Like Father Like Son - Parts One to Five

Phillip was overwhelmed. He felt a sweet pressure rising in his groin and then he was lost, pumping his milky seed across the girl’s stomach and thighs as ecstasy seized him. She stiffened monetarily and then pushed him onto his back. He gasped as he felt her soft lips upon him and he almost blacked-out as her warm mouth engulfed him, licking and sucking while she made throaty mewling noises. 

He felt himself stiffen again and cried out in wonder at the sensations that invaded his body. She rose above him, a picture of wild-haired abandon, and, seizing his now rigid member in one hand, drove her hips down upon it to impale herself. Phillip groaned at the intensity of the sensations that flowed through him. Anne Marie, her eyes still glazed and unseeing, began a slow undulation of her hips, grinding herself against his pubic bone. He reached up to cup her breasts and instinctively thumbed her nipples with a slow rotating motion that seemed to urge her on. She was crazy now, hissing like a feral cat and her face was drawn into a rictus. She rose and fell above him with a damp slapping noise. He caught the scent of her arousal and it drove him to greater efforts, thrusting up to meet her downward plunges. Her breathing was harsh and her motions became more frenzied. Phillip tried to match her, thrust for thrust, but she was too wild for him. She flung herself down one final time and then, with a harsh cry, she reached her climax, hips shuddering and twitching as she forced herself against him and he felt the rhythmic pulse of her orgasm as she continued to shiver and moan above him. Then she collapsed forward and buried her face at the junction of his neck and shoulder and gave a long, soft sigh. 

They lay together, interlocked for a while, then Anne Marie raised herself and looked at him properly for the first time. 

“Now we have each had our pleasure; I must teach how you how to please,” she said. 

She rolled off him and gazed at his hardness. 

“Ah, poor soldier, still standing to attention!”

She reached down for him and stroked him gently.

“Be patient, mon ami, your turn will come again.”

She rolled onto her back and spread her legs.

“Now, you are the pupil and I am the schoolmistress. I require diligence from my students so now, look here!”

Anne Marie pushed Phillip down until his head was level with her crotch. She gently parted the fleshy lips and spoke in a low, husky voice.

“Look well! This little button here is the heart of a woman’s pleasure. No, don’t touch, not yet. It is very, very sensitive. You must approach with caution, like you are stalking a boche aeroplane. You must creep up on her. The frontal attack will not work until you have broken down her defences. Everything must be done slowly, doucement, tres doucement, yes?”

Phillip put out a hand and began to trace the swirls and folds that surrounded the target. 

“Yes, that is good.”

He marvelled as he watched the little pink button slowly peep out from its protective hood. The smell of her sex was ripe and heady and he saw a pale moisture coating the engorged lips. He slipped a finger between them and was amazed by the slick smoothness he encountered. She lifted her hips slightly and his finger slipped into her and she gave a little gasp. 

“Gently, monsieur, always gently. Ah yes, there, rub there, oh, that’s good. You are a willing student, for sure!”

He leant forward and kissed her stomach and she giggled.

“That’s nice.”

His curiosity was aroused and he bent his head to kiss her again, but lower this time, burying his face in the profusion of brown curls. He blew gently on her clitoris and was rewarded with another gasp and a twitch. He reached out his tongue and tasted her. It was slightly salty but held a hint of sweetness and he stabbed his tongue into her and she bucked against him, seizing his head with her hands and directing his kisses. Again her breathing grew ragged and again she cried out. She forced her sex against his mouth and bucked and twisted as her orgasm transported her. She stilled him with her hands then drew him up, over her body.

Her legs parted as he entered again and he began to pump furiously. She caught him.

“No, no, little student, that is too harsh, too fast. You must go slowly. Do not withdraw so far. Keep close, let it build.”

He stopped and began again, a slow gentle rhythm that she matched with her upthrust hips. She raised her arms above her head and offered him her breasts and he hunched over her, taking first one and then the other into his willing mouth, sucking and nibbling at the delicious tips. She increased the pace and he matched her. He looked into her eyes and saw the joy that was shining in her. It tipped him over the edge and he began again to pump wildly. This time she didn’t stop him but rather rose to meet his thrusts and her fingers grabbed at his buttocks, pulling him in deeper on each downward plunge. 

Phillip felt white-hot bolts of pleasure rising like a tide within him. Electricity surged from the base of his spine and then he was past the point of no return. She arched her back and forced herself up with a great push from her thighs then pulled away quickly and grabbed his throbbing prick, pumping the seed from him with her hand so it spurted and spattered over her stomach and breasts. Phillip’s eyes rolled back in his head and he lapsed into semi-consciousness as she continued to milk him with one hand, the other kneading his balls until he collapsed on top of her. 

When he came to himself she was smiling at him.

“Was it true, I was the first?”

He nodded, too light headed to speak.

“And it was good, yes?”

“Yes. It was good; better than good, it was amazing.”

Anne Marie smiled. She gave a little self-satisfied nod. 

“And you will remember your lesson? Remember to stalk the little button, to go slowly?”

“Yes, thank you, I will. I mean, I never knew it was good for women too.”

She laughed out loud.

“Then your woman has much to thank me for, I think.”

Phillip wished she hadn’t mentioned his woman. It brought guilt and pain and longing back to him and she saw it in his face.

“Ah, don’t fret, mon ami. We will not meet again and I want nothing from you that is not already given. You love this woman, yes?”

“I don’t know, really, we’ve scarcely met but yes, I think so.”

“And she loves you?”

“I don’t know. Her letters are very affectionate but, well, we’re not that intimate yet.”

“And yet you feel guilty because you have been with a French whore.”

“No! I mean you’re not a whore. You’re beautiful and it was beautiful. It couldn’t have been like that with a whore!”

“Ah, monsieur, you are too kind but you still think me a whore. All men do. For soldiers, the world is divided into wives and whores. It is the way of things; it is the war. But pay no attention; I am always a little sad after making love. Go now, your friends will be waiting.”

So Phillip dressed and, leaving, he found he had left a little piece of his heart with Anne Marie.

*******************************

Back at Bertangles, the squadron was kept busy learning the new techniques of the ‘Contact Patrol.’ As preparations for the planned great new offensive gathered pace, they spent each available day in the air. Photographic sorties doubled and then quadrupled as Head Quarters demanded more and more maps and more and more reconnaissance missions. The German air force seemed subdued at this time and enemy aircraft seldom troubled them. Only the infamous ‘archie’ was a threat. Even so casualties on the squadron were light and morale was high. 

On the days they were not out over the front, they were practicing new techniques of communication with ground forces. The plan was that the RFC could act as the ‘eyes’ of the battlefield commanders. Flying low over the lines, they would identify the positions of the troops on the ground. The troops were equipped with coloured flares and a signalling device that was like a large round Venetian blind. Shutters could be operated to show either black or white to a circling aircraft, allowing Morse signals to be flashed skywards. Messages would then be dropped on a white sheet at the appropriate headquarters. The airmen were given weighted message bags with streamers attached for this purpose.

The two aircraft with wireless equipment were much in demand for artillery spotting. Vast numbers of batteries were moved up behind the front under cover of darkness and put in camouflaged emplacements. One or two ranging shots would be fired and the RE8’s were on hand to report the fall of shot by Morse to the batteries. Phillip and Peter Riley flew sortie after sortie. Each night they collapsed on their beds utterly exhausted but rose each dawn to repeat the process. 

Then, towards the end of June, the greatest preparatory bombardment the world has ever seen began. Phillip and Pinky Harris were flying at ten thousand feet over the lines. The noise was indescribable, drowning out even the rattling roar of their engine. It was impossible to make out individual explosions. The whole fourteen-mile front was leaping and shuddering under the impact of a million shells. They stared in disbelief at what they saw. Phillip swore he could hear the earth groaning under the assault. A haze of pulverised chalk hung over the German trenches to a height of two thousand feet and the air was redolent with the smell of damp soil even at the altitude they flew.

Just then, he caught something out of the corner of his eye. A black dot appeared for a second and then vanished. He blinked and looked away, convinced he was imagining things. Then he saw it again. He realised with horror that he was seeing the howitzer shells at the top of their trajectory. He and Pinky were flying through the bombardment! Once he had the trick, he could pick up a shell just as it reached its zenith and then follow its tumbling plunge to burst in the madness below. Once, their aircraft was rocked by some giant unseen hand. A shell had passed within six feet of them and they had experienced the disturbance created by its passage.

Day after day the guns thundered on. The bombardment could be heard in far-away England. The area behind the British front line was packed with troops, wagons, limbers, horses, ammunition dumps and the grimmer reminders of huge new canvas hospitals. The weather turned wet and the assault was postponed for three days and still the guns roared on. 

On the morning of the 1st July, Phillip and Pinky were aloft over the Fricourt salient. The guns had risen to a new pitch of fury and the shock waves reverberated through the air like rolling thunder. Just when it seemed that the climax had been reached, two huge mines were detonated under the German positions. They watched awestruck as the earth beneath them opened up. Thousands of tons of TNT had been packed into the end of two deep tunnels dug out under no-man’s-land. The mines were set off to signal the start of the attack. 

It looked to Phillip like a huge earthen tree had suddenly sprouted. It grew and rose towards them. Pinky Harris turned the plane away from the explosion so Phillip was afforded the amazing sight of thousands of tons of earth hurtling skywards to a height of ten thousand feet before slowly collapsing back onto what remained of the shattered defences, leaving a huge white crater. It was as if Earth’s bones had been exposed where the fierce explosion had flensed her mantle of flesh. The RE8 was whirled upwards by the spreading blast and threatened to come apart as it was tossed like a leaf in a storm. Shaken, they flew home.

Later that day they flew their first ‘Contact Patrols’ with little success. Despite all the practice before the attack, the infantry were reluctant to fire their signal flares, as doing so would provoke a storm of German artillery on their revealed positions. It was apparent that the attack had not succeeded everywhere. The fortified village of Fricourt still stood. Its garrison had endured the storm of steel hidden in deep concrete bunkers; the mine designed to destroy this position had been dug too short and left the position untouched. 

Flying low over the battlefield, Phillip could see silent lines of khaki bundles lying where the machine guns had caught them. It brought to mind his own experiences at Loos and sadness mixed with a burning anger stabbed at him. Yet again, it seemed, the plans had been over optimistic. Tears prickled his eyes and he wept for the wastefulness of it all, for the carnage and the horror and the terrible, all-consuming fear. 

The battle rumbled on, a mad Moloch with an insatiable appetite for yet more death, more bodies. One morning Phillip was up on an artillery-spotting sortie when he saw a yellowish fog begin to form along the line and creep out across no-mans-land. He realised with horror that he was witnessing a gas attack and he was moved by the terrible pain of pity. Pity for the Germans who would soon be coughing their lives away as their lungs melted and corroded; Pity for the British gas platoons who had to release such a fearsome, inhuman weapon and, most of all, pity for humanity that could find no better way to settle their differences. 

By the 15th July, it was clear that the plan had failed. The British Line had pushed forward a couple of miles in places but there was no sign of the heralded break-through. The cavalry still waited, impotent and frustrated, to rush through a now-mythical gap and begin the process of rolling up the enemy rear. It wasn’t going to happen. Not this year. The War would roll on unabated. It was that morning that Phillip awoke with stinging eyes. He tried bathing them but he could see from the reddened image that stared back from his mirror that there was something wrong. He reported sick and the doctor diagnosed conjunctivitis. 

“You’ll be ‘napoo’ for at least two weeks, old son. I’m sending you home on sick-leave, no use moping here!”

So off he went to catch the leave boat to Folkestone. He waved an envious Peter goodbye, stopped off to tell Pinky Harris and scrounged a lift in an old BE2 that was being ferried back to the depot at St Omer to be broken up. By that evening he was in London and luxuriating in a bath prior to arranging a slap-up dinner and enjoying his first night in a proper bed for over three months. Since the beginning of April he had flown over one hundred and twenty sorties. His promotion to Lieutenant had been gazetted and he had two glorious weeks at home ahead of him – what more could a man want?

Part Three

July 1916 Bethan

Phillip was reluctant to send a telegram home to announce his unexpected arrival: the appearance of the telegram boy was viewed as an ill omen now at home. This would be particularly the case with the battle raging across in France. He had heard that over sixty thousand British and Empire soldiers had died on that first morning as he watched the mines go up. Casualties had been mounting with each successive day of abortive attacks as the offensive ground on. He therefore decided to go to Dorset unannounced but, instead, to send a telegram to Bethan asking if she, too, could get leave. 

This done, he hastened to Waterloo Station and caught the early express to Dorchester. There was a branch line train through to Bridport a little later in the day but, in a fit of extravagance, he hired the station’s elderly taxi to take him home. He marvelled at how little changed the countryside seemed but noted, with a heavy heart, the large number of black wreaths that adorned the cottage doors as they trundled through the little villages. More land appeared to have gone under the plough than was customary in peacetime and he noted with mild surprise that many of the farm workers he glimpsed through the hedges were women. The logic, he supposed, was inescapable. With more and more of the Nation’s men under arms, it was left to the old, the very young and the womenfolk to keep things ticking at home. 

He found himself growing more relaxed as the old car wheezed on. It slowed to almost walking pace on some of the steeper hills and rattled and swung alarmingly when it gathered speed on the down-slopes. After about an hour, they swung in through the pillared entrance to the long gravel drive that led up to the house. He paid the cabman, thirty shillings and sixpence, tipped him a further five shillings and walked up the steps of the old house. 

Mrs Bugler, his parents’ housekeeper, dropped the vase of flowers she was carrying when she saw him walk in.

“Why Mr Phillip! Oh my goodness, look what you made me do! I’ll go and tell the Master that you’re here. Won’t they be surprised!”

“Good morning, Mrs B. You’re looking as lovely as ever I see. No, don’t disturb them; I’d rather go in unannounced, if you don’t mind. Where are they, by the way?”

“They’re taking tea on the terrace, sir, just took it out myself not five minutes gone. I’ll go and fetch another cup, shall I?”

“That would be splendid, Mrs B. I think I’ll just go through now and surprise them.”

Phillip strode through the familiar rooms. A sense of peace enveloped him. He loved the old house with its mellow hamstone facings and gabled windows. His father had bought the place before he was born and he had known no other home than this. The estate included two tenanted farms and a row of cottages for the workers. As a boy he had roamed every inch of it and was often to be found in some cottage or other, drinking homemade cordial and listening to stories of the ‘old days.’ Phillip’s father was a popular landlord who did his best for the estate dwellers and never dunned those who were late with the quarterly rents. His mother enjoyed equal status: she had started an elementary school for the Estate children and paid for the teacher out of her own resources. She also was the giver of the Great Annual Picnic – an event awaited with eager anticipation by young and old alike. It was natural, then, that their only son would be welcome wherever his juvenile legs carried him.

He made his entrance through the French doors from the library. His mother gave a little cry and then sprang up to hug him. His father was half a step behind with a beaming smile and outstretched hand.

“Phillip, you utter hound! Why on earth didn’t you warn us? How long are you home for?”

“Phillip, your eyes! My God, have you been wounded? Why didn’t you send a telegram?”

“Mother, my eyes are fine, just a touch of conjunctivitis – it’s lucky for me too, it’s the reason I’m home. I’ve two weeks’ sick leave. And I didn’t send a telegram because I thought it might give you a fright - you know, what with the big push and everything.”

“Well, I must say you’re a sight for sore eyes, my boy. Oh I say, what a dreadful joke!”

“And I think he looks tired, William. Have you been getting enough to eat, you look thinner, Phillip?”

“Oh, they feed us like fighting cocks, Mother, much better than the infantry. And we go home to a warm bed every night, no long spells lying in mud and dugouts for the Flying Corps. I should say not!” 

“Don’t nag the boy, Beatrice. He looks fine to me, apart from the eyes, that is. Now, Phillip, what are you going to do with this unforeseen bounty of yours, eh? I dare say you’ll want to be off to London, dancing and chasing the girls, what?”

“No, father, I don’t feel in the least like going to London and dancing. As a matter of fact, I’ve invited someone to come here, if you don’t mind awfully much. I’m not sure she’ll be able to get away but I sent her a telegram and hope for a reply later today or tomorrow.”

“Ah, and who is this mysterious lady? Not an actress, I hope!”

“No, father. Her name is Bethan Meredith and she’s a nurse – one of those who looked after me at Bentley Hall. You might even have seen her when you visited me. A very pretty girl with the most wonderful eyes.”

Phillip’s mother laughed delightedly.

“I cannot speak for your father, of course, Phillip, but I didn’t come to Bentley Hall to look at the nurses. Of course, we’ll be delighted to receive your friend. The Lord knows this old place has enough rooms and it will be nice to have some young people around for a change, won’t it William?”

“Yes, of course. Only right that a young chap like you should find himself a pretty girl or two. How long will she be staying?”

“I really don’t know, father. It depends how much leave they will allow. Sister Hallam’s a good stick, though, and I’m sure she’ll put a word in for Bethan.”

The rest of the morning passed in gentle conversation. At Phillip’s request, they shied away from the topic of the war and his father spoke of the running of the estate instead. Even here, the war cast its shadow, as every so often, he had to explain to Phillip why someone different was now doing a certain job, the previous incumbent having enlisted. It seemed to Phillip that the war tainted everything. A subtle mood of depression descended on him and he resolved to go for a walk after lunch and ‘blow away the cobwebs,’ as Mrs Bugler would say.

They took luncheon in the small dining room and, after the meal, Phillip took a couple of cigars from the humidor on the mantel and went to his room to change. He put on his walking britches, a woollen shirt and tie and his favourite old Norfolk jacket. He found a pair of stout shoes in the boot room and, feeling heartened by the change into familiar, comfortable clothing, set out for his walk. The path skirted the rose garden and ran down beside the old coach house, across the stable yard and out into the open fields of Home Farm. His pace quickened once away from the house and he found the years dropping away. He had followed this track countless times in the past, in younger, happier days. He saw the well-rounded figure of Betsy Stevenson and waved a greeting. Betsy was the daughter of the tenant of Home Farm and it was with her that Phillip had enjoyed his first adolescent fumblings behind the stables after one Great Annual Picnic. She was married now and her young husband was a farrier corporal in the Field Artillery. He had been employed as a groom on the estate and was reckoned to be ‘mustard’ with horses.

The path rose up in front of him and he began to climb. The hedgerows were a riot of wildflowers. There was the pink of the foxgloves and campion, here the blue of speedwell and the deeper glow of violets. He was sorry to have missed the bluebells that carpeted the woodland floor each year in May. He thought, too, of the apple and cherry blossom that turned the winter-stark trees to glory even before the leaves were fully out in springtime. His heart was full of love for the soft countryside. Where else did the beech trees grow just so? And in what other country stood such majestic oaks and stately birches? He moved upwards through the Holt, striding easily. Dead leaves and beech mast cushioned his footfalls and peace invaded his soul. 

He burst out of the woodland onto the hilltop and turned to look back. Below him, the old house drowsed in the valley, its stone facades turned golden by the rich, warm sunlight. He paused and took in the sweep of the land. How neat it all was, how right! After the open expanses of France and the rolling chalk-land of the Somme, the small, irregular fields with their ancient hedges pleased his eye beyond measure. He turned again and walked down a slight ridge to another summit where the trees ringed the hill but had not ventured to the top, leaving a green expanse open to the sky. He climbed up again through the beech and hornbeam until once more he stood in the open. 

From here, he could see down into the village itself. He watched a horse-drawn farm cart amble along the white road that led up to the farm on the far side of the valley. Here and there the fields were a lighter green where the haymakers had left their mark. Birdsong drifted from the wood below and he felt he could almost breathe in the tranquillity. It was to this very spot that he had willed himself during the worst moments in the trenches. He drew strength from its normality and now, as he reacquainted himself with the vista before him, he renewed his vow to build his house here. It would need to be of local hamstone, of course. Nothing too fancy, he thought, and a stable block on the reverse slope. It had to fit within this landscape so nothing too grand or modern. He would ask Bethan what she needed. He could always add a nursery later and maybe an extra bedroom or two. Then he caught himself; “putting the cart before the horse, old son,” he murmured and then, with a shrug, walked on. 

He walked all afternoon, over the hills to Netherbury, past the old Roman fort and home by way of Stoke Abbot. He stopped briefly in the village square for a pint of bitter at the inn. He was hot and thirsty but utterly at peace. The war had receded from his horizons; now he could relax and revel in being home. One or two familiar faces raised their glasses to him but no one pestered him for news of the war. He felt he had stepped back into his old life just as he donned his old clothes that afternoon. All it needed now was a positive answer from Bethan.

**************************** 

Bethan Meredith was changing a dressing when the telegram arrived. Sister Hallam called her away.

“Telegram for you, Nurse Meredith. And you’ve no need to worry, whoever sent it paid for a reply.”

Bethan ripped open the envelope and read:

“HOME ON SICK LEAVE UNTIL END OF MONTH STOP PLEASE COME DORSET SOONEST STOP DESPERATE TO SEE YOU STOP PHILLIP STOP”

She felt herself redden under the grinning gaze of the telegram boy. She whirled away and ran to Sister Hallam who stood, hands on hips, looking formidable but with a give-away twinkle in her eye.

“I suppose it’s from that young man you spend hours writing to?”

Bethan nodded her agreement. Her mouth was dry and she couldn’t seem to find her voice.

“And I equally suppose that he is home and wants to see you?”

Again, she could only nod.

“Well, I’ll have to ask Matron, but I, personally, can do without you for a little while. Let’s see, you haven’t had any leave since you got here, have you? No, I thought as much. I will need you tomorrow but you can go on Thursday. Four, no, five days I think.”

Bethan finally managed to stammer out a few words of thanks but Sister Hallam brushed them aside.

“No, you’ve earned a little break. Now go and send your reply and get back to your duties. I can’t have you mooning about the hallway all day.”

A thrill of pure happiness swept through her and before she could think what she was doing, she leaned forward and kissed the older woman on the cheek. Then she sped back to the door and wrote her reply on the little form the telegram boy handed to her:

“HAVE FIVE DAYS FROM THURSDAY STOP PLEASE WRITE TRAVEL DIRECTIONS STOP BETHAN STOP”

She found a sixpence in her pocket and tipped the grinning boy. He rode away whistling ‘Tipperary.’ Returning to the ward, she found herself all thumbs and the young officer she was bandaging mocked her gently. They had all heard the exchanges in the hall and took the opportunity to rib her mercilessly.

“Oh, don’t say you are leaving us, dear Nurse Meredith.”

“No! Say not so. We would all be desolate without you.”

“I say, Nurse, who is the lucky fellow?”

“Will you come and spend five days with me, Nurse Meredith? I promise you, you would never forget it!”

Once this would have embarrassed her beyond words but after six or so months in the company of young men, she was able to give as good as she got.

“If I could leave you lot of cheeky monkeys, I would, now, wouldn’t I? But don’t any of you fret, I’ll only be gone the five days. Then I’ll be back to make you all miserable again. And put that smelly pipe out, Mr Wilson, you know Matron hates it on the ward. And as for you, Mr Larimore, I would sooner spend five days in the company of my father’s sheep. At least they have better manners, don’t they?”

The others cheered this sally and started ribbing Larimore for lacking the manners of a sheep. Their conversation turned more earthy but they were rapidly subdued by the return of Sister Hallam.

“Officers and gentlemen, are you? I have heard better conversation in a four-ale bar! Now remember your manners, our Nurses here are young ladies and I will not tolerate such rudery.”

This brought a submissive mumbling of “Yes, Sister” and “Very good, Sister.” She scowled about the ward once more, pointedly sniffed the air by Wilson’s bed and stalked out.

“How can you stand that old dragon, Nurse Meredith?” one of the young officers asked.

Bethan whirled in outrage.

“How dare you call Sister Hallam such a thing? I’ll have you know that she is kindness itself. If you cannot keep a civil tongue in your head then, pray, don’t speak to me at all.”

Sister Hallam heard the exchange and smiled. She thought now would be a good time to go and talk to Matron. For all that Bethan Meredith was only nineteen years old, she had the makings of a first rate nurse. There would be no problem with the leave, she would see to that!

********************************

The telegram was waiting for Phillip on the hall table as he entered the house. His heart fluttered wildly as he saw it and for a second or two he stood stock-still, unable to bring himself to open the buff envelope. “Courage, man,” he muttered and ripped it open, staring in joy when he read the contents. His mother entered the hall and saw him standing there, transfixed by the message in his hands.

“From your demeanour, Phillip, I believe you have the reply for which you were hoping?”

“Yes, mother. Bethan may come for five days from Thursday. Isn’t that spiffing?”

“Yes, dear, spiffing. Now hurry and dress, for dinner is nearly ready and you know your father hates to be kept waiting for his victuals.” 

Dinner passed in a blur for Phillip. He tried to make conversation but several times his attention wandered into a private reverie. He missed the knowing looks that passed between his parents and barely tasted the food. Had he been asked what he had eaten, he would have been unable to say. His thoughts looped and spun around Bethan. Five whole days! He could hardly believe his good fortune. He planned each day in his head and then re-planned in case the weather was inclement. Then he rejected all of those plans as not good enough and started the whole process over again. Yet everything he thought of seemed inadequate. He gnashed his teeth in anguish and then, before he could catch himself blurted it all out.

“I say, what shall I do with Bethan. I mean, I want her to have a really tiptop time but, for the life of me, I cannot think how!”

His mother smiled.

“Phillip, if she is the person you believe her to be then there is no reason to worry. Show her the estate, take her on a picnic. Use the governess cart and take her to the seaside. Do whatever you want. But I would say, if she is anything like as smitten as you so obviously are, dear, just be with her. It is probably all she will ask.”

“Oh, do you think so, mother, truly? I do so hope you’re right.”

His father chuckled. “I was the same when I met your mother. Went right off my fodder for a fortnight!” He slapped his ample girth. “Could do with losing me appetite for a bit now, what?” 

They all laughed and Phillip felt immeasurably better. His mother was right – wasn’t she always? If Bethan Meredith was the girl for him she had much better see him ‘warts and all.’ With this decided, the evening improved and he was even glad to join his parents in the library for a hand or two of whist after dinner. 

A decanter of Port stood by the card table and another of Madeira. Phillip and his father smoked cigars contentedly and, apart from the soft rasp of the cards and the occasional muted expression of triumph or disappointment, they played mostly in silence, happy in each other’s company. His mother retired at about ten o’clock and this left Phillip and his father alone. Phillip had the suspicion that this had been planned. His father lit a fresh cigar and, when he had it drawing to his satisfaction, turned his attention to his son.

“Now, Phillip old man, I’m not going to come the heavy-handed paterfamilias but your mother and I think it’s time we had a talk. How old are you now? Twenty one, is it?” 

“You know very well, father, that I shall be twenty two in a month.”

“Ah, well, yes. Be that as it may, it is certainly time we discussed your future.”

“Father, I’m not so terribly sure that I have a future. The war, you know.”

“Nonsense, my boy. This big push on the Somme will soon put an end it, the newspapers all say so!”

“Father, I don’t care much for what the newspapers say. The big push is a failure. As far as I can work out it failed on the very first morning. I was talking to some of the chaps on the leave boat; walking wounded, you know. They told me that half our shells didn’t detonate and it was the same as at Loos - large stretches of the wire uncut and the Huns snug in their deep bunkers just waiting for the bombardment to finish. Then they’re up on the parapet like a long dog after a rabbit, machine guns to the fore. Some battalions lost over seventy-five percent of their strength just negotiating the gaps in our wire. You see, they’d been marked with white tape. It gave the Hun machine gunners a perfect aiming-point.”

“I am sure they were exaggerating. Shell-shocked, I expect. Does funny things to a fellow, I’ve heard. All the communiqués are quite clear that we are advancing. Why, I saw a map in the Times this very morning. Showed we’ve pushed the blighters back almost everywhere.”