Wartime on Coronation Street

by Maggie Sullivan

  Take care.

  ERIC BOWMAN

  She had just read the signature which was written in childish capital letters when the lights clicked off and she shuddered as she slid down under the flimsy blanket. She didn’t know what to make of it and was unable to stop shivering. She had left home to get away from her mother, but somehow Ena was still managing to interfere in her life. Vera felt a flash of shame as she realized she hadn’t yet written to Bob since she’d arrived though she’d said she would do so as soon as she got to Kent – but when had she had time? Still, she’d thought of him often while she’d been working, and she thought of him now. Then she thought of Eric. There was no comparison, so why did her mother persist in trying to push the rag-and-bone boy onto her?

  She pictured going to the cinema with Bob and she was overcome by a wave of homesickness. She genuinely missed him and she hoped he missed her. It made her sad to think that he might be going to the cinema on his own and she felt angry at the thought of her mother still trying to take over her life. If it hadn’t been for Ena’s meddling, Vera would probably have been married to Bob by now. She couldn’t stop a sob escaping. She tried to cover it with a cough. but now that she had seen Eric’s so-called signature on the bottom of the page, she realized that her mother would not leave her alone until she had got her own way, and she couldn’t stop the flow of tears that spilled down her cheeks or the low sob that escaped her. Vera vowed to write to Bob the following morning before she started work and tell him that she missed him.

  She heard Lily’s voice call out, ‘Everything all right, Vera?’

  ‘Uh huh,’ was all she could reply.

  Chapter 16

  Vera tore Eric’s letter into small pieces for she had no intention of replying and hated the very idea of anyone ever seeing it. Even if she had wanted to she would have found it difficult to make the time to write back. Every minute of every day was filled with tasks connected with the cows, for feeding and watering them had now been added to her list of things she had to do several times a day; and if it wasn’t related to the cows directly, then there were things to be done in the dairy parlour.

  She would come in at the end of the day, joints aching, eyes stinging from tiredness and so generally exhausted that she didn’t have the energy for additional tasks, even something as simple as sitting down to write a letter, as Lily frequently complained.

  ‘This is inhuman,’ Lily wailed when it finally began to sink in that these were to be their working hours and conditions.

  ‘Oh, don’t be such a wimp!’ Margaret snapped. ‘I don’t know what you expected.’ She was the only one in their dormitory who was up each day before the alarm, while the other three dragged their feet and found it difficult to get going.

  After that first early morning call they were granted an extra half an hour before the alarm woke them up, but it still felt as though it was the middle of the night. Vera complained that she never had sufficient time to relax properly and Lily too was constantly tired, with barely enough energy to get through the day.

  As August came in, bringing even more unseasonal weather, the hostel became extremely damp and cold. Vera couldn’t stop shivering once she was awake and she dressed as quickly as possible, ready to go down for a hastily snatched breakfast. But before long she began to function automatically as she grew used to the new routine. She was surprised at how much she enjoyed working with the animals and for their sake, despite her aching body, she always tried to be there on time.

  Poor Lily on the other hand was not always able to drag herself out of bed in good time each morning and she was constantly hungry. She worked slowly as the blisters on her hands from the hoeing took time to heal, and she was frequently being punished by Mrs Sykes with additional tasks or reduced rations every time she was late reporting for work or coming back for the evening meal.

  Lily always seemed to be tackling some new task, whereas for Vera there was something comfortingly familiar about the repetitiveness of her work and, once she had completed the cycle of that first day for a week, she was able to repeat the tasks without having to think too hard about what she was doing. Vera was locked into a tight schedule that was dictated by the animals’ nature and needs and yet there was a freedom about her daily routine that she had never felt at the factory, working with her mother, and she went about her business with an air of quiet confidence. She was sure she would never get used to the sheer drudgery of it all, the permanent ache in her limbs and the constant tiredness. But she took a pride in her work and she found she was surprisingly good with the animals. She wished that Bob and her mother could see her milking and churning as though she had been doing it all her life.

  Towards the end of the first week Vera was told that Friday was to be her last day in the cowsheds and on Friday morning she was upset to find that she was later than usual leaving the hostel. Jenny had already left and Vera knew she’d have to walk quickly if she wanted to catch up with her and be at the byre in time for the start of milking. But as she stepped outside and began to walk down the path, she was enveloped in an unusually heavy fog that the earlier risers had dismissed as merely low-hanging cloud. Whatever they called it, Vera soon found to her cost that it was the kind of fog that made it difficult to see more than a few yards in any direction and she could only hope when she set off that she was heading for the cowsheds.

  Vera hadn’t gone far when she was overtaken by a sudden sense of unease and she realized that she couldn’t be sure she was still heading the right way. She shouted Jenny’s name in the hope that her friend might not be far away, but she was greeted by an eerie silence. It was as if her words were left hanging in the air and she was aware of being completely disorientated. She was in no doubt now that she had lost her bearings and, in the all-enveloping gloom, she didn’t know where she was.

  It was purely by accident, as she admitted later, that she came across the cowsheds. She was breathless from running fruitlessly back and forth and she hurried inside with a sigh of relief, anxious to begin milking before anyone noticed that she was late. But although the shed she went into had looked the same on the outside, it didn’t look the same on the inside and it took her some time to find a milking stool. For some reason the cows didn’t look the same either. There were fewer of them, for a start, and they didn’t seem to be standing in the same order as they usually did. The stalls seemed to have higher sides than she remembered and each beast was individually tied up with a thick rope that led to a chain of sturdy metal links, firmly attached to the wall. Her hand was shaking slightly as she sat down on the stool beside the first animal and went to feel for the reassuring fullness of the udders. She had barely touched the beast when, without warning, it lashed out with a strong backward kick that landed painfully on her stomach. Vera’s scream as she was knocked off the stool and the clatter of the pail as it fell onto the hardened mud floor brought the dairyman running.

  ‘What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?’ Bert shouted the moment he set foot inside. ‘Get away from there or you’ll get us all killed!’ And he picked up a pitchfork that was leaning against the whitewashed wall. It looked exactly like the one Vera remembered the young girl carrying in the advertising posters, only this one looked menacing as Bert took a firm stance and aimed it at the bucking animal.

  Vera gasped as if she had suddenly woken up to her surroundings and realized they were definitely different, although she still couldn’t say where she was.

  ‘Oh, my goodness, I think I’ve come to the wrong place!’ she cried. ‘I got lost in the fog this morning and … This isn’t the regular cowshed for milking, is it?’ She couldn’t help the tears that were falling because she really was in great pain and it was difficult to speak as she nursed her bruised stomach.

  ‘You daft bugger, of course it’s not!’ They were harsh words but Bert’s breathing seemed to be calming down. ‘I’ll say you’re in the wrong place. You’re lucky he didn’t kill you.’

  ‘Whe
re am I? I’ve never made a mistake like that before,’ Vera sobbed. ‘I only put my hand up to test the udder was full—’

  ‘You did what?’ Bert shouted.

  She repeated what she had said and he shook his head in disbelief. He was still holding on to the pitchfork, in readiness, keeping his eye on the animal, but thankfully it had stopped kicking. It snorted heavily and tossed its head as if trying to slip the leash.

  Bert flashed a disdainful look in Vera’s direction. ‘Hasn’t anybody ever told you the difference between a cow and a bloody bull?’ he asked with heavy sarcasm. ‘These bulls are waiting to be taken out into the fields to service the cows, you’re blooming lucky he didn’t try to service you.’

  Vera gasped, her hand flew to her mouth and the tears flowed faster when she realized the enormity of her mistake. Bert put out his hand to help her get up off the floor but she was still bent double as she tried to stand up. When she did eventually manage to pull upright she didn’t lift her head. She had never been so humiliated.

  ‘You’d better get out of here before you do any more damage,’ Bert said without sympathy, then he said something she didn’t understand about her cock and bull story being a load of bullshit and if she wanted to see a real stud in action it was a pity she was a few years too late. She presumed whatever he said was meant to be a joke, for he roared with laughter as he said it. But she didn’t ask him to repeat it; in fact, she resolved never to mention the incident again and she prayed that he wouldn’t, for fear that everyone in the hostel would laugh at her as the story spread.

  She spent the rest of the day in the dairy nursing her painful stomach but trying not to let it show. She desperately wanted to keep up the output of milk and said nothing, for no one had any time for a complainer. But when she finally found some privacy to inspect the damage she was not surprised to find that, from the waist down, her normally pale skin was all shades of black and blue. Vera thought of home as she rubbed her hand gently over her painful stomach in the kind of comforting gesture she’d often wished her mother would make. She smiled ruefully. In reality she knew better than to ever expect any real sympathy from Ena. She would have tossed her head and called Vera stupid for making such a mistake in the first place.

  The fog had lifted during the day although there were heavy clouds as Vera made her way back to the hostel and she paused to watch the stream of nightly bombers that filled the sky. No sirens had been sounded but no doubt they would shortly be heard in different parts of London; wherever the planes were heading to drop their deadly loads. Vera shuddered and clutched at her stomach, grateful she didn’t have to run for a shelter. At least she would get a chance to have a rest for a few hours tomorrow. All the girls in her group had been told they would be getting a half a day off over the weekend and she was on the list for a break in the morning.

  ‘Not that there’s much for us to do,’ Jenny had grumbled when the notice went up, ‘we might as well be working.’

  ‘Not at all,’ Margaret sounded perky. ‘I intend to read and write letters.’

  Vera wondered if she might write to Bob or to her mother.

  ‘I want to stay in bed and to sleep until the last possible minute,’ Lily said. ‘At least give my poor hands a chance to recover.’ And she patted her flaming palms together as if to cool them down.

  ‘Is half a day off all we’re ever going to get?’ Jenny asked. ‘I think that’s pretty tough for the hours of work we put in.’

  ‘Don’t worry.’ Margaret assured her, ‘I’m told on good authority that we’ll get a whole day off when we get up to the manor house and it will be good because there’ll be far more to do and people to do it with. I hear they have parties and dances going on up there all the time.’

  ‘Wow! Really? You mean with real men?’ Jenny asked, and Margaret nodded. ‘Oh yes, it will all be quite different when we go there.’ And to Vera’s astonishment, she winked.

  The dinner that marked the end of their first week of work at the training centre contained actual portions of meat and all the girls ate heartily. They had all worked so hard every day but the bread and milk, even though it was readily available, never seemed to fill them. So, when a spotted dick dessert appeared, drowned in a creamy-looking custard, the girls all fell on it and for once no one complained that they were still hungry.

  Chapter 17

  Over the next few weeks the girls had to complete their training and they rotated round all the different tasks that needed to be done on the farm. Vera had the opportunity to learn how to do most of the work that would be expected of her when they moved on to the big house. But if she thought life might get easier when they moved, she found she was very much mistaken. She had no sooner mastered one skill than she was moving on to learn the next, pushing herself to new limits of exhaustion.

  ‘I don’t know about you, but I ache in places I didn’t know I had,’ she said to Lily one evening when the two of them were dragging their weary bodies in from the fields. They had both been on gardening duty; harvesting rows and rows of vegetables and it had been back-breaking work.

  ‘The only thing that amazes me is that I’m getting used to some of the hard work,’ Lily said. ‘Even my hands are getting hardened. After a bit, some of it doesn’t seem so bad. Though don’t tell my mother I said that.’

  ‘Me too!’ Vera nodded in agreement and they both laughed.

  ‘Maybe it won’t be as bad when we get up to the big house,’ Vera said, trying to straighten her back.

  ‘I dunno, from the sounds of it the gardens are twice the size of what they are here.’

  ‘Well, maybe they’ll have twice as many people working on them,’ Vera said.

  ‘At least we’ll get some proper time off when we get there and from the sounds of it there’ll be more people to share it with,’ Lily said.

  They walked in silence for a few moments then Lily said, ‘I don’t think I’ll ever get used to getting up so early every day. I can’t wait to have a full day off when I can stay in bed all day if I want to.’

  ‘At least we get some decent grub here most of the time,’ Vera said, ‘even if there’s not always enough of it.’

  ‘Don’t complain – I’ve found bits of meat floating in the stew sometimes,’ Lily said. ‘And I’ve never even heard of half the vegetables they have here, except for spuds, of course, and we all know about them,’ she said with a laugh.

  ‘It beats my mam’s cooking,’ Vera said, ‘though I know that’s not saying much. I only hope it will be as good up there.’

  By the time they were ready to move up to Holden Manor, Vera’s bruises were reduced to yellows and pinks and the terrible mistake she had made in the cowshed was beginning to fade from her mind. She had mixed feelings about making the move now that she had settled into the centre, but from what she had been able to see of the house from a distance, a part of her felt very excited. There were stories about the kind of accommodation the manor offered, which ranged from sleeping in tents in the extensive grounds to each person having their own bedroom with access to a bath. Vera didn’t know what to believe.

  On the final Friday night at the centre, Mrs Sykes announced in the dining room that the trainees who were leaving would be going on Saturday. ‘That way you will have plenty of time to settle into your new surroundings up at the House, and will be ready to start work fresh, first thing on Monday morning.’

  ‘What, at four o’clock?’ Jenny whispered, reminding them of their first morning in the Centre. ‘We’d probably sleep through the alarm this time.’

  ‘At least we won’t think it’s an air raid warning,’ Lily whispered back and Mrs Sykes glared at her. ‘You will have your beds stripped and your bags packed straight after breakfast – and that includes you, Lily,’ she said pointedly.

  ‘What time will the wagon be picking us up?’ Margaret asked.

  Mrs Sykes frowned. ‘It won’t,’ she said sternly. ‘You will make your own way. It’s only half a mile down the road.’r />
  ‘What about our—’ Jenny began, but Mrs Sykes cut in, ‘I should think carrying your suitcases will feel like nothing to you strong girls by now and you will be given instructions about where to go once you get to the main gate.’

  Chapter 18

  Long-distance views of the manor were deceiving, for what they hadn’t been told was that the house was nearly a mile from the main gate and though they set off at a smart pace along the gravel driveway it wasn’t long before they had to slow down.

  ‘I don’t know about you lot, but my suitcase is getting heavier by the minute,’ Jenny grumbled.

  ‘That’s bound to happen now that it’s begun to rain,’ Margaret called over her shoulder and they agreed to stop to put on their uniform mackintoshes.

  ‘At least I can stop my hair curling,’ Jenny giggled and she pulled her regulation hat as far down over her face as possible.

  The house was set well back from the road which was why they had never seen its full splendour, and when it first came into view as they’d turned the corner into the private drive Lily caught her breath.

  ‘No wonder they call it the big house,’ she said to Vera who was walking beside her. ‘It looked big enough from the top fields at the Centre, but the closer we get, the more magnificent it looks.’

  From that distance it did indeed look beautiful, even in the rain, and they stopped for a moment to admire the original white stone façade that glinted as if it was new.

  ‘It looks like Tara in Gone with the Wind,’ Lily said.

  ‘Whoever would have imagined for one second that we would end up living in anything quite so grand?’ Vera said, gazing at it in awe.

  ‘Don’t get carried away, we’re hardly going to be living in the house itself, now are we?’ Margaret pointed out. ‘And there seems to be lots of signs up there saying, “Keep Out” and “Danger No Admittance”.’