My Name is Eva(49)

Pat scoffs. ‘It’s hardly panic stations here, is it? Not exactly what I’d call mad preparations.’ She looks around the drawing room at the few who are sitting in their armchairs. Some are dozing after their good lunch. There was a choice of roast pork or chicken curry, followed by rice pudding or apple tart. Evelyn complained because fish wasn’t on the menu, even though she has already had fish this week, so she had a cheese omelette.

‘So what exactly did you want to see me about that couldn’t be said on the phone?’ Pat is sitting down, but perched on the edge of her seat as if she is ready to fly away the minute Evelyn has spoken.

‘It’s lovely to see you, dear,’ Evelyn says. ‘I always prefer to talk about serious matters face to face.’

‘Yes, it’s lovely to see you too. But there had better be more to it than just wanting to see me this afternoon. I’m far too busy just for a social visit, you know, however quick.’ She checks her watch. ‘I might just have time to nip into Boots before I head back so come on, out with it.’

‘Well, dear, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking recently.’

‘About what exactly?’

‘Oh, about the past.’ Evelyn reaches for her niece’s hand. It feels calloused and there is a vestige of purple varnish on the nails. They’d be in much better shape if she pushed back her cuticles after a bath, just like Mama had shown Evelyn when she was young. Evelyn’s nails are still perfect pink and white ovals.

‘What about the past, Aunt? I’m much more involved with the present occupying all my time right now.’ Pat pulls her hand away and rummages for a remnant of tissue tucked up her sleeve.

‘Yes, dear, I know. Such a busy life you have. But I’ve been thinking a lot lately, about all sorts of things that happened in the past, and I think I may have remembered something that would interest your nice young man. You know, the one you brought to visit me the other week.’

‘Young man? Oh, you mean Inspector Williams?’

‘Is that his name, dear? He was asking me such a lot of questions. I think I may have been a bit muddled at the time when he was here, but now I think I might have some answers for him so I think you should ask him back for another visit.’

Pat is staring at Evelyn and rolls the damp tissue into a ball in her hand. ‘What kind of answers? I’m not dragging him all the way over here if you’re just going to get silly and cause a fuss all over again.’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t do that, dear. I think he’ll be very pleased to see me. In fact, I’ve written it down here, in my diary.’ Evelyn pats her handbag and when Pat reaches out for it, she says, ‘No, it wouldn’t make any sense to you. I have to tell him myself, face to face.’

‘Can’t I tell him what it’s all about so he knows it will be worth his while?’

‘Why? Do you think he’s too busy Christmas shopping to come and see me?’

‘No, I just want to be sure he won’t be wasting his time again.’

‘Then tell him I’ve remembered what happened to that man he was asking about, Stephen Robinson. Tell him I’ve remembered and it’s very important.’ And Evelyn holds her handbag tight with both hands, while Pat’s mouth falls open.





Part VI





And on the Sixth Day… (3,4,4,3)





45





12 November 1945



Darling Hugh,

I think you would have found it hard to contain your laughter, my darling. You always were one for a huge practical joke! I can’t quite believe how I kept up the act and managed to escape that horrible place. I just hope no one ever gets to hear about it and wonders how I’ve ended up without a baby after my phantom pregnancy!

So here I am, fully recovered from my supposed morning sickness, on my way to Wildflecken, the refugee camp where Brian Joliffe thinks I can help. It might be challenging there, but it surely can’t be as bad as the Forbidden Village, can it? I have already met my travelling companions and one of them is a nurse who says she is expected to be occupied day and night, delivering umpteen babies. I didn’t dare tell her that I had pretended to need similar services recently!



All my love, my dearest, Your Evie Ps I love you Xxxxx





46





Eva, 13 November 1945





In the Night





As the wintry sun began to dip, their truck rattled through miles of dark fir trees until they finally came to the camp and Eva was reminded of T.S. Eliot’s poem about the Three Kings, ‘Journey of the Magi’: But they were not the Magi, it was not yet Christmas and they had not arrived bearing gifts; they could only bring hope to Wildflecken, known to all the aid workers as the ‘Wild Place’.

The snow had come early that year and lay thick on the ground, ice forming in the ruts made by the constant movements of supply trucks. As they drew to a halt, the lorry’s exhaust billowing clouds of fumes around them, Eva could make out dark figures pulling makeshift sledges towards them along the frozen track, spilling like black ants out of the austere blockhouses in the middle of the camp.

‘Stay right here. I’ll tell them we don’t have anything,’ Ken said. He’d driven all the way from Frankfurt, telling them on the journey how the camp operated. It was familiar territory for him, this hearty Australian, but to Eva and the others it was an alien landscape, not just because of the snow and because they were far from home, but because this had been right at the heart of Hitler’s heartless empire. Wildflecken, once a secret SS training base, so secret even its name didn’t appear on any maps after 1938, was now a resettlement centre for thousands of displaced persons, all desperately hoping to find their lost relatives and return to lost homes.