Can Dreams Come True?

by Oliver, Marina

  'Your father will be turning in his grave to hear you say that!'

  Robert forbore to ask how his father, dead these three months, could hear anything. His mother had been devastated by Mr Manning's death, despite the years of ill health that had preceded it. 'There is going to be a war, and Father would want me to do my bit. Charles is too old for active service, and he's been with us for over twenty years, since he came out of the army in 1918.'

  'And what about me? You mean to leave me alone?'

  He restrained his impatience. 'Your sister has come to live with you, and she can be with you all the time. Even if I came back to live here it would be only an hour or so I could spare each evening, there is so much to be done.'

  'So you can't be spared!'

  'It's pointless arguing any longer. I mean to join the RAF as soon as they will have me. They need as many pilots as possible, and I can, I hope, be employed training them. If I do, I'll be at Tern Hill, and able to get home as frequently as duties allow.'

  She dissolved into ugly sobbing, and Robert, hardening his heart, left the room. Now he had better go and tell Daphne of his decision.

  Daphne was listlessly reading a medical text book when he was shown into the Carstairs' drawing room. She smiled at him a little warily. Having failed to persuade him into agreeing to a quiet wedding six months after the death of his father, she had been unusually subdued. He was afraid she had realised he did not love her. He felt trapped. He'd only proposed to her in order to please his father, and the plan had worked so far as that was concerned. Almost the last words his father had spoken, the morning before his last and fatal attack, had been how proud he would be to hold his grandchildren in his arms.

  Robert suspected he was not being totally honest with himself when he decided to enlist before they could be married. He knew he was committed to Daphne, indeed it would be shameful to let her down, but if war came, and it looked more and more likely that summer, the wedding could justifiably be delayed. He didn't allow himself to think further than that, to imagine what might happen to prevent it altogether.

  'Daphne, I'm glad to have found you alone,' he began. 'I came to let you know I have decided to join the RAF as soon as possible.'

  'Before we can be married?' she asked.

  'We really cannot marry until next Easter,' he said, trying to sound calm. 'If war comes, it's likely to be well before then, and we need to be prepared. I have something to offer, I can train pilots.'

  'You don't want to marry me, do you?' Daphne asked, and for a crazy moment Robert was tempted to tell her the truth. But she looked so unhappy he could not bring himself to do so. It would be dishonourable, it would no doubt hurt her, if she regarded it as a rejection. And there was no point in hurting Daphne since he still could not have Kate.

  'Not yet,' he said gently. 'It wouldn't be seemly, and with war coming who knows what might happen. It would be unfair to you, to both of us, if we had to be separated for months just after we married.'

  Daphne turned her face away. 'Please go, Robert. You'll let me know when you go? And write to me?'

  'Of course.'

  Thankfully he escaped. He had already contacted the recruiting office, and expected to be called on any time in the next few weeks. Meanwhile, he must make arrangements for his Tiger to be stored. He'd have neither the time nor the inclination to fly it for many months to come, however long the war lasted.

  *

  On a rare weekend off Kate went to Coventry and stayed with Sheila. There was no room in Maggie's cramped room, but Sheila had offered her the use of the sofa in her parlour.

  'If you don't mind sleeping curled up, you're welcome to it any time. I know Maggie likes to see you, but dinnertime meetings aren't very satisfactory.'

  'I don't know what she'd have done without you and George,' Kate said, helping Sheila to peel potatoes on Saturday morning. 'Between them Sam and Hattie would have driven her mad. What's that in the garden,' she added, pointing to the hump at the far end of the plot.

  'It's our air raid shelter. George insisted we had one. He says Coventry could be a target, there are so many factories here. Want to see it?'

  Kate shook her head. 'I've seen pictures. I just haven't seen any covered with earth like that. What will Maggie do? They don't have a garden big enough.'

  'There are communal ones. When all the kids are at school in September I shall join something to help out. I don't know what yet, but there's bound to be lots needed. I might even go and work school hours for George.'

  'Aren't they talking about sending the children out into the country?'

  'Only from the central areas. Maggie's kids could go, but she doesn't want to be parted from them. Understandable, when she still doesn't know what's happened to Sid.'

  'Perhaps Sam will make the men let him come home,' Kate said, but without much conviction. Sam had never been reliable, and whenever she saw him now she thought he'd got meaner and vicious rather than just weak.

  'I'm thinking of going myself, and I could take Maggie's kids too. But until it actually starts, there's no point in making plans.'

  Maggie came in then, and Kate was shocked at how drawn she looked. She seemed at least ten years older, and her hair had begun to go grey. She gave Kate a big smile, though, and hugged her.

  'You're looking great, love. Being in the open air all day seems to suit you. Got plenty of warm clothes?'

  Kate nodded. 'And I need so many layers in the winter I'm almost too fat to get into the cockpit.'

  Jeannie came in then with Harry, George's eldest son who was a year older. She was twelve now, growing into a pretty girl who looked very like Maggie. She smiled shyly at Kate, and she and Harry began to ask her questions.

  'What's it like up there? Does it look like a map? I like geography best at school.'

  Kate tried to explain. 'One day, perhaps, I might be able to take you up with me. Would you like that?'

  Jeannie smiled and bit her lip. 'I'd be frightened, I think.'

  'Of course you wouldn't. Tell me about school.'

  Jeannie, losing her shyness, chattered away until Sheila called them to the table. Then they all wanted to know how Kate was doing.

  'I expect you'll be flying air liners next,' George said. 'Though no doubt they'll stop civilian flying soon.'

  'I thought about joining the Women's Auxiliary Air Force,' Kate said, 'but I don't think they allow the women to fly RAF planes. I don't want to be there just in an office, or even helping to service the planes. Since I can fly, I want to use that.'

  They talked the whole weekend, sometimes all the grown ups apart from Hattie, who seemed to live in a world of her own, sometimes just Kate and Maggie. For the first time Maggie spoke in more detail of the man who had fathered Kate and then deserted her.

  'You came from officer stock, on his side at least,' she said, chuckling. 'Even if he was a scoundrel.'

  'Do you ever regret him?' Kate asked, curious.

  'Yes, at times. He was good company. And apart from my kids I wish I'd never set eyes on Sam Pritchard!'

  Kate sighed. 'Does it ever work out? Being in love, I mean? There always seem to be so many obstacles! I think Phyllis and Frank are the only couple I know who are happy together, and have no problems!'

  *

  Kate had a week off before she joined the Air Transport Auxiliary. Mr Jennison had, reluctantly, accepted her decision to leave.

  'We'll miss you, Miss Martins,' he said when she approached him. 'Even if we are likely to be doing less flying now war has begun, I'd have found you other tasks, until we are back to normal.'

  'I don't think we'll be back to normal for a long time,' Kate said. 'And I must do something to help. I'd rather go where my flying can be useful than have to work in a munitions factory or cook in a soldier's canteen!'

  She stayed with Sheila, whose lodgers had departed the moment war was declared, saying they didn't feel safe so close to a big town.

  'The husband was liable for conscr
iption soon, I expect, anyway, and she wanted to be near her family in Derbyshire,' Sheila explained. 'I'm tempted to go into the country as well, but George needs me here.'

  'He's fire-watching at night, is he?'

  'Yes, at the factory. And he helps lots of other voluntary groups. We all do our bit. Even Jeannie and my Harry have started to learn first aid, and George bought them both bikes. He said it would keep them out of mischief if they thought they might be useful to take messages in an emergency.'

  'It's odd without lights. I've been used to them all my life, street lights and omnibuses and trams.'

  'They've caused a lot of accidents, being driven without lights,' Sheila said. 'But your new job, what is it you'll be doing?'

  'The factories are turning out so many aeroplanes, and they need pilots to move them from the factories to the RAF airfields. It used to be the Civilian Air Guard, but they've given it another name. They've recruited some women like me, and pilots from the Great War who are too old to join up this time.'

  'But, Kate, don't you have to have instructions on how to fly the planes? Aren't they all different?'

  Kate laughed. 'That could be a problem! I shall soon find out. I imagine most of the controls are similar, but they will be different sizes, higher up off the ground, and so on. Thank goodness I've had some experience with a bigger plane. However, I think I'll be flying Moths to begin with.'

  Maggie came in then and wanted to know all about it. When she'd explained Kate demanded what news, if any, she had.

  'I think Sam might be scarpering soon,' she said. 'One of his pals has already gone back to Ireland, said he didn't want to get caught in an a war that was none of his affair.'

  'Sam's not Irish,' Kate said. 'How can he go?'

  'Because he's a coward! He's gone forty, but he won't believe they'll not want him in the army sooner or later. I think he's afraid of the bombing, really. He says Coventry's bound to be a target with all the factories making aeroplanes and parts.'

  'For once he could be right. But Maggie, if he goes, what about the children?'

  'He won't take them,' Maggie said. 'They'd be too much trouble. But the devil still won't tell me where Sid is.'

  'Well, if he goes, you must all come back here. You'd be safer than near the centre.'

  Maggie gave her a tired smile. 'Thanks, Sheila. You're a real good friend.'

  'Don't you want to get them away, evacuated?' Kate said. 'They'd be safer in the country.'

  'I couldn't bear to lose them,' Maggie said. 'It's bad enough not having Sid. Besides, Jeannie says she'd not go, she'd run away and come back here. She would, too, and if she's not with the others they'd feel so lost. Besides, they'll soon have the shelters dug at the schools, and they can go back to school.'

  'I hear some children have come back already,' Sheila said. 'There's been no bombing yet.'

  'Maybe the barrage balloons will keep them away. They did look odd, when I came in on the train.'

  'More likely to tell them Germans where we are,' Maggie said. 'Come on, kids, time we were on our way,' she said, picking up her gas mask. 'It takes a while to walk, but I don't like to use the trams and buses,' she explained to Kate. 'See you tomorrow.'

  *

  Robert rubbed his eyes as he walked back to the office in the dawn light. In six months of war there had been relatively little activity in the air, though several Wellingon bombers had been shot down in raids over Germany. On the ground and at sea it was different, the Germans had been advancing on several fronts. It had been the loss of a dozen Wellingtons a week before Christmas, because of a new German radar device, that had changed the tactics to concentrate on night raids. He now spent all the hours of darkness training pilots in night-flying techniques, though the severe weather in January, when the Thames had frozen for the first time in just over fifty years, had restricted the hours they could fly.

  By the time he had completed the log and drunk a cup of weak tea, he was longing for his bed. He went out again into the cold morning, shivering even in his thick jacket at the biting north wind, and looked up as he heard the drone of a plane coming in to land. More training aircraft, he hoped. They needed them. At least some of the Dominions were sending airmen to fight, and they had increased their production of aircraft too.

  A Tiger was approaching from the south, preparing to land, and then, behind it, slightly to one side, he saw a much heavier and faster twin-engined plane, a Whitley, he thought, with one engine belching smoke and flames.

  It was rapidly overhauling the Tiger, and Robert watched in dismay as the two aeroplanes seemed to be on a collision course. Had the Tiger pilot seen the danger?

  Then, at almost the last moment the Tiger banked steeply and swerved away, at the same time gaining height, so that the damaged Whitley had a clear run for landing. The smoke was now thick and black, and for a few seconds Robert lost sight of the Tiger which was enveloped in the black cloud. Would it become impossible to control in the swirling air currents?

  He barely noticed the Whitley landing, and the fire crew going into action. He was more concerned with the Tiger, for it was still his favourite aeroplane, and he hated to see any of them damaged, apart from the danger to the pilot if he lost control and crashed to the ground.

  He breathed a sigh of relief as the Tiger, wobbling furiously while steering clear of the Whitley and the fire fighters, regained equilibrium and after doing a circle at a greater height, came down to land in the rough grass at the edge of the field, bouncing and bumping almost to a halt, and then taxiing across to near the hangars, still keeping well away from the activity on the runway.

  It came to a halt fifty yards from him, and he watched as the pilot clambered out, and dropped lightly to the ground. He glanced round. The usual ground crew were occupied with the Whitley, so he walked across to the Tiger.

  'That was a great bit of flying,' he said to the pilot's back. 'I thought you'd have turned turtle at least.'

  The pilot's head jerked upright, and the shoulders stiffened. Then the pilot turned round slowly and dragged off the concealing helmet.

  'I'm glad my instructor approves.'

  'Kate? Kate, is it really you? I'm not dreaming? What the devil are you doing?'

  'Getting out of the way of burning bombers. Good morning, Robert. I didn't expect to see you here.'

  Robert pulled himself together. 'ATA?' he asked, and Kate nodded, unsmiling.

  She was thinner of face, and her hair had been cropped short, but she was the same, his Kate. No, not his, he reminded himself. She was married to a butcher who worked in the Bull Ring, and probably living with John Wilson, her lover.

  He tried to be calm and practical. 'Come into the mess, we can provide some tea and breakfast.'

  'I'd better check in first, get a receipt. Then I ought to be catching the train. I have an hour to spare to see Maggie in Coventry before I go back to the pool.'

  'This way.' They began to walk towards the office. 'I'll take you to the station. Kate, why did you leave without telling me?'

  She shook her head, avoiding his gaze. 'I thought it was for the best. Did you get the rest of the money for my lessons? I asked Maggie to send you postal orders.'

  'Damn the money! Oh, I beg your pardon. Kate, why did you run away? I heard you'd gone to Lincolnshire. Did you go to John Wilson?'

  *

  Kate had always known she might meet Robert at one of the RAF airfields, when she was delivering planes. She'd thought she was prepared, could be cool and calm, treat him as she did the other men she worked with or met during her missions. At the first sound of his voice she knew how badly mistaken she had been.

  She had been shaken by the near-collision with the stricken Whitley, it was that which made her tremble, she told herself. It wasn't that, however, which had made her want to turn and throw herself into Robert's arms. She'd exercised the greatest control in speaking calmly, and prayed he would follow her lead. Instead he'd begun to ask questions, questions she could not ans
wer.

  'I left because I was offered a job flying,' she said now.

  'In Lincolnshire? But that's where John Wilson lives.'

  'Is it?' How did he know about John Wilson, she was thinking. What else did he know about her? Who could have told him? Surely Maggie never would, even if he'd been to Coventry to try and discover where she was.

  'Robert!' It was a cry of distress. 'It's no use! Please, leave me alone. I'll always be grateful to you for teaching me to fly, and now I'm doing a job I love, a useful job. Leave me in peace to live how I choose.'

  When she looked up at him she could have wept at the anguish in his eyes, but she forced herself not to relent. He might think he loved her, but she was not the sort of girl who could support him. He was important, he ran a large business, and she was a girl from a poverty-stricken background, a bastard, a fool who had disgraced herself. And, she suddenly recalled, he was engaged to be married to someone else.

  'How is Daphne?' she asked before she could consider the implications of mentioning her.

  'Daphne?' It seemed for a moment that he didn't understand, had never known anyone of that name. Then he rallied. 'Still at the University,' he said, his tone bleak.

  'Are you married yet?' It made no difference to her, but she had to know.

  'Married? Not yet. It was to have been last year, but my father died, so it was postponed. Then there was the war.'

  'Your father? Oh, Robert, I'm so sorry. But who's running the business if you're here? And what are you doing here?'

  'So many questions.' He had recovered his poise, and grinned at her in the old, familiar way which made her heart turn over with longing. 'It was rather sudden, when my father had his last heart attack, just a year ago. He'd been ill before, though, so it was not entirely unexpected. I have a very competent manager for the factory, and I decided I could be more use training some of the pilots we desperately need. My mother has shut up the house and retreated to the wilds of Yorkshire with her sister. She is terrified at the idea of bombs falling in Birmingham. Now, sign in. I'll wait for you and take you to the Mess for breakfast. I'd like to hear how the ATA are managing. If things get any worse we will be needing a good many more aeroplanes than we have at present.'