Lucia in Wartime Read online

  ‘She sounds quite frightful.’

  ‘Oh she is—but she’s magnificent and I adore her, and I want her to have as many officers in Tilling as she had duchesses in London, if not more. And your Miss Coles adores her too. Lucia introduced her to me in the High Street, like a queen scattering largesse to the mob!’

  ‘Oh very well then, since she’s the original of Miss Coles’s Bellona,’ said Henry Porteous, scowling. ‘But I won’t take her any sausages, or eggs, or parachute silk, which is all that women seem to be interested in these days.’

  Meanwhile Lucia was practising the Moonlight Sonata, deep in thought. She must not repeat the mistake she had made when she had entertained Lord Tony in Riseholme. She had invited all her London friends there one weekend and, foolish woman that she was, had kept them to herself, taking them to laugh at the new Museum and not introducing them to any of her subjects, even Georgie. As a result Riseholme had rebelled against her, and she had been hard put to it to regain her crown. This time she would allow Tilling to meet her officers, although she would have to ration them, as everything is rationed in wartime. An occasional lunch or Bridge party, at which an honoured Tillingite would be permitted to be present. On no account should Elizabeth be allowed to annex any of her officers. On that point she was adamant.

  With these elements of strategy firm in her mind, she closed the lid of the piano and looked out of the window in case any German spy, entranced by the music of his countrymen, should be standing beneath. Having satisfied herself that her lure had attracted nothing, she took her bicycle and cycled down to the High Street to order a Polish phrase-book.

  She had not gone far when she saw something that caused her to skid violently and almost collide with a lamp-post. There, outside Irene’s house Taormina, was the quaint one being kissed by a short, balding man in uniform. Covered in confusion she righted her machine and pedalled furiously into the High Street.

  She had not been the only witness of this most unTilling-like event. Diva, walking her dog up towards Church Square, observed it also and immediately turned round and walked briskly back towards the High Street, almost colliding with Elizabeth in her anxiety to escape from the remarkable display of emotion.

  ‘Irene,’ said Diva breathlessly. ‘Soldier. Kissing outside Taormina.’

  ‘No!’ said Elizabeth. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Saw them myself just now,’ replied Diva. ‘Probably still at it.’

  ‘Fancy! What was he like?’

  ‘Short, balding, spectacles. It must be Henry.’

  ‘I was saying to Major Benjy just the other day how morality is remarkably lax in wartime,’ said Elizabeth proudly. ‘And now this! The poor child. She must be protected against herself.’

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about that,’ said Diva crossly. ‘I just hope it was Henry, that’s all. If there are two of them after her, they might go and fight duels over her in the sand-dunes. You know how military men tend to fight duels over women.’

  Elizabeth decided to ignore the deadly irony of this remark.

  ‘Hardly likely, dear. Even if he did have a rival, I doubt whether they’d be able to have a duel in the sand-dunes. Mines. Patrols. Military police. Someone would be sure to stop them.’

  ‘Be that as it may,’ said Diva, more red in the face than ever, ‘you’re not to go interfering. Besides, love might be good for Irene. Stop her wearing fishermen’s jerseys and riding her bicycle too fast. And I don’t see how you could stop it, unless you walked up and down outside Taormina ringing a dinner-bell.’

  With this brilliant allusion, Diva scuttled off to impart the news to the Padre and wee wifie, who were queuing outside the fishmonger’s in the pretty belief that he might sell them some fish.

  Chapter 2.

  Lucia’s first officers’ dinner was an outstanding success, for Lucia if not for the officers. There was lobster à la Riseholme (albeit with rather more Riseholme than lobster) and raspberry fool (rather more fool than raspberry) and a quantity of sound port. This was followed by Beethoven and Mozartino, Elgar and Purcell, by readings from Shakespeare (Henry V to the troops at Harfleur—Lucia was Henry V) and Pope’s Iliad (Hector’s farewell to Andromache—Lucia was Hector). As the two Humbers rattled away down the hill in the rain (one of them pausing outside Taormina to release quaint Irene) Lucia waved them goodbye from the blacked-out window of the garden-room and then retired to bed, gloriously happy. Four officers, including a peer of the realm and a notorious avant-garde painter, and Irene as a witness that it had actually happened.

  Irene was not slow in performing her rôle as messenger, for by marketing time in the High Street next morning Elizabeth had heard all about it from Evie Bartlett.

  ‘There were two Humbers,’ said the mouselike one, ‘Lord Limpsfield and Captain Porteous in one and Captain Oldshaw and Lieutenant Custard in the other. They arrived at six and they didn’t leave until after twelve. Fancy that!’

  Elizabeth smiled. ‘I wonder what they can have been doing all that time?’ she said cheerfully. ‘Ah! Of course. I see it all. Dear quaint Irene has been misleading us, for clearly it was not Lord Limpsfield and Mr. Porteous the painter—such daubs, dear Evie, no form at all—at Mallards last night, but Mr. Churchill, the First Sea Lord and the head of the Air Force, all come to seek our dear Lulu’s advice. After all, if you recall, in peacetime all the leading lights of the Stock Exchange, and no doubt the Treasury as well, were accustomed to hang on her every word’ (Lucia had been known to say occasionally that Mammoncash, her broker, had come round to her way of thinking) ‘even though those shares she recommended me to put all my money into did so very badly. Well now, we must hope she gave the Government rather better advice than she gave me.’

  Evie waited patiently until this bitter, although confused, tirade had subsided.

  ‘I don’t think so, Elizabeth dear, or there would have been more than two cars, and I don’t think dear Irene would have been asked. I would have thought Mr. Churchill was capable of conducting the war without her help, even if he can’t do without Lucia’s.’

  Despite the shock of apparently being savaged by a mouse, Elizabeth found a gleam of comfort in this reply. Was Evie just the slightest bit resentful that Lucia had invited quaint Irene Coles to the inaugural officer-feast, rather than one of the more senior members of Tilling society?

  ‘I expect he wanted to meet our brilliant young painter. Perhaps,’ she said, echoing the hopes of her own unconscious mind, ‘he intends to send her abroad as an official war artist.’

  Poor Elizabeth! Lucia might well have been taking lessons in strategy from the Chiefs of Staff, for she had forestalled all disaffection by brilliant generalship. Evie, on her return to the Vicarage, found an invitation waiting for her; dinner, for the Padre and herself to meet the officers at Mallards the day after tomorrow. Clearly Tilling would get its ration of officers, although as with all rationing there must be some standing in line and waiting of turns first. And so it proved, for, with the exception of Irene, who was invited every time that Henry came, thus securing his presence, each and every Tillingite of note received their invitation in turn, even including the Wyses; all, that is, except the Mapp-Flints. For word of Elizabeth’s fury had reached Lucia’s ears, and she had concluded that if Elizabeth expected to meet Mr. Churchill at Mallards she would be sadly disappointed, and had better not come at all.

  So Elizabeth was thrown back upon two miserable alternatives. Either she must sue for peace, and upon wretched terms, or else she must make up her mind to ignore Lucia and her officers and her magnificent gesture towards the war-effort (for, in order to feed so many officers so well and so often, she and Georgie must, between dinners, be living on fresh air and rainwater) and pretend that neither she nor the Staffordshire Regiment nor indeed the whole British Army existed. This would be well-nigh impossible to do, for all Tilling now lived and breathed officers; the latest despatches from the Mallards front were awaited with breathless excitement in the High Stre
et next morning—how Lucia had addressed Lord Limpsfield as ‘Lord Tony’; how Irene and Henry Porteous always sat next to each other and exchanged furtive glances which, to the innocent ladies of Tilling, looked remarkably like smouldering passion; how the tall, lean officer from Yorkshire, Captain Oldshaw, had admitted in strict confidence that he had been across the Channel in a small boat to inspect the German barges, and how he thought that they were mostly like to sink before they got half-way. To ignore all this was to ignore life itself. She had nothing left with which to fight back; Major Benjy might specify the exact fjord in Iceland where he thought the counterattack most likely to land and no one would pay the slightest attention. She must find something or else submit utterly.

  Her mind was filled with these horrible imaginings as she walked briskly up through the Landgate and up the High Street one morning in search of eggs, although for all the luck she was having she might as well have been looking for phoenix eggs, which the Arabian fowl lays only once every thousand years. She would have, she realised, to go and virtually prostrate herself at the feet of the odious Mr. Rice whom, in happier times, she had so often broadsided with the full batteries of her eloquence, and this wretched thought so filled her mind like mist that she utterly failed to notice Lucia, hurrying along towards her with her eyes downcast as if wishing for once to avoid attention. Of course, even if Elizabeth had seen Lucia, she would have failed to notice her (Lucia and her officers and her merry little dinners did not, needless to say, exist), but she would not have collided with her quite so sharply, knocking the basket from her hand. Filled with furious remorse she stooped to pick up the contents of the basket, but Lucia stooped more quickly than she and began to hurl provisions back into their container without bothering to replace their newspaper wrappings. She was also trying to screen these provisions from Elizabeth’s sight, and in this she was imperfectly successful.

  ‘So sorry, dear, let me help you,’ cried Elizabeth, frantically scanning Lucia’s upset hoard. There was sugar and eggs, one of which was broken, its golden essence seeping away between the cobbles, a whole leg of lamb, from a lamb the size of a horse, and—ye gods!—four oranges!

  ‘Not at all, not at all,’ replied Lucia, and there was mortal fear in her eyes. ‘Nothing broken.’

  ‘Such lovely things, Lulu dear. Leg of lamb, surely?’ purred Elizabeth.

  ‘So fortunate. A food-parcel from dear Lord Whitby in America. All these treasures!’ And the petrified woman almost ran down the High Street and up towards Mallards. Elizabeth stepped back and felt something against her heel. There, evidence of Lucia’s undoubted crime, was an orange.

  She thought quickly. Would it be better to hold it above her head and call out in a voice that all Tilling would be able to hear, ‘Lucia dearest, you’ve dropped one of your oranges!,’ or should she bear that unimaginable prize back to Grebe to use as the main exhibit in Lucia’s trial, as it were, when she came to broadcast this episode, complete with Lucia’s ludicrous story about food-parcels, to the entire town? Strategy and the thought of the dramatic effect that could be obtained from skilful use of that orange caused her to slip the treasure into her pocket and continue on her way, murmuring as she went a prayer of thanksgiving to the God that she had believed only that same morning had utterly forsaken her.

  Lucia, her heart pounding, finally managed to regain the safety of Mallards; she closed the stout front-door and, to make sure, put on the chain. What could have possessed her, she thought, to return from the interview with the seedy little man at the railway-station with all her eggs (and sugar and lamb and oranges) in one eminently insecure basket? She had been simply inviting this disaster, and that foolish, foolish lie about Lord Whitby in America and food-parcels had surely sealed her doom for ever. Had she merely dropped the basket and run, she might conceivably have come up with some convincing explanation; now she was as good as convicted of black-market trafficking. And that it should be Elizabeth Mapp-Flint—Liblib of all people—who had discovered her! The Padre or Diva or the Wyses might have had mercy on her, for had they not eaten her salt (most of it from the same source) and dined with her officers; in aid of whom she had steeped herself in sin in the first place? But, of all Tilling, Elizabeth alone had not partaken of these illegally provisioned banquets, and she alone was under no obligation to keep silent. Perhaps, just conceivably, it might all be put down to the forgeries of jealousy; it all depended. Perhaps her guests had already reached the conclusion that all the culinary glory laid before them had not been earmarked by King George for Lucia’s use, and had decided to turn a blind eye. Perhaps not ....

  She hurled the evidence of her guilt into the secret cupboard in the garden-room where, so Tilling folklore related, Elizabeth, at that time the proud owner of Mallards, had once hoarded food during a coal-strike while condemning hoarding to others as a particularly nasty form of treason. To think that she, three times Mayor of Tilling, could have sunk as low as dear Liblib!

  Already the secret cupboard contained riches beyond the dreams of wartime avarice, gleaned from the gratitude of the Staffordshire Regiment or her own unlawful enterprise. Besides tea and sausages, there were eggs and jars of honey and bags of sultanas; three bottles of whisky, seven tins of peaches, nine tins of salmon. There was bacon, butter, lard (in incredible quantities), nutmeg, cinnamon and cloves. To this she added the leg of lamb, the eggs, the sugar and the three oranges ....

  Three oranges! Numb with fear she stared at them, and in her imagination they replied with wide, Elizabeth-like grins of mocking triumph. One of these detestable objects must be still there in the High Street, or else in the possession of that awful woman. Suddenly she remembered the sight of an orange-coloured thing glimpsed out of the corner of her eye as she stooped down, rolling away behind Elizabeth’s foot. It seemed inevitable now that Elizabeth had that orange.

  She dashed out of the garden-room and into the house. Georgie was sitting in the drawing-room, working on his chair-cover (Britannia had turned out splendidly, but the Rother Estuary resembled nothing so much as a sleeping python).

  ‘Georgie,’ she cried, ‘the most appalling thing has happened. As I was returning from the station that woman crashed into me—she must have done it on purpose—and spilt everything in the basket all over the ground. And I think she’s got one of the oranges.’

  ‘No!’ said Georgie, the chair-cover falling forgotten from his hand.

  ‘We’ve been found out, Georgie. Everyone in Tilling will know by now. Oh! How could I have been so foolish? And to make it worse, I told her it was a food-parcel from Lord Whitby in America. I can’t imagine what made me say that, but it was the first thing that came into my head.’

  ‘We must think,’ said Georgie, pulling himself together with an effort. ‘Are you sure she’s got it?

  ‘I can see it now, rolling behind her foot. It would be a miracle if she hasn’t got it.’

  ‘There’s only one thing we can do,’ said Georgie. ‘You must invite her to the next dinner and let her meet all the officers. That’s if she hasn’t told everyone already.’

  ‘That’s true,’ said Lucia. ‘Perhaps she’ll wait for the best opportunity. I’ll write the invitation at once; she might possibly be bought off that way. Georgie, you must go down to the High Street and find out if she’s told anyone yet.’

  ‘How will I know?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, I shouldn’t worry about that,’ said Lucia gloomily. ‘lf she has, no one will speak to you. Ever again.’

  With this miserable prospect before him Georgie set off for the High Street. To his unutterable relief he found that he was still counted as a member of the human race; Diva angled for an invitation, Susan Wyse admired the new hat which he had obtained only recently and which he had been saving for a great event—but in the panic of the moment he had seized the first hat that came to hand .... Clearly Elizabeth had held her peace for the moment. He collected the Polish phrase-book which had just arrived and returned home. He told Lucia t
hat they were safe for the moment, and was sent forth again to walk out to Grebe and deliver the invitation that Lucia so profoundly hoped would serve as Danegeld.

  Brennus the Gaul, receiving ransom from the Romans for their city, weighed down the scale with his sword and, laughing, cried, ‘Woe to the vanquished!’ Even so did Elizabeth laugh, and would undoubtedly have made the same exclamation (had she thought of it) as she opened the envelope and extracted one of the distinctive invitation cards that these days had the power of Royal Commands in Tilling. Why else, after all, had she spared Lucia so far? Only a stay of execution, not a reprieve, for the orange would keep for quite some time if stored in a cool, shady place, and could finally be used when she had made her bid to subvert Lucia’s officers and transfer them to Grebe. She was not quite sure how to do this, but she felt absolutely confident that justice would prevail ....

  Of course. How foolish of her not to have thought of it before. How on earth could those dear soldiers, engaged as they were in a desperate struggle with a merciless enemy, consent to continue to break bread with a woman who, by engaging in such contemptible conduct, was virtually stabbing them in the back? They would spurn her as if she were a leper, and turn their Humbers towards Grebe.

  ‘Dear Lulu’s invited us to go and meet her officers,’ said she to Major Benjy. ‘How sweet of her! And I can tell you exactly what we’ll have to eat. Leg of lamb, Benjy-boy, and I dare say orange soufflé to follow.’

  ‘That’ll be nice, Liz,’ said he. ‘But how can you tell?’

  ‘Because I bumped into her in the street this morning and she upset her basket. And what do you think was in it? Three guesses? Very well, I shall tell you. Leg of lamb and four oranges. And now you must tell me where she got them from. Now, she told me that it was a food-parcel from dear Lord Whitby in America, but why, pray, should she unwrap the parcel and carry all those eggs and oranges down the High Street? To show them the fine Georgian houses, no doubt, and point out other features of antiquarian interest. Food-parcel fiddlesticks! Black market, Benjy.’