The Secrets of Latimer House

by Jules Wake

  Eventually her sobs subsided and she clutched their arms. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Don’t apologise. We’re so glad to see you alive. We were so worried when we realised you hadn’t come home.’

  ‘I’m sorry and I’m a wicked person. Worrying about my face when … when.’ Her voice lowered to a whisper. ‘There are women in here who have lost legs, been blinded and…’ She nodded to the red screens. ‘Worse. One of those girls has lost most of her face. A bomb blast the day before yesterday. She’s only eighteen. We all know she’s going to die but she doesn’t know about her face. I know I shouldn’t, my face is nothing compared to hers, but I’m…’ Her mouth crumpled again.

  ‘Betty, we love you as you are and no one is going to judge you,’ said Judith fiercely, squeezing her hand. ‘You’re our friend.’

  ‘We were so worried about you,’ added Evelyn. ‘It’s such a relief you’re all in one piece. It could have been so much worse. Honestly, we’ve been imagining all sorts of terrible things.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ She sniffed again and Evelyn could see she was trying to put a brave face on. ‘You shouldn’t have worried. It was my own stupid fault for going into London. Like you said, it could have been far worse than a stupid building falling on me.’

  ‘You could have been killed,’ said Judith with a fearful shudder.

  ‘I thought I was at first. There was so much dust, I couldn’t see. I thought I’d gone to hell.’ Betty half laughed and half cried, and both Evelyn and Judith leaned in to hug her again as she told them about the whole experience.

  ‘Luckily they found my handbag and phoned Ma, but she was supposed to phone the switchboard at CSDIC. I had no idea who needed to be told.’

  ‘I think she forgot,’ said Evelyn kindly. ‘She had other things on her mind.’

  Betty groaned. ‘Oh no. How much trouble am I in? She doesn’t understand the Army. I told her they’d think I’d gone AWOL and I’d be court martialled if she didn’t call. I was so worried.’

  ‘You won’t be in any trouble,’ said Evelyn confidently, ‘although once Carl knows, he’s sure to make sure you’re not in trouble.’

  ‘Carl?’ Alarm filled her eye and then she closed it, giving a little shiver.

  ‘Yes. I’m sorry, he was with VIPs today so I didn’t manage to tell him what’s happened, but I’m sure as soon as he knows he’ll be here.’

  ‘Don’t let him come,’ said Betty with sudden urgency.

  ‘Why ever not?’ asked Judith.

  ‘He won’t want me now,’ she said in a small voice.

  ‘Why would you think that?’ Evelyn hated the way that she suddenly seemed to shrink in the bed.

  ‘My face. Not as bad as…’ she nodded towards the screens again, ‘but it’s a mess.’ She touched the dressing and her mouth turned down in a mournful crescent. ‘No one will ever look at me again.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ said Judith with stalwart determined support.

  Evelyn had to say more. ‘Betty, if that’s all he cares about, then he’s not the man for you. But I think that he’s more than the man for you. How many men go and build hen houses? Rescue you from dastardly villains? Punch your ex for you? I think it’s going to take a lot more than that to put him off.’

  ‘I wish I could believe you,’ said Betty. ‘But look at him. He could have any girl he wants. Why me?’

  ‘Because you’re smart as a whip, you’ve got brains and you know how to use them.

  ‘And you have die Helligkeit,’ said Judith. ‘When you walk into a room.’

  ‘Die what?’

  ‘Helligkeit,’ repeated Evelyn with a broad smile. Judith had summed it up perfectly. ‘Luminosity. You light things up.’

  ‘Pshaw,’ said Betty with a wave of her hand, batting away the compliments.

  ‘It’s true,’ said Judith earnestly. ‘You have a special talent. It’s not about your looks, it’s the way you look at life. “You Are My Sunshine”.’ She began to hum the tune softly.

  Betty shook her head.

  ‘No, you have sunshine and you bring it to other people. Especially when you sing.’

  ‘That’s one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to me,’ said Betty, her eye blinking. ‘And you’re going to make me cry again.’

  ‘Sing instead,’ said Judith, humming the refrain of the song again.

  Betty took a deep breath and began to sing quietly along. Almost immediately, at the sound of her beautiful voice, the conversation at the neighbouring bed stopped and the elderly woman propped up against the pillows turned and gave Betty a rheumy-eyed smile, which lifted the whole of her thin, mournful face. ‘Oh, darling,’ she called over. ‘That’s something else. We all need some sunshine. Sing up, duck!’

  In response Betty sang a little louder to include the woman and what looked like her daughters, who were crowded round the bed. There was a soft clap of delight from the woman in the bed on the other side, and Betty turned to give her a tentative smile. The woman, her leg swathed in bulky bandages, gave her a cheery thumbs-up.

  ‘That’s grand, love.’

  Betty’s voice gradually swelled, gaining volume as she sang the next few lines and her face, or rather what could be seen of it, brightened. The rest of the ward had grown silent, almost as if everyone were holding their breath and listening.

  Evelyn clasped her hands over her heart, her eyes meeting Judith’s in silent wonderment. It was such a special moment of magic and hope, and it seemed to infect Betty, who held out her hands to both of them, raising her voice and singing with a piercing sweetness, as if reaching out to the other injured patients. All three of them had tears pouring down their cheeks by the time Betty’s song drew to a close. Complete silence held the ward in its grip for a few seconds, as if blanketed in heavy emotion. Then a round of spontaneous applause rang out, along with a few shouts.

  ‘That was luverly, ducks.’

  ‘Beautiful, lovie.’

  ‘Gorgeous.’

  Betty lifted her chin and waved to everyone, without a shred of shyness. ‘Thank you.’ She nodded her head regally at the other patients.

  ‘I’m for it now,’ she suddenly muttered as the three of them spotted a Staff Nurse coming across to them at a speedy pace. ‘Probably disturbed those poor girls.’ She caught her lip between her teeth.

  ‘So—’

  ‘Miss Connors.’ She clutched her hands to her chest in front of her. ‘That was … simply wonderful.’ She stood at the end of the bed, beaming, her cheeks pink with pleasure. ‘What a treat. I don’t suppose you’d sing another song, would you? It would do wonders for the morale. Especially…’ she tilted her head to the two beds at the far end of the ward, surrounded by screens. ‘They’re unconscious but they’re aware. You’ll be doing them the power of good. I promise it will help.’

  From the nurse’s expression, those poor souls behind the screens needed the help of angels and more.

  ‘What shall I sing?’

  ‘I know.’ Judith began humming and Betty smiled and nodded.

  ‘Perfect.’ She started to sing the opening words of ‘We’ll Meet Again’, the timbre of her voice low and sure, flooding the words with meaning. All around the ward heads lifted; some eyes shone with tears and several hummed along, gradually gaining in confidence until most of the ward was singing along to the famous refrain. Both Evelyn and Judith joined in, the three of them singing together, catching each other’s eyes and smiling. Evelyn could feel a lump in her throat. The sound of all the women’s voices was oddly moving and brought home a sense of unity and peace as she squeezed Betty’s hand.

  The human spirit was an amazing thing and they would triumph through adversity. She, Betty and Judith had had their share of trials in recent months, but life went on and the three of them had forged a bond of friendship which would help carry them through the coming months, whatever this blessed war threw at them.

  After the impromptu singalong, a ward maid began bringing round cups of tea for everyone
and a doctor appeared at the end of the bed, clapping as he approached her side. ‘Thank you for that. Sometimes music and laughter are the best medicine. You’ve cheered up a lot of my patients and you are looking a lot brighter. How are you feeling? Want to go home?’

  ‘Can I?’ asked Betty, sitting up straighter. ‘I could go with my friends. Then I wouldn’t have to travel on my own on the train.’

  ‘I have the Bentley,’ said Evelyn.

  ‘Travelling in style.’ The doctor looked impressed and gave Evelyn a quick appraising glance. Used to this sort of attention, she gave him a cool smile in return, although he was rather good-looking. Once upon a time she might have flirted back but now her heart felt too sore and her head too full of thoughts of Peter and what a mess she’d made of their final meeting.

  ‘I think that’s probably an excellent idea then. Let me speak to Sister and we’ll sort out the paperwork, if you ladies don’t mind waiting about for a little while. I would like to examine Miss Connors. As well as the lacerations to her face, which will need further treatment over the coming months, she has some nasty bruises, so she will need to take it easy for a while. What is it you do?’

  The three of them looked at each other, tiny smiles on their faces.

  ‘I work in a distribution centre. Administration. That sort of thing,’ said Betty.

  ‘No heavy lifting or physical work?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, I’d still like you to rest up for a few days. You had a very lucky escape. I’ll write you a sick note for your commanding officer.’

  Evelyn and Judith went out to a small waiting room while the doctor and nurses undertook whatever procedures they needed to complete to release Betty. While they were waiting a petite nurse, so tiny she didn’t look as if she could lift a bedpan, let alone a patient, came into the room clutching a brown paper parcel.

  ‘This is your friend’s. She says she doesn’t want it but … well, it’s such a pretty dress, I’d hate her to change her mind. Will you take it for her?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Evelyn, taking the parcel and folding it over before putting it into her big handbag, remembering with sadness how excited Betty had been at the prospect of shopping for a new dress for the dance.

  ‘She won’t want to go now, will she?’ said Judith astutely.

  ‘I don’t suppose she will.’

  ‘Then it will be the three of us together, in our rooftop eyrie.’

  ‘Looks like it will be,’ said Evelyn sombrely.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Judith

  Up on the roof, Judith listened to the excited voices filling the air from down below and then the slam of the coach door and the rumble of its engine as it drove away down the drive. It took a moment for the big green bus to come into view before it wove its way down the lane towards the village.

  That was it, everyone had gone off to the dance at RAF Bovingdon. She grimaced. It was all anyone seemed to have talked about for the last week and today the whole house seemed to have hummed with preparations.

  ‘They’ve left,’ she announced, clambering through the window back into the stuffy room. It had been yet another beautiful day – whatever happened to the myth that it rained all the time in Britain? – and the heat had gathered under the roof, leaving them restless and scratchy. None of them seemed to have much energy today. Betty lay listlessly on her bed and Evelyn was propped up against her bedhead reading a copy of Vogue magazine. If anyone spoke it was in monosyllables.

  Judith sat down on her bed and picked up her knitting, thinking about how much pleasure she’d had wearing the red jumper she’d made and the sense of hope she’d had while working on it. All that had gone but she was making a scarf for Betty with the remainder of the scarlet wool. Perhaps it might cheer her up, but she doubted it. She glanced across the room where Betty sighed and linked her hands behind her head, staring up at the ceiling.

  Both Judith and Evelyn had seen the livid red gash stitched together with jagged teeth-like stitches that tracked an uneven curve from the top of her forehead across her cheekbone to her ear. It was a miracle that the ugly wound had left her eye intact, the gash stopping at her eyebrow and starting again at the top of her cheek. Now a smaller dressing covered her face beneath her eye, but the angry, puckered, swollen skin and black zig-zags on her forehead were clearly visible. As they’d driven home it was noticeable that Betty had become quieter and quieter on the journey, the bravado in the hospital wearing thin, and since they’d arrived back at the house she’d barely said a word apart from insisting that they used the servants’ passage from the hallway up to their room, so that she wouldn’t see anyone.

  Somehow, as it always seemed to in a closed community, news of Betty’s accident had spread and everyone in the house appeared to know what had happened to her, although not the full extent of her injuries. As a result, plenty of well-wishers sent their best, from little notes through to personal messages when Judith had ventured into the Mess for a cup of tea, which showed how popular Betty was among the other ATS women. Unfortunately, she didn’t want to know and had stayed in bed all day today.

  Carl had contrived to send up a note and a gift-wrapped pair of nylons via Elsie, who’d brought up a food tray for Betty, but Betty had refused to read it and looked so woebegone at the sight of the nylons that Judith and Evelyn had exchanged a silent agreement that they wouldn’t press her about it. Betty also turned down the plate of food that Elsie had so kindly put together, saying she wasn’t hungry.

  ‘The bus has gone,’ announced Judith again as she’d got no reaction the first time. Evelyn looked up and gave her a steady stare. Betty didn’t even move.

  A horrible sense of inertia and fatalism pervaded the room as if all three of them had been drugged by gloom, and it wasn’t right, not at all. She cast a worried look at Betty, her usual bright light extinguished. Where was Betty’s golden optimism? What had happened to Evelyn’s forthright positive outlook, with her gung-ho determination to get things done? This was all wrong. Judith was the one that normally looked on the bleaker side.

  All week her thoughts had been dogged by those awful images of the slaughtered women and children in Mizoch on the other side of Europe. Now it was as if her mind suddenly cleared, clouds parting to reveal a stark truth. There was nothing she could do for those women and children. They would never dance again. Their time had gone but she, Betty and Evelyn, they had a life to live. They still had hope.

  ‘We have to go,’ she said, standing up with uncharacteristic resolution, her voice resonating with sudden conviction. Those women hadn’t had the chance to fulfil their lives. She, they, owed it to the dead to live. To live life to the full, to celebrate being alive and do all the things that those women and thousands of others across Europe would never have the chance to do again. ‘We have to celebrate our freedom. Celebrate what we have.’

  ‘Pardon?’ Evelyn enquired in her calm voice.

  ‘We should be at the dance. All of us. Betty nearly died. All the women suffering across Europe. They won’t dance again. We owe it to them to live. We still have so much.’ She looked across at the other two women, remembering their words of a few months before. ‘We have to think of tomorrow because today is done.’

  Betty sat up, cocking her head thoughtfully for a second and then as Judith watched, the light trickled back into her eyes and she nodded. Uncurling from her bed, she stood up, her chin lifted and shoulders back, like Boudicca going into battle. ‘For those women in the hospital. They’ll never dance again, either. Judith’s right.’

  Evelyn sighed. ‘You’re both right. We should celebrate our freedom, for those that can’t.’ She didn’t say his name but Judith could tell she meant Peter. She suddenly rose to her feet with a sudden grin. ‘All right, then. Let’s hope there’s enough petrol in the car.’

  ‘We’re going?’ Judith looked at both of them, a small smile touching her mouth as a thrill of delight fizzed through her that her words had meant somethin
g to both of them. It was unlike her to take the lead, she normally left that to others, but doing so this evening had energised her and she found herself standing straighter.

  ‘Yes,’ said Betty with a determined bite. ‘Enough feeling sorry for myself. You’re right. We do owe it to all the others who are less fortunate. I need to be brave and face everyone. Those poor damaged girls in the hospital,’ she shook her head, ‘they had it so much worse than me. I can’t hide away from everyone. I’m still the same person I was last week.’

  ‘That’s the spirit,’ said Evelyn. ‘And I have lots to be grateful for. Peter’s not dead. I’m just going to have to be patient and wait until the end of the war.’

  ‘And I owe Walther an apology for being so self-indulgent.’ Judith winced. ‘I hope he’ll forgive me.’

  ‘I rather think Walther will understand,’ said Evelyn with a teasing smile.

  ‘He will,’ said Judith with a sudden surge of confidence, because he was a wonderful man and had wisdom enough for both of them.

  ‘Let’s get ready then,’ said Betty, the light of battle glinting in her eye. ‘It’s just like Cinderella. We are going to the ball. Although what are we going to wear?’

  Evelyn shot Judith a triumphant grin. ‘I’ve got the very thing.’ From under her bed, she pulled the paper bag that the nurse had handed them and shook out the dress.

  ‘How did you get that?’ Betty’s mouth fell open in surprise.

  ‘The nurse thought you might regret it. It is a lovely dress and you’re going to look beautiful in it.’

  ‘I’m not sure I’ll ever look beautiful again,’ said Betty, her mouth turning down a little as she held her hand up when the other two began to protest. ‘But I’m alive and that’s what I’m going to think about when I walk into the room.’

  ‘You can do it, Betty,’ said Evelyn. ‘I know you’ll feel self-conscious at first, but after that first step it will get easier. Always remember people love us for who we are.’