Under the Blanket of War by Petken Jana

Author:Petken, Jana
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: JCP Publishing
Published: 2024-01-16T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Brinley Knight

Lancashire, Northern England.

19 May 1940

Brin, who had accompanied Mosley to Middleton, Lancashire, knew better than to speak to the leader when he was in one of his furious moods and apt to throttle the first person who interrupted his thunderous thoughts. This was the most disastrous by-election a BU candidate had taken part in, and Brin expected that Mosley’s day was going to deteriorate further.

In the days prior to the election, Mosley predicted his candidate would receive enough votes to secure a new BU seat in parliament. He couldn’t have been more wrong about his popularity as a serious leader. It was in Brin’s mind a defeat for fascism and a victory for democracy. However, it had broken a man who still believed the country would rally behind him. Hugging his brandy, Mosley had become a broken figure somewhere between the town hall and the hotel. This result had finished him as a politician and as a leader, and he knew it.

“Four hundred and eighteen votes, Gregg … four hundred and eighteen. Remind me again of what the Tory candidate got?” Mosley asked Brin.

Piercey, looking downcast, glanced at Brin as if he were to blame for the outcome. Brin had no such qualms and answered, “Thirty-two thousand and thirty-six.”

Mosley grumbled, “I can always rely on your memory for good and bad, Gregg, can’t I? To think I spent all that money on a candidate who couldn’t even hit half a thousand. He’s supposed to be at this table celebrating with us. Instead, he ran away and hid like a damned coward!”

“Leader, please, don’t let the other guests see you rattled,” Brin suggested as fellow diners stared at Mosley.

“How can I stay calm? This is a slap in my face. Damned France carry-on has done this to me. If the Germans had only waited one week more, I’d have been home and dry in this election.”

Deluded fool. “Do you want to go back to London?”

“Not yet. I promised I would speak to our voters after lunch, and I won’t let them down.”

Today, Mosley, a man who had never once admitted out loud that he might be unpopular, could not deny his time in the sun had run out and he was now heading to a big black hole of irrelevance. He had not grasped that this week, while he’d been talking about reconciliation with Hitler and a wishy-washy imagined negotiated peace in which Britain would have to make concessions, British sons, brothers and husbands were trying to defend ground against a behemoth enemy who had cut down the trees on their way into France as if through a block of lard. Thinking of his brother, Tommy, he envisioned a battle for survival across the Channel, with the desperate goal of making it back home before the British army faced complete annihilation. This was how he imagined the disaster unfolding in the days to come.

With Tommy in his mind, Brin suggested again, “I think we should go back to London. You won’t find many friends here, Tom.

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