Ben paid no attention to me. He was now looking at James and James was looking at him. James was frowning thoughtfully. Then he said, ‘Staff-Sergeant Fitch.’
‘Yes, that’s right.’
‘Royal Engineers.’
‘That’s right.’
‘You were the chap in that show in the Ardennes.’
‘That’s right.’
‘You did well,’ said James.
Ben’s face hardened, perhaps to inhibit some show of emotion, even some fleeting gleam of gratification. ‘You his cousin?’
‘Yes.’
‘Are you still serving?’
‘Yes. Just retired actually.’
‘Wish I’d stayed in.’
There was a moment’s silence as if they were both thinking about the past and likely to break out into reminiscence. Then James said hastily, ‘I’m sorry about this business now. I-er, it wasn’t her fault at all, she’s completely innocent, and nothing happened, I give you my word of honour.’
Ben said expressionlessly, ‘OK.’ He made a movement of his head and shoulders indicative of dismissal.
James turned to me, rather blandly, like a chairman tacitly asking a distinguished speaker if he has anything further to say. I did not respond to his look, but turned to go. Gilbert opened the door, Peregrine marched out, then Gilbert, then Titus, then me, then James. The door closed softly behind us.
Before I reached the car I realized that I was still carrying the plastic bag containing Hartley’s make-up and the stone which I had given her. I automatically turned back. James tried to catch hold of me, but I dodged him and walked steadily back up the path. It was an almost superstitiously stringent necessity to leave that bag with Hartley, not to take it away, not to take it back to Shruff End to be a sort of unlucky token and collect the filth of demons. It only occurred to me afterwards that I could have left it on the doorstep. I rang the ding-dong bell and waited. The savage barking started up again. Ben shouted, ‘Shut up, you devil!’
After a moment or two he opened the door. The expressionless mask was gone. He grimaced with hatred. I felt there was a kind of levity about what I was doing, and yet it had to be done. I was also aware of interrupting the next scene. The bedroom door was open.
I held out the bag. ‘These are hers. Sorry I forgot to leave them.’
Ben seized the bag and hurled it away behind him into the hall where it bumped and clattered. He thrust his grimacing snarling head out at me and I stepped back. ‘Keep away or I’ll kill you. And tell that vile brat to keep away too.
The door slammed with a violence which set the bell vibrating. The dog was now almost screaming. I came back down the path and crossed to the car, where Ben’s words would not have been audible.
Gilbert and Titus were sitting in the back. The seat was covered with opaque white stones like huge pearls. ‘What’s this stuff?’ I said.
‘The windscreen broke, remember?’ said James. ‘Now let’s go home. Peregrine?’
The car started, roared up the hill, turned, roared down the hill, going very fast. The air blew fiercely in through the open front window. No one spoke.
When we were getting near to the junction with the coast road Titus said, ‘Would you mind stopping? I’d like to walk from here.’
Peregrine stopped with an abruptness which sent us all flying forward. Titus began to get out.
‘Titus, you’re not going back there?’ I cried to him and grabbed at his shirt.
‘No!’ He slipped out, and said as he turned away, ‘I’m going to be sick, if you want to know.’ He started walking in the direction of the harbour. Peregrine set off again, driving violently.
Gilbert said to James, ‘What was that thing in the Ardennes that you were saying about?’
James was looking alert and rather pleased. The meeting with Ben seemed to have put him in a good mood. He said, ‘It was an odd business. That chap Fitch was a prisoner of war in a camp in the Ardennes, he must have been captured in 1944. There weren’t any officers in the camp, I suppose he was the senior NCO, anyway he was the leading figure. In May 1945 when the Germans were going to evacuate the camp before our lot arrived he staged a private war of his own. He managed to impose himself on everybody. He had a group of toughs among the prisoners, well everybody joined in, it was well organized, quite a classic piece of planning, and they sabotaged the transport, I think they even nobbled a train. They got hold of arms and started shooting up the Germans. It was rather a savage business, possibly some personal vendetta was involved. Anyway when our troops arrived the surviving Germans were the prisoners and young Fitch had got the entire camp under his control and was standing at the gate to welcome us in. It was a neat exercise of personal bravery and initiative. There was a bit of fuss about “unnecessary brutality”, but that soon blew over. He got a Military Medal.’
‘Were you there?’ said Gilbert.
‘No, I was somewhere else, but it was my outfit that relieved the camp and someone told me about it. I remember seeing a picture of the chap, he hasn’t changed. And I recalled his name, and it all somehow remained in my memory, it appealed to my imagination. He was a brave man. How odd coming across him like that!’
‘A rather unattractive sort of courage,’ I said.
‘There was a rather unattractive sort of war on,’ said James.
‘The man’s a killer.’
‘Some people are better at killing than others, it needn’t mean a vicious character. He behaved like an able soldier.’
We had reached the house. Peregrine scraped the car on a rock and it stopped with a jolt. We all got out. I looked at my watch. It was ten o’clock. The day lay ahead.
I went into the house, passed automatically through the kitchen and out onto the lawn. James, who had followed on my heels, was standing at the kitchen door looking at me. I said to him, ‘Thank you for your help. Now you’ve finished your job here I expect you’ll want to be off.’
He said, ‘Well, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll stay till tomorrow. ’
‘Please yourself.’
I went away across the rocks in the direction of the tower, passing over Minn’s bridge. I found a place down on the edge of the water where I could see into Raven Bay. A hot wind was blowing in from the sea and there was a slightly menacing swell, but the atmosphere was less thundery. Perhaps the storms had passed by.
My hand was hurting where it had been struck by Rosina’s stone. A bruise was appearing. I found that I had been sweating profusely. The hot wind was drying my shirt and denim jacket, both of which had been sticking to my back. I pulled the jacket off and loosened the shirt. There was a haze over the bay, the water was pale blue, fringed by a pretty lace of breaking waves. The big round boulders looked hot, as if the stored-up heat which they were exuding were shimmering visibly. They had a solemn, almost religious look. The dark yellow seaweed stains upon them looked like hieroglyphs. Beyond the other arm of the bay the sea was spotted with purple. I sat with my feet almost within reach of the strongly rising and falling water which was spattering the yellow rocks with a quick- drying foam. I felt that I had made a fool of myself in the recent scene and felt sad to think that in relation to anything so awful I should look ridiculous.
I heard a soft footfall and saw a shadow and James came and sat down beside me. I paid no attention to him and we sat for a while in silence.
James started fingering around in the rocks, finding small stones and tossing them into the water. He said at last, ‘Don’t worry too much, I think she’ll be all right, I’m sure she will.’
‘Why?’
‘My general assessment of the situation.’
‘I see.’
‘And also that odd episode.’
‘You think Staff-Sergeant Fitch’s respect for General Arrowby will be such-?’
‘Not exactly. But it’s as if something passed between us.’
