‘Father, we’re fighting a war,’ Conrad said. ‘And it’s a just war. It’s not like the first war where your country fought Mother’s country. This is a war between good and evil. Hitler is evil, Father. If he wins, Europe will fall into darkness. He has to lose. We have to beat him.’
‘But we have no plans to beat him, do we?’ said Oakford. ‘Our plan is to sit in France and wait for him to attack us. And when he does it will be like the western front all over again. Except this time there will be tens of thousands of air-raid casualties among civilians in Britain.’
‘He won’t go away until we beat him,’ Conrad said.
‘Damn it, Conrad!’ Oakford hit his palm on the table. ‘It takes two to fight a war. We can end this if we want to.’
‘Stop it, both of you!’ said Millie.
Both men looked at her.
‘Stop it! Father, you know what Conrad’s views are. And, Conrad, you know how much Father believes in peace. Neither of you is going to change the other’s point of view. But Conrad’s going off to fight. And Father is right, a bomb might land on this house, or on the House of Lords. Maybe the Germans will invade Somerset. Maybe we won’t see each other again. I couldn’t bear it if the last time we ever saw each other ended in a fight. So please do shut up.’
Lord Oakford glared at his impertinent daughter. ‘Millie!’
The colour in Millie’s cheeks rose, but she held his gaze.
‘I’ll shut up,’ said Conrad. ‘Millie’s right.’
Oakford turned to his pheasant, stabbing it with his fork. ‘I wish you would see sense, Conrad,’ he muttered.
Conrad let his father have the last word. But, as far as he was concerned, he had seen sense. That was the whole point.
15
Kensington, London, 11 November
Millie and her father walked briskly along Kensington High Street towards the park. Lord Oakford was in good spirits, which pleasantly surprised Millie. An argument with his son about war and peace was just the kind of thing that could set Lord Oakford off on a week-long bad mood. Added to which, it was Armistice Day, which Millie had feared would only add salt to the wound. No one had mentioned the date yet that morning, although the newspapers had been full of the plan to move the two-minutes’ silence to the following day, Sunday, in order not to interrupt war production.
She was glad she had put her foot down at dinner. Although the evening had become uncomfortable, it could have been a lot worse. She hadn’t realized until she had said it how aware she had been that this might be their last time together: that something might happen to one or other of them. And she didn’t just mean Conrad. It was only then that it had truly sunk in that what she was about to do had its own danger, that she might be the one not to come back. For a moment she could feel the fear enveloping her, but she beat it back. Millie de Lancey was a brave woman, at least as brave as her elder brother.
She hated deceiving him, but she had had no choice. She couldn’t tell him she had already found her war work, which was why she was in London.
‘Where is Conrad off to?’ she asked. ‘I assumed he was returning to barracks, but he was a bit evasive. Is his battalion going over to France?’
‘Heston Airport. He’s flying to Holland to see Theo,’ Lord Oakford said.
‘No!’ That made Millie think. ‘Do we still go ahead with our plan?’
‘Oh, yes,’ said Oakford. ‘It will be all right.’
‘I hope Conrad never finds out. He would be furious.’
‘He won’t find out,’ said Oakford.
Millie had been excited to help her father. She had been brought up by him as a pacifist, as had Conrad and the other de Lancey children. She understood what her father was trying to do, and thought he was right to do it. But she knew Conrad wouldn’t approve at all.
‘Here we are.’
They were outside a grand white house just to the south of the park, which had been converted into flats. Lord Oakford rang a bell, a maid answered and they followed her up some stairs to the second floor.
‘Lord Oakford and Miss de Lancey, sir,’ the maid announced as she led them into a drawing room.
Sir Henry Alston rose to greet them.
Millie repressed a shudder as she took his hand. Alston was a fellow director of her father at Gurney Kroheim, her father’s merchant bank. She had met him on a number of occasions before — at dinner parties at Kensington Square and he had been to stay the weekend at Chilton Coombe — yet she had never quite become used to his ravaged face.
‘Millie, there’s someone I want you to meet.’ Alston turned to a pale, dark-haired girl of about Millie’s own age.
‘Lord Oakford, Millie de Lancey, this is Mrs Scott-Dunton.’
‘Constance,’ said the girl, holding out her hand to Millie. She was smiling broadly. ‘I’m so pleased to meet you. This is going to be quite an adventure.’
Bloomsbury, London
It was easy for Anneliese to identify Bloomsbury House; it was the impressive mansion on the southern side of Bloomsbury Square with the queue of Jews outside it. It reminded her a bit of the British Passport Control Office in the Tiergartenstrasse in Berlin. There the Jews were queuing for visas for Britain or Palestine. Here they were queuing for food, distributed by the Jewish Refugee Committee. Just as Anneliese had managed to slip ahead of the queue in Berlin with Conrad to see Captain Foley, the Passport Control Officer, now too she walked right in, feeling just as guilty. But she had an appointment.
Wilfrid Israel had a tiny office in an upper floor of the building. He had thinning blond hair and blue, tired eyes. His suit was immaculately cut and, despite his fair complexion, he exuded the sophistication of a wealthy Berlin Jew. And he was wealthy, or at least he had been. His family had owned N. Israel, one of the most upmarket department stores in Berlin, until he had been forced to relinquish it to Aryan owners.
‘Fräulein Rosen! I’m so pleased to meet you at last,’ he said in German, smiling. ‘And in safety too. Please. Have a seat.’
‘Thank you for agreeing to see me,’ said Anneliese. ‘And in particular, thank you for getting me out of the camp.’ The wife of the commandant of Sachsenhausen concentration camp loved to shop at N. Israel, which had given Wilfrid some influence.
‘Not at all,’ said Wilfrid. ‘Mr de Lancey and Captain Foley were quite insistent.’
‘I owe you my life,’ Anneliese said. ‘As I’m sure do many of the people out there.’
Wilfrid gave a tired smile. ‘Yes. But there are so many more back in Germany whom I couldn’t help.’
‘When did you get out yourself?’
‘In the spring. Berlin finally became untenable. How do you find London?’
‘It’s hard,’ said Anneliese. ‘My father is a doctor, but they won’t allow him to take a job. And my mother is a cleaner.’
‘At least you have found something,’ Wilfrid said, indicating Anneliese’s nurse’s uniform.
‘Yes, I’m working at St George’s Hospital. There are good things about London. My family is safe. And when you bump into a bobby in the street he is more likely to give you directions than lock you up.’
‘And they know how to queue.’
‘And if you tread on their toes, they apologize.’
Wilfrid laughed. ‘But they can be difficult to get to know. Even the English Jews.’
‘I thought you were English yourself?’ Anneliese said.
‘Half-English,’ Wilfrid said. ‘But I miss Berlin. The old Berlin.’
‘Before the Nazis came,’ said Anneliese.
Wilfrid nodded. Then he checked his watch. ‘Anyway, what can I do for you Fräulein Rosen?’