Page 150 of The Gathering Storm

Richard went into the sitting-room, where Cynthia was standing, her back to him, apparently studying the fire in the grate. ‘Darling,’ he said hesitantly.

She turned. There were tears on her cheeks. ‘I can’t bear it,’ she said.

‘Nobody wants a war. But if it comes, we have to be ready.’ She shook her head – It’s not that. ‘What is it?’ he asked gently.

‘I don’t want a baby if there’s going to be a war,’ she blurted out. ‘What kind of a life would there be for it?’

‘There’ve always been wars, but people go on living, babies go on being born. More than ever, when times are bad, we need hope. A new generation.’ She shook her head again – this time I don’t agree. ‘Tell me,’ he said. ‘What do you want?’ She looked at him with hopeless, miserable appeal, and he had to guess. ‘Do you want to go to America?’

‘Oh, Richard!’ she said, and then she was crying properly.

He took her in his arms and let her cry into his collar. ‘You want to go to America? Soon?’ She made a noise of assent. ‘Then you shall go.’ She made another sound. He was getting good at interpreting. ‘Of course, your mother and Leah too. That was always the plan.’ She murmured against his wet neck. ‘I will take you myself,’ he said. ‘It will only need a few days to arrange. Don’t worry, darling. The war is still a long way off.’ Though he didn’t know, of course. Did anyone know?

‘You’ll take us?’ she said, detaching herself and dragging out a handkerchief.

‘Of course.’

‘And you’ll stay too?’ His hesitation was her answer. She emerged from blowing her nose to stare.

‘I can’t abandon the country now,’ he said. ‘If the war comes, I’ll be needed.’ He was thirty-eight, in the prime of life. ‘I’ll have to fight. They’ll need everyone they can get. We have to keep the Germans out. We have to defeat them.’

‘You’ll leave me there?’

‘I’ll see you settled. You’ll be all right. And when the war’s over, you can come back. I’ll come and fetch you.’

She turned away from him again, stared at the fire, picked up the poker and prodded it a little. With her back still turned, she said, ‘I’ll stay with you. Mummy and Leah can go.’

She turned at last, and searched his face. It came to him that this was a deciding moment, but he had no idea what to say or do. He had no idea even what he was feeling. He said hesitantly, ‘It’s up to you.’

He saw something die in her face, and knew he had not said the right thing, whatever that might have been. ‘I’ll go, then,’ she said. ‘Mummy will need me. I think Daddy would want me to take care of her.’ She turned and knelt down to put more coal on the fire. ‘Will you stay here, or go to Ealing?’

‘Here, I suppose,’ he said vaguely, still trying to think it out. ‘I’ll have to sell the Ealing house. We can’t keep leaving it empty. We can buy somewhere else after the war.’ She said something, but he didn’t hear through the rattling of the fire-shovel. ‘What was that?’

‘I said, when can we go?’

‘On Monday? Will that give you enough time to pack?’

‘Yes, thank you,’ she said. She stood up, brushing her hands off, and said, ‘I’d better go and see if they need help with supper.’ And she went.

He didn’t know what had just happened, but he felt he had crossed a line – whether starting or finishing he couldn’t say.

She hadn’t even poured him his evening glass of sherry. He had to get it himself.

James came in out of the chilly April rain, shook himself off, and went into the canteen. The small former factory near the station, which they had taken over as headquarters, was warm inside, and the canteen was steamy with smells of food and cigarettes. He received a tin plate of sausage and bean stew and a tin mug of coffee, and went and sat down at one of the long trestles. The canteen was full, but he got himself onto the end of one of the benches and saved the space next to him.

He saw Emil come in, and waved to him; but Emil stopped just inside the door, in deep conversation with Tante Lotti. Eventually, they came over together.

‘James, we have to talk to you,’ Lotti said. She took the space at the end of the bench; Emil stood at her shoulder.

‘Has something happened?’ he asked. He hoped it was nothing that would require a lot of talk. He was starving, and the food in front of him smelt good. He hadn’t eaten since their early breakfast.

Emil said, ‘I’ve had a cable from my father. He wants me to come home.’

‘Oh,’ said James, blankly.

‘Things are becoming dangerous,’ Lotti said. ‘You know that your government has signed a pact with Poland, guaranteeing their independence? Well, yesterday Britain and France extended the guarantee to Romania and Greece. It has absolutely infuriated the Führer. He was quite deranged with rage, they say. He said if England wanted war, it should have a war, one of destruction beyond imagination. He said no English town would be left standing.’

‘But that’s just—’ James began.