Gunner Girls and Fighter Boys Read online

  The destruction appeared demonic and yet upon its surface she saw ordinary life persisting. There were already long queues of women gathered in the early morning light, waiting patiently to buy oranges or fish, whatever foodstuffs or material had suddenly made a reappearance in the shops. Then, as they neared the station, from the high viaduct she could see clear to the docks where a large vessel was being unloaded by cranes, and she glimpsed the river, visible through gaps made by destroyed warehouses. As the train shunted to a halt and they were held on the viaduct, waiting for a troop train to pull out of the station, she looked down from their position high above the street at crowds of suited office workers, picking their way over ruins, following the well-worn route across London Bridge to the City. She realized that beneath the fallen stones was an invisible magnetic pathway, drawing them into their daily routine, in spite of the surrounding devastation, and May had learned in her army training how strong a force that could be. Routine kept her steady at the predictor, as gunfire erupted around her, routine kept her mind from her mother’s distress, routine kept her marching when she’d rather be weeping, and routine got her up in the morning with reveille when she’d rather stay with her head under the covers because she’d cried half the night mourning her brother.

  Finally the signal changed and they were allowed to pull into the station. The machine-gun rat-a-tat of countless carriage doors being flung open, banging back against the carriages, announced their arrival like a hundred-gun salute. Tommies shouldering kitbags, RAF boys and sailors leaped down first, eager to get into London and start their leave in earnest. May and Emmy stepped down into the mêlée and were swept along the platform. After they’d passed through the gate, Emmy offered her a cigarette and lit a match, cupping it with her hand. May dipped her head, and as she did so her eye was caught by the figure of a woman at the next platform. She was wrapped in the arms of a soldier who had dropped his kitbag to the floor. It was a normal sight, these days: couples, oblivious to their surroundings, not caring who witnessed what might be their last goodbye. The couple’s kiss seemed endless to May, as if they were gathering all that they were and passing it to each other for safe keeping. She had time to straighten up, inhaling and exhaling a long thread of smoke, before Emmy noticed her stare. Her eyes followed May’s.

  ‘Jesus,’ she whispered, ‘is that your sister?’

  13

  Leave It To Love

  Late Spring 1941

  ‘Come on, Em,’ May said. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

  Picking up her kitbag, she hurried for the stairs leading down into Tooley Street. Neither of them spoke until they reached the bus stop opposite.

  ‘Blimey, May, are you going to say anything?’

  ‘To Peggy?’

  ‘No, to George!’

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t believe she’s done this to George. He idolizes her.’

  ‘Might be best to leave it. What he don’t know can’t hurt him, can it?’

  ‘He’d do anything for her, though. It was Peggy, wasn’t it? I didn’t just imagine it?’

  ‘Gawd, you’re like a tit in a trance! Come on!’

  Emmy pulled her on to the back board of the bus, which had arrived without May even noticing. She followed her friend blindly along the crowded lower deck till they found two seats at the front. Slumping down, kitbag perched on her lap, she replayed the scene on the station – Peggy’s head tilting as the young soldier kissed her, his hand pressing into the small of her back. She had seen her sister’s closed eyes, her rapt expression. It didn’t look like the Peggy she knew. She’d always seemed so unsentimental, sometimes almost cold. For May it had been like witnessing some passionate stranger; perhaps the best course of action would be to pretend Peggy was just that, a stranger, and to say nothing at all.

  Finally, she said to Emmy, ‘It’d finish Mum off if she found out. She’d never forgive Peggy for this. You know how Mum loves George.’

  ‘Well, she might love him, but it don’t look like Peggy does.’

  Emmy’s blunt statement was too much for her. ‘She does, though!’ May protested. And then she remembered scenes, conversations with Peggy, that told a different tale. Perhaps her sister had been less happy to play the role of cosseted princess than everyone had assumed. May remembered her sister’s joy when she’d came to tell her she was going back to work, and how proud she’d been of her WVS uniform.

  ‘I wish I’d never seen them.’

  ‘Well, act as if you didn’t then,’ Emmy said, with her usual practical refusal to be brought low by anything. ‘Anyway,’ she went on, ‘it’s none of your business, is it? Best keep your nose out, love, even if it is your sister.’

  ‘Perhaps.’ May rubbed knuckles into her tired eyes. Their train should have arrived late the previous evening, but instead they’d had to spend the night in a siding near Reading and May hadn’t slept.

  ‘My stop next. Listen, don’t let it spoil your leave,’ Emmy said. ‘We’re still going dancing next week, ain’t we?’

  ‘Of course!’ May said, more brightly than she felt. But what would be the point in moping at home? Emmy got off at Grange Road, waving to May as the bus moved off. She leaned her head against the window, giving into the swaying motion, her eyelids drooping as they passed the familiar shops in the Blue. Grants the toyshop, with its front boarded up, no kids peering in through the windows today. She smiled to herself. Then the Home and Colonial, where she’d sheltered on her first time caught out in an air raid. It seemed so long ago. Then the Blue Anchor pub and finally, where the railway viaduct crossed the road, the patched-up John Bull Arch, the very name on her lips, as she whispered it, bringing back all the heaviness of loss. She closed her eyes tight against the memory. Tiredness and the rocking of the bus must have caused her to doze off, for she narrowly avoided missing her stop.

  When the clippie called out, ‘Southwark Park!’ she stumbled off the bus, banging her kitbag against standing passengers, her legs weak, her strength all but drained. She hadn’t felt so tired in all those solid nights and days of training. Trudging towards her house, she tried to push Peggy to the back of her mind, hoping to regain the sense of excitement she’d felt when she’d started her journey. She was nearly home, she told herself, nearly home!

  *

  Her father opened the door.

  ‘What sort of bird am I?’ she asked, falling into his outstretched arms, letting him pull her into a tight embrace.

  ‘It’s my little homing pigeon!’ he said, with a catch in his voice, squeezing her till she laughed. ‘You’d better let me go, Dad, I can’t breathe!’

  May peered down the passage. ‘Where’s Mum?’ She looked searchingly at her father.

  ‘She’ll be down later, love. She don’t get much kip of a night. Here, let me carry that.’

  He took the kitbag from her and she didn’t bother protesting, even though last week she’d had a try at lifting some shells, for emergency drill, and she was sure they must have weighed five times her kitbag.

  ‘Look at you!’ her father said, once she was seated in the kitchen with a cup of tea in front of her. ‘You look…’ he searched for the word, ‘older.’

  ‘Oh thanks, Dad!’ Tact had never been his strong point.

  ‘No, I don’t mean older, I mean, well… grown up.’ But although he was smiling, his eyes looked sad.

  May bent down to retrieve a tin from her kitbag. ‘Here. Cakes to go with the tea,’ she said, smiling.

  ‘Cakes?’ Her father examined the tin.

  ‘Pontefract cakes, but they’re really liquorice.’

  ‘For me?’

  ‘Yes, for you – but you can share them with Mum if you’re feeling generous!’

  They were both chewing on the liquorice when her mother came in.

  ‘You’re home! Why didn’t no one get me up?’

  May spun round and a small cry of alarm burst from her at the sight of her much-changed mother. She jumped up, hoping that Mrs Lloyd had
taken her cry for one of surprise. As she enfolded the woman in her arms, she tried to hide her shock at her mother’s appearance. She had faded, wasting away in just a couple of months, so that she seemed half the size May remembered. As May hugged her, she felt her shoulder blades, bony wings protruding through her mother’s wrap-around pinny. The pinafore, a tight corset-like covering, normally announced that Carrie Lloyd was ready for all manner of work: cooking; cleaning; washing or ironing; caring for whoever needed it. It was just as much a uniform as May’s own khaki, and proclaimed, like Joe Capp’s sign, that she was carrying on business as usual. But today the floral-print pinny hung upon her bones like a sail in a windless ocean; her mother, it was clear, was still becalmed on a sea of grief.

  ‘I’ve only just got here. And anyway, we didn’t want to wake you up! Dad says you’ve not been sleeping.’

  Her mother slumped in the chair opposite May, still holding on to one of her hands.

  ‘Oh, take no notice of him… I can sleep when I’m dead!’ she said, a small smile on her lips as she stroked the back of May’s hand. ‘I’m so glad you’re back, darlin’.’

  May looked into her red-rimmed eyes, seeing more than tiredness. There was a blankness there, which belied her assurances.

  ‘But let’s have a look at you. Your lovely hair! You’ve cut it all off.’

  May put her palm to the bottom of the new waved style, rolled just above her collar. ‘Regulations. I like it, though.’

  ‘I think it suits her,’ Mr Lloyd said, and May flashed him a wide black-toothed grin so that even her mother had to smile.

  ‘Well, I’ve got to love you and leave you or I’ll be late for me shift,’ her father said, kissing the top of her new hairstyle.

  When he’d gone her mother insisted on making May a cooked breakfast, which she thought must have contained the whole family’s monthly bacon ration. Afterwards, she and her mother washed up plates in the scullery.

  ‘Peggy said she’ll try to get round and see you tomorrow, after work.’

  ‘Oh, that’s good,’ May said, trying to sound unconcerned. ‘I bet she’s been finding it hard without George.’

  ‘Oh yes, she’s lost without him,’ her mother said wistfully. ‘Well, he was everything to her, wasn’t he?’

  But May suspected her mother was thinking more about her own loss than Peggy’s.

  ‘Still, she’s enjoying being back at Atkinson’s, and her WVS work?’

  Her mother polished the plate again, which she had already dried once. ‘She’s wearing herself out with it and it’s not necessary. Atkinson’s counts as war work. It worries me sick, her out all night in that canteen, down by the docks, bombs falling and gawd knows what.’

  ‘Perhaps she’s lonely at night, without George I mean. She might want the distraction,’ May said, secretly feeling Peggy might be getting distraction enough at the moment. ‘Does she get up to see George much?’

  ‘Oh, regular as clockwork. Never misses a visit. No, she’s a good wife… well, as good as she can be with him in nick.’

  May was getting uncomfortable with the direction of the conversation. ‘What about you, Mum? Are you going up London Bridge every night now?’

  ‘I have to! It’s the only way I get any sleep. It’s been terrible here since you left – well, you’ve only got to look at the streets. Not that you get much sleep up there, what with the kids larking about and the chatting. But at least I feel safe enough to close me eyes, which I never do at home, not no more.’

  She was silent for a moment, her eyes fixed, as if searching out a time when sleep came easily. She shook her head.

  ‘No, I’d rather line up and get me spot on the platform. There’s a few of us got our regular places. Mrs Collins is always there, and sometimes Flo comes with me. We takes our eiderdowns and a primus so we can make a cuppa. The only thing you can’t do nothing about is the filth. Everything comes home grubby. I’m forever washing. You coming with me tonight?’

  ‘Mum! I’m not wasting half my leave queuing up for a shelter. Anyway, I’ve got to get used to being out in a raid, now I’m going on the ack-acks.’

  ‘Don’t talk to me about it. I don’t want to know.’ Her mother turned away abruptly and May followed her back into the kitchen. She was glad to have her mother to herself. It was obvious that her letters to May had masked her real state. They sat drinking more tea at the kitchen table.

  ‘Mum, you’ve got to stop worrying about me. That’s what all the training’s been for, and don’t forget, I’ll be the one behind a bloody great big gun! Now that should make you feel better, eh?’

  May was trying to be light-hearted, but the furrows in her mother’s forehead only deepened.

  ‘I’ve already lost one child. I don’t want to lose another.’

  May grabbed her mother’s hand, squeezing it tight. ‘And you won’t. I promise.’

  ‘You can’t promise me that,’ her mother said flatly and for the moment, May gave up trying to ease her worries.

  ‘How’s Nan? Does she go up London Bridge with you of a night?’

  ‘No fear! Not her – she shakes her bleedin’ fist at them when they fly over, won’t even go near a shelter.’

  May laughed. ‘We can’t all be brave like her.’

  ‘Brave? No such thing – she’s seen it in the leaves! Says it’s not her time to go…’

  May was silent, remembering her grandmother’s reading of the leaves before she’d joined up. Granny Byron had not, she was sure, revealed everything, and May wondered if her own ‘time to go’ had been written in the leaves on that day. But only Troubles, the dog, would hear of it, for her grandmother was adamant that there were things in the future it was really better not to know. Perhaps May had been right not to try to wheedle any more out of her. For May had been feeling her own youth far more acutely since joining up, and when she reported to her battery after firing-camp training, she wanted nothing to hold her back from living her own present. In spite of the war, there was never going to be another time when she would be this young again, and Jack’s death had convinced her that life was too precious to waste. Come bombs and destruction, come gunfire and danger, she knew that youth was on her side and, if that hadn’t made her exactly reckless, like her poor brother Jack, it had made her heedless of whatever perils lay ahead.

  May went upstairs, and after unpacking, she spent the rest of the day with her mother, exploring the old house as if it were some new country, wondering at how small her bedroom was and how tiny the backyard and how close the next-door house was to theirs. Wherever she went she saw the familiar in a new light. At one point there was a loud bang and May noticed her mother flinch at the sudden noise. But it was only Flo knocking on the front door. She walked straight in through the unlocked door, calling from the passage, ‘It’s only me. There’s fish down the Blue!’

  When her mother didn’t answer, May called back unnecessarily, ‘Come in, Flo!’

  ‘Oh hello, love! Stand up, let’s see your uniform then.’

  May happily walked round the small kitchen, modelling her khaki shirt and skirt, and even put on the cap.

  ‘You look so smart!’ Flo exclaimed, glancing at Mrs Lloyd. ‘Don’t she, Carrie? Anyway, you coming down the Blue?’

  ‘I don’t think I can be bothered, Flo, not today.’ She sat at the kitchen table, fingering the cloth absent-mindedly.

  ‘Not bothered! Your old man won’t thank you when every one else’s got fish for their teas and he’s got potato pie!’

  May was shocked. Her mother had always been a woman who showed her affection for her family in the size of the portions she dished up at dinner time. Before rationing, if a recipe had called for an ounce of butter, she would contrive to put in two, on the principle that more was always better. And in the early days of the war she’d cheerfully stand in line all day for fish.

  ‘Come on, Mum, it’ll do you good to get out. I’ll come with you.’

  Mrs Lloyd let out a small sigh a
nd shook her head. ‘No, you don’t want to waste your time.’

  But May saw her glance at Flo; she was wavering.

  ‘It’s not a waste – it’ll give us a chance to chat. Besides we’ll need more tea, the amount I’ve drunk this morning!’ She plucked the coupon book down from the kitchen mantlepiece and handed it to her mother.

  ‘All right, love,’ Mrs Lloyd said, her face brightening.

  ‘Thanks, Flo,’ May said, as her mother went to fetch her coat.

  ‘No trouble.’ Then, dropping her voice, Flo said, ‘She’s not been very good, May. But she’s been talking about your leave all week. You’re a good girl – try and jolly her along a bit while you’re home, won’t you?’

  May assured Flo that she would and as they walked towards the fish shop in the Blue, she linked arms with her mother. Though this wasn’t the way she’d imagined her first day’s leave, she found herself actually enjoying queuing with the gossiping, bantering women. When the woman in front of them asked Ray, the fishmonger, if he had any skate’s eyeballs, Flo said in a loud voice, ‘No, love, he keeps his balls under the counter, for the special customers, don’t you, Ray?’ The queue erupted into laughter, and May was grateful to the woman for drawing out her mother’s once ready laugh.

  *

  The next day May woke up with a sense of unease: she really was dreading her meeting with Peggy. Always good at hiding her feelings, May now worried that her discovery of Peggy’s infidelity might somehow betray itself in her manner. As it was, she needn’t have worried – in fact it would have been more suspicious if May hadn’t acted shocked. Her sister was so changed that May couldn’t take her eyes off her. Straight from her Saturday morning shift at Atkinson’s, she walked into the kitchen, where they’d just finished dinner, and threw off her coat to reveal a red siren suit, which looked almost elegant on her long-legged, slim frame. May only wished she looked half as good in those baggy, battledress trousers that she kept ironed to a knife-edged crease in an attempt to make them look stylish. Peggy’s fair hair was fashionably waved, and there was no sign of the net that used to confine it.