Recovery and the Return of Ethan Hart by Stephen Benatar Read Free Book Online Page A

the exterior of the church; we look for his name on the village war memorial (there it is—Brooke—after Baker, Blogg and Bolton) and think a little, too, about those other names imprinted on the stone. Then we eat a proper English tea, high tea, in a proper English cottage, with a proper homemade sign outside its door. And afterwards, while still not quite of this world, while wandering through some twilit balm-filled extension touched with just sufficient melancholy to sharpen our appreciation of it, we wend our way back to the punt and give a florin to the boy who’s been left most proudly and willingly in charge.
    However, once we’re in the jeep returning to the farm, tranquillity soon disappears. And how! Pity all the life of field and hedgerow. ‘You’re in the army, Mr Brown’…‘The Lambeth walk’…‘She’ll be coming round the mountain when she comes’…‘It’s a grand night for singing’…
    But then he must have seen me shiver (it is cold riding in a jeep after the sun’s gone down) for with his free hand he pulls me towards him and I lay my head on his shoulder and we drive along less boisterously for the remainder of the way.
    As we get closer to home I tell him he must come in and meet Fred and Amy and have a mug of tea and a sandwich. The Crawfords stand to some extent in loco parentis and I would vaguely feel I had to do this anyway, even without the urge to show him off and give him something hot and let him see the farm by moonlight, for the house is moated and therefore picturesque as well as merely old. I could have shown it to him in the morning but had felt then that this was the better way to do it. Another time—and I was now fairly certain there was going to be another time—he could look at it by day.
    I can see he’s making an impression on the Crawfords: I’ve never heard them talk so animatedly to somebody they didn’t know. They even turn down the wireless: Albert Sandler and his Palm Court Orchestra playing ‘Bells Across the Meadow’! As usual, the lamp has the faint aroma of paraffin about it but its light spreads a soft glow over the kitchen and the range gives out the same style of homeliness, with the kettle now boiling once more and whistling gently on the hob. Fred, stringy, weather-beaten, with slightly protuberant eyes, talks about the execution of Mussolini, the supposed cerebral haemorrhage of Hitler and the dropping of food bombs on Holland. Amy, mending towels, the typical farmer’s wife, rosy-cheeked, round, comfortable, talks about the children and the difficulties of making do. (“I have eighteen people to feed; two gallons of broth to prepare each evening!”) Then Matt asks about the moat and Fred’s well away: protection against peasant uprisings, wolves and winter floods and cattle thieves—well, that’s only the start of it. Fred’s an authority.
    Therefore it’s nearly a quarter past ten when Matt again stands up to take his leave—and this time is allowed to—fairly late when you consider we all have to be up so early (although as yet there’s not been any sign of Trixie). He hesitates about whether to give me a goodnight kiss, then does so, on the cheek, which is exactly right.
    In bed, in our small room with its sloping floor and equally sloping ceiling, I drunkenly review the day and suddenly I’m aware of a tremendous sense of loss, an awful ache of longing in the abdomen. Already.
    I don’t want to lose him!
    Can’t bear the thought I’ll have to lose him!

7
    We get to the embassy at half-past-nine and discover it’s been open for an hour. We’re directed to the Upper Brook Street entrance. A man in front of us has his attaché case looked into but we’re okay, neither of us is carrying anything. Oh, yes, Tom has a bunch of keys in his pants pocket. So he has to hand it over for a minute