MORNING SERIAL
‘NOT much. Most of the kids seemed to be crying at the tops of their voices. I felt like joining in.’
‘Poor little tykes. Well, they soon get used to it. Ja, bitte... und Kaffee fur mich.’
Issie was amazed at the food: it was spectacularly good, and plentiful. German cooks dished up the breakfast at high table, a mixture of egg, bacon and potato baked in a tray, and as much of it as you could pack in. Thick-lipped jugs of cocoa and coffee steamed on the table.
Susan broke open a warm roll and spread it with butter.
‘One thing you can say for this place, and perhaps there is just the one thing, is the food’s decent. We’ve got the same cooks that cooked for Admiral Donitz. You don’t know about that? I’m surprised Our Leader hasn’t filled you in on the gen. His absolute favourite topic.’ She raised her voice malevolently. ‘I was just telling Miss Dahl, Mr Patterson, about Admiral Donitz.’ She pronounced it ‘Doughnuts’, solving a riddle.
‘Doesn’t Miss Dahl know about Admiral Donitz?’ He craned eagerly forward. ‘Gracious, Miss Dahl. In that case I must enlighten you. Admiral Donitz was eating his breakfast hereabouts just thirteen years ago, perhaps the very same farmers’ breakfast we are enjoying now — think of that.’
The eaters round the table chewed on, suppressing groans, offering perfunctory signs of brooding upon the breakfasting admiral.
Issie hadn’t a clue who Admiral Donitz was, and it showed.
‘You are familiar with the history of the final stages of the war?’
‘Oh — in a rather vague way. Hitler in the bunker and so forth.’
‘Ah, but that was not the end of the Third Reich, Miss Dahl,’ said Patterson with zeal. ‘Not by several weeks. Let me fill you in.’
Susan sat back to allow Patterson’s monologue to flow across her bosom to its victim.
> The Element of Water by Stevie Davies is published by Parthian in the Library of Wales series www.parthianbooks.com
CONTINUES MONDAY