The Soldier's Valentine Read online

  No frost, no icy cold could have made Henry Randall feel colder than he already was. He stood there, frozen to the spot, staring down at Lewis’s dead body, which was now crumpled over his feet.

  He thought of all the times they’d had together since joining up. If he’d had the time, his body would have been racked with sobs. As it was he wasn’t given the time.

  ‘Get going Randall! Get going! That’s an order!’

  Although jerked back to his senses, Henry Randall was smitten with a terrible resolve; he would kill that bloody officer. Damned right he would and a battlefield was just the place for an accident to happen.

  His resolve solidified as, grim-faced, he clambered over the top, following all the others who were likely to get killed this day.

  The firing of artillery exploded across the dawn sky. Men ran forwards all around him, and he ran with them, firing all the way, waiting for the right opportunity to do more than kill the opposite side.

  Would he get away with killing an officer? He thought he probably would. In the midst of battle nothing was for certain.

  He charged his way forwards, though never veering too far away from the track the young officer was taking. All around him, men cried out in terror and in pain. He kept going, sure of his aim with both cartridge and bayonet. Bodies and bits of bodies littered the ground around him and still the enemy came forwards, but always, always, he kept the officer in his sight.

  It was like a dream or a wish come true when he became aware of the lieutenant running parallel with him on his right side. He was also aware of figures emerging from the gloom – German soldiers, their weapons primed and ready to kill.

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw that his officer was in the thick of it. He also saw the weak side, a place where he could barge through and support the man. Normally, he would have relished doing that, surprising the enemy with the sheer aggressiveness of his skill, the man who was born to be a warrior.

  But not this time. This time the vision of Lewis Allen’s hands clawing down his uniform intervened. Lieutenant Ross had killed his best friend. So let him die, but let the Germans do it.

  He heard him cry out, saw the bayonets piercing his body again and again until he slumped to the ground, indistinguishable from the mud, the enemy figures all shrouded with the blackness of night.

  He had his revenge, but gained no great joy from it. The dark deed was done. His beloved friend was dead. Once again he was totally alone.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Mary Anne felt as though her flesh had turned to stone. The telegram lay in her mother’s hands. Mary Anne hadn’t been able to read it. Her mother had intervened, her hands shaking because they both knew it did not bring good news.

  It was short and to the point. The War Office is sorry to inform you …

  Edward was dead. One of many thousands killed in a big push. There would be no wedding, but he had left her with a problem.

  ‘We have to decide what to do,’ said her mother. She was sitting in her favourite chintz-covered armchair in front of the fire. Her father was sitting in the opposite chair; Mary Anne sitting on a stool between them.

  ‘We have to think of her future. There is no question whatsoever of keeping the child. The matter must be kept secret. Arrangements must be made for her to go away to have it, somewhere far away from here.’

  Mary Anne, numbed at the terrible news, felt as though she were nothing but an empty shell, as though she no longer had a place in the world.

  They’re discussing this as though I’m dead too, she thought, listening to their plans without comment. There again, I might just as well be. Edward is dead. I’m expecting his baby. My life is ruined.

  Her mother was adamant. ‘She can’t keep it of course. We’d never live down the shame of it.’

  ‘You mean give it up for adoption? I quite agree. Best for the child,’ stated her father, who was dipping in and out of a sermon he was writing, correcting the odd word, refilling his pen in the moments when he couldn’t think of anything to say or nothing in front of him to edit.

  Mary Anne heaved a big sigh. ‘We were going to get married.’

  She jumped when her father slapped his chair arms with his meaty hands.

  ‘Well, that’s not going to happen now. We have to make the best of things. We have to do what’s best for the child. Have you any idea how children with no fathers are picked on by children who have a normal father and mother?’

  Mary Anne wanted to say that she was a normal mother too, but she could see that their minds were made up.

  ‘The thing is,’ said her father, finally placing his pen down on his paperwork, ‘we have to insist for your own good that you put the child up for adoption. I know some very good organisations. The potential parents will be properly vetted and the child would be guaranteed to have a good home. It’s the only solution. If you refuse to go along with this …’ He paused, his bushy brows almost meeting with the severity of his frown. ‘Then you are no daughter of ours. You will be on your own.’

  Stunned at this statement, Mary Anne gasped. She even fancied the child inside her jumped in alarm.

  Having risen from her chair, her mother patted her shoulder.

  ‘It’s for the best, dear. Surely you must see that? Every child deserves a father and a mother. It’s what makes them grow up whole.’

  The baby was born on 14 February, St Valentine’s Day. Mary Anne cried. Today was the date Edward and her were to marry. No need for a pretty card and romantic poetry; their wedding would have been enough. They would have loved forever. She was sure of it.

  The nursing home was private and many miles away from prying eyes in rural Wales.

  Her heart almost broke in two at the sound of her child’s – her and Edward’s child’s – first cry. She half rose from the pillow, trying to peer at the small bundle being taken away from her. All she saw were two tiny hands waving as though saying goodbye. The baby was taken away.

  She wailed for it to be brought back to her, thrashing from side to side in her bed, until a nurse came and requested she be quiet.

  The moon shaped face of the matron hovered over her.

  ‘Your parents decided it better you knew nothing about the child and didn’t hold it. It’s best that way, otherwise you may get fond of it. They’ve dealt with the paperwork.’

  Mary Anne lay back, her head hot upon the pillow, her belly still pulsating. Was the baby a girl or a boy? Somehow she knew they wouldn’t tell her. The baby was no longer hers. He or she belonged to someone else.

  She looked towards the window. The bottom panes were whitewashed. She presumed this was to stop the expectant mothers looking out, or was it to stop the outside world looking in?

  Above the whitewashed panes the bare branches of trees, dripping with rain, swayed as though they were weeping. Mary Anne wept too.

  Her parents made sure that nobody knew the true reason for her being away. They’d let it be known that Mary Anne had gone travelling with one of her father’s aunts around Europe. It was well known in the local vicinity that her father came from well-to-do stock, who owned and farmed half of Lincolnshire – at least it sounded like that the way he told it. It was not beyond the bounds of disbelief that he really did have a rich aunt off travelling around Europe. Actually she lived in Norwich, over a hundred miles to the east but her mother was paranoid that nobody would ever know where she really was. The lies rolled off her tongue.

  ‘Mostly the South of France and Italy,’ he told anyone who questioned the wisdom of wandering around a war torn Europe. ‘The war’s in the north. The south of France is a very different place hardly touched by any of the carnage. Thanks be to God,’ he’d explained jocularly in the mission hall on a Sunday morning.

  Henry Randall was one of the congregation listening to what the preacher had to say about war, life and the predilection towards gossip and lies rather than truth.

  He’d taken to attending a service on a Sunday morning in order to
refill his soul with something that had been lost on the Somme and all the other battlefields he’d fought on. The mission hall was a calm place and the good words, the familiar passages from the Bible, helped him cope though not forget the terrible scenes he’d witnessed, the wounds, the horror of a war it was hoped would end all wars. He hoped it wouldn’t. He firmly believed that it was only in the heat of battle that boys really did become men.

  He joined in the hymns, not really making a sound, but just opening and shutting his mouth while his thoughts wandered.

  Since leaving the army he’d gone from job to job, his only relaxation the demon drink. Beer was something you could drown your sorrows in, though no amount of drinking would consign his old friend Lewis to memory.

  He’d been offered a job driving one of the blue taxicabs that plied around the city centre. He liked the sound of it. No being stuck in a factory for him. Driving around the city would suit him very well.

  Life began to return to normal, though Lewis remained in his heart. He would never forget the look on his face and those clawing hands as he slowly slid towards the ground. He would never forget his dying or, more specifically, the surprised look on his face when the officer had shot him.

  He would never forget the officer either and, although Lieutenant Ross was dead, neither would he ever forgive him. Damn him to hell. Damn him and all the officers like him.

  Although his throat was dry, on his way out, he managed to wish the preacher a good day. He prided himself on not drinking on Sunday. Let the Lord have his day; the demon drink could have the rest of the week.

  Mary Anne’s father noticed that Henry Randall never missed a Sunday service and mentioned the fact to his wife at Sunday teatime.

  ‘He’s here every week without fail whether it’s me doing the preaching or somebody else. Now that’s what I call a regular and respectable young man.’

  His wife sighed and shook her head sadly. ‘Like lots of other young men he served his country well. I expect after going through that he needs God more than most folk.’

  Her husband agreed with her. ‘So many died and those that survived are never likely to be the same again.’

  Mrs Sweet bustled around with the tea things. Sunday lunch was always relished after a good bout of sermonising from her husband. Teatime was more relaxed; there was always buttered bread, pots of jam and cakes. A large brown pot took pride of place in the middle of the table.

  Just two of them for tea this evening, though sometimes they invited guests, usually business people or those Mr Sweet thought particularly deserving of his charity and his wife’s home-made cakes.

  Mrs Sweet looked at the dining chair where her daughter used to sit, consoling herself that she’d be home soon.

  ‘No doubt she’ll come back with a bloom on her cheeks,’ tittered some of the old ladies who frequented the shop.

  ‘I hope not. I hope she’s taken my advice and used a sunshade and white cotton gloves. If you have a white skin, then keep it white. That’s what I say,’ Mrs Sweet had declared.

  The comment about how her daughter’s complexion might have been affected by continental sunshine alarmed her. It was something she hadn’t considered before. Luckily her retort about the sunshade and white cotton gloves seemed to satisfy them.

  However, the sooner the past was buried the better. The sooner Mary Anne was married to somebody else the better. That’s when the idea occurred to her regarding the lonely young man who attended Sunday service so regularly.

  ‘I know his name is Henry, but is there anything else we know about him?’

  Her husband, now deep in notes for next Sunday’s sermon, looked up at her. ‘Who?’

  ‘The young man. Henry whatever his name is.’

  ‘Randall. Henry Randall. All I know is that he lives alone in lodgings somewhere and that he has no relatives. And of course we already know he served on the Western Front.’

  ‘No wonder he spends Sunday with God. Weekends, especially Sundays, are so lonely if one doesn’t have any family – everything being closed and nothing happening anywhere.’

  She smiled while peering at her husband from beneath a fringe of reddish blonde hair which was only a little lighter than her daughter’s. She could still smile prettily and turn on girlish ways when there was something she wanted him to agree to. This was exactly what she did now.

  Her husband shook his head mournfully. ‘Sundays are a day of rest, my dear. The Lord rested on the seventh day following a hard week of creating the Universe. Poor fella! Still, at least he’s hard working. I know that much. Drives a taxicab; one of them blue ones that pick people up from outside Temple Meads Station.’

  ‘Oh really,’ said his wife, sounding surprised, though in reality she already knew that. ‘I wonder, dear, whether we should invite him for tea, not next Sunday, but perhaps the Sunday after? I mean, Mary Anne’s back next week. She needs to settle …’

  The seed was planted. She could tell that by the way he frowned, lightened, then frowned again. ‘He’s very working class.’

  ‘Under the circumstances, I think we have to overlook that particular shortcoming,’ said his wife.

  ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘I suppose we do.’

  The first Mary Anne knew of Henry Randall was when he shook hands with her father at church the following Sunday.

  On this particular Sunday another lay preacher was giving the sermon, her father consigned to listening and nodding in agreement with certain statements, however clichéd they might be.

  Mary Anne was introduced to Henry immediately following the end of the service.

  Her father cleared his throat. ‘This is our daughter, Mary Anne.’

  Henry Randall seemed taken aback at the sight of her before finally before finding his voice. ‘Pleased to meet you.’

  ‘Likewise,’ said Mary Anne, before retrieving her hand from his firm grip.

  She never thought anything more of it until her mother announced that he was coming to tea the following Sunday.

  ‘Now you’re recovered from your little trip,’ she said smiling.

  Mary Anne grimaced at the knowledge that her confinement would always be referred to as her ‘little trip’. The fact that giving away her baby had left her feeling devastated was brushed over. It was all for the best, that was what they kept telling her. The story they’d told people about having been on a trip to Europe was almost laughable, or would be if she didn’t feel so sad.

  ‘Be kind to Mr Randall,’ her father said to her, his voice was firm. ‘He fought on the Western Front. We haven’t mentioned anything about your engagement to Edward. Your mother and I think it’s best nothing is said. It’s over and what’s past is past.’

  Her mother was supportive of her husband, her gaze flashing nervously between Mr Sweet and their daughter.

  ‘Three-quarters of a million men were killed, Mary Anne; a dreadful tragedy for them their families and the girls that might have become their wives. There are going to be a lot of young girls who will never know the joy of having children …’ She hesitated, suddenly aware of what she was saying. ‘What I mean to say is, if you do marry then you’ll be one of the lucky ones.’

  It was on the tip of Mary Anne’s tongue to retaliate and say that she was quite happy to be one of those ‘old maids’. Edward was gone. Her baby was gone. What did she care if she never married? The man she was going to marry was dead.

  At night she sometimes dreamed of that summer day before he’d gone to war when they’d stripped naked and swam in the weir, afterwards lying in the cool grass, the sun drying their bodies. That was when they’d made the baby that Edward never got to see, and all she could recall were a pair of tiny hands, waving goodbye to her forever.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  In the aftermath of meeting Mary Anne Sweet, Henry Randall was subject to a number of interesting thoughts.

  For one thing he felt certain he’d seen her somewhere before, but no matter how much he racked his brains, he co
uldn’t think where. It could be that he’d dreamed about her when bone weary following yet another push, another battle full of noise, blood and bodies blasted to pieces before his eyes.

  Mary Anne was the sort of girl most of the soldiers dreamed of in their rest moments – the girls they’d left behind, the girls of their dreams. Other soldiers dreamed of their mothers.

  He’d never dreamed much of his mother or of the girls he’d left behind because there hadn’t been any. As for his mother, she’d been a poor thing, unable to stand up for herself against his father’s temper and the cuffs and blows that came with it. Once he’d got over the ‘found under the gooseberry bush’ thing and knew the truth about how babies came to be, it surprised him that regardless of his father’s bullying, his mother produced one child after another.

  He vaguely recalled having two or three younger siblings, if they’d survived the deprivation that is; he didn’t know for sure if they had.

  Over plates of home-made cakes, he watched as Mary Anne glided around the table, pouring tea from a big brown pot. Her hair changed colour when she moved, and she smelled good.

  He accepted another cup of tea, glad it was her pouring it out rather than her sanctimonious father or her stiff-looking mother. He had the distinct impression they favoured a match between him and their daughter. It occurred to him that she could do better than him, that there had to be a reason they favoured him.

  He wasn’t entirely unfavourable to the idea. He had his own reasons for favouring such a match, though he wouldn’t of course divulge it to them. His was a reason that had to be kept a lifelong secret.

  Deciding it wouldn’t hurt to set the pace, he moved his arm so that his elbow brushed against her. As women went, she was very attractive. All he had to do was play his cards right, keep his temper in check and rise above what he had been in the past.

  Every Sunday was much the same, their conversation light and focused on general topics such as what he thought of her father’s sermons. He said it was one of the reasons he kept coming on Sundays; he needed to hear those things.