On a Wing and a Prayer

by Ruby Jackson

  Looking round the billet, she saw that most heads were already on the pillows. Before she sealed the envelope, she kissed it, wondering how long it would be before she saw Brad again and felt his lips on hers.

  NINETEEN

  Rose was absolutely stunned. She had packed her kitbag for her overnight stay, put it in the car and made her way to the depot to sign out the gorgeous Daimler, her favourite car. She had been given her instructions and almost gasped with surprise. Lance Corporal Petrie was ordered to drive Senator Jarrold and possibly a second dignitary to Silvertides Estate, Dartford, Kent.

  How frustrating, thought Rose, that she would be on duty within walking distance of her own home, and unable to pop in to see them. What a beautiful surprise that would have been for Mum. Nothing could make up for Phil’s injuries, but having one of her children home, even for half an hour, would have cheered Flora.

  Senator Jarrold was staying at the American ambassador’s residence and Rose drove there first. The senator certainly packed quite a few clothes for a one-night stay, Rose decided, seeing various items of luggage being loaded into the car. What on earth had been planned by the commander, if indeed it was he who had organised the house party? Thankfully, the Daimler was a large, roomy vehicle and there was more than enough room for the French officer, whom she picked up at his hotel. Rose had expected to see someone in the style of General de Gaulle, an exceptionally tall man, but her passenger was of average height and very slender.

  If her passengers had never met or even communicated with each other before, they had no trouble at all in chatting together. The language used was French, and Rose envied Senator Jarrold her fluency. Idly she wondered if the French officer spoke no English, or perhaps their conversation was so important that they wanted to ensure that Rose did not understand them.

  The Frenchman spoke perfect English, as Rose discovered when they reached Silvertides Estate. The man addressed as ‘Commander’ in the office, but whom Rose preferred to think of as ‘the butler’, came down the steps of the house to greet them.

  ‘Lord Silvertide, it is very kind of you to host this meeting,’ said the French officer. Senator Jarrold added her thanks.

  ‘London is lovely, but what a joy to be in a glorious private home where we can pretend for a few hours that we’re simply guests of the family.’

  ‘The family is delighted to have you here as a guest, Senator. My wife suggested coffee in the drawing room and you’ll be glad to know she ordered a roaring fire.’

  He nodded politely to Rose and walked up the steps with his guests.

  A member of staff, an elderly civilian, then directed Rose to where she should park the car. When she had done that, a housemaid came out to take her to her quarters for the weekend. These consisted of a small sitting room, a smaller bedroom and a nicely appointed bathroom. Rose, who had never in her entire life enjoyed the luxury of a private bathroom, her own bedroom and, wonder of wonders, a sitting room, thought it all quite marvellous.

  ‘Used to be the governess’s rooms,’ the housemaid informed her. ‘I suppose it’ll do for you. It’s better than being up on the servants’ floor. The wind comes right off the river, perishing sometimes.’ She turned to leave and then turned back, ‘Not sure whether you’re them or us, but lunch is at one and dinner’s at eight.’ She looked unsure. ‘Or maybe it’ll be later as there’s guests.’

  With that rather unsatisfactory information she left, and Rose, quite sure that she was not one of ‘them’ but more probably one of ‘us’, found herself hoping that she would be told for sure before she had missed too many meals. Her duties, as far as she knew, were to drive Senator Jarrold and possibly the French officer wherever they wanted to go at whatever time they decided. But, in the meantime, she had her own sitting room and so she decided to sit in one of the very lovely chairs and read more of Sally’s book.

  She was totally involved when she was disturbed by a knock on the door, which opened to admit a woman who was, at one and the same time, familiar and yet a complete stranger.

  ‘Forgive me for disturbing you, Miss Petrie. I’m Mrs Brown, the housekeeper. You probably don’t remember me but I helped look after you and the poor young gentleman as died trying to do his duty. A beautiful spring day, it was. Dreadful sad.’

  ‘Of course I remember, Mrs Brown, and yes, it was quite dreadful. You made me tea. I hope I thanked you.’

  ‘You’re welcome, I’m sure, but I’d like to know your preferences for meals. Mr Cornelius thinks you might prefer to dine alone and, of course, we’re most willing to arrange things as you wish, but I wondered if a young lady like yourself might not be happier having meals with senior staff – only three of us these days, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Whichever would be easier, Mrs Brown,’ said Rose, who had fully expected to be grabbing a sandwich and a cuppa in the kitchen.

  ‘Thank you, miss. With so many house guests and a depleted staff, having you join us would free up a housemaid. We set a good table here. Her ladyship is very strict over rationing – nothing under the counter comes to this house – but it’s amazing what a good cook can do when she puts her mind to it.’

  Immediately Rose thought of her mother, who had lost one son, had a second injured and then imprisoned, and who was now dealing with worry over yet another seriously injured son. How hard she worked to make her family’s meals as tasty and nourishing as possible. Now it seemed that even the great houses like this one had to make do and mend and squirrel away a few ounces here and there so that one day there would be something really delicious for the family.

  At lunch she discovered that there were dignitaries from each and every Allied country spending the weekend at Silvertides.

  ‘All these very important men, all speaking several languages. Oh, and the lady politician too. Changed days, but it’s the ideal house, don’t you think, Miss Petrie? It’s not too far from London, but far enough away to be well off the radar.’

  Rose smiled at the butler, Mr Cornelius, who, being round and rather wobbly, certainly looked less like the Hollywood idea of a butler than did Lord Silvertide, who was tall, slender and stately.

  ‘Perfect seclusion, Mr Cornelius. I imagine there will be lots of meetings.’

  ‘I have no idea what his lordship’s guests will be doing, Miss Petrie,’ said Mr Cornelius, in a tone that implied he knew perfectly well but a mere driver had no business asking what the host’s guests were doing, ‘since the gentlemen plan, and the lady, of course, they plan to be sequestered in the blue drawing room this afternoon and in the library after breakfast tomorrow morning. This evening everyone will attend a cocktail party – I think that’s what the Americans call it – at a neighbouring estate, returning for dinner at nine. I would assume you will be driving your lady.’

  Rose nodded and said that she was supposed to drive the American senator wherever she wanted to go. She was rather ashamed to realise that she was looking forward to seeing Senator Jarrold’s cocktail dress. She sighed. The senator had worn the most incredible grey full-length fur coat on the journey from London. No doubt the magnificent coat would be worn again this evening, and thus the dress would be hidden. She had been looking forward to telling her mum and her sister about the fur, which was so like the coats worn by American ladies in glamorous films, and a fabulous evening dress would be something else to talk about.

  ‘I don’t suppose I could walk a little in the grounds, since I won’t be needed until the evening?’

  ‘Walk in the gardens by all means, but don’t go off through any gates. Wouldn’t want the security men jumping out at you.’

  ‘Perhaps I’ll just stay inside and read,’ said Rose, who found the thought of being accosted by ‘security men’, possibly aided by large dogs with very large teeth, rather disconcerting.

  ‘Go and get some fresh air afore it gets dark, lass. Even this late the gardens are lovely. You’ll have them all to yourself.’ Mrs Brown waited until the butler was out of earshot. ‘He sees s
pies everywhere. Saw two nuns collecting for refugees in Dartford the other day and was sure they was German paratroopers.’

  Spies? Mrs Brown’s tale triggered a memory. Rose remembered a cold Saturday evening a year or so before the war when she, her sister, and some friends had gone looking for spies on the nearby salt flats. They had caught nothing but bad colds.

  ‘I’ll wrap up and walk around the garden, Mrs Brown,’ said Rose, and went to fetch her coat.

  Out in the garden she wished that she had rammed on a hat. She pushed her hands as deep into the pockets of her greatcoat as they would go and cursed herself for allowing conceit to win over common sense. Her Teddy Bear coat would have been a better protection against the biting wind. She walked quickly; this was no time to stroll around admiring plantings. She found a pond that she was quite sure would be frozen over by morning and wondered what would happen to any fish, if indeed it contained fish, if the water froze. But it was too cold to stay gazing at the statue that portrayed a rather handsome, scantily clothed young man with wings on his heels. His name hovered on the tip of her tongue but refused, probably because of the extreme cold, thought Rose, to jump off into the world. The next architectural point was a wrought-iron archway over which twined leafless tendrils. Even to Rose’s unskilled eye, the ironwork showed the hand of a master. She imagined it with white roses tumbling over it in high summer. How lovely it must be and, naturally, the roses would be highly scented, and their perfume would drift all over the garden. ‘Lovely.’

  ‘Yes, it is, even in winter. Honeysuckle. I love it,’ an almost familiar voice agreed with her. ‘Sorry if I startled you, Lance Corporal, but sometimes I find it’s better for international relations if I leave a discussion before I lose control and knock a few heads together.’

  Rose had indeed been startled. Standing on the path beyond the archway, but facing it, was the American whom she had driven to the Ritz Hotel. Was it the darkness of the secluded garden or the frivolity of his remark, but Rose heard her voice saying, ‘Maybe knocking a few selected heads together might be a good idea.’

  He laughed and again she thought the sound familiar, but she told herself that all Americans from his part of the United States probably sounded the same. He moved closer to her and instinctively she moved back a step and he stopped. ‘I do believe you’re right, Lance Corporal, but, I assure you, such an action would not augur well for, what shall we say, friendly interchanges among peoples.’

  ‘Perhaps not, sir, especially since there’s too much violence in the world at the moment.’

  He looked up at the sky where a sprinkling of stars was shining bravely. ‘Again, you’re right,’ he said. ‘Guess the air will have cleared and so I’d best get back inside. Don’t stay out here too long: you’ll freeze.’

  He walked back towards the drawing room’s curtained French doors and disappeared inside, and Rose, suddenly aware of exactly how cold she was, hurried back to the kitchen door, appreciating the wall of heat that enveloped her as she opened it.

  ‘His lordship’s chauffeur was looking for you, Miss Petrie. He wants you to help him warm up the cars.’

  ‘Of course, I’ll go right away.’ Rose had scarcely had time to warm up herself, but the chauffeur wasn’t to know that she’d been chatting to…whoever he was in the garden. Warming up the cars was bound to help her too.

  The chauffeur, Ingram, saw Rose approaching and an angry look crossed his face. ‘I thought you was supposed to change.’

  ‘Change? Change what?’

  ‘They did tell you to bring a smart frock?’

  Rose had completely forgotten that command, especially since she could see no reason for her to be out of uniform.

  ‘You do have one?’

  Rose had packed a dress her mother referred to as a ‘dress up or dress down’ dress. It was lightweight black wool with three-quarter-length sleeves, a kick-pleat at the back and a relatively modest sweetheart neckline. Unfortunately Rose had nothing but a string of faux pearls with which to dress it up, and so she had decided, should she need to look smart, to weave these, rather cunningly, through her hair. She would, she decided after much debate, look presentable.

  ‘Look at me, Petrie. Do you think I usually drive ’is nibs wearing black tie?’

  ‘Sorry, I hadn’t noticed, I was thinking about something.’

  ‘Then think about getting yourself ready.’ He looked down at her legs. ‘Please say you have finer stockings than those. For heaven’s sake, girl, you and I are to mingle, champagne in hand, with our little ears wide open, just in case someone drops a little pearl.’

  ‘A pearl. What kind of pearl?’

  ‘A word or ten to tell us what any one of our Allies is planning. Now move, and heavy on the perfume.’

  ‘Allies, Ingram, you do know what that means?’

  ‘You’re getting above yourself, girl. Knowledge is power. Don’t forget the scent.’

  Rose had no perfume at all but, if anyone noticed, nothing was said. She did worry that her coat certainly did not look like the coat of a woman used to ‘mingling’ with champagne in hand.

  Her passengers were already at the car and the male dignitary was not the very correct French officer, but the man who had chatted to her in the garden. Senator Jarrold frowned when she saw Rose’s coat but, to Rose’s surprise, it was because the senator thought the coat too thin to be of any use in cold weather. She shrugged herself out of her fur coat and handed it to Rose. ‘Take it, girl, I’ll wear my stole.’

  She ignored Rose’s stuttering attempt at a refusal of the very kind offer. ‘Wear it with panache; you’re exactly the right height for it – and weight,’ she added rather sadly.

  A few minutes were lost while the fur stole was brought down from the guest’s bedroom, but it gave Rose an opportunity to admire the truly beautiful designer dress. Senator Jarrold shimmered from the diamonds at her ears and her throat all the way down to her knees. Below them Rose saw the finest of silk stockings and handmade black shoes. She could hardly wait to describe the outfit to Daisy and their friends.

  ‘Oh, you look stunning,’ she said before she could stop herself, and Senator Jarrold smiled her thanks. ‘Why, thank you, honey. I do take that for a genuine compliment.’

  The senator wrapped her silver stole around her shoulders and they were on their way, Rose and her very important passengers in the second car of a fleet of three.

  Less than thirty minutes later, Lance Corporal Rose Petrie drove up to the great stone steps of a country house even more imposing than Silvertides, wearing a coat that she was sure had cost more than every penny she had ever earned or would ever earn. If the butler thought it odd that a chauffeur was wearing fur, his well-schooled face gave nothing away. The coat, far heavier than Rose’s kitbag, was lifted from her shoulders and spirited away. She found herself praying that it would be found again at the end of the evening.

  Rose was completely out of her depth. How was she to find Ingram, the commander’s chauffeur, and what exactly did ‘mingling’ mean?

  ‘You don’t look half bad when you’re dolled up,’ said a voice, and her partner for the evening appeared from the direction of the hall. ‘Like the way you’ve coiled your hair, very feminine.’

  Rose said nothing.

  He sniffed. ‘I smell soap.’

  ‘It’s what my mother taught me to wash with. Palmolive, it’s called.’

  ‘Very funny, Petrie, but you’re supposed to be one of them. Where’s the perfume?’

  ‘I don’t have any,’ said Rose, who had detected the faintest, most enchanting smell when Senator Jarrold had handed over the coat. That was perfume, she thought, and nothing she could afford could possibly compete.

  While they talked, Ingram had gently guided her, his hand cupped under her elbow, along a carpeted corridor where gold-framed paintings adorned the walls and several small but extremely elegant pieces of furniture were positioned under them. Music and voices competed for air room and Rose rela
xed. She was a guest in a beautiful house; she expected that she would never be in this position again and so she would make the most of it. How her mother would enjoy the descriptions of furniture and clothes – if Rose was ever allowed to tell her of the evening.

  Where did they find all those magnificent flowers? They were at the open doors of a crowded reception room in which vases of exotic flowers had been arranged on almost every surface. A glass of golden liquid was put into Rose’s hand and she and her partner moved on into the room.

  ‘It’s real champagne, Rose. Enjoy that glass, but be careful with it; it’ll go straight to your head.’

  Rose laughed. She knew it was unkind – no doubt he was trying to be helpful – but had he the faintest idea of how patronising he sounded?

  He did not. ‘Laughter’s good,’ he said. ‘You’ve got a nice laugh. Last woman I had to take to a party laughed like a braying mule.’

  Rose wondered if she would face a court martial if she picked up Ingram and disposed of him somewhere. There was, though, the slight possibility that the smart dinner jacket hid the body of a martial arts champion who could take care of himself. Just thinking of it, though, had made her smile, and that smile was noticed by Senator Jarrold and her companions from across the room.

  ‘Glad you loaned the Petrie girl your coat, Araminta,’ said the other American. ‘I came upon her by the fish pond and thought she’d catch cold then.’

  ‘What was she doing out in the garden?’

  ‘Taking some exercise, I suppose – or maybe blowing off steam, like me.’

  ‘Why has Silvertide planted her here? Her body language tells me she’s just this much short of socking her escort.’

  He laughed, and Rose heard the sound and thought of Brad. She pushed the thought from her mind. ‘Shall we split up? I’ll go off to powder my nose and I’ll listen to the conversations.’

  ‘Good idea. The guests have all been vetted and likely they are one hundred per cent on our side, but one never knows. I’ll catch up with you later.’