it was but that was not her business.
In her jeep she secured the chain of the leather pouch to her wrist and struggled for a moment with the intransient gears of the jeep. And then she was on her way home to gather a few belongings: precious soap, a towel and some fresh underclothes.
Mr Evans was standing outside her door looking up and down the street as if waiting for someone. Hari stepped out of the jeep and touched his arm. ‘What’s wrong, Mr Evans?’
‘My dog, I got a dog to keep me company and now I can’t find him. He’s black and white, small, not very strong. Vet said he wouldn’t last very long but I’ll keep him going, it’s love he wants, see, that’s all we all want, isn’t it?’
Hari thought briefly of Michael, the way he leaned into her when he talked, the way he smelt of grass and the outdoors. Her heart lifted. ‘Don’t worry, Mr Evans, your dog will come back when he’s hungry. What’s his name?’
Mr Evans smiled. ‘It’s a her, I’ve called her after my wife Maud, I know she wouldn’t mind.’
Hari had the hysterical desire to laugh and ask who wouldn’t mind, Mrs Evans or the dog. ‘I must go inside, Mr Evans, I’ve got work to do. See you later.’
As she was putting her things into her bag the air-raid warning sounded wailing through the air like the knell of doom. Hari hesitated, should she wait for the all-clear or should she head out of Swansea and away from the bombers?
The crash and scream of tangled masonry convinced her she should wait. She went downstairs and made a cup of tea and sat at the kitchen table drinking it. Her house shook and she prayed it wouldn’t get bombed, she’d hardly begun paying for it yet. It was her place and Meryl’s, their home when all the madness of war was over.
Dust rose from under the door, there must have been a direct hit in the street. Hari waited until the all-clear rang out and the sounds of crashing buildings stilled. She opened the door gingerly and gave a gasp of horror. Her jeep was a burned-out wreck, she wouldn’t be going anywhere in that.
For a moment she felt rage against the foreign bombers. The jeep was like her friend, she’d grown used to it, it gave her freedom of movement. But now it smouldered and the stink of petrol was all-pervading.
And then she noticed the figure on the floor outside her house. He was crouched up against her wall. His old face was blackened by smoke, the creases outlined as though with a black pencil, but she recognized him: it was Mr Evans. In his arms was clutched the tiny black and white dog. Both of them were dead.
Eighteen
