‘I’ll come back,’ I said. ‘I promise.’
She dropped her eyes, and I felt the last bit of trust she had in me disappear.
I pushed them towards the holly bush. Frankie pulled a branch aside and crawled in. They’d get a nice collection of scratches, but better that than be found by an advance party of Germans.
Elizabeth followed him. I’d have time to apologise to her later, if all went well.
The German voice came and went. One man, talking, as if he was giving a speech. It was difficult to work out the distance. One minute it sounded close, then it seemed to get more distant. At times it disappeared entirely.
The sergeant had gone, following the sound. I followed.
It sounded like the man was at the edge of the woods, or in the field. Either way it was between me and the farmhouse, where Mum and Nob were left unprotected. I picked up my pace.
At the edge of the woods, I caught up with the sergeant, crouched in the drainage ditch on the other side of the barbed-wire fence. The Polish soldier was forty yards to our left, same position, crouched in the ditch. I looked right. The third soldier slid under the fence, down into theditch. We had a good vantage point across the open field, looking north up towards the house. The field was empty. No German scouting party. No parachutists.
I rolled under the lower strand of barbed wire and slid down into the drainage ditch to confer with the sergeant. As I reached him I heard the voice again. Difficult to locate. It sounded like it was from above us, coming out of the ether. I didn’t speak German but he sounded like he was giving a briefing. A confident man, an officer perhaps.
The sergeant looked at me, at a loss. I shook my head. We looked along the ditch. The Polish soldier shrugged.
I stood up, wincing against the anticipated zip of a bullet, followed by the crack from the rifle. I put my hand on the fence, superstitious, like the barbed wire had conjured the voice.
The voice stopped. Rabbits nibbled grass along the edge of the field. They watched me warily. If there had been another man out there, they’d have disappeared back into their burrows.
The three soldiers stood up, looking around, as confused as I was.
16
The soldiers sat at the kitchen table. Mum stood with her back to the sink, torn between a desire to help three young men fighting for King and Country, and a fear of what they represented. Nob, as always, sat in his chair by the fire, shaking hands gripping the wooden arms. I’d sent the children upstairs. It was one thing for Frankie to read about soldiering in his comics, another to have him confront the reality.
‘More potatoes?’ Mum asked, as they wolfed down their food.
‘Yes please,’ the Polish soldier said, not looking up from his plate. ‘And sausages.’
Mum looked at me and I nodded. It would finish up our meat ration, but I knew a man who could get us more. Potatoes weren’t rationed, so as far as I was concerned the soldiers could eat them all night. Mum added the last batch of sausages to the pan with a splatter of grease and set about peeling more potatoes.
‘What’s your plan?’ I asked.
‘Get back into the fight. Kill more Germans,’ the Polish soldier said. The other two looked at each other.
‘What about you two?’ I asked.
‘We got separated from our company,’ the sergeant said. It wasn’t an answer, and we both knew it.
‘It was chaos,’ the other soldier said. ‘Hold your ground. Retreat. Hold your ground. Retreat. As soon as they get across the Channel we’re fucked.’
‘How did they do it?’ I asked. ‘What’s their secret?’
‘No secret,’ the sergeant said. ‘There are more of them, they’re better trained, better armed, and they’ve got a taste for blood. If I were you I’d take those kids and your old people and go north. If you’re all here in a few weeks you won’t like what happens.’
‘We’ll fight back,’ Mum said, her back to the men.
‘No, you won’t,’ the sergeant said. ‘You’ll be dead.’
Conversation stopped. The only sound was Mum pushing the potatoes and sausages around in the pan.
The Polish soldier finished the food on his plate and wiped his mouth with his sleeve.
‘In Poland, our cavalry was on horseback,’ he said. ‘We charged their lines with sabres. They didn’t slow down.’ He brought his hands together with a loud smack, his right hand moving on. ‘And the whole time the sky was full of their fighters and bombers. They took out our air force before they even admitted they were invading.’
