Chris Cleave - Everyone Brave is Forgiven

“But darling, don’t you notice something?”

Mary noticed that Palmer was trembling with the strain of holding up the salver to the light. The vibration caused a pulsation in the wave, as if it might crest at any moment and break into streaks of mannered foam.

“I think Cook has dyed the aspic, hasn’t she? It’s a very subtle green.”

Her mother made an exasperated sound. “Yes, but the shrimp — don’t you see? Half of them are swimming upside down. And they would hardly be scattered throughout the wave like that, willy-nilly. Shrimp would be down near the seabed, feeding.”

“It’s almost as if Cook has forgotten her marine biology.”

“You mock me, but this is why we have a practice run. Oh Palmer, you may put the damned thing down now, and let’s see how it slices.”

While Palmer set to with a serving knife, Mary’s mother briefed her on the next evening’s table plan.

“Father will be here on the left, giving the Minister the head of the table. Anderson will sit here with you on his right to make him laugh, which you are awfully good at. And you must try to show off your figure a little. You have worn nothing but sackcloth since… well, since you know when.”

“I am not entirely clear on my role. Am I to seduce Anderson, or to render him well disposed toward Father?”

“Would a little of both be beyond you? Anyway, you mustn’t look at me like that. I have invited Henry Hunter-Hall just for you, and he will be sitting here, directly opposite. You may bother each other with your toes, or whatever it is that young people do since the art of conversation was lost.”

“It is too soon. I was in love with Tom — I think you know that I was.”

“Dear, you are twenty years old. We all have our practice runs.”

“You are relieved that Tom died.”

“Oh, not at all. I am dreadfully sorry when anyone is killed, doubly so if it is someone you were fond of.”

Mary smiled.

“What?” said her mother.

“ ‘Well you make him sound like a pony, or a Labrador.”

“It’s only that he was never someone I thought of as a grown-up match for you.”

“He was killed trying to save one of my pupils. I thought it grown-up.”

“It is heartbreaking, I know, but one advances through such trials.’

“And hence Henry, to be seated opposite me, and in whom with your blessing I am to find consolation. Tell me, should I write out the place cards in Tom’s blood, or would you prefer me to use my own?”

“Must you be like that? I am only anxious that you should get straight back on with life. Henry is a likeable boy, from a very good family, and you shan’t tell me he isn’t handsome.”

There was a sadness in her mother’s eyes. Mary wondered whether it had always been there, becoming visible only now that she was attuned to sorrow’s frequency.

“Mother,” she said, “were you ever in love with Father?”

Her mother looked toward the salver where Palmer — before dematerializing — had carved the pristine wave into slices.

“We were very lucky to find each other,” she said.

“Yes, but were you?”

“Yes, we were very lucky.”

“Sometimes, Mother, I don’t know whether you’d be glad if I went along with you, and attended your functions and married some outrageously suitable Henry, or whether you wouldn’t secretly be much happier if I just said ‘hang it all’, and flew as close to the sun as I jolly well dared.’

“Yes, you are quite right, you don’t know that.”

A gray wind blew snowflakes past the windows. When the silence got too much, Mary said, “Hilda thinks we should volunteer for the ambulances.”

“Hilda is jolly public-spirited.”

“You know as well as I do that she only covets the uniform.”

“I’m glad it is you who said it.”

“So, do you think we should?”

“Should what?”

“Join the ambulances.”

Her mother fetched the cigarette case from its place on the mantel. She took a cigarette and slid the case over to Mary. Palmer appeared and disappeared, in such a way that he left behind him two lit cigarettes, an onyx ashtray and no lingering image on the back of the eye.

It was the first time Mary had smoked with her mother. They said nothing. They tended their cigarettes while the sliced aspic, untouched, melted slowly in the heat of the dining-room fire, releasing fish and shrimp by ones and twos into an uncertain future.

ALISTAIR GUESSED THAT THE arithmetic might not be encouraging if worked through to its conclusion. Malta was eight miles wide by eighteen long — as large as London, only with less to do in the evening. From this unpromising rock — their best remaining possession in the Mediterranean — the starving garrison had orders to hold out against the combined forces of Germany and Italy. Alistair tried to count the enemy’s available armies, but he ran out of fingers.

“Heath?” said Lieutenant Colonel Hamilton.

“My apologies, sir — I was miles away.”

“I’ll bet you wish you were.”

Alistair grinned. “Sir.”

“Brief the men, will you? A pep talk would be nice. Otherwise any kind of talk they will listen to. Soliloquy, philippic…” He waved his hand as if it was all too wearisome. Alistair saluted and left the old man to his paperwork.

Ten Regiment, Royal Artillery was mustered at easy readiness among the ramparts of Fort St. Elmo. The men relaxed in the twilight and lounged against the stone walls, while below them Grand Harbour shone under a fulvous moon. The men had the news already: the carrier Illustrious had been badly smashed up and was on its way in to port. Now the whole spite of the enemy would be directed against the island, to finish the great ship off. It was up to Alistair to tell the men, officially, that they were in for it.

He swallowed his nerves, blew his tin whistle, and stood firm while two hundred men came to their feet with the grudging compliance they might have afforded to a football referee who could just as usefully have let play continue. The men got themselves into their three batteries, each battery subdivided into two troops of four guns apiece, each gun accounting for a sergeant and seven gunners.

They lined up facing Alistair while the senior officers assembled at his side — his five fellow captains and the three majors. As captain, Alistair commanded a four-gun troop. Even when one added in his subalterns and his warrant officer, only thirty-five of the men arranged before him were his own. It was nerve-wracking, which was why Hamilton did it — made his juniors take turns to address the whole of 10 Regiment.

The men fell quiet, waiting for Alistair to be a genius. They watched him with the world-class loyalty and affection that only the British Army could disguise as open sarcasm.

At his side, Simonson whispered, “Your fly is undone, old man.”

With effort, Alistair stopped himself from checking.

Simonson whispered, “Oh, and your mother telephoned.”

Alistair ignored him.

“I’m to let you know that your father’s cock tastes of your dog’s arse.”

To stop himself laughing Alistair had to bite his cheek.

He took a step forward. “Well, men, as you all know, our loved ones are taking a beating back home and they are holding up superbly, and now it is our turn. The Admiralty tells us that one of their tubs, Illustrious, has undergone some unplanned modifications at sea. She’s on her way in now, and we can be certain that the enemy will spare no effort to sink her in port.”

“Or brandy,” whispered Simonson.

“Perhaps we cannot do much against high-altitude bombing, but as you know we have a very effective anti-aircraft weapon in the 3.7-inch gun, and we intend by coordinated firing to establish a box within which the enemy’s dive-bombers cannot operate.”