Christmas on the Home Front

‘We thought you could do with some help.’ Joyce unfastened her coat.

‘Henry could, that’s for sure.’

Inside, they found her husband, the Reverend Henry Jameson. The good-looking and earnest young man was struggling to move a trestle table. ‘Where have you been, Connie?’

‘Some people wanted to know if they could come along.’ Connie raised her eyebrow slightly in Joyce’s direction. It was technically true, Joyce supposed. ‘But I don’t think they were quite old enough yet.’

Connie turned her attention to sticking up a piece of bunting that had drooped. Joyce grabbed the other end of the trestle table and they lifted it together. Esther and Connie started to put out chairs. Each year, Lady Hoxley would donate money to a fund run by the church to organise a Christmas meal for the old people of Helmstead. Local business people and good Samaritans would contribute beer, wine and food; a lot of it grown on the fields and houses around Helmstead. A lot of people in the village, from Mrs Gulliver and the other busybodies to the local butcher would pitch in to arrange the meal. Finch had promised them a bag of spuds to help them along.

And the meal wasn’t the only attraction for the old folk in the village. There would be songs at the piano and maybe a little dancing. Sometimes the event happened on Christmas Day itself, but this year it was happening earlier. The lunch was organised by Henry Jameson for anyone who wanted to spend the day with the community. With so many loved ones away overseas, Christmas could be a lonely and sad experience, so this event distracted everyone from their problems for a day. And Henry liked to think he’d gain a few new parishioners at the Sunday Service as a result too.

As Esther, Connie and Joyce helped Henry set up the hall, their conversation turned to who would be at Pasture Farm for Christmas.

‘Connie and I hope to have the day together – after I’ve finished my service and my visits to parishioners.’ Henry placed a beer mat under a wobbly table leg.

‘That means he’ll be home at five in the evening and I’ll have been on my tod all day.’ Connie rolled her eyes to her husband’s amusement.

‘So what about Dolores?’

‘Oh, she’s got nowhere to go, so she’ll be there,’ Esther replied. About twelve years older than the other girls, Dolores O’Malley kept herself to herself. Joyce remembered Connie playing a game over the summer, to try to find out details – any details – about Dolores’s life. Connie would try every trick she knew to get Dolores to divulge even the smallest detail. What colour did she like? What was her home like? Was she courting anyone? But as skilful as Connie was in digging, Dolores proved equally adept at deflecting. She was as closed as a clam in deep water. Joyce felt that Dolores deserved her privacy.

‘At least I don’t think she’s got anywhere to go,’ Esther mused. ‘You never know with that one.’

‘And that’s the point, innit? We’ll never know.’ Connie laughed.

Joyce stood on a chair to put some more bunting up. The streamers had been cut and assembled from strips of old magazines, giving the bunting a colourful and varied effect.

‘And of course, Martin and Iris will be back with us for the big day,’ Esther volunteered, spooling the bunting up to Joyce. ‘Fred will be back by then too.’

‘We’ll have a good time.’

‘Will we?’ Esther pulled a sceptical face.

‘Yes,’ Joyce grinned. ‘Especially if we persuade Fred to open his carrot whisky.’

‘Joyce Fisher! I never had you down as being naughty.’

‘It’s living with him what’s done it!’

A distant rumble distracted her. It wasn’t thunder. Joyce’s laughter died in her throat as she noticed a flash in the sky which illuminated the glass of the window pane, making the rain drops glisten like pearls for a brief moment. There was another flash and a distant bang, further away. If there wasn’t a war on, Joyce would have marvelled that they might have been shooting stars or some strange firework show.

Esther, Connie and Joyce peered through the window their hands cupped over their eyes to help them see outside. In the sky, a small grey shape moved quickly across the horizon, with two other similarly-sized shapes following. A flash went off to the right of the first object. It was the last stages of a dog fight. Joyce squinted to try to work out whether it was an allied or German plane being chased. The first plane banked round, and Joyce glimpsed the markings. A yellow band around the rear fuselage and a black cross told her all she needed to know. It was a German bomber and it was being gained on by two Spitfires. One of the allied planes reeled off machine gun fire.

Henry came over to watch and they all peered intently, trying to glimpse the action.

Joyce instinctively ducked down slightly from the window. Esther put a comforting hand on her shoulder. The truth was that they were far enough away to be out of danger. The bullets wouldn’t reach the village hall from that distance. But a basic innate need for survival meant that they shied away nonetheless.

Joyce craned her head. At the corner of the window frame, the second Spitfire looped round, cutting off the escape path of the German bomber. The Spitfire fired its guns and there was a flash of fire on the wing of the bomber. It banked sharply away, an erratic movement that told Joyce it wasn’t an evasive manoeuvre but a sign it was out of control. Sure enough the bomber spiralled down and away, with the awful whining sound that signified an imminent crash. Joyce could just about make out a plume of black smoke from the rear of the plane. Fire was gripping the rear section. It disappeared behind some trees several miles away. The Spitfires pursued it over the canopy to check they had completed their task. After a few moments, a smoky mushroom of fire billowed up from behind the trees. Esther looked solemnly at what she had seen.

‘There’s one for our boys.’ But there was no hint of celebration in Esther’s voice. They knew it could have so easily been a loss to the allied side. They both knew that death wasn’t anything to celebrate. Instead this was a grim tallying up of a minor victory in a war that was dragging on above the skies of Helmstead. Another mother would be getting a telegram.

Joyce continued to put up the celebratory bunting; an action that seemed darkly poignant now. But for now, she didn’t think any more about the German plane or what had happened to it.

Twin paths of blackened, smoking grass etched their way into a copse of trees on the edge of Frensham Fields. And there, its nose smashed into an ancient oak tree was the German plane, one of its engines whirring in a death throe of aviation fuel and smoke. The fuselage was already sparking with fire and the fuel caught alight suddenly, sending a dense cloud exploding into the sky like some nightmarish purple and black peony. The men in the cockpit were frantically trying to escape. One of them smashed open the canopy, sending it cascading down the side of the plane. He was up and out, falling over the side onto the singed heather beneath. His partner quickly followed, but being nearer the fuselage, he found his arm engulfed in burning fuel.

The man screamed and fell hard onto the ground. The first man was on his feet, scrambling to his aid, rolling the burning man over and over until the flames subsided. Then he pulled the man away from the wreckage, getting only twenty feet away before he collapsed on his back from the effort.

‘Kapitän?’ The younger man had concern etched on his face, terror in his eyes. His name was Siegfried Weber. He was twenty-two and although this has been his third mission, he had never been to England before.

The older man winced and clutched his right arm. His name was Emory Mayer. He was forty and this had been his eighteenth mission. He had worked as a tailor in England for two years in the 1920s and if sartorial thoughts were foremost in his mind right now, he’d have registered the state of his uniform, which was partially burnt away around the arm, the skin underneath blackened. Siegfried couldn’t tell whether it was from the burn or from dirt from the fuel. He didn’t want to rub it to find out. Instead, he lifted his captain as best as he could and shuffled them both even further away from the plane. It was burning brightly, and Siegfried knew it would be a beacon for anyone trying to find survivors. They had to get away.

Siegfried hoisted Emory’s good arm over his shoulder and walked them across the scrubland, inching slowly away. Every now and then he would risk a look behind him, hoping that the wreckage would be a small dot on the horizon. But the progress was such that he stopped looking behind him, knowing that the continued proximity of the plane would sap his morale and rob him of the impetus to keep going.

The plane exploded in a final, epic fireball, plumes of black smoke reaching fleetingly into the sky before disappearing forever. Siegfried risked a look back, feeling a burst of heat on his face. And then the fire was gone, the hulking remains continuing to spew black smoke into a black sky. He hoped that the explosion had signified the end of the plane acting like a beacon for the enemy.

In the distance, Siegfried could hear dogs barking. They sounded close, but he had no idea how close. How could the search have been coordinated so quickly? Siegfried tried to calm his nerves, taking deep breaths as he hauled his captain along. No, the searchers were probably a long way away and the sound of the dogs had carried in the wind.

Siegfried knew that he couldn’t be certain of any of that. He knew that his life was hanging by a thread. He had to find shelter soon; a place to give medical treatment to his captain. They had to find somewhere safe.

Joyce Fisher stood on the front step of the village hall, staring up at the sky. She thought she’d heard an explosion in the distance, far off in Frensham Fields. But it could have been soldiers on night manoeuvres. Esther came out to join her and they looked out into the night sky together. A chill wind was blowing gently, carrying a faint rainfall and Joyce felt her face getting slightly damp. It was oddly refreshing and she didn’t immediately think about going back inside. Sometimes it was good to feel nature and enjoy a light rain against your face.

‘We should be getting back to the farm,’ Esther commented.

‘I know,’ Joyce replied. She and Dolores would have to be awake by six and out working by half-past. Late nights weren’t something you could keep doing when you were a land girl, not unless you wanted to fall asleep on your shovel.

By the time they got back to Pasture Farm it was nearly ten o’clock. Joyce locked the back door. The light flickered slightly.

‘Probably the rain,’ Esther commented. ‘I keep telling Fred that the junction box gets submerged when there’s too much water.’

Joyce turned out the light and she and Esther trudged up the stairs to the bedrooms. Joyce could hear Dolores murmuring in her sleep and she wished Esther a hushed goodnight and went into her own room.

‘See you in the morning,’ Joyce whispered.

‘I wish it was really the morning. It’s still the middle of the night when we get up, isn’t it?’ Esther replied. They shared a smile as Joyce closed the door behind her.

She dropped her dress to the floor and carefully folded it over the back of the chair. Walking to the window, Joyce closed the curtains. Outside she could hear the plaintive cries of a fox somewhere in Gorley Wood. She got her washbag and sat on the bed, waiting for the sounds of Esther in the bathroom to fall silent before she ventured out to see if it was free.

Joyce stared at the dressing table. A dog-eared photograph of John was propped next to her rollers and hairbrush. Seeing his face warmed her heart and made her smile. She hoped he was resting and taking it easy and not having too many chores to do for Teddy. But more than that she hoped he would be back soon; back on the train.

She hoped he’d be back in time for Christmas.

Chapter 2

Seven days to Christmas.

It was chilly in the fields with a winter frost covering the ploughed soil as Joyce, Connie, and Iris trudged out to repair a fallen fence; the earth cracking under their feet like frozen chocolate on ice cream. They competed to see who could produce the biggest bloom of cloudy air from their lungs until they all felt dizzy and had to stop. Iris wanted to find out who had the widest stride and started taking huge steps on her way to the field. Connie tried too. Joyce thought this was unfair as her legs were shorter than both the other women, but they joked and cajoled her into having a go.

‘Well, make sure you’re watching!’

‘Go on, Joyce. See if you can beat Iris’s record.’

‘Yes, I managed to get all the way from that furrow to this one.’

‘It was never that far.’ Joyce suspected they were trying to put her off by fibbing. This was psychological warfare. ‘You’d have to be on stilts to do that.’

‘Excuse me. My legs are exactly like stilts.’

‘Hush now, I’ve got to focus.’

Joyce concentrated as the other women watched expectantly. She lifted one foot and pushed it forward as far as it would go before planting it on the ground. At the last minute she realised she’d overstretched, and while Connie and Iris had managed to do the manoeuvre elegantly, Joyce lost her balance and fell over. Connie helped her to her feet, and they walked the remaining distance across the field giggling at the ridiculous competitions they invented. It was a way to pass the time; a way to have fun in these difficult times.

Reaching the fence, they started to sort the planks of wood and posts on the ground into a rough approximation of the fence they planned to build. Joyce counted out nails as Connie idly swung the mallet round like a gunslinger from a western.

‘Here, do you think I could test your reflexes with this, Iris?’

‘Not flaming likely. You’d break my leg.’

Iris and Connie dissolved into a fit of giggles.

‘Will you two stop mucking about? I want to finish this job before Christmas day.’ Joyce was grinning too as she placed the nails into different pockets ready for the assembly.

They had lived through five wartime Christmases and it was getting hard to remember the ones before. Or at least it was getting hard to remember them without them being painted as halcyon days when everything was perfect. But there was no denying that those pre-war Christmases had plenty of food and presents; they were times you didn’t have to scrimp and save your rations for the big day; when turkeys and chickens hung in the butchers’ windows and you could take your pick; times when you could put on a pair of stockings without having to think about faking them with an eyebrow pencil to draw the seams.

Each Christmas since had seemed to present more challenges. As people became adept at scouring the shops for sought-after rations, basic goods for Christmas became harder to source. You really did have to be an early bird. This year, like the ones before that she’d spent on the farm, Joyce had put aside some of the sixteen shillings she was paid by Finch since September. This nest egg, together with money from the other girls, could enable them to buy a decent ox heart or some beef cheek from the butchers – plus other food and drink for the Christmas period. But it wasn’t always easy to save.

‘Sorry I haven’t put any into the pot for a few weeks,’ Joyce looked apologetically to the others. ‘Finch said there’s been a delay in getting the wages from the government.’

‘Ah there’s always a delay.’ Iris shook her head. ‘But we’re all in the same boat. Finch pays some of us one week, and the others the next. He’s always catching up with himself.’

‘I think he’s betting it on the horses.’ Connie offered a devilish smile. They laughed, but in reality they knew that the one thing Finch would never be dishonest about was their wages. He valued what they did on the farm and was happy that it didn’t personally cost him anything to have them doing it.

They worked in silence for a few minutes, concentrating on excavating the holes for the fence posts. It was hard to dig down into the frosted soil; the clay underneath was solid and unyielding.

‘Oh, I had a look for some dried fruit,’ Joyce said, apropos of nothing. ‘For the Christmas cake. We’ve got enough sugar put by for the icing, but there will be no point doing it without fruit in the middle.’

‘If there’s none around, my mum cuts up apple and puts in a few raisins.’ Iris mimed the act of cutting an apple, just in case they didn’t understand what she was saying.

‘Where did we get it from last year?’ Connie asked.

‘Finch got it from Birmingham. Mind you, he had to wait forty minutes in the queue for it. Do you not remember all the swearing when he got back? Very festive!’

Connie laughed, shaking her head. ‘I don’t listen half the time.’ She lodged a fence prop into the first hole.

‘Very wise.’ Iris held the base of the prop. ‘Some of those words were an education.’

‘So can we send him over to Birmingham this year?’

‘There’s no way he’ll do it.’ Joyce hammered in the post as Iris and Connie kicked in earth around the base. ‘Is that vertical? It doesn’t look very vertical.’

‘Yes! It’s vertical.’ Connie squinted at the post. ‘It looks wonky because your head’s at an angle!’

Joyce smiled and straightened her neck and assessed her handiwork with a fresh perspective. The post stood proud and upright in the hole. She watched as the other women finished tamping the earth down around it.

‘Maybe there will be dried fruit in the village?’ Iris ventured; her open and childlike face full of hope.

‘No, Mrs Gulliver and all those harpies will have snatched it all by now.’ Connie frowned. ‘Face facts, one of us will have to go to Birmingham at the weekend.’

‘Sounds like you’re not volunteering?’ Joyce smiled.

‘You’re correct. I don’t mind drawing lots though. Loser spends all day waiting in the queue.’

‘Deal.’ That sounded a good arrangement to Iris.

Joyce considered for a moment and nodded. ‘Go on then.’

Connie scoured the ground for some twigs and found three of a similar size. She broke one of them, so it was shorter and bunched the three in her closed hand for the others to pick.

‘Whoever gets the short one has to go.’

‘Who goes first?’ Iris asked.

‘Shall I do it?’ Joyce volunteered.

‘Go on, Joycie, be lucky!’ Connie proffered her hand with the sticks clenched in her fist. ‘Or don’t! Actually don’t be lucky at all. I don’t want to be lumbered!’

Joyce took a deep breath and pulled out a twig. To her relief, it wasn’t the short one.

‘Thank goodness for that.’ She jumped up and down and taunted Connie and Iris with her twig.

‘Look at her! It’s like she’s won a flaming Oscar!’

‘Just you and me then, Connie.’ Iris’s face was taut with concentration.

‘You and me, Iris.’ Connie moved her closed hand towards the youngest Land Girl. Iris mumbled to herself as she looked at both the twigs. For her part, Joyce had no idea which was the shortest but she was just glad she was out of the running.

Iris cautiously plucked a twig from Connie’s hand.

It was the short one.

Connie laughed and Iris’s face fell in mock anger. Joyce suspected that Iris didn’t really mind the prospect of a trip to Birmingham. It would be a chance to look in the shops. She could queue for the dried fruit and then perhaps stop for a cup of tea and a cake in Butler’s Tea Rooms near the station off Stephenson Street.

Butler’s Tea Rooms.

Joyce hadn’t thought of that place in years.

Why had it popped back into her head now?

She’d only been there once herself back in November 1940, before she joined the Women’s Land Army. And although the tea and cake had been lovely, that visit had turned out to be an unhappy experience. She thought back to that time. It had been the day before she discovered that her home in Coventry had been destroyed in the blitz of the city. So by rights, that afternoon in the tea room should have been the last time she’d been truly happy; unburdened by the effects of the war, unburdened by loss. But something else had happened in the tea room that had marred even that final sunny day.

She’d been away in Birmingham with John. Ostensibly it had been a business trip as John was scheduled to see a motorbike parts manufacturer for a discussion about supplying the Triumph factory where John worked in Coventry. But John and Joyce had used the opportunity to turn it into a mini-honeymoon – after all, they’d not managed to get away after their wedding. They’d stayed in a small hotel and John had gone to his meeting leaving Joyce alone. She’d looked at the wallpaper with its busy design of roses and vines, flicked through the bible on the bedside table and, bored of waiting, had decided she needed some air. Butler’s Tea Rooms had been visible from her window and she’d seen a steady procession of well-dressed people amble inside for afternoon tea. Joyce decided to put on her best clothes and join them. Why shouldn’t she live a little?

When she arrived at the tea rooms, Joyce was dressed in her smart dress – an eggshell blue frock with a white collar and a white belt blooming out to a full skirt. She sat at a table for four, her handbag occupying the seat next to her. She imagined she was a toff as she surveyed the smart and impressive establishment with its central atrium where a grand piano stood on the black and white tiled floor. Tables were arranged all around with a selection of large potted plants to add a splash of colour. For some reason the lower section was closed, so Joyce was seated on a table on the balcony that overlooked the atrium. All around her, other patrons sat around tables, chatting and smoking. On the plate in front of her was a business card for Butler’s Tea Rooms. Joyce put it into her purse as a memento. And while a proper toff wouldn’t have done that, Joyce didn’t care. Then she perused the menu and ordered tea and a sponge cake. The elderly waiter explained in a low voice that would have conveyed the reverence of a funeral parlour that the cake was made with dried egg and honey due to rationing. Joyce had assumed that would be the case and said she didn’t mind.

Joyce smiled at some people who were crammed in around a table nearby. She indicated the three free chairs at her own table, wondering if they would like to spread themselves out, but they were too busy chatting to notice her gesture. To her surprise, when Joyce turned back to her menu, a woman was already sitting down with her. The woman was catching her breath as if she had run from somewhere and had seemingly appeared out of thin air. She was a similar age to Joyce but stick-thin and glamorous despite her shorter hair and lack of makeup. She wore a simple black suit with trousers. On her shoulders sat a fur wrap, making her ensemble a curious mix of business and evening attire. Joyce noticed the worn cuffs on the woman’s jacket and wondered if the woman was down on her luck.

‘Hope you don’t mind.’ The woman had an accent that was hard to place. Was that a faint Manchester twang? ‘Say if you mind and I’ll move. But they didn’t have any other tables, see?’

‘I don’t mind.’ The truth was that Joyce would enjoy having someone sit with her. It would save her having to keep reading the menu to pass the time. ‘I’m Joyce Fisher.’

‘I know.’ The woman stared straight into Joyce’s eyes.

Joyce felt her mouth fall open in total shock.

‘How could you—?’

‘No, I’m joking,’ the woman laughed. ‘I’m always doing that. You should have seen your face!’

‘Yes, well,’ Joyce replied grumpily. She didn’t enjoy practical jokes. She remembered when her brother-in-law, Charlie, had excitedly claimed that John had won a prize in the Mayor’s raffle and made him get dressed up for a non-existent prize-giving ceremony. John had found it funny, but Joyce hadn’t appreciated it.