Cold Harbour

‘That’s okay,’ he told her. ‘Do you have any cigarettes?’

‘You shouldn’t really, sir,’ she hesitated then took a packet of Player’s from her pocket and some matches. ‘Don’t tell Dr Baum where they came from.’

‘You’re a honey,’ Craig kissed her hand. ‘First night out I’ll take you to Rainbow Corner in Piccadilly. Best cup of coffee in London and great swing to dance to.’

She blushed and went out, laughing. He sat there, smoking, staring into the garden, and after a while there was a knock at the door and Jack Carter limped in, a stick in one hand, a briefcase in the other.

‘Hello, Craig.’

Craig, truly delighted to see him, stood up. ‘Jack – how bloody marvellous after all this time. So, you still work for that old sod.’

‘Oh, yes.’ Carter sat down and opened the briefcase. ‘Dr Baum says you’re much better?’

‘So I hear.’

‘Good. The Brigadier would like you to do a job for him, if you feel up to it, that is.’

‘Already? What’s he trying to do? Kill me off?’

Carter raised a hand. ‘Please, Craig, hear me out. It’s not good, this one. This friend of yours, Anne-Marie Trevaunce?’

Craig paused, a cigarette to his lips. ‘What about her?’

‘The Brigadier needed to see her face-to-face. Something very big is coming up. Very big.’

Craig lit his cigarette. ‘Isn’t it always?’

‘No, this time, it really is of supreme importance, Craig. Anyway, a Lysander pick-up was arranged to bring her out and I’m afraid things went very badly wrong.’ He passed a file across. ‘See for yourself.’

Craig went to the window seat, opened the file and started to read. After a while, he closed it, great pain on his face.

Carter said, ‘I’m sorry. It’s pretty bad, isn’t it?’

‘About as bad as it could be. A horror story.’

He sat there thinking of Anne-Marie, the lip-sticked mouth, the arrogance, the good legs in the dark stockings, the constant cigarette. So damned irritating and so bloody marvellous and now . . .?

Carter said, ‘Did you know of the existence of this twin sister, this Genevieve Trevaunce in England?’

‘No.’ Craig handed back the file. ‘She was never mentioned in all the time I knew Anne-Marie, even in the old days. I knew there was an English father. She once told me Trevaunce was a Cornish name, but I always thought he was dead.’

‘Not at all. He’s a doctor. Lives in Cornwall. North Cornwall. A village called St Martin.’

‘And the daughter? This Genevieve?’

‘She’s a Staff Nurse here in London at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. She was recently rather ill with influenza. She’s on extended sick leave staying with her father at St Martin.’

‘So?’ Craig said.

‘The Brigadier would like you to go and see her.’ Carter took a large white envelope from his briefcase and passed it across. ‘This will explain just how important it is that you help us out on this one.’

Craig opened the envelope, took out the typed letter and began to read it slowly.

4

Just behind the village of St Martin there was a hill, a strange place with no name that was marked on the maps as probably having been some kind of Roman–British fort in ancient times. It was Genevieve Trevaunce’s favourite place. From its crest she could sit and look out across the estuary to where the surf washed in over treacherous shoals, only the seabirds to keep her company.

She had climbed up there after breakfast for what was to be the last time. On the previous evening, she had reluctantly faced up to the fact that she was well again and those raids on London, according to the BBC news, had intensified. They would need everyone they could get on the casualty wards at Bart’s now.

It was a fine, soft day of a kind peculiar to North Cornwall and nowhere else, the sky very blue, white water breaking across the bar. She felt at peace with herself for the first time in months, relaxed and happy, turned and looked down at the village below, her father working in the garden of the old rectory. And then she noticed a car some distance away. At that stage of the war with severe petrol rationing it usually meant either the doctor or the police, but as it drew nearer, she saw that it was painted with the drab olive green colour used by the military.

It stopped outside the rectory gate and a man in some sort of uniform got out. Genevieve started down the hill at once. She saw her father straighten, put down his spade and go to the gate. A few words were exchanged and then he and the other man went up the path together and went inside the house.

It took her no more than three or four minutes to reach the bottom of the hill. As she did so, the front door opened and her father came out and started down the path. They met at the gate.

His face was working terribly, a glazed look in his eyes. She put a hand on his arm. ‘What is it? What’s happened?’

His eyes focused on her for a moment and he recoiled, as if in horror. ‘Anne-Marie,’ he said hoarsely. ‘She’s dead. Anne-Marie is dead.’

He pushed past her, making for the church. He went through the graveyard in a grotesque, limping, half-run and entered the porch. The great oak door closed with a hollow boom.

The sky was still blue, the rooks in the trees beyond the church tower called harshly to each other. Nothing had changed, yet everything was different. She stood there, suddenly ice-cold. No emotion at all, only an emptiness.

Footsteps approached behind. ‘Miss Trevaunce?’

She turned slowly. The uniform was American, a trenchcoat open over an olive drab battledress. A Major and with several medal ribbons. A surprising number for such a young man. The forage cap was tilted across gold hair with lights in it. A smooth, blank face gave nothing away, eyes the same cold grey as the Atlantic in winter. He opened his mouth slightly, then closed it again as if unable to speak.

She said, ‘You bring us bad news, I believe, Major?’

‘Osbourne.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Craig Osbourne. Dear God, Miss Trevaunce, but for a moment there it was like seeing a ghost.’

She took his trenchcoat in the hall and opened the parlour door. ‘If you’ll just go through, I’ll ask the housekeeper to make some tea. No coffee, I’m afraid.’

‘That’s very kind of you.’

She put her head round the kitchen door. ‘Could we have some tea, Mrs Trembath? I have a visitor. My father’s in the church. I’m afraid we’ve had bad news.’

She turned from the sink, wiping her hands on her apron, a tall gaunt woman, the strong Cornish face very still, blue eyes watchful. ‘Anne-Marie, is it?’

‘She’s dead,’ Genevieve said simply and closed the door.

When she went into the parlour, Craig was standing at the mantelpiece looking at an old photo of Anne-Marie and her as children.

‘Not much difference, even then,’ he said. ‘It’s remarkable.’

‘You knew my sister, I take it?’

‘Yes. I met her in Paris in 1940. I was a journalist then. We became friends. I knew she had an English father, but to be honest, she never mentioned you. Not even a hint that you existed.’