Soldier No More

knew why.'

Colonel Clinton grunted. 'Which is why— this time—we must know exactly what we are about, Roche—'

'—so, yes, I knew him, David Roche,' said Willis, nodding at Roche, but then looking away from him towards the distant rugger posts at the far end of the pitch. 'And yet, the answer could just as well be no for all the good it'll do you.'

Yes— and no—had said Major Stocker.

Roche looked up at the rugger posts towering above him, and began to suspect even more strongly from his own inadequate knowledge of the game that Willis was kicking for touch, not so much to gain ground as to win time in which to let the defenders get in position.

'David Audley was in the war, wasn't he?' As of now, if the dialogue was going to go off at a tangent, it would be David dummy5

Roche's tangent.

'The last half, yes,' agreed Willis coolly, taking the change in his stride, his defenders ready. 'He was in Normandy about the same time as I was, actually.'

'In an armoured regiment?'

'Yes. Yeomanry lot, dashing about the place in Cromwells, to the west of us—we were poor bloody infantry.'

'He did quite well, I gather?'

'He didn't let the side down, no,' agreed Willis. 'And they did have a pretty rugged time in that neck of the woods, the tank chaps—bad country for them, that bocage. Good anti-tank country—we'd have loved it. Badger had a bloody field day in it, with his PIAT! But of course they were on the receiving end, trying to push south, past Caumont towards Flers and Conde, to take the heat off the Yanks at the time of the break-out.' He smiled at Roche. 'Lovely place for a holiday—marvellous food—but a rotten place from which to winkle hard-bitten Jerries with the Fuehrer's stand-fast order in their pockets.' He paused, and nodded to emphasise his military judgement. 'He did all right, did young David, even if he was a bit over-sized for his tank—he performed satisfactorily, anyway . . . And, more to the point, he survived, which in itself indicates a certain skill. Mere longevity is a considerable virtue, in peace as well as war, don't you think?'

Stripped of all its verbiage, and allowing for the fact that the dummy5

schoolmaster had a tongue like a cow-bell, there was more there than old soldierly memories. Willis had known exactly where his ward had gone into battle, and the long odds against his survival unscathed; and if it was all a gentle joke now, casually thrown off, it wouldn't have been a joke then—

no joke at all.

'There's a lot to say for surviving, I agree.' He returned Willis's smile. 'But his father didn't do so well there, did he!'

'Ah ...' For one fraction of a second the change in direction caught Willis unprepared. 'Yes . . . that is to say, no—he didn't—' The eyes clouded as the defences were adjusted '—

though, again, perhaps it wasn't altogether ill-timed, in so far as being killed can ever be considered well- timed—but Tacitus did say it of Agricola, after all— felix opportunitate mortis, and all that, eh?'

'What?' exclaimed Roche, totally outflanked.

'A charming fellow, Nigel Audley—quite delightful . . .

manners, breeding, grace—and guts . . . everyone liked him, everyone admired him. Good-looking, and clever with it— the expectancy and rose of the fair state—he had that rare quality of perfection which prevented lesser mortals envying him his silver spoon, he was too far above the rest of us for that, we were simply grateful for knowing him—that's the simple fact of it, David Roche.'

Roche was struck speechless by this panegyric: David Audley's father was too impossibly good to be true.

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Willis regarded him tolerantly. 'Ah—I know what you're thinking: de mortuis nil nisi bonum, and all that. But it's not true, you can ask anyone who knew him, and every man-jack of them—and every woman too—will bear me out.'

Roche waited for him to continue, but he seemed to have run out of steam with surprising suddenness.

'He was killed in 1940, wasn't he?'

'What?' Willis turned towards him, frowning. 'Why do you persist in asking me questions to which you already know the answers?' he asked sharply.

And that was uncharacteristic too, thought Roche, taken aback by the sharpness. If the defences around David Audley were well-sited, those protecting his father were in even greater depth, and suspiciously so for such a paragon.

'Do you always ask your pupils questions they're not sure of—

or do you lead them from what they know to the more difficult ones?' he countered as gently as he could.

Willis stared at him, at first vaguely then focussing exactly.

'T ouche . . .' he nodded, accepting the rebuke. 'You made me remember things I'd forgotten—I'm sorry—you're quite right, and you have your job to do ... Yes, in 1940, when the skies were falling in on us—in 1940, in France.'

And he hadn't told everything, either: because in one particular respect, and the most important one, he had already indicated that the paragon wasn't a paragon.

But that could wait for the right moment.

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