Jackdaws

PAUL CHANCELLOR SPENT the day fighting the military bureaucracy-persuading, threatening, pleading, cajoling, and as a last resort using the name of Monty-and, in the end, he got a plane for the team’s parachute training tomorrow.

When he caught the train back to Hampshire, he found he was eager to see Flick again. He liked her a lot. She was smart, tough, and a pleasure to look at. He wished to hell she was single.

On the train he read the war news in the paper. The long lull on the eastern front had been broken, yesterday, by a surprisingly powerful German attack in Rumania. The continuing resilience of the Germans was formidable. They were in retreat everywhere, but they kept fighting back.

The train was delayed, and he missed six o’clock dinner at the Finishing School. After dinner there was always another lecture; then at nine the students were free to relax for an hour or so before bed. Paul found most of the team gathered in the drawing room of the house, which had a bookcase, a cupboard full of games, a wireless set, and a half-size billiards table. He sat on the sofa beside Flick and said quietly, “How did it go today?”

“Better than we had a right to expect,” she said. “But everything is so compressed. I don’t know how much they’re going to remember when they’re in the field.”

“I guess anything is better than nothing.”

Percy Thwaite and Jelly were playing poker for penflies. Jelly was a real character, Paul thought. How could a professional safebreaker consider herself a respectable English lady? “How was Jelly?” he asked Flick.

“Not bad. She has more difficulty than the others with the physical training but, my goodness, she just grit her teeth and got on with it, and in the end she did everything the youngsters did.” Flick paused and frowned.

Paul said, “What?”

“Her hostility to Greta is a problem.”

“It’s not surprising that an Englishwoman should hate Germans.”

“It’s illogical, though-Greta has suffered more from the Nazis than Jelly has.”

“Jelly doesn’t know that.”

“She knows that Greta’s prepared to fight against the Nazis.”

“People aren’t logical about these things.”

“Too bloody right.”

Greta herself was talking to Denise. Or rather, Paul thought, Denise was talking and Greta was listening. “My stepbrother, Lord Foules, pilots fighter-bombers,” he heard her say in her half-swallowed aristocratic accent. “He’s been training to fly support missions for the invasion troops.”

Paul frowned. “Did you hear that?” he asked Flick.

“Yes. Either she’s making it up, or she’s being dangerously indiscreet.”

He studied Denise. She was a rawboned girl who always looked as if she had just been insulted. He did not think she was fantasizing. “She doesn’t seem the imaginative type,” he said.

“I agree. I think she’s giving away real secrets.”

“I’d better arrange a little test tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

Paul wanted to get Flick to himself so that they could talk more freely. “Let’s take a stroll around the garden,” he said.

They stepped outside. The air was warm and there was an hour of daylight left. The house had a large garden with several acres of lawn dotted with trees. Maude and Diana were sitting on a bench under a copper beech. Maude had flirted with Paul at first, but he had given her no encouragement, and she seemed to have given up. Now she was listening avidly to something Diana was saying, looking into Diana’s face with an attitude almost of adoration. “I wonder what Diana’s saying?” Paul said. “She’s got Maude fascinated.”

“Maude likes to hear about the places she’s been,” Flick said. “The fashion shows, the balls, the ocean liners.”

Paul recalled that Maude had surprised him by asking whether the mission would take them to Pans. “Maybe she wanted to go to America with me,” he said.

“I noticed her making a play for you,” Flick said. “She’s pretty.”

“Not my type, though.”

“Why not?”

“Candidly? She’s not smart enough.”

“Good,” Flick said. “I’m glad.”

He raised an eyebrow at her. “Why?”

“I would have thought less of you otherwise.”

He thought this was a little condescending. “I’m glad to have your approval,” he said.

“Don’t be ironic,” she reprimanded him. “I was paying you a compliment.”

He grinned. He could not help liking her, even when she was being high-handed. “Then I’ll quit while I’m ahead,” he said.

They passed close to the two women, and heard Diana say, “So the contessa said, ‘Keep your painted claws off my husband,’ then poured a glass of champagne over Jennifer’s head, whereupon Jennifer pulled the contessa’s hair-and it came off in her hand, because it was a wig!”

Maude laughed. “I wish I’d been there!”

Paul said to Flick, “They all seem to be making friends.”

“I’m pleased. I need them to work as a team.”

The garden merged gradually with the forest, and they found themselves walking through woodland. It was only half light under the canopy of leaves. “Why is it called the New Forest?” Paul said. “It looks old.”

“Do you still expect English names to be logical?”

He laughed. “I guess I don’t.”