Page 122 - Michael Frost-Voyages to Maturity-23531.indd

She, Heidi, was talkative, humorous and, I found, had come down from
Stuttgart for a couple of days’ recreation. She was German by birth and upbringing,
but her English was flawless. I knew little about Stuttgart, other than that it had
had a strategic and economic significance due to its central position in Germany
and had been cruelly treated by combat in both the Thirty Years’ War and World
War II. But my ignorance mattered little, as she was obviously well-educated and
seemed to have an interest in everything that interested me. She was also, as I
found out, a very good skier.

For the rest of the evening I was frankly entranced. I believe that the gluewein
gradually became wein, and therefore our conversation became more and
more interesting as the evening wore on. Suitably, I believe that it even snowed
‘romantically’ while we were sitting there. (We were, of course, surrounded by
quite a good number of snuggling couples, which was itself all to the good, as I
rapidly discovered that Heidi was not at all bad herself at snuggling … in fact, she
was quite excellent at it!)

Her visit was short, she being in Leysin for just the weekend, and off she drove
on the next evening. I did, however, feel that this was a life-changing encounter;
even a couple of my companions complimented me; praise indeed (most cadets,
I found, were cynics).

The following day the trip was over, undoubtedly one of the signal episodes
of my life to that date. But another interesting interlude came up only three
days after our return. This was a visit for our group to the Royal Naval College
at Dartmouth, which was just a day’s drive from Southampton. This was to be
significant; we knew that the Senior Service looked down upon us; it was our job
to enlighten them (in just three days).

We were accommodated in a rather plush barracks, and the lectures that we
received were given by highly professional officers who imparted their knowledge
with a notably good description of reality, largely because in 1964 we were at the
tail-end of the careers of a number of Naval officers, many of whom had seen active
service in the War, and who had been selected to teach their craft to the up-and-
coming midshipmen with whom we were consorting. There was still something
of an antique air to the lectures, however, because the battleship was still regarded
by many as the quintessence of the mighty warship, whereas the reality of the day
was that the aircraft carrier was now the reigning queen of war at sea (though
submariners had begun to be the cutting edge of mature navies, their presence, by
their very nature, had to remain quite undemonstrative, the complete antithesis of
the Enterprise). Thus, lectures would be about the Battle of Matapan (between the
Italian and British Mediterranean fleets), rather than about the decisive Battle of
Midway, where aircraft from two US aircraft carriers sank four Japanese carriers
without the ships ever seeing each other. We, of course, were directed more to

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