Storyteller - Colin & Anne Brookfield (ebook and pdf reader .txt) 📗

time, in very passable English. “It’s nice to meet you Captain Philip Rogers. Yes Captain, we do have our informants, and as you see, they can be very informative.” As he spoke, Wehrmacht soldiers moved in to encircle him.

The German officer smiled and clicked his heels together in acknowledgment of military officer protocol.

“Oh dear,” he said, “you are in the worst kind of trouble Captain. You are wearing civilian clothes and you know what that means. Pass me your side arm please.”

Philip was well aware of the impending firing-squad, and that they would have him drained of all useful information first.

It took two weeks of intensive and sometimes brutal treatment, before it was decided that, as they were making no useful progress with him, he was to be passed on to the specialist interrogation skills of the SS. It was for this reason that Philip was brought to the garrison Kommandant’s office.

“Well Captain Rogers,” he said, “you have proved your courage here, but then we are not trained in the black arts like the SS, whom you will soon be meeting. There is a train waiting at the station with hundreds of our Jewish friends securely packed into its box-cars; they are in transportation to an unpleasant place. Your temporary incarceration will be in the first box-car behind the locomotive’s fuel tender, where you will meet more of your stubborn military friends, for whom the SS will also be waiting.”

Within the hour, Philip was delivered to the station under armed escort, and deposited with the others in the first box-car. His fellow prisoners proved to be a rather battered lot like himself, although they were not all British. The day dragged monotonously on in the stifling mid-summer heat, punctuated at times by the cries of despair from the overcrowded carriages behind theirs.

There was a mutter of relief for everyone as the sun finally settled very low, and daylight began to fade. For a few moments the world seemed to fall into silence. The sound of approaching military boots pulled their minds back to their desperate plight, but as the metronomic impact of the boots on the station platform got close, they seemed to slow slightly, before picking up again to their former pace. To everyone’s surprise, the change in pace had also co-ordinated with a small package that had been hastily thrust through the vertical bars of the ventilation window. Fortunately, one of the men had retained his cigarette lighter, and as it flickered on, they saw the package was addressed to ‘Captain Philip Rogers’.

Philip picked it up as the rest of the mystified men looked on. Four new hacksaw blades fell to the floor, but Philip didn’t notice. Instead, he was staring at a small flat object that he recognised; it was his old pay-book that had been lost in the mud during the November battle of the Somme in France in 1917. There was a note enclosed:

“Get sawing. One good turn deserves another. I have the rank and know-how to help a friend in trouble. I hope you managed to get those two muddy horses to a place of safety. Now read carefully: After the train has travelled for three hours, it will slow to a halt at a junction. This will be the time for all of you to jump. At that point, make for the woods at the other side of the water-tower – the French resistance will be there to conduct your safe passage. Destroy the evidence at all costs.”

Double Jeopardy

Sarah Buick and her mother Melody, made their way with others towards the baggage carousels at Glasgow Airport. They had already phoned Mrs. Langley to arrange a meeting place and were feeling quite nervous of what lay ahead. Despite their anxiety, it was pleasant to finally sit back in Marjory Langley’s comfortable car, away from the hassle and stress of the airport. Sarah talked to her as she drove, but after a while had dozed off to sleep. Her mother also closed her eyes whilst her mind drifted back to the reasons they were there.

It began ten years ago when Sarah was a joyful eighteen year old destined for a successful career. The only shadow in Sarah’s life was her very rare blood group, and like all people with that problem, they lived in hope they would never find themselves in the position of needing a transfusion when their blood group was not available. It was for such reasons it was worldwide listed for donating that type of blood.

The problems now before them, had their beginnings in a hospital ward where Sara was in desperate need to receive a blood transfusion following a car accident. She remembered how surprised the attending surgeon had been that the correct blood group for Sarah was already available in another hospital blood bank. It was to that freak of good fortune that Sarah now owed her life, but it later seemed to have come at a price.

It wasn’t until Sarah had eventually been discharged from hospital and spent several months of recuperation at home that her mother discovered Sarah smoking, which was difficult to understand, because Sarah had always hated cigarettes. There was more to follow; the house had become host to the unfamiliar television sounds of football, rugby matches and the empty lager cans, which were beginning to make their unwelcome presence into the dustbin. The final crushing disappointment was Sarah’s decision not to return to college, and old friends no longer held interest for her.

“I feel as though I have a stranger in the house,” Melody told her friend, “but I’m coping. I so nearly lost her that I’m grateful she is still with me. As for the rest, it’ll all ‘come out in the wash’, as they say.

The months slipped by, and Sarah now had a job as a waitress at a local restaurant, until finally, all those newly arrived oddities seemed to find an acceptance with Melody. However, one evening, Melody had arrived home expecting her daughter to be there but found a note on the kitchen table saying that there was a waitress short at the restaurant and she had stepped in to fill the gap for a couple of extra hours. Melody found no problem with that – until she saw the words, ‘love Philippa’ at the bottom of the note.

“Who is Philippa?” were the first words that greeted Sarah when she returned home that evening. Presenting her with the signed note Philippa, did not solve anything either.

“Must have been day-dreaming when I wrote it,” she replied.

Melody received a phone call that evening from the restaurant owner.

“Just called to thank Philippa for helping out, she left before I had the chance to do so.”

She sat heavily into a nearby chair, wondering what on earth was going on, and was further surprised when several weeks later, Sarah started driving lessons and had placed an order for a new car.

“On waitress’s wages? You can’t afford these extravagant enterprises,” she berated her daughter.

“I’m earning six times more than I did a few months ago,” was Sarah’s reply.

The following morning, the owner of the restaurant had an unexpected visitor to his office.

“Please take a seat madam,” he offered politely. “What can I do for you?”

“It’s about my daughter that you employ as a waitress. Her name is Sarah, or Philippa as she seems now to prefer being called.”

“Ah, you’re her mother. I’m so pleased to meet you at last Mrs. Langley.”

“Langley?” she gasped questioningly. She wondered what was going on and if she were going mad.

A cup of hot tea was brought in and gradually Melody regained her composure. The owner listened sympathetically as she unfolded the changes that had occurred since Sarah’s hospitalisation.

“Come with me,” he said when Melody had finished and she followed him through two swing doors into the enormous restaurant kitchen. “We are lucky to have such a highly trained world class chef as Philippa... sorry... Sarah. We only discovered her culinary genius when she noticed a recipe going wrong and saved the day with an expertise we had not been aware of, and now she has three other chefs under her.”

The expression on Melody’s face was priceless, especially by his next question.

“By the way, where was she trained?”

“Trained? She can’t even cook and never could,” Melody had replied. “She has never been trained nor had anything whatsoever to do with catering.”

“My God! A bit of a miracle then,” the man replied, “but whatever the reasons behind this, we are both blessed to have such a lovely talented young lady enriching our lives. It would please me,” he continued, “If you and your daughter would accept an invitation to the restaurant after our closing this evening, and might it be better not to bother Sarah anymore concerning these anomalies? I’m sure they will work themselves out by and by.”

After that evening, invitations to the restaurant became a regular event, and began including one of the under-chefs called Michael, that Sarah had taken a liking to. Melody had also begun to realise that the restaurant owner Tom Landsworth, had developed a noticeable personal interest in her and, as she was now unattached, her feelings towards him seemed to be growing. A phone call from him one morning seemed to raise her hopes even more.

“It’s Mr. Landsworth from the restaurant,” he began. “I hear it’s your birthday the day after tomorrow and I would like to arrange a little celebration, if that is alright with you.”

“Oh, this is a most wonderful surprise Mr. Landsworth, thank you.”

“By the way, please call me ‘Tom’, after all, we all know one another quite well by now.”

“Well thank you again Tom, we’ll see you the day after tomorrow.”

The wonderful company and celebratory repast before her on the arranged evening at the restaurant, moved her to thank Tom for his extraordinary generosity, saying also how thrilled she was with her daughter’s success, and return from the shadows of life.

“There’s more to come,” interjected Sarah, turning to the young man next to her and placing her hand on his. “Mike and I would like your approval for our engagement.”

Melody was thrilled by her news, whereupon Tom took Melody’s hand and said, “I almost feel at last as though I have got my own family.” The reassuring squeeze that he felt from Melody’s hand told him quite firmly, that he had.

The following morning over breakfast, Sarah appeared preoccupied by something serious, which seemed rather odd to her mother, considering how charmed her daughter’s future now seemed.

“Penny for your thoughts,” she asked.

“I’ve just read an article in the paper,” replied Sarah, “about several successful medical cases of lung and kidney transplants etcetera, where the patient had later taken on lifestyle changes consistent with those of the donor. Hell! I think it is happening to me.”

Subsequent to that, an appointment was made with the hospital doctor who had originally attended her. After explaining the bizarre changes in her life, she stated her need to contact the person who had donated blood to her.

“I doubt that would be possible,” maintained the doctor, “but I will contact the other hospital from which the donation and storage was obtained and see what they can do.”

Two weeks later, her