Coming Home

On that morning, all the ships of the Fleet held Thanksgiving services, and across the water you could hear the hymn ‘Eternal Father Strong to Save’ being sung by all the ships' companies, and the Royal Marine Buglers playing the ‘Last Post’ in memory of all the men who had been killed.

  It was a tremendously exciting and rather drunken day, as all rules were waived, and there was a party in the VAD's mess, and people were coming and going all day long, and nobody at all seemed to be doing any work. That night, after dark, there were great celebrations, the whole East Indies Fleet lit up with flares and searchlights, fire-hoses, making fountains, rockets exploding, and hooters hooting. On the Quarterdeck of the flagship, the Royal Marine band played — not ceremonial marches but tunes like ‘Little Brown Jug’, and ‘In the Mood’, and ‘I'm Going to Get Lit Up When the Lights Go On in London’.

  We all crowded out onto the terrace and watched the fun, the Senior Medical Officer and two other doctors, and Sister and all the patients (some in wheelchairs), and various other hangers-on, and everybody who turned up seemed to have brought a bottle of gin, so it was fairly riotous, and every time a rocket went up, we all yelled and shouted and cheered.

  I did too and it was wonderful, but, at the same time, I felt a bit scared as well. Because I know that, sooner or later, somebody will tell me what has become of Mummy and Dad and Jess, and if they have survived these terrible three and a half years. I've only survived because I've deliberately not thought about them too much, but now I'm going to have to get my head out of the sand and face up to the truth, whatever it is. As soon as I hear anything, I'll send you a cable, and I'll telephone Uncle Bob, provided I can get a line through to the C in C's office in Colombo. Things are bound to be a bit disorganised with so much going on. Toby Whitaker dropped in a couple of days ago, and there is talk of the Fleet beginning to move on to Singapore. Already. Perhaps HMS Adelaide will go as well. I don't know. We'll just have to wait and see.

  Another person who has been to see me two or three times is Toddy. I've told you about her, I know, in other letters, but in case you've forgotten, she has lived in Ceylon since she was married (widow now) and used to know Mummy and Dad in Colombo in the 1930s. About the only person here who did know them, and we talked about them for a long time, the first evening I was in Sick-Bay. It was actually the day before the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, but of course we didn't know this was going to happen, and my foot was hurting and I was feeling a bit depressed. And, to cheer me up, she said, ‘The war will end, someday. Perhaps sooner than any of us will imagine.’ And the very next day, the bomb happened, and that day was the beginning of the end. Don't you think that was extraordinary?

  My love to you and to Phyllis and Anna, and the Carey-Lewises when you see them, and Loveday and Nat, from

  Judith

  Sooner or later somebody will tell me what has become of Mummy and Dad and Jess.

  She waited. Life continued. Day followed day; the customary routine. Travelling by boat each morning to Smeaton's Cove and HMS Adelaide. Long, sweltering hours spent typing, filing, correcting Confidential books. Then back to Quarters each evening.

  Perhaps now, she would tell herself. Perhaps today.

  Nothing.

  Her anxieties were compounded by the driblets of information that were trickling through from the first of the Japanese prison-camps. A saga of atrocities, slave labour, starvation, and disease. Others spoke of them, but Judith could not.

  In the Captain's Office, all who worked there were particularly thoughtful and kind, almost protective, even the Chief Petty Officer Writer, who was renowned for his surly disposition and rough tongue. Judith guessed that Captain Spiros had put the word around, but how he had come to know about her family's circumstances was anybody's guess. She supposed that he must have been told by First Officer, and felt touched that on a senior level, there should be so much concern.

  Penny Wailes was a particular comfort. They had always been good friends and worked well together, but all at once there developed a real closeness between them, a tacit understanding without anything very much being said. It was a bit like being at school, and having a sympathetic older sister to keep an eye on you. Together, each evening, they made the return journey, and Penny never left Judith's side until they had passed through the Regulating Office and confirmed that there was still no message. No summons. No news.

  And then it happened. At six o'clock on a Tuesday evening. Judith was in her banda. She had been swimming in the cove, had had a shower. Wrapped in a towel, she was combing her wet hair, when one of the Leading Wrens who worked in the Regulating Office came in search of her.

  ‘Dunbar?’

  She turned from the mirror, her comb in her hand. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Message for you. You've got to go and see First Officer tomorrow morning.’

  She heard herself say, quite calmly, ‘I have to go to work.’

  ‘Message says she's fixed it with Captain Spiros. You can go on board on one of the later boats.’

  ‘What time does she want to see me?’

  ‘Ten-thirty.’ The Leading Wren waited for some response. ‘Okay?’ she prompted.

  ‘Yes. Fine. Thanks.’ Judith turned back to her mirror and went on combing her hair.

  The next morning, she blancoed her shoes and her cap, put them out into the sun to dry. She put on clean uniform, white cotton shirt and skirt, still crisp with the creases of the dhobi's iron. A bit like a sailor, going into battle. If a ship went into battle, the entire ship's company put on clean clothes, so that if you got wounded, there was less chance of infection. Her shoes were dry. She laced them up, and put on her hat, and walked out of the banda and into the dazzling sun, down through Quarters, through the gate, down the familiar road that led to NHQ.

  The Senior Wren in Trincomalee was First Officer Beresford. She and her staff, a petty officer and two leading wrens, occupied three rooms on the upper floor of one of the NHQ blocks, with windows facing out over the long jetty and the harbour beyond. The prospect, ever changing and always busy, was a bit like having a marvellous painting hanging upon the wall, and visitors to her office invariably remarked on this, and paused to gaze, and to ask her how she could possibly concentrate upon her work with such a constant diversion.

  But, after nearly a year of coping with the many aspects of her responsible post, the view beyond the window had lost some of its magic, and become quite humdrum, part of her day-to-day life. Her desk was placed at right angles to the view, and should she look up from her papers, or pause to take a telephone call, she was faced by a blank wall, two filing cabinets, and the odd lizard, pinned to the white plaster like a decorative ornament.

  As well, there were three small photographs, framed and placed discreetly on her desk, so that they should not obtrude on professional concentration. Her husband, a lieutenant-colonel in the Gunners, and her two children. She had not seen these children since the early summer of 1940, when, persuaded by her husband, she had sent them to Canada to sit out the duration of the war with relations in Toronto. The memory of putting them on the train at Euston and saying goodbye, perhaps for ever, was so horrible and so traumatic that most of the time she blocked it out.

  But now the war, so terribly, so precipitantly, was over. Finished. They had all survived. The Beresford family, one day, would be reunited. Together again. Her children had been eight and six when they left for Canada. They were now thirteen and eleven. Every day of the separation had been painful. No day had passed without her thinking about them…

  Enough. With a little jerk she pulled herself together. This was not the moment to start brooding over her children; in fact, right now, the most inappropriate time to choose. Now was August the twenty-second, a Wednesday, and at a quarter past ten in the morning almost unbearably hot, the temperature creeping upwards as the sun moved into the September equinox. Even the breeze, flowing in from the sea, and the ubiquitous fans churning overhead, did little to cool the air, and First Officer's cotto
n shirt was already damp and sticking to her back.

  The relevant papers lay on her desk. She drew them towards her and began to read, although, already, she knew them by heart.

  A knock at the door. Outwardly composed, she raised her head.

  ‘Yes?’

  Petty Officer Wren put her head round the door. ‘Wren Dunbar, ma'm.’

  ‘Thank you, Richardson. Send her in.’

  Judith went through the open door. Saw the spacious, workmanlike office, the fans churning, the open window on the far wall, framing the familiar prospect of the harbour. From behind her desk, First Officer rose to her feet, as though politely greeting an invited visitor. She was a tall and pleasant-faced woman in her late thirties, with smooth brown hair wound up into a neat bun at the back of her head. For some reason, she had never looked quite right in uniform. It wasn't that it didn't suit her, just that it was much easier to imagine her in a twin set and pearls, being the backbone of the Women's Institute, and organising the flower rota for the church.

  ‘Dunbar. Thank you for coming. Now, pull up a chair and make yourself comfortable. Would you like a cup of tea?’

  ‘No, thank you, ma'm.’

  The chair was a plain wooden one, and not particularly comfortable. She sat facing First Officer across the desk, her hands in her lap. Their eyes met. Then First Officer looked away, busying herself by unnecessarily neatening a few papers, reaching for her pen.

  ‘You got my message? Yes, of course you did, or you wouldn't be here. I spoke to Captain Spiros on the telephone yesterday evening, and he said it would be in order for you to take the morning off.’

  ‘Thank you, ma'm.’

  Another pause. And then, ‘How's your foot?’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Your foot. You had an accident with a piece of glass. It's recovered?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course. It wasn't very serious.’

  ‘Nasty enough, though.’

  Preliminaries over. Judith waited for First Officer to come to the point. Which, after another painful hesitation, she did. ‘I'm afraid it's not very good news, Dunbar. I am sorry.’

  ‘It's about my family, isn't it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What's happened?’

  ‘We heard, through the Red Cross and Naval Welfare. The two organisations work closely together. I…I have to tell you that your father is dead. He died in Changi Prison, of dysentery, a year after the fall of Singapore. He wasn't alone. Others with him did all they could to care for him and nurse him, but of course, conditions were appalling. There were no medicines and little food. There wasn't much they could do. But he would have had friends around him. Try not to think of him dying alone.’

  ‘I see.’ Her mouth was suddenly so dry that she could scarcely speak the words, and they came out in a sort of whisper. She tried again. A bit better this time. ‘And my mother? And Jess?’

  ‘So far we have no definite information. We only know that their ship, The Rajah of Sarawak, was torpedoed in the Java Sea, six days out of Singapore. She was grossly overcrowded in the first place, and she went down almost instantly. There would have been only moments to get away, and the official verdict seems to be that if there were survivors, there could have been no more than a handful.’

  ‘Have they found anyone who did survive?’

  First Officer shook her head. ‘No. Not yet. There are so many camps, in Java and Sumatra and Malaya — even some civilian camps in Japan itself. It's going to take some time to clear them all.’

  ‘Perhaps…’

  ‘I think, my dear, that you shouldn't hold out any hope.’

  ‘Is that what you've been told to tell me?’

  ‘Yes. I'm afraid it is.’

  The fans circled overhead. From beyond the open window came the sound of a boat's engine, approaching the jetty. Somewhere, a man was hammering. They were gone. They were all dead. Three and a half years of waiting and hoping, and now this. Never, ever to see any of them again.

  Out of the long silence which lay between them, she heard First Officer say, ‘Dunbar? Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes.’ Perhaps she was not behaving properly. Perhaps she should be weeping and sobbing. But tears had never felt so unlikely, so impossible. She nodded. ‘Yes, I'm all right.’

  ‘Perhaps…now…a cup of tea or something?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I…I really am so dreadfully sorry.’ And there was a break in her voice, and Judith felt sorry for her because she looked so distressed and motherly, and because it must have been a terrible ordeal, having to break such devastating tidings.

  She said, and was astonished to hear her own voice so expressionless and calm, ‘I knew about The Rajah of Sarawak being sunk. I mean, I knew she must have been, that something must have happened, because she never reached Australia. My mother said she'd write, once she and Jess got to Australia, but I never got any letters after that last one from Singapore.’

  She remembered the letter, read so often that she knew that last painful paragraph by heart.

  It is very strange, but all my life from time to time I have found myself asking unanswerable questions. Who am I? And what am I doing here? And where am I going? Now it seems to be coming terribly true, and it feels like a haunting dream that I have lived through many times before.

  A premonition, perhaps? But now, nobody would ever know.

  ‘I realised something must have happened to the ship. But still, I told myself they would have survived; got themselves into a lifeboat, or onto a raft. Been picked up…or…’ The Java Sea. Sharks. Judith's own personal nightmare. Blot it out. ‘…but I don't suppose they had a chance. Jess was only little. And my mother had never been much of a swimmer.’

  ‘Do you have other brothers and sisters?’

  ‘No.’

  Once more, First Officer glanced down at the papers on her desk, which Judith now realised were her own, the complete record of her service career ever since that day, the day after Edward was killed, when she had travelled from Penzance to Devonport and signed on for the WRNS.

  ‘It states here that Captain and Mrs Somerville are your next of kin.’

  ‘Yes. I couldn't put my parents, because they were abroad. And he's Rear Admiral Somerville now, over in Colombo, in charge of the Dockyard. Biddy Somerville is my mother's sister.’ Which reminded her. ‘I promised I'd send her a cable as soon as I got any news. I must do that. She'll be waiting.’

  ‘We can help there. You can write what you want to say, and we'll get one of the leading wrens to put it through…’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘But you have other friends in Ceylon, I believe? The Campbells. You spent your last leave with them, up-country?’

  ‘Yes, that's right. They used to know my mother and father.’

  ‘I only mentioned them because I think you should take some leave. Get away from Trincomalee. Perhaps you would like to go and stay with them again?’

  Taken unawares, Judith painfully considered this suggestion. Nuwara Eliya. The mountains and the cool air, and the rain. The hillsides, quilted in tea-bushes, and the fragrance of lemon-scented eucalyptus. The casually comfortable bungalow, log-fires in the evenings…But she hesitated, and finally shook her head.

  ‘Does it not appeal?’

  ‘Not really.’ That leave, the Campbells had given her a wonderful time, but it couldn't be the same again. Not now. Now, she didn't think she could face a succession of parties at the Hill Club, and hosts of new faces. Rather, she longed for somewhere quiet. A place to lick her wounds. ‘It's not that the Campbells aren't endlessly kind…’ She tried to explain ‘…it's just that…’

  She needed to say no more. First Officer smiled. ‘I entirely understand. The closest of friends can be exhausting. So, here's another suggestion. Why not go to Colombo, and spend some time with Rear Admiral Somerville? His official residence is in the Galle Road, he'll have plenty of space, and there will be servants to take care of you. Most importan
t of all, you'll be with family. I feel, just now, that's what you really need. Time to come to terms with what I have just had to tell you. Opportunity to talk things over…perhaps even make a few plans for your future…’

  Uncle Bob. At this bleak watershed of her life, Judith knew that there was no man in the world she would rather be with. But…

  She said, ‘He'll be working, away all day. I don't want to be a nuisance to him.’

  ‘I don't think that's likely at all.’

  ‘He did say I could go and stay. He wrote to me as soon as he arrived in Colombo. He said then that it would be all right…’

  ‘So, what are we waiting for? Why don't we telephone him, and have a word?’

  ‘What about my job? Captain Spiros and Adelaide?’

  ‘We'll arrange for a temporary Writer to help Wren Wailes.’

  ‘When could I go?’

  ‘I think, right away. So we should waste no time.’

  ‘How long could I stay in Colombo?’

  ‘That's another thing. You're due two weeks leave, but I think we should add compassionate leave on to that. Which would give you a month.’

  ‘A month?’

  ‘Now, don't come up with any more objections, because it is no more than you deserve.’

  A month. A whole month with Uncle Bob. Colombo again. She remembered the house where she had lived for the first ten years of her life. She remembered her mother, sitting on the veranda sewing, and the cool of the sea-winds blowing in from the Indian Ocean.

  First Officer was waiting patiently. Judith looked up and into her eyes. She smiled encouragingly. ‘Well?’

  But all Judith could say was, ‘You've been so kind to me.’

  ‘That's my job. It's settled then?’ After a bit, Judith nodded. ‘Good. In that case, let us make the necessary arrangements.’

  From: The Offices of the First Officer WRNS, Trincomalee