“Isobel is not coming,” he announced. He felt he had said it before, but it needed to be said again. “I had things to give her,” he continued. “Records of Teddy Stauffer and Zacharius.” He stopped for a moment. He had so looked forward to talking to her and now she was not there the conversation was bursting out of him whether he liked it or not. Perhaps this woman would understand.
“Zacharius is our own Stephane Grappelli,” he told her slowly. “He was taught by Kreisler, you know.”
Veronica did not know, nor had she ever heard of Kreisler, but she nodded all the same. All she understood was that Lentsch was feeling sorry for himself. If she managed to lift him out of his lovesick gloom, who knows, he might forget Isobel altogether. At times like this a girl’s fortune could change overnight if she picked the right moment. But she would not do anything yet. First he had to sink a little deeper into despair.
“My father has many Kreisler records,” he continued wistfully. “Brahms, Beethoven…” He looked across to where Bohde lay before raising his voice. “Even Mendelssohn.” He lurched back onto his original tack. “Do you know, Veronica, the leave before last I saw Django Reinhardt. I was this close.”
He stretched his hand from his nose to hers. She leant back and rolled her pyjama top back up. Lentsch saw she had managed to insert a glass bead into the dimpled flesh of her belly button. Veronica caught his stare.
“Do you ever go dancing?” she asked, sticking her leg out and wriggling her toes. “I bet you know some wonderful clubs.”
He brightened at the recollection of them.
“I do!” he exclaimed, as if they could hop in a taxi and be taken to one there and then. “Paris, Berlin, Munich.”
“Before all this happened that’s what I wanted to do, branch out into clubs. Dancing and singing.”
“Singing?” A note of hope rose in his voice. He could understand so little tonight. “You are a singer too?”
“Light operatic,” she explained. “Of course it would have to be different for clubs. Different clientèle. More sophisticated.”
Now he remembered. She was a singer! He beamed at her. “There is a song named after you, you know,” he said, clutching her hand. “Such a song!”
Veronica did know. Nearly every German who tried to put his hand up her skirt had told her that there was a song named after her.
“You don’t say,” she said. “Do tell.”
“A very famous song. Gruss und Kuss Veronika!”
“I don’t know if I want to be grussed. Even by an officer.” It had always raised a laugh in the past. Lentsch tried to ignore the flutter of her eyelids.
“No, no,” he insisted, pointing across the room, momentarily glad to evade her eyes, “I have it somewhere. You must hear it.” He lurched across the room, bumping into Zep and Molly locked into a slow embrace. Squatting down by the radiogram he starled to leaf through his box of records. It was hard for him to lift each one out and focus on the label, harder still for him to prevent them slipping out of their sleeves. Finally he found what he was looking for and held it up triumphantly.
“Veronica! “Gruss und Kuss”,” he called out. “You listen.”
Ignoring Zep and Molly’s protests he changed the record and hurried back. As the music started he took up Veronica’s hand again and began waving it in time to the music, lost in its jaunty refrain. Veronica started to hum along. It was that sort of tune. Lentsch was entranced.
“You know it already! You may keep it if you like.”
She squeezed his hand. “I’d love to, not that I deserve such a present.”
“Isobel is not present.” Lentsch blurted out. “She should be here.”
“Well, I’m here.”
“Of course you are. Everyone is here, all the Swingheimes of Guernsey.” He waved his hand across the room, knowing before he opened his mouth again that he was about to speak foolishly. “You are very lovely. Like a picture. I would like to paint you. Perhaps tomorrow?”
Veronica held her breath. She could push it a little further and suggest that she stay the night, or thank him for a perfectly lovely evening and go home. She would have liked to stay the night, if for no other reason than to have a good look upstairs and a decent breakfast tomorrow, but she had the feeling that in his present condition come the morning he would regret it. She should leave and wait for him to call on her. The trouble was he was so drunk he probably wouldn’t remember asking her, but there was just a chance. It was worth the risk. If he and Isobel were splitting up…There were not many better prizes on the island than Major Gerhard Lentsch. She patted his hand.
“Of course you can. One more glass of champagne and then you must get Herbert to drive me home.”
“Helmut,” he corrected. He struggled to pull himself upright. “Champagne and brandy. That’s what I need. Is what everybody needs.” He raised his voice. “Wedel, bring me the bottles. Veronica is having another drink and then she has promised to dance for us. A dance like they do in Turkey. All belly.” He patted her stomach.
“Gerhard, darling,” she said, sufficiently pleased with herself. “I shall do no such thing.”
Lentsch’s face grew serious. “Then you shall walk home without a pass and be arrested and brought before the magistrate. And I shall instruct him to be very severe. A fine of what…what do you think, Bohde?” he called out. “Bohde!”
Though he had drunk enough to be unable to utter another coherent word until morning, Bohde had enough training to recognize the voice of a superior officer. He dragged himself out of his slumber and began to blink.
“We need your advice,” Lentsch explained. “What do you think the punishment should be for a young English woman out on the streets after curfew, dressed only in her very finest bedclothes, and,” he shouted, deciding to let the room know her little secret, “with this in her satchel?” He snatched her bag and brought out the cheese. “See?”
Hearing the others laugh Bohde puzzled for a moment, concerned that if there was a joke to be had, it should not be at his own expense.
“Ask him,” he said slowly, eyeing the swaying couple with obvious distaste. “Black marketeers are his concern.” Zep, his head buried in Molly’s neck, elected not to hear.
“There’s no point in asking him,” Lentsch argued. “He’s worse than all of them put together. As far as the Captain is concerned there should be no curfew at all for girls over sixteen. Isn’t that right, Zep?”
Zep looked up. “No curfew for good-looking girls,” he countered. “The rest should be deported to Alderney.” He laughed. “Ugly girls for the Todts and the turnip-eaters. Pretty girls for us. An island of nothing but pretty girls.” He turned his attention back to Molly, opening her jealous mouth with a hard kiss.
Lentsch turned back to Bohde. “See what I mean? The man’s no use at all. So what’s it to be, Bohde?”
Bohde sat up and stared over from across the room. There was no pleasure in his face, not even a trace of an alcoholic leer, which was what Veronica expected from men in his state. She started to fidget with the tassel of her pyjama cord, feeling uncomfortably naked beneath her costume. Bohde lit his cigar slowly and bunching his fingers round the thick stem held it out in an almost obscene manner. The room had gone quiet.