The Day Before Tomorrow (2 page)

Everybody who knew them had been surprised at their romance.  She so beautiful and he so – well … not. 

She herself had been surprised, in a way, when this love had sprung up out of friendship and engulfed her.  People had said that it would never last, that they were too different and that she was a vain and selfish bitch anyway, who would leave him for someone rich and handsome within six months.  But she knew that she could not live without him and that he felt the same.  They had been in love for seven years now, and Tamar knew that she would rather have him than all the money in the world.  This was just as well, since he did not have any money.  They would be together forever, she had once thought.  Suddenly forever did not seem as certain as it once had. 

Denny sensed her thoughts and turned to her.  ‘They won’t come round to the house,’ he said.  ‘It’ll be a letter, probably. 

‘Or a phone call,’ he added after a moment’s thought.  ‘And even then, I’ll have to pass a physical test.’  He laughed.  ‘And I mean, just look at me.  They’re more likely to draft
you
.’  It was a hollow reassurance, and they both knew it.  Denny might look unimpressive, but there was nothing actually
wrong
with him.  Even his eyesight was perfect (although people who saw them together had their doubts about
hers
).  She knew also, that he would not try to dodge.  Denny hated fighting and the idea of war sickened him, but he was no coward.

‘They’ll make you cut your hair,’ she said, just for something to say.  She pushed his long fair fringe out of his eyes.

‘Just as long as they don’t try to make me wash my socks.’

‘Ha, even I couldn’t manage that.’  It was the closest they could come to a normal conversation.  They were trying desperately to act normally, as if this terrible thing were not hanging over their lives.  It was a weak attempt at comfort. 

Tamar allowed herself to be comforted though. She crawled onto his lap, and he put his arms around her.  They sat together like this for a long time, feeling helpless, as the shadows lengthened.  Then, abruptly, startling them, the phone rang. 

~ Chapter Three ~

I
t was as Denny had predicted.  Within six months of the announcement, the general forces of the army had been decimated, and the draft was in full swing.  There was no sign of an all-out nuclear exchange being on the cards.  Apparently, Denny’s surmise had been correct, and nobody was willing to go that far – ‘Yet,’ as Tamar said darkly.  Denny had had his papers and he was going to China, having passed the physical with no problems.  He faced his fate stoically, and Tamar felt that, for his sake, she could do no less. 

She was to remove to the countryside the day after he left. London was no longer safe. It was being bombed every night. 

She stood on the platform, tears in her eyes that she could no longer hold back, and a sense of unreality, that must have mirrored that of her forebears who had watched their own loved ones leaving to fight, and sometimes die, in the last war.  It was this comparison, as much as anything that made it seem so unreal.  She had, learned, as we all did, about WWII at school, and had since seen documentaries on the “Hitler” channel (officially known as the History channel) but nobody had ever thought it could happen again.  At least, not in such a similar way.  There were differences of course, but not significant ones.  All the atomic paranoia of the fifties and sixties, the nuclear paranoia of the eighties, and now WWIII was here, and saw troops going off in trains to fight as infantry or in tanks or planes.  Just like before.  No wonder she could not quite believe it, it went against everything she had been taught to expect.

The train pulled away, and Tamar was left on the platform feeling lost.  The other women on the platform seemed to share her feelings, some of them had children, who ran about unheeded while their mothers just stared at the disappearing train as if in a trance, unbelieving and frightened of a future that had never seemed so uncertain. 

Tamar went home slowly to pack her things; her own train would be early in the morning.  Civilians were now only able to travel by rail between the hours of four and six a.m.  This meant that it would take three days of travelling to get to her friend’s home in the country.  Staying, no doubt, in “inns of dubious reputation” known to the rest of us as Bed and Breakfasts. Tamar sometimes had a curiously old fashioned way of expressing herself. 

Tamar had been popular at school – in that superficial way that attractive, well off people often are.  But real friends, the kind that last, had been rare.  However, she had stayed in touch with Ophelia Ostley, a dainty fluffy sort of person, who had less reason than most to be jealous of Tamar and who had married into the peerage and, therefore, now enjoyed a sense of superiority over her old friend (who had only married that strange Sanger boy) which completely mitigated any envy she might otherwise have felt, and which she enjoyed immensely.  Therefore, they had continued to correspond, and Tamar and an uncomfortable Denny, had been invited to stay at the family pile every year, the better to facilitate the gloating aspect of their relationship. 

It was to the home of Ophelia – now Ophelia Ffawlkes Buffington Smythe – that Tamar now proposed to go. 

‘Of course you
must
come, Darling.’ (Always said with a capital D nowadays – Ophelia had not been so aristocratic back at Hill Road Comprehensive)  ‘Dear Tristan won’t mind a bit, I assure you.’ 

Tamar knew this last bit, and she knew why. It had probably been his suggestion that she come in the first place.

Dear Tristan
was a tall, thin aristocratic type – good-looking, Tamar supposed, if you like that type of thing.  He had limp, floppy hair and a limp, floppy personality.  Tamar felt she had no reason to envy Ophelia.

It was the last place that she wanted to go, but after Ophelia’s invitation had arrived (‘You
must
come. You really can’t stay in London with all those nasty bombs Darling.  It’s not nice.’  For Ophelia, the world was divided into ‘nice’ and ‘not nice’.) 

Denny had insisted that she accept. He would feel happier, he said, knowing she was safe. 

“Safe” was a relative term, Tamar thought.  Safe from the bombing certainly, but not safe from Tristan Ffawlkes Buffington Smythe’s wandering hands.  (It was not just his hands that wandered. A tall, thin, sparse personage; he seemed to be permanently on the move, restless and twitchy – afflicted with what Denny referred to as the “look arounds”.) 

Oh well, she had not been known at school as “The Bitch Queen of Hell”, for nothing.  If
she
could not handle one chinless wonder, however amorous, who could?  She wondered if Ophelia knew what she had married.  Some people would put up with any humiliation for the sake of money.  

~ Chapter Four ~

D
enny was frightened, more frightened than he had ever been, but not as frightened as the young, dark haired boy – and he
was
a boy – seated next to him.  Denny still had enough self-possession to hide his feelings, but the lad beside him was gnawing on his fingernails and looked as if he were about to cry.  They were all in the same boat, Denny realised.  Being sent to a strange county to fight people with whom they had no personal quarrel, for reasons that they did not understand.  What was it to them if Russia had invaded China?  And China was now their ally by virtue of being the enemy of America, who had declared war on most of Europe.  The edict of a mad President who believed that America was destined to rule the world.  This much Denny understood, but not the reasons why.  There were American troops now charging through Europe, as once the Nazis had done.  Germany was now Britain’s ally; all beach towel infractions now forgiven.  And Russia, although not allied to America, had taken the initiative from them, and invaded their old enemy of China instead of joining forces with the rest of Europe against America.  It was all incomprehensible to Denny.  And he was not the only one.

* * *

Captain Jack Stiles stood before the General looking bemused.  This was not terribly surprising since he was drunk again.  The General was haranguing him about his conduct, but Stiles did not care.  For him, the only way to get through the horror of this war was to look at it through the hazy glow at the bottom of a bottle of whisky.  It still made no sense, but at least this way it made at least as much sense as anything else did. 

The General was threatening to throw him out of the army. 

‘No such luck,’ thought Stiles.  It was an idle threat, he knew. They were just too short of troops; and he did not care if he got demoted, he was not a proud man.  And it was for this very reason that he made such a good Captain – when he was sober.  They could not afford to lose him – unfortunately.

‘Report to the camp surgeon,’ barked the General, giving up and dismissing him. 

‘Yesshir,’ slurred Stiles and lurched out of the General’s tent.

‘And try to sober up, man.  Before the new troops arrive,’ the General shouted after him.

 The General put his head in his hands after Stiles had departed.  He looked at the orders that had set Stiles off again on this latest binge.  He knew how the man felt.  He did not understand it either. 

Stiles wandered outside into the dreary sunshine. ‘More troops?’ he thought, ‘more cannon fodder.’  And did anyone know what the bloody hell this war was about anyway?

~ Chapter Five ~

‘T
he Apocalypse, Dolus, get that through your head will you, that’s what this war is all about. Well, it’s what it’s
supposed
to be about anyway.’

‘Supposed to be?  Surely it is, or it isn’t.’

‘Hah!  You’d think so wouldn’t you?’

‘What’s the problem then?’ drawled Talbot. 

‘Well, it’s just not bloody happening, is it?  In your private ear, I’d say there’s been a cock up somewhere.  I just hope I don’t get the blame, that’s all.’

‘Any reason why you should?’

‘Well, if they’re not destroying the world as
per spec
, then that can only mean one thing, can’t it?’ he paused.

Talbot just looked blank. 

‘It was my responsibility, I suppose, back then,’ he mused.  ‘But I did my bit,’ he wailed.  ‘It’s not my fault if it’s all gone wrong now.’

Talbot continued to look blank, Crispin was exasperated.  Matlus, had he still been here, would have got the point immediately. 

‘The
box
, Talbot,’ he snapped.  ‘What’s happened to the bloody box?’

Talbot took the point.  ‘You think it’s gone missing?’

‘How else do you explain it?’ asked Crispin wearily.  ‘The box was always an integral part of the plan.’ 

Talbot thought about this and then went pale.  ‘Oh
system
failure
,’ he said.  ‘Do you think it’s too late for me to request that transfer?’ 

Dolus looked up from his crossword.  ‘What box?’ he said

.

~ Chapter Six ~

A
girl came swiftly out of the gloom, with a click of high heels – a tinsel blonde, heavily made up, but pretty.  She looked about twenty five.  Even in her outdoor clothes, she was very shapely.  A man opened the car door for her, and she climbed in. 

‘I thought you were never coming,’ she complained.

‘Don’t see why,’ said he, ‘I’m not late.’  The car moved off silently, now filled with a cloying scent. 

‘Maybe I was early,’ she shrugged, anxious not to offend.  ‘I’m nervous I suppose, I’ve never done anything like this before.’  She sounded slightly breathless.  Spoke quickly. 

The man jerked his head irritably.  ‘Shut up Cindy,’ he told her.  ‘We’ve got work to do.’ 

Cindy subsided immediately.  She was not in the least submissive by nature, but this man frightened her, he knew her secret; that was why she was here. 

The car pulled up sharply outside what even Cindy knew was a doss house.  Another man – a youth – was lounging casually – too casually – against a lamppost.  On seeing the car, he strolled over and climbed in the back. 

‘Hey Tom,’ said the driver.

‘This her?’ asked the youth excitedly.

The man grunted assent.  ‘Put that cig out, Tommy boy,’ he added, ‘ain’t you got no manners?’

‘Sorry Mack,’ said the youth. 

Cindy closed her eyes and prayed to Hecaté to get her out of this.  If only he had not got a video of her she would be okay. After all, without that proof, who would believe him?  Although admittedly, never the brightest star in the firmament, she still could not believe that she had been so stupid.  Now all she could hope for was that she was good enough to keep him happy; she was so out of practice, and if he carried out his threat … Perhaps people no longer believed in witches, but Cindy knew her history.  She believed in witch-hunts.

* * *

Tamar felt lonely in the big old house. Most of the servants, whose company she generally preferred to that of the master and mistress of the house, were gone.  Tristan Ffawlkes Buffington Smythe III was best avoided, and Ophelia, who had never been the best company, was now intolerable without Denny as a buffer.  Worse, she was expecting, and could talk about nothing else but “baby” and how proud she was to be bearing the next scion of the great house of Buffington Smythe, until Tamar felt like she could scream.  Never sensitive to the feelings of others, Ophelia never realised that Tamar wanted to be alone with her anxieties.  And probably would not have cared if she had.

Tristan was better, at least he was sympathetic, and it was he who anxiously scanned the mail every day for a letter for Tamar.  And it was he who, with great jubilation, brought her the first one after a week of waiting.

She recognised the handwriting immediately, as you might expect, and hugged it to her, tears of relief shining in her eyes. 

‘An’t you going to read it then?’ asked Tristan. 

‘Oh, I will, but I don’t care what it says,’ she told him.  ‘I just care that he’s alive to write it.’