“…and we of our island race are a sea-going people, but even more so we are a nation— an empire—that floats on a sea of words and where language is nourished in our books and in our homes and in our libraries and even in our great public schools until we can rightly say that our mother tongue has become the lingua franca of a quarter of the world— more if one counts America—and our literary heritage in that language– the language of Bible and The Times and…er…Dorothy L. Sayers… I need not remind you… is something of which the British people should be awfully proud…of.”  

Martin found he was getting muddled and sensed that his audience—the audience of local people gathered for the opening of the new village library and who had already endured speeches by the Vicar and Daniel Sachs M.P. —were becoming restive and so, without further ado, he handed the scissors to Mata who smiled and generated a ripple of applause.  The ribbon was cut to more applause and Mata broke the beam of light and the glass doors miraculously swung open and she stepped inside. 

Martin raised his hat to the crowd and attempted to follow her but the doors shut in his face.  He stepped back into the beam and the doors snapped open and he stepped forward again only to have them close on him, narrowly missing his nose.  Stephen and Erna crossed the tiled porch and were admitted, but again the doors did not oblige his lordship.  He waved his hat impotently at the beam and the crowd tittered rudely.  The man from the Automated North British Door Company scurried forward to the control box and was seen with a screwdriver.  He turned to Martin with a silly grin that was meant to serve as an apology and Martin glared at him.  At last the doors swung wide and Martin proceeded inside with as much dignity as he could muster. 

He was no sooner on the beautiful new parquet floor and within sight of the self-inking date stamp that he had presented to Miss Bott, the librarian, only the previous day, than he realised that he had left his hat outside.  He went to go out, but again the troublesome doors refused to co-operate and so he hammered furiously on the glass until the technician heard and looked up from his metal box from which now spewed forth a great tangle of coloured wires.  With mime, Martin made the devil aware of his hat lying on the tiled porch and the man mouthed the word: ‘righteoh’ and indicated that he would pass it in through the window.  However there were no windows of the opening sort on this side of the building— the architect having employed more up-to-date glass bricks whose shortcomings in the matter of the passage of hats was quickly evident.  Thus Martin had to be content to wait until the wretch fixed the doors, which he did at last with Martin’s hat impudently perched on his own bonce.   At last Martin was reunited with his new grey fedora and it had to be reported that he snatched it quite violently from the representative of the Automated North British Door Company and that his words, which could not be distinguished through the glass bricks, can only be left to the reader’s imagination.

The library was indeed an ornament to the village of Branksome-le-Bourne and spoke confidently in the tones of 1938.  It was not the white-plastered building that Martin had originally envisaged; he had been persuaded that pinky-cream bricks spotted with iron would look more harmonious and no less modern, but the flat roofed assemblage of interlocking cubes remained much the same as in Martin’s original sketch.  Inside, the main space was devoted to the ‘stacks’ with their still pristine shelving of varnished blond wood.  The children’s corner had a square of carpet and was appropriately decorated and Miss Bott’s office boasted a curved glass window overlooking the circulation desk and designed for the invigilation of the library in general.  Indeed Miss Bott was quite strict and Martin was a little frightened of her.  To the right there were shallow stairs that descended to a basement where there was a small lecture hall and cinema and a poster put up by Erna advertised, at an early date, an illustrated talk on the necessity of vaccinating infants.

Tea was being served and the general public were now admitted and wandered about, disarranging Miss Bott’s shelves and clumping noisily on the parquetry with its boots.  Martin was permitted to take out the first book— a volume called Men Without Women by Ernest Hemmingway— which Martin found to be disappointingly different from the promise of its title, and for which he had the indignity of being fined sixpence by Miss Bott for neglecting to return it on time.

***** 

As the world beyond the village darkened with the passage of each month, Martin and Stephen seemed to turn their attention inwards, with even visits to the capital reduced to their essential minimum and the doings of the local community provided more than enough fodder for the mills of two active minds.  There was the building of a proper cinema in the village by a businessman from Dorchester as well as the construction of six new shops.  At the same time there was Mrs Harkness’ granddaughter’s departure for London as the result of the girl winning a ‘talent’ competition, although Mr Destrombe knew that the girl— rather too well developed for 16—sang as flat as Norfolk in the choir.  Two natives returned, if only for a visit.  The first was Elsie (now Mrs Tremont) the licensee of a public house in Woolloomooloo, New South Wales, and a former old flame of Stephen’s, and the second was young Tom Hughes, the son of Miss Tadrew’s servant, who had distinguished himself at university in Manchester and was now engaged in important research in the field of radiation.  However, the chief reason why Martin and Stephen kept at home and refused so many invitations was because little Will and Charlotte proved to be such a limitless source of delight and entertainment.

The two infants were now ‘toddlers’ and could ‘walk and talk and everything’ as Martin enthusiastically explained at every opportunity to disinterested inquiries at Boodles and it was clear to both Martin and Stephen that their two children were far superior in the matters of the cutting of teeth, locomotion, growth of hair, speed of intelligence, amiability of temperament and attractiveness of countenance to all other infants of their acquaintance and probably a lot more besides.

Charlotte, the older by a couple of days, was clearly the boss while Will was handsome and easy going, never minding who he was passed to, but smiling radiantly very often and when not eating always looking to see where Charlotte was.  Charlotte was particular about most things and would not settle until Will was down and she had her menagerie of felt animals arranged in order in her cot.  It was she who would decide what toys Will was to be allowed and, as she developed speech first, she had the ability (or so she claimed) to know what Will wanted or did not want— these desires often coinciding happily with her own.  Will, on his part, adored Charlotte and was contented to be in her thrall.

The children each had their own relationship with their four parents.  It was no surprise that Stephen was the favourite with both of them, for it was Stephen who would play the roughest games and get them all excited and it was Nurse or Mata who would have to calm them down again so they could feed or sleep.  Erna played intently with them and they looked to her for how to do things while Martin became the expert in dealing with injuries and tears and was having significant success in interesting Will in his train set, while it was he alone who must push Charlotte’s rocking horse, when she was old enough to mount it, until his arms ached.  Thus it was that a considerable portion of the boys’ days was spent in the nursery or in the garden or in the nearby fields on picnics and the older men in the village sniggered and made sarcastic remarks—even at Stephen’s expense— when the two of them pushed the perambulators down to The Feathers on fine afternoons where they sat outside with their pints and their babies in the company of Stephen’s dogs.  It was on one of these expeditions that they encountered the former Elsie and she saw at once that the two infants were Stephen’s but said nothing but looked troubled all the same.

“Lottie has real talent, Poole; I think she’s a fauvist.  You should enrol her at the Slade right now,” said The Plunger.  Martin looked at the smears and handprints made on butcher’s paper with red and blue paint and then looked down at Charlotte who was decorated in the same hues and was gazing up at the two boys with an intense expression, as she knew that she was being discussed.  Out of the corner of his eye Martin saw Nurse approaching like a thundercloud and so he tried to clean the little girl with his handkerchief.  Nurse scooped up Charlotte, announcing, in broad Scotch, that her tea was ready and that Will was waiting for her and Martin was pleased to see, as they departed, that the woman now sported a blue handprint on her cheek.

The Plunger, now Lord Altnaharra, sat on several boards, aside from Craigth’s Caladonian Ale, and had recently been invited onto the board of the Tate Gallery and was working with Lord Duveen on an extension to the gallery on Millbank.  “Mother is quite happy at the Dorchester, Poole,” said The Plunger as he inspected one of the paintings in the long Gallery with a magnifying glass.  “She doesn’t miss Fayette at all.”

“What will happen to it?” asked Stephen.

“The new owners are planning to turn it into a hotel and golf links will be built in the remaining grounds.”

Martin and Stephen thought this was apt, for his mother’s house had always resembled a hotel and the disposal of it left The Plunger even wealthier than before.

The Plunger and Teddy had been kept from travelling by the deterioration in Europe, first with the Anschluss in March and then the Sudetenland and the Munich Crisis over the summer months.  The Foreign Office had been frantic.  “I’ve never felt so ashamed, Derby,” said Martin in a hushed voice in the newsreel theatre.  “The stupid British public is cheering because they think they have dodged a fight.  Chamberlain has been played for a fool.”  He looked across; Stephen had tears in his eyes but he pretended not to see.

Teddy was now on the European desk but as war was now certain, according to the younger men there, and as Teddy’s father had been unwell, it was decided to delay the trip to America no longer and they planned to sail in the April of the following year if there had been no outbreak of hostilities before then.  The four from Croome and the two babies were also to travel, and this entailed a passage for Myles, Carlo, Gertrude and Nurse as well.  Martin had hoped that cabins could be obtained on the new Queen Mary but this proved impossible so they contented themselves with three suites on the French Line’s Normandie, which was no hardship.  In the meantime the others tried to divert Teddy and each other from current events and there were many peaceful weekends at Broughton Lodge and at Croome and there was a fortnight in Antibes when Marta and Erna went to Jersey. 

***** 

“Her Ladyship is not at home.”

“No, that’s not right, Carlo, try it again,” said Martin.

Carlo raised his chin in the direction of Stephen who was stood there in the bedroom at Croome wearing a cap bearing the insignia of the West London Gas Corporation and intoned in a deeper voice: “Her ladyship is not at home.”

“It’s still not right.  Fetch Chilvers.”

The reason for this play acting was the result of the gift of an assortment of costumes and theatrical props from The Plunger’s manservant, Gertie Haines, who had every reason to be grateful to Stephen for a diverting hour on a freezing Thursday in January when Stephen had called at Cheyne Walk only to find that The Plunger had been delayed at the Tate.

Other costumes, in addition to Stephen’s gladiator outfit that remained as a souvenir from their time in Hollywood during the War, included ‘Dick Turpin’, a pirate, a pharaoh (from Aida) and ‘Cardinal Richelieu’– for which no play had been yet devised.  However, Martin’s favourite was a simple leather blacksmith’s apron from Il Trovatore that Stephen wore with nothing else as he pounded on the fire irons from the bedroom hearth.  Stephen enjoyed the action of the leathern material on his rampant cock and Martin and Carlo, as his two wayward ‘apprentices’, were required by the ever-changing script to do lewd things to the blacksmith’s sweat-soaked buttocks that were revealed (in a neat piece of stagecraft) where the leather apron did not meet.

The fragment of play being performed—a mere ‘sketch’— was of Martin’s devising and involved Stephen as a meter reader taking liberties with the son of a big house in Grosvenor Square but it required a third actor to play the short-sighted butler.  Chilvers appeared and thought nothing of the task given to him, read his lines like John Gielgud himself and was dismissed before the action of the second scene took place, although Stephen urged the author to rewrite the scene so that Chilvers might have more stage time, if he so desired to further his career on the boards.

Perhaps from more than twenty years of early morning teas, or perhaps from several summers of sunbathing on the roof with Stephen, Mr Chilvers had become relatively used to the free and easy— or perhaps more accurately, the frankly ‘lewd’ behaviour of his two masters.  Stephen did not bother to cover up in the privacy of their rooms and would stroll about just wearing the various straps and rings that he favoured from Mr Weintraub’s peculiar establishment in Bond Street.  Very often Stephen was shamelessly aroused and Martin was no better, almost delighting in being caught by the butler with Stephen’s enormous cock deep inside him or with traces of Stephen’s bountiful seed plastered all over his face while to two of them would sit up in bed looking like so many cows bedecked with daisies.  Martin would rub Stephen’s handsome chest and slyly remark: “Mr Stephen was awfully good last night, Chilvers and I’m full up to pussy’s bow.  I think you might need to send for Dr Markby.” 

Chilvers, for his part, kept up the pretence of professional indifference and would reply:  “Your wounds are self-inflicted your lordship and I can hardly imagine that you, Mr Stephen, are the same shy boy who used to come to the kitchen door at thirteen.”

“Was he handsome at thirteen Chilvers?”

“As an angel, your lordship, but who was to know what devilment was lurking in those old trousers.”

This would make Martin laugh and sometimes he would waggle Stephen’s cock beneath the sheets, but Chilvers would never accept any of the thinly disguised invitation to participate in their romps (apart from reading the aforementioned lines), although it was clear that he found Stephen attractive and it goes without saying that he loved  both of the boys like…well, it was actually rather hard to define the exact depth of the relationship.

In the sweet, velvet darkness Martin lay awake, suffused with happiness.  Theirs was an enormous old bed from the eighteenth century, with faded tapestry hangings from the tester and a profusion of pillows and expensive but ancient linen bearing the Poole coronet and exhibiting neat patches where the seamstress had darned holes formed from what causes she had no idea—but rents seemed all too frequent for her liking.

He could not sleep—his mind was too active— but he was thinking of nothing in particular and was chiefly conscious of being simply happy in its most abstract sense.  Stephen must be awake too, thought Martin, for he was not snoring— an abominable basso profondo racket that was perhaps his only fault, but one that Martin found he missed horribly when he was away.  It was nice just knowing he was here in the bed with him, his big, naked body just a foot away but radiating warmth and love.

“Mala, are you awake?” said a voice.  Martin grunted in the affirmative.  “I love you Mala.”

“I know you do Derbs.”

”Why are you so far away on the other side of the bed?  I need you to touch me.”

“Do you Derbs?  I was happy here; just being close without touching.”

“I like our skin to touch, Mala; I need to have the certainty that you are here.”

“Where do you want me to touch you?”

“Anywhere.”

“Are you hard?”

“No.”

Martin extended his hand and felt the plump, flaccid limb that lay halfway down to Stephen’s knee.  Martin knew that Stephen liked anything he did to him.  He could slide his silky foreskin dreamily up and down or stretch it or do any number of unspeakable things with his tongue and teeth.  Stephen loved to have his balls caressed or stretched— or even twisted— and permitted Martin to insert one or more wetted fingers into his tender rectum in moments of passion or idleness.  Martin did none of these but instead got Stephen to lie on his broad back with his legs apart and his hands clasped behind his head.  Martin rested his head on his chest where he could inhale the masculine sweatiness of his hairy armpits.  Stephen added to his enjoyment by mashing Martin’s face into their foetid depths before Martin, gasping for air, returned to resting in contented silence on Stephen’s chest.

“Touching skin-on-skin is important, Mala,” said Stephen returning to the former topic.  “I learnt that as a boy.  Do you remember me telling you about that salesman at The Feathers?”

“You were fourteen and he paid you a shilling to fuck him.”

“Thirteen, but I looked sixteen and I gave him back his shilling when he screamed so much when I tried to put it in.”

“I don’t scream, do I Derby?”

“Well, you do a little, Mala, but I would be broke if I had to give you a bob every time we did it.  Well, this man was watching me closely as he made me lift his trunk and suitcases and put them on top of the wardrobe and that sort of thing.  He was watching my cock in my trousers—I had given up underwear by then; watching me just like you do.”

“Do I watch your cock, Derby?”

“Certainly you do and I want you to promise you will always do it when other people are around.”

Martin didn’t know what to make of this but said: “How does that make you feel?”

“Like a man.”

“Not a just tiny bit conceited?”

“Certainly not Mala.  My cock is there for your enjoyment; not mine.”  Martin was doubtful about this assertion but said nothing and Stephen continued.  “Well, this man made me take my shirt off and then he ran his hands all over my chest and arms and then my back and everything.  He rubbed his lips over me and tried to explain to me how sensuous touching skin was.  He took off his own clothes and then my trousers and he frotted himself against me.  Do you know what that means?”  Martin did.  “He said young flesh was more beautiful than the most costly marble statue and I’ve always remembered that.”

“He was right, Derbs; I’d rather have you than David.”

“Thank you, Mala.  There’s nothing so beautiful as your fair skin, especially on your pretty bottom.”  Martin took this as a compliment, for Stephen was being sincere.  “My stepfather said much the same thing and always made sure he touched me when we said good morning or good night— I mean just on the hand or shoulder or perhaps brushing my cheek and I did the same; you may have noticed and it made us closer without words.”

“Yes, and he would kiss you; my father never kissed me that I remember.”

“Then I’m sorry for you and I will try to make up for what you have been denied, Mala.  You know, Titus said I should be proud of my body, Mala, and he didn’t mind when I walked around the cottage naked.  I think he was very proud of my cock in an odd sort of way, although he was a very moral person, and it was he who said I was too old to wear pyjamas.”

“I’m glad; it’s lovely being naked under the blankets with you Derby and the sin would be for you to cover up.  I love touching skin too and I assure you I’m proud of your cock— very proud,” said Martin, trying to stifle a laugh.

“Are you, Mala?  I feel it is my duty to make you happy…happy and proud.”

“Well you do…both of you do.”

“I have a surprise for you, Mala.”

“What?”

“Mr Weintraub made me a new strap for my cock.”

“How lovely, Derbs; you have quite a collection.”

“Yes I do, but this is the first one in red leather and we designed it together— my engineering skills helped.”

“Is it like the Mersey Tunnel then?”

“More like the Forth Bridge, Mala.  It fastens around the base and will keep me hard for longer.”

“But you’re already hard enough, Derbs.”

“You’re just being kind, Mala, and I think I will be able to please you a lot more.”

“But you already delight me long enough, Derbs.”

Stephen dismissed these objections and went on:  “It stretches and separates my balls, Mala, and there is this harness…well you’ll see it all in the morning when Carlo fits it— he’s been softening the new leather with saddle soap.”

“Well, that’s appropriate for such an agricultural implement as yours.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment, Mala.  Now did you want to do some more skin touching?”

“Hadn’t you better save yourself for the morning to give the new strap a fair trial?”

“I think I can manage both and my cock is telling me that it would like to reacquaint itself with that pretty skin on your pink cheeks, Mala.  It can’t wait.”

“Well it may have to, for mine is telling me that it would like to explore some places most easily reached if you were to roll over and spread your cheeks; I think it is my duty to pleasure you…this is not about me enjoying myself at all.”

The morning came and after their tea had been drunk and the morning post attended to and Chilvers had been dismissed, Carlo was instructed to turn the key in the door and to produce the box from Stephen’s dressing room.  It was a lovely box in ‘shagreen’ leather with watered silk linings and bearing in gold the name: ‘Weintraub et Cie New Bond Street’.  In it reposed a complicated tangle of red leather strapping with silver-coloured metal parts.  “No, they are not silver or platinum, Mala, just ordinary chrome plating— I despise extravagance.”

Carlo removed it from the open box as Martin sat excitedly on the edge of the bed.  Stephen leapt out and took it from him.  “Would you like me to flail you with it first, Mr Stephen?” said Carlo who was flexing the leather.

“No, I don’t think so,” replied Stephen.  A faint shadow of disappointment passed over the valet’s countenance.

Martin couldn’t quite work out how it fitted, even though he watched Stephen and Carlo’s busy fingers, but he saw how some straps bound Stephen’s testicles and Stephen said that the discipline did him good.  Another band fitted around the thick base of his shaft and Stephen called for it to be fastened tighter and tighter. 

“This will keep the blood up and I’ll be able to last for hours.”  Carlo looked delighted, but Martin was slightly alarmed and thought for an instant of the bridle on the elephant at Regent’s Park Zoo.  Then there was a girdle that sat down on his hips and another strap that bisected his meaty buttocks and fastened somewhere underneath.  The result was that Stephen’s more than generous privates were encouraged forward, away from between his legs, and into the most provocative of profiles.

“Derbs,” said Martin, “you’ll never be able to pull your trousers on over all that.”

“Yes, I will.  We designed it with that in mind.  Fetch my new pinstripes, Carlo.”

Carlo returned with the expensive suit trousers and helped Stephen into them.  With a bit of rearranging and repacking—the sort that would be familiar to readers who may have found that their suitcase was too small for their holiday— Stephen was at last made presentable.

“I have to admit it looks very thrilling,” said Martin standing back with a critical eye.  The full cut of Mr Gibbon’s tailoring was taken advantage of, and the long curve could be detected disturbing the parallel lines of the material down the left leg and there was a distinct bulge in the flies when Stephen moved.  “I will certainly be proud of you when we’re out together Derbs.  How does it feel?”

“Wonderful and I think it has made me extra randy.  Get these trousers off me, both of you.  Do you have anything to do this morning?”

“I am at your disposal, Mr Stephen,” said Carlo, licking his lips.

“We are supposed to be having lunch with Custard, Biffo, Dongo and The Plunger at Boodles, Derbs.  Do you think you will be finished by one o’clock?”

Stephen promised faithfully and for the next few hours proved the excellence of British engineering and design to such an extent that Carlo had to rest for the remainder of the afternoon and was unable to even rise from his bed in order to press his lordship’s evening trousers, while Martin was as pleased as Punch to walk out with Stephen to St James’s Street— although his gait was a little ginger and he had to request a cushion from a club servant before he could begin on his cutlet.

It was only a few days later when Carlo lingered in the boys’ bedroom.  Martin pretended to be absorbed in his correspondence and The Times (The Morning Post having ceased publication the year before) while Stephen had his naked back to him and was possibly asleep.  Carlo dithered and titted about until Martin finally said:  “Carlo!”

“Yes, your lordship?”

“Happy birthday.”

“Oh your lordship, thank you.  How did you remember?”

Martin could have told him how easy Carlo had made it to keep the date in mind, but refrained from so doing and instead drew a small box from beneath his pillow.

“Oh you lordship, you shouldn’t have!” cried Carlo with admirable conviction.

“Well, it is an important birthday.  Open it.”

The contents proved to be a handsome wristwatch.  Carlo looked down at his pocket watch and chain.

“Move with the times, Carlo.  No one wears a fob watch nowadays.”

“Mr Chilvers does, sir, but this is lovely.  And it will make me more efficient.”  Martin doubted this but dug Stephen in the ribs.  “Wake up Derbs and look at Carlo’s new watch.”  Stephen rolled over and sat up.

“Happy birthday Carlo!”

“Thank you Mr Stephen.  We’ve been together a long time.”

“Indeed we have and I have a present for you too.”

“Sir?”

“How would you like to sleep with me tonight?”

“Well, sir, that would be very nice— as nice as a watch really—but his lordship…”

“His lordship doesn’t mind and can do without me for once.  Isn’t that right Mala?”

Martin nodded generously.

“But where will you sleep your lordship?”

“He’ll sleep here of course,” answered Stephen.  “It will be you and me in your room, Carlo, if that is satisfactory?”

It was more than satisfactory and Carlo wanted to say that he looked forward most of all to waking up in Stephen’s strong arms like Martin did, but found he couldn’t confess this weakness aloud.  “What do you want me to wear?” asked Stephen.

“Just the LSPB, sir,” said Carlo, invoking their abbreviation they used for the Japanese pyjama bottoms made of a lemon-hued silk that sat so attractively low on Stephen’s hip bones and showed off, to great effect, his masculine attributes, including Carlo’s careful barbering.  “And bare feet,” he added.  “Oh, and perhaps the platinum ring?”

This was all agreed to and Carlo found it hard to concentrate for the rest of the day.  “Your lordship, I will lay out your blue suit for tomorrow and are you sure you can put the toothpaste on your brush?  I will leave it by the basin.”  Martin said it would be no trouble.  “And the bath, please don’t get your head stuck in a book while it is filling.  Remember what happened last time.”  Martin replied that he remembered and would be careful and further told Carlo he wouldn’t be required before luncheon the following morning. 

“I will be deducting two shillings from your wages, Carlo,” said Martin with a straight face.

“You can make it ten bob if you like.”

“Just don’t exhaust him.”

Carlo didn’t reply as he had every intention of exhausting Stephen.   After all, he was only fift…forty-nine… once.

“How do I look, Mala?” asked Stephen, who must have had a good idea of the answer, for he was admiring himself in the pier glass.

“Turn around.”  Stephen did and spread his legs a little.  His evident virility tented the yellow fabric, which was already starting to stain, and the enhanced pendulous motion caused by the heavy ring with the chased inscription upon it that girdled Stephen’s big balls, could be readily detected when he walked.  “Really, you’re too good for that devil, Carlo.  Perhaps I should forbid your going.”

Stephen gave a snort at the thought of Martin forbidding anything and said:  “He has been a good fellow, Mala and serves us well.  I’ll never forget how he took care of me during the War— we took care of each other actually.  And we’ve had many adventures together, haven’t we, Mala?  You don’t really mind me sleeping with him, do you?”

“Of course not.  I’ve never minded what you and he get up to, or you and Harry for that matter, and I hope it works out to your mutual satisfaction.”

“I have a duty, Mala,” said Stephen turning once more to the glass so that Martin couldn’t tell if he was being entirely serious. 

“You have a nice bottom, Derbs.”

“Not as sweet as yours, Mala.”  With that Stephen swaggered out of the door and barefooted made his way down some corridors and up a flight of narrow stairs to where the servants’ bedrooms were located while Martin settled down with The Fashion in Shrouds and contemplated the long and strangely lonely night ahead.

Martin was sitting up and had resumed his detective novel when Carlo entered at about half-past nine.  “I thought I had best see to your bath, your lordship.  I worried about the tap all night.”

Carlo began to tidy up and removed the untouched tea that should have been Stephen’s.  “Never mind that, Carlo.  Come here and tell me about last night.”

Carlo drew closer and said “It was very nice, your lordship.”

“And?”

“And Mr Stephen is a lovely kisser.”

“Yes he is and always was, even at just sixteen,” said Martin, recalling with pleasure how Stephen wrapped his whole arms around his head and had a way of gently tugging at his lips with his teeth which was very passionate.  He wondered, not for the first time, if he had learned to kiss like that or if it just came naturally. “Come and sit on the bed and tell me all.” 

Carlo sat very gingerly and explained: “He put the Chinese plug in me and said that I must keep it in as long as I can.  There was a lot of it, your lordship and…”  At last Carlo was forthcoming, this time not being too shy to admit how much he enjoyed waking, clasped in Stephen’s young, strong arms with his thick cock half-hard and still inside him, and thusly the master and servant compared notes over the next twenty minutes.  At one point Stephen himself came in and he knew they were discussing him by the way they stopped talking.  He said nothing, but simply scratched his bare chest and headed towards the bathroom.  The LSPB were a dreadful sight, having been stained and ripped.  Martin could see a patch of Stephen’s hairy bottom and another window revealed much of his cock and balls.  He decided that this garment must go at once into the dress-up chest and that it might even be employed again that very evening for some amateur theatricals if Stephen were rested sufficiently.  

*****

“Bicycles?” said Martin with incredulity.

“Yes, bicycles or spectacles or biscuits, anything really,” replied the young man airily.

“But why should such things be made here, on my estate?  We are in the middle of the countryside.”

“It would be a new town— everything planned—and we would bring both the employment and the people to it.  The workers would benefit from getting away from Birmingham or London and bringing up their families in the fresh air with scientifically planned facilities all around them.  Think of it as ‘Pendleton New Town’.”

“But I do not want to sell my land for a new town.  I want to keep it as productive farmland.  Why, we have three of the best dairy farms in the south-west and there are piggeries and sheep and grain and…”

“Economists tell us, Lord Branksome,” interrupted the young man as he began to light his pipe, “that it will be more efficient for Britain to import all its food from countries where there are broad acres—what with all the improvements in transport we have seen this century— and, in any case, you will be compensated by the government for the loss of your land.”

Martin was outraged.  The fellow before him was impudence itself and Martin took in with displeasure his horn-rimmed spectacles on his long and spotty face and his arrogant Harris Tweed sports jacket, his knitted tie and the outrageous pipe.  The swine did not even appear to possess a hat.  On the table before them lay architect’s drawings for the dystopian new town of Pendleton which, if constructed, would completely engulf the old village and much of the surrounding land as well, with ‘stages three and four’, right at the gates of Croome itself.  There were to be endless blocks of walk-up flats of three stories and, in two clusters, were to be constructed estates of twelve storey towers.  Everywhere there seemed to be concrete kerbing and electric streetlamps with their arms raised in Hitlerian salutes.  Abstract squiggles represented dispirited trees, forced to take root in bleak concrete boxes.  Beyond a slender lozenge labelled ‘green belt’ was the artist’s impressions of the establishments that were to make the bicycles, spectacles and biscuits and there was little to differentiate these from the drawings labelled ‘school’, ‘community centre’ and ‘co-operative shops’.

The flats for the unfortunate residents were tiny but the architects’ collective had been very thorough and had planned each of the six types of flat down to the last inch, with no room left that might admit individual expression.  One sheet even had plans for ideal minimum wardrobes, with the spaces precisely demarked for collars, hats and overcoats set out exactly and Martin was intrigued to see that four dress shirts took up a depth of six inches in a drawer and wondered if workers in bicycle factories possessed a great many dress shirts.  “Why would anyone want to come out into the country and live in such minute dwellings?” asked Martin in despair.

“Lord Branksome,” began the irritating young man with dripping condescension, “you are clearly wedded to outmoded bourgeois concepts.”  Martin bristled at being called ‘bourgeois’ but let the wretch continue.  “These flats are small but in every way preferable to wasteful, ill-planned cottages or suburban homes that ape the columns, cornices and capitals of collapsed aristocratic society.  There will be wonderful views of the countryside through the Vita-glass windows and many will have a door that opens onto a balcony for sunbathing and with room for a potted plant.”

“But these workers will have wives and children presumably?”

“Of course.  The flats will come in various sizes, although we are hoping that ‘family planning’ will eliminate the need for more than two bedrooms.  The sitting room will have a bookshelf and a built-in wireless and there will be play equipment in the supervised playgrounds at the foot of each block.  For the women, housework will only take minutes and there are to be communal laundries on the roof….”  The young man continued in this vein for several minutes while Martin’s despair deepened.

“Well it all looks cold and ugly to me Mr Prichard,” said Martin, unmoved by what he had heard, “and I will oppose it with every fibre of my body.  I feel sorry that your collective has wasted its time.”

“Oh it is not a waste, Lord Branksome, I assure you.  The Labour Party is committed to improved conditions for the British people and when they achieve power…’

“Well, they are not in government yet, Mr Prichard.”

“It is only a question of time,” he replied hotly.  “The aristocracy has had its day and you won’t be allowed to stand in the way of giving the British people a better standard of living.”  They stood glaring at each other and Martin was pleased to see that his pipe had gone out and his sucking on the stem was unproductive.  Martin was determined not to speak first.

“Well, I had better be going, as the Fabien Society in Bournemouth is anxious to hear about Pendleton New Town and there is to be a vegetarian supper to follow.”

“Chilvers will show you out, Mr Prichard.”

Martin went at once to Daniel Sachs, the Member of Parliament for South Dorset and Purbeck, and poured out his feelings on the matter of the New Britain as had been revealed to him.  Daniel tried to calm him. 

“Martin, it is only some socialists flying a kite as we say in Westminster.  The Labour Party is still a long way from achieving government on its own, and I can’t see it ever winning in this county.  Our party does not support such schemes— certainly not state funded ones.  I think you have little to fear from Croome becoming another Daggenham.”

“But Daniel, these people will keep trying,” said Martin, still distressed.

“Look Martin, the government won’t be embarking on any more housing schemes at present, I assure you.”

“You mean because we are rearming.”

“That is exactly right.  We will be expanding our existing industries in places like Coventry and Birmingham and the priority will not be tower block housing for the working class.”

Martin felt a little better and had tea with the Sachs.  Then he collected the three girls, Lila, Eliana and Gisela, who were always very keen to play with Will and Charlotte and today had an extra treat, for Stephen had returned from helping old Mrs Larchpole with a late lambing and had brought home an orphan who required feeding from a bottle and the attention of three little girls was obviously vital for the helpless creature’s welfare and he wondered if such delights would ever be available to the offspring of the denizens of places like Pendleton New Town. 

***** 

It was not long before the Christmas of 1938 that Martin received the first letter.  It was postmarked from Rome but dated in Durazzo, Albania.  It was couched in legal terms but was nevertheless rambling and certain stylistic infelicities suggested that it was composed by someone whose first language was not English.  Martin wondered if Count Osmochescu was the writer.  It placed the demands in terms of ‘regularising outstanding matters’ but it boiled down to a demand for a payment of £10,000 to the family of Xhmel Bey for the loss of his sister-in-law’s dowry and hinted that an action for breach of promise would be forthcoming.

“Should I show it to Mata, Derbs?” asked Martin.

“No, don’t upset her.  The scoundrel is just ‘trying it on’ and he must know that he hasn’t a leg to stand on.”

Therefore Martin didn’t tell his wife, but he did tell Teddy Loew when they were next at Broughton Lodge.  By this time there had been a second letter with a more urgent tone to it.

“Things are moving fast in Albania, Martin,” said Teddy when he had scanned the letters.  He sat down and rubbed his bad leg, which always gave him trouble when he was worried and he was greatly worried these days.  “Zog has turned against Mussolini and the Italians would like to depose him or possibly even invade the country as a stepping stone to Greece.  Vlore would be a valuable port and Greece has practically no army.  The Duce sees himself as emperor of the whole Mediterranean.”

“But how is all this related to Xhemal Bey?” 

“I’m not sure.  Perhaps he is offering himself as an Italian puppet.  Perhaps he sees King Zog is weak and wants to finance his own tilt at the throne.  Zog has no heir but…”

“But what?”

“But Queen Geraldine is said to be with child.  If that child were to be a boy and born on Albanian soil, then it would be just that much harder to set up a rival monarchy or for the Italians to assume full control.”

“What do you think will happen?”

“Well, Halifax and the F.O. state that there are absolutely no signs of Italian mobilization on the Albanian frontier.”

“And you think?”

“They will march in soon, before the baby is born and then they will attack Greece.”

“And Xhemel Bey?” asked Stephen who was listening.

“Who knows?  I imagine his situation will be more desperate and if he is with the Italians he will do their bidding in return for gold.” 

***** 

“I feel giddy,” laughed Mata.

“Hang on to me, Schatz,” said Erna, offering a strong arm from under the white lamé cape she wore over her evening trousers.  Mata, drowning under furs and hobbled by a bias cut evening dress of midnight blue silk, smiled at her and hooked her left arm through hers while her right hand grasped Martin’s.  The seven of them, each resplendent in evening clothes, stood at the top of the grande descente, whose declivity was truly dizzying, like being at the apex of a rollercoaster and looking down, and on the Normandie this vista encompassed several impossibly enormous and lavishly appointed salons, ensuite, and each gained through lofty bronze doors flanked by over-scaled vases and lighting standards.  If this wasn’t daunting enough, there was little to prepare the passengers for the restaurant (if such a prosaic work could be used to describe such a stupendous space) which was four decks high and positively glittering with artificial light from a dozen giant Lalique icebergs (as Martin thought of them) and many more glass pilasters on the windowless walls, besides.  In its gold-and-grey magnificence it took one’s breath away and, for the statistically minded, a helpful brochure said (in French) that it was ‘just slightly longer than the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles’. 

Apparently there was still a little room left over on the ship for the engines and the luggage holds and for the passengers’ cabins and Mata, Erna and the children were settled into the delicately hued Deauville Suite with its grand piano of blond wood.  The Plunger and Teddy occupied the Rouen Suite, which was appropriately masculine in tone, with dark lacquered furniture and pigskin upholstery.  The Jumièges Suite, that was for Martin and Stephen, was frankly disappointing, although undeniably comfortable, for it was at odds with the rest of the ship in that it had a period décor in the Louis XVI style, but it had a room for Carlo and Myles and because Stephen was so excited by the trip he made especially vigorous love to Martin and so the odd room acquired a corner of affection in Martin’s heart after just their first night out from Southampton.

Stephen spent a good deal of the crossing in the gymnasium and down in the swimming bath where he held Charlotte and Will in the crook of each arms so that they might paddle before their games became rougher and more delight-filled, with much shrieking and splashing on the ‘children’s beach’.  There was also a nursery and a full-sized theatre and the Rouen suite had its own dining room where they all gathered for the children’s dinner before proceeding to their own.

It goes without saying that they suffered from no shortage of invitations to dine and drink cocktails by dint of the glamour of their titles alone but, as it often happens, they found they knew quite a few other passengers, both American and British and Mata met a German aristocrat whom she had known as a youth.  He was now on his way to the United States with his family to take up a position with a large corporation and he seemed to hint that he would not be returning to Germany.

Before they knew it, five days had passed and they were approaching New York before they even had time to explore all their temporary home.  While the First Class passengers were largely spared the trials of customs, as Martin and Stephen had experienced many times since 1917, they did have to run the gauntlet of the brash American newsmen who waited like hungry jackals at Pier 58.  Mata was superb, and smiled and graciously waved at the odious creatures like Queen Elizabeth herself.  There were newsreel cameras this time and both Mata and Martin were asked how they felt about being in New York:

“Terribly excited and I am anxious to catch up with my American friends,” said Martin.

“Thrilled to the marrow; I never imagined a city so wonderful,” said Mata and then in a piece of invention added, “Although I warn you I am a Dodger’s fan.”  There was laughter from the hardboiled pressmen and one dared to call out to her Serene Highness that the Dodgers had had another lacklustre year.  She laughed prettily and exclaimed: “Wait till next year!  We have Dolph Camilli batting for us.”  There was more laughter and it had to be admitted that Mata’s reception had been a great success, with the reporters taking comparatively little interest in Lords Branksome and Altnaharra and with Dr Oberman’s name simply being noted as ‘also arriving’ with no photograph at all.  Stephen however, was snapped flanked by Noel Coward and Cary Grant, the motion picture star, and several newspapers decided, without any evidence, that Mr Knight-Poole was on his way to take a screen test in Hollywood.

“What was all that about being a baseball fan?” asked Martin as they got into a taxi.

“Oh that,” laughed Mata, “I just thought I had better feed them something lest they publish nasty lies about me.  I just did some homework and talked to some American passengers.  I was clever, don’t you think?”

“Very,” replied Martin with a chuckle.

The Waldorf Astoria was as wonderful as the old Plaza had been— if not more so— and was almost as good as the Normandie itself in terms of all those ways de-luxe one seems to crave when away from the more domestic comforts of home.  Certainly the party from England took up a considerable acreage, with three suites and three servants and Harry Myles to organise them all.

As on the ship, invitations flooded in, especially as no one in New York could have failed to read the papers or see the footage of their arrival.  However the first was for Erna who was invited to speak at Colombia University.  “Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt is to be present, Mata!  What an honour.”  Indeed it was and the wife of the President apparently was the patron of the National Association of Nursery Education and had even read Erna’s article, Montessori, Education and Peace.   They had never seen her so happy.

There were the inevitable invitations to dinners, balls and theatre parties.  The passage of time from their first visit in 1917 was marked by the passing of the Old Order, for it was now the daughters of the great hostesses of the Gilded Age who sent the invitations and in nearly all instances these ladies lived in luxurious flats—apartments as they were termed here— with the roof top ones called ‘penthouses’— and the old marble mansions that once lined Fifth Ave had fallen victim to progress and the wrecker’s ball.

Three invitations were of a more unusual character.  The Ladies’ Home Journal wanted to write an article on Mata and send a photographer to take pictures of her with Martin and baby Will.  All considerations of privacy and dignity were thrown out of the 14th floor window when it became clear that a very generous cheque would be forthcoming.  “This will almost pay our hotel bill, Mata!” cried Martin and his wife offered no objection, merely wondering what to wear.

The second was from a newspaper called the New York Evening Post, which Martin had never read.  This organ asked if Martin would write 700 words on the ‘European Situation’.   “What do I know about politics?” cried Martin in despair but Teddy offered to ghost it and Martin, quite rightly, said that the $200 should go to him.

The third had no monetary inducement attached to it, but was prized by the recipient nevertheless.  A certain Miss Hilla Rebay wanted to consult Archibald Craigh on the matter of non-objective art for her proposed new museum.  Apart from Teddy, the others were not interested at all, but The Plunger was terribly excited and dashed around to West 54th Street that very afternoon.

That night was the first of many spent at a marvellous club called El Morocco, which was all pink and zebra-striped and had artificial palm trees made of cellophane.  “Thank God alcohol is legal again!” was a prayer that was oft invoked.

Carlo, Gertrude and Myles worked hard in their respective capacities to make sure their employers were well turned out and sent to the correct functions.  Carlo graciously offered to help The Plunger dress, which was never an easy matter.  Teddy, for his part, was more self-reliant and less conscious of the need to dazzle.  He spent several days across the Hudson in New Jersey where his elderly parents had settled with his married sister.

On the third day, after much sightseeing, Bunny and Dwight arrived from Chicago and they had the curious occasion—one hardly to have ever been expected— of being introduced, at last, to Martin’s wife.  As with most Americans, there was no bowing and scraping and in this case democratic kisses were exchanged for they were already well known to each other through their letters and by repute.

In fact it was at the very hour of this meeting that Carlo entered with a most extraordinary telegram.  Martin called them all to gather round and read it aloud for a second time.

The President would be very pleased to visit with Lord Branksome, Lord Altnaharra, HSH the Princess Mata and Major Knight-Poole, should they happen to be in Washington DC on the 25th.  Best wishes for your visit to the United States.  Franklin. Roosevelt per M.A. LeHand, secretary.

Martin’s first thought was: “What can Mr Roosevelt want to learn from me?  Surely this can’t be just social.”

“Perhaps he wants to hear my views on painting, Poole.”  The others looked at The Plunger and saw that he was serious.

“I dare say,” replied Martin, trying not to smile, for he was a kind person.

“I’m sorry that you are not included in the invitation, Erna,” said Stephen.

“Ach!  Not to worry.  I would have to cancel my talk in front of his wife.  For you, I am pleased.”

“I have not been included,” said Teddy, “but I do have a letter of introduction to Sir Ronald at the Embassy from Lord Halifax.  I will come to Washington with you, that is, if you don’t mind.  There are things I can discuss there.”

“Of course it is,” said Martin.

“Well, I might as well come too,” said Dwight.  “Sir Ronald Lindsay married two of my great aunts on the Hoyt-Sherman side of the family.  He’s practically an American or perhaps I am almost British.”

Thus the party for the Washington train grew and Myles arranged for a hotel in that city and the friends found that their days in New York simply flew by.  They departed for Washington on an early train on the 25th.  Mata turned all heads in a tan suit whose skirt fell to just below the knees, while on her head was a tiny hat made up of strands of something rather like a bird’s nest but terribly chic.  Overall was a short white fur jacket made from the pelts of some exotic animal.  Martin had never seen it before and said how beautiful she looked in it.  Marta thanked him with a smile and added by way of explanation:  “Furs are my one weakness.”

Stephen was terribly excited about meeting the President and Martin reminded him of the difficulty he had meeting Mr Wilson twenty years before, when Stephen’s trousers, or rather what lay beneath, would not behave.  Stephen dismissed this fear and said: “Should I wear my new red strap or the alligator one— or perhaps your platinum ring, Mala?  My balls could do with a good stretching.”

“Oh Mr Stephen,” said Carlo, “I don’t think you should wear anything; this is the land of the free after all.”  Thus Stephen was persuaded, but he was not entirely happy with the choice and seemed to constantly adjust his person on the train, earning looks from both sexes, to Martin’s consternation.

As before, the official residence of the President of the Republic was a large and simple country house in the Greek style of the late eighteenth century and set in not particularly interesting grounds.  It lacked a ‘personal touch’ and Martin attributed this to the fact that the incumbents only spent a few years in residence and thus had no time to impart much of themselves.  And as before, there was little ceremony and quite quickly they were shown in to the President’s study.  He did not rise and Martin realised that Mr Roosevelt was considerably more disabled than photographs and the newsreels made evident.  Nevertheless he was witty and charming, with lively eyes and a toothy grin around his tortoiseshell cigarette holder.

“Yes, I believe you were here in my predecessor’s time,” he observed to Martin and Stephen and they replied with a few non-committal remarks about the late President Wilson.  “We are not all that used to having European royalty here, Princess Mata, and I hope you will forgive me if I appear awkward.”

“Not at all, Mr President,” replied Mata in her careful English.  “It was gracious of you to invite me and I am very minor royalty indeed, for unlike you I have lost my country long ago. Weid was a very small state, but I loved it of course.”

“And you Lord, Altnaharra, are an artist I am told.”

“In a minor way, sir.  I am really the son of a brewer who dabbled in politics.”  Martin and Stephen dared not to look at each other.  The Plunger had bared his soul.

The conversation turned to Europe as an aide helped Roosevelt to a chair while coffee was brought in by a coloured butler.  Stephen ventured to remark that Ambassador Kennedy was an admirer of Herr Hitler and quoted some remarks that he had read before sailing.  The President looked troubled and at one point said “Kennedy’s a son-of-a-bitch.  Do you know that expression in England?”

Stephen confessed he had heard of it and Martin said:  “I gather, Mr President, you are merely referring to the circumstances of his birth.”  There was a pause for a few long seconds and then Roosevelt laughed out loud, slapping his knee.”

“Oh that is a good one!  You Britishers are so dry!  I must tell that to Cordell.”

Stephen thought he should put the case for his country and painted a gloomy picture of Europe controlled by Hitler and Stalin.  “They will dictate what the Americas can and can’t sell into Europe, Mr President, and without a British or French fleet, what is to stop Germany controlling the Atlantic right up to Maryland and what is to stop the Japanese from doing the same in the Pacific?”

“We are almost too late,” confessed The Plunger in a rare excursion into politics, “but at home we are rearming as quickly as we can.  We have been fools to think we can negotiate with Hitler and Mussolini from a position of weakness.”

“Our desire for peace has been our undoing,” contributed Martin.

The President nodded and Martin felt quite sure that he had heard all this before and that he was a genuinely well-disposed to Britain and France and not the evil friend of Russia that Bunny had maintained.  Then the real reason for the invitation became apparent.  “I might tell you,” began Roosevelt, “that your new King and Queen will be paying us a visit in the next few months.”  This was astounding news and the visitors looked at one another.  “And I was wondering what they would think of this back in your country and if you could tell me a little about them as I’m sure you must know them socially.”  Martin wanted to laugh at the thought of knowing the King and Queen ‘socially’—a peculiarly American way of looking at it, as if they were all members of the same country club or the Wauwatosa Rotary perhaps.  But then he thought again: the King has played golf at Croome and Mata was actually related to the King’s mother. 

Thus these facts were trotted out, with confessions from both The Plunger and Stephen that they were actually half-American to balance matters somewhat and Roosevelt was assured that the general public, with the exception of a few Communists, felt nothing but good will towards the USA and Martin tactfully omitted a certain distressing snobbery among the upper classes.  As for the Royal Family, a picture was quickly painted of a good and oddly devout young man who was shy but possessed of a very bright and capable wife in the person of Her Majesty.  They emphasised the affection in which nearly all the peoples of the Empire held them both.

“I know them to be very much devoted to their children, Mr President,’ said Mata “and they greatly value simple home life and are not ones for smart cafe society,” she added, forgetting her previous night at El Morocco.

“Indeed?” said the President and ventured to wonder if it would be appropriate to invite them to his country house at Hyde Park.  They all agreed it would be very appropriate and the President smiled.  A few other topics were dusted, but it was soon time to depart, as Miss LeHand’s appearance signalled, and they were speedily outside, electing to walk back to their hotel.

“What did you make of that?” asked The Plunger

“If Roosevelt has anything to do with it, I think our two countries might be allies against the dictators,” said Martin.

“But don’t forget Mr Kennedy and ‘America First’,” warned Stephen.  “It is a big country as we found in 1917, Mala.”  Martin nodded and not for the first time found himself voicing the pessimistic phrase: ‘the last war’.”

From the grim reality of the present, the British visitors were then afforded an optimistic glimpse of a glittering future, as revealed to the shirt-sleeved American public of 1939 at the World’s Fair.  It was more than a glimpse, as over two long days they took the subway out to Flushing where boastful governments and powerful corporations had thrown up a veritable city of the most miraculous modern pavilions.  Everything was so clean and so superbly organised, they kept enthusiastically telling one another as they queued with their ice-creams and hot dogs (a first for Mata and Erna) to experience the wonders of ‘Democracity’ from the moving walkways inside the Perisphere and as they goggled at the free-flowing streets and highways of 1960 on the ‘Futurama’ ride in the General Motors Building.

Locomotives, both full size ones and scale models of those yet to come, were of special interest to Martin and he thought of Will’s train set at home.   They saw television and fluorescent lighting and the Borden Company’s automatic model dairy where lucky cows rotated on something called a ‘rotolactor’ and were washed and shampooed as they were automatically milked, and this display was almost outshone by that of a fully electrified farm, the details of which Martin did not fully grasp as the others hurried him on to the Three Crown Restaurant in the Swedish Pavilion where diners ate a buffet meal called a ‘smörgåsbord’ from an electric revolving table that was constantly replenished in the kitchen. 

In the Petroleum Building, a huge black disc of polished onyx proved to actually be a shallow lake of Texas oil and it was strangely beautiful, while the Parachute Jump, elsewhere, was terribly thrilling, although Erna landed rather heavily but was unhurt.  They saw Seminole Indians wresting alligators and Billy Rose’s Aquacade where Stephen’s old friend from the Bremen, Johnny Weissmuller— now Tarzan— performed in an elaborate water pageant.  From the Corning Company, Mata ordered a dinner service made entirely of heatproof glass and The Plunger was propositioned by a sailor at the ‘Self-hypnotised Girl’ who was, for reasons not made clear, encased in a 1400 lb block of ice.

It was all rather sad, thought Martin on the train back to Manhattan.  This is how the world should go: a smooth, rational curve of progress to a better world.  But it was not the future; of that he was certain.  The Americans were deluding themselves just as his own people had for the last decade.  Democracy had no air raid shelters and there was no German Pavilion where IG Faben might have had a diorama showing ‘Poison Gas Warfare of Tomorrow’.

That night Martin and Stephen went to the Apollo Theatre up to Harlem.  Martin had secured a ticket for a celebrated event: a ‘Battle of the Swing Bands’— a contest between Benny Goodman’s orchestra and Chick Webb’s band.  It was the most wonderful night of his life, although his enthusiasm for swing music outshone Stephen’s.  Both bands were confident and incomparable and the electric thrills that they generated seemed to almost lift the roof off the theatre and made it impossible to sit still.  The honours went to the Negro musicians of Webb’s band who, on this occasion almost made Goodman’s sound lacklustre.   Martin suddenly found himself fighting back hot tears.  This music, so fresh, free and energetic—the very essence of the New World— somehow seemed to sum up, in its driving rhythms, the vitality and profundity of this limitless country that he knew rolled endlessly west and south from New York City.  It was America at its height, come from adolescence into confident young manhood.  It was hard to define, but he felt in his heart that it was as great as anything they had seen at the Fair.  The United States would be an ally, just as Roosevelt had said, when the war came— and it would come, of that he was certain.   And he knew now they could not lose. 

*****

It was early April when they returned to England.  Sure enough, the Royal Tour of Canada and the United States was announced for June.  There were two more letters of a threatening tone, one from Xhemel Bey himself, with all the barbarity of the blood feuds that characterised Albanian society, and another, more guarded, from the Italian Foreign Office under Count Ciano.  The demands for money were repeated and these were joined with demands that Mata renounce any claims her family had to the Albanian throne.  Martin decided to show these to Mata.  She was terribly upset.  “But Martin I make no claims, let me tell them this! I don’t understand: first they want me to marry Xhemel Bey and return to Albania and then they want me completely out of the picture.”

“Matters are obviously very complicated,” said Martin in understatement.  “Should I pay them?”

“Absolutely not!  The Albanians are ‘great patriots’ but would sell their birthright for gold at the first opportunity.  Xhemel Bey is a greedy pig.”  Mata wept bitter tears and Martin tried to calm her.

“I will see Halifax or someone in the FO when we go up to London.  Perhaps they can guide us.”

Events that week were moving fast.  The Germans had marched into Bohemia, effectively obliterating the nation of Czechoslovakia that Martin had seen born at Versailles.  Madrid fell to Franco’s Loyalists and the Civil War in Spain was over.  In the Balkans there were constant rumours of war between Italy, Albania, Greece and Yugoslavia, the exact alliances changing almost hourly and the opinions of strategists varying wildly.  Then the news reached them that Queen Geraldine had delivered Zog a boy in the royal palace in Tirana.

Martin and Stephen, with Erna and Mata were walking to the Victoria Theatre.  They were going to see, for the second time, the musical comedy ‘Me and my Girl’ which was the hit of the day.  Erna in particular loved the cockney ‘Lambeth Walk’ and was much taken with the shout of ‘Oi!’ with which Noel Gay’s song was punctuated.

They headed towards Piccadilly Circus and saw through the railings that slit trenches were being dug in Green Park.  Stephen had spent the day organising the basement rooms at Branksome House into a commodious air-raid shelter that would accommodate their household and those of their neighbours as well.  He had sketched specifications for its further reinforcement with concrete in accordance with the latest thinking. 

“We must offer Croome to evacuated children,” said Mata quietly and they all agreed.  They passed a newspaper kiosk.  A poster behind its wire frame announced that the Italian invasion of Albania had begun.  They looked at this grim news, but remained tight-lipped.

In Piccadilly Circus the lights were as yet undimmed by the threat of war and there were many people about, enjoying their evening in the throbbing capital just as they were.  No one saw the black Mercedes at first.  It was travelling at speed and mounted the pavement and headed in their direction just as Mata began to say, “What is Bovril exactly?”  She didn’t scream; there was a terrible dull noise and then Martin found himself suspended in time, frozen with horror.  He saw himself looking down at Mata, who had been beside him just a moment ago but was now lying in an unnatural pose on the pavement, with the yellow and red of the moving neon advertising signs splashing her white fur coat.  And she was dead, of that he was quite certain.

To be continued… 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWb_jZct2SY