by Annie Murray
Audrey was amazed by the size of the place as Dorrie led her inside. She followed her friend’s energetic, curvaceous shape through the food hall and up to the tearoom, feeling a sudden explosion of happiness inside her. This was so exciting, so exactly what she wanted of life! Here, with Dorrie, she felt she had all she needed. When they reached a table in the enormous tearoom, with the orchestra playing softly in the background, she was smiling broadly.
Dorrie looked at her as they sat down and a smile lit up her own face.
‘Happy?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ Audrey said, ‘I’ve just loved today. Seeing everything. All those grand places. I know everything’s covered in sandbags and there’s so much wreckage, but it’s still a grand place. You feel you could really do something here, don’t you?’
‘Yes,’ Dorrie said. ‘That’s just it. Not like the sleepy hole I come from. I’m going to come here and beg a newspaper to let me write for them! When it’s all over, I mean.’
‘I want to live here after the war too,’ Audrey said, full of excitement. Suddenly she wanted to plan everything, for them to pledge to do it all together. But just as she was about to speak, the nippy came, in her black uniform and little cap, to take their order.
Dorrie asked about cakes, winking at Audrey. ‘I’ll treat you, kid. They must have something, even these days.’
When the waitress had gone, Dorrie looked around. ‘I’ve been here a few times with Ma and Pa – before the war, obviously. We came up to see a show now and then. Ma used to insist that we did something not related to death, just occasionally!’
‘Lucky you,’ Audrey laughed. She sat drinking it all in: the huge, pale room with its ornate columns supporting the ceiling, and tables stretching off in rows almost as far as she could see, now occupied by families and couples all enjoying a treat. There was a festive atmosphere, with the sweet smells and clinking of spoons on china and the chatter all around them. A little girl at a table across the aisle stared intently at them. Dorrie winked at her and she looked away.
Dorrie looked around her dreamily. ‘One day,’ she said, then stopped.
‘One day what?’
Dorrie looked as if she was going to say something important, but then she sat back in the chair and just said. ‘Yes – when it’s all over. Things have got to be different then, haven’t they?’
‘How d’you mean?’
Dorrie shrugged expansively. ‘I don’t know. Not so hemmed in and constrained. Something’s got to come out of this war – less of a class divide, more fairness, letting people just live their lives how they want to,’ she finished, sounding almost angry.
‘I suppose,’ Audrey said. She wasn’t used to such talk. She could hardly imagine how things might be different.
The nippy arrived again and laid out their tea and scones.
‘Ooh,’ Dorrie said with relish. ‘Look – strawberry jam. What a treat!’
Once they were alone again she said. ‘D’you know, we’ll be able to get away for a weekend soon. Neither of us have had much leave at all since we’ve been at Cardington. How d’you fancy coming and staying at home with me for the weekend? I’d love to show you around all my haunts.’
Audrey looked into her friend’s eager face. For a moment she had a sensation of falling into something, and wanting with all her being to be swept along. It was a feeling she could barely understand.
‘Wouldn’t they mind?’
‘No, of course not.’ Dorrie seemed to be choosing her words carefully. ‘We wouldn’t be any trouble – we’d be out most of the time anyway. It’s just never easy with them; and since Piers was killed, it’s . . .’ She shook her head. ‘But what they want is for me to be normal, and this sort of counts as normal, I suppose.’
Audrey was completely bewildered now. ‘You’re normal enough, aren’t you? What’re you talking about?’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Dorrie said wearily. ‘Whatever I do, they don’t think it’s the right thing. Pa is so pretentious – hence our names, for a start – and both of them want me to be the sort of girl who would become secretary to a top man.’ She made a face. ‘What they would really have liked is for me to go to finishing school in Switzerland and learn how to pick up a hanky from the floor without showing my knickers, and talk as if I’ve got a mouthful of mothballs.’
Audrey was laughing at her friend’s indignation. ‘They got the wrong daughter then, didn’t they?’
‘They absolutely did! They’ve always wanted to be “in” with the right people, but where does a funeral director fit in socially? So far as the toffs are concerned, they’re trade, and therefore beyond the pale. Whereas they see themselves as many cuts above the butcher and fishmonger, who are also trade – except the right people don’t see it that way. It’s all very, very stilted and ghastly. I was a tomboy and, even when I grew out of that, I’ve never been able to fit the mould. That’s what I mean about the war – it must break these moulds. Look at us: the RAF wouldn’t have touched us before the war, and now they’ve found out that it doesn’t take five women to do one man’s job, there’s no going back, is there? God knows, I hope not anyway. You see, Audie,’ Dorrie leaned passionately across the table, ‘these are all the sort of things I want to write about.’
Audrey watched her friend, her face full of intelligence and animation. She was saying things that filled Audrey with a new sense of excitement. It was so different from Mom, who never wanted to rock the boat in any way; or from Sylvia, bless her, with her romantic, timid approach to the world.
‘What’re you thinking?’ Dorrie said, peering at her.
‘I’m wondering why you’d want to be friends with me,’ Audrey said. ‘I come from somewhere very different—’
‘You’re from somewhere real,’ Dorrie interrupted. She seemed to be almost quivering with emotion. ‘Which isn’t full of small-minded, feudally inclined snobs. Believe me, Audrey.’
‘But that doesn’t mean people aren’t stuck, in their own way. In thinking things can’t change.’
Dorrie gazed at her, looking into Audrey’s eyes as if she was trying to decide something vital and was looking for a sign. She reached over and touched Audrey’s hand for a moment.
‘Come, anyway, and stay. Just for a weekend, or whatever we can get off. I’ve got lots to show you. How about it?’
Thirty-Two
August 1941
The Coopers’ house was in a side street close to the Corn Market at the centre of High Wycombe. It was a smart brick terraced house three floors high, with the family business on the ground floor.
By the time the girls arrived, having walked from the station, Audrey was feeling sticky and dishevelled. The weather was very close and sultry. She was also rather nervous. Apart from her time in the WAAF, she had never been away from home and had certainly never stayed in a little place like this that felt so quiet and respectable. She looked at the smartly painted black front door and the green-and-gold sign above the front window, which read: ‘REG. COOPER & SON – FUNERAL DIRECTORS’.
Audrey turned to Dorrie. ‘“And Son”? So your brother . . . ?’
‘Yup,’ Dorrie said briskly. ‘Piers had gone in with Pa. It wasn’t what he wanted. He was more of an outdoors type, but as the parents said: you can’t earn a living playing cricket. Piers jumped at the chance of joining up, because it got him out of here. I suppose they can’t face taking the sign down.’
‘It must all be a bit grim – as a job, I mean,’ Audrey said.
‘You get used to it.’ Dorrie seemed distracted, and Audrey realized that she too was nervous about seeing her parents. ‘Come on, let’s go round the back.’
A narrow alley led them to a walled-off back yard. Audrey could hear hammering from the outhouse along one side of the yard, and she caught a pleasant whiff of sawn wood.
‘Do they make the coffins here?’ she whispered. She felt giggly suddenly with nerves.
‘Yes, we had to find someone to replace the lad wh
o worked here. It’s not a reserved occ – you’d think it might be.’ Dorrie went to a green back door and rapped on it. Rolling her eyes she said, ‘Let’s get it over.’
The door was opened by a young woman with a pale, pointy face and scraped-back black hair. She looked hostile for a second, until her face softened into a smile.
‘’Ello, Miss Dorrie. Your mother said you was coming back for a visit!’
‘Hello, Susan,’ Dorrie said as the skinny young woman stood back to let them in. ‘How’re you keeping?’
‘I’m all right. Yes, I’m all right.’ She seemed very flustered. ‘But . . .’
‘What’s the matter?’ Dorrie asked. She and Audrey stood in the dark back kitchen with the young woman, who looked as if she was about to dissolve into tears.
‘Oh, it’s nothing. It’s just that my mother’s none too well again, and I can’t help but worry . . .’ Tears began to run down her cheeks.
‘Oh dear, I am sorry, Susan,’ Dorrie said in a kind voice. ‘But I’m sure you’re doing your best, and the neighbours are very good with your mother, aren’t they?’
Susan wiped her face and tried to rally herself. ‘Oh, they are – yes. Just sometimes it all gets on top of me.’
Audrey had the impression this was a problem that had gone on for a long time.
Dorrie reached out and gave the young woman’s arm a squeeze. ‘You’re very good to your mother. She’s a lucky woman.’
Susan was trying to find a brave smile, when they heard footsteps.
‘Dorothea?’ A face appeared at the door. ‘I thought I heard voices.’
‘Hello, Ma.’ Dorrie went and kissed her mother, rather stiffly, and Audrey immediately had the impression that Dorrie was humouring her, that she had to put on a show for her. ‘This is my WAAF pal, Audrey Whitehouse.’
As they made polite greetings, Audrey took in the sight of Mrs Cooper. She was a lean, rather stringy woman with hair darker than Dorrie’s and more tightly curled. A twirling lock of it hung over her forehead. Her complexion was sallow, and she had bruise-like rings under her eyes. Audrey could see in her a resemblance to Dorrie, in the large eyes and shape of the face, but it was as if Mrs Cooper had been sucked dry. Whereas Dorrie was rounded like a golden, fleshy plum, her mother seemed a shrunken-up version, like a dried prune. She thought about Marjorie Gould for a moment. It was terrible, what loss and grief did.
‘Susan, do make the girls a cup of tea,’ Mrs Cooper said. ‘Come through, and we’ll show you where’re you’re sleeping. I’m afraid you may have to be in the attic,’ she told Audrey.
‘Oh, that’s all right,’ Audrey said.
Behind her mother’s back Dorrie turned and winked at her. Audrey was startled by this.
‘Where’re you from, Audrey?’ Mrs Cooper asked, stopping at the foot of the stairs.
‘Birmingham,’ Audrey said. She felt shy and subdued suddenly.
‘I see,’ Mrs Cooper said. She sounded weary.
Climbing up behind her, Audrey wondered what ‘I see’ meant.
‘This is my room,’ Dorrie said, going into the one that looked out over the back and putting her bag down. Audrey had a glimpse of a pale-green counterpane. The main bedroom was at the front and there was another door that she knew, without asking, must have been Piers’s room. They took her up to the attic, which Audrey liked as it gave a good view. The floor was covered with brown linoleum and there was a bed with another pale-green counterpane, a chair and a small chest of drawers.
‘I’m afraid it’s rather spartan up here,’ Mrs Cooper said.
‘No – it’s nice,’ Audrey said. ‘Thank you, Mrs Cooper.’
Dorrie’s mother gave a stiff smile. Seeming preoccupied by other things, she went to the door.
‘There’ll be tea in a moment – do come down, Dorothea.’
‘We’ll be down,’ Dorrie said.
Dorrie seemed amused by something and Audrey could not work out what, but she was too busy looking around. She found Mrs Cooper strange, but told herself: what did it matter what the woman thought of her? She was only here for two days after all.
‘What a poor summer this is,’ Dorrie said, looking out. ‘At least it’s dry, though. Let’s get out of here this afternoon, shall we?’ She seemed restless and ill at ease. ‘There are two bikes – are you okay on one?’
‘Oh yes, I’ll manage. Dorrie?’
‘Umm?’ Dorrie turned from the window and came and sat beside Audrey on the bed. ‘You’re here. I can hardly believe it.’
‘Your mom – has she changed a lot since, you know, Piers . . . ?’
Dorrie’s eyes clouded. ‘No. Not changed really. I’d say she was just more so.’
The Coopers’ business took up the front room and yard of the spacious terraced house. There were two more rooms at the back, apart from the kitchen and scullery, which served as a parlour and a dining room. Audrey found the house forbidding. The dining room was small and crammed with dark furniture. The back parlour contained the expected ration of chairs, the upholstery all dark green, a table and fireplace, the fire tools neatly lined up, their brass handles polished. There were side-tables with the requisite newspapers and half-finished knitting and letters. And in the window stood a vase of faded yellow yarrow, giving off a musty scent. There was nothing wrong with the place, nothing jarred. But it was lacking in the sort of homeliness that Audrey was used to.
She wondered what Mr Cooper was like. When he appeared for the midday dinner that Susan had fretfully produced, Audrey saw a compact, grey-haired man, who hurried up to her and shook her hand forcefully. She could see where Dorrie got her energy from.
‘How d’you do,’ he said with a brisk nod, before sitting at the table and dealing with his food in an equally fast and curt manner. He had greeted Dorrie with a peck on the cheek. ‘Back home then?’ And little else.
Audrey was puzzled by the whole set-up. At home, when she went on leave, everyone was full of questions, pleased to see her, and there was the usual chatter and teasing and Jack fooling about. There was a warmth to it, she thought, that she had taken for granted. She realized with a pang of fondness that she had a nice family, and she felt a rush of love for them, missing them as she sat in this odd, chilly room.
Mrs Cooper did ask them both questions about WAAF life, and Audrey a few about home. Dorrie talked more than Audrey, telling them about the balloon training, about how strong Audrey was and a little about her own driving. But as she talked Audrey felt that Dorrie’s parents didn’t approve or want to know.
‘What did you do before the war?’ Mrs Cooper asked after a time.
‘I worked in an insurance office – as a shorthand typist,’ Audrey said.
‘Ah, now that seems . . .’
‘I didn’t enjoy it much,’ she said firmly.
By the time the stilted meal had finished with a dismal lump of chocolate shape and some tinned pears, Audrey was starting to wonder whether Dorrie could really be the daughter of these people at all. Talk about cuckoo in the nest! She wondered what Piers had been like, but no one ever mentioned him. Dorrie dealt with her parents with a cool, detached and almost amused manner, as if they were strangers she had just met and whom she had to put up with for the moment.
Audrey had never been so glad to get to the end of a meal.
Thirty-Three
‘They’re not really what I was expecting,’ Audrey said.
The two of them were cycling along a country lane, the verges lined with hawthorn and cow parsley. Audrey, who was the taller of the two, had said she would ride Piers’s bike, although it had a crossbar. Dorrie was riding her own. She had shown Audrey the Abbey and the Rye, the green parkland in High Wycombe, but seemed very keen to get out of the town and it was soon left behind by the two fit, fast-pedalling young women.
Dorrie laughed. ‘The parents, you mean? So what were you expecting?’ She seemed light-hearted now that she was away from there. Both of them had changed into civilian clothes, and
Dorrie had on a peach-coloured skirt and a white sleeveless blouse. Audrey had brought a cotton frock with her, covered with navy-and-white flowers. The day was overcast, but warm and muggy.
‘I don’t know. They just seem very . . .’ She didn’t want to be rude, so discarded the words cold, dull, odd. ‘Very – just not like you, that’s all.’
‘No, they’re not like me. Or, at least, I try not to be like them. Well spotted!’ Dorrie turned and grinned. Audrey thought how lovely she looked, with her brown forearms and round, pink face. She felt a pang of tenderness for her, seeing this strange family and sensing there were all sorts of difficulties that Dorrie was always brave about.
‘D’you think I could meet your family sometime?’ Dorrie asked, seeming suddenly bashful.
‘Yes, course you can. I’d like you to,’ Audrey said, panting a little as they were cycling uphill along a dry, white track.
‘They sound nice,’ Dorrie said wistfully.
‘Yes. I s’pose they are.’
‘Mine aren’t not nice. They just don’t . . .’ Dorrie paused. Audrey was not sure if she was catching her breath or if she didn’t know how to go on. ‘I suppose I’m just not the daughter they hoped for.’ Before Audrey could reply, Dorrie went on, ‘Come on – we can really get up speed down here!’
They crested the hill and started to go down, Dorrie swooping ahead, her hair flapping. Audrey followed, hardly using the brakes and letting the bicycle rush downhill, with the wind against her face.
‘Whoooooo!’ she heard from Dorrie, whose legs were flying out, off the pedals.
Audrey heard her own laughter. It bubbled up, free and happy, and poured out of her all the way down the hill. The warm, billowing air caressed her skin. Pure joy filled her at the speed, at the excitement of it and at this carefree being here with Dorrie, whom she would rather be with than anyone in the world. She let her own legs fly free. Then the track levelled off and soon they were going uphill to the top of another rise.
At the top Dorrie braked in a gateway.
