“I’ve always thought of us as having quite a lot in common, you know Piet. Does anyone know who you are?” Behind Fleming’s eyes there was a serenity and a wisdom that disturbed Kruze. The words, delivered without any trace of malice, hit him hard.
“There was someone. I think she knew.”
“Someone to go back to?”
“Right now I can only think of Shaposhnikov,” Kruze answered, stiffly.
Fleming lit another cigarette. “I wish I shared your sense of professionalism.”
“How do you mean?”
“You asked me about Rostock. To tell you the truth, it was Penny who kept me going. This past year has been pretty bad for us, and I realized then that it was my fault, that it was up to me to do something about it. A little late in the day.”
Again, Kruze felt the cramp in his stomach. Fleming had stopped, was pulling on his cigarette. “What exactly happened to you in Italy?”
Fleming hesitated, then began. “I was on the tail of an FW 190. I remember feeling elated, he was slap in the middle of my sights, didn’t have a clue I was there. I thought he must have been half-asleep, so I closed the range, just to make sure. Stupid. I was the dozy one. I must have been about a hundred feet behind him, when he lowered his undercarriage and flaps — just like you did with the Junkers the other day. I shot past him and the next thing I knew was his cannon thumping into the wings and the fuselage. Then the instrument panel exploded and I blacked out.”
Fleming took another drag from his cigarette.
“I came to with this bloody awful pain in my side. The aircraft was in an inverted spin and I reached up and tried to pull the hood back. But my Mae West dug into me and hurt like hell, so I reached down to untie it. It came as a bit of a bloody surprise when I found I had no Mae West and most of my tunic was missing and there was just this big hole in the left side of my body. Then I just started watching the ground spinning lazily overhead. I would have been quite happy to have carried on like that, except the shell that hit the instrument panel had also severed my oxygen pipe and I started to breathe in the flames which had eaten through the forward bulkhead. I gave the canopy a bloody good tug and then I must have been sucked out. God knows how I opened the chute, because I don’t remember a thing between sitting in the cockpit and waking up in bed in a field hospital.”
He dropped the cigarette next to the first stub. “So there you have it. Penny must have been by my side for every single hour of the day and night when they shipped me back to England. They told me afterwards that when she wasn’t in the operating theatre watching bits of metal being removed from me, she was in that chair by my bed, holding my hand, worried sick. She thought I was going to die. I did for a while, but not then. That came later.”
“How long did it take for you to come round?” Half of Kruze wanted Fleming to stop, but the other was captivated.
“I was in a coma for about three months. It’s funny, you know. No one could possibly have loved a woman more than I loved her on that morning in Tuscany. I suppose I thought that there wasn’t a hope in hell she would want to stay with a man who couldn’t change his own clothes, who had to be spoon-fed, pissed himself without even knowing it. So I shut her off, before she had the chance to leave me. There were violent moments too, when I couldn’t even control my actions. God, I hated myself for that. Even so, I loved her all that time. I just bent over backwards not to let her know…” His voice trailed away.
Suddenly he said: “I’ve never told a soul before.”
“You’ve changed, Robert, that’s why. You’re no longer the prick of the EAEU.”
Fleming stared at him for a second and then burst out laughing. “I suppose from you, Kruze, that’s a compliment.”
Kruze allowed himself a smile. “It was meant to be one.” He took one of his own cigarettes from his pocket and lit it. “What are you going to do about your wife?”
“She wants a divorce, so it’s probably too late for us. I have to start getting realistic. Still, I’d just like a chance to explain.”
Kruze swung his feet off the bed and sat on the edge of the mattress.
“It’s not too late, Robert.” Kruze took a deep breath. “If you get out of this shit-hole alive, and there’s every reason why you should, you must go to her as soon as you can.”
Fleming laughed again. In the dim, half-light of the room, he looked ten years younger. “Piet, you’ve only met her once, you don’t know her: she’s a headstrong girl and—”
Kruze cut him off. “No, Robert, I bumped into her a few days ago. I was leaving the Ministry and she was heading in to deliver the letter.”
“The infamous letter. So, you know we were getting divorced.”
“Only later. She seemed upset, so I bought her a drink. That was when she told me.”
“I see,” Fleming said, his voice suddenly distant.
“She loves you, don’t you see? The letter was a cry for help.”
Fleming straightened. “How can you possibly know? Did she tell you all this?”
“She didn’t have to. It was obvious. The girl is still in love with you.”
“You really don’t have to do this, Kruze. I’ve come to terms with it. Look at me, I’ve made a full recovery.” He held his arms out. “But this is not the man she married. He never got out of that Spitfire over Monte Lupo.”
Kruze felt an urge to shake him. “You look like the same guy to me.”
Fleming shrugged. “You didn’t know me then.”
“I saw the photograph of you in the Spit…”
Fleming got to his feet. The look of bewilderment had changed to anger. “I only sent that picture to her a month ago, long after you came to the cottage.”
“What are you talking about?” Kruze pushed himself off the bed.
“The shot of me in the Spitfire. I found it in the Bunker and sent it to her. Now you tell me you’ve seen it at the cottage. What the bloody hell were you doing there?”
Kruze shook his head. “It’s nothing.”
Fleming pushed the chair back. “I asked you what you were doing there.”
Kruze dropped his cigarette. “I told you. We met quite by chance. It must have been the day before you were sent to Rostock. We saved a child from that V2 blast near the Ministry. That night I had a long talk with her. Two days later we had a bite to eat in Padbury.”
Fleming’s face twisted in disbelief.
In the semi-darkness, Kruze saw the fist coming a little too late. He made no attempt to parry it, but tried to duck. The blow caught him on the side of the face and he fell backwards against the thin wall of the hut. He shook his head and began pulling himself onto his feet, but Fleming’s hands were already on him, dragging him upwards, his breath coming in deep, convulsing gasps.
“You’ve got a fucking nerve, Kruze.”
Even with his head ringing from the blow, Kruze easily wrenched the other man’s grip from him. With all his might he pushed, ramming Fleming up against the far wall. The whole hut rocked.
“Listen, Robert, I’m not telling you all this so I can have a bloody good gloat. I’m trying to get it into your stupid skull that she may not know it, but she still loves you, and you’re never going to discover that for yourself if you sit on your arse, thinking about the good times you could have had.”
Fleming tried to push himself free, but Kruze had him pinned hard against the wall. Fleming rammed his face right up to the Rhodesian’s.
“Did you touch her?”
“You said it yourself; we’re two of a kind. She’s lonely and afraid, but it’s not me she wants. She wants you, needs you, but you have to make the move. Don’t waste any time when you get back. Go to her.”
Kruze felt Fleming’s body relax, saw some of the fire die in his eyes. He drew back, not sure what would happen next. Fleming’s breath came more easily as he looked into the Rhodesian’s face, straightening his tie and uniform as he did so.