Sweet Sorrow by David Roberts Read Free Book Online Page A

everybody?’
    Evensong in the cool, quiet church was a moment of peace in a world in turmoil. Edward savoured the Englishness of it – the badly sung hymns, the wheezing organ and even Paul Fisher’s lengthy, hell-and-damnation sermon during which Edward studied the marble plaque on the wall listing the villagers killed in the Great War. He thought of the first time he had walked under School Arch into School Yard and seen the names of the dead in black bronze stretching along the arcade and into the cloisters. He remembered how he had wept for the first and last time as an Eton schoolboy as he read the words from Milton’s Samson Agonistes . ‘Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt, dispraise or blame; nothing but well and fair, and what may quiet us in a death so noble.’
    There were a dozen people seated on the narrow pews. According to Leonard, this was a few more than usual – no doubt as a result of the terrifying reports on the wireless. The Nazis were threatening the Baltic port of Danzig, the Poles’ access to the sea. To add to the fear, the IRA were planting bombs in London and for security reasons the public were being denied access to the House of Commons. The Chancellor, Sir John Simon, had just announced new defence borrowings of five hundred million pounds, and at the Ideal Home Exhibition luxuriously fitted-out bomb shelters were being offered for sale.
    Edward wondered whether it was sentimentality that made him pray that this village and its ancient church, which had survived so much bloodshed in its long history, would be spared the tide of destruction relentlessly sweeping over Europe.
    As the little congregation left the church, Paul took Edward by the hand and asked to be excused from joining them for dinner. He gave no clear reason beyond a need to pray and a general disinclination, as he put it, to make merry at such a time. Edward was surprised and annoyed but did not press him. He knew that Verity would take his change of mind as a snub but, if Paul had decided not to come, there was nothing to be done about it.
    ‘Another time,’ Edward said, trying to sound undisturbed.
    ‘Of course. Please convey my apologies to your wife. I hope she will understand.’
    Leonard had overheard the exchange and said, ‘Our vicar’s a rum cove but I respect him. Tell Verity not to take it personally. We are all anxious and out of sorts and will be until this war has really begun. Then I believe we will buckle down and do what has to be done.’
    As they strolled through the churchyard out past the village school, he added, ‘The news is very bad. It can’t be long now. Both of us have cyanide pills. If the Nazis do invade, we shall not wait to be rounded up and sent to a concentration camp.’
    ‘We have withstood invaders before now,’ Edward tried to reassure him.
    ‘Not ones with powerful flying machines to transform the Channel into a simple ditch. But I do not despair,’ he said, hunching his shoulders. ‘Not yet, at any rate.’

3
    Waiting on the platform at Lewes the following morning, they literally bumped into Byron Gates. Edward was effusive. Verity had noticed before that, when he did not like someone, he tended to hide his distaste by being extra-friendly. Byron explained that he was on his way to Broadcasting House to plan the next series of talks he was due to give on why Britain had to stand up to Hitler.
    ‘Better late than never,’ he added ruefully. ‘Reith backed the Prime Minister all the way. Now even he has to accept that appeasement has failed and that war is inevitable. I knew from the first that it was better to defy Hitler,’ he lied.
    Sir John Reith, the BBC’s first Director General, had recently resigned to become Chairman of Imperial Airways but his shadow still hung over the BBC.
    ‘Churchill can’t abide him,’ Edward commented.
    ‘That’s because, during the General Strike, he refused to let the