Lucinda
Chasing Elusive Happiness
Lucinda waited as the operator tried to put her through. She’d received an urgent hand-delivered message that her editor wanted to speak to her. It seemed she’d missed two calls from him. This hadn’t surprised her as she’d been out walking as often as she could, trying to make sense of everything, seeking a tiredness from the exercise that would make her sleep. And even when she’d been in, she’d ignored the telephone, thinking it might be Flo or Roland and she’d have to lie to them.
At last she heard the American drawl of her boss at the Daily News, one of London’s most popular papers. ‘Lucinda! Great to hear from you. How are you? Feeling a whole lot better, I hope. Have you made your mind up about taking the correspondent’s job?’
Lucinda bit her lip. Everything in her screamed against her doing this, and yet she knew that common sense couldn’t win over what her heart desired of her.
Making her voice sound as normal and decisive as it usually did, she answered, ‘Yes. I would love to do it. When do I go?’
‘Is tomorrow too soon?’
Her heart jolted. No time was too soon, but could she really just run out on Flo and Roland? She heard herself answer, ‘No, that’ll be fine. Where and when?’
‘I knew you’d say yes, so in anticipation I had all of your papers prepared. And I’ve got press clearance for you with both the English and German governments, and that phoney government in the South of France. That’s where you will go initially – just the other side of Paris to Vichy. You will stay there for a week, before you are to join the forces in Belgium. Though be careful of the Germans; they say they will give you press immunity, but they don’t play fair. Dickie Peterson was taken in last week as a suspected spy. We haven’t heard anything of him since. But we’re onto it. And that’s why we need you out there. Things are happening that are not being reported on. You’ll fly out in a supply plane. It’ll be a bit hairy, as they’re carrying cargo for the Resistance workers. You may have to jump if they can’t land. You’ve parachuted before, haven’t you?’
‘Yes, I told you. Me and a few others from university took a course. It was all for fun, but I enjoyed it and did a few jumps.’
She felt momentary fear for her unborn child, but she knew that things rarely went wrong on a jump and there should be little or no risk if it went smoothly. She had excelled in her training and had perfected the landing; in the end, it had felt no different from rolling on the grass, and never jarred or bruised her. Yes, I’ll take the chance . . . I have to. ‘I’ll set it up, then. You’ll only have a makeshift seat next to whatever it is they’re carrying. There’ll be a camera on board for you. I want pictures of the drop. So take all that you can, then leave the camera on board to be delivered back to me. We’ll decide what we can get clearance to use. Get over to Harwell in Berkshire, wherever that is. You’ll pick up your papers at the post office and report to the commander on the air base there. Everything you need will already be at the base waiting for you. And good luck.’
‘Before you go: how do I get news back to you?’
‘There’ll be other correspondents with you to show you the ropes, and the Resistance will take you to the world news office. The army will also be part of the chain. They take the film and your written report to the airfields and make sure they are loaded onto the transporters coming back to Britain. There’s various means.’
As she replaced the receiver, Lucinda had a moment when the deceit she intended to practise – not only on her dear brother and friends, but also on the newspaper – gave her a feeling of intense shame. But she had to do this. There was no other way she could get to France. Flo would explain why she’d gone. Along with Roland and Simon she would find a way of covering for her absence. Now all she had to do was write a note for Flo and Roland.
Flo had found that she hadn’t as much time off as she’d first thought, and so Roland was coming down to London instead of Flo and herself going to Leeds. The plan was for them all to meet here in her apartment on Saturday. Guilt visited her as she wrote that she’d taken a job in France. She didn’t say that she wasn’t intending to return.
With her only experience of flying being in a small aircraft, from which she and a few other students from Cambridge engaged in the sport of parachuting, Lucinda wasn’t sure if the sick feeling she was experiencing was air sickness or due to her pregnancy. But cramped up as she was, sitting between two huge bales of she-knew-not-what, she had the devil’s own job to keep from vomiting.
The pilot had kept up a running commentary about where they were, so she knew they were over France. ‘In five minutes we will be landing, ma’am. You know that you will be met by Resistance workers, I presume?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, get your parachute ready to put on, just in case. And don’t be alarmed, for whichever way you reach the earth, the resistance workers will grab you and hurry you into the bushes. Extreme secrecy is their thing. If we’re able to land, we need you to go down the chute as quickly as you can. We will then take off and drop the cargo from the air, as we can’t stay on the ground long enough to unload manually. So please do everything with the utmost speed. No hesitation. Understood?’
‘Understood.’
A few minutes later Lucinda wanted to scream that she hadn’t understood they would have to dodge enemy fire. The ack-ack of ground-fire terrified her, as did seeing what looked like sparks shooting past the window.
The shout of, ‘Gunner, north-west twenty-nine degrees: fire!’ had Lucinda cowering and covering her ears. She bit hard on her lip, as terror streaked through her. After a moment she saw an almighty explosion on the ground beneath them. The pilot’s shout of joy brought a small amount of relief to her.
‘You did it! Well done, gunner. By the looks of things, the Resistance are engaging what’s left of the unit. We’ll have to turn back.’
‘No. Please, I have to get down there.’
‘You can’t parachute from this height – we would be dropping you into unknown territory. Good God, woman, you could land anywhere.’
‘Well, now that the Germans have been stopped, surely we could at least get over the landing strip and I can jump there. I have experience. I used to parachute for sport, when up at Cambridge, and carried out a lot of jumps.’
The pilot was silent for a moment. She could see his bent head; he was scrutinizing the terrain below. Probably checking whether the activity was still going on. His radio crackled. A French voice came over the air. It appeared to be from the men on the ground. The second pilot left his seat and tuned in. Lucinda couldn’t understand a word, even though she spoke excellent French. She assumed it was coded.
‘They have the way clear, Squadron Leader; they’re saying the mission can complete as per schedule.’
‘I don’t like it. Tell them we will drop the supplies, but won’t come in. Tell them the person will parachute in.’
Once this was done, the second pilot took hold of the parachute. ‘Here, I’ll help you on with this. I’ll just unhook it. Leave it with the Resistance group, and they’ll return it to the next shipment. Even if it’s damaged, parts of it can be recycled.’
Lucinda breathed a sigh of relief as she donned the parachute and checked that she could locate the ripcord. But her relief soon dissolved into fear as the hatch was opened. Beneath her lay a mass of blackness. No light could be seen anywhere.
‘Wait for it. Right, give them the signal.’
Another radio message was sent and below her Lucinda saw a runway of flames light up.
‘Go!’
As the rush of air caught her breath, she felt a moment of panic. She’d never jumped from this height before. She had no idea when to release her parachute. She’d been reckless, as she wasn’t trained for this kind of jump.
Her body swirled and descended. She tried desperately to judge how near the flames below were. When she thought she had free-fallen long enough, and the flames looked as near as she remembered the ground looking in her previous jumps, she pulled the ripcord and prayed.
Within a few minutes, pain jarred her shins as her feet smashed against a solid mass. Intending to use the rolling technique, she tried to break the rest of her fall, but something prevented her from moving. Agonizing pain ripped through her body, as what felt like a thousand sticks stabbed into her. Voices came to her from below. Reaching out, she felt the rough bark of a tree. Her body slipped, and something tightened around her neck. Oh God . . . help me!
Her body shifted again. Torches shone on her. She couldn’t breathe. Her legs dangled. Judging by the tightness of her jacket, she knew it had caught on something. Terrifying clarity about the horrific danger she was in came to Lucinda. If the bough that her parachute was caught on broke, or the material gave way, she would hang.
A desperate voice shouted in French, ‘Grab that branch to your right. Henrique is coming. Quick, hold on to it – take your weight.’
Reaching out, Lucinda tried in vain to find the branch they were talking about, but then a tearing sound and the sinking of her body took all her strength. The pain in her neck zinged through her. She had no air. The thought came to her: My baby, my baby . . . Then a blackness overcame her that she knew she would never come out of.
Roland pressed the bell for a third time. ‘There’s no answer. Wait a minute, I have a key to Simon’s flat. We’ll go in there, and up to Lucinda’s flat that way.’
Flo felt her heart begin to race. Trepidation settled in her. Lucinda, please be in. Please.
A shiver took hold of her body as they entered Simon’s cold, empty apartment. There was a silence clothing the whole house that spoke to Flo of doom.
Inside Lucinda’s apartment, Flo’s eyes were drawn to the note leaning against the clock on the mantelpiece. For a moment she stared at her name, beautifully written on the white envelope.
‘You’d better open it. Then I think you’d better tell me what this is all about – what trouble Lucinda is in. I’ve been worried sick all week. I called Simon to tell him I was coming here to meet you, but he couldn’t make it. I almost told him Lucinda had a problem and that she wasn’t answering her phone, but decided not to worry him until I’d got to the bottom of things.’
‘I knaw. I managed to get to use a phone and tried calling her.’
The ripping open of the letter gave Flo a feeling that she was about to read something that would change all of their lives: Dear Flo & Roland, Forgive me . . .
Flo handed the letter to Roland and listened as he read it out. ‘Oh, dear. This is the last thing we needed to hear. I knew she wanted to be a war correspondent, but why go now, when she is in trouble? Look, sit down, Flo. I’ll put the kettle on. While we drink some tea, which I’m surely in need of, you can tell me what all this is about.’
The tea tasted good. Roland must have found some sugar. It had been a long time since Flo had tasted its smooth sweetness, so different from the bitter saccharine they were forced to use, if they wanted to sweeten anything.
Roland was quiet for some time as he scrutinized the letter once more. It was as if he thought there was more than he’d initially read. Flo waited.
‘She seems to have gone three days ago, but she says nothing about the trouble you spoke of. What is it, Flo? What trouble had Lucinda got herself into?’
The telephone ringing prevented her from answering. She jumped up and ran to it. ‘Simon! Simon? Simon, what’s wrong?’ Flo’s whole body turned cold. Goosebumps stood up on her arms. Roland took the phone from her. His face drained of colour.
Something terrible had happened, but Flo didn’t want to know what. Simon’s sobs told of something so painful that she didn’t know if she would be able to stand it.
‘Oh God, no! No . . . Oh, my darling. Look, I’m here with Flo. We’ll come to you. I’m in my car, as I – well, I’ll explain when I see you. Have they given you compassionate leave? . . . Good. We’ll bring you back here. Hang on, Simon, my darling man. Hang on.’
The ting of the phone as it disconnected brought Flo the realization that the moment was upon her. She wanted to cover her ears with her hands. When Roland did speak, the shock in his voice was so deep it cut into her.
‘He – he . . . Simon, he said, Lu-Lucinda is dead. Dead – oh God!’
Flo’s world – the wonderful new world these people had given her – tumbled out of all understanding at these words. Her lips opened to release the scream that threatened to strangle her, but instead she sank under her own body weight and landed in the fireside chair that Lucinda had said was her favourite. A big, comfy chair that seemed to wrap its arms around you, but which today had no impact on Flo.
But then she saw how Roland’s every limb trembled. His eyes stared blankly and his mouth hung slack. His need spurred her to get up and go to him. ‘Sit down, Roland. Please. Sit down.’ As she spoke she tried to be a source of strength to him. She coaxed him and rubbed his back – natural comforting actions – and yet nothing around her was natural, or even familiar any more, for it had all been scarred by the impact of the horrific words Roland had uttered. Lucinda . . . dead? No . . . No!
Gradually Roland was able to tell her what had happened. When he’d finished, his voice was a desperate plea. ‘I need to go to Simon. We both do. We need to bring him back here. Oh, poor man. Poor, poor Simon. And Lucinda. Darling Lucinda. How could such a thing happen? Why did she go? Did you know she was going? Is this what the trouble was: did you want me to stop her?’
In that moment it came to Flo that she wouldn’t tell him the whole truth. She would keep Lucinda’s secret about the baby, and she wouldn’t tell them the true nationality of her boyfriend. ‘She . . . she was in love. She had a French boyfriend. She wanted to go to him, and this was the only way. I begged her not to. I – I . . . Sh-she had agreed to come up to Leeds for a few days to be with you. Until I had to change our plans.’
‘That can’t have been all. Flo, you said she was in trouble. Having a French boyfriend isn’t trouble. Sad, yes, as they would have to be apart so much, but not trouble.’
Weighing up the lesser of the two evils – fraternizing or . . . – she blurted out, ‘She was pregnant.’
‘No!’ This came out on a gasp, and it was a long moment before Roland spoke again. ‘We can’t tell Simon.’
‘But what will we tell him as to why we were here?’
Roland was silent for a moment.
‘We’ll say that Lucinda had told you she intended to go to France, and begged you not to tell Simon until she was there. So you asked me to try and persuade her not to go. I thought it best to come up and see if I could get Lucinda to come to stay with me for a while, to talk it all over. We’ll leave it at that. No mention of the French boyfriend. Though I suppose we ought to try to contact him.’
‘She was going to give me an address so that Simon would know where she was. She said to tell him that she would be with her boyfriend and his aunt.’
‘See if there’s anything else in the envelope.’
‘Yes, there’s a small card.’ Flo’s hands shook as she pulled the card out. Please don’t let it have Aldric’s name on it. It didn’t, only a French-sounding female name, Mme Bonheur. She must be Aldric’s aunt. Flo handed the card to Roland.
‘Do you know the name of the boyfriend?’
Afraid to say, in case it was an obviously German name, Flo lied again. ‘No. Lucinda did mention it, but – well, I can’t remember. I . . . Oh, Roland, I can’t believe she’s dead.’
His arms came around her. ‘I know. Poor Lucinda.’
‘How did she die?’
‘I – I don’t know. Simon couldn’t tell me. Look, we need to get to him. Leave this other business with me. I can speak French. I will take it on myself to write to this lady. I’ll tell her we are sorry that we don’t know her nephew’s name. But I’ll ask her to kindly inform him.’
Flo had a moment of misgiving. What if Aldric didn’t believe that Lucinda was dead? What if he thought her English family had found out about him and had made up her death? He might try to come over again! But then, surely he would realize that they didn’t know he was German, so they would have no need to lie. This thought settled her mind. But another dread replaced it. How was she going to face Simon?