Читать книгу The Interpreter - Philip Gibbs - Страница 16

Table of Contents

He had one more farewell to make before taking the night train to the west of England. It was to Peter and Katherine Langdon, his best friends in England.

“I feel as though I had come to say good-bye forever,” he told them, when he was shown into their room, that book-lined room—it was Langdon’s study—where he had had so many discussions before the war with this writing man whose novels had been an inspiration to him as a young man, and where he had met many intelligent people—all great talkers—in the years of crisis before the war. Langdon had seen the approach of war with horror. All his books had been dedicated to the spirit of peace, and he had gone far—too far in Barton’s opinion—to create friendliness between Germany and England. Katherine’s sister had married a German. German friends had come into this room, perturbed by the shadow of coming war, and torn desperately between admiration for Hitler’s achievements and fear that he was leading their nation to a new war of conquest. Barton had behaved badly to them, and had been hardly civil now and then. But he reverenced Langdon’s passionate desire for peace, and always the presence of Katherine, so wise, so fragrant in her mind, and so warm in sympathy and understanding, had helped him to wear off his rough edges and look upon this house so close to his own as a little sanctuary of civilization to which he was always welcome.

Now, when he came to say good-bye, he saw that something terrible had happened to these two people whom he loved. It was several moments before he became aware of that. He was self-centred because of that poignant hour in his own house. But there was something in the lingering clasp of Langdon’s hand, and in the silence of them both, which brought him out of his own introspection. Katherine’s face was dead white and he saw that she had been weeping.

“What has happened?” he asked. A terrible thought leaped into his mind, and he put it in one word.

“Paul?”

“He’s missing,” said Langdon in a low voice.

Barton looked into Langdon’s eyes and saw the anguish in them.

“It had to happen,” said Katherine. “I’ve been waiting for it night after night for months. Why should Paul escape when so many other boys were being killed? That awful nine-o’clock news. ‘Seven of our bombers failed to return.’ Those frightful raids over the Ruhr and Bremen, and Paul there in the barrage fire. ‘One of our bombers failed to return.’ To me, it was always Paul. One or seven, or seventy—who cared? People went on playing bridge, hardly listening. I’ve seen them when I had to sit in torture.”

It was the first time Barton had ever heard Katherine speak with a touch of hysteria. She had always been so brave. She had always comforted her husband when he was in the depths of gloom, but now her control had broken down, just for a second. He went over to her and took her hands and kissed them. They were very cold.

“I’m terribly sorry,” he said. “But isn’t there a gleam of hope in that word ‘missing’?”

Katherine Langdon struggled with herself, and after that moment of hysteria, when there was a sharp edge to her voice, she became calm and self-possessed again.

“Yes. We must cling on to that,” she answered. “They think he might have baled out.”

“Where was it?” asked John.

“Over the Ruhr—three nights ago.”

“Over the Ruhr.” John Barton dared not reveal his secret thoughts. The chances of baling out in that hell-fire were very slight.

“I’ve given up hope,” said Langdon. His despair was complete, like a man standing at the deathbed of his only son, with tragic resignation.

“I believe Paul is alive,” said Katherine. “I believe I should know if he were dead. I believe he would come to me at the moment of death.”

“Do you believe that?” asked John Barton. “Do they ever come?”

He thought of that curious sense of having heard Anne’s voice saying “Speak to me.” He had seemed to hear the words quite distinctly, and yet it must have been a trick of the mind.

“I have heard so many cases,” said Katherine. “I don’t feel that Paul is dead. Perhaps I’m deceiving myself. But it’s all I have now. Even self-deception is better than certainty.”

“No,” said Langdon; “I want certainty—one way or the other.”

This was John’s last night in England. He hated the idea of leaving these two people in this hour of their affliction.

“I wish to God I could stay,” he said presently. “I feel like a deserter. I feel that I’m running away from the danger zone and all my friends.”

“That’s nonsense,” said Katherine. “You’re going out on a great crusade, to enlist help for England.”

“I haven’t a chance,” said John. “I’m not a spellbinder. It will need a miracle to bring my people into this war.”

“Sometimes I believe in miracles,” answered Katherine.

It was an odd coincidence that she should have spoken those words, for a miracle happened then. It seemed like a miracle. It had the effect of a miracle.

The telephone bell rang, and for a moment or two no one stirred to answer it.

“I dare not lift that receiver,” said Langdon. But while he said he dared not he rose from his chair and walked towards the telephone. But it was Katherine who was there first.

“Yes,” she said. “Mrs. Langdon speaking.”

John Barton was standing up also. He watched Katherine Langdon’s face intently, while for a second or two she listened. She had been very pale when she lifted the receiver. Suddenly a flush of colour swept it.

“You are certain?” ... she asked. “He is safe? ... Oh, how wonderful!”

She replaced the receiver. Peter Langdon had listened to her words with all his soul in his eyes. John Barton had listened with a sudden shock of joyful relief.

“Paul is alive,” said Katherine Langdon. “Oh, my darling, our torture is at an end. Paul baled out over the North Sea and was picked up by a trawler. They say he isn’t badly hurt.”

She went over to her husband and put her arms about him.

“If God has anything to do with it,” said Langdon, “I thank God.”

John was profoundly moved. He dared not look at this father and mother as they clung to each other.

Then he gave a queer kind of laugh.

“I feel terribly glad,” he said. “I feel as if someone had given me the keys of heaven. It’s grand that it happened before I left.”

He stayed with them until it was time to make a dash for the station. They both kissed him before he went away. He went away with wet eyes. He hated to go.