She left him, and he followed her a little later, and they rode back to Hartley Magna at opposite ends of the bus.
He did not speak to her again, alone, for several days.
A string of circumstances prevented them from meeting in the afternoons; one or other of them had duties to perform except for one day, when it rained. For five days Marshall had to watch her without talking to her. It was impossible for him to avoid her even if he had wanted to, and he did not want to; at the same time it was impossible for them to meet and talk without starting gossip all around the station, and he was unwilling to do that.
He found himself continually seeing things that he wanted to tell her about. He saw a blue tit on a branch one day; he did not know what it was, except that it was blue. Gervase would know; he suffered a sudden mad impulse to go to the signals office and ask her to come out and see it. He saw a Halifax without a front turret and heard from the pilot why it was given up; he wanted to pour out to her this vital and most interesting news. Down by the river, standing very quiet, he saw three tiny water-rats learning to swim; it irked him that she was not there with him to see. Gunnar Franck received a letter from his mother that had come via Switzerland and Spain; he was unable to talk to her about it. He could only catch her eye occasionally across the table or the ante-room and smile.
He slept badly during that five days; that is to say, instead of sleeping solidly for nine hours as he was accustomed to, he slept for seven and lay awake for two, and got up in the morning stale and tired. After the third such night it seemed to him that they could hardly go on as they were; they would have to work out some means of meeting—if she wanted to. He was not sure of that, however. Gervase might be quite satisfied with their relationship, for all he knew. He was uncertain and upset; in those five days his friends found him sharp and irritable. Even his crew found him to be difficult to please, a novel and unusual trait developed in their captain.
Gervase saw nothing of this restlessness because she did not meet him. When circumstances allowed, she knew she would go out with him again; the two afternoons that she had spent with him had been happy ones, the happiest she had spent since she had been at Hartley. She was not in any hurry for the third. She knew, with a little glow of wonder and of pride, that this casual, competent, and kind young man was coming to be very much in love with her. She knew that this would raise enormous problems for her in the future that she did not in the least know how to tackle. She was grateful for the respite that prevented them from meeting. Her whole instinct was to take it slowly; when it rained on the one afternoon when they were both free, she was almost glad.
They did an operation on the fifth day: Essen. It was a massed raid of more than six hundred aircraft, Lancasters, Halifaxes, Wellingtons, and a few Stirlings. The Wellingtons from Hartley were scheduled to arrive in the last quarter of an hour; they got there when the target was a sea of flame with smoke-clouds rising up above ten thousand feet. Most of the searchlights had ceased functioning and the flak was weak and inaccurate; for the Wellingtons it was an easy raid. There were night fighters over the target, but a layer of cloud at thirteen thousand gave them cover for the journey home; Phillips got off a couple of bursts at one as they climbed up beside Lines in the dim light, covering each other. Then they were in the cloud and sheering apart, and so they came home, and landed back at about three in the morning. There were no losses, though Sergeant Pilot Nutter came back swearing like a sergeant pilot with the fabric missing from one elevator and his rear-gunner wounded in the shoulder from a burst beside the tail.
Throughout this raid Marshall was absent-minded and distrait. He took the machine off and flew it normally, checked his instruments with his usual care, talked to his crew down the inter-com, did all his normal duties. But there was no life in his work that night; he performed it automatically, thinking about other things. All the way from Hartley Magna to Essen and back from Essen to Hartley Magna his mind was only on Gervase. The vast glow of smoke and flame that they saw fifty miles away did not excite him; he was oppressed with the feeling that the present position with Gervase was intolerable; the artificial constraint that life upon the station placed between them must be ended as soon as possible. The target was too far obscured by smoke and fire for him to be able to identify the engine assembly shops that they were detailed to destroy. Gunnar Franck took over and from the river bend guided him across the inferno for about the right distance, and they dropped their bombs and fell into formation beside Lines as they climbed up towards the clouds, and Marshall was free again to think about his trouble. He would have to reach an understanding with Gervase. They could not go on like this.
He got to bed at about half-past three, and slept restlessly and late. He woke up at about half-past eleven; there was no tea for him in spite of the pigeon that he had given to the Flight Officer, and his batwoman had gone downstairs. He lay for half an hour in bed rather unhappy and resentful of the circumstances of his life; then he got up and shaved and went downstairs to drink his pint of beer before lunch.
He saw Gervase in the ante-room and crossed over to her, can in hand.
“Morning,” he said.
She turned to him. “Good-morning. Did you get your cup of tea?”
He grumbled: “No, I didn’t. Fat lot of good giving her a pigeon.”
The girl said: “But she told the girl that you could have it! I know she did.” In fact, he had been asleep at the time when his batwoman might have brought it to him.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said gloomily. “Beer is best.”
She laughed. “What’s the matter with you?”
He yawned. “I stayed up too late last night.”
Gervase said: “It’s going to be a lovely afternoon. You’d better get out and get some exercise.”
He nodded. “I thought of going out to that place Riddington up the river, that I told you about, to try and get another pike. Like to come with me?” He paused, and added persuasively: “I’d let you have a crack with the little rod, if you like.”
She said: “All right. I’ll meet you out there.”
He fixed details of the time and place with her, and left her almost immediately, conscious of Flying Officer Davy watching them across the room. He went in presently to lunch, and then up to his room to collect his fishing gear. He rode out of the station on his bicycle ahead of Gervase; when she reached the river he had already fitted up his rod and made a cast or two with the red plug.
The river here swelled out into a wide pool, rather black and muddy, and overhung with trees. At one time it might have been a millpool or perhaps a reservoir; now nothing remained to show its purpose save the stone retaining wall and rusty sluice. Gervase found him at the deep end of it; she came to him by a little path through beds of nettles.
“You do find nice places,” she said. “I think this is fun.”
The sun shone on them through the bare trees; the shadows of the branches made thin pencilled lines upon the water. “It’s nothing like that Kingslake place,” he said. “I was just thinking it looks pretty grim.” He glanced at the dark water and the black sunken branches sticking out of it up at the shallow end.
“We won’t spin too deep,” he said. “We might bring up the body.”
She made a little gesture of distaste. “Loathsome ideas you have.”
“Well, I didn’t want to spoil our afternoon.”
He showed her his rod, reel, and tackle. She had never fished in that way; indeed, she had never fished at all except for one or two abortive trials with a fly, as she had told him. They stood there together on the bank of the dark pool as he explained the tackle to her; he stumbled once or twice during his explanation, confused by her proximity. The tension communicated itself to her, because she moved away from him a little and said:
“All right. Go on, and let’s see you do it.”
He cast out over the still pool; the plug went flying thirty yards and landed with a little splash; he began to re
el in slowly. “That’s nice,” she said. She watched as the little red fish wiggled up towards them as he reeled it out and cast again.
Presently he handed her the rod and showed her how to do it; it was necessary to adjust her hand upon the handle and her thumb upon the reel, and that was difficult for both of them. She cast, and got an overrun that tangled up the line; cast again when he had straightened it for her and got another. The third time the plug sailed correctly up the still pool a little way, giving her the thrill of achievement.
They fished on for half an hour and caught nothing, which was not surprising. Their minds were not upon the job but on very different matters; a fish, if fish there were, might have looked out of the water at them brandishing the rod above his head and wondered at their few, constrained remarks and the long, difficult silences.
For Gervase, the afternoon was a disappointment. For some reason that she did not clearly understand it was not working out so well as the day in Kingslake Woods. That and the evening in Oxford had been sheer pleasure; this was different, and awkward. She became aware that she wanted to get away, and quickly too, before something frightful happened.
She handed him back the rod. “Thanks ever so much for letting me try,” she said. “I’ve got to go back now—I said I’d be back for tea. I hope you catch a fish.”
He smiled at her. He had felt the awkwardness between them as much as she had; if she wanted to escape he would not try to stop her. “There’s a dance in the Town Hall tomorrow night,” he said. “Would you like to come to it?”
She said, to gain time: “You mean the one in Hartley Town Hall?”
He nodded. “That’s the one.”
She hesitated, and then said: “I think that’s a bit near the station, isn’t it?”
There was a long pause.
“I’m not so struck upon this hole-and-corner business,” he said at last. “I think we ought to give ourselves a chance.”
She realised in panic what was happening and tried to laugh it off. “We wouldn’t have much chance if we went to the Hartley dance together.” She moved away. “I really must go now.”
“Just one more thing,” the pilot said.
She glanced at him and realised that, as she saw him then, so he must look over the target just as Gunnar Franck said “Bombs away, Cap.”
She said weakly: “What’s that?”
“I think you’re a grand person,” he said quietly. “I’m working up to ask you if you’d like to marry me.”
The date was March the fourteenth, the last day of the season for coarse fishing.
Chapter Four
Now hollow fires burn out to black,
And lights are guttering low:
Square your shoulders, lift your pack,
And leave your friends, and go.
Oh never fear, man, nought’s to dread,
Look not to left or right:
In all the endless path you tread
There’s nothing but the night.
A. E. HOUSMAN
There was a long silence between them. Now that the worst had happened, Gervase found that all awkwardness had disappeared; his frankness seemed to give her licence to speak freely herself. “Look,” she said at last, “that’s perfectly absurd. We’ve only met twice or three times.”
He said: “Well, that’s not true, because we’ve been meeting almost every day in the mess. But if it was true—so what? Do you think that matters?”
She thought for a moment. “No, I don’t,” she said. “I think you’re right there. I think if you wanted to marry anybody you’d probably know in the first five minutes.”
Their agreement only served to deepen the message of her words. “Well, I did,” he said quietly, “even if you didn’t. I knew I wanted you to marry me that first day of all, when we went to see the badger.”
She said helplessly: “I’m frightfully sorry …”
They were still standing by the edge of the pool. Marshall said: “Let’s go and sit on that stile.”
She said: “I’ve got to go back soon.”
“It won’t hurt you to wait ten minutes.” He smiled at her. “I won’t try any of the rough stuff.”
They left the pool, and carrying the rod and case they went towards the stile and sat upon it, one at each end so that there was a yard between them. As they went Marshall had time to collect his eloquence, and when they were settled he said:
“Look, Gervase. When I said we ought to give ourselves a chance, I meant just that. I hate this lousy hole-and-corner business, snooping about in the bushes in case an A.C.2. sees us and starts gossiping on the station. If we were both in civil life I wouldn’t have asked you to marry me the third time we went out together. But here, it’s either that or go on creeping round the hedges, and I take a dim view of that.”
She said: “There’s nothing else to do, is there? If you don’t want to set the whole station off talking.”
He grinned at her. “I’d rather set the whole station off talking and have done with it.”
“I don’t see what good that would do,” she said. “It’d just make things difficult.”
He pulled out his cigarette-case and offered her one; she refused, and absently he lit one himself, flipped the match away, and blew a long cloud.
“I think I’ve been a bloody fool,” he said. “I’m sorry if I’ve upset you, Gervase.”
She said: “You’ve not upset me.” As she spoke she knew that it would be months before she would be able to stop thinking about what was going on between them.
He glanced at her, and saw that her face was troubled, and her cheeks rather pink. “Would you like to hear my side of it?” he asked.
She said: “I don’t think I would, Peter. It won’t do any good.”
“Maybe, but I’d like you to know.” He glanced up at her, smiling faintly. “Children may go out before the sermon.”
She flushed. “I’m not a child.”
“Then you can stay and listen to the sermon,” he said equably.
He blew another cloud of smoke, considering his words. “I know we don’t know much about each other,” he said slowly. “But I do think this. I think we know enough to justify us in taking a chance together. When we know each other better we may get to hate the sight of one another, and then everything will come to an end, and we’ll be well out of it.”
“In that case,” she observed, “we’d better not start.”
“If I thought it was going to end like that,” he said, “I wouldn’t want to. But what I think is this. I think you’re the finest girl I’ve ever met, Gervase, or that I’m ever likely to meet. I think I could make you happy, not only now but when we’re old. In fifty years’ time, when you’ve got rheumatism and I’m stone deaf, I think we’d still be happy together. That’s what I think.”
She did not speak.
“It’s pretty early to speak to you about getting married,” he said, “and you’ve got every right to shoot me down. But I’m glad I did.”
There was a long silence. In the end she broke it. “When you said you wanted us to take a chance together,” she said, “did you mean you wanted us to be engaged, or something?”
He thought for a minute. “If you like. What I really meant was that we should say, ‘To hell with the station.’ That we should meet as often as we like, and when we like. In the middle of the parade ground, if we like.”
“We wouldn’t go on like that for very long,” she said practically. “One or other of us would get shifted. It would probably be me.”
He said: “I’m sorry, Gervase. I didn’t think of that.”
There was a pause, and then he said: “I don’t think I object so much to dodging behind hedges to kid the people on the station, so long as it’s all right between ourselves. But I’m not going to kid you any more, Gervase. I think you’re a lovely girl, and I think when we know each other a bit better we’ll want to get married.” He glanced at her. “I don’t want there to be any misundersta
nding about that.”
She said: “There couldn’t be now, Peter. You’ve said it about six different ways already.”
He blew a cloud of smoke. “I’m pretty eloquent when I get going,” he said. There was a pause, and then he added: “Mind if I ask a question?”
She shook her head, wondering what was coming now.
“You haven’t got a boy friend tucked away anywhere, have you?” he asked. “Somebody you knew at your last station?”
She thought rapidly of simulating an impassioned separation, and abandoned the idea as too difficult to improvise. “There’s nobody like that,” she said.
Marshall said: “I didn’t think there was. And I might have known I’d get a straight answer.” He glanced at her and met her eyes, smiling. “You really are a wizard girl,” he said. “I’m doing this all wrong. I ought to be holding you clutched to my manly bosom, whispering hot words of love into your shell-like ear.”
She said nervously: “You promised to cut out the rough stuff if I stayed.”
He glanced at her. “Don’t worry,” he said gently. “I know when I’m not wanted.”
The sun shone down upon them sitting one at each end of the stile, and a little wind of March blew across the plough behind them, fresh and stimulating. Gervase sat mustering her thoughts, trying to think of ways to say the things she had to say without hurting him too much.
“You’re not wanted,” she said quietly. “Not in the way you mean.” She glanced at him, sitting staring at the dead leaves on the ground before him, smoking quietly. “I don’t want to be beastly to you, saying that. You’ve been very nice to me, Peter. You’ve done me a great honour, saying you wanted to marry me. But I couldn’t marry you just because of that.”
He said: “I wouldn’t want you to. But there’s more to it than that. I think you like me a bit, too.”
“I do like you,” she said. “I like coming out with you. But I don’t want to marry you. I don’t want to marry anybody, not for six or seven years.”
“Why not?” he asked.