Torrents Farm. A trip back to France. ____________________________________________________________________________
Andy just stood there staring at this man and his beautiful ice blue eyes not believing that just moments ago he thought he had been looking at a very senior citizen.
"I am so sorry about my deceit just now, but thank you for your kindness. I would like to explain if I may and have a cup of tea? Please do say you will, oh and here is your kind donation." He handed Andy his 1/9d back (remember that money! For you in the US that would be about 20 cents.) and led the way into the café.
"I just thought it a good idea to find out whether people would give a few pennies in spite of the austere situation we are all in at this time. I know it sounds stupid, but my word it opened my eyes I can tell you. As you saw I did not do too well as you were the only person to give me money, but I did pick up a few insults as you saw. I am Patrick Warrington by the way and when i'm not a beggar I am a freelance journalist and write for a number of daily papers and a couple of social magazines. I write a lot about the social climate and how people are coping since the war ended and if people are as close as they seemed to be during it. As we all know things are really difficult and from what I see it will go on much longer. It will take many more years to recover I am afraid. It's not all bad for me personally though as I write from home mostly and only have to go to London once maybe twice a month."
"I'm Andy Tyler and I have never begged for anything! I'm a student from Sparsholt Agriculture College and i'm in my final year working on my placement at Torrents farm near Morton village." "What happens when you finish?" "God knows, but the college helps you find a place. My interest is in market gardening or even general gardening and i'm pretty sure I will get a job somewhere." "Why a farm if you are going to work in gardening?" "Tommy and Lee, the farmers, have 25 greenhouses and I do a lot of work in them. It's a fantastic place, we all love it there."
They went on to chat for a long time and Andy came to realised he liked this man, but had no idea how old he was. Patrick was tall, he guessed about 6ft, seemed very slim and looked fit, but it was his hair that caused him not to be sure of his age. His handsome face said roughly 30 and his greyish hair 40/50? He looked at his hands and they looked young as well, so he settled for 30. Suddenly he realized that time had gone by and he had no idea what it was, he looked round for a clock but there wasn't one. "Have you got the time please, i'm due to meet my friends at 5. "Oh dear, it's 5 30. Have you missed your bus?" "Bugger it, yes and I don't know if there is another one." "Don't worry the least I can do is take you back Andy, my car is just a short walk. Do you have to be back by a certain time?" "No, so long as i'm there for a 5am start." "Look this may seem a bit forward, but could I take you for a meal and I can drop you off afterwards? I will get you back in good time and don't worry i'm quite safe!" They both laughed at that and Andy said thank you he would love a meal with him. Andy smiled at his formality, he liked that.
They walked to his car and drove out in the country for a short distance and Patrick pulled into a car park outside a really old English building which Andy thought must have been a small mansion in times past. "Here we are, The old Mansion House Restaurant. My favourite place to eat." Andy congratulated himself. Although a Saturday there were only a few in and immediately felt uncomfortable, he was not exactly dressed for this place and said so. "Don't worry Andy, i'm not that insensitive. There is a room at the back for us tramps!" Patrick waited for Andy's reaction which was all smiles and joked back. "Actually when you were dressed as a tramp, you still looked better than me!"
It was a nice meal given the restricted menu not that Andy thought that, he had never had such a good meal in his life. Patrick was the perfect host and made sure Andy was as comfortable as he was himself. They talked for ages and it was obvious they were both happy with the company they were in.
"Patrick, when you used to be a tramp and you had those medals on, were they yours?" "Yes Andy. I was with the British Expeditionary Force in France until we got kicked out at Dunkirk." "Is that when you got the MC?" (Military Cross) "Yes." It was the type of "yes" that told Andy he did not want to talk about how he got it. So he didn't.
"Andy! My thick head has just switched on. Does the farm you work at belong to Major Torrent the VC?" "Yep the very one not that anyone would know if you weren't told. He never talks about it or the war, neither does his business partner Lee. Both great blokes to work for. I just wish there was a job going after we finish, i'm trying to pluck up courage to ask if they want to take any of us on." "I would love to talk to them and get their story. I bet they have some fantastic tales to tell. Anyway there is no harm in asking about a job and good luck." "Well, I don't know about them talking about the war, bit like you really. It would be easier to get blood from a stone. At least that's what I think."
Patrick stopped at the entrance to the farm and thanked Andy for his company. "Thanks Patrick, it's been great. I will give money to every beggar I see from now on. Thanks again." "It really has been a lovely time and I mean that. Andy, would you like to meet in town again? I would certainly like too." "Yes sure, why not?" Patrick gave him his phone number and made Andy promise to call and to meet again. "We don't get much time off, but when I do I will call you." "I will be happy to pick you up and bring you back, that will save a couple of hours on the bus." They looked at one another, not long, but long enough to make both of them think. "Goodnight Patrick." "Goodnight Andy."
Andy had lots of questions to answer when he got in and no one believing what he came up with. When he got into their hut, or lodge as they now called it, he smiled to himself when he saw Pete and Tony cuddled up together on one of the settees. It was so lovely that they had just excepted that they were now "together" and would be left alone. He also thought like all of them that when the time for them to part it was going to be very very difficult. They were nowhere near being brothers, brothers fought a lot of the time. No, these were great friends and had enormous feelings towards with one another.
He went to bed and did a lot of thinking when he did. He thought about his granddad and the fact he preferred the company of older men and although he still did not know how old Patrick was, he had been more than comfortable in his company and he already knew he wanted to see him again, soon.
"Come on now this meeting must come to order Lee." Tommy joked. Lee lent forward and kissed the chairman after which he leaned back and flashed his eyes at him. "Yes Mr Chairman? I am now, "come to order." Tommy already knew that there was no way they could discuss anything as they were anyway. Sitting on the bed naked and facing one another was not conducive to meaningful serious discussion. Tommy smiled at him. "Fuck you Lee Thompson." Lee lent forward and kissed Tommy again. "Is that the first item on the agenda then? Ok, fuck me, I will now spread me legs Mr Chairmen." Tommy beat him up instead which turned them both on no end and he finally carried out the first item on the agenda, got Lee on his back with legs akimbo ready for Mr Chairman to enter this most glorious of "board members." He slipped into Lee the whole way and at the same time lent forward and kissed the love of his life stroking himself into him until both of them arrived at the point they had now got to so many times now and with one more thrust into Lee, he held himself all the way and both of them erupted into or onto one another. Once again neither of them had touched Lee's man bit.
After some considerable time Tommy withdrew from Lee and laid down on top of him put his arms under Lee's head and Lee's arms and legs around Tommy's body. They carried on kissing until order was restored and they went onto the next item on the agenda. A slightly more serious one. "So we have to go then Tommy?" "Seems like it, not that I could give a toss, all i'm worried about is the farm, but do you know with the lads we have got, i'm sure they wont let us down. Cornwallis will go to the farm everyday to supervise them and they will be fine, I hope. We should only be away for a week or a fortnight at the most and we will be back in good time to start harvesting the potato's. We will go and talk to them tonight, so long as we stop fucking that is." Tommy moved them on their sides and began to play with Lee. "That wont help. If you keep that up we wont get to the farm let alone France." Tommy stopped playing and beat Lee up again instead. It didn't help though and after Lee had finished with Tommy's bum they fell sleep for an hour.
"Right lads we have a slight problem Lee and I have to go to France next week and we could be away for two weeks, but hopefully less than that. I don't need to tell you we will have to trust you to carry on and not fuck about, or up. Cornwallis will come down every day to check on you, but mainly you will be on your own." "It's none of our business of course Tommy, but this must be important. Are we allowed to know what's going on?" Bill asked for them all. "We actually think it is your business Bill, after all we regard you as part of the farm and you should know what's going on. It's certainly not a holiday. Ok lets make some tea, or would you prefer the beer we have bought?" A mug of tea was not an option. They poured out and at the same time Tommy and Lee liked to see Tony and Pete, shall we say, sitting close together. They looked at one another and smiled broadly. Lee lent over to Tommy and whispered, "I think we must attract homo's Tommy." Tommy put his arm around Lee and everyone else had a smile on their faces.
"Right boys, we wont go into details about every thing that happened but here is the bones of it. Lee and I were involved in forward observations during the war and one of them was when we got to a village in France and stopped some Germans executing a lot of villagers before they left. We counted about 50 villagers were lined up to be shot including women and children. The officer in charged has been caught and is now on trial for war crimes as he has been accused of murdering several of the villagers before we got there, but as no one actually saw him carry out any shootings it's all circumstantial and he is saying he did not intend to kill the villagers anyway, but it was just to frighten them. He could actually get away with it according to the lawyer who spoke to us. Anyway, we have to go to a court in France and give our side to what happened and let them make up their minds on the basis of the evidence, but we both know what they were going to do and will never think differently. Still, as the guy said he could get away with it. "Can you tell us how you stopped them shooting the villagers Tommy?" Bill asked. "Not really Bill, lets just say no villagers died that day." The boys looked at Tommy and Lee and tried to imagine what must have happened and knew that someone had to die that day to stop the executions. It was so hard to think of all that these two must have experienced during the war. All they knew of them was they were farmers and nothing to show that they must have gone through a lot of shit. There was no way that Tommy or Lee had anything to worry about while they were gone. "Look, there is no way we will mess up when you are away. I know i'm speaking for all of us when I say we will work as though your were not going away, we all love it here. It will be the same when you two get back only better!" Bill spoke for them all. "Thanks Bill we are sure you will be fine and with you in charge we know it will." "Oh FUCK, and I was going on holiday! Thanks Tommy, everything will be ok though."
"Are you sure this is the right road?" They had picked up a hire car and were driving towards Rouen to stay at the Hotel Bellevue were they had that weekend that Colonel Smiffy had given them and they had met Phillippe. They had managed to get through on the phone at last and found that Phillippe was very much still alive and the screams of joy over the phone had been deafening. "OH MY BOYS! OH GOODNESS ME!" That had gone on for some time before they told Phillippe what they wanted but were not sure how long. "No matter your old room will be yours for as long as you want it. OH my boys!" He went for ages and now they were approaching Rouen and Tommy had to rely once again on Lee's fantastic memory to get them there. The town had been cleared up a lot and it all looked so different now. "Tommy, shut up I know i'm right and we are only half an hour away." Lee seemed to go all over the place, then drove round a bend and swung into the front of the hotel. "There, satisfied?" Lee looked Tommy who was smiling back at him. "You will be soon my angle."
Phillippe came flying out of the hotel entrance and literally threw himself at them and the French way of greeting went on for ages. He stood back and looked at them with tears streaming down his eyes. They cuddled back into him and thanked God he had survived. They had countless days together now to be thankful for and this was another of them. He took them into the hotel and showed them the photo on his reception desk he had taken of them when they had stayed the first time, then sat them down in the lounge and drank the cognac he had poured. "To you, France and England and also God, there is one after all." They sat chatting for ages and when he was told why they were there Phillippe got serious. "May they hang him, he deserves no less. There are many of them to find, but we all know many will get away with murder. My God how humanity can live in the gutter at times. BUT! You boys survived and I am SO happy, this will be a day that will stay with me for the rest of my life. My boys back, may God bless you both." Once again the tears poured out of him and Tommy and Lee could not be more happy that they were there for him. The world could do with a lot more Phillippe's.
They looked around their room and it bought many memories back and they would be repeating all of them only this time they knew there was no war to fight or get killed by. They got back from the bath and laid together on the bed. Tommy had a huge grin on his face and laid still knowing what Lee would do and say. "Tommy we have been back from the bath three minutes and you have done fuck all, then dug him in the ribs." "OW!" Tommy screamed out and there was a fight not that it lasted that long, they had both been greatly effected by Phillippe's welcome and the love he showed them and that love was at it's height between them right now. Tommy got Lee on top of him and like that their lips met with Lee's arms around Tommy and Tommy stroking Lee's back and those beautiful cheeks.
The court room was packed and Tommy was taken by surprised as he walked in after he had been called to give evidence and the whole of the public gallery stood up and applauded him. The judge banged his gavel and called out for order. Tommy was led to his place and took the oath and at the same time saw the face of ex Oberleutnant Claus Bergman, a face he never expected to see again, but would never forget. He looked drawn and scared, but Tommy had to admit still very good looking. The prosecutor asked Tommy for his details and his account of the day he was observing the village of Bourgeaville. That day would never leave him or Lee which is described in full detail in Part 9. As he recounted that day he became aware of what the defence would take from all that he was saying and he knew they would argue that Tommy in fact could not prove anything about the fact the villagers were about to be shot and he also thought they would turn this on it's head and even if they did not accuse Tommy of murdering the Germans himself, they would certainly imply it. After he had given his evidence the judges called for a recess which gave Tommy time to talk to the prosecuting lawyers. "Yes Tommy they will try to divert this away from Bergman and of course you are not here to prove or disprove anything, but the court needs to know what you saw. The defence will try to make this a matter of unproven evidence, but that's not your concern. When all the evidence is in it's all up to the judges and as we have said before, we expect this man to get off. "Why are we hear then?" "Tommy you will not be in court when I get hold of him, I can assure you I will at least give him a good workout!"
"Major Torrent, you state that you saw my client with ten of his men lined up facing a wall and then about 50 villagers were lined up against it. Is that right?" "Yes." "And what did you assume Major?" "They were about to be shot." "REALLY? How do you know that?" "I didn't say I did, I said I assumed and given the fact that......." "ASSUMED Major! THAT'S the pertinent question and you and we all know you have no proof whatsoever that was indeed about to happen." "What was then? Villager of the year awards?" That caused a lot of cheering and laughter from the gallery. Again the judge slammed his gavel down. "SILENCE!" "That will be enough Major, this is a court of law, not a comedy theatre." "Yes your Honour." Tommy looked again at Bergman and he saw a very worried man and he knew why, would Tommy mention that he had seen him having sex with the big man in the copse? He knew damb well they would have seen everything from were they had been hiding. "So Major let us recap, you saw a group of people being lead out and lined up against a wall. Did anyone get shot?" "No." "Why is that?" Tommy knew where this was going. "Because there was no other reason for them to be there and I opened fire on the firing squad...." "ENOUGH! You have no proof they were a firing squad. No Major the only people to fire was YOU and your Sergeant and you not only fired upon the men guarding the villagers you also fired on those men lined up to board the transport BEFORE they could drive away to surrender to the Allies. You did not know that did you?" "No and I don't believe......." "That will do Major...." Tommy had had enough of this shit. "No it wont do, you WILL listen to what I say." Tommy turned to the Judges. "Am I to give evidence or be told by that man what I can or cannot say? I have come here not to prove anything, but I am dambed if I am going to allow this to be turned against me or the sergeant as he is trying to do. I have been told this is a court of law by you your Honour, but it's more like a circus!" The Judges conferred and spoke to the defence lawyer. "If you are implying that the Major and his sergeant were in anyway acting against the Geneva Convention it is for you to prove that. You will not continue in this way. Do you understand?" "Yes your Honour. Major, I am not suggesting you acted against any law yourself, but I am doubting the fact you opened fire on the guards before you had any cause to do so and the reasons you give for doing so." "May I continue without interruption?" "Please do." "I want to remind you that there was a war going on at that time and in war enemies do tend to kill one another even though the side I was fighting on did not in anyway start it or indeed wanted it to happen and we opening fire on the enemy should not be a question I need to justify to you or anyone else. I repeat I did not come here to prove anything, just give my evidence about what I was seeing and knowing FULL well what was about to happen and as a result I acted and open fired. If you think I should have waited for this man to order his men to fire before I took action, then you are very much mistaken. I have told this court enough times now of what I was witnessing and if anyone thinks differently it is only because he is a defence lawyer who's job it is to get his client off the hook regardless of how that is achieved. I have no more to say except this." Tommy looked directly at Bergman and could see in his eyes he was about to hear Tommy telling the court of his sex with big man. His eyes were imploring Tommy not to say it. Tommy delayed continuing for sometime just to make him sweat a little longer. His eyes never left the defendant. "Can anyone in this court explain why when Herr Bergman surrendered to me he said and I quote, "I was only carrying out orders? Why was it he had his arm upright with his pistol in his hand? Did they have orders about "just frightening people" and they should be lined up in the same way as they would be if they were to be executed? I am sure there are other ways to frighten people, like kill one or more villagers possibly? Has anyone come across written orders that citizens of illegal occupation should be "frightened?" No, the defendant was the officer in charge of a firing squad and was about to order his men to open fire, but Sergeant Thompson and I were there to stop them from murdering those villagers, men, women AND children." The gallery stood and a massive cheer went up and none of them took any notice of the gavel. "Thank you Major, you may stand down sir."
"Well done Tommy, I think you have just found him guilty. That shit is getting a fair trial, but he was not going to give those folk the same. Christ this is a fucked up world and I wont stop until more like him face their actions. There is so much coming out about the glorious Third Reich and that maniac Hateler's Final Solution. CHRIST why could he not be stopped?"
It was Lee's turn next and he had the gallery in tears as he spoke. Lee stared at Bergman the whole time and spoke slowly and quietly. Everyone had to strain to hear him. It was all intentional of course. "Tommy -and- I- could- not- believe- what- was- about- to- happen,- but- it- was- obvious- it- was- going- to, only- a- complete- fool- or- a- defence- lawyer- would- disagree. You- even- told- us- when- you- surrendered- you- expected- to- be- treated- in- accordance- with- the- Geneva- Convention- even- though- you- would- have- killed- innocent- people- without- any- regard- to- human- life- yourself. You- and- everyone- like- you- are- nothing- more- than- vermin, only- that's- an- insult- to- vermin. Everyone- knows- the- villagers- were- going- to- be- executed- on- your- orders- and- at- the- same- time- made- Tommy- and- me- kill- so- that- others- could- live- and- for- the- rest- of- our -lives- we- will- hate- you- for- that. You- claim- you- were- carrying- out- orders, but- nobody- would- know- if- you- didn't-carry-them-out. You- were- going- to- do- it- because- YOU- wanted- too. You- are-no-different-to-the-man-you-followed-and-all-he-was-was-a-mass-murderer-and-you- and-your-kind-followed-like-sheep." You could hear a pin drop in the court room, except for the sounds of those crying. There was a long pause while the judge composed himself. "Thank you Mr Thompson, you may stand down sir."
They had a lovely couple of days after the trial and they were invited to the village where they were treated like royalty and made many new friends.
Phillippe made a special meal for the three of them on their last night and even more photos were taken. It was a sad farewell, but they could not wait to get home and see the farm and the boys again. It had been ten days since they had left and they missed it all so much.
Bergman? He was in prison before Tommy and Lee got back home and he would be there for life. ____________________________________________________________________________
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