Cousins at War (40 page)

‘I was on a truck when it was blown up. Quite a lot of us were injured and the driver was killed.’

The darkening of his eyes told her that he was remembering the horrors of that time so she said, brightly, ‘Does your mum know where you are?’

‘I haven’t written since . . . I didn’t want her to worry.’

‘I’d think she’ll be a lot more worried about not hearing from you.’ Her own mother had told her of the nights she had lain awake wondering where her daughter was.

He considered for a moment. ‘I hadn’t thought of that but I suppose you’re right. I’ll wait and see how this next graft goes then I’ll maybe write. Don’t say
anything about me when you write to your mother, though.’

Glancing at her watch, Olive stood up. ‘I’ll have to go or else Ron’ll be wondering why I’m late.’

‘Thanks for coming, Olive, and you’ll come again?’

His eyes were so humble and pleading that she couldn’t say no. ‘Yes, I’ll look in again.’

When she went home, she told Ron that she had seen Neil and explained how she had been forced into it. ‘I’m glad I went though,’ she continued, a little defiantly. ‘His
face had been badly burned and he’s very self conscious about it. You don’t mind me going to see him, do you? I felt nothing but pity for him.’

‘Like you feel for me?’ He looked at her with his eyebrows raised, then burst out, ‘No, I’m not being fair! Poor devil, go to see him as often as you like.’

‘I did promise to visit him again.’

‘So you should. He’s family, isn’t he?’

She went to see Neil every second day, telling Ron before she left the house why she would be a little later in going home, and he gave no sign of being displeased. After Neil’s next
graft, with skin from his back instead of his thigh, as had happened before, she was delighted to see an improvement on his shrivelled upper lip, telling him so before going on to hold a one-sided
conversation because he was not allowed to move his mouth yet. She told him about the work she did, about Ron, about anything she could think of which might be of interest to him, and he listened
avidly to every word.

A week later, events were taken further out of her hands. She was telling Ron that Neil was happier with his looks and was looking forward to going out. ‘He says he can face other people
now, though he’s still some more grafts to get.’

Ron smiled, ‘Take him home for tea as soon as he feels up to it. I’m sure he’ll welcome some home cooking and I want to meet him. I haven’t met any of your family
yet.’

Olive thought carefully before issuing the invitation. Ron had meant it in good faith but she was afraid that when he saw Neil and her together he might brood about the fact that they had once
made love and be depressed again. At last, she decided to risk it. Ron would realise that only family ties bound her to her cousin now and any doubts he had would be dispelled.

Walking through the hospital doors, Neil was thinking of his visit to the cottage. Watching Olive attending her husband as if he were a child had been a revelation. Ron’s
love for his wife had been glaringly obvious and it had been equally clear that, although she cared for him deeply, she did not love him. She had changed completely since he had last seen her, Neil
mused, a strange feeling assailing the pit of his stomach when he recalled what he had done on that occasion. She was no longer the spoiled brat she had been, determined to get her own way no
matter what; she was caring and tender now, and her manner to him had been quite friendly though, looking back, it may have been a little distant. Maybe she, too, had remembered, with shame, what
they had done on that last night they had been together.

Ron had been most hospitable, treating him like an old pal and inviting him back the next week and he had promised to go because he had enjoyed their company. It was good to get out amongst
friends. He had never found out if Alf Melville survived the war, though Alf had been his best friend for so long. It was a shame that they’d been separated so near the end, for they’d
been through so much together and it hurt not to know what had happened to him. But he would likely be demobbed and home by this time, making a play for every girl in Elgin. Well, that was
something he would never be doing again, for no girl would look at him now, not with a face like Dr Jekyll after he changed into Mr Hyde.

Neil’s thoughts veered to Olive again, wondering what had made her give up her studies at medical school. From the things that were said while they’d all been talking tonight, he had
gathered that she’d gone to France just after D Day, not long after he had gone across himself, so she hadn’t had time to qualify as a doctor. She had been absolutely set on it before,
so what had happened?

Although she was lying in bed with her husband, Olive was thinking about Neil. Over the course of the evening, she had been forced to admit to herself that she still loved him,
in spite of his grotesque face – which did not repulse her now as much as when she had first seen him. This time, she loved him for himself, not for his looks, as she had done before. When
she had seen him back to the hospital, neither of them saying anything personal, she had been tempted to tell him how she felt about him . . . but only for an instant. She was married to Ron, she
had been happy with him until Neil came back into her life, and she would be happy with him again – when her cousin went away.

A small sigh at her side had her on the alert at once, ‘Is anything wrong? Do you want a sleeping pill?’

Touching her cheek with his hand, Ron said, ‘I’m OK, stop worrying. It crossed my mind just now that Neil and I make one complete man between us. If he had my face, or if I had his
legs . . . you’d have a real husband.’

She turned to kiss him, ‘I have a real husband, one that I wouldn’t change for anything. You should know that by now.’

‘I can’t help feeling . . .’

‘Don’t, then. If Neil’s going to upset you, I’ll tell him not to come any more.’

‘No, no, I like having him here. It wasn’t his fault I got moody. In fact, he cheers me up more than anybody else. I’ve been feeling a bit down all day, that’s what it
is.’

‘Will I ask Doctor Peters to have a look at you?’

‘He was here this afternoon, he often calls in when he’s passing. Look, Scottie, I’m fine, so just relax.’

She closed her eyes. She had been quite prepared to stop Neil from visiting but Ron seemed to enjoy his company and she would have to keep a tighter rein on her feelings when he came in
future.

Neil’s visits, at Ron’s instigation, were now twice weekly and Olive looked forward to them as much as her husband. She could talk and laugh with him without revealing anything of
her true feelings and it was getting easier all the time to act naturally when he was there. She was pleased that Neil’s company seemed to help Ron, whose moods had stopped lately, his good
humour carrying over from one visit to the next, and she sometimes found herself hoping that Neil would never be sent home.

‘Driver was telling me today that Neil’s to be having his next skin graft,’ Ron remarked one day. ‘I won’t see him for a while and I’m going to miss
him.’

Olive looked at him in concern, ‘There’ll come a day when he’s discharged, you know, and you’ll never see him again.’

‘Oh, I know that, and I’ll have to put up with it but he makes me feel . . . I don’t know, maybe it’s because we’re both in the same boat, having a handicap
we’ll never overcome . . . but I feel lucky when he’s here. I have a wife to look after me . . . and I shouldn’t think he’ll ever find a girl to . . .’

‘He has a mother who’ll look after him,’ Olive broke in. ‘When Gracie’s brother and his wife were killed in the Blitz she was left to look after their daughter
Queenie and she put her through school and sent her to university, even if it must have been a struggle for her financially. She never complained once, that I know of.’ Recalling the things
she had said to Queenie, Olive came to an abrupt halt.

Having already been told about this, Ron grinned, ‘I know you were a proper bitch at that time, but by God! You’re an angel without wings now.’ His smile faded. ‘I
don’t know how I’d have got on if it hadn’t been for you. It’s a girl like you Neil’s going to need but they’re not ten a penny.’

She gave a faint smile, ‘It’s just as well, isn’t it?’

Six weeks later, Olive was surprised that Ron was not in the kitchen when she went home but she hung her cloak up on the usual hook before going through to the bedroom. He was lying on the bed
but the colour of his face told her that he was not just sleeping. Hurrying over, she felt his pulse, barely noticing the tumbler on the chest by the bed, and her heart came into her mouth when she
could scarcely feel a beat at all. Bending over him, she tried to give him mouth to mouth resuscitation, but there was no response. Panicking now, she ran to the farmhouse and asked Mr Lord to
phone the doctor and, as he gave the operator the number, his wife, a homely, comfortably plump woman, said, ‘Is something wrong with Ron? I’d better go back with you.’

When they went in, Olive felt her husband’s pulse again but this time it had stopped altogether, not even the feeble beat she had picked up before. Turning to the farmer’s wife, she
whispered, ‘He’s gone.’

‘Come through to the fire and sit down, m’dear.’ The woman took her arm and led her into the kitchen. ‘Have you got any brandy? You’re as white as a
sheet.’

While Mrs Lord was looking for the bottle of brandy in the cupboard, Olive spotted the letter on the mantelpiece with one word on the envelope. ‘Scottie.’ Suspecting what it was, she
grabbed it and stuffed it into the pocket of her apron.

‘Here you are, m’dear.’

The spirits calmed her a little and she accepted the cup of tea which she was handed in a few minutes. ‘I should have been here with him,’ she said sadly.

‘You couldn’t have done anything. It’s been his heart.’

Sure that it had not been his heart, Olive kept silent. If she could only find out what was in the letter . . . ‘I’ll have to go to the lavatory.’

She almost ran to the outhouse at the bottom of the small garden and put the hook over the staple to lock the door. With shaking hands, she drew out the letter and opened it.

‘Oh, Ron,’ Olive whispered, feeling that she had been slowly strangled, ‘I’m so sorry!’

After a moment, she went back inside, her heart aching for a man she had never loved, but who was as dear to her as if she had.

When Dr Peters came, she went through to the bedroom with him, Mrs Lord remaining discreetly in the kitchen, and after hearing that Olive had found her husband lying on the bed and that she had
tried to revive him, the doctor made a brief examination then pursed his lips. Certain that he had guessed what Ron had done, Olive held her breath.

His head suddenly shot up, as if he had been deliberating something and come to a final conclusion. Laying his hand on her shoulder, he said quietly, ‘I think you know as well as I how
your husband died, Mrs White?’ Colouring, she hung her head and he went on, ‘Shall we keep it just between the two of us? I know that I am risking my own career but I think we can get
away with it. Mr and Mrs Lord have seen me here a few times . . . oh, it was purely social calls but they don’t know that and, to be quite honest, Ron’s heart was not very strong. He
could have lasted another year, perhaps not even that, so . . . do you understand?’

‘But you can’t . . .’

‘It will save you a lot of embarrassment, my dear. I know that he’d been worrying about something for some time and I should state on the death certificate that he died while the
balance of his mind was disturbed but I will make it out as “cardiac arrest”, which is what it came to in the end, after all, isn’t it?’

Olive’s conscience wouldn’t let it rest there. ‘It was all my fault though I didn’t think he knew. I fell in love with someone else and . . .’

He held up his hand, ‘Yes, I suspected that. Come now.’ In the kitchen, he said to Mrs Lord, ‘Look after her, she’s had a deep shock. I should have told her that
Ron’s heart was a bit dodgy.’

The woman nodded, ‘I did wonder why you kept calling.’

Olive was trembling violently when she sat down. Ron must have taken an overdose of the sleeping tablets that she had got for him once and which he had never used, that was why the empty tumbler
had been there. If only she had known what was in his mind, she would have taken them away and disposed of them and now, even though he had taken his own life so that she and Neil could marry, he
had driven a bigger wedge between them than ever. For the rest of her life she would blame herself for Ron’s death.

Why was Olive being so strange with him? Neil had posed this question to himself several times in the three months since Ron’s funeral. It had started on that blustery,
showery day in March, when he had hung back until she thanked the people who had attended – those of the hospital staff who could be spared, long-term mobile patients who had known Ron and
some who were conveyed to the cemetery in wheelchairs – and when she finally came to him, she had been very curt. ‘Thanks for coming, Neil,’ was all she had said, then excused
herself to go and talk to the minister.

He had wanted to let her know how sorry he was about Ron but she hadn’t given him a chance. He realised that she must have had a dreadful shock when she found her husband dead – a
heart attack, Mrs Lord had said – and that she would take a long time to get over it, but he had hoped to comfort her a little, to let her know that she wasn’t alone, that he would
provide a shoulder to cry on any time she wanted one.