Churchill’s Angels

by Ruby Jackson

  Fred’s gaze followed her pointing finger. They had just experienced the first raid of the war but a sign showed that life had to try to go on.

  ‘Luncheons for one shilling and sixpence, and they’re advertising Loman Ales. We could all go on Sunday after church. Do us good. Six shillings for four and then a few shillings for drinks and a tip. Your mum couldn’t do that at home. I’d have walked right past that, Rose. May I take you to luncheon on Sunday, madame?’

  ‘You’re ever so kind, sir,’ she teased, fluttering her eyes at him, ‘but I can’t. I’m going to teach physical jerks at the factory. Big posters all over the walls. “Fitness in Defence”, they’re calling it, and besides, we’re probably doing an extra shift, Sunday. You should do some classes with the wardens; some of them look like they need exercise. It’s direct from the Government, Dad, and I bet you can still shin up a tree faster than any of us.’

  ‘I think I’ve enough to do, Rose Petrie. I’m needed in the shop and will be even more when Daisy goes, and now that the raids have started I’ll spend hours patrolling my area and helping when I can, and assessing damages and reporting it when I can’t.’

  They had reached the back door of the shop. Just inside was the staircase to the flat. Fred moved to put his key in the lock.

  ‘What do you mean, Dad, Daisy going? She hasn’t said nothing to me. Has she had a letter?’

  ‘Not yet. She was excused with the boys away and me needing another driver, but your mum can manage the shop and, I hates to say it, but them Preston lads is good workers. We’ve even had a couple of Mum’s beetle drive ladies saying they could use a few hours’ work. Daisy wants to join the WAAF and we can’t hold her back.’

  FIVE

  The film was everything they had hoped it would be. It was called Storm in a Teacup and was touted as being very amusing. It was. Daisy thought it hilariously funny and Vivien Leigh the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. Sally, though, was still very faithful to her first favourite, Margaret Lockwood.

  Daisy would not be so juvenile as to tell Sally, but it had also been really lovely to spend an entire evening with her. Their old school friend, Sally, a rising actress, was more glamorous and elegant than ever. She might be well on her way to becoming a real star, but inside, Sally seemed little changed since the days when they had played together in the playground or on the floor of the projectionist’s room at the cinema.

  ‘I don’t think we’ve had an evening – all four of us – since that party you gave for me, Daisy, just before war was declared.’

  ‘Feels as if that was a long time ago. Do you think we all seem much older because of the war? Don’t know about you, Sally, but I feel a hundred years old sometimes.’

  ‘You don’t look it. I miss us all getting together. Don’t know what’s happening to Grace. I don’t think she’s forgiven me for laughing at Sam, and now he’s gone too.’

  ‘Missing, not gone, Sal. We’ll soon find out where he is. I think Grace has what our lovely vicar calls issues, things, probably from her early childhood, which she has to come to terms with. Maybe she’ll tell us, maybe she won’t. She knows we’re here.’

  ‘Hope you’re right. Gosh, I forgot to tell you. Dad says he’s getting Wings of the Morning back for reshowing. Did you see it? It was the very first colour film made in England. You’ll love it, lots of horses and – Henry Fonda.’ Sally said his name as if it were written in huge lights before her. ‘His eyes are incredible, look right into you. He is just so … so …’

  Such intensity made Daisy slightly uncomfortable. She decided to tease Sally. ‘Sally Brewer, you haven’t, you know …?’

  ‘Wash your mouth out with soap, Miss Petrie. I’m saving myself for Clark Gable.’

  ‘Now you’re talking,’ said Daisy, who had sat, motionless and almost breathless, through Gone with the Wind three times, and would probably have seen it more often but for the fact that it had to be sent to the next cinema on a long list of waiting customers.

  They were laughing the way they had laughed together as schoolgirls. It felt good.

  ‘Damn.’ Sally had tripped over a rough part of the pavement.

  Daisy grabbed her. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Fine, frightened the life out of me, that’s all. I really hate being in the dark. Feeling your way around, not knowing who is near you, is one of the worst parts of blackouts. Creepy.’

  Daisy could think of nothing to say.

  They had reached the Brewers’ little house. ‘Come in and have some hot chocolate.’

  ‘Can’t, Sally. Dad’s in the markets tomorrow and customers’ll be at the door before eight.’

  They hugged, promised to see each other before too long, and Sally let herself into her house. Daisy hurried on towards home, being as careful as she could, still moving with the many other people who had been at the cinema. In less than five minutes she would be climbing the stairs to her comfy bed.

  The air-raid sirens seemed to blare from every factory in Dartford. The frightening noise filled the air and sent people stumbling and running towards the nearest shelters. Dartford had prepared well, and there were excellent shelters on the streets and in the basements of department stores.

  Daisy found a seat beside a rather large but very pleasant woman, who smelled, unfortunately, of disinfectant, and prepared to wait it out with as much fortitude as possible. There was a light, limited but still a light, and seats. So many people had packed into the shelter that it was warm. Even inside this concrete box, however, they could hear the droning of enemy planes and the ack-ack and rat-tat, rat-a-tat of guns, both friend and enemy. Low booming sounds were heard and then the floor of the shelter seemed to shake as something heavy thudded down near to it.

  ‘That’s a bomb,’ came a frightened man’s voice. ‘Right beside us. God ’elp us. It goes off and we’re all done for. I’m getting out.’

  He tried to force his way to the entrance but was stopped by several men. ‘You’re safer in here, lad. Sit yourself down and think of something else. Anyone know a good song?’

  Immediately a rousing chorus of ‘Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit Bag’ began. The air was soon full of singing voices, the smells of unwashed bodies and of too much cheap perfume. Not a nice mix, thought Daisy, as she tried to think calm thoughts. She was beginning to relax when there was a piercing scream.

  ‘Help her, help her, my sister’s having a baby.’

  The singing grew quieter and quieter and above it rose the distressed sounds of someone young trying hard not to scream.

  ‘Quiet, everyone,’ came a voice of obvious authority. ‘Anyone here with any medical knowledge?’

  The woman beside Daisy sighed, said, ‘No rest for the wicked,’ and stood up. ‘I’m a hospital nurse,’ she said. ‘Anyone else know anything, even how to hold someone’s hand?’

  Feeling as cold as ice, Daisy forced herself to follow the nurse. Holding hands I can do, holding hands I can do, she repeated to herself as she found herself, the nurse, and a thin woman kneeling on the cold cement floor beside two very frightened young girls, one of whom was possibly about to have a baby.

  The thin woman looked at the girl and then at the nurse and whispered, ‘I’ve ’ad three as lived; should remember something.’

  ‘Very encouraging,’ said the nurse. ‘How far on?’ she asked the young woman and when she said nothing she asked, ‘Come on, pet, seven months, eight?’

  ‘She doesn’t know.’ The sister was stroking the whimpering girl’s forehead.

  ‘Is her husband here?’

  ‘Missing since Dunkirk.’

  Daisy was holding the pregnant girl’s cold and very small hand. She’s younger than I am; she has a missing husband and she’s worried sick and terrified of having a baby. ‘There, there,’ she soothed. ‘It’s going to be all right. This lady is the best nurse in the whole of Kent, you know, and she’ll take super care of you.’

  ‘Good girl,’ whispered the nurse. ‘Carry on
talking to her while I have a look. Shine that light here, please, Warden, and would you hold your coat up to give us some privacy.’

  The girl had stopped sobbing and although she moved in embarrassment and discomfort, she seemed to be calmer. Her sister kneeled on the floor beside her, holding her other hand, and Daisy chattered about the film she had just seen.

  ‘We was there,’ said the sister. ‘Rex Harrison’s ever so ’andsome, isn’t he?’

  There was no time for Daisy to reply as the nurse had straightened up with a smile. ‘Baby’s in no hurry, love. False alarm. You had a bit of a fright but everything’s fine.’

  Daisy’s first emergency was over and she hoped she had been of some use.

  ‘Thanks, pet.’ The tired nurse, who had arranged with the ARP warden that the girl would be taken home by car, turned to Daisy as they stood together outside the shelter watching them leave. The all clear must have sounded but neither was aware of actually hearing it. ‘Our “three as lived” wasn’t much of a bargain; God knows what she’d have done if that child had been in labour, but you kept your cool. Well done. If my bike hasn’t been pinched, I’ll be in bed and sound asleep in five minutes. Far to go?’

  ‘Just down the High Street. Can’t say as I really enjoyed that, Nurse, but I did like working with you and helping a bit. Good night.’

  ‘Go careful, lass.’

  ‘You too.’

  Daisy managed to straighten her cramped limbs. Somehow she felt a bit flat, though she was sure that she should have been exhilarated. After all, had she not actually helped a young pregnant woman? She had stayed calm. She prayed with all her might that the baby would grow up to be a happy person, surrounded by love, if not by wealth, and that the father would return safely from some prison camp. She followed the crowds along the pavement. How quickly the days had grown shorter. Surely at this time only a few weeks ago she had cycled across Dartford Heath in lovely summer twilight.

  She was so busy thinking that she had bumped into a bulky figure without noticing. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she began just as the man, for it was a man, started to say exactly the same thing. They laughed and began again but then stopped, again in tandem. She would know that lovely voice anywhere. She had not looked up into his face and could scarcely bring herself to do so now. Adair … It was Adair Maxwell and he was very solidly and healthily alive.

  ‘Well, if it isn’t my favourite aircraft mechanic. Daisy, how absolutely splendid to bump into you. I was on my way to your shop, hoping someone would still be awake, when the raid started. We ran and literally fell into a trench in the park. I can still smell it so I apologise. Now I have to get some chums back to base.’ He gave her no time to talk. ‘Are you alone? Are you on your way home? We’ll drop you off, if you don’t mind perching in a military vehicle – if it hasn’t been totalled, that is. Not good to be out alone in a blackout.’

  ‘No, yes,’ she began but he had taken her arm by the elbow. Sally would be impressed. They had seen Trevor Howard hold a woman’s arm like that in a film.

  Two other men in air force uniforms were with Adair, ‘Toby and Simon,’ he introduced them, ‘but ignore them; they’re not fit for you to know, especially after they’ve been face down in a ditch.’

  Toby and Simon laughed. ‘We didn’t believe there was an angel in Dartford who made sick planes better,’ one of them said. ‘But, wicked Adair, why did you fail to tell us that the angel had soft brown hair and lovely, lovely eyes?’

  ‘Because I didn’t want you two to know, and as for the angel bit, I told you I never lie. Upbringing.’

  ‘Me, I always lie,’ said either Simon or Toby, and the other immediately said, ‘Upbringing,’ and all three laughed.

  Their vehicle was still in one piece although they had been very lucky as there was a large hole in the road almost beside it.

  The airmen looked, without speaking, at the hole.

  ‘Right, boys,’ said Adair after a few moments of deep thought, ‘best to lift it.’

  To Daisy’s amazement, they picked up the small truck or Jeep or whatever it was and carried it over the hole to an undamaged stretch of road.

  Adair then lifted Daisy into the back of the vehicle and turned to the others. ‘I need to talk to Daisy, lads. One of you two drive, and I suggest that means the one who’s drunk the least.’

  He then gave them directions to Daisy’s home and with something of a screech and a squeal of tyres, they set off.

  ‘How are you, Daisy?’

  ‘I was … we were all worried … Alf and Nancy, I mean.’

  ‘It’s been hell,’ he said, and then went quiet.

  Daisy, so aware of him that she was scarcely able to breathe, plucked up courage to speak. ‘You were at Dunkirk. We read Mr Churchill’s speech in June. It was wonderful.’

  He grabbed her hands and, aware that he did not know that he was hurting her, Daisy did not struggle.

  ‘Dunkirk was a nightmare, not just the hours but the scenes we saw, the knowledge of how little we were able to do, watching men drowning or being strafed as we tried to fight off the Luftwaffe. I don’t want to talk about it …’ He gulped. ‘But I want you to believe that in the past two months, if I had been able to get back to The Old Manor, I would have been there.’

  She said nothing because she did not have the words but she continued to hold his hands. She was in the cockpit with him, looking down at the water tinged with blood, seeing heads bobbing up and down, hearing cries for help. Was Sam there? Was Phil?

  ‘Do you believe me, Daisy?’ he broke the silence.

  She was startled, so far into his scenario had she gone. ‘Of course, and I’m pleased that you are safe.’

  ‘Watch out, you idiot.’ The voice came from the front.

  ‘Sorry, but damn it, I can’t see a bloody thing. Grandfather said that someone used to run in front of him with a lamp. Where’s the bugger when I need him?’

  ‘Language, language, lady present. I apologise for my … associates,’ said Adair, and Daisy laughed. Never before had she been called a lady. It sounded rather nice.

  The laughter had lightened the atmosphere. ‘I have a forty-eight-hour pass, Daisy. I rang Alf to let him know that I was coming. We need to get her up tomorrow. Will you come?’

  ‘To see her fly?’

  ‘Well, yes, but to fly with me. There’s nothing like a first flight, Daisy. I can’t explain what it feels like to be up there looking down and looking up too. It can’t be explained, only experienced. Are you free, Daisy, for the afternoon at least?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘of course.’ She would worry about Saturday being the shop’s busiest day later.

  Flora still spent a great deal of time looking out of the windows and listening for the postman, but she determined to try to be brave and not to allow her rising despair to blight the lives of the already suffering members of her family she had around her. Usually a whirlwind of activity, she sat quietly in her front room or in her kitchen and allowed the rooms to fill up with the remembered happy voices of a large family. Two adults and five children had lived and laughed and, yes, sometimes cried in this tired-looking flat. ‘I’ll make new curtains,’ she told the echoes with a sniff. ‘New curtains’ll brighten us all up and my Sam’ll notice, although I’ll have to hold ’em up under Phil’s nose. Daisy’ll help me; good with her fingers, our Daisy, comes of being small built, I suppose.’

  She stood up, determined to pull herself together and stop moping. Women all over England were waiting and hoping, and here was Flora Petrie behaving as if she was the only one entitled to twiddle her fingers. First step was to give Daisy the afternoon off.

  Flora sat down abruptly. ‘I’m going to lose her too, my baby. That pilot lad’ll fill ’er head with dreams an’ we won’t be able to hold her down. She’ll fly like his damn plane.’

  ‘Time for a cuppa, Mum?’ Daisy had come up from the shop.

  With an incredible force of will, Flora stood up and smiled. ‘I was
just thinking, pet, that we need new curtains in the front room – cheer it up a bit for the boys coming home.’

  ‘Great idea, Mum. I’ll give you a hand.’

  ‘Not this afternoon, you won’t. You’d best tidy yourself up if you’re going flying.’ She lifted a folded newspaper and held it out. ‘Look, there’s an ad in the Chronicle. Heddles on Lowfield Street’s got flannel slacks at five shillings the pair; lovely turn-ups on the legs, very smart. Perfect for flying. Be a bit windy up there, I should think.’

  ‘Oh, Mum, thank you.’ Daisy held out her arms and her mother moved quickly to hug her.

  ‘Dad and me’ll pay. Go on down and tell him you’re running over to Heddles and I’ll take him down a cuppa in two ticks.’ Before Daisy had a chance to reply, she carried on. ‘Grey or dark blue would be ever so smart and useful, and you could wear them with your pale blue blouse and my dark blue cardigan.’

  ‘But, Mum, that was your Christmas—’ began Daisy.

  ‘It’s a bit tight on me, love, and you’ll be a right smasher in it. When I finish these socks I’ll knit you a new one. I found some ever so pretty buttons in my button tin, never used.’

  Daisy hugged her again. ‘Thanks, Mum,’ she whispered, and turned and hurried back to the shop. She could be forgiven for wondering if the airmen and her mother were right about her appearance. The lads hadn’t called her a smasher exactly but they had sort of said she was pretty, hadn’t they?

  A few moments later, Flora heard the friendly ping of the doorbell. She stood for a moment with her arms tightly wrapped around as much of her body as she could reach before taking a deep breath and going into the kitchen. Life had to go on.

  Daisy cycled out to Old Manor Farm. Her dad, as the van owner, was only allowed two hundred miles a week, and deliveries on two days could easily take care of that. Daisy used a rather elderly bike that had a large basket on the front for local deliveries these days, but she rode her own lighter one for the trip out to the farm.

  As she cycled along leafy country lanes, hearing only the occasional sound of growing lambs plaintively reminding their mothers that lunch time had arrived, and smelling the clean, warm smell of ripening crops, she hoped fervently that the air would not be filled with the shrieking of the sirens. Hardly likely, she decided, that a Messerschmitt would come speeding towards her across buttercup-filled, rolling meadows. Her very flattering new flannels would be absolutely ruined if she were forced to dive into the ditch.