‘Not with the hatches wide open, it couldn’t. Hah!’
‘That’s interesting, sir, and I’m glad the crew survived and all, but I’m wondering if you can tell me a bit more about the bodies?’
‘I’d be lying to you if I said nobody was killed at Slapton Sands, Miss Yates, but that was a day earlier, before the sub attacks, when the operation began and soldiers stormed the beach. They were using live ammunition, don’t forget. Some of the soldiers… well, I guess they forgot to duck.’
‘Cathy’s father was aboard one of the doomed LSTs,’ I told him.
‘Hannah’s right, sir. Number five three one.’
Bailey nodded sagely. ‘Well, then. His body would never have washed ashore at Slapton Sands. None of ’em did.’
‘What?’ Cathy and I said in unison.
‘God’s truth, ladies. When it was attacked by the German E-boats, that convoy was in Lyme Bay, twelve miles west-southwest of Portland. It was a major disaster, all right, but when those LSTs went down and the bodies floated ashore, they floated ashore at Chesil Beach in Dorset.
‘Some never came ashore, I’m sorry to say. The current’s strong in the bay. Carried many of ’em up the English Channel where they were never seen again.’
‘But what about the bodies that did float ashore? What happened to them?’
‘It took the Yanks eight days, but I can tell you on good authority that every body that washed ashore was accounted for. Had to be. Do you want to know why?’ His eyes twinkled mischievously.
Cathy nodded like a five-year-old at story hour, enrapt.
‘Ten of the missing men carried top-secret maps with details of the invasion. Until those maps were recovered, D-Day would be off.’
Cathy took a deep breath. ‘Since the invasion went forward, they must have…’
Bailey leaned forward, cutting her off. ‘All present and accounted for. The Americans had this burial regiment, you see. Efficient blokes. They loaded all the bodies into lorries and carried them to a cemetery in West London. Later, the bodies were moved to Cambridge.’
Tears filled Cathy’s eyes. ‘Were there any survivors, Mr Bailey?’
‘More than three hundred, I’d say. Every available boat in Portland, Weymouth and West Bay went out to help pick up survivors. Horribly burned they were, suffering from hypothermia, too.’
I shivered. ‘What happened to them?’
‘They were taken to hospitals all over the United Kingdom. Split up, kept out of contact with their families and with each other for more than five weeks. Locked up, some of them. Guarded twenty-four-seven. You know why, don’t you?’
Cathy was a quick study. ‘They had to protect the secret of the D-Day invasion.’
Bailey leaned back, folded his arms across his chest. ‘Exactly.’
‘I have this fantasy that my father survived,’ Cathy said, clearly grasping at straws. ‘Maybe he lost his dog tags when he jumped overboard. Maybe he was injured, suffering from amnesia.’
‘Frankly, Miss Yates, if your father was not accounted for at Chesil Beach, or listed among the survivors, most likely he floated out to sea. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it was.’
‘Missing in action. I know.’ Cathy sat silently for a moment, staring out the window where a sparrow was busily scattering seeds about the base of a feeder. ‘But you can’t be sure, can you? You didn’t actually see it.’
‘No. At the time, I was only seventeen. My family had been evacuated to a farm near Dittisham.’
‘Weren’t you ever curious what was happening to your farm, Mr Bailey? Didn’t you sneak back just to have a look?’
‘Dad and I wanted to, but American security was too tight. Even the Home Guard weren’t allowed into the American Zone, although they patrolled the roads that led up to it.’
Cathy puffed air out through her lips. ‘And we should believe what the government tells us – why?’
‘There’s no denying that there was a cover-up, but surely you can understand why.’
‘Then? Sure. But now? So long after D-Day? There can’t be any good reason to keep the details secret now!’ Cathy closed her eyes, massaged the bridge of her nose with two fingers. ‘Some of those soldiers and sailors are shriveled up old men now, dying of emphysema in VA hospitals,’ she said at last. ‘Death’s knocking at the door and they’re still covering their patooties.’
Somewhere deep within the house, a telephone rang, filling a sudden silence. We hadn’t laid eyes on Jon as yet, but he must have answered the call because he appeared at the door of the conservatory after a few minutes, waving a portable handset and asking, ‘Hannah, can you spare Paul for a few days?’
‘The last time you asked me that question, Jon, Paul ended up helping you build the very conservatory in which we are presently sitting.’
Jon beamed. ‘And a fine job it was, too. No, I entered my boat in the races at Cowes, and I need a grinder. I have a six-man crew, but one chap just dropped out.’
Grinders, I knew, worked in pairs, cranking sheets – ropes to you landlubbers – on a variety of winches to help shape the sails in coordination with other guys called trimmers. Grinding was not for the flabby, and Paul, still lean and mean at the ripe old age of… well, never mind… would be good at it.
‘Unless I miss my guess, Captain, Cowes Race Week begins this Saturday, as in just a week from today.’
‘Short notice, I know.’ He flashed a toothy, apologetic grin.
I gave Jon Paul’s cell phone number and resigned myself to a week of temporary widowhood. Cowes Race Week – unfolding on the waters of the Solent between the south coast of England and the Isle of Wight – was huge in sailing circles, and because of the area’s strong double tides, exciting. There was no way Paul, an experienced sailor, was going to say no to the opportunity of joining a team, even if he had to be a lowly grinder rather than, say, a navigator or tactician.
‘What boat are you racing, Jon?’
‘You know the boat, Hannah. Biding Thyme. A Contessa Thirty-Two.’
Egad! Biding Thyme was the same Contessa 32 that Beth Hamilton had been last seen sailing. If Paul had died aboard that stupid boat I’d have put it on the market so fast it would have made his head spin. In the afterlife, of course.
‘Alison!’ Stephen Bailey bellowed after Jon had disappeared, presumably to telephone Paul. ‘What’s happened to my tea, girl?’
Cathy took this as a sign that her interview with Stephen Bailey was over. ‘Well, I have to be going,’ she said, gathering up her sweater and handbag. ‘Thanks so much for your help, Mr Bailey. I really, really appreciate it.’
Before her father could answer, Alison interrupted, breezing into the room carrying a tray laden with the wherewithal for tea. ‘Won’t you stay for tea, Cathy?’
‘Thank you, but no, Mrs Hamilton, I’ve got to be going. I have an appointment with a woman from BASH and if I don’t hurry, I’ll be late. Do you know her? Lilith Price?’
Stephen Bailey grunted, which Cathy took for a no. ‘She was twelve years old during the American occupation of South Hams,’ Cathy explained, ‘so I’m going to talk to her about what it was like when the Americans were billeted here.’
BASH I knew, was the Blackawton and Strete History Group. They’d published several illustrated booklets that made interesting reading even if you weren’t a World War Two history buff.
Stephen Bailey struggled to his feet, reached into his breast pocket and drew out a folded piece of paper. ‘Here’s the number of that fellow in Brixton. Perhaps he’ll be of some use to you.’
Cathy accepted the paper and tucked it into her handbag. ‘Thanks ever so.’
While Alison busied herself with the tea, I walked Cathy to the door. ‘See you back at the B &B?’