Jeffrey Archer - As the Crow Flies

"Don't talk daft," said Sal. "Even Dan Salmon couldn't 'ave afforded one of these."

Charlie didn't bother to reply.

When it came to how long Charlie would take to master the baking trade, Becky's judgment proved accurate. Within a month he knew almost as much about oven temperatures, controls, rising yeast and the correct mixture of flour to water as either of the two assistants, and as they were dealing with the same customers as Charlie was on his barrow, sales on both dropped only slightly during the first quarter.

Becky turned out to be as good as her word, keeping the accounts in what she described as "apple-pie order" and even opening a set of books for Trumper's barrow. By the end of their first three months as partners they declared a profit of four pounds eleven shillings, despite having a gas oven refitted at Salmon's and allowing Charlie to buy his first second-hand suit.

Sal continued working as a waitress in a cafe on the Commercial Road, but Charlie knew she couldn't wait to find someone willing to marry her—whatever physical shape he was in—just as long as I can sleep in a room of my own, she explained.

Grace never failed to send a letter on the first of every month, and somehow managed to sound cheerful despite being surrounded by death. She's just like her mother, Father O'Malley would tell his parishioners. Kitty still came and went as she pleased, borrowing money from both her sisters as well as Charlie, and never paying them back. Just like her father, the priest told the same parishioners.

"Like your new suit," said Mrs. Smelley, when Charlie dropped off her weekly order that Monday afternoon. He blushed, raised his cap and pretended not to hear the compliment, as he dashed off to the baker's shop.

The second quarter promised to show a further profit on both Charlie's enterprises, and he warned Becky that he had his eye on the butcher's shop, since the owner's only boy had lost his life at Passchendaele. Becky cautioned him against rushing into another venture before they had discovered what their profit margins were like, and then only if the rather elderly assistants knew what they were up to. "Because one thing's for certain, Charlie Trumper," she told him as they sat down in the little room at the back of Salmon's shop to check the monthly accounts, "you don't know the first thing about butchery. 'Trumper, the honest trader, founded in 1823' still appeals to me," she added. "'Trumper, the foolish bankrupt, folded in 1917' doesn't."

Becky also commented on the new suit, but not until she had finished checking a lengthy column of figures. He was about to return the compliment by suggesting that she might have lost a little weight when she leaned across and helped herself to another jam tart.

She ran a sticky finger down the monthly balance sheet, then checked the figures against the handwritten bank statement. A profit of eight pounds and fourteen shillings, she wrote in thick black ink neatly on the bottom line.

"At this rate we'll be millionaires by the time I'm forty," said Charlie with a grin.

"Forty, Charlie Trumper?" Becky repeated disdainfully. "Not exactly in a hurry, are you?"

"What do you mean?" asked Charlie.

"Just that I was rather hoping we might have achieved that long before then."

Charlie laughed loudly to cover the fact that he wasn't quite certain whether or not she was joking. Once Becky felt sure the ink was dry she closed the books and put them back in her satchel while Charlie prepared to lock up the baker's shop. As they stepped out onto the pavement Charlie bade his partner good night with an exaggerated bow. He then turned the key in the lock before starting his journey home. He whistled the "Lambeth Walk" out of tune as he pushed the few remains left over from the day towards the setting sun. Could he really make a million before he was forty, or had Becky just been teasing him?

As he reached Bert Shorrocks' place Charlie came to a sudden halt. Outside the front door of 112, dressed in a long black cassock, black hat, and with black Bible in hand, stood Father O'Malley.

Charlie sat in the carriage of a train bound for Edinburgh and thought about the actions he had taken during the past four days. Becky had described his decision as foolhardy. Sal hadn't bothered with the "hardy." Mrs. Smelley didn't think he should have gone until he had been called up, while Grace was still tending the wounded on the Western Front, so she didn't even know what he had done. As for Kitty, she just sulked and asked how she was expected to survive without him.

Private George Trumper had been killed on 2 November 1917 at Passchendaele, the letter had informed him: bravely, while charging the enemy lines at Polygon Wood. Over a thousand men had died that day attacking a ten-mile front from Messines to Passchendaele, so it wasn't surprising that the lieutenant's letter was short and to the point.

After a sleepless night, Charlie was the first to be found the following morning standing outside the recruiting office in Great Scotland Yard. The poster on the wall called for volunteers between the ages of eighteen and forty to join up and serve in "General Haig's" army.

Although not yet eighteen, Charlie prayed that they wouldn't reject him.

When the recruiting sergeant barked, "Name?" Charlie threw out his chest and almost shouted "Trumper." He waited anxiously.

"Date of birth?" said the man with three white stripes on his arm.

"Twentieth of January, 1899," replied Charlie without hesitation, but his cheeks flushed as he delivered the words.

The recruiting sergeant looked up at him and winked. The letters and numbers were written on a buff form without comment. "Remove your cap, lad, and report to the medical officer."

A nurse led Charlie through to a cubicle where an elderly man in a long white coat made him strip to the waist, cough, stick out his tongue and breathe heavily before prodding him all over with a cold rubber object. He then proceeded to stare into Charlie's ears and eyes before going on to hit his kneecaps with a rubber stick. After taking his trousers and underpants off—for the first time ever in front of someone who wasn't a member of his family—he was told he had no transmittable diseases—whatever they were, thought Charlie.

He stared at himself in the mirror as they measured him. "Five feet nine and a quarter," said the orderly.

And still growing, Charlie wanted to add, as he pushed a mop of dark hair out of his eyes.

"Teeth in good condition, eyes brown," stated the elderly doctor. "Not much wrong with you," he added. The old man made a series of ticks down the right-hand side of the buff form before telling Charlie to report back to the chap with the three white stripes.

Charlie found himself waiting in another queue before coming face to face with the sergeant again.

"Right, lad, sign up here and we'll issue you with a travel warrant."

Charlie scrawled his signature on the spot above where the sergeant's finger rested. He couldn't help noticing that the man didn't have a thumb.

"The Honourable Artillery Company or Royal Fusiliers?" the sergeant asked.

"Royal Fusiliers," said Charlie. "That was my old man's regiment."

"Royal Fusiliers it is then," said the sergeant without a second thought, and put a tick in yet another box.

"When do I get my uniform?"

"Not until you get to Edinburgh, lad. Report to King's Cross at zero eight hundred hours tomorrow morning. Next."

Charlie returned to 112 Whitechapel Road to spend another sleepless night. His thoughts darted from Sal to Grace and then on to Kity and how two of his sisters would survive in his absence. He also began thinking about Rebecca Salmon and their bargain, but in the end his thoughts always returned to his father's grave on a foreign battlefield and the revenge he intended to inflict on any German who dared to cross his path. These sentiments remained with him until the morning light came shining through the windows.