Soldier No More (9 page)

“Ah!” Wimpy raised his hand. “
Now
I see what you’ve been driving at—why you’re here, asking all these damnfool questions! Why didn’t you tell me straight off?”

Roche stared at him questioningly. “I beg your pardon?”

“My dear man—Glendowerin Henry IV—‘
I can call spirits from the vasty deep’
—I sent David tickets to see that at Stratford in ‘52, and bloody marvellous it was too!
He
’
d
understand—and Hotspur replies: ‘
Why, so can I, or so can any man
—
but will they
come when you do call on them
?’—that’s the question!” Wimpy beamed at him. “Not under military discipline any more, like in ‘44—so when they called on him he wouldn’t come, naturally … once bitten, twice shy!” And then suddenly the smile vanished, as though it had been switched off from within. “But now it’s different, isn’t it!”

The switch to seriousness was somewhat disconcerting. “How d’you mean different?” said Roche cautiously.

“Because they
wanted
him in ‘49, or whenever it was, after Cambridge. But now they
need
him, that’s the real difference.” Wimpy nodded again. “Because something’s happened, and they’ve damn well got to have him, one way or another—isn’t that the strength of it?”

And that was even more disconcerting: by whatever reasoning, the little schoolmaster had reached the same conclusion as Genghis Khan, that Audley’s recruitment was not an end in itself, but a means to some other end.

“You could be right,” Roche admitted.

“I usually am, though it’s never done me much good.” The smile came back as suddenly as it had disappeared. “But don’t worry! On this occasion it’s at least to your advantage. It’s high time
my
David was gainfully employed, as I’ve already said.” Wimpy gestured down the goal line. “So come on, then … and ‘you shall come and go and look and know where I shall show’. Though I can’t guarantee that you shall know neither doubt nor fear in the end, as Puck promised.”

“Puck?”

“Kipling—
Puck of Pook
’
s Hill
.” Wimpy began to move down the line. “
Puck
and
Stalky & Co
are your two set books for this examination, my dear fellow. My young David was brought up on those two books, when the world was also young … Kipling and the rugger field … and then the battlefield—so which was illusion and which was reality, eh? And then the cold war after the hot war to add disillusion, maybe?”

I’m not sure I understand you,” said Roche.

“I’m not sure I understand myself. But he’s there somewhere, in the middle of it. And if you want to understand him you’ve got to go there yourself first, I think.”

“Where?”

“Where indeed!” Wimpy thought for a moment. “A place first, yes. And a person too, I think—yes!”

“Where?” Roche abandoned the idea of
why
. “And who?”

“Someone who makes the best fruit cakes in Sussex,” said Wimpy.

“WILL YOU HAVE
another piece, sir?”

Roche studied the last third of the fruit cake, rearguards of guilt offering token resistance against greed. It
was
the best fruit cake in Sussex, beyond doubt; and very probably the best fruit cake in England, and consequently the best one in the whole world, almost certainly … and
was
would be the operative word for it if she carved them two more of her gargantuan slices, like those they had already consumed. But the opportunity was far too good to be missed.

He looked up from the fruit cake to meet Ada Clarke’s gaze, trying to feign a moment’s indecision for conscience’s sake.

“But… what about your husband’s tea, Mrs Clarke?”

Wimpy emitted a short, unsympathetic chuckle. “To hell with Charlie! Speaking for myself, Clarkie—“

“And you always do, sir, Mr William—“ she cut back at him, quick as a flash, but smiling “—if I may make so bold as to say, sir—“

“You may, Clarkie—you may! And I always do—I admit it, I admit it frankly and unashamedly … for if I do not speak for myself, then who will speak for me?” Wimpy accepted the state of affectionate war between them with evident delight. “Not you, Clarkie, not you…
therefore
…
speaking for myself, I will quote first that fine old French saying—which covers any claim Charlie may or may not have on that cake—‘he who is absent is always in the wrong’, Clarkie. In which case—“

“But I wasn’t offering it to you, sir. I was offering it to—to—“ Mrs Clarke blinked at Roche uncertainly: she had forgotten his name.

“To Captain Roche—of course! Who guards us ceaselessly, so that we may sleep safely in our beds—a thoroughly deserving case, Clarkie. Hardly less deserving than myself, a poor bachelor schoolmaster …. Cut the cake, Clarkie—bisect it into equal portions, and stop arguing!”

Mrs Clarke shook her head at him in despair, and turned back to Roche.

“You mustn’t mind him, sir, Captain Roche—you must take no notice of him. Now…”

But she was already dividing the cake. She had known from the start that he would succumb to temptation, that her cake would reduce them both to greedy schoolboys.

“And don’t worry about Charlie, sir. I always make two cakes at a time … it’s habit, really: one for Charlie and one for Mr David, like in the old days. Only now Charlie eats both of them, that’s all.”

“Well … thank you, Mrs Clarke.” Roche accepted his half-of-one-third. Poor old absent Charlie—half-witted, shell-shocked Charlie—was on to a damn good thing, whatever his handicaps.

A
d
amn
good thing: the little cottage smelt bewitchingly of cake and cooking and cleanliness, scrubbed and polished and apple-pie-ordered. The black kitchen range, out of which the paradisal cake had come, glistened with use and elbow grease; above it, on the mantelpiece, a line of cheap commemorative mugs caught his eye—the Queen’s Coronation cup from five years back, then King George VI’s, and Edward VIII’s premature celebration, and so on through other coronations and jubilees to Queen Victoria herself.

“Interesting, aren’t they?” murmured Wimpy. “You had the end ones from your mother, didn’t you, Clarkie?”

“That’s right, sir. Mine begin with the coronation of King George that was King Edward’s brother—King Edward that married that American lady, or the Prince of Wales as he’ll always be to me. He was a lovely boy, the Prince. I saw him once, at the races, when Charlie and me went to attend to a party the Master, Mr Nigel, was putting on—he gave me a lovely smile, like he knew me, as I took round the tray with the champagne on it, the Prince did … ‘Course, I was younger then, only a slip of a girl.” She nodded knowingly at Roche. “And he had an eye for the girls, he did, did the Prince of Wales.”

Roche glanced covertly at her. She was little and dumpy, with cheeks reddened by all weathers and the heat of that black kitchen range. But those tight pepper-and-salt curls had once been blonde, and the sparkle in the blue eyes was still bright.

“So he did,” agreed Wimpy. “And that, you might say, was his undoing in the end, eh?”

“And that Prince Philip—he’s a lad!” Mrs Clarke warmed to what was clearly one of her favourite subjects. “Of course, he gets that from having been a sailor, like his Uncle, that was Lord Louis when I was a girl—I met him too.
And
Lady Louis—“ she nodded proudly at Roche “—Edwina Ashley, she was, and beautiful like in those magazines, you should have seen her!”

Wimpy caught Roche’s eye for a fraction of a second. “But that mug from the Silver Jubilee in 1935 ought to be yours too, Clarkie, surely? You were in service then?”

“So I was, sir. But so was Mother—and I broke mine, so that’s hers, that one.” She grinned at Roche. “To tell the truth, sir, Captain Roche, I got tiddly that night—all because of the Master, Mr Nigel, and his champagne …”

“A tradition of the house,” agreed Wimpy, shifting his attention from Mrs Clarke to Roche as he spoke. “On great occasions the wine flows in the Old House—in the appropriate receptacle, naturally.” He nodded at the line of mugs on the mantelpiece.

“That’s right, sir,” said Mrs Clarke, nodding at Wimpy and Roche as she spoke. “Filled to the brim with champagne, that was the rule. No wonder we all got tiddly!”

Roche reached up towards the nearest mug, fascinated.

“You look at it, sir,” Ada Clarke encouraged him, “and see for yourself how much it takes. That was Master David’s favourite, that one, he liked it because of all the writing on it.”

Wimpy gave a derisive snort. “Absolute rubbish, Clarkie! He liked it because it was bigger than the others—it held more champagne, that’s why. And he was drunk as a lord on both occasions as a result.”

“He was sick both times, more like,” conceded Mrs Clarke defensively. “But it could have been what he ate just as easily.”

“He was beastly drunk—“

They were oblivious of him, duelling with twenty-year memories.

“It was too much rich food. All that smoked salmon, sir—and the caviare from Fortnum and Mason’s … and I made him that Black Forest cherry cake specially—“

“Full of kirsch—precisely! He was tight as a tick, Clarkie dear. Kirsch plus champagne—no wonder!”

Or maybe Wimpy was very far from forgetting him—maybe quite the opposite … maybe this, very deliberately, was the beginning of Wimpy’s special tuition on David Audley.

Mrs Clarke drew a deep breath. “Well… if he was … a bit tiddly—“

“Aha!” Wimpy seized her admission instantly. In any argument with Wimpy the loser would never be allowed to retreat in good order, pursuit would always be close and merciless. Indeed, he was already turning triumphantly to Roche. “Now the truth comes out, old boy!”

“Huh!” exclaimed Ada Clarke, also turning towards Roche. “And if he was, then who was to blame, I ask you!” She nodded significantly at Wimpy. “You don’t need far to look, sir, Captain Roche—indeed you don’t.”

Wimpy spread his hands. “I’m not denying anything, Clarkie dear.”

“Nor can you—I should think not!” She gave him a mock-disapproving sniff. “No, sir—“ she caught Roche with his mouth full of cake “—you should have seen what he brought down here, for Mr David—I saw him slip out of the House with the tray … I was waiting on the guests of course-piled high with everything, like he was feeding a regiment… and a
whole
bottle of champagne, and Master David hardly ten years old … and the Master sees him too, what’s more—“

“I never knew that, Clarkie!” Wimpy leant forward. “You never told me that before.”

“You never asked me. But
I
saw—and
he
sees you—“ back to Roche again “—the Master, Mr Nigel, that is … And he says to me ‘Aye-aye! Now where’s he off to then, Mrs Clarke, eh?’ with that look in his eye, like he half knew already—like he always did when it was you and Mr David up to your tricks, goin’ up to London, and that—“

“Good God!” whispered Wimpy, a muscle twitching in his cheek. “He knew about—London?”

“When you took Master David to see the illuminations, for the jubilee— and the coronation?” She shook the grey-blonde curls with a quick, almost convulsive movement. “He didn’t
know
—but he
knew
all the same—like, he couldn’t know, because he wasn’t here those nights, when you went off, but he knew somehow, I don’t know how … You know Mr Nigel, sir—he always knew everything somehow—“

Except which horse was going to win—“

“I mean about people, sir, Mr William, not horses.” She stared at Wimpy in silence for a moment.

Wimpy nodded into the silence. Now, this time, and for the first time, they were both oblivious of him, thought Roche: now they were both wrapped and enveloped in a secret play in which they had acted independently, here in this sweet-smelling room and also up the drive, in the house which he hadn’t yet seen, where the Master, Mr Nigel, had lavished entertainment on his smart friends—

“So … what on earth did you
do
, Clarkie?” Wimpy watched her intently.

“I told a lie, sir—a black lie.” She half-smiled, the recollection of the black lie warming her memory. “You remember that Mrs Templeton, that went off in the end with Captain Wallace-White, and there was all that scandal?”

Wimpy’s eyes widened. “Phew! Do I not! Lottie Templeton—
phew!
She was there—I remember that too, by golly!”

“That’s right. And she fancied you, what’s more, sir.”

“Lottie Templeton? She never did, Clarkie!”

“No, sir. She fancied you.”

“I fancied
her
. She just talked to me, that’s all.”

“You made her laugh. And she said you were clever, I heard her say so. She fancied you, and that’s a fact.”

Wimpy shook his head. “Oh … come on, Clarkie! Mere schoolmasters weren’t Lottie’s style.”

“Begging your pardon, sir, anything in trousers was Mrs Templeton’s style.”

The servants knew, thought Roche. The servants always knew. And, judging by Wimpy’s failure to reply this time, the same thing was occurring to him.

Ada Clarke nodded. “Yes, sir … So it came to me, right on the spur of the moment, and I says to him—or I whispers to him, more like—‘I think Mr William is looking after Mrs Templeton in the summerhouse, sir’.” She paused. “And she
was
in the summerhouse too.”

“But not with me—“ Wimpy blinked at her.

“No, sir. You weren’t quick enough off the mark! But
he
didn’t know that—or … he couldn’t be sure, not without going after you, which he couldn’t do, and wouldn’t do—“

“You’re wrong, Clarkie.” He shook his head again. “He’d know better than that, whatever you say.”

He always knew everything about people
…

She looked at him silently for a second or two, curiously without any expression on her face. “Maybe he did, sir. But you know what he was like, about Master David—like he didn’t want to know if he could help it? He was the same with those times the two of you went off—knowing, and not knowing at the same time … All he wanted was an excuse
not
to know, and that’s what I gave him—an excuse. Because he said, ‘Oh well, then that’s all right then’, and went off back to the party, to—“ she caught Roche’s eye “—back to the party he went, sir, Captain Roche … But it was
him
that gave Master David all that to drink, anyway, is what I’m saying.” She nodded accusingly at Wimpy.