“Anyone who believes the Communists will let us have any of that territory back is a dreamer,” General Freeman proclaimed to the clutch of White House press photographers and reporters crowding around him after the president had pinned on the general’s Medal of Honor. The general saluted solemnly then raised both arms in a victory sign to show his well-wishers that his wounded arm was back in service.
Harold Schuman, as the president’s national security adviser, was not pleased with Freeman’s off-the-cuff remarks. The Medal of Honor, in his view, brought you respect — it didn’t make you an authority on the delicate matter of diplomatic maneuvering, especially when Moscow and Beijing might interpret the general’s words, at such a high-profile event with the president, as official U.S. policy.
“But it is our policy, isn’t it?” the president challenged Schuman when the general had left. “I certainly don’t intend spilling American blood to defend Germany, then turn around and tell Moscow it can have whatever it overruns. I’m certainly in no mood to ‘stabilize’ the position ‘as is,’ as someone at State said last night. The United States alone,” Mayne reminded Schuman, “has lost twenty-five thousand troops in this war. The very worst thing to do in my view is to give any impression to the Russians, or anyone else for that matter, that we’re about to seriously consider redrawing the map of Europe on their terms. Why — it would make a mockery of what we’ve been through. Those boys would haunt us from their graves.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” put in Trainor. “These are bullyboy tactics from beginning to end. Carve up half of Europe and then say you’re willing to talk. Personally, I’d tell them to shove it.”
“I’ve no doubt you would,” said Schuman tartly. “But we must never close the door to negotiations.”
“Agreed,” said the president, “but this isn’t the time, Harry. First we want the NKA north of the old DMZ, where they belong. And we need the European border where it was.”
“Well,” mused Schuman, “as far as Korea goes, it seems now we’re in better shape than anyone had a right to expect.”
“Because,” interjected Trainor, “we gave Freeman — if you’ll pardon the pun — a free hand there, Mr. Schuman. And State ought to realize that. Only thing those jokers understand in the Kremlin is the fist.”
“You’re beginning to sound like General Freeman,” said Schuman in a slightly disapproving tone. “I hope it isn’t contagious.”
“Well, he did one hell of a job over there, Mr. Schuman. You can’t deny that. We could do with a few more like him in Europe.”
“It’s a much different war in Europe,” said Schuman.
“How?” Trainor challenged him, suspecting that the national security adviser’s comments about Freeman were motivated more from envy of the general’s sudden celebrity than from any sound military consideration.
“We don’t need cowboys in Europe, Mr. Trainor.”
The president held up his hand for an end to the disagreement. He was due for a meeting with the Joint Chiefs, and he intended to bring the matter of Freeman up there. Formerly the president’s title of commander in chief was viewed by the vast majority of American people as a more or less honorary title until he was actually involved in the direction of some military action. In having taken the responsibility of giving the green light for the Pyongyang raid, his stocks were now high, and he intended using them as bargaining chips with the Joint Chiefs. In the president’s view, Freeman’s raid had done infinitely more than turn around the position in Korea and raise American morale and status all around the world in perhaps its darkest time since the Cuban crisis.
Freeman, as far as the president was concerned, had overnight established a new battlefield code of conduct, showing what Mayne called “armchair video” commanders that in a rapid and highly fluid, high-tech mobile war, perhaps more than ever a commanding officer needed HUMINT — human intelligence — to get away from HQ and “go on the point.” Precisely because of all the gizmology available, a commander ought to get out of the claustrophobic, noisy push-button world of divisional HQ tents and get into the thick of the fighting himself, just as some of the fighter pilots had found out that for all the benefits of instrument flying, sometimes it was necessary to simply shut off all the “incoming” buzz and use their eyes.
On this October day, however, with southern England flashing by, Robert Brentwood was one commanding officer who wanted to forget the war, and had it not been for Lana’s letters and the tape she had sent to him from the Spence boy, he might have succeeded. He certainly would not have been on the 10:00 a.m. Glasgow to Victoria Station had he not read her letters, beginning with the last one she had posted. Now she had been posted to some “godforsaken rock,” as she called it, the name of the rock carefully erased by the censor. It could have been anywhere, from Gibraltar to the Galapagos.
Robert was struck by the change in her tone. The self-centeredness of the beautiful coed and the bitterness of her failed marriage alike were conspicuous now by their absence. Instead she talked to her older brother about the terrible ordeal of Ray, of the Spence boy and how it had brought her closer to her three brothers. The war, she wrote, had not diminished her own worries, which she’d hoped it would, for despite common wisdom, she’d found that other people’s troubles, worse though they may be, had not helped put her own “into perspective.” That kind of thing, she discovered, was only a “short fix.” Talking of fixes, she asked Robert whether it was true that many of the pilots were being given — the censor had crossed the word out, but she obviously meant amphetamines. “Yes, they are,” would have been his answer.
After a long letter about Ray, her next had been almost exclusively about the Spence boy, not as a lover, Robert could see, though in matters of the heart he regarded himself as woefully deficient. She went on to tell him that if the war had taught her anything, it was that morale was often more potent than penicillin, that with a purpose before you, you could brave all kinds of horrors that normally would prove too much. Which is what had surprised her so much about William Spence’s death. Unlike some of the smart-ass profs who were against the war and were 4-Fs and knew they wouldn’t be called up, the young sailor had recognized that this was a war NATO and the United States had to win, that at the very best, it was good against evil. At the very worst, no matter what the deficiencies of NATO countries, there was a vast difference between a regime that could knock your door down and take you away in the early hours of the morning and a regime that was required to show good cause. Which was why, she told Robert, she had thought that William Spence, filled with old-fashioned love of country, family, would pull through. But then no one, including herself, had seen that “old hag,” pneumonia, creeping up, just sitting there, knitting, patiendy rocking in the savage corner. Waiting.
It had made her even more worried about Ray. Apparently he’d gone into a funk until some admiral from La Jolla had visited him and told him straight that if he was going to go into a damn sulk over it and not see his kids, he might as well make himself useful — OD and clear the bed for somebody who needed it.
Some of the fighter pilots, she said, who were coming in were experiencing what they call “electronics burn” the result of an intense spitting kind of fire that came from all the high-tech, lightweight, but highly inflammable consoles they’d stuffed into the cockpits. Anyway, apparently Ray had had his sixth plastic surgery operation and had seen the kids. Everyone had a good cry, “according to Mom,” and Ray had started to make noises about sea duty, though that would certainly be a long way off if not out of the question. Maybe some form of support ship, a tender, spare parts or something. Mom was all in a flap because she’d just heard that young David was in for some kind of decoration.
Lana didn’t know, though, whether it was such a good idea for Ray to try and get back in the navy. “Knowing Ray,” she’d written, “he’ll probably be worse than—” she couldn’t think of the name “—the man played by James Cagney in ‘Mr. Roberts’—you know, the old grump who kept losing his palm trees.”
“Anyway, Bob,” she ended, “if there’s one thing I’ve learned in the last two years, from Hong Kong to this godforsaken rock, it’s that love is all that matters and you should give it wherever you can. Hopefully you’ll get some back before we’re all blown to Kingdom Come.”
Robert Brentwood had read all the letters at Holy Loch and, as per her instructions, had run the tape forward a little so Mr. and Mrs. Spence wouldn’t fret about not hearing anything for the first few minutes. Robert had waited to push the “stop” button, not wanting to intrude in any way on the boy’s private thoughts to his family. But the tape was silent. It had come via fleet mail quickly enough, and Brentwood guessed the security and bomb people had done their job — the package going through X ray, and with it, the dead boy’s last message to his folks.
Under the circumstances, and seeing that he had two weeks to fill, Robert thought that the least he could do was visit the boy’s folks. Before going to Waterloo and catching a train down to Surrey, he had called into Marriage’s bookstore. The same manager in Harris tweed who had taken his order several months before had just finished serving a customer when he looked up and saw Brentwood walking in. The manager beamed. “Welcome back, Captain.”
Suddenly throughout the whole store, from the paperback section atop the old spiral iron staircase down to the hardcovers on the main floor, the staff and customers broke into applause. Brentwood looked around to see who they were all clapping for, and blushed like an afterburner when he realized it was him. It was the convoys — they were starting to get through, the convoys without which the British would die, let alone Europe, and the guardians of the convoys were in good standing with the people of Britain.
The manager, Mr. Harris, was quite definite about refusing payment, handing Brentwood a mint-new copy of Bing.
“No, look, I’d like to—” protested Brentwood.
“No, old man. Least we can do.” Everyone from assistants to the unloading clerk had gathered to welcome the American captain.
“Have you time for tea, Captain?” someone asked.
“Why — er — I’ve got to be getting up to Oxshott.”
The manager was so tickled by the occasion, he couldn’t bring himself to correct the American, but he did ring British Rail and ask them what time the next train down to Oxshott was. Eleven p.m.
While they were having tea and biscuits, someone brought in a dolly with a carton of at least fifty paperbacks for the officers and crew of Brentwood’s ship. The manager saw the captain of the most deadly armed ship in history looking rather nonplussed.
“Not to worry, Captain. We’ll have them sent to your ship. You won’t have to carry them about.” There were a few giggles and polite laughs. “If you’ll just give me an address?”
Robert, as security demanded, gave him the U.S. naval P.O. box in Glasgow. Overcome by the warmth, especially after he’d been told so much about the reserved British manner, Brentwood almost forgot to take Bing with him.
After tea, there was a pub dinner: pickles, Scotch eggs, and several pints of black Guiness, their brown, creamy heads flowing like velvet down the captain’s dry throat. Another pint later, Brentwood asked, “Mr. Harris — can I ask you a straight question?”
“Fire away, old boy.”
“This gal — young lady, young British lady — was rather upset with me at a party. Said I was ‘worse than Bing Crosby.’ You know what she meant?”
“Hmm,” said Harris, who was swirling the final ration of Guiness. “Weren’t singing, were you?”
“No,” answered Robert. “No, I wasn’t.”
“Romancing then, was it?”
“No — well, I mean, she was kind of annoyed that I wouldn’t—”
“Ah—” Harris leaned over to the barman. “Fred — haven’t any of the rough red left, have you?”
“ ‘Fraid not, Mr.’Arris. I’ve got a liter of Old Espagnol, though.”
“Dry, is it?” Harris inquired about the sherry, Brentwood thinking he’d forgotten completely about his question.
“Mr. ‘Arris,” said the barman, “if this stuff was any drier, it’d make your ‘air fall out — eyebrows, too, most likely.”
“How much?” asked Harris, forehead furrowed, ready for a shock. He got it.
“A century.”
“Oooh—” said Harris, his head coming back from the bar. “Oh dear—”
“Best I can do, Squire,” said the barman. “Rationing and all.”
“Oh, quite, quite. Quite all right, Fred.”
“You’re welcome, Mr. Harris.”
Brentwood Lifted the last of his Guiness and savored it as it went down. “I like that,” he said.
“I think, old man, she was saying you were rather bourgeois.”
“Straitlaced,” cut in the barman, his hand rocking from side to side. “You know—’long the straight and narrow. No ‘anky-panky.”
“Well,” said Harris, “I have to spend a penny. Then I ‘m off, I’m afraid. I’ll take you to the station.”
“Going to the loo,” explained the barman as Harris made off, a little unsteadily, through the gray-blue haze of cigarette smoke, something you saw much more often these days since the war had begun.
“Straitlaced, eh?” Brentwood said to the barman.
“Yeah. ‘Cor, my dad. ‘E loved Crosby. Bit of a crooner himself. Always hummin’ round the ‘ouse. Then I’d be on listenin’ to the Who. Drive me mum nuts. Battle royal over that, I can tell you.”
“Uh-huh,” said Brentwood — it was like listening to a new code.
When Harris returned, they walked out into the chilly night air. They could see the searchlights all around London, in constant crisscrossing, interplaying patterns, reaching thousands of feet and reflecting off the stratus.
“Do no good at all, I’m told,” said Harris, looking up at them. “Is that true?”
“More or less,” agreed Robert, a cold, bracing breeze coming up from the Embankment. “It’s a war of invisible beams,” he explained to Harris. “But I guess searchlights give comfort to a lot of folks. Something you can see.”
Harris had hailed a cab for Waterloo Station, its headlights two yellow slits. “What you think our chances are? Look here— I don’t want to pry — classified stuff or anything like that.”
“I don’t know,” said Brentwood. “Far as I can tell, the experts don’t know either.”
They got into the back of the taxi.
“How long do you think it will last?” pressed Harris.
“ Longer than anyone expected.”
“That’s rather grim.”
“Yes.”
There was a long silence until they entered Waterloo and Robert Brentwood alighted, turning to pay the cabbie. Harris waved the money away.
“All right,” said Brentwood. “You can put off some of the people some of the time, but you can’t put off all of the people all of the time.” And with that he handed the bookshop manager the liter of Old Espagnol that he’d been hiding under his coat.
Harris was agape.
“Thanks for everything, Mr. Harris. I really appreciate—”
Harris cut in, “I’m — really, this is quite — wonderful.”
“Between allies,” said Brentwood, smiling.
“Allies indeed.” Harris put out his hand. He made to say something, hesitated, then dared to go on anyway. “Captain, you might be right. It might last longer than any of us imagined, but if you’ll accept a piece of advice—”
“Certainly.”
Harris lowered his head. “That gal — any port in a storm, old boy.” Then he sat back in the cab, chuckling, shaking his head. “Any port — my God, Captain — don’t you tell anyone I told you that. So banal, they’d have me thrown out of the club.”
“I won’t,” said Brentwood. “Good-bye.”
“Ta-ta.”
When he got to Oxshott, a wind had come up, the oaks and big elms around the station blowing hard, a smell so fresh and clean that despite the distant thudding of antiaircraft guns and the orange scratches against the sky that were the surface-to-air missiles along the coast from East Anglia down, Robert had the sense that he had been to this place before. But not being a superstitious man, and trained in the cold logic of launch mode attack, he decided that it must be the invigorating force of the wind that had cleared the Guiness, heightened his senses, giving him the feeling of déjà vu.
The Spence house, however, looked familiar, too, like the one his parents had in New Jersey — double-storied, semimodern brick. All the lights were out, but flower beds were dimly visible beneath the high silver moon, a dog barking from somewhere behind the house, and a run of big bushes, possibly rhododendrons, giving the whole garden a casually ordered appearance. He rang the bell, realizing that he’d planned this operation badly. But there had been no hotel rooms left in Oxshott, so it was either this or back to the train station to wait until 4:00 a.m. A light came on, then another.
When the front door opened, he saw a woman, her hair in curlers, long, padded dressing gown held tightly by her hand at the throat. He guessed it was the dead boy’s mother. He took off his cap. “Mrs. Spence?”
“No, is there something—”
“I’m Captain Brentwood, ma’am. U.S. Navy. Robert Brentwood. My sister is a nurse — she was William’s nurse and she wrote me with—”
“Oh — oh.” He heard the door chain rattling. “Oh, do come in. Ah — oh, please come in.” She switched on the kitchen and living room lights. She switched them off again, explaining quickly, “I haven’t drawn the blackout drapes.”
“What’s—Rosemary!” A man in his sixties, tousled head of sparse brown hair, in a tartan nightrobe, was coming down from the upstairs bedroom, peering shortsightedly.
“Oh, Father. This is Captain Brentwood. Nurse Brentwood’s brother. He’s—”
Richard Spence tightened the belt on his robe and put out his hand. “How kind of you. My goodness, where have you come from at this hour?”
“London, sir. I ‘m afraid I left it a bit late, and when I reached Oxshott, there were no bed-and-breakfast places, hotels, or anything else. I’m sorry to bother you.”
“Bother? No bother. Rose, get Mother quickly.” He turned back to Brentwood, tying his robe tighter about his thin frame. “Would you like a cup of tea?”
“Yes, sir. That’d be nice.”
Robert Brentwood decided there and then not to tell them about the damaged tape in his kit. If they asked, he’d say it never arrived. It would be heartbreak for them.
When Mrs. Spence came down slowly, a short, frail lady with soft white hair, she looked dazed.
Richard Spence said softly, “My wife’s been on medication, Captain. Ever since—”
“Of course, sir. I understand.” Robert Brentwood rose to his feet to greet Mrs. Spence.
Richard Spence left the room hurriedly. The American’s manners, his thoughtfulness in coming this far, all the way from Scotland, to bring something of their son’s last hours in a foreign place, filled Richard Spence with such gratitude, he had to excuse himself in order to regain his composure. When he reappeared, he was in command of the situation. “I hope you’ll be staying.”
“If it wouldn’t be too much trouble, sir. A bed for the night would be more than—”
“Tonight? When are you due back?”
“Ten days, sir.”
“Of course he must stay,” put in Anne Spence, the hot, steaming tea Rosemary had made reviving her. “William’s room.”
There was a quick glance between Rosemary and her father. It was the first time Anne Spence had even considered the idea of anyone entering William’s room.
“Perhaps,” said Rosemary, who Robert now saw had taken off her scarf and hair rollers, her hair warm and golden, “perhaps the captain has other plans, Mother. I’m sure he has friends.”
“No, I don’t.” He had said it without thinking. Why, he couldn’t fathom. First law of defense — never betray your most vulnerable angle of attack. It was Rosemary — her eyes. She was not especially beautiful, but there was a kindness, devoid of any cunning, and in that moment he remembered Lana’s injuction about giving love. He had been trained for split-second decisions; his kind of war did not permit anything else. A second lost was a ship lost.
He wanted to stay. The house, astonishingly to him, did not have a different smell from his own home; perhaps it was a spice, something as mundane as a rug cleaner his mother had used with the same odor, or perhaps he’d been at sea so long, he could no longer tell the difference in ambience between one house and another. Whatever the reason, he felt he was in a home he knew and understood. Here there was loyalty and affection. And there was love.
“I’d like to stay,” he said.
“Bravo!” said Richard Spence, brightening. “You hungry?”
Brentwood thought about it for a moment. “Why, yes, sir, I believe I am.” They all laughed. Even Mrs. Spence showed the trace of a smile.
“Now then, what do you Americans like?” asked Richard. “Wish Georgina was here.” He looked over at Brentwood. “She’s our younger daughter. Up at LSE — London School of Economics. Political Science—”
“What on earth has that got to do with what Americans eat?” asked the frail-looking Mrs. Spence.
“Haven’t the foggiest,” replied Richard, rolling up the sleeves of his robe so they wouldn’t touch the element. “Well, Georgina thinks she knows everything, I suppose. That’s why.”
“Americans like hamburgers,” said Mrs. Spence.
“Eggs,” said Richard. “What’s that expression? Easy up?”
“Easy over, Daddy,” said Rosemary, chuckling. She shook her head at Robert. “Don’t mind us,” she said. “I expect we’re bombarding you awfully. Perhaps you hate eggs?”
“No, ma’am, I love them.” Brentwood also knew that eggs were the least-rationed of foods — much easier to get than meat.
“You see?” cut in Richard happily. “I told you, Rose. How about a Welsh rarebit?”
“Sounds fine,” said Brentwood.
“Oh,” said Rosemary, “how rude we are.” She walked over and took Robert’s cap. “Call me Rose,” she said quietly, and Robert Brentwood did something he normally never did. He looked at her fingers. No rings.
As Anne Spence and her husband busied themselves in the kitchen, Mrs. Spence giving quiet directions, Richard assuring her he knew exactly what to do, Rosemary took Robert Brentwood into the dining room. “Now,” she said, “you must tell me all about yourself.”
“I’d rather know all about you.”
“I’m a schoolteacher.”
“Shakespeare,” he said.
She brightened, “How — oh,” she said, “William, I expect.”
“Yes, my sister told me. He talked quite a lot about you— and the family.”
“Yes. We miss him very much.”
There was an awkward silence.
“Can I ask you about your work?” Rosemary asked. “I mean, they won’t put me in prison or anything?”
“No,” he laughed. “Ask away.”
“This is going to sound awfully silly, but I’ve never understood why people always say how dreadful it must be on submarines. I mean, I know they’re rather crowded, or at least I imagine they are. Even the latest ones, but from the looks of them, I think I should feel much more claustrophobic on the Tube.”
“The Tube?”
“The underground,” she said, smiling. It was an easy smile, utterly devoid of any pretense. Their banter about the sub and everything else they discussed came as easily to them as if they were old friends — the kind whom one hasn’t seen for twenty years or more and yet whose conversation is taken up as if space and time had never existed. He couldn’t remember when he had felt more relaxed in the company of anyone outside his family. The house, like that of his parents, was neat but not obsessively so, comfortable but not ostentatiously indulgent. And though he knew nothing much about art, the paintings he saw gave him special pleasure; one in particular, La Gare du Nord, had such vibrant colors that at times it seemed to fill the Spences’ living room with a sense of life and light. The whole house seemed warm, and Robert felt that ironically it was the death of their youngest that, like the death of a crewman aboard a ship, drew the others closer together. And with Rosemary he felt he had to be honest, even confessing to her that he’d never read much Shakespeare.
“Most people haven’t,” she said, laughing. “Not really read him. And those who do always try to make him so dramatic— and all those flourishes. His language is really very quick. Alive. You know, ‘the quick and the dead.’ “
Robert shook his head. “Afraid you’ve lost me there.”
She paused. They looked at each other. “I don’t think so,” she said, and they both knew that it was beginning.
“Will you go away soon?” she asked quietly.
“We’ll be casting off in ten days.”
“I meant how long will you stay here?”
“As long as I possibly can.”
“Good,” she said. Her father was coming into the dining room with the tray. “I noticed you have a biography of Bing Crosby with you,” he said.
“Yes.”
“One of my favorites, too.”
Robert Brentwood was about to say that he’d bought it for Richard Spence, but it would be a lie — oh, a harmless one, but there was something about this whole family, something good that made him want to speak only the truth. Ten days might be all that they had. “I’d be happy for you to read it while I’m here—”
“Oh, no, I don’t want to—”
“No, sir. Please. I don’t think I’ll be doing much reading. I’d like to do a bit of walking. Stretch my legs for a change.”
“Rose?” Richard Spence said, looking over his cup of steaming Darjeeling. “You’re the trail person. Over to the Downs, down to Martin, then over—”
“Yes, yes,” said his wife, “but first, where did you put the toast?”
By the time they’d finished the impromptu meal, it was near 3:30 as Richard and Anne retired, Rosemary showing Robert William’s room. It was a neat room — in what Robert thought was a very navy way — small writing desk and chair, a bed, a clean, uncluttered Victorian dresser with minor, and a picture of a young seaman — winter uniform.
“I’ll see you in the morning,” she said.
Robert Brentwood was tired, but he could not sleep for thinking of her. It was already quite clear to him that they’d be married, but he decided not to rush it. He’d ask her father tomorrow.
In the morning, a Saturday, Robert was surprised to discover, they all enjoyed a late brunch, and afterward, newspapers all round in the sun room. Being the guest, Robert got to take his pick, and while a scantily clad chorus girl under the screaming headline “DOING HER BIT FOR THE WAR EFFORT” caught his eye, he played safe and took the Sunday Telegraph. It was a mixed read, for on the one hand, it was clear that the tide had turned in Korea, the NKA in disarray, editorials understanding the American desire to push as far as the Yalu but cautioning against it as part of any long-range solution to the upheavals on the Asian front.
“Who is this awful Freeman man?” asked Rosemary.
“The American general,” said Richard. “There’s talk of them sending him over to Europe. Jolly good thing, too.” He looked over at Robert. “Sorry, Captain Brentwood—”
“Call me Robert, please.”
“Yes, certainly. Well, Robert, you must forgive Rosemary’s disapproval of this Freeman chap.”
“Oh, it’s not that I disapprove, Daddy,” said Rose. “I’ve no doubt he’s a very good soldier, but he says such awful things about them.”
“That’s because they’re awful people,” said Richard. “They blatantly attack South Korea and then expect…”
Mrs. Spence excused herself from the table and they tried to steer conversation in other directions, but inevitably it seemed to come back to the war simply because it was worldwide and day by day was affecting more and more people, the Telegraph reporting, for example, how so many of the Russian minority groups, from the Georgians to the Estonians to the Mongols, were demanding greater independence from Russian domination and how the Russian tanks had quickly put down any such aspirations, which solved nothing but merely postponed the inevitable bloodshed. And in China the “Martyrs of 1989” were commemorated by students in a silent vigil in Tiananmen Square, watched from a ring of olive-green tanks by steel-helmeted troops of the People’s Liberation Army.
“That’s why,” said Richard, “things have quieted down a bit in Western Europe for the moment. The Bolshies want to make sure their backyard’s secure before they move into France.”
“You think they will?” asked Robert.
Richard Spence was stirring the tea bag in the pot and squeezing it on the side, something he would never have done were it not for the rationing that was getting more severe all the time. “Attack France? It’s inevitable. I’m no strategist, but if you chaps keep doing your job and more of those convoys get through, Ivan’s going to have to do something.”
Robert nodded. “The French ports.”
“Exactly. I’m afraid what we’re seeing here, in Europe right now, is a lull before the next storm.” It was when Mrs. Spence reentered the room and Richard quickly turned over the war news pages that showed the map of Europe with the three great Russian prongs deep into Germany that he came across the advertisement that had been running for several days and which, like so many, in his opinion, made absolutely no sense. He pounced on it as a diversionary tactic to shift his wife’s attention away from all the battlefront news. “Here’s this madman again.”
Rosemary leaned over to Robert. “This is Daddy’s favorite hobbyhorse. Be warned.”
Richard Spence was reading it aloud: “It is vital to the national defense that you surrender immediately all your portable hair dryers to the following address…”
“What’s it mean?” laughed Robert.
“It means,” said Richard Spence, “that some damned old fool called Dr. Guy Knowlton is allowed to indulge his eccentricity despite the fact that this country is in a state of national crisis. They’re always going on about shortages, paper especially, and here they go allowing…”
“It is a private ad, Daddy,” said Rosemary. “Not the government’s.”
Mrs. Spence excused herself from the table again.
“Sorry, Mother…”
Robert forgot all about the man and the portable hair dryers and everything else about the war as he and Rosemary walked, hand in hand, across the Downs, cycled through the tree-arched byways around Martin, and fell more deeply in love.
Robert had chickened out from asking either Rosemary or her parents about marrying her but gathered his forces and did so on the second to last day of his leave.
Richard Spence was stunned. As he confessed later, it had really been Anne who, to use his potential son-in-law’s idiom, “carried the ball.” She hadn’t seemed surprised at all. But Anne Spence had already lost one child and might lose more if the Russians managed to drive through in the next great offensive and take the French ports. England would be next.
They gave their blessing to Robert and Rosemary, but Richard was still fretting on the last night before Robert would have to leave and go north to Holy Loch. In their bedroom Richard was pacing back and forth, Anne having already taken her pill, trying, despite her jangled nerves, to get some sleep. “Will you stop!” she said finally.
“Too fast,” said Richard. “It’s all too fast for my liking. Too fast!”
“Perhaps not fast enough,” his wife said quietly.
“What do you mean?” he shot back.
“None of us knows whether we’ll be here tomorrow. They might as well.”
Richard didn’t speak for a long time, and not until he was in bed did he concede the point. “Perhaps you’re right.”
In the blacked-out living room, Robert and Rosemary held each other, not saying much, neither wanting to talk about the cold fact that tomorrow he would be off again to war.
“If you want,” she began.
“No,” he said, “though I suppose you think I’m nuts.”
“I think you’re wonderful and I love you and — I’m so afraid for you.”
“Maybe we should put it off then until—”
She placed her finger on his lips. “No,” she said softly, shaking her head, resolute in her decision. “No. We’ll get married as soon as you come back. As we planned.”
There was a taping on the front door, and from the living room Robert could see the small red light that came on as whoever was outside also tried the chime bell.
“Chime doesn’t work,” said Rosemary, getting up and brushing herself down, looking presentable as she walked toward the door.
Outside, a policeman was standing beneath the porch light, rain glistening on his cape.
“Yes, Constable?”
Rosemary came back, her shapely figure outlined in the spillover of the kitchen light, one hand on her chest in relief.
“What’s up?” Robert asked.
“The drapes. Apparently there’s a slit of light from Mummy and Daddy’s room.”
As she walked down from her parents’ room and he saw her silhouetted again, this time in the faint hallway light, he didn’t think he could control it any longer. Nor could she.
He took her by the hand, and in the darkness of the living room they made love.
“Tell me…” she said, “promise me, you’ll come back.”
From the coast came the dull thudding of antiaircraft fire and the high, swishing noise of missile salvos, and he remembered Lana’s premonition of danger, her counsel to give love, to have love, while one still could.
“I’ll comeback.”