Churchill’s Angels

by Ruby Jackson

  ‘The top of the frock’s too 1920s, Mum, all those beads. I’d look silly.’

  They stood solemnly, drinking their tea and looking at the dresses.

  ‘Mrs Roban,’ said Flora suddenly.

  ‘Who’s Mrs Roban?’

  ‘A refugee. Came to church last week and the Reverend says as she’s looking for work. Seems she worked in Brussels with a … oh, what’s the word, a person that makes expensive clothes? Begins with C.’

  ‘No idea, Mum, but if she’s a dressmaker, maybe she could do something with this. I never had a frock made for me before.’

  When Miss Partridge arrived to do her twice-weekly two hours in the shop, Flora thanked her and told her of the plan. Miss Partridge was thrilled. ‘Oh, now we are helping two people. Reverend Tiverton is sponsoring Mrs Roban and her family – her husband has disappeared, unfortunately – but I wish I’d thought of her, Daisy. She was trained by a well-known couturier. I would hurry over before she becomes too busy.’

  Daisy and her mother left Miss Partridge quite happily in charge of the shop and walked along to Overy Street and across the bridge to the little house that had been found for the Roban family.

  It was almost two hours later before they walked back again, both bursting with feminine delight at the frivolous afternoon they’d had, devoted entirely to talking about clothes.

  This was much more exciting than the last time she had come up to London. The train was just as full but this time her only fear was that she would make a fool of herself in front of Charlie’s father, and not that she would not be found good enough to join the WAAF. The platforms were crowded, lines of children tagged like Christmas parcels, distraught families, military personnel looking for their girls, girls looking for the only one in the crowds in uniform that they wanted to see. And there, sailing through them, and wearing – heavens, was it really a fur coat – came Charlotte Featherstone. The crowds, especially the men, parted for her as the Red Sea is said to have parted for Moses, and then she was at the window. ‘Daisy, how wonderful. So lovely to see you. Come along, the car’s just outside.’

  Daisy stepped down, case in one hand, handbag in the other, and followed in her wake.

  A car was waiting for them outside the station, a very large car with a man, a uniformed chauffeur, standing beside the rear doors. Daisy waited for Charlie to say, ‘Home, James,’ which is what ladies who had chauffeurs said in all the films she had ever seen, but Charlie said nothing except ‘Thank you’ when ‘James’ opened the door for her. She slid across the soft leather seat and Daisy, who had been relieved of her small suitcase by the chauffeur, slid in beside her.

  ‘Poor old London’s had a bit of a bashing, even since we went to Wilmslow, Daisy. Makes me sad and rather angry, but I suppose our boys are pounding chunks out of the enemy too.’

  Daisy said nothing, and not because she was giving herself up to the unexpected luxury but because she could not seem to see ‘the enemy’. Absolutely easy to hate Hitler, his acolytes, and his actions, but was not Germany inhabited by decent people – like Mr Fischer, for instance – who would rather be living a normal life?

  ‘Don’t think about it, Daisy,’ Charlie said, just as she and Daisy were propelled forward onto the floor, where they stayed listening to the wild screeching and squealing of brakes and gears until the car stopped.

  ‘You all right, miss? That hole weren’t there when I come down here last night and I didn’t see it for the smoke an’ haze.’

  ‘We’re fine, Charlie,’ said Charlie, after a nod from Daisy.

  They got out and looked at the great crack on the road’s surface. Three roadmen had been working in and around the hole.

  ‘God in Heaven. How awful if we’d hit them,’ breathed Charlie. ‘Are you men all right?’

  ‘Fine, miss, we ducked. We’re closing the road. It shoulda been done but we’re going in too many directions at the same time.’

  ‘Come on, Ebenezer,’ said Charlie. ‘You need a good strong cup of tea.’

  ‘I thought you called him Charlie.’ They were relaxing as the lovely motorcar moved more smoothly along.

  ‘It’s his name, but when I decided I wanted to be Charlie – and don’t laugh, I was very small – Daddy said he never knew who was going to answer him when he shouted. I call him almost anything except Charlie – usually.’

  A few minutes later they were at Charlie’s London home, a very lovely white building on a wide street of similar buildings. Daisy was relieved when Charlie opened the door herself and ushered Daisy inside. The chauffeur had disappeared down some steps, taking Daisy’s little case with him.

  ‘Let’s go in here and I’ll ring for tea before I show you your room. That chair’s comfy.’

  Daisy was almost afraid to sit in the chair, which seemed to be made of a fine, almost golden wood, and was upholstered in a striped red and gold material. A beautiful dolphin was carved where each arm joined the legs.

  ‘Sit down, Daisy. That takes my father and he’s a lot heavier than you. Tea will be here immediately unless you’d like something stronger.’ Charlie flopped down in a more modern armchair. ‘Welcome to Belgravia.’

  They chatted happily over tea and delicious scones, with cream and raspberry jam, and Daisy began to relax as Charlie chattered on. Voices, she felt, were so important. She could listen to Charlie all day, or to … No, she would not think of Adair Maxwell.

  TWELVE

  Charlie’s father was involved in meetings and so the girls had dinner together in what Charlie called ‘the breakfast room’.

  ‘You look absolutely lovely, Daisy. That dress is a stunner. Could I be very rude and ask you where you got it? It has couturier written all over it.’

  Over the delicious, if fairly simple meal, Daisy told her all about Miss Partridge and Mrs Roban. ‘There was a sash of sorts, Charlie, possibly worn around the neck like a necklace instead of the long strings of pearls flappers wore, but clever Mrs Roban remade the top and turned it into shoulders and these little sleeves. Is it really up to date, Charlie?’

  ‘Absolutely, and Mummy and I will want to have Mrs Roban’s address. She’ll do really well, Daisy.’

  ‘She advertised for any kind of sewing the day after they arrived – put a notice in the post office window. She’s so grateful to be safe in England and wants to earn her keep for herself and her children. Don’t think there’s much chance of finding her husband alive.’

  Charlie jumped up. ‘No gloom this evening. Go powder your nose; we’re meeting Daddy in less than twenty minutes …’

  Six hours later an exhilarated Daisy slipped off her lovely frock in the bedroom that would be the first one that she had ever slept in all alone. The privacy was just another joyful experience. She prepared for bed in her own private bathroom and then climbed into the very feminine bed. She was sure she would never sleep as memories crowded in one after the other: the chauffeur-driven car, the beautiful house, meeting Charlie’s father, who was not at all frightening but as much fun as his daughter, the London theatre, her first visit to a professional theatre and then, as if she had not experienced enough, supper in the elegant and crowded Savoy. What a tale she would have to tell her parents and write to her brothers.

  Deciding to write to Sam and Phil was her last coherent thought. The next thing she knew was when an aproned maid brought in a pot of tea with soldiers of hot buttered toast.

  That evening she arrived back in Dartford just as the air-raid sirens went and, like many others, was forced to take refuge in an overcrowed shelter. She stood pressed up against other people, one of whom smelled rather unpleasantly, and tried to think of nothing but the perfect time she had enjoyed. But her mind would not obey her. Where was her father, who had been coming to meet her? Surely he had found a shelter. Were her mother and sister safe in the refuge room?

  The noise was deafening and it went on and on. Some soldiers tried to start a singsong. ‘Come on, ladies and gents, a few choruses of ‘Roll out th
e Barrel’.’ After a half-hearted attempt at that old song, they tried ‘Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit Bag’ and Daisy sang along as lustily as she could. She was a WAAF; it was her duty and privilege to help, in any way, to win this war. That thought kept her going through the drone of the planes, the booms from bombs and whatever else exploding, and even the sound of their own ack-ack guns firing at the enemy.

  The rather hoarse leader had just begun the fifth repeat of a rather tired ‘The Lambeth Walk’ when the all clear sounded, and the exhausted crowd, too tired and worried to do anything but creep, made their slow way out into the street to a disaster scene. Fires were blazing everywhere, especially on the other side of Mill Pond Road where many of the chemical and munitions factories were situated.

  Daisy, aware that her father must be out there in that mayhem, had no clear idea what to do for the best. Should she stand still and wait, in the hope that he was safe and would come to the shelter nearest the station or should she begin to walk home? Flames lit up this part of town, but once she was beyond the fires, down Hythe Street and as far perhaps as Home Gardens and so well on her way to High Street, it was unlikely that there would be much visibility. Was the sky dark? She could not see because a huge mass of smoke and fire lay between her and any stars that might have dared to shine. Torches, with their lights dimmed, were allowed during blackouts but she had not thought beyond seeing her father at the barrier. She stood for a moment, getting her bearings.

  ‘Come on, our Daisy.’ Her father, covered in smoke and soot, almost hobbled towards her. ‘Firemen need us. You remember how to use a stirrup pump?’

  There was no time to hug, to express their joy that each was alive; that would come later. For now they were fire wardens who knew how to kill incendiaries, how to recognise an unexploded bomb, and how to put out smaller fires.

  ‘The van’s copped it, Daisy, love. We’ll have to walk home,’ said Fred some hours later, and that was when Daisy realised that she had lost her little suitcase, but, much more importantly, her beautiful dress.

  Once in a lifetime, she thought. She said nothing. What was the point? She had no idea where to begin looking and it was almost morning.

  ‘It’s only a dress,’ she mumbled, ‘and not a life.’

  ‘What’s that, love?’

  ‘Saying I’d kill for a cuppa, Dad.’

  ‘Me an’ all, love.’

  Daisy had by now relaxed into her pre-WAAF self and so, towards the end of her leave, she was sitting in the kitchen enjoying a cup of tea with her mother when Mr Churchill broadcast on the radio. Daisy was thrilled. Usually she read reports of his stirring speeches or heard a recording weeks after the broadcast, but here the great man was speaking, as it were, directly to her. He spoke of his belief that Hitler assumed that Britain would cave in after the fall of France. Britain, of course, did not. He wanted the nation to realise that Hitler would certainly be preparing and planning even more horrific attacks on Great Britain but he emphasised his faith in the resilience of the British. Daisy felt herself grow stronger as she listened to the speech. He quoted from a letter sent to him by the President of the United States, Mr Roosevelt. The President had used a poem by Longfellow to tell Mr Churchill what the world thought of Britain. The world, he said, was ‘hanging breathless’ as it waited to learn Britain’s fate. And then the genius that was the Prime Minister had answered the worries. If America supplies us with the tools we need, said Mr Churchill, ‘we will finish the job.’

  ‘And we will, Mum, we will.’

  Flora looked down at her cold tea. ‘That were so stirring, Daisy, I never touched my tea. Let’s have a nice cup of Oxo instead.’

  Dear Mum, thought Daisy. Trying so hard to bury her fears, to steer life back to the ordinary and everyday. But Daisy knew the veneer of cheerfulness was wafer thin.

  Two weeks into her training at her new air base, Daisy was summoned to the squadron leader’s office. She was terrified. She was, she knew, working very hard and learning a great deal. The skilled mechanic who was supervising her was pleased, or so he said, with her progress. So this summons could not be about work. It had to be her family. Who? Phil, Rose? Sam? Had something even more horrifying than prison camp happened to Sam?

  Outside the door she straightened her cap, her tie and her shoulders, then knocked.

  ‘Come in.’

  Tentatively, Daisy opened the door. ‘You sent for me, sir.’

  But it was Wing Commander Anstruther who was in the office, not sitting at the desk but standing at the window staring out, as far as she could see, at nothing. He turned and walked over to the desk. ‘Sit down, Miss Petrie.’

  Oh God, it was bad news, but why him?

  She sat down as correctly as she could on the wooden chair by the desk.

  ‘I’m afraid I have some very bad news for you. A few weeks ago, you were staying with your friend Charlotte in London.’ He waited.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I regret very much having to tell you that the house received a direct hit – on the night you left – and the occupants were killed. Sir Charles Featherstone, his daughter, Charlotte, and two members of staff: the housekeeper and the chauffeur. The maid, Poppy Smith, was seriously injured and, I’m sorry, but when she recovered consciousness, she was quite sure that “Miss Charlotte’s friend” was also in the house.’

  Daisy started up. ‘No, oh, no, please.’ Seeing the understanding look on his face she sank back into the chair. He, too, was suffering. If he had not known Charlie well – and she knew she would never know whether or not that was the case – he was certainly a friend of her parents.

  ‘I’m sorry, but she was so sure of it that Lady Featherstone insisted that they spend time looking for you. Needless to say we are all very happy that you had already left.’ He stood up and lifted a small parcel from the desk. ‘Lady Featherstone asked me to give you this. She says Charlie would have wanted you to have them.’

  He handed her the parcel. ‘Will you be all right?’

  She looked up at him, into the kind eyes that had helped the terrified Charlie climb the wall. ‘Yes, sir,’ she said, and saluted, and the wing commander returned the salute.

  As she left the room she wondered if she was imagining things for she could have sworn she heard him say softly, ‘Do it for Charlie, Daisy.’

  No, a wing commander would never address a mere aircraftswoman second class by her Christian name.

  Back in her hut, she put the parcel in a drawer, changed into her overalls and went back to work where she struggled to keep her over-active mind from working. She saw beautiful, vital Charlie crushed and bleeding under fallen masonry, and then in the exquisite dress she had worn to the theatre and had sworn ‘isn’t a patch on yours, Daisy’, and then white with terror as she climbed the gym wall.

  ‘You’re no’ a bit o’ use tae me the day, Daisy. Wis it bad news, hen?’ the Scots mechanic asked.

  She nodded.

  ‘Then away and hae a hot shower followed by a nice cuppa tea, lotsa sugar. I’ll see you the morn when you’ve turned back intae a mechanic.’

  She stumbled towards the hut, hoping that none of the other girls was there. Turned back into a mechanic. He was said to be the best aircraft mechanic on the base and he had said she was doing well. Do it for Charlie.

  She remembered the little boy and his innocent play on the Heath. I have two of them now, she told herself.

  She burst into healing tears and lay sobbing on her bed until there was not a tear left in her body. How long had she known Charlie? Three months? And yet she felt almost unbearable pain. Nothing, surely, could feel worse than this. She obeyed Scottie’s orders, took a hot shower and drank a pot of hot sweet tea.

  She felt totally exhausted, wrung out like a limp sheet on washing day. She leaned over, took out the precious parcel and opened it. There was a small silver-framed picture of Charlie – in complete flying gear, in the pilot’s seat of a Tiger Moth.

  ‘Oh, modest,
lovely Charlie.’ Daisy smiled but could feel tears – where were they coming from – welling up again. The other little packet held a leather pouch that contained the silver belt.

  ‘Too much, too much.’ She pushed them under the pillow, lay down and sobbed pitifully until she fell asleep.

  Daisy did turn back into a mechanic, so much sothat Sergeant Gordon, the senior mechanic, worried about her.

  ‘There’s lads here would kill tae take you to the dancing, Daisy. You don’t hiv tae marry one o’ them if you hiv a lad elsewhere.’

  Had her mother not said something like that a long time ago?

  ‘There’s a war on, Sarge.’ The girls in her hut asked her constantly to join them on various excursions but somehow she had no appetite for entertainment. Even the suggestion of going dancing, or for a meal out, or to the theatre in nearby Salisbury held no appeal. This course, like the first one, was to last eight weeks. She had left school before she was fifteen years old. She needed to study.

  ‘Very amusing. Daisy, trust me, a wee bit o’ fun never hurt anybody.’

  ‘I know, Sarge, but you’re the best mechanic in the business, everybody says so, and I want to learn everything you can teach me.’

  ‘There’s nowt left for you tae learn but the Highland Fling, and that’s no’ on my list.’ He looked at her questioningly as she sat astride the nose of the plane on which they were working. ‘You went up with that Spitfire pilot?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why? How?’

  ‘I met him before the war. My brothers had taught me a lot about engines and I helped him with his aircraft engine, pretty basic one. He took me up as a thank you.’

  ‘Simple as that.’

  ‘Yes, Sergeant Gordon.’

  ‘Well, Daisy, the exam’s next Saturday. You’ll easy be top. I’ll see if I can gie you a wee push to a base that has flyers on it. You’ll get a bittie leave. Have you a home tae go to?’

  ‘Yes, in Dartford.’