Chapter 26 Nightmares
In the past six months, Ned had learned that if there was a downside to having Charlie as a lover again, it was that it took him even longer in the mornings to get himself out of bed and into work.
This Monday was particularly egregious after a lazy session of lovemaking with Charlie in the early hours of the day, and Ned tried to ignore the pointed glance Miss Forbes made to the clock when he entered their office.
“Morning, Mr Pinsent.”
“Morning, Miss Forbes.” Ned hung his overcoat on the coat stand. A teapot was already sitting on his desk beside a white teacup. “I missed the tea ladies already?”
“You ask for your tea steeped so strongly that they brew it the night before,” Miss Forbes responded, following him into his office with a worryingly large stack of papers that made him feel like a schoolboy about to be assigned his lessons.
Unlike other secretaries, Miss Forbes left Ned to his own devices when it came to pouring his own tea, so while he sorted out his cup, she ran through the day’s tasks.
“These are the reports from the War Office, the Foreign Office and the Ministry of Information that you requested. The middle folder includes the new rationing recommendations, which you are going to want to read yourself. The papers on the bottom are the latest draft for the National Service Act extension, but frankly nothing worth your time there.”
Ned arbitrarily flipped one of the files open, not really reading the contents on the neatly typed sheets. “I agree the extension will pass without any help from us.” He looked up at her. “I’m going to have to enlist, aren’t I?”
Miss Forbes didn’t pause from taking notes on a small notepad. “The papers are already drawn up and ready for your signature.”
“They used to burn women like you as witches, you know.”
She pursed her lips, but Ned would swear that there might have been a smile. He expected her to leave him to his reports, but instead she ploughed ahead and said, “There is also the service record you asked for.”
“Thank you. Faster than I expected.” Ned took a sip of his tea to cover the shake in his voice.
He managed to stutter his way through the rest of their morning chat, but the door wasn’t even closed before he had pulled out the ragged manila folder and was flipping through the first pages.
Ned had no professional reason to request Charlie’s military records.
Personally, he couldn’t help but worry about what raising the age of conscription would mean for his lover.
There were tribunals conscientious for objectors to ask for exemptions, but they were unpredictable.
As well as likely to take into account past service.
The enlistment papers were as expected. Height: 5’6”. Eyes: Blue. Address: 151 Edge Lane, Marylebone. Training from September 1914 to October 1914. Arrival in Flanders: 4 November 1914.
Service records included his lengthy list of infractions, but also his citations. The Military Cross for gallantry. Mentioned in the dispatches, three, no five, times, including as a driver in the motor pool. Ned hadn’t known that.
As he reached the end of the slim file, Ned’s shoulders began to relax.
Then he turned to the last page—on a thicker paper, not the thin War Office sheets. A letter dated August 1932.
Dear Sir,
I recently attended a gathering of old soldiers in France to celebrate the opening of the memorial to the Somme and commemorate those lost for King and Country.
While there, a suspicion I have long harboured was confirmed; a stain on that very sacrifice.
In May 1917, I was serving as the lieutenant for the London Scottish Regiment outside of the Somme.
The offensive had not gone our way, and I called out the order to retreat.
One of my men refused this order, a Corporal Charles Villiers.
Later that night I was informed he returned injured to the dressing station, and when I visited him the marks of self-harm on his wrists were evident.
Before I could seek charges of treason and abandonment of post, Corporal Villiers was reassigned to the motor pool.
I believe that Corporal Villiers deliberately put his section and our battle plans at risk in order to injure himself and be removed from the front.
Worse, I believe he debased himself in the worst way to secure this removal.
I am ashamed to write that I said nothing at the time, fearing the powers that had clearly intervened to protect him.
Despite the years that have passed, I couldn’t in good conscience let this go unpunished. I am at your disposal to discuss further.
Cordially,
Mr Bernard Pemberton (Lt, ret’d)
Bugger and damnation. Ned slammed his hands down on his desk, not caring who heard his anger.
There was no surprise that a letter of gossip like this was ignored in ’32. But now? It would sink any application for objector status.
Ned opened the bottom drawer of his desk and dropped in Charlie’s file. He would come up with a solution for this, and for the meantime he was the only person with a copy.
He hoped.
???
Miss Forbes’ knock at Ned’s office door later that day was perfunctory, and she already had it open before Ned looked up from the reports he’d been attempting to read. “A Mr George Roland to see you.”
“Come in, come in!” Ned got up from his desk and beckoned to the stuffed chairs by his fireplace.
In the decades since George had helped recruit Ned to government, he had advanced in his own career, perhaps not as senior as Ned, but he had his fingers in every pie at the Treasury.
While Ned’s office at the Cabinet Office was only a few hundred yards down the street from George’s in the Treasury, it had still been a good number of months since their paths had crossed.
As he clasped the other man’s clammy hand, Ned could tell this was not a social visit. George was sweating buckets, and his normally soft face was furrowed with lines. Checking that the door was closed, Ned leaned in closer. “What’s the matter? Shall I have Miss Forbes scrounge up some tea?”
“Do you have anything stronger?” George was white as a sheet, his voice barely above a whisper.
Without hesitating, Ned went to the bottom drawer of his desk, the same drawer where he had dropped Charlie’s file a few hours earlier, and extracted the other secret in his office: a bottle of whiskey, a birthday present from his father.
He poured a glass and passed it to George. “Have some of that and tell me what is going on.”
George took a long sip before he spoke. “Hugh was arrested for homosexual acts at the Victoria Arches public toilets three nights ago.”
“Oh Jesus.” Ned fought the urge to down his whiskey in a single go. “The Met is pressing charges?”
“He was on his knees with another man’s cock down his throat. Hard to say it was all a terrible misunderstanding.”
“So stupid!” Ned began pacing the room. “How many times did you tell Hugh to be careful? Did I tell him? Why on earth was he cottaging?”
The last time he had seen Hugh was almost a year ago at one of Sophie’s parties. The man had been as bombastic and charming as ever.
George answered Ned sharply, “You know what I thought when Freddy rang me? But for the grace of God. But for the grace of God.”
Ned stiffened. “Don’t tell me you’re familiar with the Victoria Arches’ toilets?”
“Not all of us can still turn the heads of young men in the pubs, Edmund. Some of us are old and fat and on a civil servant’s salary.” Ned wasn’t quite sure how to take that. George reached for the bottle of whiskey. “That wasn’t what I meant. What I meant was, luck is running out.”
“There is a way to go about things. You know it, I know it. People—”
“—don’t see what is right in front of them,” George finished.
“Except maybe they are paying attention now. Or the rules have changed. It used to be simple—don’t wear make-up and don’t kiss men in public.
Then you couldn’t wear your trousers too tight or laugh too high pitched.
Now you can’t wear bright colours. I’ve no idea whether one should have short hair or not, but it feels like every year something that used to be safe is now a risk. ”
Ned slouched into his chair, the defeat in George’s voice seeping into him. “They used to focus on the most defiant and leave the rest of us alone. Yet every year the noose seems to tighten.”
“Such disgust at deviants.” George stared into his whiskey. Ned hated that, even in the privacy of his own office, he didn’t dare take the hand of his dear friend to offer comfort.
“One would hope that the Met would have better things to do with their time. What with the war and the rationing and the Blitz.” Ned knew he was lashing out at paper tigers.
“The vice squad has such vigorous energy for stamping out indecency.”
“Not unless you cut the funding for it,” Ned countered.
That at least got a small smile from George. “I try every year.”
“Cheers to that.” Ned and George clinked their glasses in quiet defiance.
Ned had gotten a bit rounder in recent years, but he wasn’t fat.
His slightly too large facial features had always radiated kindness and, despite the defeat in his voice now, they still did.
Sitting across from each other like this made Ned vividly remember other, more pleasant cosy drinks.
Drinks that had turned into a nightcap at home.
Holidays along the Devon coast. A stone cottage to themselves.
A casual suggestion that they share a flat.
An equally calm reply about not wanting to overly entangle their lives.
George taking an early train back to London.
Ned walking the coast by himself. With a look, their whole affair played out in each other’s eyes.