Obediently Frank took the tray on his knees and began to eat. Despite not having full use of his right hand he could use his fork dexterously. Experience, David supposed. When he had finished Frank said abruptly, ‘Did you notice it when you met me?’
‘What? Your hand?’
‘No. Everyone notices that. I mean this thing about me, this – aura. My mother used to talk a lot about auras.’
‘No, Frank. I just thought you were – afraid. I thought maybe because of that school; you didn’t say much about it but it sounded bad.’
‘It was.’ Frank looked out of the window at the fog again. ‘But most people survived it. I just couldn’t, somehow.’ He shook his head. ‘Unless you were exactly like them and did what they wanted – well, they’d do anything to you. They were like the Nazis in lots of ways. You know,’ he added, ‘I always had a feeling my life would end with something really bad, it was bound to somehow.’ He glanced at David and said, curiously, ‘You remember yesterday, in that field, I said I’d always wanted to be normal and you said you’d always felt the same. Why? You’re not like me, you’re the opposite of me. People respect you, they like you. They always have.’
‘Do they?’ David shifted uneasily. ‘They expect things. Since I was a kid, everyone expected something special. I had advantages, you’re right, but I always felt I couldn’t be just normal, any more than you.’ He remembered school, diving into the swimming pool. Down into silence, peace. ‘Anyway, I brought all this on myself. I went into the Resistance, deceived my wife, everyone I worked with, because—’
‘Why?’
‘Because underneath it all I was so angry. I think I always have been.’ He turned to his old friend. ‘You must be too, Frank. You must be angry?’
Frank shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Maybe. But what’s the point of being angry with your fate?’ His voice sank to a whisper. ‘Frightened, yes, because you can’t change fate, you can’t do anything.’
‘You pushed your brother out of that window.’
‘That was an accident. But yes, he made me lose control. I have to keep control.’ Frank spoke with a sudden emphasis. ‘If I hadn’t, they’d have got it all out of me at the hospital. You – have – to – keep – control,’ he repeated, slowly, fiercely. ‘I learned that at school.’
‘Easy, Frank, easy. No-one’s threatening you here. Not Mr O’Shea, not any of us.’
‘All right.’
‘That took some guts, not spilling what your brother told you when you were alone in that hospital, or to the police.’
‘I shouldn’t have told you. That it was about the Bomb. I’m sorry, but it’s a – it’s a big thing to bear.’ He looked at David with sudden sharpness. ‘You haven’t told anybody?’
‘I promised you I wouldn’t.’
‘In the field, you see – I thought if you knew how important it was, you’d realize I had to die.’
‘You don’t. We’ll get you out. And you made a promise too, remember. To stay alive.’
‘I know.’ There was silence for a few moments, then Frank said, ‘What will it be like, in America? I’ve met a few Americans, they always seem so noisy. Then there’s all the gangsters in the films. But it’s a big country, isn’t it; maybe I could find somewhere quiet. Do you think I could, David?’
‘I hope so.’
‘Where would you go? You and your wife?’
‘I don’t know about Sarah, but I’d like to go to New Zealand. It’s a good place. They’re decent people, they hate this Fascist shit.’
Frank looked puzzled. ‘You’d go together, surely?’
‘I don’t know.’
Frank said quietly, ‘We’re not going to get there, you know, David. It’s only a dream. They’ll get me still.’
‘No, they won’t. Come on, Frank, we’ve got this far. We have to be positive.’
Frank picked at a loose thread on his mattress. ‘You said you had cyanide pills, if the Germans came. That Natalia would shoot me to stop them taking me. But what if you didn’t get the chance? David, I want a cyanide pill as well. I won’t take it unless they come, I promise, but I – I want the same chance as the rest of you.’
David looked at him. Natalia and Ben would never take the risk of Frank trying to kill himself again. The Americans wanted him alive; though Ben and Natalia had also become protective of him, wanted him to live. ‘I’ll talk to them,’ he said.
Frank nodded. But from his expression he knew it wasn’t going to happen, David saw. That uncanny sensitivity of his, he thought, the sensitivity of an endangered animal.
After breakfast Ben persuaded Frank to come downstairs. Eileen had gone out to the shops, and to meet her Resistance contact. They sat in the lounge: Geoff still looked ill; he coughed frequently, a dry, hacking sound. Ben suggested a board game; Eileen had said there were some to be found next door. David went to fetch them. He switched on the light – the fog made everything so dim. The room had the faintly damp smell of a little-used ‘best parlour’. There was a cardboard box of games under the table, chess and draughts and Monopoly.
For a couple of hours they sat round playing Monopoly, like some strange family party. Frank turned out to be an easy winner, piling up a heap of paper money beside him. Ben said jokingly, ‘You’re a Monopoly capitalist, Frank, that’s what you are. Ye’ve taken all my money, I’ve nothin’ left.’
Frank looked pleased. ‘I just try to think ahead, that’s all.’
Ben shook his head. ‘I played a bit when I was inside, I wisnae bad but you’re a bloody genius, mate.’
‘Why were you in prison?’ Geoff asked. ‘Was it for political reasons?’
Ben looked at him intently. ‘No, I wis a naughty boy at school, did some bad things. The Glasgow magistrates thought they were bad anyway. Got two years in a Borstal when I was seventeen, and a good dose of the birch.’ David remembered the scars he had seen on Ben last night. ‘Put an end tae a promising career, that did. Parents disowned me, the auld bastards. Though it was being inside taught me about politics, people in there gave me a proper education about the class system. So I don’t regret it.’
David smiled ruefully. ‘Everything’s class with you, isn’t it?’
‘Aye, it is. I’ve seen you once or twice, ye don’t always follow what I’m sayin’, do ye, with ma accent?’
‘You put it on sometimes.’
‘Where ah wis brought up, ye’d no’ve understood a word.’
‘That’s because you’ve a Scottish accent.’
‘No.’ Ben looked at him intently. ‘It’s because I’m working-class Scottish.’
Frank said, ‘He’s right. My school was in Scotland, but I understood the accents all right.’
‘Because they spoke middle-class Scots, that’s why. Morrrningsiide.’ Ben drew out the name in a way that made Frank do something David could barely ever remember him doing. He laughed.
‘It’s class that’s the real divide, not nationality,’ Ben said finally. He nudged Frank. ‘Come on, Rockefeller, David’s still got a few houses left.’
They moved on to chess. David played Frank as he had promised, the others watching while Geoff went upstairs to lie down. Frank had just won his second game when, in the middle of the afternoon, Sean returned. ‘They’ve sent me home,’ he said. ‘There’s problems all round London, freight’s not moving. Drivers can’t see the bloody signals. Everything all right here?’
‘Yes.’
‘Eileen back?’
‘Not yet,’ Natalia said. Sean bit his lip.
‘It’ll be the fog, don’t worry,’ she reassured him.
Sean turned to Frank with a smile. ‘How are you, feller? Listen, I’m sorry I was a bit rude last night. It’s the strain, y’see?’