by Annie Groves
The arguments and the angry unhappy atmosphere they had caused had rumbled on all Christmas Day, despite Grace and Seb’s attempts to cheer everyone up. Sasha had even rowed with Grace, saying that it was all right for her to say, ‘Let’s not spoil Christmas’ because she’d got what she wanted and she was married to her Seb.
Jean was just thankful that Bobby had gone home to Newcastle to see his own family over Christmas because she didn’t know what Sam might have said to him if he’d been with them. And that was such a shame, because Sam had really taken to Bobby, and if Sasha had just been sensible and bided her time, Jean suspected that Sam would have agreed to them getting engaged on Sasha’s birthday and then Sasha could have coaxed her dad into letting them get married sooner rather than later afterwards.
No, she had never known a Christmas like it, Jean admitted, blinking away the threat of her own tears. It wouldn’t do for her to let Sam see she was upset; he’d only go blaming Sasha for upsetting her and that was the last thing she wanted. Jean felt for her daughter, she really did, but at the same time she believed that Sam was right and that Sasha wasn’t mature enough yet for marriage, no matter how much she might think that she was.
TWENTY-SIX
Francine had everything clear-cut in her mind, her decision made and her determination not to be persuaded to change it immovable, or so she had thought until she had Jean’s letter telling her about Luke. Jean was lucky. Luke had survived. Francine knew how grateful Jean would be feeling that Luke had been spared, and that he hadn’t lost his life in the desert fighting for his country–as Marcus might easily have done, if he hadn’t still been on leave when the battle of El Alamein had taken place.
She moved tensely through the apartment, picking things up and then putting them down again. The apartment was furnished and decorated by the hotel, with very little in it that was personal except for the few things on what had been Brandon’s desk, which Francine had kept exactly as he had liked it, in his memory. There was a silver-framed photograph of them on their wedding day, put at the angle on which he had always insisted, so that he could see it whilst he wrote his letters and made his telephone calls, and the dark green leather-covered desk set she had bought him from a small second-hand shop in the Strand.
Francine picked up the blotter and then put it down again, rearranging the silver cigarette box she had also managed to find in an antique shop, and on which she’d had his initials engraved. Brandon had loved it. Francine stroked the cold surface.
Brandon. She knew what he would want her to do. He had wanted her to be with Marcus.
The apartment felt so empty with just her in it, like her life would be without Marcus.
She shivered, despite the warmth of the gas fire. In the mirror above the fireplace she could see her own reflection. She was wearing an oyster-coloured cashmere twinset just a shade or so darker than the pearl earrings and necklace that Brandon had insisted on giving her, the colour of her twinset picked out by the soft cream and brown tweed skirt she was wearing–part of a suit, a copy of a Chanel design she had had made in Cairo. Francine closed her eyes and then opened them again.
Marcus might have been spared the fighting at El Alamein but his leave finished the day after New Year’s Eve, and then he would be returning to his unit. She had thought that she would be relieved to see him go. He had meant it when he had said that he intended to do everything in his power to show her how much he loved her and how much he wanted to make up for what had happened in Egypt. It had been hard for her to hold him at arm’s length. She still loved him, after all–that had never been in any doubt–but she was determined not to put herself in a position when she could be hurt again. She had a duty to carry out Brandon’s wishes as a trustee of the foundation; doing so would be an act of faith and an act of love. She couldn’t allow herself to take the risk of getting emotionally involved with Marcus again. Or at least that was what she had told herself until she had read Jean’s letter and realised what she would feel if she sent Marcus away and he were to lose his life in battle. No fear of him stopping loving her was powerful enough to hurt more than losing him without them having shared the love he was offering her. She knew that now. If she were ever to learn that Marcus had lost his life on a faraway battlefield she didn’t want to regret and weep for what they had not had as well as for Marcus himself. What was holding her back wasn’t common sense, as she had told herself, it was cowardice, and fear.
She looked at the telephone. All she had to do was pick up the receiver and asked to be put through to Marcus’s room. He was staying in the hotel, and had suggested to her that they spend Christmas together.
She, though, had refused. And she had deliberately offered to stand in for the lead singer in a popular West End show so that she could spend Christmas with her family. That way, Francine wouldn’t be tempted to change her mind, but now the singer was back and there was nothing to stop Francine from being with Marcus except her own fear.
She reached for the receiver, then released it back into its cradle when the bell to the apartment buzzed.
She wasn’t expecting anyone. She had agreed to attend a reception at the American Embassy tomorrow but tonight she was spending the evening alone.
Frowning slightly, she got up and went to the door, her heart hammering against her ribs when she opened to find Marcus standing outside.
‘I had to come,’ he told her simply. ‘I know we agreed that I wouldn’t. I hadn’t planned to, and in fact I’d decided to join a party of fellow officers on leave for dinner, but I had the most extraordinary feeling all of a sudden that I had to come here. You can send me away if you wish.’
Francine looked at him. It was impossible, of course, for her heart to have called out to him. Logically, that sort of thing belonged in a novel–a romantic fantasy, not real life. But then perhaps sometimes things happened in real life that overturned the rules of logic; sometimes perhaps two hearts could know best. Sometimes, through the loving generous actions of a special person, another person got a second chance to have what they most longed for.
This, after all, was what Brandon had wanted for her.
‘I’ve got to know if there’s any chance that you can find it your heart to forgive me, Francine,’ Marcus continued.
‘And if I say that I can’t?’
‘Then I’ll say that I can’t stop loving you, but that I can and will respect your wishes, and that you can send me away if you wish.’
Send him away? The feeling of anguish that swept through her only confirmed what she already knew. These last weeks of seeing him, being with him, had shown her how much he meant to her and how bleak and empty her future would be without his love. It was time to put pride and past to one side.
‘I’m glad you’re here,’ she told him, abandoning the defensive pretence she had been clinging to, as she held the door wide so that he could come in. ‘I was just about to telephone you.’ She took a deep breath. ‘The hotel is holding a dinner dance on New Year’s Eve and I was wondering if we might go, together.’
She could feel the fierce burn of the intensity with which his gaze searched her face.
‘There is no one I would rather greet this and every New Year with than you, Francine,’ he answered her. ‘You know that, just as you know how much you mean to me and how much I love you.’
Her throat had gone very dry but she wasn’t going to stop now.
‘Show me,’ she asked him softly, holding out her arms to him. ‘Show me how much you love me, Marcus. Hold me, love me and promise me that you’ll never ever let me go.’
His response was to reach for her, wrapping his arms tightly round her, kicking the door closed behind him as he did so, before bending his head to kiss her with all the love and passion she had missed and longed for so much.
‘We won’t make plans,’ she whispered to him. ‘We’ll just live every day as it comes, love one another every day we have. I don’t want to be cheated of any more happiness, Marcus.’
>
Being on duty over Christmas had been much more fun than Lou had expected. They’d worked hard, of course–planes still needed servicing and repairing–and the sergeant had still bawled them out when they were too slow, but there’d been hot mince pies at their morning tea break, and Christmas cake in the afternoon as a special treat, and then on Christmas Day itself the officers on duty had served them, in the proper Forces tradition. The canteen staff had put up decorations and there’d been a real party atmosphere, just as though they were all part of one big family, which in a way, of course, they were.
And she’d got her wonderful exciting hope for the future to hug to herself. It was there in the morning, when she woke up and opened her eyes, filling her with a joy she knew she could never properly explain to others.
There’d been presents to open from her family, and she’d thought of them, and pictured them at home opening theirs, missing her as she was missing them, but she’d missed them in a happy sort of way, knowing that she’d got something so special to look forward to.
On Boxing Day they’d entertained the children from the nearby village, with the sergeant dressing up as Father Christmas. They’d played games with the kids–blind man’s bluff and hunt the slipper - and if a handful of the men had tried to turn the situation to their advantage by changing the game into a grown-up version of sardines, well, it was only the girls who made it plain that they wanted to join in and permit a few stolen kisses that got targeted, and since Lou wasn’t one of them she’d had a very jolly time playing with the children.
She’d missed her family, especially Sasha, and it had felt lonely waking up on Christmas morning without her twin to snuggle up in bed with, whilst they explored the contents or their stockings, even if she had been in a hut full of other girls.
When would she hear about the ATA? She was so excited and yet still half afraid to believe that it was true and that she could get the chance to train as a pilot. Please let me be chosen, she begged silently in her prayers. I’ll do anything, if only I get that posting, she promised inwardly, anything and everything I can to be picked.
TWENTY-SEVEN
There was a change in the air, everyone was saying so, with the turning of the year from 1942 to 1943, and the victory of El Alamein. The bleak despair and hardship that had hung over the whole country during 1942 was giving way to a new spirit, not just of hope but the actual belief that the possibility was there that the war could be and would be won, and that Hitler would be defeated.
No one was saying that it was going to be easy, or that many more lives would not be lost, but the country’s mood had changed. Heads and shoulders that, in 1942, had been bowed were now lifted and straightened; the austerity of daily life, which had dragged people down, had now become a proud badge of endurance. The country felt deep within itself that the tide was ready to turn.
For Bella, still waiting to receive her first letter from Jan since she had heard of his captivity, the significance of what was happening meant that she could dare to hope that the war would end with the Allies the victors and that Jan would be safely restored to her.
To Jean the good news meant less; Luke had rejoined his unit and the Allies were still fighting in North Africa.
To Lou, waiting nervously for the all-important letter that would signal that she was being transferred to ATA for pilot training, the days were filled with anxiety and hope. Verity had stopped off at the base in the middle of transporting a Spitfire, on a freezing cold February day to tell Lou that she had put her name forward and set things in motion.
To Sasha the winter’s slow crawl towards spring was as irritating as it was long drawn out. As she hurried to meet Bobby at Lyons after work, the March wind coming off the Mersey buffeted her with its boisterous embrace.
‘Have you spoken to Captain Harrison yet about you getting a transfer into another unit?’ was the first thing she said to Bobby when she found him waiting outside the café for her.
‘Let’s get out of this wind,’ he suggested, going to take her arm, but Sasha pulled back.
‘You haven’t, have you?’ she demanded angrily. ‘Bobby, you know what we agreed. You promised me that you would tell him.’
Tears of anguish and disappointment stung her eyes. Why could no one understand how she felt: how miserable and afraid Bobby being with Bomb Disposal made her feel, and how envious she was of the other girls she worked with, whose men were safe in reserved occupations and not risking their lives like Bobby had to?
Sasha didn’t know when she had started to feel like this, when being proud of Bobby’s bravery had become instead a terrible fear for his safety, which had grown from that into a feeling of fear and anger that boiled up inside her, blocking her throat, making her heart thud frantically, filling her with a sickening feeling of panic that she just couldn’t explain to anyone, but which made her afraid almost to move. Thinking of what Bobby had to go through every time a bomb had to be defused made that feeling worse. Sometimes at night she couldn’t sleep for remembering how she had felt when she had been trapped in that bomb shaft, thinking she was going to die. She had had Lou to hold on to her, and then Bobby to take her place so that she could be safe, but who was there to do that for Bobby, and what would she do if anything happened to him and she lost him?
‘It isn’t as easy as that, Sash. We lost two good lads last month and it isn’t easy getting replacements. I’d feel that I was letting the unit down if I asked for a transfer out now. It affects everyone’s morale when we lose someone.’
‘You don’t want to let them down but you don’t seem to mind letting me down’ Sasha stormed, without allowing him to finish. ‘You promised me, Bobby, you know you did.’
Bobby frowned. He was an easy-going young man, who genuinely wanted to do whatever would make Sasha happy, but there were some things a chap just could not do, not without letting down team mates who relied on him. He’d tried to explain this to Sasha but she’d got herself so wrought up about the danger of his work that she just wouldn’t listen.
‘I know that I said I’d have a word with the captain, Sash …’
‘You promised me you’d tell him that you wanted to transfer out of Bomb Disposal.’
‘That was before we lost Wrighty and Thompson. Wrighty had been with our unit from the outset. Captain always used to say he was our good-luck mascot. If I’d told the captain I wanted to leave after we lost them, it would have looked like I was being a coward, walking away from the other lads and letting them down.’
As Bobby struggled for the words to explain to Sasha how he felt he could tell that she didn’t understand, and he hated seeing her so upset.
Bobby loved Sasha. He knew beyond any doubt that she was the girl for him, and he had known it since he’d found her stuck down the bomb shaft and looking like she was going to die there. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for her, except walk out on his mates when they all needed to stick together. He couldn’t do that and still call himself a man.
Sasha felt like bursting into tears, but of course she couldn’t because they were inside Lyons now, and the last thing she wanted to do was draw attention to herself.
‘Look, there’s a table there,’ Bobby told her, nudging her. ‘You go and sit down and I’ll go and queue up and get us our tea.’
‘If you really loved me like you keep saying you do then you’d tell the captain, instead of keep saying you will and then not doing,’ Sasha hissed. ‘You know what I think, Bobby. I think that you don’t really love me at all.’
Before he could say anything Sasha marched over to the table he had indicted and sat down at it, keeping her back to him.
Why was it that no one understood how she felt: not her mother and certainly not her father, who had refused to let her and Bobby get married; not her twin; and not Bobby either, it seemed. Sasha swallowed against the lump of self-pity blocking her throat. Why could none of them understand how afraid she was for Bobby? All she wanted was for him to be safe, instead of
doing some of the most dangerous of all war work–defusing enemy bombs.
She was tired of people treating her like a child, telling her one thing, promising her one thing, but then doing another, just like she didn’t really matter at all. Why, anyone would think that Bobby didn’t love her at all from the way he was behaving, not asking for a transfer when he knew all she wanted was for him to be safe. Left alone to dwell on her increasing unhappy thoughts, Sasha had worked herself up into a very bad mood indeed by the time Bobby arrived at the table carefully carrying a tray with two plates of beans on toast on it, along with tea for both of them.
‘I know what it is,’ she announced as soon as Bobby was sitting down. ‘You want to stay in Bomb Disposal really because those girls at the Grafton the other Saturday made such a fuss, saying how brave they thought you were. You’d rather have them fussing over you than please me.’
Bobby laughed. ‘Don’t be daft. Of course I wouldn’t.’
There! It was just as she’d been thinking. Everyone treated her like a child, even Bobby. Well, she wasn’t! And she wasn’t going to be fobbed off either.
‘And I’m supposed to believe that, am I, just like I believed that you’d do what you promised and tell the captain that you wanted to transfer out?’
‘Aw, come on, Sash. It isn’t the same thing at all,’ Bobby told her, tucking in to his beans.
Sasha was in no mood to be mollified. She pushed away her plate. ‘Well, I’m telling you now, Bobby, that unless you keep your promise to me and tell that captain that you want a transfer then it’s all over between you and me.’
Bobby’s good-natured smile disappeared and he too pushed away his food. ‘Come on, Sasha,’ he pleaded. ‘You don’t mean that. I know you’re upset. But—’
