Shipyard Girls 10.The Shipyard Girls on the Home Front

by Nancy Revell

  Like Polly, Gloria suffered from feelings of guilt, even though she knew she had nothing to be guilty about. Her guilt, she realised, came from the fact that her sons had been spared – and hopefully would continue to be spared – while Rosie’s husband had not. Sitting with a cup of tea in her hand and watching Hope play in the Anderson shelter, which had become redundant this past year, turning instead into a poor person’s Wendy house, she resolved to tell Hope about Peter when she was older – and about all the other Peters who had given their lives so that her generation could grow up in a free world devoid of tyrannical masters and the terrors they brought with them. She thanked whatever God there might be that she had Bobby home – safe and sound. Deafness in one ear was an easy trade to make for his life. And as she thought of Bobby, she knew it was time to talk to him. To face up to what she had been running away from.

  Similar thoughts were also going through Bobby’s head. He might not have known Peter, but he’d seen the anguish his death had brought to all the women – and especially to Dorothy and his mam. They were putting on a good show, but at work he could feel their sadness. There was nothing like death to put life into perspective, and he had to admit to himself that his mam’s new fella was a good man. There was obviously, judging by what Dorothy had intimated, a good reason why Jack had not been able to get a divorce – and it was clear there was no need to worry about Hope. She had a happy home. His worries had been unnecessary.

  Lily and George’s worries, however, were far from needless. They knew Rosie was only functioning because of her younger sister. And that Charlotte still needed watching over. Her clinginess might have abated somewhat of late, but she was still fragile and now it was more important than ever that she feel secure. They resolved to push on with their efforts to make the business legitimate – to turn their beautiful bordello into what it purported to be on the outside: a magnificent family home. Lily expressed the hope that if this happened, she might even persuade Rosie and Charlotte to move in with them and rent out Peter’s home. George agreed. Neither thought it would be good to live in the shadow of the past.

  Meanwhile, Kate was busy making Rosie a dress that was as beautiful as it was black. She knew that outside of work, her lifelong friend would not want to be clothed in colour. Not for a good while. Rosie was not one to wear her heart on her sleeve, but her clothes could go some way towards expressing the grief that Kate knew would cling to her for a long while yet.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Dr Eris sneezed, then cursed. She was down in the bowels of the asylum. It was dusty, dirty and dark. All her increasingly foul mood needed now was the bulb to blow.

  But still, needs must. Besides, she had come prepared with a torch. She was determined this would be her only trip down to the basement.

  She hoped Genevieve was right. For a petite older woman, she couldn’t half knock back the booze and she’d had no trouble demolishing three courses. Claire hoped the long and expensive evening she’d suffered would pay dividends.

  She let out a long sigh and pulled out another deep drawer rammed full of bulging files stuffed with yellowing paper. Starting to root through them, she brushed off thick, sticky cobwebs.

  She sneezed again.

  This better be worth it.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Lying in bed, Rosie held Peter’s letter to her heart. He might be gone, but she needed to keep him close – at least his words and his memory. Tonight, as she did every night, she replayed in her head the film of their love affair, starting with how she had met Peter when he came to inform her that her uncle Raymond’s body had been pulled from the Wear. The image of Peter standing in her bedsit was as clear as day. He had been wearing a smart but well-worn black woollen three-piece suit, with a narrow, perfectly knotted dark blue tie; his manner, like his attire, had been the epitome of professionalism.

  Was that really just over three and a half years ago? Somehow it seemed longer.

  Suddenly, Rosie’s eyes flashed open as a thought occurred to her.

  Had that been a sign?

  A death had brought them together, therefore was it not inevitable that their relationship would end with a death?

  Rosie sighed in the darkness.

  Well, if it was a sign of things to come, she hadn’t read it, and even if she had done, she wondered whether she would have paid it any heed, for after that first meeting they’d been drawn to each other – by chance and by an undeniable magnetism.

  Rosie looked up at the ceiling, knowing that sleep was still a long way off. Forcing her eyes closed again, she brought to the forefront of her mind the image of Peter a few months later when she had bumped into him by the docks. Much as she had tried to fight it, she’d been attracted to this older man with his thick, grey-flecked dark hair and intelligent blue eyes. Then – on Valentine’s Day of all days – they’d bumped into each other again and Rosie had agreed to go for a cup of tea with him at Vera’s café. Peter had later admitted that he’d been smitten since first setting eyes on her.

  Rosie smiled to herself in the darkness of her bedroom as she remembered his confession. She too had felt the same way. The chemistry between them had been obvious from the start.

  Their courtship had never been a traditional one – or smooth-running. Rosie had known from the off that she was playing with fire as there was no way that Peter, a detective sergeant, could find out about her ‘other job’. Still, she hadn’t been able to stop herself.

  Rosie opened her eyes and stared at the blackout curtains. She imagined she saw Peter in the shadows. The outline of his trilby hat, clutched in his hand, his coat loose and flapping open as he strode towards her; he always seemed so desperate to reach her. He had admitted later that his attraction towards her was unlike anything he had ever felt before – even with his first wife, whom he had loved dearly. ‘You fascinated and intrigued me,’ he’d told her, ‘and you still do.’

  Rosie folded Peter’s letter.

  They had been together until the day Peter had told her that he had joined the Special Operations Executive. Rosie had been so angry. Every time she remembered that awful night on New Year’s Eve, she cringed, recalling how she had shouted, ‘Damn you, Peter!’ and stomped off. She wished more than anything that she could take those words back. Had those words in fact damned him for real?

  Peter had left town without being able to say goodbye to her. He had written her a letter, but she had received it too late. She had run like the clappers in her hobnailed boots after she’d belatedly read his words – sprinted to the station to catch him, but had missed him by minutes.

  Rosie sat up in her bed and wiped away her tears. Even now she still felt exasperated with herself for being so stubborn and so selfish. She should have been proud of Peter, not furious with him. He was prepared to sacrifice his life for his country and all she could think about were her own feelings. Their time together had been too short and made shorter still by her obstinacy.

  Rosie leant over and switched on her bedside light. It was no use. Tonight, she was not going to sleep. Her body might be tired, but her mind felt on high alert.

  Putting Peter’s letter on the bedside cabinet, Rosie mused that the day she’d missed him at the station, fate had lent a hand. Peter had caught a glimpse of her as his train had left and on arrival in Guildford he had sent a telegram and a travel warrant for her to come and join him, which she had done – and they had married and barely left the hotel suite near the registry office where they had tied the knot. They had called it their hotel. Rosie tried to convince herself that she had been lucky they’d had that wonderful weekend together.

  Getting out of her bed, Rosie retrieved the special box she kept in her wardrobe. It contained the few reminders of her husband she had been left with. Climbing back under the covers, she opened the box and took out the letter she had kept pristine these past two and a half years since she had picked it up from the doormat when she had moved into Brookside Gardens. Peter had sen
t it before leaving on his first assignment. She smiled as she reread his words of love – how wonderful it was being able to call her his ‘wife’, and how happy he was that she had made him her husband – his only regret that he wasn’t there to pick her up and carry her across the threshold.

  Another tear escaped as she read his words of encouragement, telling her how strong and resilient she was.

  How she wished she still was.

  He’d told her that if he didn’t make it back, she had to live ‘this wonderful life we have been given’.

  But it doesn’t feel wonderful, she thought, forcing back more tears.

  She touched a fragile dried petal in the bottom of the box. Peter had sent her an envelope of petals a few months after he had left for France. They were the same as her wedding bouquet. Pansies. They had discussed their meaning – thinking of you. She remembered telling him on their honeymoon, ‘I want you to know I’ll always be thinking of you. When I’m working. When I’m not working. Even when I’m sleeping, I’ll always be thinking of you.’

  How true those words still were.

  Her instincts had told her that Peter would return. That they would have a future together.

  How wrong she’d been.

  And with that thought, more tears came. It was always the same when her mind slipped to the future – a future without Peter in it. The thought of never seeing him again unleashed all the unrelenting, tireless demons of grief. She muffled her cries so that Charlotte would not hear her.

  Eventually they abated. Perhaps now she might be able to sleep.

  She switched off the side light.

  As she started to drift off, she felt Peter’s presence close by. Why did she feel he was still here with her?

  She was keeping him here, in her thoughts – feeling the weight of her love for him. A love that was as strong now as it had ever been, and which she knew would never die. Not for as long as she lived.

  Chapter Forty

  Sainte-Mère-Église

  Wednesday 14 June

  It had been just over a week since the little town six miles inland from Utah Beach in Normandy had been liberated from the Germans; just over a week since the long-awaited and meticulously planned Jour J had finally happened. An old woman, her black shawl pulled tightly around her shoulders even though the weather was mild, walked past a huge mound of bricks and broken glass that had once been a patisserie. It had been derelict for a few years, Leon the baker having disappeared shortly after the Germans had goose-stepped their way into the town. Another boulangerie had opened up nearer to the market square, and so Leon’s old shop had slowly gone to rack and ruin. Now the two-storey building was totally demolished, razed to the ground by Jerry’s last-ditch attempt to reclaim a town that had never been theirs. The old woman covered her mouth with her shawl; the smell of burnt wood, soot and foul, stagnant water still lingered in the air. And there was another smell. One they had all become familiar with – death.

  She stood for a moment and said a prayer for those who had been killed, and a prayer of thanks that their lives had not been sacrificed in vain. After four years of occupation – of living in fear and hearing the tongue of the Hun – they were once again free to come and go as they pleased, without the fear of saying or doing something that would bring them to the attention of their captors.

  Now they heard American voices, but they did not mind – not one bit – for the brave paratroopers had come and saved them all. Her grandson and granddaughter, whom she was going to see now, would be able to grow up speaking the language of their forefathers and carrying on their Gallic traditions, not those of the Fatherland. She muttered another prayer of thanks and touched the rosary beads in her pocket as her mind wandered to what their futures might have been.

  ‘Merci Dieu,’ she muttered, crossing herself.

  Looking across the azure skyline, her attention settled on the steeple of their ancient church. A parachute was still flapping in the breeze. The story going round the village was that the paratrooper had hung there for several hours while the battle raged around him and the church bells rang non-stop in his ears. She heard he had been cut down and captured by the Nazis but had later escaped.

  She walked on, thinking of what she would cook her grandchildren for their evening meal. As she shuffled her way around the demolished building, her eye caught a movement. It was a big rat scurrying over the ruins. There’d been an increase of them since the fighting and the bombings. ‘Charognards!’ Scavengers! As she shouted, she grabbed a rock by the side of the pathway and chucked it with considerable force for a woman so old and arthritic.

  ‘Va au diable!’ The rock missed the rat but hit some soot-encrusted debris at the top of bomb site, causing it to tumble down the side like a miniature avalanche, taking other bricks and remnants with it. She was just about to carry on walking when she stopped and squinted hard, silently cursing her failing eyesight. What was that in the rubble? She made to go, but still something stopped her continuing on her way. She took a step forward. Squinted again. Mon Dieu! Was that a hand she could see? Or were her eyes playing tricks on her? No, she was sure it was a hand, the skin blackened with dirt.

  A young boy ran past her, catching her long skirt as she did so.

  ‘Garçon!’ she shouted out.

  The boy stopped and looked apologetically at the old woman.

  ‘Pardonnez-moi,’ he said, thinking the old witch was annoyed with him.

  The old woman shook her head, showing she was not angry, but puzzled. She pointed to the mound of bricks – to what she was certain was a man’s hand.

  ‘Gee whiz!’ the young French boy exclaimed. He had been learning a few American expressions. His mouth remained open, revealing a wad of chewing gum.

  ‘Regardez! Regardez!’ She flapped her free hand towards the ruins.

  The boy didn’t need any encouragement. He ran over, scrabbling across bricks and debris to the spot where he had seen the hand.

  The old woman watched as the boy started flinging bricks to the side. Suddenly, he stopped. He swivelled around to face the old woman.

  ‘C’est un homme!’ he cried out. It’s a man!

  The boy started frantically throwing stones and bricks to the side. After a few moments, he stopped and stood up straight. Turning to the old woman, his expression was crestfallen.

  ‘Il est mort,’ he said. Looking down at the mop of blond hair, he thought the figure would have looked German were it not for his French clothes.

  ‘Venez!’ the old woman shouted.

  The boy was about to do as he was told when he heard something.

  A muffled banging sound, which seemed to be coming from deep within the ruins.

  Chapter Forty-One

  Thursday 15 June

  Toby and Sergeant MacLeod were sitting in the smaller of the two conference rooms at RAF Harrington. The place was empty apart from Miss Sterling, the secretary, who sat at her desk at the far end of the room. The two men had been chatting about the recent air raids on London by what Germany was calling its ‘secret weapon’ – the V-1 flying bomb.

  ‘At least only four out of eleven of the damn things hit their targets,’ Toby said, pushing a clean ashtray across the desk.

  ‘Six dead, though,’ Sergeant MacLeod said gravely, casting a quick look over at Miss Sterling. They had been discussing the ‘doodlebugs’ over drinks last night. They had only just started to court and so were trying to keep their burgeoning romance under wraps for the time being.

  ‘Revenge for France,’ he added as he lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply.

  They were quiet for a moment.

  ‘What’s the total of SOE casualties so far?’ Toby asked.

  ‘There’s been at least a hundred and twenty-four either killed, wounded, missing or taken prisoner. At this stage, we’re not sure how many are actually dead and how many have been captured,’ Sergeant MacLeod informed him. He didn’t need to look up the figures; the growing number of those rep
orted or presumed dead was imprinted on his mind.

  ‘I hope one day the sacrifices these men have made are honoured. They really are our unsung heroes,’ said Toby.

  ‘I cannae agree more, sir,’ Sergeant MacLeod said, again shooting Miss Sterling a quick look and giving her a sad smile. ‘Let’s hope when all this is over, people realise that sabotage can cripple an army.’

  Toby nodded. ‘Albeit at a cost.’

  The two men were again quiet for a moment. The stillness was broken only by Miss Sterling gently tapping on her typewriter.

  ‘Right, back to the job in hand,’ Toby said, getting up and walking over to the large map pasted on the back wall. He tapped his swagger stick on a place near to the French capital. ‘About these drops …’ He rubbed his jaw as he inspected the terrain around the city. The second front was pushing inland. More soldiers and supplies were needed.

  Suddenly, the phone rang. It sounded loud due to the acoustics in the near-empty conference room.

  ‘It’s for you, sir!’ Miss Sterling called out across the half a dozen desks that separated her from the two men.

  Toby walked back over to his desk and picked up the receiver. There was a click and the caller was connected.

  ‘Hello, Lieutenant Mitchell speaking.’ Toby tried to add a modicum of warmth to his tone, but failed. He was weary. This past week the deaths of his men had been weighing heavily on him.