The Forgotten War Read online

  ‘I think you’re sick.’

  ‘Mmm. I probably agree. Something to do with one’s school.’

  ‘OK,’ I told him. ‘I’m here. I’m here because you’d already snared me with a photo of Grace. Was that kosher, by the way?’

  ‘That’s what I want you to find out. The Lady Vanishes and Find The Lady. Sound like films and card games, don’t they?’

  I wasn’t in the mood for Piers’s word games. ‘They are a film and a card game. Just explain what you want.’

  ‘Simple tasks for a man with your skills. I want you to study those photographs until you think that you can recognize the people in them on sight. Then go trolling down the Bishops Avenue until you come across them, identify them, and bring their names and locations back to me. I need to know exactly where the principals are living before we move against them. Find your errant lady into the bargain, and I’ll give you a gold star for your exercise book.’

  ‘I already have a medal from the French.’

  ‘I know. They’ll pay you a small pension for that when you retire. I’ll bet you didn’t know that.’

  ‘No, I didn’t. This isn’t very RAF work, Piers.’

  ‘No. It’s not even very GCHQ work. It’s almost GCHQ work.’

  ‘You said “trolling down the Bishops Avenue”: what does “trolling” mean? Is it a new in-word?’

  ‘No, son; a very old in-word. Norse root; adopted by the Saxons, I should imagine. It means towing a baited hook behind a boat until a fish grabs it. I can’t imagine where you went to school.’

  ‘What’s the bait I’ll be trailing?’

  ‘You and your errant woman. I’m betting she’s as much an embarrassment to them as she is to us: Brother Ivan’s not all that keen on poor little rich girls. I’m sure you’ll be very popular once they suspect that you might be going to take her away with you. We want her away from them, and they probably want to see the back of her.’

  ‘Why do you want her away from there?’

  ‘Oh, the usual reason.’ He waved his hand in the air. ‘Her father still makes most of the bullets that our fine British Tommy marches to war with, so we don’t want her face all over the front page of the Sunday Pic, do we? If you can lift her out of there without embarrassment, it will be the best of all possible outcomes for the largest number of people.’

  ‘That’s Benthamism, isn’t it? I remember that from school. If you already know she’s up there and you suspect they want to get rid of her, then you already have someone asking questions. Is that the man who took your photos?’

  ‘A man who stepped off the edge of the world about four weeks ago; just about when you stepped onto the stage, Charlie. Weren’t we lucky? We haven’t got a clue what happened to him.’

  ‘Why should she have anything to do with me? I followed her to Italy last year, remember, and she told me to bugger off.’

  ‘You’ve got her baby, haven’t you? Try that.’

  I knew it: brutal little bastard once the gloves were off, wasn’t he?

  Piers parked me in a small office, gave me a couple of photographs to memorize, and a book on socialism to give me the flavour of the people I would be mixing with. It was entitled A History of Socialism in Cromarty, and it had been published in 1919. He said that it was the only book on socialism that he’d read. It centred on the life of a nineteenth-century stone mason, and was probably very interesting to other nineteenth-century stone masons. For my purposes it was utterly fucking irrelevant.

  The pack helped, though. The office looked dead; as if no one had worked in it in years. In an otherwise empty dark green locker I found a tatty old army pack – probably from the First World War. In my mind I rehearsed what I was going to carry in it: a couple of old RAF shirts, well past their best, a change of smalls and socks. Soap and toothbrush. Oh, yeah – wrapped in there somewhere would be Tommo’s pistol. If I was going to stick my head into the lion’s mouth I wanted something that would convince the lion that I wouldn’t be all that tasty. It was only as I was packing that evening that I began to wonder when I’d begun to think like that.

  The next morning I took a bus out to the Spaniards – that is, the Spaniards Inn – and hoofed it from there. It might have been a circuitous approach, but I wanted time to think, and I think well on my feet. Kenwood House car park was open, and several cars were resting in it. A group of musicians and singers were limbering up so I wandered over and lit a pipe, putting off the evil hour. They were all in fancy dress, and produced the strangest music I had ever heard. Dark-haired women wore long red skirts that flew out into the shape of bells as they danced and whirled. A Scot who looked like Oscar Wilde told me that they were Bulgarians who had come over for an international folk-music festival being staged in the big house by the LCC.

  ‘What do you think of them?’ he asked.

  ‘This lot, or the LCC?’

  ‘Pardon? Ah! I see: joke. Funny.’

  No – not like Wilde at all.

  ‘Their singing sets my teeth on edge, and their music makes the hair on my neck stand up,’ I told him.

  ‘I know. Terrific, isn’t it?’ Oscar said. ‘Would you like to come to one of their concerts? I’ve got some free tickets.’

  I smiled at one of the women. When she smiled back I could see that some of her teeth were missing. Those that weren’t appeared to have been filed to points. I didn’t mean to shudder, but I couldn’t help it. I settled for two tickets, but didn’t guarantee to use them. Nevertheless the man had lifted my sombre mood, so I launched myself down the big avenue. The lime and silver birch trees had come into leaf, and I walked down a wide sunlight-dappled path. An ex-army pick-up drove slowly past me and dropped out of sight. The men dressed in uniform remnants huddled in the back of it gave me a quick once-over as they passed. One of them raised a hand to me. I didn’t think that I knew him, but I was dressed the same as them. The tattered-uniform remnants of the new underclass: Charlie back in character.

  The big houses were on one side of the street. There were three kinds: those occupied by their rightful owners, the unoccupied, and those taken over by our abandoned heroes – the people I was looking for. One house had a gardener weeding its freshly gravelled driveway, and a large dog chained to the front gate. It didn’t look like the place for me, so I gave it a pass. The dog lifted her lip and sneered.

  A big crumbling mock-Tudor mass looked more promising. There were kids playing in an unkempt front garden. A man wearing a tired Para smock sat on the front steps of an open door, smoking a big curved briar: one of the good guys. His accent said Newcastle or Gateshead: they get everywhere.

  ‘Help you, pal?’

  I put my old pack down, and stretched. I hoped I looked as if I was on the road. ‘I was looking for somewhere to stay for a few days.’

  He stood up so that he was between me and the door. ‘Not here, chook. We’re full up. No room at the inn.’ At least he was telling it straight.

  I shrugged, and let my shoulders sag. ‘Down the road?’

  ‘You can always ask. I wouldn’t know. Wouldn’t think so.’

  Well done, Charlie. Fallen at the first fence. I turned away from him, my mind racing behind what I hoped was something like a weary mask. I took about ten paces towards the gate when one of the kids, a boy of about seven or eight, went down on the gravel and set up a howl. He was sitting up by the time I reached him, grizzling and holding a hand over a bloody knee.

  ‘You’re a wounded soldier,’ I told him, and gave him a hug. ‘Come on, now; soldiers don’t cry. Let me see it.’

  It was just a shallow graze, but they can sting like blazes, can’t they? All the boy needed was for someone to tell him what to do. Before the big man from the steps had arrived, I was kneeling to clean the kid’s graze with his own spit and my clean but ragged spare handkerchief. The boy winced, but he didn’t shout as I picked out the dirt with a fingernail. Then I tied the handkerchief around his knee. I said, ‘There. Wounded soldier. Your dad’ll be
proud of you.’

  ‘Dad was at Alamein,’ the kid said, and drew himself up straight. He stuck his chest out. ‘He never came back. He was a hero; I’ve got his medals.’ How do you respond to that one? The Geordie was up to us by then.

  ‘We can manage now,’ he said. ‘Thanks.’ He hoisted the kid into his arms. Both of them were looking down on me now. ‘Say thank you, Gary.’

  ‘Thanks, mister.’

  I grinned. It was because that was the first time anyone had called me mister.

  ‘Bye, soldier. Watch out for the stones next time.’

  Walking away from them was all that was left for me to do. As I turned away I saw a woman I didn’t know at an upstairs window. She smiled and raised a hand. I waved back in a half-hearted sort of way. These people were good at hellos and goodbyes, but not at what went between. What the hell, they’d probably all had difficult wars.

  I was almost at the gate before the Geordie called out, ‘Hey, mister. Wait a min.’

  Second time the word had been used on me inside two minutes: not bad. I turned back.

  He added, ‘Go down to number twenty-eight and ask for the Secretary. He might be able to help you.’

  ‘What do I tell him?’

  ‘Say you’re looking for a billet for a few days, and say Matesy sent you.’

  ‘Matesy?’

  ‘That’s me.’ He held a hand out for the ritual shake: the top of the index finger was missing. He said, ‘Good luck, chum.’

  The kid looked at me solemnly and echoed him. ‘Good luck, chum.’

  They grew up quickly in those days.

  The house I had been sent to was bigger and uglier. Nineteen-thirties build – it reminded me of that police station in Cheltenham. This one had defence in depth: a couple of hard-looking buggers lounged near the garden gate, and another guy sat in a rocking chair by the double front doors, rolling a fag. I got as far as him because the hard buggers ignored me. I thought that meant that I looked as if I fitted in. Wrong, Charlie. The man in the rocker was a big serious-looking guy about my age. He had a moustache and beard around his mouth, and cheap, heavy specs. He said, ‘You took your time. Where’ve you been?’

  For a moment I was thrown, and thought that it was all over before I put a foot over the threshold. Then the kid with the bloody knee moved out of the shadow of the hallway. Matesy had sent a runner around the back: the old ways were often the best.

  ‘I had a look at some of the big houses on the way down. Why?’

  The man looked down at his fag, and shook his head. He was making a rotten job of it, so I asked, ‘Would you like me to do that? I learned how to in the mob.’

  He handed over a tatty packet of Nosegay and a pack of Rizlas. ‘Roll yourself one, too. What mob was that?’

  ‘The RAF. That was years ago.’

  ‘It seems like it, sometimes, doesn’t it? Looking for somewhere to bunk down?’

  ‘Yeah. There you go.’ I handed him a fag and his kit. ‘Thanks, but I use a pipe.’

  ‘Can you pay your way?’ he asked.

  ‘I’ve a few quid. I can always get some more.’ I wasn’t lying: I had fifty pounds sewn into a shirt pocket.

  ‘Not from round here, you don’t,’ he told me seriously. ‘The rich folk all have dogs. And anyway, it’s not my policy to upset the neighbours. Us living alongside them pisses them off enough as it is.’

  ‘I’ll remember that.’

  He clearly took me for a thief. The odd thing was that he didn’t seem to think any less of me because of it. ‘And you can buy me a pint tonight.’

  ‘I may not be here tonight. I have to speak to someone called the Secretary. I don’t know what he’s secretary of.’

  ‘Secretary of the Housing Committee of the Highgate and Hampstead Branch of the CP. What a mouthful. That’s me. I manage these houses for the People’s Housing Cooperative.’ When I didn’t react he asked, ‘Does that bother you?’

  ‘Not if you have a room, or something, for me.’

  ‘We’ll find something for you. I’m Harry James – just like the bandleader.’ He stood up. I had to do the handshake thing again. I said, ‘Charlie . . .’ And then I said something stupid, because it was much too close to home for comfort. ‘Charlie Miller.’ It was all I could think of by way of a surname at short notice.

  ‘Welcome to Millionaires’ Row, Charlie; make the most of it because they’ll have us out of here before long, and they’re the biggest houses you’ll ever sleep in. Hungry?’

  I nodded. ‘Yes, a bit.’

  ‘Cut along to the kitchen; it’s through in the back. They’ll find you something.’

  ‘How do I pay for this?’

  ‘In good time. We’ll find you something to do. Can you hold a paintbrush or repair a wireless set?’

  I grinned. ‘Yeah; I can do both those things for you.’

  The kid, Gary, held his hand up. He said, ‘I’ll take you to the kitchen, mister.’

  ‘Charlie,’ I told him.

  ‘Mister Charlie.’

  I noticed that he no longer had my handkerchief: his knee had been properly cleaned and neatly bandaged. That was interesting: there was an organizing principle at work here. In one of the rooms off the corridor that led back through the house a radio was playing music. Benny Goodman was doing ‘Memories of You’.

  Gary watched me eat thick slices of bread and dripping and drink a mug of tea. The dripping wasn’t as good as Miller’s, but they’d probably started with less promising material. He shook his head when I offered him some. Things must be looking up in England if kids could afford to refuse a meal. He asked me, ‘Were you in the RAF, Mister Charlie?’

  ‘Yes, I was. How did you guess?’

  ‘Didn’t. I heard you tell Mister James.’ He sniffed, and wiped his nose on the end of his sleeve.

  ‘Don’t do that. Use a hankie.’

  ‘Sorry, mister.’

  He looked as if I’d slapped him, and I realized that he didn’t have one. I gave him my second, and last, handkerchief. It was clean but rumpled. He said, ‘Thanks, mister. Can I keep it?’

  ‘Yes, of course. You’re welcome to it.’

  ‘Mr Mates is making me a model Spit. Did you fly Spitfires?’

  ‘No. Lancaster bombers.’

  ‘Did you kill masses of Jerries?’

  ‘Yes; I’m afraid I probably did.’

  His hand suddenly bunched around the handkerchief in a hard little fist. He stared out of the window as if he could see for a thousand miles, and said, ‘Good.’

  The room they gave me faced a back garden half the size of a football pitch and neatly laid out with vegetables. I guessed that they had lived here a long time; maybe years. My space was about twenty by twenty – the biggest room I had ever had to myself – and had two large windows and a double-bed mattress on the floor. That had four sheets and three clean blankets neatly folded on it. There was a utility armchair which had seen better days, a small table and chair, and a flimsy wardrobe. There was a key on the inside of the door, and another hanging from a nail in the back of it. I asked Gary, ‘Where did all this stuff come from?’

  ‘Bomb-sites, Mister Charlie. You need anything else?’

  ‘No. Thanks. This will do for me. Why aren’t you at school today?’

  ‘Half-term. I hate it, anyway. I should be out working, getting Ma a bit of money.’

  ‘How old are you?’

  ‘Nine.’

  ‘Does she complain about that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then wait until she does, Gary. You’ll grow up soon enough.’

  There was one missing window-pane. It had been replaced with a sheet of three-ply neatly puttied into place. If I had repaired that, and given the place a lick of paint, I could have lived the rest of my life there. There was a big bathroom, and a separate toilet along the corridor. I shared them with a woman who had three children and two rooms, and a girl who lived on her own in one. They were clean and tidy – there was no
room here for my usual slobbish ways.

  The pub that the Secretary took me to was the Parr’s Head in Camden Town. What goes around comes around. Ma showed no sign of recognizing me from the night before. This time I sat in the public bar with half a dozen other men. I thought that I recognized two of them from Piers’s photographs, but I couldn’t be sure. They talked politics. The government had betrayed the returning forces, apparently, and the Nazis who had run England before the war were re-establishing themselves in all of the top slots. Your Working Man, who had done the bulk of the fighting, had ended up with less than he’d started out with, and something had to be done about that. I kept my head down, and asked the occasional question as if a new world was opening up before me.

  We sat on the top deck of the bus going back that night. It had that musty smell of tobacco and old people: smoke, piss and sweat. Harry James said, ‘They liked you. You can stay as long as you like.’

  ‘How do you know they liked me?’

  ‘I can tell. Would you roll me another fag?’

  ‘Why don’t I show you the knack?’

  ‘I always wanted to write a book about politics. Something that would make a difference for working people – that would show them how to organize themselves and come out on top.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Now I think that writing a book about how to roll a good fag would be of more use to them.’

  ‘The knack, and how to get it,’ I told him.

  ‘I like that,’ he said. ‘You’ve been around, haven’t you?’ It was one of those phrases we used all the time in the Forties: it meant that you’d had some experiences – not all of them needed to have been good. I showed him how to dampen his forefingers and thumbs before he rolled a cigarette. He was a quick learner.

  ‘Who were those men I met tonight?’

  ‘Oh, just some committee. No one important.’

  They’d been important enough to give me the once-over, and important enough to give me the nod. I remembered that in France in the 1790s they called themselves the Committee for Public Safety, or some such guff. They were the ones who sent you to the guillotine. That was interesting. I was on a bus with Robespierre.