Only Time Will Tell (The Clifton Chronicles 1)

Emma

49

WHEN HARRY FINALLY summoned up the strength to open the countless letters that littered the floor, he came across one from Old Jack's secretary in London.

Soho Square

London

Wednesday, August 2nd, 1939

Dear Mr Clifton,

You may not receive this letter until you've returned from your honeymoon in Scotland, but I wondered if Captain Tarrant stayed on in Oxford after the wedding. He didn't return to the office on Monday morning, and he hasn't been seen since, so I wondered if you had any idea where I might contact him.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely,

Phyllis Watson

Old Jack had clearly forgotten to let Miss Watson know he was going down to Bristol to spend a few days with Sir Walter, to make it clear that, although he had caused the wedding to be abandoned and had resigned from the board of Barrington's, he remained a close friend of the chairman's. As there wasn't a second letter from Miss Watson among his pile of unopened mail, Harry assumed that Old Jack must have returned to Soho Square and be back behind his desk.

Harry spent the morning answering every one of the letters he'd left unopened; so many kind people offering sympathy - it wasn't their fault they reminded him of his unhappiness. Suddenly Harry decided he had to be as far away from Oxford as possible. He picked up the phone and told the operator he wanted to make a long-distance call to London. Half an hour later, she called back to tell him the number was continually engaged. Next, he tried Sir Walter at Barrington Hall, but the number just rang and rang. Frustrated by his failure to contact either of them, Harry decided to follow one of Old Jack's maxims: Get off your backside and do something positive.

He grabbed the suitcase he had packed for his honeymoon in Scotland, walked across to the lodge and told the porter he was going up to London and wouldn't be returning until the first day of term. 'Should Giles Barrington ask where I am,' he added, 'please tell him I've gone to work for Old Jack.'

'Old Jack,' repeated the porter, writing the name down on a slip of paper.

On the train journey to Paddington, Harry read in The Times about the latest communiques that were bouncing back and forth between the Foreign Office in London and the Reich Ministry in Berlin. He was beginning to think that Mr Chamberlain was the only person who still believed in the possibility of peace in our time. The Times was predicting that Britain would be at war within days and that the Prime Minister couldn't hope to survive in office if the Germans defied his ultimatum and marched into Poland.

The Thunderer went on to suggest that in that eventuality, a coalition government would have to be formed, led by the Foreign Secretary, Lord Halifax (a safe pair of hands), and not Winston Churchill (unpredictable and irascible). Despite the paper's obvious distaste for Churchill, Harry didn't believe that Britain needed a 'safe pair of hands' at this particular moment in history, but someone who was not frightened to bully a bully.

When Harry stepped off the train at Paddington, he was met by a wave of different coloured uniforms coming at him from every direction. He'd already decided which service he would join the moment war was declared. A morbid thought crossed his mind as he boarded a bus for Piccadilly Circus: if he was killed while serving his country, it would solve all the Barrington family's problems - except one.

When the bus reached Piccadilly, Harry jumped off and began to weave his way through the clowns that made up the West End circus, through theatre land and on past exclusive restaurants and overpriced nightclubs, which appeared determined to ignore any suggestion of war. The queue of displaced immigrants trooping in and out of the building in Soho Square appeared even longer and more bedraggled than on Harry's first visit. Once again, as he climbed the stairs to the third floor, several of the refugees stood aside, assuming he must be a member of staff. He hoped he would be within the hour.

When he reached the third floor, he headed straight for Miss Watson's office. He found her filling in forms, issuing rail warrants, arranging accommodation and handing out small amounts of cash to desperate people. Her face lit up when she saw Harry. 'Do tell me Captain Tarrant's with you,' were her first words.

'No, he isn't,' said Harry. 'I assumed he'd returned to London, which is why I'm here. I was wondering if you might be able to use an extra pair of hands.'

'That's very kind of you, Harry,' she said, 'but the most useful thing you could do for me right now is to find Captain Tarrant. This place is bursting at the seams without him.'

'The last I heard he was staying with Sir Walter Barrington at his home in Gloucester,' said Harry, 'but that was at least a fortnight ago.'

'We haven't set eyes on him since the day he went to Oxford for your wedding,' said Miss Watson as she tried to comfort two more immigrants who couldn't speak a word of English.

'Has anyone phoned his flat to see if he's there?' asked Harry.

'He doesn't have a phone,' said Miss Watson, 'and I've hardly been to my own home for the past two weeks,' she added, nodding in the direction of a queue that stretched as far as the eye could see.

'Why don't I start there, and report back to you?'

'Would you?' said Miss Watson as two little girls began sobbing. 'Don't cry, everything's going to be all right,' she reassured the children as she knelt and placed an arm round them.

'Where does he live?' asked Harry.

'Number twenty-three, Prince Edward Mansions, Lambeth Walk. Take the number eleven bus to Lambeth, then you'll have to ask for directions. And thank you, Harry.'

Harry turned and headed towards the stairs. Something wasn't right, he thought. Old Jack would never have deserted his post without giving Miss Watson a reason.

'I forgot to ask,' Miss Watson shouted after him, 'how was your honeymoon?'

Harry felt he was far enough away not to have heard her.

Back at Piccadilly Circus he boarded a double-decker bus overcrowded with soldiers. It drove down Whitehall, which was full of officers, and on through Parliament Square, where a vast crowd of onlookers was waiting for any snippets of information that might come out of the House of Commons. The bus continued its journey across Lambeth Bridge, and Harry got off when it reached Albert Embankment.

A paperboy who was shouting 'Britain Awaits Hitler's Response' told Harry to take the second on the left, then the third on the right, and added for good measure, 'I thought everyone knew where Lambeth Walk was.'

Harry began to run like a man being pursued and he didn't stop until he came to a block of flats that was so dilapidated he could only wonder which Prince Edward it had been named after. He pushed open a door that wouldn't survive much longer on those hinges and walked quickly up a flight of stairs, stepping nimbly between piles of rubbish that hadn't been cleared for days.

When he reached the second floor, he stopped outside No. 23 and knocked firmly on the door, but there was no reply. He knocked again, louder, but still no one responded. He ran back down the stairs in search of someone who worked in the building, and when he reached the basement he found an old man slumped in an even older chair, smoking a roll-up and flicking through the pages of the Daily Mirror.

'Have you seen Captain Tarrant recently?' Harry asked sharply.