Love, Death, Chariot of Fire Read online

  ‘How are you faring there, darling? Are you comfortable?’

  ‘The morphia has made me as happy as a pig in clover. As usual,’ he smiles.

  Both women laugh. ‘We’ll only be here for twenty minutes. Do you want to stretch your legs?’ Miss Jones asks.

  ‘No thanks.’

  He’s content to remain in the stretcher until a change in the engine note indicates that they’re on approach to land in Vienna. He reclaims the navigator’s seat and sees the Austrian countryside rising up to meet him. The aerodrome comes into view up ahead. Apart from the airfield itself it consists of six large hangars for aviation companies and commercial airlines together with three smaller ones for private and hobby planes, and a passenger admin building. Huge letters on the roof of the largest hangar – ones intended to be read from the air – spell out the name ‘HEINKEL-SÜD’.

  Beadle helps his passengers out of the plane, removes their luggage and takes his leave, promising to return when the party is ready to fly back to Southampton. He has to see that the plane is refuelled and safely stowed in a hangar before he takes the tram into the city for the night. Mitchell notices the warmer, dryer air of the central European spring.

  A blue Mercedes Benz sedan comes to pick up the trio. Mitchell’s companions help him into the front seat beside the driver, who seems to have no English. He drives his passengers the short distance to the admin building where their visas are checked and passports stamped.

  ‘Where are we?’ Mitchell asks when they’ve resumed their seats in the car.

  ‘Wo sind wir, mein Herr?’ Miss Jones repeats the question to the driver.

  She has at least a smattering of German, then, Mitchell notes. That’ll come in handy here. He has a smattering himself after his and Flo’s skiing trip to this country three years ago with the McLeans, but not enough to get by. He doesn’t understand the driver’s answer.

  ‘We’re in a place called Aspern, about eight miles from the hospital in the city centre. Shouldn’t take us long,’ Miss Jones reports.

  Still feeling the effects of the morphia, Mitchell settles back into the leather-covered seat and distractedly watches the scenery flash by – at first semi-rural, then more and more built up. The buildings become more pompous as they approach the centre of the city.

  They’re halted at an intersection as a large and noisy demonstration passes before them. Many of its participants wear brown uniforms and jackboots. Large flags on poles borne by these individuals float over the heads of the demonstrators. The flags feature a thick black swastika superimposed on a white disc, itself set in the middle of a red field. Seen as background to the Mercedes badge, the three-pointed star above the car’s radiator cap, they make for an ominous tableau. When Mitchell focuses on the badge, the flags blur into garish splashes of black and red behind it.

  ‘Isn’t that the new German flag?’ Mitchell asks. ‘What’s it doing here in Austria?’

  Miss Jones translates the questions for the driver. He gives an extended answer. Mitchell catches the word Nazischwein in the midst of it.

  ‘He says that the demonstrators are demanding reunification with the German Reich,’ Miss Jones says. ‘And that Nazis in other countries also fly this flag.’

  ‘ “Reunification”!?’ Mitchell scoffs. ‘When was Austria ever part of the bloody so-called German Reich?’

  ‘Niemals! ’ mutters the driver when Miss Jones puts the question to him. Never.

  The demonstration passes, and the car continues a short way to its destination via a side street. It bears the name Spitalgasse. They enter gates marked Röntgenzentrale des Allgemeinen Krankenhauses. A woman who seems to be the matron comes out to meet them when the car pulls up at the main entrance. She welcomes them in passable English.

  Mitchell soon finds himself settled into a pleasant private room decorated with framed pictures of alpine scenes. He still feels exhausted, and submits to being put to bed and served a tray of somewhat better hospital food than he’s encountered in England. Flo and Miss Jones wait to see that all his needs are met – including the continuous presence of an English-speaking nurse on the ward – before making for their Pension and a recommended restaurant, both nearby.

  ‘We’ll come back when we’re fed and watered to check on you, darling,’ Flo says.

  ‘That’s thoughtful of you, Flo. But I’ll probably be fast asleep.’

  After breakfast the next morning Mitchell is talking to Flo and Miss Jones in his room when they hear voices and a flurry of activity in the corridor outside his door. It soon opens to reveal two men in white lab coats. One looks to be around seventy years old and the other, who hangs back deferentially, in his late twenties. The younger man carries a file and a clipboard.

  ‘Mr Mitchell?’ the older one says.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I am Leopold Freund, and this is my assistant, Dr Franz Henschke. I take it these ladies are Mrs Mitchell and Miss Jones?’ Pleasantries and handshakes are exchanged. Freund speaks a hesitant but clear English. His grey hair is receding on his large head; beneath it his oval face appears set in a sombre expression, albeit one subverted by humour crinkles around his kindly but alert brown eyes. His grey moustache sets up an appealing contrast with his olive complexion. Above all the man has an unmistakeable air of authority that the attentive presence of his underling reinforces.

  He turns back to Mitchell. ‘I have read Mr Gabriel’s and Dr Pickens’s notes and seen the transparencies they sent. I don’t have to tell you how seriously ill you are, Mr Mitchell. But before we discuss your treatment here I’d like to know a bit more about you. You are an aeroplane designer, yes? A prominent one, I am led to believe.’

  ‘Yes, doctor, I design aeroplanes. I can’t comment on the “prominent” part.’

  Freund smiles at Mitchell’s modesty. ‘So what sort of aeroplanes do you design?’

  ‘All sorts – seaplanes, landplanes, amphibians. Civilian and military.’

  Freund nods. ‘But I hear your particular achievement is a new Jagdflugzeug – how do you say it in English, Henschke?’

  ‘ “Fighter plane”, Herr Professor.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve had some success with one of those,’ Mitchell says.

  ‘ “Some success”? Just how good is this “fighter plane” of yours?’

  ‘Mein Jagdflugzeug ist das beste in ganzen Welt, Herr Professor! ’ Mitchell declares, to his own astonishment at the rush of ski-lodge German.

  Freund also manifests surprise at the claim, or the unexpected German it’s expressed in – perhaps both. ‘Well, Mr Mitchell, I do hope you’re right. You British will need an effective weapon to keep the Nazis out of your country. Unfortunately we Austrians have no such weapon and expect them to invade us at any moment.’

  ‘You have my deepest sympathies, Professor. Yesterday, when we were being driven here, we were stopped by a large Nazi demonstration that seemed to invite an invasion.’

  ‘We have many Nazis in this country, Mr Mitchell, and many more idiots who would welcome being colonised by Germany. Our government lacks the will to resist. When the invasion comes, I doubt it will meet any resistance at all. As a Jew I have no choice but to resist it by leaving the country. For Belgium in fact – a position in Brussels is waiting for me. My bags are already packed, so to speak.’

  ‘That’s terrible, doctor! After all you’ve done for medical practice in this country over the decades. In this very hospital, Dr Picken informs me.’

  Freund sighs. ‘Quite so, Mr Mitchell. But right now you are my welcome patient here in Vienna, so let us get on with that. In an hour we will take you to the diagnostic X-ray department where I’ll examine you and we’ll take pictures of your insides so we know exactly where your tumours are, and their dimensions. Once we know all that, we can begin the radiotherapy tomorrow. We don’t want to subject healthy tissue to our ionising rays, you see.’

  ‘Miss Jones is a qualified nurse. Can she accompany me during these sessions?’
/>   ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘How frequent will these radiation therapies be, doctor?’ Flo asks.

  ‘Every couple of days. On some of the days in between we’ll take more pictures of your husband’s insides to see how the tumours are responding to the treatment. We’ll let you know in advance when we need him, ladies, so you can take him on walks or outing at the other times. Nothing strenuous, of course.’

  ‘What are the chances of the treatment working, Professor? Mitchell asks.

  Freund hesitates. He seems to be a sensitive man, and looks as if he’s weighing up the conflicting demands of truthfulness and encouragement.

  ‘We doctors still know so little about cancer – its causes and varieties – and about how and why human tissue responds to X-ray radiation. All we know is that certain doses of radiation will shrink and eventually kill certain types of cancer. But I have to tell you now that, in my experience, we fail more often than we succeed, even though our success rates seem to be improving as we experiment with different ways to apply the treatment.’

  ‘I see,’ Mitchell says. ‘That’s the answer I was expecting, I suppose.’

  ‘At very least we will send you home knowing that you’ve done all you could to beat your disease,’ Freund says, before he and Henschke take their leave.

  The English trio’s lives settle into a rhythm in Vienna. During treatment sessions Flo takes the fifteen-minute walk to Franz Josefs Bahnhof where she can buy The Times from the newsstand, though issues are two days old by the time they arrive. This far from England it hardly seems to matter. Each issue gets passed around so each of them can read it at their leisure. The paper reports much ado about the imminent coronation of George VI. Edward abdicated last December, and Mitchell has been too preoccupied with his own problems to have any strong feelings about that. He simply notes that George flew with the RAF towards the end of the Great War, and that has to be an excellent qualification in these dark times.

  On non-treatment days Mitchell encourages Flo and Miss Jones (who has now become ‘Theresa’) to visit one of the galleries or museums the city is famous for, while he reads his mail, including correspondence that Vera has forwarded, and writes his own letters. He writes to his mother, and his brothers Eric and Billy.

  Mostly, though, he writes to Gordon, among other things asking for his impressions of the spring growth in the garden. More importantly, he engages his now sixteen-year-old son in correspondence about the career he wants to pursue. Gordon is looking forward to leaving school, and expresses an interest in turns in becoming a mechanical engineer, then an accountant. Mitchell offers to use his contacts to help him in each case, while taking every opportunity to suggest that he’d do well to stay at school. He writes to Gordon’s housemaster to recruit an ally in that campaign.

  On some days Flo and Theresa take him in a taxi to one or other of Vienna’s famous coffee houses where they sit in thickly carpeted rooms; even the tablecloths seem to be made of carpet. Old gentlemen sit at the tables around them playing chess or cards, or reading broad-sheets strung onto poles along their spines to make them easier to handle. The coffee agitates him a little, but makes a fine accompaniment to the delicious cakes.

  The café visits remind him of his convalescence in Bournemouth, after his colostomy operation. But that memory has a disheartening edge. Back then he was aware of the pain receding and his strength returning day by day. Here in Vienna he has some better days, too; however, they’re inevitably followed by ones when the pain and feeble-ness assail him worse than ever. He experienced that darker edge especially on 20 May when Flo and Therese took him to Café Imperial, close to the Opera House, to celebrate his birthday – his forty-second, and almost certainly his last.

  After a fortnight in Vienna he feels any hope of a cure slipping away, returning him to the prospect of imminent death. With it rage and sadness assail him. He mourns what might have been – many more years with Flo, watching and guiding Gordon’s progress, continuing on with his work. He also mourns everything he’s losing or has already lost: friendships formed around shared projects at Supermarine, the excitement of seeing new designs take to the air, sport, and the many possibilities that come from occupying a fit, healthy body.

  Then there’s the loneliness. It’s not that he lacks for warm and kind company here. Freund and his staff, too, have taken such good care of him. He and Freund have even got onto first-name terms. But he can’t discuss dying with any of his carers or companions. The talk is all about treatment, not what comes after it fails. Yet dying is becoming the task at hand, and it’s the most challenging thing he’s ever done.

  He can’t even talk to Flo about dying, though they’ve been able to share so much during their marriage. They certainly discuss his pain and his growing physical incapacity. And they’ve discussed his will, her coming role as executor of his estate, his financial settlement with Vickers which will underpin her and Gordon’s financial security, and how she’ll carry on as Gordon’s sole surviving parent. But any reference to the actual business of dying shatters her.

  Strangely, the only person he can talk to about it is Stretton Reeve. The gap between their beliefs about God and life after death remains, and yet also remains trivial, just as the man said. Mitchell can vent his rage and unbearable sense of loss without inhibition to Reeve, certain he’s being heard and understood. And that Reeve will keep his promise not to preach – not let a cri de cœur prompt a sermon. In itself religion seems to retain its monopoly over the subject of death and the language in which to express its majesty. Once again Mitchell recalls the words of the burial service, about how we all flee as if we were shadows ‘and never continueth in one stay. In the midst of life we are in death.’

  Stretton Reeve is back in Southampton. His absence here in Vienna feeds Mitchell’s homing instinct. His growing homesickness.

  Monday 24 May 1937, 9 am. Freund has convened a meeting with Flo, Theresa and Henschke around Mitchell’s bed. The old doctor wears a more lugubrious expression than ever. No one seems to have any doubt about what he’s about to impart.

  ‘If our treatment was to work, Reg, it would have shown up by now in our X-ray pictures. I’m afraid to say we have detected no such progress. We can of course keep trying if that is your wish. But I think it is time for you to know where things stand and make whatever decision you feel is in your best interest.’

  Although it’s what Mitchell expected to hear, Freund’s words are like a dagger sinking into his back. His last hope is gone. He takes his time scanning the faces around him. The two women look down, as if already standing at his graveside looking down on his coffin.

  ‘Thank you for being so frank, Leo,’ he says. ‘I was expecting your conclusion. I’m determined to return to my home in Southampton to die. I want to do that surrounded by familiar people and things that are dear to me. I know you’ve done your best for me, and shown me the greatest kindness. But it’s time to go home.’

  ‘I respect your decision, Reg,’ Freund says. ‘More than I can say. You’re a brave man.’

  ‘People keep telling me that, Leo. But in our two professions you can do a lot of damage by ignoring reality. That’s my training as much as it is yours.’

  As soon as the two doctors have left the room, Mitchell turns to Flo. ‘Please wire Vera right away, darling. Ask her to send the plane. Today if possible, so we’re home tomorrow afternoon.’

  Chapter 21

  A departure

  ‘Hazeldene’, Portswood. Sunday 6 June 1937, noon. Reginald Mitchell sits supported by cushions in an upright wooden chair in the garden facing the pond. He’s so weak that he needed help to come out and settle in the chair, and he’ll need help again to get up from it. Perhaps he’s seeing his garden for the last time. With that in mind he’s taken a minimal dose of morphia, just enough to rise above the pain without dulling his senses. The family have retained Theresa Jones to see to him during the nights, but during the day when Flo and Gordon are looking a
fter him, he can manage his own oral medication.

  It’s a warm, sunny day with a few white puffy clouds floating across the sky. The garden is flourishing in its early-summer glory. He breathes in the multilayered floral scents with his eyes closed, then opens them to look around him. The Cox’s Orange Pippin apple trees are already yielding ripe fruit. The pear, horse-chestnut and plum trees still have a way to go before their fruit matures. Meanwhile flowers of all sorts are in full bloom – including geraniums, pansies, daisies, phlox, hydrangeas and roses. The London Pride ground cover has spread nicely, now boasting its pale pink rosettes. The yellow water irises ringing the pond vie with their pink flag-iris cousins in the flower beds.

  Bees and butterflies hurry from flower to flower as if overwhelmed by an embarrassment of riches. Tall oak, ash and beech trees stand guard over it all from the council land beyond the garden gate. Under the surface of the water in the pond the goldfish swirl. Overhead a flight of wondrously aerobatic swallows flits and snaps at tiny airborne insects.

  Mitchell pays silent homage to Derek, the gardener, for having brought all this about. It makes him wonder time and again if he’s neglected the more important possibilities and fulfilments of a human life – nature, beauty, family. Perhaps Derek is the true creative genius. Then there’s Flo, who’s created and nurtured new life, as well as meeting his own needs and managing their household. And Stretton Reeve, who upholds an enriching human community and adroitly fosters civic decency. While he himself has spent his all-consuming work life poring over dry drawing boards and mucking in on the noisy, ugly shop floor in Woolston.

  But when he’s confessed to such regrets to Reeve in recent days, the vicar has reminded him that he has created beautiful things too. Starting with the Spitfire. Yes, it’s true: no-nonsense men of the world – colleagues, test pilots and RAF brass – have often been moved to utter the word ‘beauty’ after seeing and flying that plane. As if it were a flying sculpture. And the nearest thing a human being has come to reproducing the lethal speed and agility of the swallows at work over his head. He remembers Ralph Sorley likening it to the exterminating angel. And Reeve associating it with the biblical chariot of fire, that expression of divine grace.