Maddon's Rock by Hammond Innes Read Free Book Online

Poland.”
    I was staggered at her answer. “Poland!” I exclaimed. “You mean you were a prisoner?”
    “Yes. Nearly three years.”
    It seemed incredible that this frail slip of a girl should have come alive out of Poland to finish up at Murmansk. “But how?” I asked. “I mean—three years—you couldn’t have been there when war broke out.”
    “No.” Her voice was toneless, flat. “They caught me in France. I used to go over to contact people. My mother was French, you see. I knew a lot of useful people. It was my third trip that they caught me. I was in Rouen. After a time they sent me to a concentration camp near Warsaw.” She gave a little dry, mirthless laugh. “That is why I don’t feel the cold.” Her voice changed to a lighter tone. “But don’t let’s talk about me. I am so tired of myself.” She was speaking English very correctly as though she were not sure of the language. “Tell me what you have been doing with yourself during the war and what you’re going to do and all about yourself.”
    I felt embarrassed. “I’ve done nothing much,” I said. “I understand the mechanism of predictors. That’s about all. They sent us over to Russia to get some gunnery equipment of ours ready for action. Now I’m on my way back to England.”
    “And when you reach England, what will you do?” She sighed almost luxuriously. “Oh, isn’t it lovely to be saying ‘England’ and feel that with every beat of the ship’s engines, we’re getting nearer. England! England! Isn’t it a lovely sounding word?” There was a fierce longing in her voice that gave it a strange quality. “They used to talk about England in that camp,” she went on quietly. “All those people whose countries had been over-run—they spoke of it the way an Arab might speak of Mecca.” Her voice changed again as she leaned towards me and said, “And when you get to England you’ll have leave, I suppose—you’ll go off to your home and your wife will be waiting for you. You’ve no idea what a wonderful thing it is to think of families still in existence, not broken up, but whole andreal—it’s something solid that I thought was lost for ever.”
    “Yes—but I’m not married, you know,” I said with a laugh.
    “Well, your family. The things that make up a home. People clustered about the fire at Christmas.” She hesitated, a faraway look in her eyes as she remembered the things she had missed for so long. “To go home! It’s so wonderful just to be able to say to myself—I’m going home.”
    As she turned away to hide her tears I heard Sill’s voice calling my name. “What is it?” I called back.
    He came forward then. “Mr. Rankin wants you, Corporal. You’re to see the Captain right away.”
    I felt suddenly like I did as a small boy when called to the headmaster’s study. It sounded like trouble. “I’m afraid I’ll have to go,” I said to my invisible companion. “Will you be here when I come back?”
    “No,” she said. “I think it’s getting too cold.”
    And then, without thinking, I found myself saying, “Meet me on the deck sometime to-morrow, will you?”
    “All right,” she said. “Goodnight.”
    “Goodnight,” I said and went aft with Sills, my mind strangely disturbed at the thought of meeting the man the old cook had gossiped about.
    Rankin was waiting for me in the guardroom. He was seated on one of the cases of bullion, his white fingers methodically breaking a match into a geometric pattern. He started up as I entered. His face looked puffy in the hard electric light. He was undoubtedly nervous, but I got the impression that he was frightened too.
    We went for’ard to the officers’ quarters. Rankin left me in the passage and went into the mess-room. I heard him say, “I’ve got the Corporal with me.” And then Hendrik’s voice replied, “Gude. Capt’n Halsey’s waitin’ for ye.” There was the sound of a chair being pushed back and then Rankin came out