Wine and Roses

Summary:

Sam's uncle, the Reverend Aubrey Stewart, and her former landlady, Mrs Merivale, fall prey to Meri's home-made wine, whilst sitting in Meri's garden. It's an all-out horticultural experience.

June 1945.

A companion story to my own serial L'Aimant, and to dancesabove's serial The Crash. The story stands well enough on its own, but is best enjoyed having read as far as Chapter 18 of L'Aimant and Chapter 17 of The Crash.

Disclaimer:

The creative rights to the characters and plotlines in "Foyle's War" belong to Anthony Horowitz. This story is a not-for-profit homage to the television series, to the talented actors who bring its characters to life, and to a fascinating era.

Author's Notes:

Merivale, Sam's bohemian former landlady, belongs to dancesabove. I got to know her whilst reading dances' excellent story, The Crash.

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The Moorfields Eye Hospital in London is the oldest-established eye hospital in the world.

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For those readers unfamiliar with European varieties of stone-fruit, the greengage (also known as the Reine Claude) is an especially sweet, round, green-skinned plum.

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Thanks to dances for lending me her character, and for beta-reading this story.

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This story is for the Plaid Pussycat, who saw some mileage in the Aubrey/Meri relationship, and challenged me to write it.

Wine and Roses

The Reverend Aubrey Stewart ran a cooling finger under his clerical collar. This was an unexpected defeat, but honesty dictated he should cede with grace, and bow to the superior quality of Mrs Merivale's home-made rose-petal wine over his own prized greengage.

"Sahtch terribly stiff and unforgiving-looking things they make you wear!" observed Meri lazily from her rattan chair. Seated beside him on the terrace of her Hastings cottage garden, her grey hair pulled into a ballerina bun, with soft wisps falling round her face, she took another languid sip of Château Merivale. "Those collars! I could never be at ease in anything that doesn't flow. Freedom to breathe, dear Father Aubrey! I hope, at home at least, God lets you take it off and fling it in the corner." She launched her free arm into an exuberant arc, mimicking the gesture of a collar being cast aside with reckless abandon. She peered at him provocatively over her half-moon spectacles and chuckled.

Aubrey gave her an unsmiling but indulgent look as he drained his second glass. "My dear Mrs M, you mustn't tease me. I am quite unused to it."

"Indeed? Then clearly I must ply you with a drop more rose-petal." Ere I resume the onslaught, was the unspoken postscript running through her mind. Satisfied with his tolerant reaction to her artful banter, Meri rose and swept past him towards the house, a cloud of fine silk kaftan and patchouli, leaving accents of ylang-ylang in her wake.

Aubrey closed his eyelids, ostensibly against the sun, but in truth the better to luxuriate in her enticing aroma. When his eyes reopened, Meri was already poised before him, holding the now-familiar bottle of temptingly sweet, but insidiously potent liquid.

"Say 'when'." Meri poured, her face lit by a winsome smile. As she did so, her hand reached out to steady his. "Now, Father Aubrey, you must try to hold your glass quite still. I should not forgive myself if any were to spill onto your trousers. Deliciously pleasant though this nectar is, it makes a troublesome sticky mess on woollen cloth. And I could not guarantee that sponging would remove it."

Aubrey's free hand fumbled with his collar yet again. "I fear the warmth outside here on the terrace has begun… to disagree with me..."

"My dear Aubrey,"—Meri's eyes lifted from her task and met her guest's—"the room behind you has four serviceable corners. Would not the irksome collar fly quite easily into one of them, if flung?" Her eyes flashed over her spectacles, and her elfin features spelt encouragement that bordered on a challenge.

Aubrey Stewart was used to his own company—his companions of habit and of inclination were his books, his butterfly collection and his God. Naturally, the responsibilities of pastoral duty devolved upon his shoulders, but he was unaccustomed to communing with others in the intimacy of a pair, save when there was the pretext of shared interest to buffer the exchange.

Indeed, it was just such an interest sharedthat had brought him back to Hastings, and to Merivale—namely, their mutual enthusiasm for home-made wine. This was a meeting informally agreed upon at his niece Samantha's wedding six months earlier, but one which he had subsequently shelved, sidelined and shamelessly postponed until today. Though cordial correspondence—ah! cordial in both senses of the word!—had passed regularly between the two of them in the intervening months, Aubrey had clung to his routine and his commitments with an assiduous devotion far beyond—if he were honest—the normal dedication his ecclesiastical duty demanded.

Though he had seen his niece Samantha frequently in the period since her wedding to Christopher Foyle, complex family circumstances affecting his brother Iain had dictated that their visits should take place in Lyminster, rather than in Hastings. Thus, and with all easy pretexts denied him for a casual call upon Sam's former landlady, no adequate contrivance had existed for their paths to cross in person.

Merivale, as she preferred to be addressed in widowhood, was more than alert to the nature of the Reverend Stewart's prevarication. Her genial encounter with Samantha's uncle at her young friend's memorable December wedding had given her the measure of the man. And it left her in no doubt that she had work to do if anything at all were to develop from their brief but warm acquaintance.

She had assessed the Reverend Aubrey Stewart as an intellectually serious individual, with a forthright, buoyant manner and a ready laugh. She found his personality and intellect attractive, but her instincts predicted that, without considerable nudging, he would opt to coast through his declining years, never venturing to upset the comfortable balance of his personal life.

Such marriage to a status quo of solitariness did not suit Merivale's plans for Aubrey Stewart in the least. Therefore she wrote to him within a fortnight of their meeting, with news of Christmas spent in London at her daughter's. She packed her letter full of cheerful anecdotes, to counterbalance the intrusive, but necessary, sad accounts of V2 rocket-strikes upon the capital, and the pursuant tragedies endured by its war-weary population.

Within a week Father Aubrey had written back to tell her of a crisis of conscience brought on by the allied bombing of Nuremberg, much vaunted in the press: "My dear Merivale, Do we condone it? Can we condone it? Ordinary people killed, or left homeless in their thousands; irreplaceable mediæval architecture destroyed? To what end? How shall we justify such acts of wanton destruction? How rationalise the flattening of a city that produces nothing more harmful than toys and gingerbread?—Hitler's favourite city? I am sorry—I cannot accept this as sufficient reason. In such moments, I despair that we shall ever see an end to this attrition."

Meri read his agonised words with the sad eyes of a mother whose child and grandchild dwelt in constant threat of arbitrary annihilation by the enemy. She wrote back: "I have pleaded with her countless times to come to me in Hastings with my grandson, but, alas, James has a serious eye condition—a result of his premature birth—and Angela will not remove herself from Islington, where they are close to The Moorfields. I exist in an agony of worry for their safety. I long for an end to this cruel and awful war."

He replied: "My dear Mrs M, I can only apologise if the deliberations of my racked conscience have offended you. I confess I am at a loss to know how a clergyman may guide his flock in such ambivalent circumstances. I am already at odds with many in my congregation. To speak the fundamental Christian values of reconciliation and forgiveness from the pulpit in the midst of war is tantamount to treason in the eyes of some. Sadly, on reflection, I must conclude that in my advocacy of humanitarianism, I have lost humility. This war is sent to test our faith in ways not even dreamt of in the history of human conflict. You have not, I note, admonished me for my impertinence, but merely reminded me of your own concerns, and so I send you grateful thanks for putting up with the conflicts of my conscience and with me."

Their letters leapt in frequency to twice a week. Both correspondents were well-placed, from their different vantage points, to pass on news of common interest: Sam's progressing pregnancy; Christopher's inordinate pride; how soon the war might end; their gardens; the stimulating books that they had read; the challenges associated with laying in wine-making ingredients in the austerity of wartime…

Finally, with Victory in Europe announced in early May, and the resultant softening of attitudes in many quarters, Aubrey felt a weight lifted from his shoulders. His relief was to be short-lived—August of that year was to bring new moral dilemmas to the fore with the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki—but for a few brief, blissful months at least, the Reverend Stewart felt sufficiently remitted from the moral perplexities of war, that he began to feel again the pull of personal affairs.

It was at the end of May that Merivale, sensing a sea-change in the tone of Aubrey's letters, took matters into her own hands, and issued an unvarnished invitation for the Reverend to come and stay. "My dear Father Aubrey, It seems to me, from memory, that we have unfinished business to complete. As I recall, you issued me a challenge at Samantha's wedding, and I have to tell you now that I am quite determined to rise to it. The roses in my garden have begun to bloom, and it will be my pleasure to acquaint you with the raw materials of this year's garden vintage—though you will naturally appreciate that tasting must be confined to last year's produce! Knowing your Sunday commitments, I would suggest a mid-week visit—with a toothbrush and a change of socks and smalls. The house has been quite empty since Samantha left, and I should be most glad of your congenial company. Quite apart from which, the honour of my best rose-petal is at stake. Sincerely, in anticipation, Merivale"

And so it came about that, on a Wednesday afternoon in early June, Meri and her clergyman sat in two rattan chairs on a sun-soaked garden terrace, imbibing two distinct and independent varieties of home-made wine.

"Mrs M, kindly present your glass, and prepare to be surprised." Gamely, Merivale held out a sherry schooner to receive the dubious-looking bright-green liquid Aubrey was proposing to dispense.

She took a hefty sip and closed one eye, gauging the impact on her tonsils. "Aubrey…" she uttered huskily, "this…"—a little cough—"is greengage?"

"Yes, indeed!" he declared with satisfaction. "I still have seven bottles in the larder." He pressed her eagerly. "What d'you think?"

"Well," she gasped, "how right you are. It's sahtch a surprise." Meri mustered a brave smile. "You're partial to this… unique… taste, yourself, I take it?"

"Extremely proud of the vintage!" he assured her with an earnest nod.

Merivale let her spectacles dangle from the chain around her neck, and studied her guest carefully. She knew from their exchange of letters that Aubrey valued truth, and did not let himself off lightly on important issues. But now it fell to her to make a tricky judgement: would he react as equably to hearing the truth about his greengage wine?

She made her choice. "Proud? And so you should be. It's an arrestingly original tipple, Aubrey. Now then— I'd like you to try a drop of my rose-petal…"

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It was an easy victory; Aubrey's eyes lit up at the first taste. "What witchcraft is this?" He gave her a delighted grin, then toasted her. "I yield!" he exclaimed. "You have undermined my confidence as a cottage vintner."

Meri settled back into her chair to enjoy a private joke. Witchcraft, is it? The usual male explanation for a feminine victory. In spite of herself, she was beaming at his good-natured capitulation.

They settled to enjoy a few more glasses, and fell into companionable conversation in the early summer sunshine. Presently Meri cast a glance across at Aubrey and asked him, "Shall we take a gentle turn around the garden? I should like to introduce you to the roses in my wine."

"Delighted, my dear." Aubrey stood and offered her his arm. As her hand threaded through the crook of his elbow, his own came down upon her fingers and rested there.

They strolled along the path, and Meri pointed out Great Maidens Blush, a tall shrub alba rose, bedecked with blowsy pink double blooms. Its scent was overwhelming in the sunshine. "Almost as inebriating as the wine itself," enthused Aubrey, reaching for a bloom and plunging his nose deep inside it.

They moved on then to Rambling Rector, a name which understandably caused amusement. Meri plucked one creamy white semi-double flower from the climbing stems above the arbour, and fed it through Aubrey's button-hole. "There," she said. "A souvenir of your own ramblings through my borders."

He chuckled and brought his lapel up to his nose, inhaling deeply. "This," he told her, "is nothing short of a spiritual experience. I have never smelt a rose quite like it. No wonder that your potions have such power." He gave her a mischievous look.

Meri simply smiled, and led him on to Albertine, a pale yellow rambler, with clustered flowers. "My husband planted this," she said. "We share a name, this rose and I. But since he died, I've given sole possession to the rose."

"You mean… possession of your name?"

"I do. My husband called me Albertine. After he died, it felt… as if my name had completely vanished from use. And so I became Merivale."

Aubrey sank his nose into an open flower. "Albertine," he said. Then, for good measure, "Albertine."

He kept a tight hold on her arm as she directed him further down the path to Frühlingsduft, an unassuming, but headily fragrant cream single-flower shrub-rose.

"It's German for 'a breath of spring'," explained Meri.

"Indeed," he answered. "A familiar concept from the German poetry I've read." He stopped and cupped a flower between his fingers. "This rose was bred by an enlightened, cultured nation—in better times. There are those who seek to disparage All Things German. I cannot share that feeling. The Third Reich was not Germany; it was the scourge of Germany. Germany suffered, too. But in my church, this message was unwelcome."

"Aubrey, you have agonised enough over this."

"I care deeply for my fellow man."

"And for your fellow… woman?" probed Meri, with the gentlest tug upon his elbow.

He smiled pensively. "As a young man, of course, I entertained hopes of personal happiness…" Aubrey pinned his gaze to a distant ivy-clad wall. "Dorothea," he said.

He spoke the name as four distinct syllables: Dor-o-the-a. "Her name was Dorothea. 'Gift of God'. The Lord gave, but he also took away. She was a nursing sister on the Western Front, and lost her life in a field hospital at Ypres."

"I am so sorry, Aubrey. How did she die?" Meri asked softly.

"Poison gas." He frowned at the words. "Such methods, as with bombs and rockets, are not conceived to spare the innocent. She died on April 22nd, 1915. The wind was simply blowing in the wrong direction. She was twenty-five years old."

Meri stood silently at Aubrey's side, but tightened her grasp around his arm. As she suspected, there was more to come.

"At the time of Dorothea's death," he continued, "I was a captain in the Royal Field Artillery, stationed in Belgium. Later that year, in September, I was reassigned to special duties, in preparation for the allied attack on Loos. It soon became apparent that the 'Special Corps' to which I'd been seconded existed solely to rain gas upon the enemy. I went forthwith to my commanding officer and refused to serve in such an enterprise. I would not, I told him, serve in any offensive involving chlorine gas. My case would certainly have ended in court martial, had I not been caught by shrapnel in the next day's operations, and found myself transported back to hospital on the SouthCoast."

Aubrey patted her hand. "Anyway, enough, my dear. I can't imagine that you want to talk about all this."

"You're wrong," she answered. "I most certainly do. It's important to my understanding of you." Meri's eyes sparkled up at him, her irises two olivines in golden circlets.

"Dear girl," he lifted his chin and regarded her thoughtfully. "Oasis in my wilderness," he said, and, bending, kissed her cheek.

Meri blinked, and stroked the place where he had kissed her. Then she unlinked her arm from his and stepped in front of him, placing a single finger on her lips. "Father Aubrey, do you consider these to be off-limits?"

A deep, rumbling chuckle rose from his belly. Without prevarication, Aubrey clasped his hands behind his back, bent forwards from the waist and, puckering his lips, planted a firm kiss on her mouth. Then he drew back and lifted his head to gaze down his nose and examine his handiwork. "Bingo!" he declared. "Right on target. Haven't lost my touch!"

Meri raised a bewildered eyebrow and attempted to decide if he were actually being serious. Was that truly all?

For his part, Aubrey rocked upon his toes in obvious satisfaction, then simply turned and set about surveying the herbaceous borders. "However shall we spend the rest of the afternoon?" he wondered aloud, "now that 'business' is completed? And you so unequivocally the victor…"

"Who knows?" murmured Meri, in genuine confusion, as they turned back towards the house. She stepped elegantly across the terrace, preceding Aubrey through the French windows and into the sitting room. "We might perhaps," she ventured, half to herself, in puzzlement, "begin by tempting your hands from behind your back."

"Ah," acknowledged Aubrey affably, disengaging the hands still clasped behind him. "Will there be tea and cake, then? Because I'm feeling rather parched."

Meri's spirits sank. A phrase from one of Aubrey's letters pushed its way into her mind: "People cannot be dragged to places they are not ready to go". She heaved a little sigh of resignation and turned towards the far wall of the sitting room, where the doorway led off into the hall and out towards the kitchen.

She had taken no more than two steps when a flash of white looped past her ear and landed on the sideboard in the corner.

It was Aubrey's collar.

Two hands came down to rest softly on her shoulders, and set her opal pendant earrings quivering. A gentle voice spoke in her ear.

"My dear, though I appreciate your roses in their outdoor habitat, this does not preclude a little indoor gardening from time to time…In furtherance of which, as you will note, my inhibitions are duly flung into the corner, and my hands"—he stroked her shoulders lightly— "are duly tempted from behind my back. By more than just the prospect of delicious tea and cake."

*** FIN ***

More Author's Notes:

Sam's Uncle Aubrey, played by Brian Poyser, made two appearances in Foyle's War: The French Drop (S3E1) and Plan of Attack (S6E1). In both episodes, he was a congenial companion who interacted easily with Foyle and Sam, displaying none of the reserve or fussiness of his brother, and fellow cleric, the Reverend Iain Stewart.

In The French Drop, Aubrey offers Samantha and her boss a place to stay at the vicarage in Leavenham while Foyle conducts investigations locally. It is on this occasion that the two of them are introduced to Aubrey's greengage wine. They are clearly underwhelmed—except by the colour, which Sam describes as "very green". (I'm fairly sure that the witches' brew handed to Mr Kitchen and Miss Weeks during that episode was enhanced with food colouring – no greengage wine would ever look that green, no matter how ineptly made!)

In Plan of Attack, the tables are turned, and Foyle provides lodgings to Aubrey while he attends a church conference in Hastings. As a little 'in-joke' for the benefit of the audience, Aubrey produces a bottle of his greengage wine as a thank-you present to Foyle for having him to stay—Foyle's reaction is polite but notably unenthusiastic. Wine notwithstanding, in this episode we learn a little more about Aubrey's personal beliefs: he speaks of his troubled conscience in the face of the high civilian casualties on both sides, as the Allies pursue a punishing campaign designed to force Germany into unconditional surrender.

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Anyone familiar with the rose paintings of Belgian botanist Pierre-Joseph Redouté will have seen a moss rose. The moss rose (rosa muscosa) evolved from the rosa centifolia (or 'cabbage rose') in the 17th century. No old-fashioned English country garden would be complete without one. Meri's garden is full of old-fashioned roses that owe a lot to moss-rose stock. And oh! the heady scent of them in my imagination.

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Hope you enjoyed reading the story as much as I did writing it.

GiuC