The Forgotten Highlander - Alistair Urquhart [104]
We got a second-class seat and I plonked him by the window, hoping the passing countryside would placate him. He had a wild look in his eyes and jabbered nonsense constantly. I had the feeling that he could become aggressive at any time so I treated him good-naturedly and tried to calm him with soothing words.
The journey was a nightmare. Hugh was a handful and I spent most of my time apologising to others for his loud outbursts, which were frequent and disturbing. Seeing him in that state really got to me. I prayed that I wouldn’t descend back down the same dark path.
I tried to convince him that he was back in Britain and would be safe now. Nobody was coming to get him. As we pulled into Aberdeen Joint Station at 6 a.m. on 18 November 1945, I told him to look out the window, hoping he would recognise the view as we crossed the River Dee. I left him with the Red Caps in much the same state as when I first met him, bidding him farewell and wishing him luck, though I’m not sure he heard.
Once I knew Hugh was safely in their hands I ventured to the main entrance, where I knew the family would be waiting. I spotted Mum first, her distinctive hair and height gave her away. I walked up to Mum, Dad, Dossie, Rhoda and a young chap I didn’t recognise. I hugged Mum and I shall never forget the look in her eyes. She was so shocked and upset, probably by my skin-and-bone appearance and lack of hair. I hugged Dossie, Dad and Rhoda and the tears could no longer be held back. Both my mother and father had aged far beyond their years. My ordeal had taken a toll on them as well as myself.
I turned to the young chap and said, ‘Are you Rhoda’s boyfriend?’
Eyebrows raised, he said, ‘No, you bloody fool! I am your brother Bill.’
It just went to show what six years of war could do – to him and me. Also there was Doug’s new wife Cicely, from Oxfordshire, and she introduced me to their new baby boy born just a few months before. They had named him Alistair in my honour. Then it emerged that they had all thought I had been killed. None of the half-dozen cards or so that I had sent from the camps had ever arrived in Aberdeen. I was back from the dead.
On the tram journey home to Seafield Drive I asked where Douglas was. They told me that he was ‘abroad’ working for the Foreign Office but nobody had heard from him in months. He had been in the Army’s glider regiment. He had broken both of his ankles during a mission into occupied France and reinvented himself as a war correspondent in the Middle East. Before the war he could speak French and German from his school days and had subsequently learned four more languages, which suited the Foreign Office, and they had signed him up. I wouldn’t see him again until the following Christmas, when he returned as a shattered wreck, barely alive, looking as if he himself had been a POW and confined to the black hole for several months. He had disappeared on some cloak and dagger mission, abandoning his new wife and baby boy for more than a year. On his bizarre return he refused to tell anybody where he had been and was very nearly a broken man.
So by the time we reached home I was already feeling panicky. Everyone had so many questions; sometimes it felt as if they were all asking at once. This was not how I had thought I would feel on my homecoming. So much had changed. Mum had prepared a lavish breakfast for my return and the table was laid out when we got back home shortly after 7 a.m. We sat down for a family meal with everyone on their best behaviour – even Father was keen to dote on me. Mum served up tattie scones, sausages, eggs, the real works. But despite much encouragement and insistence I could only pick at my food. I asked about Hazel and without looking at me Mum said she had married during the war and moved to Canada. I was not upset; in fact I was glad that she had moved on and seemed happy.
Then Mum cleared her throat