Cousins at War Read online

  On Alf’s first night in Aberdeen, Neil took him to Rubislaw Den, and they had giggled all the way home at Olive’s flirtatious behaviour. They were still laughing about it when they went out for a walk the following morning.

  ‘Hey, you two! What’s the joke?’ Scuffling out of Back Wynd on his lethargic way to Gordon’s College, Raymond Potter had heard the laughter before he saw the soldiers, but when he recognised them, he ran across Schoolhill to talk to them.

  ‘Oh, hullo.’ Neil looked surprised. ‘It’s funny us running into you – we were laughing about Olive.’

  ‘Oh, her!’ All the contempt of a sixteen-year-old for his elder sister was contained in these two words. ‘What’s she done now?’

  Neil chortled again, ‘It’s what we’ve done to her.’

  Alf shot him a warning glance, ‘Watch it!’

  This only served to whet Raymond’s curiosity. ‘Go on. What have you done to her? She was going on at breakfast time like she’d come into a fortune.’

  Neil nodded wisely, ‘I bet she was. She’ll be hearing the tinkle of wedding bells after last night, for Alf here told her he loved her.’

  ‘Great! When you marry her, you’ll be my brother-in- . . .’

  ‘No, no,’ Alf interrupted, panicking. ‘It wasn’t true. She practically forced it out of me.’

  Raymond was confused now, ‘Tell me what’s going on.’

  After Neil told him, the boy was beside himself with glee. ‘So you’ve pulled a fast one on her? Goodoh! When are you going to tell her the truth, Alf?’

  Neil explained, ‘When he goes back to camp, he’s going to write and tell her he’s found somebody else. He’s going home to Elgin now – we’re on our way to the bus – and I go back to Larkhill tomorrow, so none of us’ll be here when she gets the letter.’ He paused for a moment, realising the danger of what he had said. ‘For God’s sake, Raymond, don’t tell her!’

  His cousin looked offended. ‘What d’you take me for? I can keep my trap shut.’

  ‘You’d better, or else . . .’ Neil drew one finger across his own throat, menacingly.

  ‘Scout’s honour!’ Raymond vowed, then looked at his wrist watch. ‘I’ll be late for school. Cheerio.’

  A worried frown gathered on Alf’s brow as the boy ran off, ‘You shouldn’t have told him.’

  ‘Ach, Raymond’s OK. He won’t say anything.’

  ‘Famous last words,’ muttered Alf darkly, as they turned the corner past the granite lion erected as a memorial to the dead of the previous war outside the Cowdray Hall.

  The Elgin bus was already standing in Blackfriars Street, so Neil walked off as soon as Alf was seated. It was strange meeting Raymond but he was a sensible kid, and he was just as keen to see Olive get her comeuppance as they were. He would keep his tongue between his teeth. Remembering that he hadn’t told Alf how he’d felt about Queenie that night last week – it wasn’t something he could joke about – he decided to consider it carefully before he jumped in with both feet and did something stupid. He’d never felt anything like this before about a girl . . . but was it love?

  Chapter Eight

  Unable to banish the memory of Neil’s face when he had seen her all ‘toffed’ up, Queenie Ogilvie wondered once again if she had imagined the admiration. She knew that she had looked good – Patsy had assured her of that, and even Uncle Joe had seemed proud of her – but Neil must meet some really lovely girls in Larkhill. It could easily have been surprise that he had registered not interest. Nevertheless she was delighted that he had noticed how she looked, and perhaps next time he came home, he might ask her out, maybe even fall in love with her. She was certainly well on the way to being in love with him.

  ‘Have you got another boyfriend, Queenie?’ Patsy inquired one night. ‘You’ve been looking kind of dreamy for days.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  Her cousin’s rising colour told Patsy that she was on the right lines. ‘Yes, you do. Come on, tell me. I won’t say a word to Mum or Dad.’

  ‘There’s nothing to tell.’ Why couldn’t she just get some peace? She couldn’t tell Neil’s sister that she was dreaming of him. Patsy would think it was so funny she’d likely tell Auntie Gracie and Uncle Joe, though she’d promised not to.

  Looking disappointed, Patsy slapped some Pond’s Cold Cream on her face. ‘I thought we weren’t going to keep secrets.’

  ‘I’m not keeping any secrets. I’d tell you in a minute if I’d a boyfriend, but I haven’t. Callum was enough.’

  ‘You never said what happened with him?

  On terra firma now, Queenie giggled. ‘He was the same as the men in your office.’

  Whipping round eagerly, Patsy said, ‘Out with it, my girl. What did he do?’ She, too, ended up giggling at how Queenie had fended off the unwelcome attentions and forgot what she had asked in the first place.

  Looking up at his friend, Alf chewed the end of his pencil – his fountain pen had been lost, or more likely stolen, long ago. ‘We haven’t got very far. “Dear Olive, I regret having to tell you . . .”’

  Neil frowned. ‘It sounds more like a business letter. We’d better start again. What about . . . “I am very sorry . . .?”’

  Alf blew a raspberry. ‘I’m not sorry.’

  ‘She won’t know that. OK, then. “Dear Olive, You’re such a bloody pest, I . . .”’

  ‘Och, be serious. I wish to God I’d never got involved in anything like this.’

  Smiling wickedly, Neil laid his finger against his nose. ‘It’s your own fault. I’d never have thought of it.’

  ‘You’ll have to get me out of this mess, though. If you don’t, I could end up having to marry the bally girl.’

  Neil gave a howl of laughter. ‘I can just see you in a top hat and tails . . . and what a wedding night you’d have. I could bet Olive wouldn’t give you a minute’s rest.’

  ‘D’you want your face punched in? You’re asking for it.’

  Straightening the threatened part of his anatomy with some difficulty, Neil gave the letter further thought. ‘You could put, “This hurts me as much as it will hurt you, but . . .”’

  ‘That doesn’t sound right. It has to be more delicate.’

  After scribbling down and discarding several more phrases, Alf was finally satisfied. ‘Read it out,’ Neil prompted, ‘so I can hear what it sounds like.’

  Clearing his throat, Alf began, ‘Dear Olive, I trust you will not be hurt at what I am going to say, but I know you would prefer me to be honest, though I feel awful about it. The truth is, when I was in Elgin, I ran into a girl I used to go with and I discovered I still loved her. What I felt for you was just deep attraction, not love, and it would be wrong of me to let you go on believing it was. Please don’t think too badly of me, Olive. I couldn’t help what happened, and I will never forget you. I hope that you find a man more worthy of you some day soon. Yours sincerely, Alf Melville’.

  Neil nodded gravely. ‘Just the job! That shouldn’t put her back up, though you never can tell with her. But I’m free of her now, thank God.’

  ‘As long as she never finds out it was you I did it for.’

  ‘Nobody knows apart from us . . . and Raymond, and he’ll never tell her. Anyway, she’ll have got over it long before I go home again.’

  ‘It maybe won’t be long before we get embarkation leave,’ Alf told him. ‘There’s word we’re being sent overseas.’

  ‘Thank God for that, I’m sick fed up here, and even if she still feels angry at you, she won’t take her spite out on me if I’m going abroad. It couldn’t have worked out better.’

  Olive had given her two student acquaintances – they were not as close as friends – a detailed account of all that Alf had done and written to her, using him as a pattern for the boyfriend she had deceptively created. It sounded much more convincing when what she was saying was actually true and Polly, at least, listened eagerly. She had been longing for his first letter since his leav
e, and when it arrived, her heart accelerated as she ran her paper knife along the top of the envelope. This would be a proper love letter, since Alf had told her how he felt. The first two words alarmed her. ‘Dear Olive’? She had expected to see ‘My Darling’, or ‘My Dearest’. He hadn’t written a love letter, after all, he was preparing her for something nasty. Having worked this out, she was not so shocked when she read it. She was angry – no girl likes to be told that she’s been replaced in her boyfriend’s affections – but there was no misery, no feeling suicidal. Granted, she had thought that she loved him, even planned for a wedding, but she only felt let down, probably because she had not known Alf for very long. Well, that was that! She would have to resort to invention again to regale Frankie and Polly.

  Giving a small sigh, she placed the letter on her dressing table, to be answered some time – it would serve Alf right to be kept in suspense for a while – and picked up her comb. As she ran it through her hair, she was glad that she hadn’t told her mother of Alf’s declaration of love. At least none of her family knew how far things had gone, and she would have to play down her resentment at being thrown over.

  In the dining room, Hetty looked up with an arch smile, ‘I suppose Alf got back to camp all right?’

  Sitting down, Olive nodded, a little bleakly. ‘Yes, he got back OK.’

  ‘Is anything wrong? You’re usually full of beans after a letter from him.’

  ‘He’s found another girl.’ Olive hadn’t meant to tell them just yet – she didn’t want any sympathy and Raymond would likely gloat – but she hadn’t expected her mother to be so quick to notice. ‘Somebody in Elgin he used to go with.’

  ‘Oh, I’m so sorry.’

  ‘It’s OK. It happens all the time, doesn’t it? Now, can I just get on with my breakfast?’

  Her father, engrossed in the morning paper, had not looked up, her mother seemed very concerned, but it was Raymond’s expression which disconcerted Olive. It wasn’t derisive – as she had expected – nor sympathetic, it was amused. When he realised that she was staring at him, the amusement vanished from his eyes, but there was still something there that she couldn’t place. ‘Don’t feel sorry for me,’ she said, with as much dignity as she could muster. ‘I only went out with him a few times. There wasn’t anything in it.’

  Nothing more was said on the subject, so she finished her breakfast and left the house, proud that she had handled the situation so well.

  Her mother, however, was not so happy. ‘Olive’s had quite a shock,’ Hetty observed to Martin, whose head was still hidden behind the Press and Journal. ‘She’s pretending not to care, but she’s far too calm. She thought a lot of Alf, and she must be upset.’

  ‘Mmmm.’ Her husband turned a page.

  ‘I’d have thought she’d have flown into a temper, and it’s not natural, the way she’s taking it.’

  ‘Mmmm,’ Martin repeated.

  Giving up, Hetty looked at Raymond. ‘It’s like speaking to a stone wall, trying to tell your father anything.’

  An enigmatic smile on his face, her son stood up, ‘See you at lunchtime.’

  Alf was astonished by the way Olive had accepted what he had written. He had thought that she would answer straight away, calling him every bad name she could think of, or pleading with him to change his mind, but it was ten days before she wrote that she understood, that she forgave him and that he was not to feel guilty. His relief was so great that he felt like jumping his own height, and Neil was equally relieved that she hadn’t started writing to him again. ‘That got her off my back,’ he laughed. ‘I’d say Operation Olive was a big success and nobody got hurt.’

  ‘We were lucky. It could have ricocheted on us.’

  ‘Aye, but it didn’t. All’s well that ends well.’

  Alf grinned. ‘And the last one to the mess pays the beer tonight.’

  Neil had been occupied for most of the day trying to find out what was wrong with the Royal Enfield he had been told to repair, but he had found the trouble at last and it was ready to be taken on a test run. It was no hardship to him, for he loved the feel of a machine like this under him, the thrill as the countryside rushed past, the exhilaration when the wind was whipping his face. All the other vehicles – the trucks, the officers’ cars, whatever he had to repair – were just routine. None of them could beat motor bikes! Revving up the engine, he listened for any alien noises and, hearing none, he engaged the gear and negotiated his way out of the workshop, waving to Alf as he passed.

  Once on the open road, he opened the throttle and watched the speedometer climb higher and higher. She’s going like a bird, he thought happily, and his life was running just as smoothly these days, with Olive neatly disposed of, although Alf sneered at him occasionally for seemingly giving up his old philandering ways. ‘I can’t understand you, Neilly boy. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were in love.’

  Content to laugh it off, Neil never rose to the bait. He wasn’t exactly in love with Queenie, but he didn’t want any other girl. He still accompanied Alf to dances, but he was too aware of his own failing to be as foolish as take any of his partners home, despite their blatant hinting.

  He often wished that he had asked Queenie to write to him, but his mother would get ideas and he didn’t want that . . . not until he had diagnosed his feelings for the girl properly. He was sure that she had known he was attracted to her, and was almost sure that she’d felt attracted to him, but attraction wasn’t love, though love could develop from it, and he would wait until she left school before he said anything.

  Realising how far he had come, he slowed down and turned the motor cycle round. If he followed his inclination, he’d be carrying on to Aberdeen to see her again, but if he did, he would be court-martialled for being AWOL or at the very least incarcerated in the glasshouse. Laughing out loud, he let the engine roar back along the road again.

  Alf frowned when he coasted into the workshop. ‘Where the hell have you been?

  ‘To heaven and back,’ Neil smiled and removed the gloves with a theatrical flourish, adding, ‘Don’t take any notice of me, I’m just a silly bugger.’

  Alf rolled his eyes. ‘You never said a truer word.’

  Renewed rumours that they were to be posted made Neil think. It wasn’t definite, but it was more than probable that they would be sent abroad and he was quite pleased. He had been stagnating in Larkhill for too long, and he would welcome a change. The drawback was that he’d be separated from Queenie for longer than a few months at a time if they were sent to North Africa or the Far East. He was certain in his own mind now that he did love her – she was all that he could think of, dream of – but even if they got embarkation leave before they left, it was too soon to tell her.

  Having thought about it from all angles, Neil wrote his first love letter one night. He had no intention of mailing it, but he had to get his feelings down on paper. He would carry it with him always, and if he were unlucky enough to be killed, it would be sent home with his other belongings and Queenie would know how he had felt about her.

  My Darling Queenie,

  I am writing this because there is word we will be sent abroad. Maybe this will be a big surprise to you, but I don’t regard you as a sister any longer. It came as a shock to me, too, but I love you with all my heart. I can’t stop thinking about you, and your lovely face fills my dreams every night. I was going to tell you next year, but I might not be in this country, so I am doing the next best thing and writing it down.

  I don’t know when you will get this or if you will ever get it, but if you do you will know that you mean everything to me. If I survive the war, I will marry you as soon as I come home, and thinking about that will carry me through whatever I have to face. Goodnight, my darling.

  Yours till the end of time, Neil

  He read it over – it was no literary masterpiece, but he had never meant it to be – then put it in an envelope, wrote Queenie’s name on it and, as he slipped it into
the pocket of his battledress wondered if any of the other men also writing letters were pouring their hearts out like he had done. Probably not. He had been over-sentimental as if he were sure he was going to be killed, but that was not how he felt – just the opposite. He was looking forward to the future . . . a future with Queenie. Positive, not negative.

  As the weeks passed, Olive Potter began to think of Alf as having been just a pleasant interlude. His attentions had flattered her, had made her forget, but it was Neil she wanted . . . it had always been Neil. He must have been jealous when she was out with his friend, though he hadn’t given any sign of it, and she had better make it up to him and show how sorry she was. It would be some time yet before she saw him again, but it would give her time to plan her campaign.

  Although Olive prided herself on having kept calm when she received Alf’s letter, it was that very calmness which had set her mother worrying, and with her daughter remaining so quiet, as if she were trying to come to terms with herself, Hetty suspected that she was still pining. ‘I wish there was something I could do to buck Olive up,’ she remarked to her husband one day.

  Martin looked baffled, ‘What’s wrong with her?’

  ‘You wouldn’t see sand supposing you were standing on the beach,’ his wife retorted indignantly. ‘She hasn’t got over Alf, that’s what’s wrong.’

  ‘Oh, that! She hardly knew him.’

  ‘I hardly knew you when I fell in love with you.’

  ‘Olive wasn’t in love with Alf. You’re imagining things.’

  ‘I’m not, and she’s needing to be taken out of herself. I think, when Neil comes, I’ll get him to take her dancing or to the pictures or something.’

  ‘Good idea.’ Martin lifted a book.

  ‘The only thing is, she used to be so fond of Neil. Maybe throwing them together again would be asking for trouble. It might escalate into something deeper than she could handle.’ Hetty waited in vain for an answer, and went on, ‘I suppose we’ll have to cross that bridge when we come to it . . . if we ever come to it.’