‘I am sure all children will have been evacuated to the east long ago.’

‘I hope so.’

He laid a hand on her arm. ‘You mustn’t torture yourself over it, Lydia. You did all you could and so did Alex. Have you heard from him?’

‘No, not a word, not even through official channels. He was in Red Army uniform when I left him and I worry about him too.’

‘Try not to. He knows what he’s doing.’

But how could she not worry, especially when the German army seemed unstoppable, sweeping towards Moscow? The only way she could cope was by working, hoping that what she did might shorten the war and bring nearer their reunion. In her mind she coupled them together, Alex and Yuri, the two people she loved above all others.

She worried about Robert too. He was serving with the convoys taking war supplies to Russia and, apart from the weather and treacherous seas, they endured attack after attack from U-boats and German bombers, both during the voyage and in harbour at Murmansk while they were unloading. Whenever he came back from a voyage, he telephoned her to tell her he was safe. They wrote each other long letters, which had to be censored, so they were careful what they said, but the affection was obvious and that affection was gradually becoming more profound, but she did not try to analyse her feelings. It was enough that he cared.

They met as often as they could, sometimes going to a show or a dance. On one occasion they went to the first night of Noel Coward’s play, Blithe Spirit, at the Piccadilly Theatre. It was a comedy starring the indomitable Margaret Rutherford as Madame Arcati, a dotty medium who conjured up the spirit of a husband’s first wife and caused mayhem with the second. There was not a single reference to the war and, for an hour or two, they forgot their troubles and laughed.

Taking her home to Balfour Place afterwards, Robert stopped in the hallway and kissed her. She was taken by surprise, but did not protest. She supposed she had been half expecting it and it was not unpleasant or even unwelcome. In fact it roused her far more than she would have expected. He stood back and surveyed her with his head on one side, smiling. ‘What, no outrage?’

‘No, Robert, no outrage.’

‘But you’re not really ready for it, are you?’

‘For a kiss? Or something more?’

‘You tell me.’ He wasn’t smiling now.

‘A kiss yes, something more, no. I’m sorry, Rob. I still hope, you see…’

‘I understand. But we can still be friends, can’t we?’

‘Of course. I should be very sad if we couldn’t.’

‘Good, because I am a patient man.’

She knew that already and she knew she would try his patience sorely in the weeks to come.

Minsk fell to the Germans a week later and they had their sights set on the ancient city of Smolensk, on their way to Moscow. According to reports Lydia read, a pall of yellow smoke, caused by burning villages and the dust stirred up by the tanks, hung over everything. A few photographs came in the diplomatic bag which illustrated poignantly what was happening to the populace. One was of two little children, one aged about three and one a little older, standing in the ruins of Smolensk, crying. Another was of some refugees, trudging along a road away from the fighting. In the foreground a shawl-clad woman carried a little boy about the same age as Yuri. She studied the child, wondering if it could be her son. It was difficult to conjure up his face, and in any case her memory was of a four-month-old baby, and though she tried, she did not seem able to add the two years in her mind’s eye. Her eyes filled with tears and she couldn’t see to work.

The nightly blitz on London, the industrial cities of the north and the major ports around the coast stopped while Hitler concentrated on bombing Leningrad into submission. The Royal Air Force, which had been England’s saviour during the Blitz, was able to take a breather and bomb Germany to exact some retribution. But the convoys of vital shipping were still being lost to German U-boats in the Atlantic, the Mediterranean and the North Sea. And as another winter approached, the North Sea run became even more hazardous, with rough seas and sub-zero temperatures. Leningrad was under siege and Moscow threatened. All foreign embassies in Russia were being evacuated eastwards, which meant even less news reached the West, and rumours flourished until it was difficult to know what to believe.

But winter was Russia’s ally, not the invaders’. The cold affected everything: tanks and trucks would not start, vehicles and guns were frozen in and could not be moved until the ice had been tackled with pickaxes. According to reports reaching London, the Germans had been so sure of their swift success they had not even supplied their troops with winter clothing. Comparisons were being made with Napoleon’s march on Moscow a hundred and thirty years before; the winter had defeated him and it would defeat Hitler. At home in London, Lydia realised how lucky she had been and how much she owed to the absent Alex. He had been a constant presence in the background of her life all through her growing up, but it was only in Russia, when he had appeared just when she needed him most, that she realised how much she loved him, when it was almost too late. She longed for him to return to her.

Her daily scrutiny of all the reports arriving on her desk for his name became a ritual before she began translating, but it was never there. Surely if he were alive, he would have found some way of letting her know? She worked diligently, putting in long hours, using it as a kind of anaesthetic to numb the pain of being without her son and the man she loved.

It was Sir Edward who broke the news to her. She had arrived home a little before him and was in the kitchen preparing an evening meal for them both when he came in. He hung up his hat, coat and scarf and dropped his briefcase on the hall table as he always did. She heard the clunk of it and then his footsteps coming along the polished parquet floor towards the kitchen. ‘You’re just in time,’ she said without looking round. ‘I’ve made a casserole.’

‘Later,’ he said. ‘There’s something I have to tell you first. Come and sit down.’

She turned as he sank into a chair at the kitchen table, and noticed how tired and drawn he looked. He was working long hours and at his age it was taking its toll. She sat opposite him, the table between them. His hesitation was alarming her. ‘Papa, what is it?’

He reached out and put his hands over hers on the table. ‘It’s Alex. He’s…’ He stumbled, then collected himself. ‘I’m afraid he’s dead.’

‘Dead?’ She stared at him. ‘He can’t be.’ But even as she denied it, she realised she had been half expecting it, but refusing to acknowledge it, as if by even thinking of such a possibility she would bring it about. ‘Are you sure?’

He nodded. ‘He was in Minsk when it was overrun by the Germans. He had apparently been acting with immense courage during the battle, single-handedly disabling a gun which had been shelling a convent being used to house children orphaned by the war, but it cost him his life. The action was reported by a senior officer in the Red Army who had witnessed it and recommended Major Alexei Petrovich Simenov for a posthumous medal. And then it came to light there was no such person serving in the Red Army, and enquiries revealed who he really was. Unfortunately the government in London has had to deny he was anything to do with them and he was acting off his own bat.’

She hardly heard what he said. She was back in Russia, in that squalid room in Moscow, loving and being loved by Alex. An Alex who was no more. He had declared he would always love her however long or short his life. Had he known how short it would be? Had he said he would rejoin her and bring Yuri to her, simply to get her safely away? He had saved her life, but lost his own. She sat looking at her father’s hands covering hers and could not take it in. ‘I can’t believe it. I don’t want to believe it.’

‘I know. I didn’t want to believe it either. I looked on him as a son, especially after his parents died. I had hoped you and he might…’ He stopped and took his handkerchief from his pocket, pretending to blow his nose. It was enough to set her off and she put her head into her arms on the table and wept, huge gulping sobs. He stood up and went round behind her and laid a hand on her shaking shoulders. He did not speak. There was nothing he could say that would in any way mitigate her misery. They stayed that way for a long time, not speaking, a little tableau that epitomised the war and all it was doing to ordinary men and women.

She lifted her head at last and sat up. ‘I suppose I knew, in my heart of hearts, that it was the end when we said goodbye in Moscow. I have been living on hope, but now hope is gone, not only for Alex, but for Yuri too. There’s no one left to look for him, you see, and it’s been too long…’

‘I know.’ It was said quietly. It was the easiest thing in the world for people to disappear in Russia, especially children who were more often than not given new names when they arrived in the orphanages.

‘But when the war is over, perhaps we can try again…’ He did not know how to go on giving her more hope when it would be better for her to accept her loss.

She stood up, dry-eyed now, as if every single ounce of moisture had been sucked out of her, as if she were the withered shell of the person she had been. ‘We had better have our dinner before it’s all dried up.’

But neither could eat.

ROBERT

1941 – 1945