The Road Between Us by Nigel Farndale Read Free Book Online

of those words – and the polite restraint with which they were delivered – would have eaten into their souls like acid.
    ‘Well?’ Eric prompts. ‘I’m returning your call.’
    Charles lowers his voice: ‘You heard that announcement on the wireless about everyone with a small vessel having to register it with the Admiralty?’
    ‘Yes. Why?’
    ‘You know what it’s about, don’t you?’
    ‘I can guess.’
    ‘So what do you think? You and me. We could sail The Painted Lady over to France like in the old days. Do our bit …’ He hears a click as the connection is lost. ‘Hello? Funf?’ He shakes his head at the porter. ‘German spies,’ he says. ‘So rude.’ He jiggles the grip up and down a couple of times and stares at the earpiece. The line is dead. While he waits for it to ring again he does a thumbnail sketch of Anselm on the blotter. Eventually he looks up and says: ‘I’ll be in the bar if …’
    He orders a whiskey and sits on a high stool a few feet away from a man he hasn’t seen in the club before, a drinker judging by his cratered and purplish nose. As he waits, Charles plucks grapes from a bowl on the bar and takes in, with sidelong glances, the man’s thinning dirty-blond hair. It is threaded with grey and frosting at the temples. The man half turns his back towards him, as if worriedhis drink might be stolen. Charles stares at the empty grape stalks. They look sinister now, like birds’ claws.
    He puts a cigarette in his mouth and pats his pockets. But instead of a box of matches he takes from his pocket the letter he received from Anselm four months ago. He rubs it between his finger and thumb, as if the friction will bring it to life. It was sent via the Swedish Embassy in Berlin. Though he knows every word by heart, every endearing misspelling, grammatical mistake and unneeded Gothic capital, he re-reads it.
My dear Grumpy ,
If you have receive this letter it means my friend at the Ambassy has been true to his word. I hope it is finding you in a better state than me.
I have been on trial at the Volksgerichtshof, the People’s Court in Berlin, and sentenced to five years in an Erziehungslager, or ‘education camp’. I am not told yet where they take me but I will write and tell you when I am knowing. Do not worry for me.
I hope you are well. What happen to you after Picaddilly? Remember our Deal to meet at the Union Bar at the Slade. Remember? I think of you.
Yours, Dopey
    Yours. When he had first read that ending to the letter, he had wondered why his friend had not been warmer in tone. Was it simply a matter of Anselm’s written English being less impressive than his spoken? Did he think it would be incriminating? But then Charles had decided he couldn’t have asked for more. Anselm meant: ‘I am yours.’
    Since that communication, Charles has heard nothing from his friend, his own letters back via the diplomatic pouch at the Swedish Embassy in London having gone unanswered. He has even written to Anselm’s parents in Aachen but this letter, too, has not received a reply, as he knew it wouldn’t. All post from Germany is routinely intercepted.
    If only he knew where this ‘education camp’ was. Anselm had mentioned the name of the court in Berlin and he did wonder ifthere might be some way of gaining access to its records. He had weathered the suspicious glances of the staff at the London Library in order to go through the German newspapers held there. But if Anselm’s trial had been reported, he hadn’t been able to find any references.
    His whiskey arrives and he drinks it in one gulp before nodding at the barman for a refill. The drinker seated two stools away now turns and looks him down and up. He has a frayed collar and food stains on the tie that is resting on his bloated belly. ‘What’s your excuse, then?’ he says. His tone is not friendly.
    ‘I’m sorry?’
    ‘Why haven’t you joined up?’
    Charles stares at the grape stalks. ‘I’m an air-raid