Love, Death, Chariot of Fire Read online

  ‘Sorry to entertain you in the kitchen, Stretton, but the cleaners are turning the rest of the house upside down today. We recently lost Eva, our long-serving live-in maid. She got married, and we’re having to make do with outside help.’

  ‘No apology called for, Flo,’ Reeve says. ‘I feel quite at home in a snug kitchen, especially on a cold wet day like this. But won’t you join us?’

  ‘Afraid not. Errands to run, you know. The two of you can hold the fort and have a nice man-to-man chat without me. Stretton, could you do the honours with the tea and cake, please?’

  Reeve acts on her request. As he does so and Flo leaves, he turns to his companion. ‘Flo tells me you suffer considerable pain at this stage in your illness, Reg. How bad is it?’

  ‘Up and down. But pretty bad. Manageable though. I take analgesics when I need to, and I can resort to morphia if necessary. But I’m avoiding that at the moment. I want to keep a clear head so I can keep working. To some extent at least.’

  ‘Does your firm need you so badly?’

  ‘Strictly speaking it doesn’t “need” me at all anymore. I’ve seen to that myself. But I’m still useful to those who are replacing me.’ Mitchell frowns. ‘It’s more as if I need the firm, to keep working. It’s what I’ve always done. Without it I’d just be a gloomy sod and even more of a burden on Flo than I already am. She’s the one who really needs your solicitude, Stretton.’

  ‘I know what you mean, Reg. Rest assured, though, that I’m far from the only member of the Highfield Church community who’s looking out for her. On the other hand, I see your own and her needs as inseparable, and that’s what I want to explore with you.’

  ‘ “Inseparable”? How so? She’s a believer, and what you offer her is invaluable to her. I’m encouraging her to avail herself of it fully. But to be frank, I’m not a believer and so I can’t avail myself of your… consolation. I’m just not religious.’

  Reeve smiles. ‘I’m going to keep my promise not to preach or try to change what you believe. But I do want to challenge how you think about belief and religion. They’re not the same thing, especially these days. None of us can seriously claim to possess absolute truth. We all believe whatever we choose to believe – more and more selectively in most cases – and we must take responsibility for what we choose to believe without recourse to absolutes. Religious life can flourish without any need for common beliefs in ultimate things.’

  ‘Well, that’s news to me. Surely a lot of your fellow priests would disagree with you about that.’

  ‘You’re right. We don’t all move forward in unison, that’s for sure.’

  ‘So what do you suggest religious life is about, if it isn’t about belief?’

  ‘It’s all there in The Book of Common Prayer you held in your hands last Sunday. It’s about getting born and growing up in a community, getting married, having children, getting sick, getting well, gaining wisdom, mourning and dying. It’s about living a whole human life cycle in a meaningful way, in other words. Using shared resources to deepen into our common fate, learning common terms and shared rituals with which to work through all this together.’

  Vivid memories of Sam Kinkead’s and his own father’s funerals well up once again in Mitchell’s mind. How inchoate and unworkable his grief would have been without the authoritative words, the gestures and the solidarity of the funeral service!

  ‘Is this true of all religions, do you think?’

  ‘Most of them as far as I know, yes.’

  ‘So there’s nothing special about Christian religious life, then?’

  Reeve’s bushy eyebrows shoot up half an inch; he takes his time answering. ‘What distinguishes our religion is its everyday ethics – its insistence on love, compassion, generosity, justice and forgiveness to start with. The civilising values. If some other religions also advance those values, then no, Christianity wouldn’t be special. But since it’s the religion we have to hand – the one woven into our everyday affairs and language – maybe we should stick to it. Especially now, when Nazism is threatening to obliterate utterly the values in question.’

  Reeve grins as he tops up their teacups. ‘Given all that, Reg, I’d say your Spitfire and my religion are natural allies at this point in time.’

  Mitchell stares across the table at his companion. ‘You might be right. I’d never thought about religion in that way. You make it sound so much less other-worldly, sanctimonious and closed-off than I’ve always thought it to be. So when you asked to come and visit me, what did you have in mind?’

  ‘First up, to persuade you that you, Flo and I share a common medium in which to deal with what is happening in your lives right now. That our differences of belief are trivial in the wider scheme of things. And I’d like to see if I could keep visiting you. I admire what you’ve done. And I take my hat off to the husband and father Flo has described to me. I can offer you someone to talk to, perhaps in a different way than you talk to her. And that in itself can ease the present burden on both of you.’

  ‘To be honest with you, Stretton, I worry about her a lot more than about myself. I know where I’m headed, and it won’t take me long to get there. But she not only has to endure that – she has to go through the mourning afterwards, all the adjustments to widowhood, and look after Gordon alone. Not to mention the horrors of a new war and what it might bring. I’ve taken great care to finalise legal and financial arrangements for them with my solicitor and my firm, but she’ll still face so much grief and turbulence when I die.’

  ‘She can see all that coming, Reg. She’s told me. And that’s why she’s brought you and me together. But she knows she won’t face these difficulties alone. And in herself she’s such a tower of strength.’

  Mitchell blinks away the tears he senses welling up. ‘Now tell me something I don’t already know!’

  Supermarine works, Woolston. Wednesday, 21 April 1937, 11 am. As so often before, Mitchell sits at his desk with Vera Cross sitting opposite him. Nothing else looks normal. The workbench and drawing board behind him are bare, and the desk in front now contains just his telephone and one small stack of papers. A large and crammed waste paper basket stands beside his chair.

  ‘Will I ask Joe to come in now, RJ?’

  ‘Yes please.’

  Vera reaches over the desk and draws the phone to her. She dials an extension number and waits. Mitchell hears the dial tone, a click, and Joe Smith’s voice answering.

  ‘Vera here. Could you come in now, please Joe?’

  A few moments later Smith knocks on the door and lets himself in. Vera offers him her chair and settles into the one facing the short side of the desk between the two men. Joe looks around the bare room in bewilderment.

  ‘Morning RJ. Morning Vera. I’ve never seen your office like this before, RJ.’

  ‘I won’t be coming in any more after this, Joe. So Vera and I have cleaned up my mess, and passed on all the bumf that has any current relevance to those it concerns. We’ve already had Alf, Bev, Alan, Ernie, Agony, Ken and Arthur come and collect their piles. You’re the lucky last.’

  Smith glances at the papers Vera slides in front of him before staring across at Mitchell. ‘I hope this isn’t your way of saying goodbye to us all, RJ.’

  ‘Not exactly. You can still come and see me at home for a while. For the time being I’ll remain the firm’s chief designer, though more and more in theory. In practice you’ll take over my role, as you know, and that shift will become official soon enough. But this is my goodbye to Woolston. I’ll never see this office again.’

  Vera lets out a muffled scream, crumples forward and sobs into the palms of her hands, pushing her glasses up onto her forehead. Mitchell instantly regrets his remark. Flustered, he somehow manages to struggle to his feet, find his way behind her chair, and lay his hands on her heaving shoulders. No words come to him. He glimpses Smith staring ahead, his mouth sagging, thunderstruck. Smith comes to his senses and fetches up a freshly ironed handkerchief fro
m his pocket. He flicks it open and offers it to Vera. She holds it to her face as the sobs continue to wrack her body under Mitchell’s hands.

  ‘Oh God, I’m so sorry, RJ, Joe,’ she sniffles at last from behind the handkerchief.

  ‘Don’t be,’ Mitchell murmurs. ‘We’re all a bit overwhelmed. Been together a long time.’

  ‘Yes,’ Smith mutters. ‘It’s not so much the end of an era as the end of everything. That’s what it feels like right now.’

  When Vera shudders away the last of her sobs Mitchell gently detaches his hands and returns to his seat. She slowly dabs away her tears with the handkerchief, then rests her clasped hands on the desk. The trio falls into a long silence.

  ‘I’ll take your hankie home and wash it, Joe,’ Vera says at last.

  ‘No need, Vera. Just keep it.’

  Chapter 20

  A detour

  ‘Hazeldene’, Portswood. Tuesday 27 April 1937, 8 am. Flo and Reginald Mitchell are sitting at the kitchen table amid the remnants of their breakfast. She is reading aloud the account in The Southern Daily Echo of the German air force’s bombing of the Spanish town of Guernica the day before, one in aid of the fascist advance in the ongoing civil war. Several times her voice breaks; she has to pause to recover herself while he places a trembling hand over hers.

  The raid was timed for market day in Guernica, which brought its population up to ten thousand civilians on the day. The town had no defences of any sort, and no warning of the attack by two dozen bombers, mainly Heinkels. They dropped high-explosive and incendiary bombs indiscriminately on its inhabitants. Initial estimates put casualties at six hundred dead and many more injured. Commentators attribute the raid to an experiment in ‘terror bombing’ intended to cow the civilian population of republican Spain into submission. Nazi tacticians have been discussing the merits of this sort of attack in the context of modern warfare, and Spain offers them a laboratory in which to test it.

  Mitchell is still agitated when Dr Picken makes his daily house call. His growing difficulty climbing the stairs has led to his colonising the dining room as his bedroom, where the consultation takes place. Afterwards Mitchell invites his GP to a cup of tea in the kitchen, and Flo joins them there.

  ‘Those vicious bastards!’ Mitchell fumes. ‘This is pure evil! And precisely what they’ll perpetrate against any country they choose to attack, including ours! In the meantime here am I, sitting around just waiting to die, utterly useless, Pick. It’s intolerable – and disgraceful! There must be something I can do!’

  Picken raises his hands in a gesture of resignation. ‘I only wish there were, Reg.’

  ‘Some time ago you mentioned a specialist in Vienna, a ray doctor of some sort who treats cancer patients,’ Flo says. ‘Someone who isn’t just a quack. Bill Gabriel also mentioned him.’

  ‘Yes, I remember. But I also said that the chances of his being able to cure the type of cancer Reg has are very slight indeed. Gabriel gave you both the same advice, I believe.’

  ‘Tell us about this doctor in Vienna,’ Flo persists.

  ‘His name is Professor Doctor Leopold Freund – you know how these Central European types love their academic titles! Back in the 1890s he and a close colleague of his called Kienböck seized on Wilhelm Röntgen’s discovery of X-rays. We’re indebted to Kienböck for developing the X-ray diagnostic techniques we use today. But Freund got the idea of using X-rays therapeutically, to destroy tumours among other things. That’s proved a much more complicated business. Cancers develop in bewildering varieties; some respond to X-rays, others don’t. From what I know, Reg’s sort doesn’t. Anyway, Freund is still working on his “radiotherapy” as he calls it, at the X-ray centre of Vienna’s famous general hospital.’

  ‘What would Reg have to lose by consulting him – if he’s available?’

  Picken frowns. ‘Well, it would involve a major domestic disruption if Reg stayed in Vienna for treatment, and the cost would be considerable. Just getting there could set him back physically, too. You’d need a private nurse to go with you. It’s a long way to Vienna.’

  ‘Not by air, it isn’t,’ Mitchell says. ‘Supermarine have assured me they’d meet any outlay that might prolong my life. And I’m sure I could get one of my family in Stoke to come and mind the house. And Gordon, when he comes home on weekends.’

  Picken stares at his patient, then turns his gaze on Flo. ‘You two really want to try this, don’t you?’

  ‘The way I feel now – especially after today’s news – I have no alternative,’ Mitchell says. ‘Even the remotest chance is better than none. Can you help us, Pick? Can you put us in touch with Freund’s outfit?’

  ‘Right then, I will!’ Picken says, slapping the tabletop. ‘I know a chap called Pearse who acts as the hospital’s contact in London. I’ll ring him as soon as I get back to my surgery. If he manages to organise it, you’ll need to have your plans for the home front ready. Time is of the essence, given Reg’s condition.’

  ‘Given Austria’s condition as well,’ Mitchell adds. ‘The Nazis want to drag that country into their so-called Reich, I’ve read. And the Austrian Nazis are growing in strength, keen on this idea too. Stands to reason – Austria spawned Hitler, after all. I wouldn’t want to fall into the hands of those devils.’

  ‘Nor would the Herr Professor, I dare say,’ Picken says. ‘He’s Jewish. We all know how the German Jews are faring – denied citizenship, barred from practising any profession. Old and eminent as Freund is, they’d throw him out onto the street.’

  ‘Righto! Let’s jump to it then,’ Mitchell says.

  Eastleigh aerodrome. Thursday 29 April 1937, 8 am. On a crisp spring morning the Mitchells’ Rolls pulls up at the entrance to the passenger admin building. Flo emerges from the driver’s seat. At the same time the rear doors open and two younger women briskly alight – Vera Cross, and the shorter, stockier Theresa Jones, the nurse hired to accompany the Mitchells during their stay in Vienna.

  Miss Jones hurries to open the front passenger door to help her charge to emerge. Vera parks the car while Flo and the nurse support him into the building. Vera rejoins them at the passport control counter to expedite the formalities before the party makes its way out to the hardstanding where a chartered de Havilland Dragon Rapide awaits them. The pilot of the plane, who has been carrying out preliminary checks, approaches them and introduces himself as Jim Beadle.

  ‘I must say it’s an honour, sir, to fly you to Vienna,’ he says.

  ‘I just hope I don’t give you too much trouble on the way, Beadle. I’m afraid I’m not as airworthy as I used to be. And it’ll take us six or seven hours including a refuelling stop, won’t it?’

  ‘Yes it will, sir. But the weather report is favourable. Don’t worry, we’ll deliver you safe and sound.’

  Mitchell casts an eye over the plane. He approves of its designer, Geoffrey de Havilland, who has also given the world the Gipsy Moth and quite a few other useful aeroplanes. De Havilland might be a traditionalist – this 35-foot-long Rapide is a twin-engined biplane skinned in plywood and standing on a fixed undercart complete with ‘trousers’ – but he has his sights set on style and comfort, not shattering speed records. Mitchell admires the elegantly tapered wings, the streamlined nose section and abundant Perspex of the plane in front of him. If he’s feeling up to it he’ll be able to enjoy a fine view of the countryside they’ll be flying over.

  ‘You’re a flyer yourself, I’ve heard, sir,’ Beadle says. ‘You’re welcome to sit on the flight deck, in the navigator’s seat behind mine, if you’d like that.’

  ‘Thank you. Yes I would.’

  The five of them make their way to the steps leading up to the door just behind the wings. Vera takes her leave, hugging Flo and Mitchell. The manners of the Supermarine works no longer apply.

  ‘Best of British luck, you two! I do hope Professor Freund can help,’ she says.

  ‘Once again, Vera, we can’t thank you enough for arranging all of this, a
nd so quickly!’ Flo calls after her.

  Mitchell accepts the women’s help climbing aboard while Beadle lifts his passengers’ bags through the rear hatch into the luggage compartment. The little cabin would normally hold six seats – three lining each side – but a raised ambulance stretcher has replaced the seats on the starboard side. The cabin ceiling is so low that he has to take off his hat and crouch a little to move around. A hatch in the rear bulkhead carries the legend, ‘Lavatory’. Once strapped into the navigator’s seat he has a good view out of both sides of the plane, as well as forward and up, thanks to the generously sized windscreen and Perspex sections above it.

  He thought he’d never fly again. But here he is, enjoying the drama of the take-off, the bodily sensations of climbing through modest turbulence, and the receding view of the land below. Soon they’re flying over water, and then over land once more.

  The further they penetrate inland, though, the more pronounced pockets of turbulence bring on his abdominal pain. When the analgesics fall short, the nurse suggests he lie down on the stretcher. When he does so she gives him a morphia injection, lays a blanket over him, adjusts the pillows under his head, and secures the straps that hold him in place.

  By now he’s renewed his acquaintance with morphia, which began after his colostomy. If there’s no nurse to hand he can swallow it in liquid form, carefully judging the dose. It’s always a trade-off between retaining some clarity of mind and more effectively extinguishing the pain. Once it’s taken hold, he can manipulate its effects a little. He can simply fall asleep, or he can enter into a pleasant dreamlike state, often embellished with visions and sounds.

  As so often these days, though, he’s exhausted and chooses sleep. He half-awakens when he feels the jolt of the wheels touching down for the refuelling stop at Basel. When the plane comes to rest voices in some foreign language float through his consciousness, along with a few metallic thumps and the whirr of a pump. Flo’s face appears above him, and her hand alights on his arm. Miss Jones seems to be hovering somewhere in the periphery.