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‘Yes. He had to spend Christmas in a children’s home outside the city, much to his disgust, but he’ll be coming to us in time for the new school term. Mrs Dawson’s been getting his room ready for him. She’s had me giving it a coat of distemper to freshen it up a bit.’ A rueful look crossed the sergeant’s face. ‘I just hope that she isn’t going to spoil him too much.’
Olive could tell from both his expression and the sound of his voice how much the sergeant was looking forward to Barney’s arrival.
‘Oh, and there’s something I ought to tell you,’ he continued. ‘It’s about Reg Baxter and that vacancy there was going to be at the ARP station, the one that I thought you should put your name forward for?’
Olive nodded. She’d felt both surprised and a bit overwhelmed when Sergeant Dawson had suggested that she volunteer to fill a vacancy at their local ARP unit, but the sergeant had insisted that she would be an ideal candidate.
‘It seems that Reg Baxter has decided not to retire and move after all,’ the sergeant told her, ‘and the other vacancy, the one that Mrs Morrison had applied for, that’s gone to a chap from Court Street.’
Olive was surprised to discover how unflatteringly she was thinking of the men who had turned down the opportunity to have someone as capable as her fellow WVS member join them. Before the war such a thought wouldn’t have crossed her mind. The war, though, had shown her just how capable and resourceful her own sex was, and how proud she was of what women were doing to help with the war effort.
That neither she nor Mrs Morrison had been offered the membership of the local ARP unit wasn’t Sergeant Dawson’s fault, however, and Olive could see from his expression that he felt slightly uncomfortable about the news he had had to give her.
Even so, she couldn’t resist saying with a small smile, ‘Sergeant Dawson, the ARP unit doesn’t know what it will be missing in not taking on Mrs Morrison. She’s a first-class organiser, and she makes the best hotpot I’ve ever tasted. She regularly brings one round for our WVS suppers.’
‘Archie, please, Olive. We agreed when I was teaching you to drive that we had known one another long enough to be on first-name terms. Hearing you address me as “Sergeant Dawson” makes me feel that you think of me as someone of your late in-laws’ generation.’
‘Oh, no, I would never think that.’ Was she blushing? Her face certainly felt hot, and no wonder after such a silly gauche remark, far more suitable to someone Tilly’s age than her own. Of course she didn’t think of Sergeant D— Archie … as someone of her late in-laws’ age. How could she when it was perfectly obvious that he wasn’t? His dark hair might be greying slightly at the temples now, whilst fine lines fanned out around his eyes when he smiled, but he was still tall and lean, with a very manly bearing and …
And nothing, Olive stopped herself firmly, allowing herself to say only, ‘Somehow I don’t think that Nancy would think it proper for me to call you Archie. You know how she is about such things.’
‘Yes, I know how she is,’ he agreed, ‘but in private, when we are talking to one another, then surely it can be Olive and Archie?’
She ought to say ‘no’ but that would be rude. He didn’t know, after all, about that silly awareness of him she had developed – or those secret, dangerous, unwanted and unacceptable thoughts of envy she sometimes had for the obvious contentment of the marriage he and his wife shared.
‘Very well,’ she agreed.
Nestled in Drew’s arms, her head tucked into his shoulder, as they moved slowly together on the dance floor, Tilly gave a small sigh as the final strains of ‘A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square’ died away. The song had been one of the hits of the year and now, on New Year’s Eve, as the dancers and those sitting out broke into applause, and the band stood to take their break, she told Drew, ‘It’s such a lovely song that it always brings a lump to my throat. But it’s hard to imagine any kind of bird singing in any of London’s squares right now, thanks to the Blitz.’
‘It’s a song of hope for the future, for better times ahead,’ Drew reminded her, his arm round her as the lights came up over the darkened dance floor and they started to make their way towards their table – Dulcie’s favourite table, which she had bagged the minute they had arrived.
‘Dulcie’s brother seems a nice guy,’ Drew commented. ‘He was really friendly last night back at Ian’s when I was asking him about the desert campaign. Of course, there was stuff he couldn’t tell me but he gave me a real good idea of what it’s been like for them out there. I’ve noticed that you don’t say much to him, though. Don’t you like him?’
Tilly felt a pang of guilt, her straightforward nature making it impossible not to be honest with Drew when she loved him so much.
‘It isn’t that. I mean, there’s nothing wrong with Rick, it’s just, well, I had a bit of a crush on him for a little while, when I first met him.’ She pulled a small face. ‘So silly, and I’m ashamed of myself now. I’d grown out of it even before I met you, but I was just a girl then. I wanted to tell you but I didn’t want you to think—’
‘What I think is that he’s the one who is keen on you, not the other way around,’ Drew astonished her by saying.
‘Rick, keen on me? Oh, no.’ Tilly shook her head vehemently. ‘No, he wasn’t in the least bit interested in me.’
Hearing the honesty in Tilly’s voice made Drew smile. She was the best girl any guy could want. He didn’t for a single minute doubt her, but he knew his own sex and he’d seen the looks Rick had been giving Tilly when he thought that no one was watching him.
‘Take it from me,’ Drew corrected her, ‘he’s interested, but no way is he going to get a look-in.’
‘No way at all,’ Tilly agreed, stopping at the end of the dance floor to kiss Drew’s cheek. ‘You’re the only man I want, Drew.’ She paused to tuck her arm through his as they headed for their table, then asked him, ‘Have you told your family yet – about us, I mean? Mum had a lovely letter from your mother with her Christmas card but it didn’t say anything about you and me, but then if you have written to them they probably wouldn’t have got your letter before they sent the Christmas Card.’
‘I’ve told them that I’ve met a very special girl,’ Drew answered her, turning his head as he did so, so that she couldn’t see his expression. He changed the subject to warn her, ‘Dulcie’s heading our way with Wilder, and I know he isn’t your favourite person.’
‘I don’t like the way he treats Dulcie,’ Tilly admitted. ‘I know she seems worldly-wise on the outside but I’m afraid that Wilder might hurt her. You said that you don’t think she’s the only girl he’s seeing, but I don’t think she knows that.’
Drew nodded, feeling guiltily relieved that she had taken his lead on the subject. It wasn’t that he wanted to deceive Tilly – there was nothing he wanted more than to be completely honest with her – but it just wasn’t possible. Not at the moment, not yet. Just as it wasn’t possible for him to be totally honest with his family about his feelings for Tilly. If he wasn’t being totally honest with Tilly then it was because he loved her and wanted to protect her, that was all.
‘Not long until midnight now,’ Dulcie announced, coming to sit down next to Tilly as Drew pulled up a chair for her.
‘So don’t you go and disappear with some fast piece,’ Dulcie warned her brother. ‘I don’t want the only member of my family I’ve seen over Christmas disappearing with some girl just as it strikes midnight.’
‘If anyone’s likely to disappear to have an illicit bit of how’s your father with some girl he’s just met, it’s that fly boy of Dulcie’s, not me,’ Rick muttered in an aside to Drew whilst Dulcie was talking to Wilder. When Rick realised that Tilly had overheard him, he apologised. She shook her head in response to his, ‘Sorry …’ She was more concerned about the fact that Rick’s opinion of Wilder matched her own than she was about his sturdy male language. She was very fond of Dulcie and would hate to see her hurt.
‘Do you think there’ll be many there?’ Agnes asked Ted as they hurried arm in arm through the cold night air in the direction of Trafalgar Square, to share in the traditional way of bringing in the New Year.
‘I should think so,’ Ted assured her. ‘Londoners aren’t going to let something like a few German bombs stop them from celebrating.’
At Barts Sally looked at the watch she wore pinned to the front of her uniform apron, as she emerged from the operating theatre for her break. Ten minutes to go. She and George had promised that they’d think of one another the moment midnight started to chime. For someone who prided herself on being so matter-of-fact she was surprised how emotional she felt that they weren’t seeing out the old year and welcoming in the new one together.
Setting off in the direction of the stairs, she thought that she might as well go to the canteen, where she could at least welcome in the New Year amongst the other staff who were on their breaks.
She almost made it, would have made it, if she hadn’t been stopped in her tracks by the totally unexpected sound of George’s voice calling out breathlessly from behind her.
‘Sally.’
She spun round to stare at him in disbelief, then she was running towards him, ignoring the rule that nurses never ran unless there was an emergency. After all, there was an emergency of sorts, the emergency of reaching the man she loved and wanted to spend the rest of her life with, before the clocks struck midnight.
Her, ‘What are you doing here?’ was muffled against his lips as he kissed her and then kissed her again, lifting her off her feet to hold her tight, his face cold from the air outside, but his body warm beneath his overcoat as she unfastened the buttons and burrowed close to him.
‘I wanted to see in the New Year with the girl I love,’ he answered her question.
‘You got leave?’
‘Not exactly, but I’m off duty until tomorrow evening, so I thought I’d risk coming up to London. I’ll have to go back on the first available train, though,’ he warned her.
‘You came all the way to London, because …’
‘Because I wanted to kiss my girl and wish her a Happy New Year,’ he finished for her.
For a minute Sally just looked at him, and then her voice trembled slightly as she whispered, ‘Oh, George.’
‘It’s midnight,’ he whispered back. ‘Happy New Year, my darling girl, and may it be just the first of a lifetime of Happy New Years for us.’
‘Oh, George, don’t say that,’ Sally begged him. ‘Don’t tempt fate by talking about the future. Just kiss me instead.’
‘Oh, Ted.’ Tears filled Agnes’s eyes as she turned towards her fiancé amongst the crowd of people who had braved the threat of Hitler’s bombers to come out to celebrate the arrival of the New Year around the fountains in Trafalgar Square. Unlike before the war, there were no lights to illuminate the scene, only starlight shining fitfully through the still heavy pall of smoke, but from what Agnes could see, the couples who turned to one another didn’t seem to mind the lack of light – quite the opposite.
People were reaching out for one another’s hands, the sound of ‘Auld Lang Syne’ growing louder and stronger. As she looked at Ted, Agnes was sure that the diamond in her ring sparkled even more brightly than usual. She was so lucky, and so happy too, even if sometimes she did wish that Ted’s mother would be a bit more friendly. Ted had told Agnes not to worry about his mother’s lack of warmth towards her, stating in his calm good-natured way that eventually she’d come round. Never having known the love of her own mother, she had dearly hoped that Ted’s mother would take to her. Maybe one day she would, Agnes told herself hopefully, as she snuggled closer to Ted.
‘I love you,’ Drew mouthed to Tilly, knowing that it would be impossible for her to hear his voice in the cacophony of cheers, whoops and ‘Happy New Years’ that had filled the dancehall as midnight struck. Now they were standing up for ‘Auld Lang Syne’, the dance floor packed, people covered in streamers and the balloons that had been let down from the net above them.
‘I love you too,’ Tilly mouthed back to him. Everyone was laughing and hugging, Rick looking very happy with the pretty little redhead on his arm, and Dulcie glowing from all the male attention she was getting from single servicemen eager to get their share of the kisses being exchanged to bring in the New Year.
‘Where’s Wilder? He’s missing all the fun,’ Tilly asked Dulcie, cupping her hand to the other girl’s ear so that she could hear her, her other hand holding tightly onto Drew’s.
‘Gone to the gents’,’ Dulcie yelled back.
Truth to tell, she wasn’t as concerned about Wilder missing the countdown to midnight as she might otherwise have been, thanks to the admiring attentions of a young naval officer who, Dulcie had to admit, looked far more handsome in his immaculate uniform than Wilder did in the worn leather jacket that he had insisted on keeping on, despite the heat in the packed the dancehall.
In fact, if anything, the young naval officer, with his open delight in her company, was far better company than Wilder, who had been offhand all evening, complaining that London’s way of welcoming in the New Year was a poor drab thing compared with New York’s.
‘Well, New York isn’t being bombed by the Germans, is it?’ Dulcie had snapped at him at one point in the evening, turning her back on him to sit with her arms folded dismissively across her chest. That was when the young naval officer – Mike – had seen her and had given her a look of bashful hope.
When the band had played a ladies excuse me, and Wilder had announced that he didn’t want to dance, she’d gone over and asked Mike to dance instead, encouraging him to come over to join their table, where she’d introduced him to the others, telling Wilder prettily that she’d felt it was her duty to take pity on ‘one of our brave servicemen, who hasn’t got a dance partner’.
Wilder had responded with a grunt, and the unkind comment that Britain’s armed forces might be brave but they weren’t strong enough to defeat Hitler, and then he’d got up and walked off.
That had been half an hour ago.
Well, if Wilder thought that she was the sort of girl who got all anxious and upset about that kind of behaviour, he was going to find out that he was wrong, Dulcie decided, getting up to go and grab hold of her brother’s hand.
‘Come and dance with me, Rick …’
Later, from the dizzyingly blissful delight of Drew’s arms as they swayed romantically together beneath the dimmed lights to an intimately slow dance number, Tilly murmured to him, ‘I think that Dulcie and Wilder have had a bit of a tiff.’
‘Mmm,’ Drew murmured back. ‘Have I told you that your hair smells of honey and roses, and that your lips taste of paradise?’
Tilly closed her eyes and melted into him.
They had been so close tonight, mentally, emotionally and physically. Being held this close to him, being able to feel all of him against all of her was dangerously exciting. There was an ache low down in her body that made her want to press even closer to him, an awareness within her that the kisses they shared, no matter how sweet they were, could not alone satisfy the need that ached inside her.
Tilly knew what married intimacy entailed but she had never imagined until she had met Drew that she would hunger for that intimacy so strongly and passionately before marriage.
They stayed on the floor until the notes of the last waltz of the evening had died away, returning to their table to find Rick and Dulcie waiting there for them but no sign of Wilder. He appeared a couple of minutes later, removing his handkerchief as he did so, Tilly’s heart hammering as the lights came up and she saw on it the telltale marks of bright orange lipstick. Bright orange when Dulcie was wearing deep pink.
Anxious for her friend, Tilly deliberately leaned across to block Dulcie’s view of Wilder, asking Rick with forced nonchalance, ‘When did you say your leave finished, Rick?’
He too leaned forward, and the look in his eyes suggested to Tilly that he too had seen those lipstick marks as he folded his arms on the table, forcing Wilder to sit back.
‘Tomorrow.’
Tilly nodded, glad of his sensitivity to Dulcie’s feelings.
It was later, after the taxi had dropped the four of them off at the top of Article Row – Wilder remaining in the taxi, having turned down Drew’s suggestion that he stay the night at Ian Simpson’s, insisting that he needed to get back to his base – that Tilly told Drew what had happened as they hung back behind Dulcie and Rick.
‘That’s one of the things I love about you,’ Tilly told him, cuddling up to him. ‘The fact that you’re so honest, Drew. I know you’d never deceive me about anything.’
Drew swallowed hard, conscious that there was something he hadn’t been honest about with Tilly, and it was a very big something, a something that grew harder for him to bear with every fresh kiss they exchanged and every promise of shared love they made. What would happen when he did tell her? Would he lose her? He wouldn’t be able to bear that. He loved her so much, with her brave bright spirit, her fierce loyalty to those who mattered to her, her compassion for others, and her passionate nature.
Tilly didn’t object when Drew suddenly turned to her in the middle of the dark street, took her in his arms and kiss her fiercely. Why should she, when she loved it when he kissed her like that? The only thing was that it was a bit out of character for him to do so in such a public place. But then it was New Year.
Lying awake in bed waiting for Tilly and Dulcie to come in – Ted had brought Agnes home shortly after Olive had returned to number 13 herself, and Sally wouldn’t be off duty until the morning – Olive reflected on her own evening out. She was a sociable person by nature and naturally sympathetic to others, which often meant that people brought their troubles to her knowing they could confide in her and trust her not to repeat what they had told her to others. Normally Olive enjoyed and valued that role, but the trouble, as she was now discovering, was that there was no one for her to turn to when she herself needed to confide.
The evening had been very pleasant, a few hours of relief from the constant anxiety of the war, even if the recent bombing had been a major topic of conversation. And an incident had happened that had left her feeling wretched and guilty.
It had been about half-past eleven when Sergeant Dawson – Archie – had announced that he was taking his leave of them so that he could call round at the ARP post to wish his colleagues there all the best for the New Year and still make it home in time to welcome in 1941 with his wife.
Obviously he’d shaken hands with all those close to him, and naturally Olive had held out her hand to shake his; not to have done so would have been unthinkably rude. But then instead of shaking it he had simply held her hand between his own and …
Olive closed her eyes against the sharp knife of emotion that turned inside her, as she remembered the feelings that had swept her, the memories and the longing she had had no right to feel. How could she have allowed that to happen? How could she have felt, standing there with Sergeant Dawson clasping her hand in the warmth of his own, that shocking agonising need for the warmth of a man’s arms around her, combined with that awful surge of jealousy against those women who were lucky to have what she did not: the presence of loving husbands in their lives and in their beds.
Even now, remembering how she had felt, Olive could feel the small beads of sweat breaking out on her forehead. She was thirty-seven years old. She had been a widow for nearly eighteen years. Never once during those years had she felt the way she had felt tonight, watching Sergeant Dawson walk away from her, then turning to look at her friends with their husbands. Marriage could be hard work. All women knew that, once they were married. Decent respectable women – the kind of woman she had always believed herself to be – did not lie in their beds at night with their bodies aching because they were on their own.
What she had felt meant nothing, Olive assured herself. It was just because it was New Year. Because of the war. It certainly wasn’t Sergeant Dawson’s fault. He had simply been kind, she knew that. Her heart thudded anew, and then thankfully she heard the front door open, Tilly and Dulcie’s voices reaching her from the hallway. She was a mother and a landlady, she had responsibilities and duties, and instead of dwelling on certain things she would be far better off ignoring them – and making sure she didn’t experience them again.
Dulcie wasn’t the only person to be concerned about the Home Secretary, Mr Herbert Morrison’s, January announcement that he intended to make it compulsory for London’s residents and businesses to form their own fire-watching group from amongst their inhabitants and employees, as Olive discovered when she attended one of her twice-weekly WVS meetings at the vicarage. Audrey Windle told them that she felt they should extend the length of their normal meeting to make time to discuss ‘Mr Morrison’s request for people to form fire-watching groups.’
‘Well, as to that,’ Nancy sniffed, immediately bridling, ‘I hope that you aren’t going to suggest that any of us take up such dangerous work, Mrs Windle. That’s men’s work, that is, and besides, what are our ARP wardens being paid for if it isn’t to sort out that kind of thing?’
‘Well, yes, of course,’ the vicar’s wife agreed quickly in a placatory tone, ‘but the thing is that, as Mr Morrison has said, and as we all saw with the dreadful bombing raid on the 29th of December, with the best will in the world neither our Home Guard nor the fire brigade can be on hand everywhere they are needed. No one’s suggesting that anyone should put themselves in danger. It’s simply a matter of making sure that those of us who feel that we do want to be involved can be as safely as possible.’
‘Well, I don’t want to be,’ Nancy informed the vicar’s wife flatly. ‘Like I said, it isn’t women’s work. We’re all doing enough as it is, if you ask me.’
‘I don’t know, Nancy,’ Olive felt obliged to speak up, as much in defence of poor Audrey Windle, who was looking rather desperate, as anything else. ‘We’ve been very lucky in Article Row so far, but we’ve all seen and heard about the damage that those incendiary bombs can do if they aren’t spotted and dealt with quickly. The Government must think that it is safe for women to deal with them because they’ve sent out those leaflets to every household telling people what to do, and it’s normally women who are home most of the time, not men.’
Nancy was giving her an extremely baleful look but Olive wasn’t going to back down. As she’d been speaking she’d realised that although she hadn’t given it much thought before, she did actually believe that it was important for householders to do everything they could to protect their homes from the incendiary bombs being dropped by the Germans. Unlike other bombs, the incendiaries were not designed to explode and kill people, but rather to cause serious fires. The initially long, large bombs each contained many small incendiaries. As it fell it opened, showering the ground with these smaller incendiaries, which burst into flames as they landed. If discovered quickly, it was a relatively simple matter to dowse the flames, either with a stirrup pump, which used water, or by raking the burning matter into sand and smothering the flames with it. But the effectiveness of these courses of action depended on the incendiaries being spotted and dealt with quickly, and it was to this end that the Government had announced to the country via the BBC news that they must form themselves into fire-watching groups.
Giving Olive a grateful look Audrey Windle pressed on hopefully, ‘We’ve all read the leaflets. They explain very clearly how we set about organising local fire-watch teams and make out a rota for fire-watching.’
‘I’ve heard that you have to go up on the roof and stay there all night when it’s your turn,’ one of the other woman broke in. A large person, her ample chins shook with anxiety as she continued, ‘I couldn’t do that.’
‘No, of course not, Mrs Bell,’ the vicar’s wife agreed, ‘but as Sergeant Dawson explained to me, in many cases husbands and wives are working together, so that, for instance, the husband will be the one to do the active watching but then he will call down to his wife, who will be perhaps waiting at an open bedroom window – with the lights out, of course – to tell her where the bombs have fallen. Then she will get ready the stirrup pump, which the Government is making available to households, and together they’ll go out and tackle the incendiaries with the help of their neighbours, who they will alert about the bombs.’
‘It’s taking advantage of our good nature, that’s what it is,’ Nancy sniffed, folding her arms in front of her bosom in a way that said that she wanted no truck whatsoever with Mr Morrison’s scheme.
Olive’s assessment of her neighbour’s frame of mind was confirmed when Nancy turned to her and said, ‘There’s no one to do it in Article Row anyway, is there? Mr Whittaker at number 50 is too old; you couldn’t expect the Misses Barker at number 12 to get involved, nor Mrs Edwards at number 5, since her husband’s already working as an auxiliary fireman.’
‘There’s Mr Ryder at number 18,’ Olive pointed out. ‘I’m sure he’d want to be involved, he being retired from the Civil Service.’
‘Mr Ryder? With that bad leg of his?’ Nancy shook her head, adding triumphantly, ‘And it’s not as if you could do anything, is it, with you being a household full of women.’
‘Why should us being female stop us from getting involved?’ Nancy’s attitude reminded Olive of how she had felt when she and Mrs Morrison had been rejected by the ARP – and they had been rejected she felt sure, no matter how tactful Sergeant Dawson had tried to be.
Mrs Morrison clapped her hands and said approvingly, ‘Oh, well done, Olive. I’m certainly going to have a word with Mr Morrison and see if we can’t get something set up.’
Audrey Windle was smiling at her with relief, whilst Nancy was giving her a very angry look indeed.
‘I hope you aren’t thinking of setting yourself up in charge of some kind of fire-watch, Olive,’ Nancy told her grimly. ‘Because if you are I’m afraid that me and my Arthur will definitely have a view.’
What was Nancy trying to say? That she wasn’t up to the job of organising a small team of neighbours to keep a watch for falling incendiaries and to deal with them when they did fall? Olive very much resented Nancy’s attitude, and instead of putting her off the idea it actually made her feel very determined to carry it through.
‘Well, if Arthur wants to join in he’ll be very welcome,’ was all Olive allowed herself to say.
