Extended Summary
The story opens on the evening of the D–Day invasion, with The Quarryman’s Arms filled with patrons who have come to hear Winston Churchill’s radio broadcast. Sarah, the story’s protagonist, pulls pints behind the lounge bar while Jack Jones, the pub’s owner, tends the public bar. The pub has the tallest aerial for miles around, and for this reason it enjoys a large clientele. At Jack’s urging, Sarah steps onto a crate to warm up the wireless.
The crowd in the lounge bar consists mainly of English soldiers. A regular, Harry Hitch, asks for his ‘‘usual.’’ Most of the soldiers are ‘‘sappers,’’ military men on a work detail. One in particular, Colin, has caught Sarah’s eye. Unbeknownst to friends and family, much less the patrons in the bar, Sarah and Colin have been ‘‘sweethearts’’ for the past week. They have agreed to meet when Sarah gets off from work. As Sarah hears Churchill’s speech, she thinks of the men doing battle on Omaha Beach, and she feels proud to be of service to the men in uniform who have come to the pub.
Once Churchill’s speech ends, Sarah turns the radio to a broadcast featuring dance music from the Savoy in London, and she sees that the patrons are clapping one another on the back and smiling at the soldiers, including the locals. The men have been transformed into heroes through the actions of their countrymen far away. Colin seems even more handsome—‘‘like the lobby card of a film star’’— now that Sarah views him in this new light.
As Sarah pours pint after pint for her customers in the lounge bar, she notices that the patrons in the public bar have begun to file out. She sees her father, Arthur, among the men, and she wonders if they are leaving because they must rise early and tend to their work on their farms or if they are leaving because they feel out of place in the midst of the British soldiers’ celebration. She would like to buy her father a pint, but she knows that he is much too proud for that. Their relationship has changed since her mother’s death three years ago, for Sarah is now in charge of keeping the farm’s books, a responsibility her father entrusted to her once she obtained a job at the pub. Sarah is sad to see the men go, but she knows that their absence decreases her chances of being seen with Colin when they rendezvous after hours.
The pub is filled with soldiers and diehards now, and Sarah observes that for once the talk isn’t about politics. The village is nationalistic in its views toward the British, and Sarah thinks it is ‘‘like so much tosh’’ that disputes are still being fought with as much fervor as they were when they first arose more than forty years ago. The majority view in the village is that the war is an English war and, therefore, one that does not concern the Welsh. The Welsh still consider the English to be ‘‘occupiers,’’ but Churchill’s rousing broadcast has temporarily put an end to such divisiveness, yet a palpable tension between English and Welsh patrons still exists within the pub.
On this night when the air is charged with patriotism, Sarah, though she is proud to be Welsh, wishes she could be British. Her father, a ‘‘staunch nationalist,’’ would never entertain such a thought, for he has never forgiven Churchill for the riots that occurred at Tonypandy. Sarah knows that nationalism and provincialism go hand in hand, yet she suspects that at the heart...
(This entire section contains 2149 words.)
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of every nationalistic argument is the desire ‘‘[t]o be important, to be the center of attention, not isolated.’’ She feels excited because the soldiers and the broadcast crew from the BBC Light Program are coming to her, thus eliminating her own sense of isolation.
The sappers are building a mysterious base located on the site of an old holiday camp. Boys from the village spy on the camp, descending from the trees at dusk to explore the buildings while pretending to be commandos. Speculation about who will occupy the base runs rife throughout the village, but Jack hopes that the Yanks will come because they spend the most money. The villagers hope to see film stars like James Stewart or Tyrone Power pass through on their way to East Anglia, but, as is so often the case, they must settle for ‘‘gangly, freckle-faced farm boys’’ instead. One such boy, a tail-gunner from ‘‘Kentuck,’’ presents Sarah with a gift of a torn parachute which contains enough silk for a petticoat and two slips. When Sarah tries to politely return the gift, the tail-gunner insists that she keep it, saying, ‘‘Why, you’re what we’re fighting for!’’
As Sarah watches Colin talking to one of his fellow soldiers, she wonders if Colin will give her a gift to remember him by. She thinks that she could get him to tell her about who the camp is for, but she reconsiders, realizing that it would be ‘‘unpatriotic’’ and ‘‘disloyal to Britain.’’ More important, such an act would be disloyal to Wales. She wouldn’t want to give the British an excuse to call the Welsh unpatriotic. ‘‘Only the Welsh, it occurs to her, are allowed to declare themselves that.’’ Sarah continues to speculate about the new camp, especially since Colin told her that the work is almost completed. She realizes that there will be nothing to keep Colin in the village once the work is done.
Harry Hitch interrupts Sarah’s reverie with a request for another scotch. Harry, who is a star with the BBC Light Program, tells jokes that Sarah can’t quite understand even though her ‘‘good schoolroom English’’ got her the job at the lounge bar where so many English patrons gather. Harry tells offensive jokes that make fun of the Welsh language and temperament. Harry continues his monologue as each joke is met with cheers and applause. Sarah glances at Mary Munro, a radio actress, for support. Mary tries to persuade Harry to stop, but he refuses.
Harry begins to make fun of Sarah’s youth and naïveté by telling jokes that question a girl’s innocence and sexual experience. Sarah, offended by Harry’s insinuation, throws his drink in his face. From across the room, Colin asks Sarah if she’s all right. Harry feigns remorse for his comment, but then starts another round of jokes when Sarah accepts his hand offered in reconciliation. Sarah tries to prevent Colin from making a scene, but he challenges Harry, taking a swing at him. Harry takes a pratfall to make Colin look foolish. Jack prevents Colin from taking another swing by grabbing him around the chest, forcing the breath out of him. Mary and Tony, the sound engineer, help a drunken Harry out of the bar.
Sarah recalls something Mary said to her once about Harry’s past, that his wife had been killed in the Blitz. ‘‘You wouldn’t think to look at him, but it was true love,’’ Mary told her. Sarah begins cleaning up the bar as a call for last orders is made in both English and Welsh. She catches herself swaying gently to the music on the radio when Jack turns it off. He says the dishes can wait and lets her go home early. Sarah suspects that Jack knows of her rendezvous with Colin, so she must be especially careful not to be seen with him. Sarah’s romantic feelings reach a higher pitch when she recalls her promise of going somewhere ‘‘more private’’ with her new sweetheart.
Colin waits for her around the corner from the pub. He calls to her, and as she goes to meet him, Sarah anticipates what the night will bring. She considers herself to be rather worldly for a girl of sixteen, having kissed most of the local boys, even David, the village’s evacuee from London. She thinks that she has ‘‘acquitted herself well’’ with Colin, and that she has maybe even surprised him on occasion with her knowledge about physical intimacy.
Sarah rides on the handlebars of Colin’s bike, feeling slightly self-conscious about the way Colin stares at her bum. Colin pedals through the night, the bike gathering speed as they coast downhill, Sarah’s skirt billowing to reveal her legs. When she moves to adjust her skirt, Colin places his hand over hers, saying, ‘‘Hold still, love. I’ve got you.’’
They arrive at Camp Sunshine, and Sarah remembers viewing the camp from the hillside during the hot summer months when she was young and tended her father’s sheep. She recalls seeing the pool below her and imagining its coolness. Such retreats were not for the locals who could barely afford the occasional day trip to the sea. With this memory firmly in mind, Sarah asks Colin to take her to the pool. He had thought that one of the cottages would be a more comfortable place for them to tryst, but he pedals toward the pool and the nearby playground, where they stop to play on the swings.
Sarah is eager to see the pool once again, and she mistakes the tarpaulin that covers the pool for the surface of the water itself. Colin explains that the tarpaulin is there to keep out leaves and other debris, and he disappears underneath the cover to demonstrate that the pool has been drained. At first Sarah doesn’t know where he has gone, but then she sees him mimic the dorsal fin of a shark as his language takes on a flavor of sexual innuendo. Colin takes Sarah by the hand and leads her into the deep end of the pool, imitating various other sea creatures along the way in an attempt to physically possess her.
Sarah and Colin begin kissing, and she feels herself turning in his arms as his grip upon her tightens. Soon she finds herself pressed against the pool’s tile wall that ‘‘smells sharply of dank, chlorine, and rotten leaves.’’ Colin, in an attempt to manipulate Sarah’s affection for him, tells her that he will be leaving soon. He wonders if she will miss him when he’s gone. He tries to weaken her resolve by telling her that he could be at the front by this time next month, and that he wished he had something to remember her by, something to help him keep up his ‘‘fighting spirits.’’ Sarah, enamored of her sweetheart and eager for experience, acquiesces, allowing Colin to slide his hand against her thigh, pushing the silk slip out of the way.
When Sarah realizes Colin’s true intent, she tells him, ‘‘Nargois!’’ but he doesn’t understand Welsh and so continues his assault. Sarah feels pressure and pain, and she thinks twice about screaming for help for fear of getting caught. Finally, she lifts her head and catches Colin under the chin, forcing him to step back. He curses at her with a word she doesn’t understand, and she curses at him in Welsh in retaliation. Hearing a language he doesn’t comprehend makes Colin even more angry now that his sexual overtures have been rebuffed. ‘‘Why don’t you just give it up and speak English, like the rest of us?’’ he says. He changes his attitude, however, and tries one last time to resume his ‘‘lovemaking,’’ but Sarah, afraid of what additional harm may come to her, is already straightening her clothes and looking for an exit. Colin’s realizes that Sarah is no longer susceptible to his charms, and he begins cursing at her again.
Just when Sarah fears another attack from Colin, she hears shouts coming from above as flashlights dart across the landscape. She is relieved that help has arrived, but with that help comes the chance of being discovered with an English soldier. Before she can ask Colin what they should do, he disappears by scrambling up a ladder and out into the night.
Weak and shaking from the attack, Sarah manages to climb out of the pool. She hears shouts coming from across the camp, and she thinks that the local boys are up to their mischief again. She hurries over to the playground where the bicycle has been left. As Sarah mounts the bike, she notices that her slip has been torn, and she feels like weeping for having lost her innocence in such a violent fashion.
Sarah’s body hurts as she pedals home. She knows that she is stealing Colin’s bike, yet she could care less about the consequences. She knows that he won’t ask about it, but if he does, ‘‘she’ll pretend that she’s forgotten her English.’’
