The Ten-pound Ticket by Amanda Prowse Page B

months, if not years, and had reached this decision without discussion or consultation. Martin had been a maximum of an hour away from her since she was a little girl and the idea of him being out of reach horrified her. The thought of him being in a different city was something she couldn’tcomprehend, let alone a different country. Poppy never bought the supper without asking for his preference, yet he had done this thing alone, furtive, duplicitous. She felt excluded and betrayed.
    â€˜Mrs Cricket?’ for the second time the officer used his tone to anchor her in the present.
    Poppy nodded to show that he had succeeded, he had her full attention. Her teeth shook against her bottom lip; she bit down, trying to gain composure.
    â€˜I’m afraid I have some bad news.’ He paused, pursing his lips, remembering his training, allowing the information to be received slowly in bite-sized chunks.
    She wanted to say, ‘For God’s sake hurry up. We all know what comes next!’
    Again, he coughed. ‘As you know, Martin is currently deployed in Afghanistan.’
    Poppy tried to control her quivering legs and nodded to show understanding.
    â€˜We are here because we have some news about your husband and it isn’t good news… I am very sorry to have to tell you that Martin is missing.’
    It took a second for his words to reach her brain and a further second to digest the fact, two seconds longer than usual.
    â€˜D’you mean dead?’ she prompted, loudly. Her wide eyes told him her abruptness was a symptom of shock. Her body wasn’t wasting precious reserves on pleasantries.
    â€˜No, not dead. Not at this stage. He is missing.’
    His response only served to confuse her more, not at this stage? So dead, but not confirmed? Dead, but not discovered? Dead, but not yet? All permutations had him very definitely dead. The rest was semantics.
    â€˜But that means dead doesn’t it?’
    â€˜No. Not dead, he is missing.’ He glanced at Sergeant Gisby,silently asking if he had any better suggestions on how to clarify the facts.
    â€˜Isn’t that just because you haven’t found him or had it confirmed yet or something?’
    Major Anthony Helm visibly coloured. She had accurately called the situation and similarly was asking him the question that he’d dreaded the most. Had Poppy looked closely, she would have seen the vaguest twitch to his right cheek; he wasn’t a man that knew how to respond to questions from a girl like her. Despite his years of service, these encounters would always be outside his comfort zone. It was alien to Anthony, sitting in a council flat in Walthamstow on a muggy Tuesday with fish fingers crisping under the grill, telling Poppy that Martin was possibly dead whilst being subjected to questions that he couldn’t answer. It was an element soldiers rarely considered when enlisting, the pastoral responsibilities, the pressing of the flesh, the human face of the MoD machine. It was a world away from kicking in doors and crawling through undergrowth with a gun in your hand.
    Poppy felt his unease and might have felt sorry for him, were it not for the fact that she had decided to blame him. Well, she had to blame someone, didn’t she?
    His tone was clipped, not through any lack of compassion, but because that was how he operated; whatever the task in hand he retained absolute control.
    â€˜No, that is not the case at all. Martin at this stage is missing. We have no other useful facts, but we do believe in keeping you informed of every development as soon as we have it. At the moment, that is all the information we have.’
    â€˜I appreciate that, Major…’ she hesitated as his surname slipped from her memory, ‘Major Thingy, but what exactly does it mean?’ Poppy hadn’t intended to be rude, but she did want to know what was going on.
    Major Helm licked the sweat from his top lip, lizard-like in his