The Telephone Box Library

by Rachael Lucas

  She drifted around, soaking it all in, and then spent ages looking around the gift shop, picking up yet more books and a lovely warm Bletchley Park sweatshirt to wear on chilly evenings walking Hamish.

  ‘And the lovely thing, dear,’ said the woman on the front desk as she left, sore-footed and with a head full of stories – ‘is that your ticket lasts all year, so you can come back as often as you like.’

  ‘Oh, I will.’ Lucy hugged herself as she spun round for a final look before heading reluctantly to her car and heading home.

  ‘Hello, dear. Been somewhere exciting?’ It was Susan, walking a chocolate Labrador. She paused to take in the massive pile of books Lucy was unloading from the back of her car.

  ‘Very.’ Lucy had amassed tons of notes and bought up most of the bookshop.

  ‘Ah, Bletchley Park. Now – I must get you to come along to the WI meeting next week. There are quite a few people I’d like you to meet.’

  ‘Oh, really?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve been telling people about our little history book idea and it’s rather snowballed. It turns out that everyone wants to see their name in print, even if it is just for our little anniversary book.’

  ‘Oh, that’s lovely. I’ll look forward to it.’

  ‘See if you can bring Mel along. We need some new blood. It’s so nice to have young people ready to take up the baton and keep the heart of the village beating.’ Susan clapped her hands with delight. Her Labrador rootled around in the long grass, investigating a discarded ice-cream wrapper.

  Lucy didn’t like to remind her that she was only there temporarily, when she seemed so delighted to have some new bodies coming along. And she didn’t really know Mel, so inviting her – a relative stranger – to come along to a meeting in a town where she was the incomer felt a bit awkward. She smiled politely, nonetheless.

  ‘This is all very exciting – so nice to have someone to help with getting this booklet together. Haven’t been to Bletchley for years and years. I hear it’s all very exciting now. I think the last time I went, it was just some tired old huts.’

  ‘Oh no – there was so much to do. Loads of amazing people who were full of stories, and so much information.’

  Mel fell into step beside Sam as he walked along the lane towards the village shop. He turned to look at her. She was wearing a pair of sawn-off jeans, more practical than fashionable, a slightly grubby polo shirt and two dog leads hanging round her neck. Fairly standard Mel, he thought.

  ‘Bloody hell. Where did you spring from?’

  ‘Sorry.’ She turned around, indicating a break in the hedge between two rows of cottages. ‘I nipped down the path. I was just returning Harvey’s delinquent Dalmatian after an afternoon of training.’

  Harvey was an old school friend of theirs. He’d always been the one with a hare-brained scheme for making money, or making people laugh. Now he was a dad of five and ran a computer business from his scruffy, ramshackle cottage, which was a thorn in the side of the village improvement society. His latest family addition – a ten-month-old Dalmatian puppy – was as loved but as out of control as his children, who orbited the cottage on an assortment of bicycles and scooters, sticky with lollipop juice and grubby but happy.

  ‘How did it go?’ They paused for a second, waiting for a car to reverse into the driveway of one of the pretty houses on Main Street.

  ‘I’m winning. Well, I will be.’ She made a face. ‘Apparently he took him on from a woman in Northampton who couldn’t cope, so he’s not really house-trained, and as for his recall – well . . .’

  ‘Yeah, that’ll be why I had to catch him haring down the street the other morning. Typical Harvey. Why he couldn’t just get a nice easy-going Labrador or something, I’ll never know.’

  ‘Because that would be too easy. Talking of which, how are things with Freya?’

  ‘All right. She’s glued to her phone or her laptop, and she’s allergic to daylight. You don’t think she’s a vampire, do you?’

  Mel laughed. ‘Not unless Cammie is too. Honestly, I think I’m turning into my mother. If it’s not turn those lights off, it’s were you born in a barn? I have no idea how I’ve ended up sounding like an adult.’

  ‘You are one?’ Sam said.

  ‘Never.’ Mel recoiled in horror.

  They walked through the village, which was buzzing with the sounds of summer holidays – children up way past their usual bedtimes were whizzing along the path on bikes, and the air was filled with the smell of barbecue smoke and sizzling sausages. Behind the wall of Helen’s house they could hear the pop of a bottle being opened and the tinkle of laughter.

  ‘Oh God, that reminds me –’

  ‘What, champagne being opened?’

  ‘No, Helen’s place.’ She dropped her voice. ‘I don’t want her catching us and dragging us in for drinkies, but it reminds me I wanted to ask if you’d come to this Abba night thing?’ She indicated a poster tacked to the telegraph pole outside Helen’s huge house.

  ‘That’ll be a no.’ He shuddered. ‘I can’t stand Abba, for one thing, and you know how I feel about organized fun, Helen-style.’

  ‘Oh, come on. There’ll be cakes,’ Mel wheedled.

  ‘I can get cakes any time I like. Look, here’s the village shop. It’s full of them.’

  ‘That’s not the point,’ said Mel, shouldering the door open, ‘and you know it. Anyway, Lucy’s coming. Maybe you could come along and say hello, improve on your first meeting?’

  ‘I could turn up in a stripy jumper with a bag with SWAG written on it, just to compound her image of me.’ He picked up some biscuits and dropped them into the basket.

  ‘Pleeeease? For me?’

  ‘Oh, go on then.’

  Mel beamed.

  He wasn’t going to admit it to Mel, because if he did he’d never hear the end of it, but there was a bit of him that had been hoping he’d bump into Lucy again after their slightly unfortunate first encounter. Maybe this way he could make it clear to her that he wasn’t some sort of weirdo who made a habit of sneaking around in people’s back gardens.

  Chapter Nine

  Over the next few days, Lucy tried several tentative attempts at getting Bunty to talk about her experience during the war, but to no avail. Every time she tried to steer the conversation round, she got nowhere. Once she bumped into Freya, the teenage girl who lived in the cottage opposite, and said a brief hello. But the days passed uneventfully. She met up with Susan for a cup of tea at the village cafe and was introduced to Henry, who had worked as an ARP warden during the war. He was the absolute opposite of Bunty – just bursting to tell her all about life in Little Maudley and his part in the war effort.

  ‘Oh gosh, there was a lot going on here, considering it’s such a sleepy little village.’ Henry tore open a sachet of sugar with a gnarled, slightly shaky hand. He shook it into his mug and then carefully folded up the packet and placed it down on the tray. He was very neatly dressed in a shirt and a buttoned-up brown wool cardigan. His cuffs were fastened with monogrammed silver cufflinks. One of the things Lucy had noticed about all of the older people she’d spoken to was just how beautifully turned out they were. She smoothed down the front of her shirt, almost without thinking.

  ‘I’d love to hear all about it. Bunty mentioned that there were lots of Land Girls here, working on the farms.’

  Susan poured the tea and offered milk to Lucy. Beth, ostensibly busy refilling some village information leaflets on the rack just inside the cafe door, was craning her neck to listen in. Susan shot an old-fashioned look in her direction.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Henry. ‘Lots of those. And I was responsible for keeping everyone under control, which wasn’t as easy as you might think in those days.’ He gave a little chuckle of amusement, shaking his head.

  Lucy nodded as Susan offered her a piece of fruit cake. She snapped it in half, popping a bit in her mouth. It was absolutely delicious.

  ‘Len was Bunty’s husband,’ he said. Lucy di
dn’t point out that she already knew that. ‘He was quite a bit older than her – twenty-five to her eighteen when they met, if I remember correctly. He was the land agent for the big house back in those days, which meant he wasn’t called up. I was an aircraft joiner over at the air base, so I was exempt as well. But we both felt the same way – we wanted to do our bit, so that’s how we met. Right back before the beginning of the war we signed up as ARP wardens, but you might know it better as Civil Defence Service?’

  Lucy nodded.

  ‘You might think a sleepy little village like this wouldn’t see much action, but you’d be surprised. We weren’t that far from Bletchley Park – not that we knew about it in those days, of course – and we had the air base just along the road where they trained fighter pilots to fly Blenheims. Lovely old planes, they were.’

  Lucy was torn between wanting to write this all down, asking him to stop talking so she could get out her phone and record it, and just sitting there listening to his memories.

  ‘He was a good old boy, Len. I miss him.’ Henry tailed off then, gazing out of the window.

  ‘You see what I mean,’ said Susan, cheerfully. ‘Lots of interesting information. And of course we have all the women from the village who remember, as well.’

  Lucy nodded. So many stories, and time was running out to gather them before the people who’d lived through the war years passed on. She wanted to gather as many as she could – not the glamorous and exciting tales of the men and women who’d been caught up on the front line, but the everyday stories of the people who’d lived through it all and how it had affected their lives.

  ‘Of course,’ said Henry, beginning again, as if he’d remembered halfway through gazing out of the window that he was in the middle of a story, ‘I’m sure you’ll get some good gen on what went on from Bunty.’ He dipped a biscuit in his tea. ‘She had an interesting war.’

  Susan looked at him fleetingly and shook her head.

  ‘I’ve already spoken to her – not sure if you’ll have any more luck, Lucy?’

  Lucy shook her head, remembering how Bunty had begun to open up one afternoon but since then had resisted all attempts to bring the conversation round in that direction again.

  ‘She doesn’t seem keen to talk about it.’

  ‘Oh, I know.’ He lifted his cup to his mouth and then paused for a second, talking over it. ‘Skeletons in cupboards, and all that. But she had – well, there’s the top-secret stuff – I know she hasn’t talked about that since the war – and that’s not to mention that handsome chap.’ He took a mouthful of tea.

  ‘Which handsome chap?’ Susan looked at him, intrigued.

  ‘Oh, well. You know how it was in the war years. They trained Canadian and US airmen at that base I mentioned. The village hall was always busy. Dances, beetle drives, that sort of thing. We knew how to have fun. And all sorts of things used to happen in the blackout.’

  ‘Goodness.’ Susan looked surprised. ‘I hope you’re not casting aspersions on Bunty.’

  ‘Not just Bunty,’ Henry chuckled. ‘We were all at it. Work hard, play hard. That was our motto. There’s a lot more to war history than just what we did in working hours.’

  Susan straightened her back and brushed some imaginary specks from the front of her blouse. She pursed her lips.

  ‘I’m not sure we need to feature that sort of thing in our Little Maudley Through the Years memorial book, are you?’

  Lucy hid a smile. She’d have to get Henry alone and see what he had to tell her.

  Friday night – and the Abba night – came around. Lucy and Mel were parked on chairs at the back of the village hall, waiting for David, Helen’s husband, to get the projector working. Tickets – £5 a time, to include tea and cake at intermission – had sold out. Mel opened her capacious bag to show a bottle of something that didn’t look at all like tea.

  ‘I’ve come armed. It’s gin and elderflower tonic. I’ve brought glasses, too.’

  ‘Gin, girls,’ said Helen, noticing immediately. ‘What fun!’

  Mel pulled a face behind her back. ‘God, sorry. It’s just, she’s so “head girl at St Clare’s” that I can’t help it. She makes me want to misbehave.’

  ‘She is a bit terrifying.’

  ‘D’you think David likes that?’

  They looked over at David, who was taking instructions from her with a slightly fearful expression on his face, and both burst out laughing. ‘Not there, David,’ said Mel, in an uncanny impression of Helen. ‘Unfasten my bra first!’

  ‘Are you leading the new girl astray?’

  Lucy jumped, hearing a deep, low voice behind her. She turned and saw Sam, the erstwhile burglar. He ducked his head and gave her a slightly awkward, crooked smile.

  ‘Would I?’ Mel nudged Lucy, making her laugh. ‘We were having a perfectly civilized conversation about Helen and David’s sex life.’

  ‘Right.’ He made to turn away. ‘Shall I come back later?’

  ‘No,’ Mel said, reaching across to the table behind them and hooking a teacup on her finger to use as an extra gin glass. ‘You can join us.’

  ‘Shhhh,’ said an elderly gentleman, turning round with a finger to his lips. ‘It’s about to start.’

  Lucy couldn’t stand Abba. There had been countless awful work nights out where everyone had ended up singing karaoke, and it always seemed to end up with Abba medleys. They gave her awful flashbacks of nights when she’d drunk too much wine in an attempt to fit in and never quite managed it. And yet, oddly, here she was only a week or so into her stint of village life and she’d found two people to spend the evening with, even if they were all there under duress.

  ‘I’m doing my bit,’ Sam explained, still whispering. ‘Thanks to you persuading me to come along, I got roped into helping out afterwards with the clearing up, and Freya –’ he motioned to the other side of the room where his daughter was sitting, legs folded underneath her, beside another girl with long fair hair – ‘decided she wanted in on the act.’

  ‘Oh, I didn’t see her there. That’s Camille, my daughter,’ Mel explained to Lucy. The girls, sensing they were being talked about, looked up and waved.

  ‘She and Freya have been friends forever,’ Mel said. ‘Bit like me and whatshisname here. We’ve been friends since nursery school.’

  Sam smiled. He had good teeth, Lucy noticed. The lights dimmed and Mel unscrewed the bottle of gin and tonic. She poured the drink into the glasses and teacup, coughing to cover up the hissing noise it made as it fizzed, and passed them round.

  ‘Let me know when you want a top-up.’

  ‘Shhh!’ said the man again.

  ‘Ah, lovely – are you two giving Sam a hand with the tidying up?’

  After the film was over, the hall had cleared surprisingly quickly. (‘Everyone knows better than to hang around,’ explained Mel, ‘because they know they’ll get roped into helping.’)

  Like we have, thought Lucy; but she didn’t really mind. She was helping Sam load the dishwasher. Despite getting off on the wrong foot at their first meeting, she was finding him easy company.

  ‘Mel was telling me you were head of year in a secondary school. This must be a bit of a change of pace from teaching, then?’ Sam stacked cups. Mel had been whisked off to sweep the floor.

  ‘Well, I have to admit I didn’t expect to be quite this involved in village life,’ said Lucy, plunging her hands into a sink full of hot soapy water and washing the delicate china, which Helen had declared too fragile for the industrial dishwasher.

  ‘It does tend to take over slightly,’ Sam admitted, straightening up. His arms were tanned, and dusted with a smattering of freckles amongst the dark hairs. He pushed his sleeves up a bit further and unhooked a dishtowel.

  ‘You wash, I’ll dry. We might actually get out of here before midnight if we’re lucky.’

  There was a shriek and a giggle from the hall. Lucy and Sam both turned, looking though the kitchen hatch. Freya and Camille were waltz
ing in their socks across the newly swept floor, slipping and giggling, singing ‘Waterloo’. Mel, leaning on the big floor sweeper, looked across at them and raised her eyes heavenward, laughing. Helen beetled into the kitchen.

  ‘Are you two nearly done?’

  ‘Almost.’ Sam turned round and then back to the sink.

  ‘Chop chop, then.’

  ‘Come on, Lucy, wash those dishes a bit faster. We haven’t got all night.’ Sam slid Lucy a sideways glance that made her giggle. She widened her eyes in a silent response, and Sam had to turn a laugh into a cough. There was something about Helen Bromsgrove that made her feel more like a naughty schoolgirl than a fully grown adult. It was a nice change.

  Outside the sky was a washed-out dark blue, with a pale moon hanging above the trees. Lucy hovered, not wanting the evening to be over.

  ‘Well, that wasn’t too bad after all,’ Sam said.

  ‘Told you,’ said Mel.

  ‘Thank you so much, chaps, for your help. Hugely appreciated! Home for a nice G and T, I think?’ Helen jingled the keys to the village hall, having locked up the doors.

  Freya and Camille were still dancing on the pavement beside them, singing loudly.

  ‘Shh, you two,’ said Helen, bossily. ‘Time for bed, I think.’

  She bustled off. Mel looked at Lucy and made a face. ‘Can you imagine if she’d had children? She’d have them as well trained as her Labradors.’

  ‘Imagine having Helen Bromsgrove as your mum.’ Freya’s face was a picture of horror.

  ‘Oh my God. I’m never complaining about you again,’ said Camille, lacing her arm through Mel’s and looking up at her, batting her eyelashes. ‘Can I sleep over at Freya’s house?’