Lethbridge-Stewart - The Flaming Soldier: A Doctor Who spin-off novella. by Christopher Bryant

Author:Christopher Bryant [Bryant, Christopher]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Candy Jar Books
Published: 2019-01-20T00:00:00+00:00

April 1970

‘After the war was over,’ Eileen said, ‘the various Armed Forces found themselves with all sorts of bits of land they didn’t need any more.’

Lethbridge-Stewart waved a hand, impatiently. ‘Yes, of course. Most of it got sold off or converted into firing ranges.’

‘Unless the land had a certain kind of history,’ Eileen added. ‘Top secret things happen on top secret land and sometimes they leave an echo – or a scar.’ She looked between the two men in her office and sighed. ‘You know, you’re going to have to stop looking surprised whenever I know something. This guest house isn’t the be-all and end-all of my life. I was risking my life for King and Country when you were still in short trousers. In fact, I remember meeting a Lethbridge-Stewart during the war. He was RAF.’

‘That would have been my father.’

Eileen nodded. She thought so. ‘Went MIA at the end of the war, I seem to recall.’

‘Yes,’ Lethbridge-Stewart said. ‘So, you see, Mrs Younghusband, I’m not entirely unfamiliar with the events of the war.’

Eileen glanced through the office door into the lobby and her heart sank. Dinner was over. Guests had started to ebb out of the dining room, at which point they found themselves faced with a couple of armed soldiers guarding the front door. It was a small mercy that most of the troops were outside the hotel, but the situation wouldn’t hold for long. Eileen’s eyes settled on Mr Forster, who was attempting to badger answers out of one of the soldiers.

Positively annoyed now, she turned back to face Lethbridge-Stewart.

‘Everyone in my generation has two things in common, Brigadier. One is that we’re alive. Somehow or other, we survived the war. Millions didn’t, but we’re still standing. The second thing goes hand in hand with that: we’ve all got a story to tell. We all did things during that time, often extraordinary things, even it was staying at home and trying to keep the country together. I was born in the shadow of the worst war in history and when I was eighteen years old I was expected to fight in one that was probably even worse.

‘There’s a man out there bothering your troops. He’s one of the most irritating guests I have to put up with, an old man trotting out the same tired phrases and witticisms at the end of an unremarkable career in retail. Where was he thirty years ago? A prisoner of war? Invalided back to Blighty? Under fire on the front line? Dropping bombs on Dresden? I don’t know. But he was somewhere, doing something, and so he deserves respect. And so do I.’

She sat down again, somewhat puffed out by her own rant. ‘So I don’t care how many fungus men or alien monsters or whatever you’ve fought against, because I was there first.’

There was a self-conscious pause before Lethbridge-Stewart spoke up. ‘No one’s disputing your credentials, Mrs Younghusband. We’ll try to contain our surprise from now on. Please, continue.’

‘Alright.

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