Awfully Glad by Charlie Cochrane

Author:Charlie Cochrane [Cochrane, Charlie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781626391642
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books
Published: 2014-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

A smart London street, smelling unusually fresh after the earlier rain.

Ten minutes—by the shortcuts—back to the flat, and they’d passed that pleasantly enough, making small talk, remarking on the shops, on the passersby, anything to oil the wheels of conversation, although the first bubbles of tension were beginning to rise. They’d crossed the Rubicon; laid their intentions if not bare, then at least dishabille; made the decisive move. Sam knew what they were going back to the flat for, and Jonny must have felt the same. This didn’t feel like some brief encounter, soon finished and soon to be regretted; Jonny seemed like the sort of man he wanted to spend time with, outside of bed or in. But no time now to be counting one’s chickens. Lots of hatching still to come.

By the time they reached the bottom of the stairs in Sam’s elegantly proportioned apartment block, conversation had almost petered out, and once through the door of his flat, it died entirely.

Jonny looked around, unsure whether to sit or stand and where he might park his backside once he’d decided what to do with it. Sam’s airy suggestion to make himself at home clearly didn’t help, nor did the offer of port, which had become perfunctory. Both men knew they hadn’t come here to drink, nor to make small talk.

“This is silly, isn’t it?” Jonny said, as the latest attempt at casual conversation failed. “We’re past pussyfooting.”

“I should think so,” Sam replied, with great relief. “Come on.”

He took Jonny’s hand and drew him towards the settee. Seventh floor, nobody would be able to see through their window. They sat, holding hands, like they might have done had he really been Madeleine, and as he’d not done with anybody he’d brought back here since the war. They’d have been up against the wall, by now.

“There’s something I have to ask.”

“Ask away,” Sam said airily, but his guard—stood down from duty earlier in the evening—was up again.

“Have you ever had a punch on the nose? From somebody who didn’t like being duped?”

“I’m sorry?” What was he going on about?

“When you were Madeleine. You took Hampson and Cole in and they couldn’t have been the only ones.”

“Ah.” Sam nodded; desire was clearly making him dull-witted. “I’m not sure how many were duped, especially towards the end. The first few times I appeared, nobody suspected a thing, but then word got around a bit. Somebody was usually in on the joke. Do you know, I was nearly captured once.”

Jonny’s eyebrows shot up. “That must have been a close call. Germans caught you in no-man’s-land?”

“No, it wasn’t Jerry. A rival regiment. They wanted their very own Madeleine to join their concert party. Even if they knew she was really a Sam, she would have been a feather in their caps.” He grinned. “My colonel went doolally. Had me guarded for a week.”

“My instinct is that you’ve just told me a load of old cobblers, but you don’t strike me as somebody who lies to a friend.

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