Chapter 2

After lunch, Ginger escorted Jeanette onto the terrace. There were tables and chairs and some reclining deck chairs scattered along the flagged area. Ginger made his way to a deck chair in the shade of a large tree. "What about this?" he asked as he drew another deck chair alongside the first.

"Un transat. Excellent," approved Jeanette as she settled herself on the recliner.

"Transat?" queried Ginger. "A deck chair?"

"It comes from transatlantique," explained Jeanette. "Across the Atlantic."

"On liners, of course!" exclaimed Ginger. "That's logical."

Jeanette giggled. "You will find it 'ard to learn if you try to be logical," she told him, amused.

Ginger sat on the deck chair and lay back. The temperature was hot, even in the shade. He hesitated, wondering what to say. He felt his French was very basic.

"Raconte-moi ton enfance," Jeanette prompted him, thinking that she wanted to know all about him, including his childhood, and the pretext of improving his French was an excellent excuse to get him to tell her about it.

"Eh bien," began Ginger and then paused as he marshalled his thoughts. Jeanette asked him where he had been born.

Ginger explained that he had been born in Yorkshire, but his father took him to Smettleworth when he was a baby. "A cause de pas de travail," he explained.

"Du chômage," corrected Jeanette. "When someone is not working 'e is au chômage."

"I see," acknowledged Ginger. "Yes, my father got a job in a pit in Smettleworth and that is where I was brought up." He paused and then translated it into French.

"C'est bien," encouraged Jeanette. "Et ta mère? Comment est-elle?"

Ginger hesitated. He could barely remember his mother, so he was unable to describe her. She had died when he was so young. "Ma mère est mort," he eventually murmured ungrammatically, not knowing what else to say.

Jeanette looked at him sympathetically. "Elle est morte," she asked, emphasising the feminine ending of morte, "quand tu avais quel âge?"

Ginger looked confused. Jeanette explained about the feminine agreement and clarified she wanted to know how old he was when his mother died.

"J'étais –"

"J'avais," corrected Jeanette gently.

"J'avais cinq ans, environ," admitted Ginger.

Jeanette drew in her breath and put her hand on his arm in a spontaneous gesture of consolation. "Quel dommage!" she breathed, thinking what a pity it was he had lost his mother so young; no wonder he was so shy and diffident with women.

She asked him if his father had remarried.

Ginger shook his head. He drew in a deep breath when Jeanette asked what his father was like. He didn't know if he had the French to describe the drunken rages that had made his childhood such a misery.

"Mon père …" he began, wondering how best to express it, "… avait une vie dure."

Jeanette looked at him tenderly; she suspected that it was not just his father who had had a hard life.

Ginger struggled to explain that his father had liked a drink, not having much else that he was able to admit to. He did not want to tell Jeanette about the savage beatings.

"Il était souvent ivre?" queried Jeanette, reading between the lines.

"Ivre?"

Jeanette paused a moment before suggesting "drunken?"

Ginger nodded. "Yes, he was often drunk," he confirmed. "And when he was, he had a terrible temper," he admitted in spite of himself.

Jeanette was horrified, although she tried hard not to show it. Poor Ginger, she thought. He had had such a hard life, but he had turned out so well. She was almost overwhelmed with a desire to enfold him in her arms and comfort him but she contented herself with squeezing his arm sympathetically.

Ginger explained that eventually he had decided to escape and walk to London and that was how he had met Biggles.

"Il m'a tout appris," acknowledged Ginger, thinking Biggles had indeed taught him all he knew, from how to fly to how to act in polite society.

Jeanette gazed at Ginger admiringly. He had overcome a difficult childhood and made a great success of his life, she thought. Her feelings of respect and admiration deepened her affection for him.

"Et ton père – il doit être très fier de toi," she commented.

Ginger smiled ruefully and explained that his father, too, was dead, but that he had never given the impression he was very proud of his son. "Il m'a dit …" he began, but then stopped as he struggled to translate the sentiment. "When I last saw him, he said," Ginger decided to tell her in English, "that if I broke my neck it would be my own fault and I needn't bother coming back."

Jeanette looked shocked. "C'est incroyable, un père comme ça!" she exclaimed aghast.

Ginger shrugged. "I don't think," he said charitably, "that he ever really got over my mother's death."

Jeanette felt more than ever that she wanted to hold him and caress him to make him feel happy. She had to admit to herself that such an action would make her very happy, too.

"But what about you?" asked Ginger. "Parle-moi de ta famille."

Ginger gazed at her entranced as she told him slowly and clearly of her happy childhood on the rock, of family holidays paddling in the blue Mediterranean, of the sadness of her father's death from illness a few years before the war and of the need to take in English lodgers; sadness which was compounded by the loss of her brother Henri when he went to England to fight against the Boches. Ginger was captivated by the way her lips formed the words as much as by what she said. He had to admit French was a very attractive language, he thought. If he were honest, he admitted to himself, it was made all the more attractive because it was Jeanette who was speaking it. She had let her hand slide down his arm until she could entwine her fingers with his. He squeezed her hand gently and received an answering pressure.

Ginger breathed in the scents of Algiers; warm, exotic fragrances with the occasional whiff of something less pleasant. The war seemed a very long way away as the far-off calls of the Muezzin summoning the faithful to prayer drifted up from the town on the darkening breeze. He smiled fondly at Jeanette and she smiled back. They lay in the deep shade, facing each other on their respective deck chairs, holding hands, enjoying the moment of solitude together. The time had flown while they had been exchanging memories of their childhood upbringing. The clanging of a dinner gong reverberated through the air to break up the idyll.

"Good heavens!" exclaimed Ginger. "Is it dinner time already?" He stood up and offered his arm to Jeanette. "We don't have time to change," he said. "Not that I have anything to change into," he admitted. "I really must try to get hold of a British uniform as soon as I can."

Jeanette looked him up and down. "I think you look very 'ansome," she told him blushing.

Ginger blushed too. "Mrs Jameson has excellent taste," he murmured shyly, indicating her dress. "You look wonderful."

Jeanette looked pleased. "Madame Jameson said it was an old dress, but she bought it in Paris before the war," she told him as they walked, arm in arm, towards the dining room. "She 'as given me two more to wear. They are very pretty, too. She 'as given me a swimming costume so I can bathe in the sea," she added.

"That would be fun," exclaimed Ginger. "I wonder if I could borrow one, too."

"I would like it if you could," admitted Jeanette to Ginger's delight.

"Ah, there you are!" exclaimed Biggles as they entered the corridor leading to the refectory. "I wondered where you'd got to."

"Jeanette was helping me improve my French," explained Ginger diffidently.

"I'll bet!" murmured Algy, with a wicked grin.

Bertie glared at Jeanette holding on to Ginger's arm, but said nothing.

"Ginger learns very well," Jeanette told Biggles. "You must be very proud of 'im, Beegles."

The pronunciation of his nickname hit Biggles like a punch. For a moment he was taken back to an orchard in France. The pain of his loss was as sharp as the day he burned the letter all those years ago. He caught his breath and struggled to clear the image of Marie from his mind.

"Yes, he's not turned out too badly," he admitted, looking at the lad whom he had taken under his wing before the war.

"We'll have to requisition a new uniform for you," observed Biggles, noticing Ginger was still wearing his Italian shirt and slacks. "You can't go round looking like the enemy."

Ginger nodded. "I shall be glad to get rid of the borrowed finery," he admitted with a smile. "I'd like to borrow a swimming costume as well, so Jeanette and I can have a dip in the Med."

"I'll see what I can do," promised Biggles as Jameson appeared with the princess on his arm to lead the party into dinner.

Ginger found himself next to Jeanette again, much to his delight. They conversed in a mixture of French and English which caused them to lapse into fits of giggles from time to time. Biggles watched them indulgently, thinking Ginger seemed exceptionally happy and Jeanette appeared to relish his company. If the relationship carried on to its natural conclusion, he would not object, he thought. He liked Jeanette. He considered her a good match for Ginger and he knew the lad would take his responsibilities seriously, particularly in view of his response to the little talk they had had before Biggles had set off for Monaco.

Biggles could not resist thinking of Marie again with a pang of sorrow. Jeanette had given him a sharp, if unintentional, reminder. 'If only' were the saddest words in the English language, he thought, before he ruthlessly thrust the memories away and shut the door on them once more.

Algy, too, watched the pair indulgently. It had been a long time coming, thought Algy, but at last Ginger was not only showing an interest in girls, he was following it up. Algy had watched the progress of the pair's relationship with interest, ready to help out where necessary if Ginger needed advice or encouragement, but the lad seemed to be doing fine, even if he was rather hesitant. Jeanette was not just stunningly beautiful, reflected Algy, but she had proved herself audacious and determined. She would make a good mate for Ginger if, as looked likely, their relationship continued to strengthen.

Bertie watched the spectacle with bitterness in his heart. Ginger looked so damnably attractive. The glow of his skin and the sparkle in his eye that Jeanette provoked were so alluring it hurt, he thought unhappily.

Ginger, oblivious of the others' thoughts, had eyes only for Jeanette. He felt so deliriously happy he could not remember a time when he had felt so good. The Algerian wine he had drunk with his meal must have gone to his head, he thought.

At length, Mrs Jameson retired and took the ladies with her. For Ginger it was as if the sun had gone in. He made desultory conversation with the men remaining, but he could not wait for the port to be passed and the signal to rejoin the ladies be given. He coughed as cigar smoke filled the room.

At last his ordeal was over and he was able to rejoin Jeanette for coffee on the terrace where the warm scented air wrapped them in its embrace. It was much cooler than midday, but still pleasant. The stars twinkled overhead, like luminous grains scattered on the velvet blanket of the night sky. Jeanette saw him and came across to him straight away. Ginger wondered if she had missed him as much as he had missed her.

They stood for a moment looking out over the lights of the city. Ginger was captivated by the sight because the blackout was still in force in England. Then he took Jeanette's hand and led her to the deck chairs they had occupied during the afternoon, only to find that one of them already had an occupant, one of the Consulate staff.

Ginger indicated that Jeanette should be seated on the vacant chair and was about to find another to draw up next to her. She sat down, but then patted the seat beside her. "There is room for two," she murmured quietly.

Hesitantly Ginger sat beside her. It was very cosy, but there was indeed room for two, as he was slim. He stretched out beside her, thrilled by her nearness. It was very pleasant, he thought, to be lying under the stars, with Jeanette beside him.

They talked in whispers, their breath mingling, but their bodies not touching. It was exciting and somehow daring, felt Ginger, without quite knowing why. They seemed to be alone in the darkness, yet they both knew that there were people within calling distance. They could hear the buzz of conversation in the distance.

She gently put her hand on his shoulder. He reciprocated. It was not so much an embrace as a mutual expression of affection, but he felt very content. He longed to hold her in his arms, but this would suffice for the moment.

The effects of the meal and the wine he had imbibed took its toll; he fell asleep, exhausted by the efforts of the last few days. The brief nap he had snatched in the transport on the way to the Consulate was not enough to assuage the demands of his body for rest.

Jeanette realised from the regularity of his breathing that he had fallen asleep and caressed his shoulder gently, smiling fondly at his sleeping form. She lay still, listening to the even tenor of his breaths and the far off murmur of conversation and felt very content. She reflected that she felt safe with Ginger. He was gentle and kind. She had to acknowledge that she was falling in love with him. Gently she reached out and caressed his cheek. He smiled in his sleep and she felt a warm glow of affection for him.

At length the dinner party broke up and dispersed. The temperature was dropping and the air was chill. Ginger was still fast asleep. Gently Jeanette woke him.

For a second or two, Ginger could not work out where he was. Jeanette brought him back to the present.

"Everyone is gone," she told him, gently. "I think we should go too."

"I'm sorry," murmured Ginger, still trying to wake up. "I didn't mean to fall asleep."

"Je sais," Jeanette told him indulgently. "You are very tired."

He stood up. "I'll take you up to your room," he offered.

She smiled and thanked him. "I would like that," she said.

Ginger escorted her up to the room she shared with her mother. He paused outside, unsure what to do. He desperately wanted to kiss Jeanette but he did not want her to run away again. In the end, holding her hands, he kissed her gently on the forehead as he had done in Monaco. This time, to his great relief, she did not run away.

"Bonne nuit, Ginger," she breathed.

"Good night, Jeanette," responded Ginger. "Sleep well. Sweet dreams."

"Toi aussi," she wished him before she turned and entered her bedroom.

Breathing deeply, Ginger descended the stairs to his own room on the floor below. Biggles had been as good as his word and a British RAF tropical uniform, cap, tunic, shirt, shorts, socks and shoes, were lying, neatly arranged, on his bed. They even had his correct rank and a pilot's brevet sewn on. On the chair beside the bed was a pair of navy-blue swimming trunks with a white braid belt.

Ginger put the uniform on the chair with the bathing shorts, washed and got into bed. He was asleep almost immediately to dream pleasantly of Jeanette. He was so deeply asleep that he did not wake when Biggles returned some time later.

The next morning Biggles rose and glanced across the room at the bed where Ginger was fast asleep. The lad was obviously enjoying a pleasant dream, thought Biggles amused, as he saw Ginger was snuggled up to his pillow and sighing contentedly. Biggles guessed that Ginger would be dreaming of Jeanette. Despite the lad's protestations to the contrary, thought Biggles, it was pretty obvious that their friendship had progressed far beyond the platonic, although they were still at the stage of holding hands. Biggles' lips twitched and he left Ginger to enjoy sweet dreams while he washed and dressed.