In his cabin, Gerald Brittain threw aside the papers he had been poring over and stood up, stretching his long muscular frame.
If anyone had the idea that working for British Intelligence was a romantic job, they were vastly mistaken, he thought. And he had been taken in himself – flattered, even, that he had been thought suitable, and excited by the challenge.
The approach had come just when he had needed it most, made by an insignificant looking man of middle age, middle height and middle colouring – but whose presence would nonetheless have caused a great many eyebrows to be raised among Brit’s fellow Officers at the RAF Convalescent Home had his full rank and title been known.
‘We need someone to do a special job for us, Brittain, and we think you’re the man.’
‘Oh yes?’ Brit’s voice had conveyed all the depression he was feeling. Two days earlier a service doctor had come to see him, armed with a collection of X-ray plates, and told him it was unlikely he would ever fly again. Although he had already suspected as much, the final verdict had still hit him with the force of a knockout blow; in the self-pitying hours which followed his realisation that it was true, he had allowed himself to sink to the point of actually wishing he had’ bought it’ along with his Spitfire.
‘A special job – pushing a pen in an office somewhere, I suppose?’ he said laconically.
The apparently insignificant officer gave him a long, searching look.
‘I was given to understand that the torn tendons in your right hand would preclude that.’
‘Definitely,’ said Brit, declining to point out that he was left-handed and thankful that for the moment at least he was safe from his ultimate nightmare – to be trapped behind a desk and a pile of paperwork. The very thought was enough to bring him out in a cold, claustrophobic swear and always had been. This aversion had been one of the reasons for turning his back on Cormorant – the offices in which he would have been expected to work might be the height of luxury, with their soft nappa leather furniture and the cabinets that contained rows of bottles of the best vintage wines and spirits, but to him they had seemed like prison cells. He had said as much and thought his father would probably never forgive him.
‘You were born and raised in Hong Kong, I understand?’ the officer continued.
‘Yes.’
‘And you speak Chinese?’
‘I learned Cantonese as a boy.’
‘What about Japanese?’
‘I know the odd word.’
‘The odd word isn’t enough for what we want. But it’s a start.’
Brit looked at him with quickening interest. ‘A start for what? What is this job you have in mind?’
The officer-with-no-name stood up and crossed to the window. For seemingly endless moments he stood looking out over the rolling lawns of the convalescent home: the trees, still clinging to the last of their leaves, faded now from the glorious autumn reds and golds; and the sky, gun-metal grey for November, above them.
Then he turned and said unemotionally, ‘How would you feel about working behind enemy lines?’
How would you feel?
At the time Brit had been too startled to feel anything. It was not something that had ever occurred to him – no, not even when the officer had asked him those strange but pertinent questions. Now he remembered other questions, other conversations, other eyes looking at him with the same searching depth as this man’s. And knew what they wanted him to do.
They wanted him to go into China!
The sweat broke out in cold drops and the back of his neck prickled with it. How the hell could he hope to get away with it? It would be suicide. But what did that matter? The last two days he had been thinking he might just as well be dead. This was his chance to do something useful again and, if he died, to make his death worth-while.
He pulled himself up laboriously. ‘It’s another six weeks before ray leg will be out of plaster.’
A small half smile twisted the mouth of the officer-with-no-name.
‘You’ll need every minute of that to learn all we shall push your way.’
And that had been no exaggeration, thought Brit, staring with restless dislike at the untidy pile of papers spread across his bunk. Six weeks had only enabled him to skim the surface of the data he was expected to memorise and given him a mere smattering of Japanese. The powers in high places had arranged it so that he had a cabin of his own every step of the voyage, thus giving him the privacy to continue with his studies, and there would be more timewith specialised tutors when he arrived back in Hong Kong. So far, knowing that not only the success of the job he had to do but also his own life depended on it, he had made conscientious use of his time, but there were occasions when concentration was hard to come by, and today had been one of them.
The disturbance caused by picking up the survivors of the torpedoed ship had upset his routine, he supposed, for this morning – though he had settled himself with his books for the allotted time and refused to move – his mind had wandered repeatedly and he had the feeling that very little had actually sunk in. Or perhaps it was his subconscious kicking against the lists of Cantonese vocabulary – a throwback to his rebellious youth.
If I had worked harder on it then, it would be a good deal easier for me now, he thought ruefully.
But he hadn’t worked on it; he had learned as little as he could get away with under pressure from his father, George, Brittain, tai-pan of Cormorant, who had insisted his two sons needed at least an understanding of Cantonese in order to control the business successfully.
Charles, Gerald’s elder brother, had learned well and was everything his father had hoped he would be. Not so Gerald. His ambition had begun and ended with his desire to drive one of the two Rolls Royces that stood in the drive of their mansion at Shek-o and to pilot the company plane – much to the disgust of his father, who had lectured him endlessly.
‘Cormorant has been handed down from father to son since your great-great-great-grandfather came out here in the 1700s with the British East India Company and made something of himself. It’s yours, in trust, for your children and theirs.’
Later when Brit had left home, first to fly commercially and then to join the RAF, the pressure had intensified.
‘Damn it, your place is here!’
But the tighter the noose, the more he had fought against it.
Ironic, he thought now, that I could end up doing more to help safeguard Cormorant than if I had stayed in Hong Kong like a good son and heir should. Even more ironic to think they might never know it!
But time was getting damned short. The day after tomorrow the Stranraer would be docking in Bombay; if his information was correct, after a week’s wait another ship would take him on the next leg of his voyage around the coast to Calcutta. The prospect of the delay annoyed him. It would have been quicker to go overland, he would have thought. But the Ministry of War Transport was a law unto itself and argument would be pointless. And the important thing at the moment was not to draw attention to himself.
The mournful sound of a distant bugle interrupted his train of thought and he crossed the cabin to where the papers, spread out on his bunk, stared up at him uninvitingly. He cursed them silently but their hold over him was too strong. That one word he knew or did not know could mean the difference between being detected as a spy or being unsuspected; that cipher could hold the key to life or death.
With a sigh he bent over and dragged his mind back to the task in hand.
‘Man that is born of woman hath but a short time to live. He cometh up and is cut down like a flower; he fleeth as it were a shadow and never continueth in one stay.’
The Chaplain’s voice was thin and reedy on the open air; from the corner of the deck where she stood to watch the service of committal Elise strained her ears to catch the words.
‘In the midst of life we are in death: of whom may we seek for succour but of thee, O Lord …’
The ship had slowed and her flag flew at half-mast above the burial party. Against the guard rail a galley table rested; on it a bundle lay covered with a limp Union Jack.
John Grimly.
As Elise reminded herself once more that the body, weighted down by a 3-inch shell and sewn into a canvas bag, was indeed that of the young Captain, her throat seemed to swell and tighten until she could no longer swallow.
She had thought last night’s tears would be the only ones she would shed for him. He was nothing to her, after all, just a young man whose path had crossed hers; yet more than anything she had been affected by the paralysing guilt that came from knowing she had made his last days wretched, when perhaps she could have made them happy. Those tears had been the tears of exhaustion, for herself and her failure as much as for the young man who had died so tragically.
Now, the knowledge of a life ended hit her afresh and the hollow echo of the Chaplain’s words struck a core of sadness in her so deep and sharp that she wanted to cry out with it.
‘For as much as it hath pleased Almighty God of his great mercy …’
What great mercy? the weeping heart of her asked.
‘…to take unto himself the soul of our dear brother here departed, we therefore commit his body to the deep …’
Her eyes were full of tears but she saw six men step forward, three each side, the galley table tipped and the duncoloured bundle slid out from beneath the Union Jack. The weighted body broke the surface with a soft, unmistakable splash. A bugle sounded the haunting notes of the Last Post which shot the still air with piercing sweetness; the Army officers mustered on deck saluted, and she clamped her lips over the sob that was rising from the numbness of her throat.
She didn’t want to cry, not here, yet oddly she felt that someone should. It wasn’t right to have a burial with no tears spilled.
But as she stood, blurred with unexpected grief, the tableau on deck dispersed; the ship was under way again. For a short time they had slowed to bury their dead, now it was time to make haste out of the dangerous seas for the sake of the living.
‘Are you going to the party tonight?’
Elise looked up in surprise from her latest excursion into Gone With The Wind.
Since the day when they had worked together to help the survivors of the raider attack, the Wrens had stopped their barrage of unpleasantness towards her, with only Ruth unable to resist the odd, spiteful remark. But the peace had been a guarded one for all that, and for her part Elise found it difficult to forget the venom they had directed at her in those early days when a friendly word would have meant so much.
Now she said, ‘ Party? What party?’
‘Son of farewell binge, I suppose, before we all go our separate ways in Bombay.’ Joyce Lindsell was doing her hair at the cabin mirror and not looking at Elise. It was the way they had conducted all conversations since that evening in the hospital galley – tentative, not unfriendly but too conscious of what had gone before to be comfortable – yet today Elise had the feeling that there was something more behind this: an olive branch, perhaps.
‘I didn’t know anything about it,’ she said. ‘I hardly think I’d be invited, anyway.’
‘Why not? You’re on the ship, just like us.’
Elise almost smiled. What a turn-about!’Where is it?’ she asked.
‘In the main ballroom where, believe it or not, we’re actually being allowed to mix with the men, though I expect there will be plenty of MPs responsible for making sure we don’t fraternise outside. Not that they’d stop you, anyway, would they?’
‘Maybe not. But I don’t expect I shall be going.’
Elise returned to her book. There was a silence, then Joyce said, ‘Wish I had something decent to wear, though. You don’t know how lucky you are!’
‘Don’t you have to be in uniform?’
‘Not tonight. We can dress up – cheer our brave lads on their way, I suppose that’s the idea. The trouble is I have nothing but a Utility dress and that’s hardly going to set the world on fire.’
There was something in her voice, something about the sly way her eyes slid to Elise’s trunk and away again that awakened the first hint of suspicion.
She wants to borrow something! thought Elise in surprise. That’s why she’s being so very friendly all of a sudden. For the first time on this whole damn voyage I’ve actually got the upper hand.
The knowledge gave her a kick and with it an imp of mischief took hold of her.
‘Oh, it is a trial, I know. This war is doing dreadful things to the fashion industry,’ she said drily. ‘My favourite designer, Schiaparelli, has closed her house and so has Chanel.’
She saw Joyce’s jaw drop and swallowing at the bubble of laughter in her throat, went on, ‘ Molyneux has gone back to England and Mainbocher to America. I honestly don’t know what I’d do if it wasn’t for the fact that high fashion’s just been frozen into the 1939 look …’
Joyce’s face was an absolute picture now – a mixture of disbelief, envy and scorn – the look of a girl who, even unrestricted by clothing coupons, would probably never have had a dress that hadn’t come from a high street store or a club catalogue, and suddenly, inexplicably, Elise was ashamed. Things came so easily to her that she tended to take them for granted.
‘Would you like me to lend you something?’ she asked, taking pity on Joyce.
The green eyes sharpened – it was obviously what she had been angling for; now it had happened she could hardly believe it.
‘Something of yours?’
‘Well, of course something of mine. We’re about the same size, aren’t we?’ Elise got up, reaching into the storage rack for the small trunk she had been allowed to bring into the cabin. ‘What about this one? Shocking pink. It would look good with your fair hair …’
She had kept the dresses hidden away throughout the voyage so as not to arouse the Wrens’ jealousy; now, something in the girl’s face as she looked at the raw silk Schiap with its swathed bodice, full skirt, and matching jacket embroidered with tiny seed pearls, told Elise it was not the first time she had seen it.
So they’ve been poking in my trunk when I wasn’t here! she thought. But even then the initial rush of anger and sense of violation was tempered by the realisation that she owned and took for granted things these girls had probably never even seen before.
I have my opportunity for revenge now, Elise thought. I’ve dangled this dress before her, but now I could snatch it away. At one fell swoop I could return all the heartache she caused by encouraging the others to make an outcast of me. I could say to her, ‘Right, Cinderella, see what you could have had if you’d been nicer to me! Now – back to your utility dress.’
But all the while she knew she wouldn’t do it. Quite apart from the feeling, almost superstitious in its intensity, that she should share her good fortune, there was another motive – one she could barely understand. After all they had said and done, perversely she still wanted them to like her – wanted, even now, to be one of them.
‘Try it on,’ she said.
‘Can I?’
‘I said so, didn’t I?’ She leaned back against the bunk and saw Joyce’s shiver of delight as the raw silk caressed her skin.
‘God, this is even better than taffeta!’
‘It’s silk. The creases will drop out by the time you want to wear it.’
‘Jeepers, it’s beautiful. Wait till the others see this!’
‘You’d better have the things that go with it.’ Surprising even herself, Elise dived into the trunk again. ‘ There’s a pearl choker and stud ear-rings …’ She found the box, unlocked it and showed it to Joyce – a perfect set of creamy pearls, graduated in size.
This time, however, Joyce’s face took on a closed look.
‘Oh no – I couldn’t!’
‘It’s all right. You needn’t worry about them. They were restrung just before I left Hong Kong and they’re well insured.’
‘No. Not pearls! Thanks all the same.’
‘Why not?’
‘Pearls for tears, they say, don’t they?’
‘But that’s ridiculous!’
‘Maybe. But you know about my fiancé, don’t you? I’m still waiting for news as to whether or not he’s going to be all right – so I don’t want to tempt fate. And besides him, there’s my sister who lives in London and refuses to be evacuated in spite of the blitz, and my parents living slap-bang alongside the dockyard at Pompey. No thanks! Laugh at me if you like, but it’s a good luck charm I could do with just now, I can tell you, not pearls for tears.’
‘All right.’ It was sobering, thought Elise, to see such a rough and ready character as Joyce sheltering behind superstition. ‘Well, enjoy wearing the dress anyway.’
The pert, pretty face brightened, her serious moment forgotten.
‘Don’t worry – I intend to! A dress by Schia – whatever the hell it was you said – oh Lordy, I intend to!’
If discipline for the members of the armed forces had been strict until now, on that last night before docking in Bombay all rules and regulations were temporarily forgotten.
For many Bombay would be journey’s end, for others merely a staging post. The detachment of Wrens was going on to the naval base at Trincomalee in Ceylon, a regiment of soldiers was bound for Burma.
But it would certainly be the last night on board the Stranraer for all of them – their last night together and possibly their last night of freedom, and the ballroom of the one-time passenger liner reverberated with a rowdier party than any Elise had ever seen in her cruising days.
At eight, only the sound of the piano, rather out of tune from being moved too many times from mess room to mess room, and the rhythmic thumping of drums could be heard in the cabins and companion ways; by nine there were gales of laughter too, and by nine-thirty, when Elise left the officers’ dining room, it sounded as if the whole place was jumping.
On the companion way she hesitated. Several of the officers had invited her to a small private party they were having in one of the bars, but she had declined, explaining she was still feeling the effects of her long day’s nursing but not divulging the real reason: that she could not face seeing them drinking and laughing while knowing that John Grimly, whom she had known better than any of them, would not be there and would never drink or laugh again.
Another day had passed and still she could not forget him. His eager young face, rosy and beaming, with only his eyes sometimes betraying his uncertainty, rose to attract her attention a dozen times a day, and even now it was hard to realise that his body had slipped into the sea yesterday, hidden by the impersonal canvas shroud. But what her conscious mind refused to accept, her unconscious mind told her was true, and she felt too leaden with sadness to be able to face the determinedly cheerful company of the other officers.
There was a perverse attraction, however, about the frenzied gaiety being generated in the ballroom, though Elise was not sure what it was.
Not the free-flowing booze – she drank little herself. Not the laughter – there was something almost frightening about that. No, if anything it was the sense of comradeship and sharing that seemed to spill out on the waves of noise.
As she stood there undecided, the doors opened and two young soldiers came out, whooping and catching her between them in a movement reminiscent of a childhood game of ‘Oranges and Lemons’.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ she demanded, half amused and half annoyed.
‘With any luck – you!’ They laughed loudly and her quick temper rose.
‘How dare you! Let me go at once!’
‘Not until you give us a kiss.’
‘Both of us!’
‘Let me go! You’re drunk, the pair of you!’
‘And you’re beautiful. She’s beautiful, isn’t she?’
‘Oh, she’s classy, this one!’
‘Let me go!’
‘Having trouble?’ The voice was low and faintly amused, yet it contained a note of indisputable authority. Without even turning to look, Elise knew who it was! Gerald Brittain – Brit.
‘Have a heart, sir! We were only joking!’ one of the men said. They automatically loosened their hold and Elise was able to free herself.
‘Thank you very much,’ she flared at them with heavy sarcasm. ‘And next time, pick on someone who wants to play.’
But as they rolled off together, slapping one another’s backs and casting curled-lip glances at her over their shoulders, she felt a flush of embarrassment rush in to replace the anger.
It was the first time she had seen Brit since the night John Grimly died, and these were not the circumstances she would have chosen. But that was nothing new – if there was an awkward situation, it seemed he found it; if there was a moment when more than anything she would choose to be alone, that was the very moment he could be trusted to put in an appearance.
He must think me a complete and utter fool, Elise thought, briefly tasting the bitter pill John Grimly had been forced to swallow time and again.
His eyes moved over her now and the slight downward twist of his mouth evoked the impression of mockery once more.
‘Going to the party, were you?’
Her chin rose a shade. ‘I was thinking about it.’
‘I wouldn’t advise it, unless you want a repeat performance! There are a lot of men there who have drunk more than is wise, and not many women. Someone who looks like you is bound to be in demand.’
She could feel her pulses hammering – a result of her encounter with the two tipsy soldiers, she assumed; as the teasing hazel eyes met hers, she flushed.
Apparently oblivious of her discomfort, he went on, ‘I was looking for you, actually.’
‘For me?’
‘Yes.’ The sound of voices counting loudly in unison rang out from the ballroom, then a storm of laughter and cheering was followed by the crash of breaking glass. ‘Drinking contests,’ Brit said amiably. ‘It’s beginning to sound like a Bavarian bierkeller. Are you sure you want to go in there?’
‘Perhaps not.’ But there was a regretful look on her face that made him throw back his head and laugh.
‘So you’d like to go slumming, eh? Come on, then!’
He pushed open the door and the heat and the smoke haze and the wild, charged atmosphere met them like a wall. On a table a young man stood with head back, beer spilling over his chin and neck and bare chest as he literally poured it down his throat to the frenzied counting of a six-deep circle of supporters. Around them the floor was packed; men were sitting on chairs, tables and with their backs against the wall, while gales of laughter rose from others standing in large groups. Elise caught a glimpse of Linda Preece sitting on the lap of a rather handsome soldier but of Joyce there was no sign, and she knew a moment’s sharp anxiety for her dress.
‘I don’t suppose you’ve ever been to a party quite like this before?’ Brit said above the hubbub.
‘No.’ It was certainly a world away from the stately dinner dances in the Rose Room at the Peninsula Hotel. Occasionally, of course, someone had too much to drink and disgraced themselves, much to the disgust of the very proper colonial matrons and the amusement of the young set, but she had never seen merrymaking on this scale before and, intense though her curiosity had been on the other side of the door, now that she was here she wasn’t sure she cared for it.
The man on the table had finished his beer, deafening cheers followed and Elise watched fascinated as he towelled his chest with a tolled-up shirt, then shook it out and put it on again. As the cheering died away the pianist took advantage of the lull to strike up again, and voices were raised in a slurred chorus of ‘Lili Marlene’.
‘Do you want a drink?’ Brit asked, shouting to make himself heard. ‘I can’t guarantee how long it will take to get one, but I can try.’
‘No!’ She didn’t like the idea of him disappearing to the bar and leaving her here alone in this seething, noisy crush. ‘Had enough, have you?’
She nodded. Her eyes were stinging from the cigarette smoke and there was something almost alarming about the frivolity if you were not really a part of it.
He eased her out again. As the doors closed behind them she felt nothing but relief.
‘You know there’s an officers’ party going on, do you?’ he asked when they were sufficiently far away from the ballroom to be able to make themselves heard more easily.
‘Yes. But I said I didn’t want to go. After what happened to John Grimly, I didn’t feel like it somehow. And I’m still pretty tired, actually. It was a very exhausting day.’
They were on deck now, beneath that perfect expanse of velvet dark that Elise thought she would never tire of seeing.
‘Yes – it must have been quite a broadening couple of days for you, one way and another,’ Brit said.
The levity in his tone annoyed her. How he could equate the horror of nursing the wounded and watching John Grimly die with the wild party she had just witnessed, she did not know. But it was true, whether she liked it or not. Until the last few days, she had not realised how sheltered a life she had always led.
‘What did you think of the party in there, then?’ Brit asked.
‘Well … it was … different. I wouldn’t have missed it, though I should think Gordon would have a fit if he knew.’
‘He would?’
‘He would never have let me anywhere near it!’
‘Really? How strange!’
‘What do you mean?’
He was lighting a cigarette, not looking at her. ‘ Strange that a man who protects his wife from a rowdy party should allow her to go charging about the world in time of war. Now to me, that seems a total nonsense.’
She felt an instant and prickling response.
‘What on earth has that got to do with it?’
‘Nothing really. It just doesn’t make sense to refuse to let you be contaminated by the common hurly-burly, yet not turn a hair at your wandering around in what is without doubt a very dangerous situation.’
‘How do you know he’s not turning a hair?’
‘Well, he let you come, didn’t he?’
‘Only because my mother was dying.’ Oh how easy it was to let him rile her. The voice of caution was warning her to take no notice, but it fell on deaf ears. ‘I had to see her. And in any case, the situation wasn’t like it is now. Everything was just as usual – in Hong Kong, anyway.’
He blew smoke into the aromatic breeze.
‘Business in Hong Kong is always as usual. Making money is what keeps the place ticking over – or haven’t you realised that yet? It’s an insular world and I suppose your husband’s not entirely to blame for not foreseeing what was going to happen. Unfortunately, it’s all too true that someone who can accurately forecast next year’s trade figures hasn’t a clue about ordinary mundane things affecting their own family. It’s the way a businessman’s mind works.’
The suggestion that Gordon cared more for the business than he did for her was both insulting and infuriating, and she thrust aside the creeping memory of her occasional resentment of mornings when she awoke to find he had already left for the factory and nights when he worked until the small hours in his study; times when he was there but the business intruded – breakfasts when he hardly raised his head from the business section of the South China Morning Post, and evening dinners shared with clients or business associates. It was necessary for him to be single-minded if he was to be successful – their whole future depended on it. And to criticise him without knowing anything about him was as intolerable as the implication that he was also stupid.
‘I don’t really think it’s any of your business,’ she flared.
‘Ouch!’ But he didn’t sound hurt, only amused still. ‘You’re quite right, of course; it isn’t any of my business. I was merely making the point that if you were my wife, dying mother or no dying mother, I’d have made sure you stayed where I could keep an eye on you.’
In the darkness her face flamed. ‘I think this conversation has gone quite far enough.’
‘Probably. Anyway, I still haven’t told you why I was looking for you. We land at Bombay tomorrow and will be there for about a week. I shall be staying at the Taj Mahal Hotel. Perhaps when you’ve fixed up accommodation for yourself you will let me know where you are?’
‘Why?’
‘So that I can let you know the arrangements for the next stage.’
‘Oh!’ The flush deepened as she realised how aggressive her question must have sounded.
‘Do you know yet where you will be?’
‘When I was last in Bombay I stayed at the Taj Mahal, too. I should imagine I will go there again.’
‘Fine! That will make it easy, then, won’t it?’ He threw his cigarette butt towards the sea. ‘Do you want me to see you back to your cabin, or will you be all right?’
‘Thank you, but I’ll be all right.’
He smiled and in the bright moonlight his teeth showed very white.
‘Yes. In your present mood I think you will be. I feel quite sorry for any drunken sailor who gets in your way!’