L'Aimant

Summary:

A group outing to the flickers proves to be a revelation—in more than one sense.

Set after "Broken Souls". November 1944.

The story picks up on Thursday 7th December 1944, the morning after their meal at Benito's. Foyle and Sam address the next items on their list of plans.

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:

During WW2, internment camps for people designated enemy aliens were set up on the Isle of Man—a British Crown Dependency in the Irish Sea, just off the west coast of England.

dancesabove pranced through this first.

Previously, in "L'Aimant"

Only minutes later, Brooke was on the phone to Foyle. "The sheep's eyes came from Harris's, Sir. It's got to be. I don't think he 'ad anything to do with it. He didn't know Miss Stewart—looked quite honest when I asked him. But she did. Smirked like anything when I mentioned Miss Stewart. I reckon it was 'er. No doubt about it."

Foyle heard him out calmly. "Hmm. I see. Well, wrap them up tightly and leave the packet in my office, would you? I'll deal with it tomorrow. And, um, Sergeant? Thanks."

He hung up the receiver, stood, and thought things quietly through. That day when he'd been shopping after Sam and he… Sam's ration book—and later, she'd been ill outside the butcher's shop. He cursed himself a fool.

Chapter 9

Thursday 7th December 1944

Sam stuck her head around Foyle's office door and hissed, "Paul's in!"

Foyle was in semi-reverie, hands resting on a flat, brown-paper-wrapped square parcel on his desk. Sam's voice reclaimed him for the here-and-now, and he met her eyes with a slightly startled look. "Aah…thank you, Sam. I'll be—um—right onto that."

Adjusting the tie at his throat, Foyle rose from his seat and stepped past her into the corridor to do that thing they had agreed he must do alone.

Sam made to close the door, then caught a sudden whiff of something nasty coming from his office. She tentatively poked her nose back round the door to take a couple of experimental sniffs. A nauseous, ripe, decaying smell was reaching her from somewhere in the room… a dead rat stuck behind the wainscoting? One must have nibbled on that poison I put down some weeks ago. She smiled, remembering the Lux Flakes Christopher had planted in the kitchen-cupboard by the bottle of rat poison. Ours has to be the most unusual courtship, she mused, stifling a giggle.

For a second, Sam was tempted to hunt more closely for the source of the odour, but in view of recent bad experience with nasty smells, resolved to leave well alone.

She closed Foyle's office door and leant against the wall of the corridor, watching Christopher prepare himself to break their news to Paul. A pang of sympathy jabbed at her, but she could hardly do it for him, could she?

Milner's office door stood wide, signifying that he wasn't all that busy—still, Foyle hovered on the threshold, fingering his tie.

"Morning. Um—may I?" Foyle gestured to the seat in front of Milner's desk.

Milner raised his eyebrows and gave his boss an open smile. "Yes, of course, Sir! Morning! Please come in." He hauled himself laboriously from his chair.

It was unusual for the DCS to conduct police business on territory not his own. Milner's brows knitted briefly in puzzlement. Under normal circumstances, Mr Foyle would summon him across the corridor.

Foyle stepped inside and closed the door behind him, settling himself into the chair across from Milner.

"Everything quite all right, Sir?" Milner's eyes spelt mild concern, and didn't leave his boss as he felt carefully behind him to resume his seat.

Foyle grimaced, smoothing down a crease across his trouser-leg, his face uneasy, verging on the pained. "Aaah—yes. Um, yes." His tone was bright but forced. He didn't usually find his sergeant's intense gaze this disconcerting, but today's agenda was just about as difficult as things could get for Foyle.

Nothing to be done but bite the bullet, then. "Fact is," he started, sucking on his teeth, "I have some news to share with you of a—um—personal nature."

"Oh yes, Sir?" Milner's eyes grew a little wider even than his usual, arresting stare.

"Yes. Well. So here it is. Um, Sam and I have been, um—courting for several weeks now and we—um—seem to find ourselves engaged to be married?" Foyle's tone appeared to be asking how the devil Milner supposed that such a thing could happen.

There, it's out now. He watched the sergeant's eyelids disappear into his head. Foyle worked his mouth and waited for the other man to blink.

The blink took several seconds to arrive, but when it did, a warm, pervasive smile came hot upon its heels, and melted Milner's serious features into a look of undiluted pleasure.

"I take it you approve, then?" Foyle asked wryly, masking his intense relief. "I can understand this comes as something of a shock."

Milner scrutinised his boss, re-casting him in a somewhat different light. "Well, Sir, I can't pretend I'm not surprised. Mostly, though, I'm ashamed of myself for not picking up on things before now—I've been so wrapped up with my own affairs lately, now that Edie's expecting."

Foyle inclined his head, acknowledging the generous admission. "Absolutely nothing to apologise for, Paul."

"I really am delighted for you both, Sir. My warmest congratulations." Milner rose to his feet as if to formalise the sentiment, and reached across the desk to offer his hand to his boss.

Foyle gave a nod and shook it heartily, hitching up the corner of his mouth in gratitude. "Thank you, Paul. Appreciate your loyalty and support, as ever."

As if on cue, there was a gentle rapping at the office door, and both men called, "Come in, Sam," in a chorus nothing short of comical.

In she came, a vision of pink cheeks and honey hair, and closed the door behind her. "You told him, then?" she asked breathlessly, with her usual inimitable tact.

"I told him." Foyle's eyes crinkled as he looked at her, and Milner realised he'd seen it all before—the spark between them—but had never quite believed what he was seeing. With hindsight, he reflected, this was really no surprise at all.

"Sam, it's marvellous news," said Milner, walking round the desk to kiss her cheek. "I hope—I know—you'll both be very happy."

Foyle absorbed the scene with satisfaction and no small measure of relief. One more hurdle cleared, he thought, then stopped to add, "Um, Milner. Just for now, please keep this between us. Tell Edie, by all means. But we've yet to share the news with Samantha's parents, or announce this publicly in any way. From that perspective it would help immensely if you'd treat the information with discretion."

"You have my word, Sir." Esteem for his boss and affection for Sam shone in Milner's dazzling stare. There was no shadow of a doubt that he would be rock-solid on this detail.

Foyle nodded. "Thank you, Sergeant. Now if you'll both excuse me, I've some errands to attend to. Sam, why don't you make yourself and Paul a cup of tea?" He smiled and nodded to them warmly as he left the room.

Sam beamed at Paul, remarking cheerily: "Well, isn't this a turn-up for the books?"

Foyle swept out of the station in his hat and coat, carrying the parcel Sam had seen him handling in his office earlier.

Ten minutes later, he stood outside Harris's butchers, holding the brown paper package at arm's length. No customers, he noted. The shop window was largely bare of meat. The Hastings housewives must have cleaned them out already. All the better, considering the things that I'm about to say.

He pushed open the shop door, and stepped inside. Behind the counter, both the Harrises were cleaning surfaces and trays. Foyle nodded briefly to the husband, then turned to address the wife.

"Mrs Harris." Foyle's face was stony, his hat remaining resolutely on his head. "I'm calling to return some property of yours which seems to have found its way to the Hastings police station." He dropped the parcel arm's-length on the counter, looking at the Harris woman steadily.

Gladys, who had already spotted Foyle as he approached the shop, began to feel heat prickling the back of her neck. She had never in her wildest dreams imagined these particular chickens coming home to roost. Not a word escaped her as she stood in thrall to Foyle's insistent stare.

George Harris's attention ranged, bemused, between his wife and Mr Foyle. Eventually, he made a choice, and settled on his wife: "You didn't tell me anything of ours was missing, Glad."

Seeing that the Harris woman wasn't going to touch the parcel, Foyle stepped up and unwrapped it deftly to reveal the familiar, flat, floral chocolate-box. With the paper off, the nauseous smell spread quickly outwards from the counter.

Harris, still puzzled (but luckily for him, possessed of a muted sense of smell), stepped forward in his wife's place to identify the item. "Well, good Lord, Glad, isn't that the box you keep your cotton-reels in? Who the blazes would've stolen that? Well, I'll be… thank you, Mr Foyle. How did you know it belonged…?"

Foyle fastened his eyes on Mrs Harris as he lifted the lid from the box, revealing the now seriously rancid rows of sheep's eyes and the open, illustrative note. A powerful smell of putrefaction wafted through the shop.

He turned now to address the woman's baffled husband. "It's my conviction, Mr Harris, that your wife sent this repellent gift to my fiancée, Miss Samantha Stewart."

The Harris jaw was hanging loose, his bewildered gaze shifting between Foyle, his wife, the sheep's eyes, and the note. "She what? Don't be ridic— Gladys? What the— ?"

Gladys Harris couldn't hold it in a moment longer. Out came the pent-up moral indignation in a serpent-strike of spite. "She had it coming to her. Girl's no better than she ought to be." Tell the truth and shame the devil! Her eyes flashed in a fit of bald defiance.

Foyle absorbed the comment with a tilt of his head. His eyes began to rove about him, but whatever they alighted on he didn't see, because his brain was focussed solely on assembling the weaponry to slay a dragon.

Satisfied his arsenal was fully stocked, Foyle brought his steely gaze to rest on Sam's detractor. "Beg to differ, Madam. My fiancée, Miss Stewart, is so much better than she ought to be. She brings kindness and consideration to her every dealing. In fact,"—he paused to weigh up Sam's many virtues—"I'd say that she's a rarity in that respect. And what's your contribution to society in these happy times, Mrs Harris? It seems that you assemble trouble, garnish it with venom and dispense it in… a chocolate box?" Foyle broke off there to renew his penetrating stare; his blue eyes pierced through Mrs Harris like a skewer through a joint of meat.

But there was more that needed to be said.

"I can only assume," he continued, "that, dealing as you do in dead meat day-to-day, your sensitivity towards living beings has been… blunted? Apparently you feel you're qualified to judge a person to their detriment on no acquaintance?" Foyle widened his eyes inviting an answer.

Still there was silence from the Harris woman, who clearly wasn't versed in face-to-face encounters. Suppose the dead meat doesn't ever answer back, concluded Foyle. He shrugged, and launched into the rest of his assault.

"But I wouldn't be so naïve, Madam, as to hope for an apology to my fiancée, because the malice is important to you, isn't it? This," he indicated the offending box, "is an uncommon specimen of several behaviours that I find obnoxious: underhanded; spiteful; cowardly; and unrepentant. And yet you set yourself above my fiancée and claim the right to pass summary judgement on her?" He paused and rubbed his chin. "I don't know if I'm witnessing malevolence or gross stupidity. I wonder what would happen if we took the malice out of you? I tend to think you'd… disappear?"

Foyle parked his tongue and waited for some peep of a reply from his crimson-faced culprit. When none came, he appended quietly, "In future, kindly keep your tainted offal to yourself." He turned then on his heel and quietly left the shop, leaving the noxious smell behind him. He put it down to more than just the rancid eyeballs.

George Harris watched Foyle leave, agape, but once the door had closed, he rallied well enough to poke his wife irritably in the shoulder.

"D'you want to tell me what you're playing at? Sending sheep's eyes to the ruddy police? And who's Samantha Stewart, when she's out?"

Gladys shrugged, relating her suspicions and her reasons.

"So… hang on a tick," George was mentally drawing together all the threads, and knotting a nice rope with which he fancied he might hang himself in peace, a little later on. "You decided she was in the family way, and so you thought it would be funny to insult her and her precious policeman—who just happens to be our regular customer, and a Detective Bloody Chief Superintendent to boot? I've got to wonder if you're all there, Gladys."

"I never thought they'd find out it was me."

"Well, there's a funny thing. Looks like they have, though, don't it? And do we really want the Hastings police a-sniffing round our business, what with the stuff we have to handle in hard times like these…? Not on your life, we don't. You want your lady-cronies down the WI to find out your 'usband's mince comes straight from the knacker's yard? Eh? Gladys? Eh?"

Harris wiped his podgy hand across his face in irritation, and levelled one fat finger at his wife. "You'll breathe not one word of this to anybody, Glad; you hear? They could close me down, and throw me into jail."

George wasn't nasty as a rule, but God! She'd got his dander up today. The missus had to learn her lesson, so he pushed his point: "And if they did that, you'd be on the street. Which is exactly where you would've been if I hadn't married you pretty bloody quick in 1923. Hah! You've got a short memory for your own mistakes, my girl."

Gladys looked at him in undisguised contempt. "Who put me in the club in the first place, you ruddy oaf?"

Outside, comfortably unaware of the pleasant marital exchange unfolding chez Harris, Foyle mentally crossed another item (one he hadn't shared with Sam) off his agenda, and moved on to the next.

He turned and headed for the jeweller's to get Sam's ring resized.

Across the glass-topped counter, Mr Goldfarr held the dazzling ring beneath his loupe with fascinated interest, peering closely at the gems.

He spoke in precise but heavily-accented English. "A splendid piece indeed you have here, Mr Foyle. Vell vorth the vork you are proposing. Fortunately, gemstones such as these are tolerant of heat, and I am able to resize the ring vithout disturbance to the mount. It can be ready in two hours if you so vish. Do you have other calls to make today?"

"That would be very helpful, Mr Goldfarr. Yes, in fact there is another errand on my list. I'll come back after lunch; mid-afternoon, if that's acceptable?"

"Good, Mr Foyle. It vill be ready, I assure you."

"One more thing, Mr Goldfarr—I shall need a plain gold wedding-band to match this ring."

"Of course! Of course! So, for your wedding, mazel tov! I vill be pleased to show you a selection ven you come again this afternoon."

Once the shop door had closed behind his customer, Goldfarr returned to squinting at the blue-green beryl gem that formed the ring's attractive centrepiece.

For this age of ring, und blo-grin steyn, the origin is Madagascar, zikher! He held the ring aloft, addressing it in admiration, but with no small hint of sadness. "Oy gevalt! A thing of rarest beauty, though. You come to me from where the British Fascists vont to send my people. A little warmer than this 'Isle off Man' that Mr Churchill favoured for my holiday in '41... Feh!"

Well, that was fairly simple. Foyle paused on the pavement outside Goldfarr's and stuck his hands into his pockets. Now, the "other call" he was about to make involved a special marriage licence…

****** TBC ******

More Author's Notes:

(I like to share these bees-in-my bonnet, but feel free to skip them if you find them boring!)

To any reader who finds the eyeballs incident a bit far-fetched, I can honestly say the episode is based upon something that really happened to my mother.

She and my father married by special licence back in 1939, one month before the outbreak of war. They didn't have the money for, or didn't want to waste it on, a "do". And so they turned up quietly at the Register Office to tie the knot.

Having been courting for nearly six years at the time, they naïvely supposed they had the right to please themselves.

There's quite a lot more to the story, but to cut it short, the day after their lightning wedding, my mum was back at work, managing a draper's shop. A box of sheep's eyes arrived for her from the butcher's lads across the road. There was no real malice in it. They were just being crude, as lads will be. Nevertheless, the joke stemmed from a social habit of the day, of punishing and humiliating any woman unfortunate to fall pregnant out of wedlock. And special-licence marriages were generally thought to advertise that fact.

Except that: Mum, not being your retiring type, and (almost comically at this stage) still a virgin (she and my dad had not slept together and weren't due to take their honeymoon in Brighton until the following week—in the meantime, Dad was still residing at his mother's house)—Mum decided that she wasn't going to put up with it, and marched across the road to tell the butchers where to stuff their eyeballs. Unlike Sam in this story, though, she actually had the moral high ground, or what passed for such in those days.

It would be a marvellous bit of dialogue to write. Sadly, I couldn't borrow her words for Sam or Foyle, because the circumstance is different here. But in the end, Foyle managed well enough, I hope.

Some of the harshest judges of out-of-wedlock pregnancy were other women. I suppose the Germans would call it Schadenfreude—'malicious joy in the demise or misfortune of others'. Society being what it was back then, women were often running scared around their reputations. Weaker vessels amongst them were apt to exploit the distraction afforded by their sisters "falling by the wayside", simply because it took the spotlight off themselves. That's the motivation I've ascribed to Mrs Harris.

Double-standards also being rife between the sexes, it wasn't unusual either for the very men who'd put their women in the family way to remind wives later of the huge favour they'd been done in being offered marriage to avoid the stigma. That's my Mr Harris in a nutshell.

The idea behind The Madagascar Plan, to resettle European Jews on an island off the coast of Africa, didn't originate with The Third Reich. It started with Paul de Lagarde, a German biblical scholar, towards the end of the 19th Century. A number of prominent British anti-Semites then adopted the idea in the 1920s. Eventually the Nazis toyed half-heartedly with Madagascar for a while, before settling on the more chilling Final Solution.

As we saw in the first-ever episode of "Foyle's War", British Jews of German origin didn't always escape internment, and many were sent away for up to a year before the tide of public opinion turned, and called for their release. In my imagination, Goldfarr probably did a year on the Isle of Man before he was allowed back home. After that experience, who could blame him for dwelling on the perfect beauty of a gemstone, in preference to the flawed ugliness of the real world.

More soon.

GiuC