‘You’re not going to be stuffy, arc you? Didn’t you say you were off duty today?’
‘Even so, I have to be careful.’
‘I sec. You sound like a man treading a line. Well, I can relate to that. It’s exactly what I’m doing myself.’
Morrissey chose a vegetable bake, while Cooper settled for a lasagne. He felt ridiculously nervous. When the food was served, he couldn’t quite think what order he should do things where to put his napkin, what part of his meal to load on to his fork first, when to order coffee.
‘What did you mean about “treading a line”?’ said Cooper.
Morrissey raised an eyebrow. ‘The line between two worlds, the line between the right and the wrong thing to do, the line
o o o ‘
between the past and present. Choose which you prefer. I’m
treading them all.’
‘And the line between rationality and obsession, perhaps?’ She looked at him, nursing her cider. Her cheeks were already
turning pink from the alcohol and the warmth of the pub. Then,
gradually, she began to talk. Cooper could feel her relaxing as
the words trickled out.
‘Yes, you’re right — it has become an obsession,’ she said.
238
‘ft became an obsession after I saw the report on the crash of Lancaster SU-V, and the list of names of the dead. From that moment, those men were no longer the crew of an RAF bomber they were people. They had lives, they had wives and children. It was the tact that Dick Abbott had also been father of a young child that was the real trigger. Abbott was barely more than a boy himself. It set off something inside me, some urge,
an instinct that has been driving me on to find out what exactly
Z3 ^
happened.’
‘An instinct? Not curiosity?’
‘Maybe. 1 don’t understand what else to call it. But 1 had
y
to know what happened. I had to know the truth, and in a way it was on behalf of that other fatherless child, as much as for myself. I wondered about Zygmunt Lukasz, too, and the family he might have. I can’t explain why those British
v O 1 ^
and Polish children mean anything to me at all. 1 know, in my logical moments, that the pictures of those children that I’ve been carrying in my head are nothing like the reality. I know they’ll be well into middle age by now. But I found I was starting to live in some kind of parallel universe, where everyone was still as they were in 1945. So I made no attempt to explain it to anyone, not even to my mother. 1 was aware of the fact that I couldn’t justify it, too afraid of the reasonable arguments that could be put to me, which I couldn’t counter, but which would only make my determination stronger. Some people already call me obsessed, like you; I didn’t want to give them an opportunity to call me mad.’
‘I’ll take the word back if it makes you feel better.’
‘It doesn’t matter. It helps if you understand how determined I am.’
‘It’s so far in the past, though …’
‘Yes, I know. It was such an alien time. It makes you appreciate peace. Do you know, it took me a long time to understand that an aircraft falling out of the sky was an everyday occurrence in wartime Britain.’
And more than fifty aircraft have been wrecked in the
v
Dark Peak area alone since the start of the Second World War.’
239
Morrisscy looked at him in surprise. ‘How did you know that?’
‘I found a book/ said Cooper.
‘Where?’
‘In a secondhand bookshop we have here in town. Eden Valley Books.’
‘That’s interesting. I’d like to see it some time. Yes, I could hardly believe the figures when Frank Baine told me. I mean, on the map, the Peak District looks so small. It’s no more than a few dozen miles across, locked in between the big cities. And the hills aren’t even all that high. I mean, these summits arc three thousand feet at the highest. We’re not exactly talking the
O v O
Rockies here, arc we, Ben? Why was this area the graveyard for so many aircraft and airmen?’
‘Some were damaged by enemy action, some suffered mechanical failure, or iced up and broke apart in mid-air. Other crashes were the result of pilot error or faulty navigation. If they found themselves over high ground in poor weather conditions, they were in trouble.’
‘You really have done your research. Don’t let it become an obsession.’
