In Farleigh Field: A Novel of World War II

This particular morning he was returning empty-handed. The gamekeeper suspected some village lads were helping themselves to the odd rabbit or partridge, and he talked of putting down mantraps. The thought of mantraps brought an added spice of excitement to the daily chore for the boy. He wondered how it would feel to see one of the bigger village boys caught in a trap—the boys who took delight in bullying him and pushing him around because he was a runt and an outsider. He quickened his stride for the cottage, his stomach growling for porridge and eggs, real eggs, not the powdered stuff that tasted like cardboard. It was going to be a warm and perfect early summer’s day. Strands of mist lingered over the meadows, and a cuckoo was calling loudly, drowning out the dawn chorus of birds.

The boy came out of the woods and into the parkland that surrounded the big house, looking out carefully for the herd of deer because he was still rather scared of them. Smooth green grass was dotted with spreading oaks, chestnuts, and copper beeches, and beyond he caught a glimpse of the big house itself rising like a fairy-tale castle above the trees. He was about to take the path that led to the cottage when he saw something lying in the grass—something brown, and beside it, something long and light and flapping a little, like a large wounded bird. He couldn’t imagine what it could be, and he went toward it cautiously, still conscious that the country was full of unexpected dangers. When he got closer, he saw that it was a man lying there. Or had been a man. He was wearing an army uniform and lying facedown, his limbs at improbable angles. From a pack on his back came strings, and the strings were attached to what looked like long strands of whitish fabric. It took him a while to realise that it was a parachute, or the remains of a parachute, because it lay there, limp and lifeless, torn and flapping pathetically in the breeze. The boy understood then that the man had literally fallen from the sky.

He stood for a moment, wondering what to do, feeling slightly sick because the corpse was horribly damaged and the grass around it stained with blood. Before he could make up his mind, he heard the thud of hoofbeats on grass and the jingle of a bridle. He looked up to see a girl on a fat white pony galloping toward him. The girl was well turned out in a velvet crash cap, jodhpurs, and hacking jacket, and as she came closer, he recognised her as Lady Phoebe, the youngest of the daughters from the big house. He realised with horror that she’d ride right into the corpse if he didn’t stop her. He ran forward waving his arms.

“Stop!” he cried.

The pony skidded to a halt, whinnied, danced, and bucked nervously, but the girl kept her seat well.

“What do you think you’re doing?” she demanded. “Are you mad? You could have had me off. Snowball could have trampled you.”

“You mustn’t go that way, miss,” he said. “There’s been an accident. You wouldn’t want to see it.”

“What kind of accident?”

He glanced back. “A man fell from the sky. He’s all smashed up. It’s horrible.”

“Fell from the sky?” She was straining to see past him. “Like an angel, you mean?”

“A soldier,” he said. “I don’t think his parachute opened.”

“Golly. How horrid. Let me see.” She tried to urge the pony forward, but it was still snorting and dancing nervously.

The boy stepped between her and the corpse again. “Don’t look, miss. You don’t want to see things like that.”

“Of course I do. I’m not squeamish, you know. I’ve watched the men butchering a hog. Now, that really was rather horrid. The way it screamed. I decided never to eat bacon again. But I happen to adore bacon, so that didn’t last long.”

She nudged the pony forward, making the boy step aside. The pony took a few nervous steps, then stopped, sensing that it didn’t want to go any closer. Phoebe stood up in the saddle and peered.

“Crikey,” she said. “We must tell somebody.”

“We should tell the army blokes. He’s one of them, ain’t he?”

“Isn’t he,” she corrected. “Really, your grammar is awful.”

“Bugger my grammar, miss, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

“I do mind. And it’s not ‘miss.’ I’m Lady Phoebe Sutton, and you should address me as ‘my lady.’”

“Sorry,” he said, swallowing back the word miss that was about to come out.

“We must tell my father,” she said firmly. “It is still his land, after all, even though the army is using it at the moment. It still belongs to Farleigh. Come on. You’d better come with me.”

“To the big house, miss? I mean, my lady?”

“Of course. Pah is always up early. The rest of them will still be asleep.”

He started to walk beside the pony.

“You’re the boy who is staying with our gamekeeper, aren’t you?” she asked.

“That’s right. Alfie’s me name. I came down from the Smoke last winter.”

“Smoke? What sort of smoke?”

He chuckled then. “It’s what us Cockneys call London.”

She stared down at him critically. “I haven’t seen much of you on the estate.”

“I’m at school in the village all day.”

“How do you like it?”

“It’s all right. The village kids pick on me ’cos I’m little for my age, and I ain’t got no one to stick up for me.”

“That’s not nice.”

He looked up at her haughty little face, a face that looked so content with itself, so secure. “In case you haven’t noticed, people aren’t nice,” he said. “There’s a war on. Blokes are flying over London every night dropping bombs and not caring who they kill—women, children, old people . . . it don’t matter to them. I saw a baby after a bomb had gone off. Lying there in the street, looking as if there wasn’t a mark on it. And I went to pick it up, and it was stone-cold dead. And another time a woman ran down the street screaming, and all her clothes had been blown off in the blast, and do you know what she was screaming? She was screaming, ‘My little boy. He’s buried under all that rubble. Someone save my little boy.’”

Phoebe’s expression softened. “You were sensible to come here, away from the Smoke,” she said. “How old are you?”

“Eleven, almost twelve.”

“I just turned twelve,” she said proudly. “I was hoping they’d send me to school when I was thirteen, but I don’t think it will happen now. Not with a war on. My sisters went to school, lucky ducks.”

“You mean you haven’t been to school yet?”

“No. I’ve always had a governess. It’s so boring doing lessons alone. It was different for my sisters because they had each other, and they were naughty and played tricks on the governess. But I was an afterthought. Dido says I was an accident.”

“Who’s Dido?”

“My sister Diana. She’s nineteen. She’s furious about the war because she was supposed to come out last year.”

“Come out of what?”

Phoebe laughed, a rather fake and superior sort of ha-ha. “You don’t know anything, do you? Girls like us have a season and are presented at court. We go to dances and are supposed to find a husband. But Dido’s been stuck here instead, dying of boredom. The older ones all had their season.”

“And got married?”

“Livvy did. But she was always the good child, Dido says. She married boring Edmund Carrington and she’s already produced the heir.”

“Air?” Alfie asked, making her laugh again.