She smiled when she saw who it was. ‘So! You have become bored, eh?’
‘I thought you might like to come for a walk,’ I said. ‘It’s a warm night.’
‘A walk?’ She looked up at me quickly. ‘Yes. Why not? Come into the kitchen whilst I go and dress myself in some clothes.’
It was a big kitchen, warm and friendly, with bacon hanging from hooks in the ceiling and bunches of dried herbs and a smell of chicken. ‘You like cream?’ She produced a bowl full of thick cream, a loaf of bread and some home-made jam. ‘Help yourself please. I will be one minute, that is all.’
I hadn’t tasted cream in years and I was still eating when she returned. ‘You like to take some back with you? Mrs Ellwood will not mind. She is a very ‘ospitable woman.’
‘No. No thanks.’ I should have to explain to Saeton where it had come from.
She looked at me with a slight frown, but she made no comment. ‘Come. I take you to the pond. It is very funny there at night. The frogs croak and there are many wild things.’
We went round behind the outbuildings, through the farmyard and out into a grass field. ‘There are mushrooms here in the autumn. What is your name?’
‘Neil Fraser.’
‘Do you like working at the airfield?’
‘Yes.’ I spoke without thinking, conscious only of her nearness and of the fact that she hadn’t hesitated to come out with me.
‘It is going well, I hope?’
‘Yes. Very well.’
‘When will you have finished the engines?’
I took her hand. Her fingers were warm and soft in mine. She raised no objection.
‘Well?’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘What was it you asked?’
‘When will you finish? When do you fly?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘In about a month.’
‘So soon?’ She fell silent. We were in the woods again now on a path that ran downhill. The night air rustled gently among the tall, spear-like shafts of the osiers. I tightened my grip on her hand, but she didn’t seem to notice, for she asked if I were a flier and then began to talk about her brother who had been in the Luftwaffe. ‘Where is he now?’ I asked.
She was silent for a moment, and then she said, ‘He is dead. He was shot down over England.’ She glanced up at me, her face serious. ‘Do you think we shall ever be at peace — Germany and England?’
‘We’re at peace now,’ I answered.
‘Oh, now! Now you are the victors. You occupy us with your troops. But it is not peace. There is no treaty. Germany is not permitted to join any international organisation. We cannot trade. Everything is taken from us.’
I didn’t say anything. I wasn’t interested in a political argument. I didn’t want to be reminded that she was German. I just wanted her companionship, her warmth, the feel of her close to me. The screen of osiers parted and we were looking down a steep bank to a dew pond. It was fringed with reeds and the still surface in the centre was like a plate of burnished pewter reflecting the stars. ‘It is beautiful here, yes?’ The cry of a night bird jarred the stillness and a frog croaked. The stillness and the wintry beauty of it brought the blood hammering to my throat. I reached out and caught her by the shoulder twisting her round so that her neck lay in the curve of my arm. Then I bent and kissed her.
For a moment she was limp in my arms, her lips soft and open against mine. Then her body became rigid and her mouth tightened. She fought me off with a sudden and intense fury. For a moment we struggled, but she was strong and my passion subsided with the obstinacy of her resistance and I let her go. ‘You — you-’ She stood there speechless, panting with the effort she had made. ‘Because I am German and you are English you think I should lie on my back for you? Verfluchter Kerl! Ich hasse Sie!’ She turned, tears of anger on her face, and fled up the path. In an instant the screen of osiers had swallowed her and I was alone by the pond with the protesting croak of the frogs.
Saeton was just leaving when I got back to the quarters. ‘What have you been up to?’ he said, looking up at me from under his shaggy eyebrows. ‘That cut of yours has opened up again.’
I put my hand to my forehead and my fingers came away sticky with blood. Else must have scratched the scab as she fought me off. ‘It’s nothing,’ I said. ‘A branch of a tree caught me, that’s all.’
He grunted and went out into the night towards the hangar. As I passed the door of the Carters’ home I heard Diana say, ‘All right. But any time I like the
Malcolm Club will…” I was back in the tense atmosphere of our own little world and I’d destroyed my one chance of escape. I went to bed feeling depressed and angry with myself, for Else had been right — I had treated her as though she were a piece of occupied territory to be bought for a bar of chocolate.
The next day we had visitors. Diana rang through on the field telephone. ‘There’s an R.A.F. officer here and a Mr Garside of the Ministry of Civil Aviation. They want to speak to Bill.’ I had answered the phone and I passed on the message to Saeton. He jumped to his feet as though I’d cracked a stock whip. ‘Tell her they’re not to come up here. I’ll see them over at the quarters.’ He searched quickly along the bench, picking up odd parts that lay amongst the junk at the back. Tubby. Take these out the back somewhere and hide them. Go over the whole bench and see that there’s nothing left of the old engine here. I’ll hold them at the quarters for five or ten minutes.’
‘They may only have come to check over the plane prior to airworthiness tests,’ Tubby said.
‘Maybe. But I’m taking no chances. You’d better keep in the background, Neil.’
He hurried out of the hangar and Tubby searched frantically along the bench, picking up parts and stuffing them into a canvas tool bag. I stood watching him, wondering whether my identity had been discovered.
Tubby had barely returned from hiding the bag when Saeton brought the two men into the hangar. ‘These are my two engineers,’ he said. ‘Carter and
Fraser. Tubby, this is Wing-Commander Felton, R.A.F. Intelligence, and Garside, Civil Aviation. Well, now, what exactly do you want to look at?’ Saeton was forcing himself to be genial, but I could see by the way his head was hunched into his shoulders that he was angry.
‘Well, if you did take it, I don’t imagine you’d be fool enough to leave the prototype lying about,’ the R.A.F. officer said. ‘We’d like to have a look at the design you’re working on.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Saeton said. ‘That’s the one thing I can’t allow you to do. You can have a look at the finished engine, but the design remains secret until we’re in the air.’
‘You’re not being very helpful,’ the Intelligence Officer said.
‘Why should I be?’ Saeton demanded angrily. ‘. German company complains that an English concern is working on a pet project of their own and immediately they have the support of our own people and you come rushing up here to investigate.’
‘As far as I’m concerned the Germans can stew in their own juice,’ Felton replied. ‘But they’ve persuaded Control Commission the matter needs investigating. My instructions come from B.A.F.O. H.Q. Garside here is1 acting at the direct request of Control Commission.’
‘Have the Rauch Motoren sent over the plans of their prototype?’ Saeton asked.
‘No.’
‘Then how can you check from my plans whether I’ve lifted their design?’
The Intelligence Officer glanced at his companion. ‘According to my information,’ Garside said, ‘they claim that the plans were looted with the prototype.’
‘The plans can be withdrawn.’
‘The designer is dead. The fools arrested him in the middle of his work for alleged complicity in the July 20 bomb plot.’
‘Then they’ve only themselves to blame,’ Saeton said.
‘How did you know that it was the Rauch Motoren who had lodged the complaint?’ the R.A.F. officer asked.
‘I’ve admitted already that it was seeing their prototype that gave me the idea,’ Saeton answered. His voice was quiet. He was keeping a tight hold of himself. ‘The same company has already made an effort to get control of my outfit through a gentleman called Reinbaum who now holds the mortgages on the plane and equipment here.’ He turned and faced the two of them. ‘What exactly are the authorities trying to do? Do they want a German company to produce a new type of aero engine in preference to a British concern? Carter and I have worked for nearly three years on this. If we’d pinched their prototype and it was so far advanced that they were ready to go into production with it, surely we’d have been in the air now, instead of mortgaged to the hilt and still working to produce a second engine?’