The Sharing of Moments

                He wore his age on his face. Lines, an artist’s cross-hatching, defined his features. White hair, still a full shock of it, if wispier than it had been in his youth, crowned his head. His teeth, always stretched into a smile, had that stereotypical Englishman snaggle. Now into his eighties, Frank was still fit. He carried some paunch, but his devotion to cycling kept him within some measure of fitness. It was this desire to pedal the Continent that had carried him to Heidelberg. It was sheer good fortune that Brad and I had chosen that same time to turn up at the camping ground.

                Hearing other English speakers, Frank called us over to his brand new VW camper van, as proud as a new father. He had spared no expense. And there, safely lashed to the back, was his other pride and joy, his bicycle. An Italian racing bike, it was worth considerably more than my car back home. As so often happens, that chance meeting, and ensuing small talk led to deeper conversation. We invited Frank over to our small camp, and poured out healthy measures of cheap red wine. I lit a cigarillo. We began to speak of many things.

                Frank, now an octogenarian, was eager for the chance to talk of his life, now that the majority of it was in the rear-view mirror. Listening to the tales of such a life whilst sipping Vin du Pays and smoking vanilla cigars may not sound very extraordinary, but that Heidelberg afternoon stands as one of the finest days Brad and I had on that 2003 sojourn. Frank had been in The War. He had enlisted early, and been made into an Able Seaman. He was posted to the HMS Aubretia, and set to prowling the North Atlantic for German U-Boats. It was here that his life grew in status. On a routine mission, the Aubretia was able to use her depth charges to blow U-Boat 110 to the surface, where they strafed her with their guns. The crew poured out onto the hull, surrendering. It was the first time that the Allies had been able to seize an intact enemy submarine.

                Frank began to smile, remembering, as he should have, for the War turned on that day. The Captain of the U-Boat was a creature of Social Nationalism, a political beast, and not one to observe the naval code of war. After the surrender, he took up one of the sub’s own depth charges, and dove into the sea, intent on his own immolation and the destruction of the Aubretia. The First Officer, himself a real Navy man, one of Rayder’s, not one of Hitler’s, took his surrender and that of his crew far more seriously, and drew his own side arm, shooting his Captain as he swam for the British ship. Frank saw it all unfold, being one of the rowers in the life boat, charged with taking men from the crippled vessel. Officially, the Captain was recorded as drowned in the history texts. Unofficially some men knew better.

The capture of that intact U-Boat, and its intact Enigma Code machine, led to the Allies breaking the infamous Enigma Code, giving them a distinct advantage over the Nazi’s for the duration of the war. And Frank had been one of the men who helped seize it. That, in and of itself, was something special to listen to, but Frank was far from finished. He went back to his camper and returned with a bottle of brandy, all his talking being thirsty work.

Following the Nazi surrender, he was sent to the Pacific theatre. Montbatton, the hapless British strategist, had the brilliant notion to take Atlantic sailors and turn them into Pacific fliers. And so, Frank became a pilot, and flew against the Japanese to close out his carrier as a soldier.

At his mention of Montbatton, he must have seen my face twist. “You know about Montbatton?” he asked. I nodded in the affirmative. “He planned the Dieppe Raid, where my Grandfather fought.” Ernie Ludkin had been a Riley, and the wounds he suffered that day, the scars, they haunted him for the rest of his life, in the form of drinking and flashbacks. You don’t easily forget seeing your friends head explode as it meets a German bullet. Nor do you forget using that same corpse as cover so that your own head might remain attached.

“He was the shame of our nation, you know,” Frank said gently. “Everyone knew he was the one who botched the Raid. I met a lot of Canadian soldiers. They were Lions. Fierce, proud, toughest buggers the Empire had in the fight. They were Lions alright. But they were led by a donkey.” And then a strange thing happened. Frank apologized to me. I was touched deeply, although I had never met my Grandfather, nor had I ever held the people of Britain accountable for the debacle that Dieppe was.

“Did he ever learn to like German’s again?” Frank wanted to know. “I had a hell of a time myself.” It was an odd thing to say, sitting as we were by the banks of a German river, in a German university town, the medieval Schloss staring down at us from its hilltop perch. “But then, I came to Europe for a ceremony on Armistice Day, and I met a man who had fought on the other side. And I liked him. So I let go of the hate I had held inside for so long.”

We continued to share liquor and stories. Places we had been. Experiences we had had. We stayed up and spoke long into the night. The next day, Frank was gone early, eager to travel on and ride his Italian bike down other Continental laneways. Our paths never did cross again. And yet we had shared a time that was unique, and special. Which is what travel is all about. That is the good life, that sharing of moments.