The Silent Forest Read online

  ‘Best not.’

  ‘Noah might look like a lost cause, but the least I can do is to bring him a sandwich every morning. Keep an eye on him.’

  ‘It’s still got to be a huge mistake.’

  ‘Noah or my baby?’

  ‘Stop being so bloody uppity. I don’t think I can bear it today.’

  ‘Say what you have to, but sometimes a little act of kindness counts for more than the airy-fairy twaddle that we hear from our so-called betters.’

  ‘Isn’t that the truth.’

  Bella barked.

  ‘Don’t worry about her,’ said Jo. ‘She just wants her sausage.’

  *

  Jo ordered a freshly roasted coffee in the Cadena Café and shot Bella a smile as she lay down obediently at her feet.

  ‘What’s up?’ asked John, opting for hot chocolate and a sticky bun. ‘Don’t tell me you’re going to be nice today, after all?’

  ‘First thing this morning I stood in front of my mirror and told myself: Jo Wheeler, you are slim, you are fabulous, you are brilliant.’

  ‘No change there, then.’

  ‘I was brought up to be a nice, obedient girl. I went to a good finishing school for polite young ladies, but for too long I never thought for myself. No one has a right to expect everything to be tickety-boo any more.’

  ‘Can’t answer that.’

  ‘Being happy is all about choices, not constantly worrying if I’ll put a foot wrong.’

  ‘My view exactly.’

  ‘For too long I’ve silenced the sound of my own voice.’

  ‘That before your mother called you a whore, or after?’

  ‘Too much ‘poshness’ is depressing. It’s time to cut the navel-gazing. Suppress my negative feelings.’

  ‘You think?’

  ‘I’ve joined “The Women’s League of Health and Beauty”.’

  ‘I’ll say.’

  She could never tell if John was taking her seriously or not, but she pressed on.

  ‘From this day forward I’m going to make sure I keep fit and healthy for the sake of the baby. What about you?’

  John’s pencil-thin moustache was a sudden mess of frothy, hot chocolate.

  ‘I can’t take all these government ‘Keep Fit and Eat Healthy’ posters seriously.’

  ‘Happy as we are, are we?’

  ‘It’s not all good news. I’ve put on three pounds already. I must be one of the few people getting fatter despite rationing.’

  Bella lay on the ground and chewed the end off her sausage. She knew what it was like to be on a restrictive diet. Hers had come with beatings and confinement and still she’d been expected to give birth to puppies in her former home. Nor had she been safe when she crawled out of the wreckage after that bomb hit them all. You didn’t meet many dogs in big cities nowadays. In London, for instance, it was official policy to gas pets to save food.

  All that was behind her, but she still found it hard to take readily to strangers.

  John was one such person.

  Yet he seemed kind enough.

  Not that you could always tell.

  ‘So what are we really doing here?’ said John. ‘What is it you want to tell me that you can’t in the cathedral?’

  Jo lit a hasty cigarette.

  ‘As you know, the Dean’s sister is being buried tomorrow in Westbury-on Severn.’

  ‘Oh dear yes, everyone’s talking about poor Sarah.’

  ‘You have to admit she died rather brutally.’

  ‘But nobody I’ve met so far can say why it happened. Can you?’

  ‘From what I’ve heard she was driving home at night through the Forest of Dean when she swerved off the road and struck a tree. Stray animals roam wild. She could have met a sheep or a deer.’

  John took a moment to bite his bun in half.

  ‘A bit of a puzzle, definitely.’

  ‘Fire watching on the cathedral roof won’t be the same without her.’

  ‘You two struck me as very good friends.’

  Jo wanted to say that Sarah had been her only friend until John had come along. But she was afraid it might give him the wrong impression. She didn’t want to come across as a moaning Minnie.

  ‘Sarah might have, for all I know, never really liked me, but we talked a lot while looking out for the Luftwaffe. Did you know she was fearless at rock climbing? She was ready to clamber anywhere on top of the cathedral to dowse incendiaries.’

  ‘Everyone speaks very highly of her.’

  ‘As I said. A lovely person.’

  ‘Take my advice.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Don’t go.’

  ‘That’s just it. I really do want to do the right thing by my fellow plane spotter. Also Dean Drew isn’t coping too well with his loss.’

  ‘You mean you know you should attend but can’t see a way to wriggle out of it.’

  ‘I’ve seen enough funerals to last me a lifetime. I detest them. What would you do?’

  ‘I just told you.’

  She eyed him truculently over her carrot cookie.

  ‘No, really.’

  ‘Should I go with you, Jo?’

  ‘No, I’ll be fine.’

  John traded looks with Bella who shut one eye. She laid her head on her paws and sighed. Jo was frowning at her – so now someone wanted her opinion? By all means. She closed her other eye. Squeamishness should come before loyalty at all times.

  John reached for his hot chocolate again.

  ‘Tell me one thing.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘How old was she?’

  ‘Sarah would have been twenty-six this Sunday.’

  ‘Better take some flowers. Do it for all of us.’

  ‘Flowers? Are you mad? All those have been dug up to grow vegetables. Have you seen the price of violets, lately?’

  ‘Leave it to me. The archdeacon won’t miss six of his best blooms from his rose garden.’

  FOUR

  ‘You first, my love. Your palace awaits you.’

  Freya Boreman forced a smile at her husband’s brisk words – they were less invitation than command. James was holding open the door of their new house in the Forest of Dean. Dressed in his striped worsted business suit he managed to look rather self-absorbed and bookish with his slightly hunched shoulders. A certain handsomeness featured in his large, square head, rugged jaw and blazing red-rimmed eyes. He was not a young man, but he knew how to live well. That’s because he had the money to do it.

  Her show of enthusiasm was not exactly voluntary, but self-control won. Self-control always won. That’s why she was wearing the platinum and diamond wristwatch that he had just bought her, as well as the new eau de toilette with its hint of perfumed verbena. She wore her blonde locks gathered and waved with curls on top and rolled into a fashionable chignon at the back of her neck for the special occasion.

  It was at times like this that she knew to consider the risks before uttering a word – she held back and went in on herself like a snail.

  ‘Well James, it looks big and bright, I must admit.’

  ‘I thought we’d call it Beech Tree Grange.’

  ‘How lovely.’

  Freya secretly shivered. So much clean, perfect white plaster struck her as cold and unfeeling. It would need an enormous dining-room suite and a lot of easy chairs and sideboards to fill all the stark, empty angles. Such things weren’t that easy to come by as the world went to hell in a handcart.

  Nevertheless, she tiptoed from one vast space to another, marvelling.

  ‘Can it really be true?’

  ‘What’s not to like, my darling?’

  ‘At Drake’s House we have pleasant neighbours and a great view of the boats on the River Severn.’

  ‘You got that right.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Our so-called neighbours are always watching us come and go. They’re too interested i
n what we do. In what I do.’

  ‘What about me, James? I’ll be all alone in this woodland glade. I won’t have anyone to speak to all day.’

  ‘You’ll have our maid Betty. And Sam has no school to go to for the moment.’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘It’s only a matter of fitting the oil-fired Aga.’

  ‘We should decide what paper to hang on the walls.’

  His face clouded.

  ‘Would that be better?’

  ‘I don’t know. Are you telling me not to?’

  ‘Isn’t it fantastic!’ said James, removing his Homburg to stroke his slicked and neatly parted scalp. The use of so much shiny, lilac-scented Brylcreem to tame his shock of bristly white hair was threatening to ruin another, otherwise perfectly good hat. ‘It’s a whole new step up for both of us. Our future belongs here in our very own sylvan mansion.’

  No matter where Freya turned her head, to whichever window, the nearby Forest stared back at her in silence. Ancient oaks and beeches cast long shadows over the new home whose walls were all metal and glass, even futuristic.

  But James was too busy running his hand admiringly along red and black painted wall cupboards and creamy white worktops in the kitchen to notice. He trod the fashionable black and white checkerboard flooring and came to a stop at a freestanding, large metal box in a corner. With a loud hurrah, he levered open its door.

  ‘Come here Freya.’

  ‘Is that a …?’

  Words failed her.

  ‘Isn’t it the cat’s whiskers, darling?’

  ‘But where on earth did you get it?’

  ‘Never you mind.’

  She studied the shelves inside their latest acquisition and was genuinely astonished. While she might have the newest Goblin vacuum cleaner at home, she didn’t know anyone with a refrigerator. She stored all her meat in a wire mesh safe in the pantry while vegetables were left to wilt on a rack.

  ‘How beautiful.’

  ‘It’s a Frigidaire from America.’

  ‘But wasn’t it hideously expensive?’

  ‘Don’t worry your pretty little head about that.’

  Freya flinched. The kitchen was a marvel of new design but she hated it when he talked down to her. Not that he seemed to notice.

  ‘You might at least have consulted me on the colour scheme.’

  ‘Take care with these drawers and doors, won’t you. I don’t want you staining them. Whatever you do, don’t use bleach on them or you’ll ruin the finish. Just try a cloth and warm water. That’s goes for Betty, too. Make sure you tell her.’

  Since she’d had no say in it, the length of the brightly coloured room came as a genuine shock. Back at Drake’s House everything was, by comparison, quite tiny.

  ‘But James, don’t you think it’s a bit too big and swanky?’

  ‘Who wouldn’t want a kitchen this size?’

  ‘To do what exactly?’

  ‘Trust me, it means we can have bigger and better parties. Be as noisy as we choose. Invite the right kind of people.’

  Suddenly her worst fears were confirmed. In this bright new tomorrow at the heart of the silent Forest, her job was to play ‘hostest with the mostest’ to his business associates and their saccharine wives. It meant more expensive cars, champagne and haute couture clothes.

  She was going to have a hell of a time.

  FIVE

  ‘Look lively, the Chapter Steward is after us,’ said Jo, buttonholing John Curtis on her way to hear singers rehearsing for Choral Evensong at 3 p.m. ‘The British Red Cross and the Order of St John want to raise funds for the sick and wounded in the cathedral cloisters. He wants to know if we’ll help out?’

  ‘I will if you will.’

  ‘Okay, but I might have to run off for a pee every now and then. Something to do with the baby, you know.’

  ‘No, I don’t know. More importantly, no one else round here does, either. The dean will have a fit if he finds out you’re pregnant by some random soldier and not by your dead husband.’

  ‘That would indeed be a miracle.’

  ‘You know what I mean. Unmarried mother and all that…’

  ‘Yeah yeah, tell me about it. The whole world is going up in flames and all anyone can worry about is my GI baby.’

  ‘My lips are sealed.’

  ‘It won’t all be hush-hush for long, that’s for sure. My breasts are getting larger and so are my….’

  ‘Spare me the details.’

  ‘Who else round here climbs 225 feet up the cathedral tower every night? Who else freezes their ass off on the roof to watch for German Heinkels?’

  ‘Don’t I always?’

  ‘Without your flasks of lovely hot tea I’d die, it’s true.’

  She felt a bit sorry for John. As verger there was no denying the demands of the chief operating officer. He was also in the Home Guard. What he really dreaded, though, was not marching about with a wooden rifle but dressing up as Father Christmas for the specially sung Eucharist on 25th December. He had not yet been in his current job a full twelve months, but it had to be a racing certainty that on account of his avuncular size he would be the one saying ‘ho ho ho’ to the children again this year. At least he wouldn’t have to dish out any presents, not when everyone was being encouraged to donate funds to help finance the armed forces instead. Besides, there was no wrapping paper to be had for love or money in the shops. And what was a present without the surprise?

  They’d arrived at the font by the cathedral’s main entrance. Blackout was not far off, despite two extra hours of daylight every afternoon ever since the clocks had not been put back since 1940 and 1941 to save fuel. John rattled the big bunch of keys that swung from his belt. Ancient keys. To doors and history. They had to be doubly careful to keep everything safe, ever since they’d caught some chancer trying to help himself to one of two silver-gilt candlesticks from the altar last month. It was a myth to suppose that everyone was patriotic or actively supporting the war effort. Some people had an eye for the main chance.

  ‘So, Jo, what did you do about the boy? You still haven’t said.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘You never told me what happened. Was he casing the joint, or what? He was, wasn’t he?’

  She had no idea. There was no point lying to him. She could feign great concern or none at all. Nobody would know. Probably meant nothing. But she wasn’t behaving as if it meant nothing. Because their budding pyromaniac, although gone physically, hadn’t vanished. He’d somehow stayed behind in the shadows, incorporeally. By talking to him she’d established a link and now there was no going back. The genie, sprite or goblin was out of the bottle. It was called worry.

  Nothing placated it. Not the Preces of Evening Prayer, nor its prose psalms ending with the Gloria Patri. On the contrary, the monotone chanting of the Apostles’ Creed stirred something ghost-like in the air which even the combined joy of twenty choristers, twelve adults and an organ could not quite dispel: Credo in Deum Patrem omnipotentem, Creatorem caeli et terrae…

  ‘It turns out his name is Sam Boreman.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘You’re not going to believe it.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘We can talk about it later.’

  ‘Bullshit.’

  ‘Don’t worry, he’ll be back.’

  John stepped up the pace. For a big man, he could move surprisingly quickly.

  ‘You were meant to scare the hell out of him, remember.’

  ‘Because he left something behind.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘The Ian Allan “ABC of GWR LOCOMOTIVES”.’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘The boy is obsessed with trains.’

  ‘Really? That’s your answer?’

  ‘It’s not so bad.’

  ‘It’s not so good.’

  ‘Clearly you’ve not met many boys. Trainspotting is t
he new rage.’

  ‘Time to check the close,’ said John, with exasperation and signalled her outside.

  And Jo obeyed. They walked out of the South Porch into the bitterly cold air to the car park, beneath whose paving many a human skeleton still resided. It wasn’t only monks who lay interred in shallow graves at the foot of the minster’s walls, but the medieval citizens of Gloucester in their very own lay cemetery.

  Or so it was said.

  John might be right about the boy after all, thought Jo. They could be missing something. Could he be a thief? She didn’t think so. But should she have interfered? She’d done what she had to do. Now what? She should really throw Sam’s book away and forget all about it. That especially went for the very odd picture he had drawn her. Undecided, she watched John slip a rude note under the wiper blade of a badly parked, green Riley 9 Lynx Tourer that was doing its best to block access to the cathedral.

  Damned shoppers.

  It was all the distraction she could do with right now.

  Bella, meanwhile, slunk off to nearby College Green where she began digging grass furiously for more coffins.

  Sunday November 24, 1940

  The fires haven’t left much for the looters, that’s for sure. Here, Woolworths is wrecked and smouldering. I’m treading all sorts of boiled sweets, fruits and bars of chocolate whose pretty silver and gold Christmas wrappers lie scattered among the shop’s broken glass on the pavement.

  My hair is burnt and one ear hurts like hell. I’m stumbling along past wrecked buildings and overturned cars, willing the next bomb to fall on me as I try to see where I’m going through soot and tears.

  All I know is that those enemy planes have been passing over Bristol for hours now.

  Do you want to die tonight?

  Yes, I actually do.

  The firefighters don’t stand a chance – there aren’t nearly enough of them to cope with so much destruction. Burst water mains everywhere tell their own story. It’s 9 p.m. and the city is one blazing inferno. That goes for St Peter’s Church as well. It won’t be long before its bells fall down.

  In front of me the flame-lit river is a mass of dancing light on a cruel mirror. I plunge my head and hands into water but it might as well be liquid fire. My fingers, I realise with curiosity, are covered in blood.