Victory for the East End Angels

by Rosie Hendry

  ‘She’s blooming, apparently, and Harry’s fussing around her like an old mother hen, so she told me when she came onto the telephone.’ Connie poured herself a cup of tea. ‘And it means of course that you will become an aunt.’

  ‘An aunt who’ll no doubt lead her niece or nephew into mischief,’ Bella said.

  Winnie laughed. ‘Isn’t that what aunts are supposed to do? Rather like godmothers.’ She looked at Connie who raised her eyebrows back at her.

  ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Connie said, feigning innocence.

  ‘You have done far more interesting and exciting things with me and my brothers than our parents ever did,’ Winnie said. ‘Though I’m sure Harry and Meredith will be much better parents than ours were to us. I know Meredith would never leave her child for someone else to look after, like ours did.’

  ‘Who looked after you?’ Rose asked.

  ‘We had an ayah, darling Sita, who was much more of a mother to us than our own.’ Winnie paused for a moment, remembering how much love Sita had shown them and how much it had hurt to leave her behind when Winnie had left India and been sent to boarding school in England. She still missed the loving Indian woman very much and wrote to her often.

  ‘I’m sure you’re right.’ Connie offered the teapot round for more cups of tea. ‘Perhaps your parents will enjoy being grandparents much more than they did parents.’

  Winnie laughed. ‘I very much doubt that, the only thing my mother would be interested in is bossing Harry and Meredith around to do things the way she thinks they should be done. Luckily, my brother and his wife have minds of their own and aren’t afraid to follow what they believe is right. They’ll most definitely look after their child the way they want to, and it will certainly be a whole lot better than my mother’s method.

  Chapter 7

  Station Officer Violet Steele stood by the common room window of Station 75 looking down at the activity in the courtyard below. Crew members were busy making the daily checks on their ambulances, topping up oil and water, measuring tyre pressure and cleaning the vehicles until they were spotless, or at least as clean as they could get the battle-scarred ambulances to be – all of them bore dents from where they’d been caught by falling rubble or from where bits of shrapnel had landed on them, embedding into the vehicle’s bodywork.

  ‘You all right, boss?’ Sparky came over and stood beside her.

  She glanced at him and shook her head. ‘I’m worried, Sparky. The crews are looking tired and strained.’

  ‘Well that ain’t surprising, is it? Not with the bleedin’ Jerries bombing us again.’ Sparky folded his arms across the front of his navy overalls. ‘I’d got used to spending the whole night asleep in my bed but now we’re either runnin’ for the shelter and not getting much sleep in there or laying there awake waiting for the siren to go off. And if you do drop off, you’ll only be woken up by the Moaning Minnie starting to wail.’

  Station Officer Steele sighed. ‘Do you think it will go on as long as the last Blitz?’

  ‘I bleedin’ hope not! I just wish they’d get on with the invasion and go and sort Hitler out. ’im and his army have done more than enough damage to this country and wherever else they’ve turned their greedy sights.’

  ‘I don’t think Churchill’s going to order an invasion until the weather’s better.’ She looked out the window at the grey sky, where the clouds hung low and heavy, and were being buffeted along by a strong wind. ‘Hopefully in the summer, when the weather should make it easier to land forces and the soldiers won’t have to battle through mud and freezing weather. It was bad enough in the Great War, and they were only battling over small distances – this time our army will have a lot further to go.’

  ‘I suppose you’re right but let’s ’ope we don’t keep getting bombed right up until then,’ Sparky said, before leaving the lookout post and going back down to the courtyard to carry on working on his own ambulance.

  Station Officer Steele watched the crews for a few more minutes, hoping that there wouldn’t be another air raid again tonight and that they could catch up on some precious sleep. With London being once more at the mercy of the bombers, it made her glad that her sister and two nieces had gone to live with her parents down in Devon. They’d considered staying in London with her, but she’d persuaded them to move out to the safety of the countryside, knowing that the bombers could and probably would come back at any time.

  Her sister and her two girls had already been through enough, she thought, having escaped from Singapore when the Japanese invaded, fleeing to South Africa, then boarding a ship to bring them back to England, only to have it torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine. They’d been lucky to survive and had even spent some time in a camp in North Africa before finally arriving home on Christmas Eve of 1942, which was the best present that she’d ever had.

  It had been a horribly worrying time not knowing where they were and what had happened to them. At least with her sister and nieces now safely in Devon she didn’t have to worry about them, and she could focus her attention fully on running Station 75 and the well-being of her crews. With the bombing and sleep deprivation clearly beginning to take its toll, she needed to keep a close eye on her crew and do what she could to keep up their spirits - and she knew what might be just the ticket to help.

  Leaving her lookout spot, she headed for the kitchen where Mrs Connelly, Station 75’s cook, was busy preparing their midday meal helped by Hooky, who used to be Winnie’s attendant but now worked in the kitchen.

  ‘Mrs Connelly.’ Station Officer Steele smiled at the older woman who was busy rolling out pastry to put on top of the pie she was making, her grey curls bobbing about as she worked. ‘I have a favour to ask of you: would you be able to make some carrot buns for the crew to have on their tea break this afternoon, please?’

  The cook stopped rolling and looked at her. ‘If I’ve got enough carrots, I will. They went down a treat last time I made them, as I recall.’

  Station Officer Steele nodded, remembering how pleased the crew had been to have the carrot buns which were surprisingly sweet considering the lack of sugar in them.

  ‘Yes, they were extremely popular and had to be divided up fairly so that everybody had their equal share. And I’m sure they’ll be delighted to have some more. I think we could all do with a treat with this bombing going on again, don’t you? Thank you, Mrs Connelly, I appreciate it very much and I’m sure everybody else will too.’

  Chapter 8

  Frankie smudged the pencil shading with her finger, blending it until she was satisfied with how it looked, then she added a few more strokes until she was happy with her drawing of Trixie who lay curled up fast asleep on one of the armchairs in Station 75’s common room. It was afternoon break, but the common room was quiet for once. Winnie and Rose had gone out to do their weekly voluntary work at the American Eagle club and Bella had gone to the post office to send off her latest story to a magazine.

  The ringing telephone in Station Officer Steele’s office made Frankie jump and woke Trixie up. She stroked the little dog’s ears, straining to listen to the boss’s voice as she answered, trying to work out if it was a call-out to an incident or not. There hadn’t been an air raid, but sometimes they were sent to take patients to hospital if the other Ambulance Service was busy, but as far as she could make out from what the boss said it didn’t seem like it.

  ‘Frankie!’ Station Officer Steele called as she hurried out of her office and, standing in the doorway, beckoned her. ‘Come quick, there’s someone who wants to speak to you.’

  Frankie hurried to the office. Who would be ringing her? Was Stanley ill? ‘Is it Stanley, is he all right?’

  Station Officer Steele just smiled at her, her brown eyes warm behind her owlish horn-rimmed glasses, and nodded to the telephone receiver which lay waiting on her desk. ‘Go on, pick it up and find out.’ And without saying any more she left the office, closing the door behind her.

  With h
er heart racing, Frankie picked up the receiver. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Frankie, it’s me!’

  She knew that voice instantly, with its beautiful Scottish accent – it was Alastair.

  ‘Alastair! Are you all right?’

  He laughed, the rich sound coming down the wires. ‘Absolutely. I’m back, my ship’s just docked in Clydeside, in Scotland, and I’ll be seeing you soon.’

  ‘You’re in Scotland, but how? I thought you were still in Egypt.’

  ‘Not any more, I’ve been sent home for a while and I want to make good that promise I made to you before I left, remember? I want us to be married when I come down to London. That’s if you still want to.’

  Frankie laughed. ‘Of course I do. When will you be ’ere?’

  ‘Since I’m in Scotland I’m going to see my mother for a few days and then I’ll come down to London.’ Frankie could hear some other voices in the background. ‘Look, I’ll have to go, there’s a big queue for the telephone, lots of the men who came off my ship want to ring someone. I can’t wait to see you again, Frankie. I’ll be in touch and let you know when I’ll arrive in London. Goodbye.’

  ‘Goodbye,’ Frankie said. ‘I . . . ’ But the line went dead, he was gone.

  She slowly replaced the telephone receiver, feeling a maelstrom of emotions: shock, elation and excitement. Alastair was home! And she’d see him in a matter of days. Her worry over not hearing from him for weeks had instantly evaporated with the knowledge that he was safe and well, and on top of that, he wanted to get married, and soon!

  The door of the office opened, and Station Officer Steele looked in. ‘Everything all right?’

  Frankie nodded and smiled. ‘Alastair’s coming ’ome! And he wants us to get married.’ Saying it out loud to someone made it even more real.

  ‘That’s marvellous.’ The boss walked across the room and put her arm around Frankie. ‘I’m so pleased, I know you’ve been worried about him. So, are you going to get married then?’

  ‘Yes, we’ve got the chance and I’m goin’ to grab it. I’d thought I wouldn’t see him again until the war was over but now . . . ’ Her voice wavered.

  ‘It’s wonderful news and I’m very happy for you. When is he arriving?’

  ‘In a few days and then we can get married. It will ’ave to be a rushed wedding, nothing fancy, as long as we can be married that’s all that matters.’

  ‘I’ll do everything I can to help you, and I’m sure the others will too,’ Station Officer Steele said. ‘You can use my wedding dress if you like. It will need altering a bit, of course, like it was for Winnie, but you might have other ideas, so I won’t be offended if you don’t want it.’

  Frankie looked at her boss, touched by her offer. ‘I’d love to wear it, thank you. It’s a beautiful dress and I’d be honoured to get married in it.’

  The older woman beamed at her. ‘That’s one thing settled then. Where will you get married?’

  ‘My local church where my grandparents were married, and where I was christened, that’s if the parson will allow it – we’d ’ave to get a special licence as there wouldn’t be time for the usual banns to be read, but that ain’t nothing unusual these days.’

  ‘We’d better start a list.’ Station Officer Steele sat down at her desk and picked up a pen and paper and started to write.

  Frankie sat down in the chair beside the desk, marvelling at how things could change in a matter of minutes. Just moments ago, she’d been drawing Winnie’s little dog and now here she was, thinking about what needed to be done to get married!

  ‘Married!’ Winnie stared at Frankie for a few moments before throwing her arms around her; she was closely followed by Bella and Rose whose equally stunned faces were now smiling broadly. Her friends were all clearly delighted at the news.

  ‘When?’ Bella said, loosening her hold on Frankie and stepping back to look at her. ‘And where?’

  Frankie told them all about what she and the boss had talked about and what needed to be done. ‘I was ’oping you three would be my bridesmaids.’

  ‘Absolutely, try and stop us,’ Winnie said. ‘Bella, you could wear the silk dress you wore for my wedding and I could wear the one Frankie wore, and Rose, I’ve got just the perfect dress for you, too.’

  ‘I don’t know if I should, you’ve both known Frankie so much longer than me,’ Rose said.

  ‘That don’t matter,’ Frankie said. ‘You’re like a sister to me and I truly would like you to be my bridesmaid as well.’

  Rose’s face flushed prettily, and she smiled. ‘Then I would be delighted, thank you, Frankie, I am honoured that you asked me.’

  ‘Well,’ Winnie said, her hands on her hips, ‘we’ve got a wedding to arrange and look forward to – this is going to be fun.’

  Frankie smiled at her dear friends. She couldn’t imagine getting married without them by her side.

  Chapter 9

  Bella couldn’t sleep. She lay on one of the mattresses on the floor of the women’s rest room at Station 75. Around her she could hear the soft, rhythmic breathing of other sleeping crew members who were taking advantage of the air-raid-free night to catch up on some sleep. She was tired, the lack of sleep from spending half of last night in the Underground made her body feel heavy and sluggish. However, her mind wouldn’t rest and allow her to drop off, she kept thinking about her brother Walter, wondering where he was and if he was still alive.

  It was no good lying there going over and over the same questions which she had no answer to, she decided. If she got up, then she could do some writing – at least thinking about characters and their stories would help distract her own thoughts. Bella got up and quietly tiptoed her way between the mattresses, glad of the sliver of light coming in from under the door which safely guided her past her sleeping colleagues.

  After making herself a cup of tea in the common room’s kitchen area, she settled down at the table and picked up her pencil and started to write in her notebook, losing herself in her latest story which she’d set in the countryside where she’d grown up.

  As always, when she was engrossed in her writing, she was unaware of the passage of time and it was only when she stopped to take a sip of tea and found that it had gone stone-cold that she realised how long she’d been working. Looking back at what she’d written, she saw that she’d filled up several pages of her notebook. She’d need to type it up on Connie’s typewriter before it was ready to send off to The People’s Friend magazine to whom she’d sold many stories and articles over the past year.

  ‘Would you like another cup, only hot this time?’ Station Officer Steele asked from her office doorway. She always stayed in there, or within hearing distance of the telephone, right through the night just in case it rang, never seeming to tire or needing to lie down and sleep like the rest of the crew did if there were no incidents to go out to.

  ‘Yes, thank you, I got distracted and forgot to drink it.’ Bella passed the cup to the boss.

  ‘Sounds like a good story then. I’ll be back in a moment with a fresh cup.’

  Sitting down at the table opposite her a short while later, with fresh cups of hot tea for them both, Station Officer Steele fixed her shrewd brown eyes on Bella’s face. ‘Couldn’t you sleep? Only you look like you could do with some, if you don’t mind me saying so.’

  She shook her head. ‘My mind wouldn’t rest, I kept thinking the same things over and over, trying to work out an answer when there isn’t one to be had, not yet anyway, and maybe never.’ She took a sip of tea, enjoying the warmth of the hot liquid as it went down.

  ‘Sounds like you’re worrying about something you can’t fix. Is there anything I can do to help?’ the boss probed gently.

  Bella sighed. ‘I wish there was, but there’s nothing any of us can do until we hear from Walter himself or from the War Office that something has happened to him, but it doesn’t stop my mind from going over and over where he might be and what he could be doing. If he’s alive, even.
’ She hadn’t heard anything from him since the Italians surrendered last year and his POW camp should have been freed.

  Station Officer Steele leaned across the table and patted Bella’s arm. ‘Rather like what I went through worrying about my sister when Singapore fell.’ She shook her head. ‘This blasted war is hard on so many counts – not just for the men and women serving, but also for those who are left behind worrying about them and not being able to do anything about it. You just have to keep yourself occupied as that helps take your mind off your worries for a while. You’re busy enough, Bella, what with your shifts here, writing, and volunteering at the POW parcel packing centre on your days off.’

  ‘I like being busy.’ Bella took a sip of tea. ‘At least Frankie’s worries are over for the moment, it’s wonderful that she and Alastair are going to get married. She was absolutely glowing with happiness this afternoon; she deserves it after all that’s happened to her.’

  ‘Absolutely, and her happiness rubs off on the rest of us, too. It’s going to be wonderful to have a wedding for one of my crew again. Winnie and Mac’s was such a lovely day.’

  Bella smiled at the memory of her dear friend’s wedding day, and soon another friend would marry. ‘She’s asked Winnie, Rose and me to be bridesmaids which will be fun. I’m making a habit of that role, always the bridesmaid and never the bride.’

  ‘Oh, you don’t know that, you’re young and there’s still plenty of time to meet the perfect man for you to marry,’ Station Officer Steele said.

  ‘I’ve already met him.’ Bella’s eyes filled with sudden tears. ‘And I lost him. James was the perfect man for me and no one could ever replace him.’ She paused for a moment to compose herself. ‘I’m not interested in looking for someone who would always be second best to him.’

  The boss frowned, her brown eyes concerned behind her owlish glasses. ‘Believe me, I do understand how you feel. I lost my fiancé in the Great War, as you know. He was the perfect man for me, but I never dismissed the idea of perhaps finding someone else that I might love and want to marry. My generation lost so many men the chances of that happening were slim.’ She shrugged. ‘It hasn’t happened, yet, and probably never will now, but I’m happy with my life. Being married isn’t everything – better to be single than married to someone who makes your life a misery.’