An Unmarked Grave

It was a measure of my parents’ fear that no one had told me until now. As if it would bring back for them what must have been long, terrifying hours of not knowing.

If I had been in France and was told that one of my parents was dying, I would have felt much the same helplessness. And so I could understand. Indeed, there had been a fortnight when I had had no news and feared the worst.

“We must consider what to have for dinner,” she said bracingly, changing the subject before we were both brought to tears. “I was planning to dine alone, and now here you are. Let’s talk to Cook and see what’s possible.”

I left Somerset before my father came back from whatever mission had taken him away this time. My mother made the best of what she must have considered to be a bad bargain and sent me off with freshly ironed uniforms, a packet of sandwiches, and her love, as she’d always done.

When I reached Portsmouth after a long and wearing journey on the train, shunted from siding to siding as troop trains hurtled through, given precedence, I was walking through the dark and crowded port to find my own transport when I saw a tall figure in uniform making his way toward me.

It was my father, calling to me as he recognized me, enveloping me in an embrace that expressed, more than anything, his belief that he wouldn’t be in time.

“There you are!” he said. “I’ve moved heaven and earth-and more to the point, the War Office-to get here before you sailed, and I thought I’d missed you in spite of everything.”

“How did you know?” I asked. “Did Mother reach you?”

“Someone from the Canadian Army reached me. He told me where to find you.”

That ridiculous American, I thought, hoping to stop me from leaving by summoning my father to meet me here.

But I was wrong about his motives.

My father was saying, “God knows how he found out where I was. I am most grateful he did. Of course I shall most likely be sent to the Tower for leaving London so precipitously. He must know people in very high places. Perhaps he will also arrange my pardon.”

I laughed, as I was intended to do. “I never told him that you were away. I wasn’t aware of it myself until Mother told me.”

“You know him, then, do you? This Canadian?”

“It’s a long story. And he’s an American serving with the Canadian forces. I can’t think why he should even guess where or how to find you.”

Somewhere down the quay a blast of a ship’s horn, muffled but still loud in the damp night air, reminded me that I hadn’t yet located my transport.

“Look, there isn’t much time. Simon told me about Vincent Carson. I don’t want you involved with this business, Bess. Leave it to us. I have ways of finding out what we need to know about this Colonel of his. And if I can track down his grave, I can ask to have the body exhumed in the hope of discovering the cause of death. Are you quite certain that his journal wasn’t there when you found him?”

“He’d been stripped of his uniform, and there was no way to know even what rank he held or in what regiment. The burial detail would have no choice but to put him in a grave marked UNKNOWN. What’s more, there were no possessions to be sent to his family. If I hadn’t recognized him when Private Wilson showed me the body, no one would have known the truth. We’d have believed he’d died in the trenches, just as it was reported.”

The Colonel winced at that. “And as far as Simon could discover, Private Wilson never officially reported finding the Major’s body. Which means if he did speak to someone else, it cost him his life. Listen to me. If anyone approaches you, trying in any way to discover what you know-even someone you believe you can trust-send word at once but let them believe your high fever erased any memory of what happened the evening you fell ill. Ignorance will keep you safe, my dear. Remember that.”

“Yes, I understand,” I told him, and only a few minutes later, he was waving to me from the quay while I stood by the rail, watching until the crowded docks blocked him from view.

Why had Simon chosen to tell the Colonel Sahib about Vincent Carson’s death?

There hadn’t been time to ask, but I could think of two reasons-Simon needed my father’s authority to open doors shut to him.

Or he was going into danger and felt that the time had come to protect me by bringing my father into the picture. Pray God this was not the reason. But it had been too long since last I heard from him, and in ordinary circumstances he would have found a way to get in touch.

And it worried me as well that Captain Barclay had reached my father. Even my mother had had no idea where he was.

Although I was offered a cabin, I had too much on my mind to rest. And so I remained at the rail of The Mermaid, a former ferry turned transport ship, and watched the long, dark shape of the Isle of Wight slip by in the night. The wind was unseasonably cold, coming off the water, and I looked up at the bridge to see the watch scanning the seas for German raiders. All lights were out, and the only sounds beside the wind were the engines, a deep and reassuring throb.

I was not the only recovered invalid on board. A good few officers and other ranks I saw on deck were in my opinion still too pale and too thin to return to active duty. But there was that other driving force a soldier understood only too well: the need to be there with those he’d had to leave behind for the duration of his recovery. I read it there later in the intensity of their gaze watching for the first faint blue haze that was France looming on the horizon. The determination not to let the side down, even if it meant dying with them.

Someone found a chair for me, and I sat there, waiting patiently for the journey to end. I was not going back to the hospital where the body of Vincent Carson had been discovered by Private Wilson. Still it was possible for me to get there if I looked for the opportunity. Patient transfers, picking up supplies-there was always traffic of some sort between forward aid stations and those behind the lines.

And then the buffeting of the Channel ceased, and we were moving up the Seine, our destination Rouen. I stood at the rail, picking out landmarks. Gripping my valise, I watched men on the quay bringing The Mermaid in close and tying her up. Then we were ordered to prepare for disembarkation, troops to report in companies. One of the officers nodded to me, indicating I should be among the first to land. But the way had no more than been cleared when the tall, fair Australian who’d contacted my mother appeared out of nowhere, coming up the gangway in long, swift strides to enclose me in a huge embrace, swinging me off my feet.

“You’re alive. I had to see it for myself,” he said. “Your mother, bless her, is a rare lady.”

Laughing, I commanded him to put me down.

Behind me, an English officer said angrily, “I’ll have you on report for that, Sergeant.”

Sergeant Larimore set me down, turned to him, and said blandly, lying through his teeth, “She’s my English cousin, sir.” And then leaning closer to whisper in my ear, he said, “I’m that glad you’re alive, my lass. I couldn’t contemplate a world without your shining face. Now I know you’re safe, I must report to my unit. I’ve been on leave without permission for the past two days, watching for you.”

And he was gone, disappearing into the crowded quayside before I could say a word or ask him who had told him I was even sailing to France.

It must have been my mother. The American didn’t know about Sergeant Larimore.

“Cousin, indeed,” snorted the officer behind me.

“Alas, sir, the black sheep,” I replied. With that I nodded to the ship’s officer and walked sedately off The Mermaid and into Rouen.

I was back in France at last. As I made my way toward the American Base Hospital, where I was to meet my convoy, I could hear the guns in the distance. Someone jostled my shoulder, apologized in rough French, and another man, appearing to be in a great hurry, brushed past me, nearly causing me to drop my valise. I realized all at once how vulnerable I was, alone in a city of this size. I hadn’t really taken thought to the danger I might be in until now, where I was surrounded by people on their way to market or the port or the waiting trains. I didn’t know the face of my enemy, if he was that. But it occurred to me that I could disappear here, and even my father, with all his authority, couldn’t find me in the muddy bottom of the river.

I was glad to see my next transport waiting just beyond the port-an ambulance packed with supplies to replace the depleted stocks of aid units closer to the Front. The driver was someone I didn’t know, a taciturn man who told me his name was Sam and we were late already, Sister, so don’t dawdle, please, Miss.