by Annie Groves
‘I’m beginning to think that it would be best for all of us if I put in for a transfer,’ Sam told her in a low voice. ‘I don’t seem to fit in any more and since we’re talking of fresh starts …’
‘Give it time,’ Hazel advised her.
It was all very well for Hazel to tell her to give things time, but how was she supposed to do that when Lynsey was making it clear how much she resented and disliked her? Working here on her own at the barracks, where she had worked with Mouse, half expecting to hear her voice every time she managed to forget what had happened for a few seconds wasn’t helping either, she acknowledged miserably as she stared at what seemed like a never-ending stock list.
‘Frank told you yet that Molly’s had a little boy?’
Sam almost jumped out of her skin. Sergeant Everton!
‘Anyone would think you’d been trained as a spy the way you go creeping up on a person,’ she complained.
‘Over the moon, he is, from what I’ve heard.’
‘I’m sure he is,’ Sam agreed, refusing to look at him.
‘About the other day …’
The gloves were off now and no mistake. She had been waiting for something like this, Sam admitted. She had known that he wouldn’t let what he had seen go without saying something about it. Not that he had any business telling her what to do.
‘I’m going for my break,’ she told him, knowing that whatever it was he planned to say to her, she did not want to hear it. What gave him the right anyway to keep on at her the way he did? It wasn’t even as though she had done anything wrong.
‘Heard about what happened to your pal.’
Sam was too taken off guard to do anything other than stare up at him in pain. Lynsey must have told him, she guessed.
‘Bad do,’ he added, causing Sam’s shock that he should mention Mouse to turn to anger. Did he really expect her to believe that he meant that? Of course he didn’t. Not a man like him. And besides, he was bound to agree with Lynsey’s opinion of Mouse, as they were seeing one another.
‘I think so,’ she told him pointedly. His words had grated on her still-raw emotions like someone touching an exposed nerve in a bad tooth. ‘But you don’t. Not really. I expect you think the ATS is better off without her, just like Lynsey does.’
‘Now wait just a minute—’
‘No! Why should I? And why should people like you still go on criticising poor Mouse? Haven’t you all hurt her enough? She’s dead now. Can’t you leave her alone and let her rest in peace? You don’t care about Mouse at all. No one here does except me. No one! I’m not even allowed to ask what’s happened to … to her, or if she’s going to be buried with her mother, like I know she would have wanted,’ Sam burst out wretchedly, filled with the misery of the last few days and her pain at the lack of any proper respectful mourning for her friend, even though logically she knew why this was not possible. To her chagrin she realised that she was dangerously close to tears. She could feel them clogging her throat and burning the backs of her eyes. The last thing she wanted to do was to humiliate herself by crying in front of this man.
‘I’ll bet that you and Lynsey had a wonderful time pulling Mouse to pieces, just like Toadie did her bear,’ Sam rushed on, swallowing back her threatening tears.
‘Lynsey?’
‘And I’m sure she’ll have told you as well how relieved everyone is that poor Mouse isn’t around any more. Everyone but me, that is.’
‘Hang on a minute,’ he tried to stop her, but Sam was too caught up in her own feelings and her determination to show him that she cared about Mouse and she didn’t care how unpopular that made her.
‘Well, you can tell her that she won’t have to put up with me for much longer because I’m going to put in for a transfer. That should please everyone. And this time I’m going to ask for a posting as a driver, seeing as that’s what the ATS have me trained to do.’
‘You’ve trained as a driver?’ he queried sharply.
‘Yes,’ Sam confirmed.
‘Then how come you’re working as a clerk?’
‘You wouldn’t understand.’
‘Larked about and got rumbled by the wrong person, did you?’ he guessed.
Sam stared at him. He had no right to make such an astute guess and be right. How could he have judged her so accurately when he barely knew her? Suddenly she felt vulnerable in a way that was totally unfamiliar to her. How could this man, who did nothing but criticise her and who always seemed to be there when she most wanted him not to be there, be able to know something like that about her? Certainly not from Lynsey, because Sam hadn’t told the other girls about that. She felt thoroughly unnerved, not just by his assessment but by her own emotions, which she could neither understand nor control.
‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ she told him, refusing to acknowledge that he had guessed correctly.
‘But you do want that transfer?’
Why was he asking her that? Because Lynsey had told him about their fall-out? Because he harboured suspicions that she was trying to chase after Sergeant Brookes?
‘I said I did, didn’t I?’ she answered assertively. ‘Do you really think I’d want to stay here after what’s happened?’ she demanded when he made no comment but instead simply looked at her, subjecting her to a silent scrutiny as though he was weighing her up – and finding her wanting. ‘Well, I don’t,’ she told him forcefully. ‘In fact …’ Sam stopped, her voice cracking, unable to continue, hating herself for her vulnerability, and hating him for being there to witness it. What was happening to her?
She started to turn away, wanting to get away from him before she broke down completely and then stiffened, inhaling in shocked disbelief as he moved, blocking her exit and then closing the distance between them, to take hold of her in an imprisoning grip. She could feel the strength of his hands as he held her upper arms and she could feel their warmth too.
‘Now listen to me for a moment.’
‘Listen to you?’ Her heart was jerking around inside her chest and her pulse was racing. Humiliatingly she could feel tears prickling the backs of her eyes. ‘Why? So that you can start criticising me again? So that you can make more accusations about me that aren’t true? No thank you.’ She must not let him see the effect he was having on her or how emotionally vulnerable he made her feel. No man had reduced her to tears, not ever, and she had never imagined that they might. Tears in reaction to male criticism belonged to a very different type of woman from her, and it increased her hostility towards Johnny Everton that he should somehow have managed to provoke them.
Sam wasn’t prepared to listen to him any more. Abandoning her list, she pushed past him, ignoring his curt demand that she stay and listen to what he had to say. She could imagine all too easily the cruel way he and Lynsey would have talked about poor Mouse.
She was going to ask for a transfer, Sam decided. A fresh start was definitely what she needed.
FOURTEEN
‘You sang lovely in church this morning, Sally, didn’t she, Vicar?’
‘Indeed she did, Mrs Brookes,’ the vicar agreed. ‘In fact I was hoping to have a word with you to ask you if you’d be kind enough to help out with teaching the little ones ready for the Christmas carol service. I know we’re only just going into October this week, but it takes time to get them to learn all the words properly. Brown Owl does her best, but she isn’t very musical.’
‘Well …’ Sally began uncertainly.
‘You don’t have to give me an answer right now. Oh, excuse me whilst I go and have a word with Dr Ross and welcome him to our community.’
Dr Ross! Sally couldn’t stop herself turning round to look over to where the doctor was standing with the vicar’s wife. Was it because she now knew of his personal loss that she felt he looked very alone? She was feeling sorry for him? Sally frowned.
‘Well, I’m not having mine joining in any carol singing, not if she’s going to be teaching them after what she’s tried to do to me
and mine.’
As the strident sound of Daisy’s voice reached her, Sally was well aware that it had been deliberately pitched loud enough for her to hear, and not just her; she could feel the sidelong looks she was being given.
‘That’s daft talk, Daisy, and you know it,’ Doris responded immediately, coming to Sally’s rescue. ‘In your shoes I’d be down on me knees thanking God that I hadn’t got more sick kiddies on me conscience.’
‘That’s a lie that it were our fault.’ Daisy’s face was bright red with temper. ‘And if she’s been saying any different—’
‘Sally’s said nothing,’ Doris defended her.
‘Sez you. If that’s true then how come he’s here?’ Daisy nodded in the direction of the doctor. ‘Let him just start trying to put the blame on us and I’ll have a thing or two to say to him about her. Some mother she is, leaving her kiddies with someone else and going off out at night. You’d never catch me doing owt like that …’
‘Oh, there you are, Mam,’ Frank announced, hurrying over. ‘Molly’s told me to have a word with the vicar about the christening. I’ve told her there’s plenty of time but she wants Teddy christened well before Christmas. Can you keep an eye on Lillibet for a minute for me?’
‘How is Molly now, Frank?’ Daisy asked, immediately solicitous, turning her back on Sally as she did so.
‘Picking up a bit – but don’t go bringing her any of them sandwiches of yours, Daisy,’ Frank grinned, winking at Sally.
‘Take no notice of Daisy, Sally,’ Doris counselled Sally when Daisy had subsided. ‘Allus had a bit of a temper on her, she has. How’ve you gone on with changing your shift at the factory?’
‘The foreman says that he’s sorting it out as fast as he can.’
Sally knew from Doris’s expression that her words had been sharper than they should have been, but it wasn’t her fault, was it, that all of a sudden she and her sons were just a nuisance?
‘Dr Ross is coming over,’ Doris told her quietly.
‘He’s probably heard that Molly’s had her baby and he wants to have another go at me to have my two evacuated,’ Sally returned, refusing to let go of her hostility.
‘Well, there’s summat to be said for it,’ Doris told her. ‘I can’t pretend that I haven’t been thinking meself that it isn’t safe for kiddies to be living in Liverpool since that school was bombed.’
Sally was too busy trying to call back Tommy, who had seen the doctor and was making for him, to answer her, but it was too late, and she had to stand by in chagrined embarrassment as her son flung himself at his hero, clasping him round the knees as he beamed up at him.
‘Well, you can certainly see he’s used to handling kiddies,’ Doris remarked approvingly as she too watched the doctor bend down and pick Tommy up.
‘Huh,’ Sally heard Daisy exclaiming sourly. ‘I’m sure I know what to think about the kind of woman who uses her kiddies to go sucking up to a man, especially when she’s already got a husband. Downright shocking, I call it, but then you allus get them sort wot has that much brass face they don’t care what anyone else thinks. I never thought as we’d have one living in a respectable neighbourhood like ours, though.’
Sally had had enough. Turning round, she said to Daisy fiercely, ‘If you’re talking about me—’
‘Don’t let her upset you, Sally,’ Doris intervened quickly. ‘The trouble with Daisy is that she doesn’t allus know when she’s gone too far. She doesn’t mean any harm.’
Sally didn’t believe that for one moment but Doris’s intervention was enough to have Sally recoiling from the recognition of how ashamed of herself she would have felt if she had been provoked into an exchange of insults, not just in public, but also having just come out of church.
‘The doctor looks lonely. If it wasn’t for Molly just having had her baby I’d invite him back to have his Sunday dinner with us,’ Doris commented. ‘Mind you, I expect the vicar will have asked him to join them.’
‘Would you do me a favour, Doris, and go over and tell Tommy that we’re going home now?’ Sally asked. ‘I’d go myself only I don’t want Daisy making any more accusations.’
‘Oh, don’t pay any attention to her. No one else will,’ Doris told her forthrightly, but Sally stood her ground, refusing to look across at the doctor, and hurrying Tommy away as soon as he came back.
Normally Sam enjoyed Sundays. There was something that always lifted her spirits about the bracing parade-ground-style march down to the small local church, followed by their shared singing of the traditional hymns that every schoolchild knew off by heart. But it would take more than singing hymns to lift her spirits today, she admitted as she filed into a pew behind May and then kneeled to say a few words of silent prayer. She had come down here to the church several times since Mouse’s death, torn between the comforting familiarity of kneeling to say her prayers for her friend, and her wretchedness and guilt because of the manner of that death.
Her personal prayers said, she stood up, pity clutching at her heart as she saw the little black-clad family several pews in front of her: three young children, a girl and two boys, clinging to their mother.
Not very far away from them stood a young couple who were exchanging tender looks, and Sam wasn’t surprised to hear their wedding bans being read in the service, nor the announcement of the loss of another brave fighting man – husband and father to the family she had already noticed.
‘Pity you didn’t come with us last night,’ May commented once they were outside. ‘You should have seen the way Lynsey was carrying on over her sergeant. All over him like a rash, she was. She’s really got it bad. She’s nuts about him.’ She started to yawn. ‘Gawd knows how I managed to get up in time for parade this morning.’ She smothered another yawn. ‘This time next week we’ll be into October; I hope I get Christmas leave this year. Normally the whole family get together. My mum’s got two sisters and a brother, and they all come round to us; there’s always a houseful. We had some smashing fun before the war. I missed it last year. Have you got any plans?’
‘No, I haven’t thought about it,’ Sam told her truthfully.
‘An only one, are you?’ May looked sympathetic.
Sam shook her head. ‘No, I’ve got a brother. He’s in the RAF. I can’t remember the last time we got leave together, though.’
‘This will be the fourth Christmas we’ve been at war,’ May pointed out unnecessarily.
They exchanged looks and then May shivered.
‘My dad said it’d go on longer than everyone said. Watch out,’ she warned Sam, putting out the cigarette she had been smoking. ‘Here comes the captain.’
Both of them were standing smartly to attention, ready to salute, by the time the captain, deep in conversation with the vicar, drew level with them.
Sunday afternoon for those girls who didn’t have a pass out were normally spent in the shared sitting room, writing letters or engaged in some activity such as reading, knitting or sewing, the captain apparently having ‘strong views’ about the morality of playing card games on a Sunday.
Sam had just finished writing her weekly letter to her parents when she heard her name being called.
‘Captain wants to see you,’ the young lieutenant informed her.
Sam tried not to look as anxious as she felt. The soles to her better pair of shoes had started to come away and so she had had to wear her other less well-polished pair this morning, and no doubt the captain had noticed that fact when she had walked past them. Had there been any other faults with the smartness of her uniform, Sam worried uneasily as she made her way to the captain’s office. She may still feel unhappy about the statement she had been pressured into giving after Mouse’s death, but she was too sensible not to know that if she went ahead and asked for a transfer, it would not help her cause if she were to get on the wrong side of the captain.
‘Private Grey, ma’am,’ the lieutenant announced as they both saluted.
‘Ah, Private Grey. Goo
d. Sit down.’
The captain was actually smiling approvingly at her!
‘Naturally I expect the women under my command to remember that we are all judged by the behaviour of each of us and put up a good show. We all want the country to be proud of us. However, I must say that one can’t help but feel pleased when a senior army officer applauds the pluck of one of one’s gals. Well done, Grey.’
Sam was baffled by the captain’s praise and felt sure that she had been mistaken for someone else, but she knew enough of the system now not to say so.
‘In fact Major Thomas is so impressed with you that he has requested your transfer to his unit, as his personal driver and stenographer. It seems his existing driver is getting married and has requested a transfer back to Aldershot.’
‘Major Thomas?’
Sam tried not to look too blank. She had no idea who Major Thomas was. She really must have been confused with someone else. A someone else she was already envying. There was nothing she’d like more than to leave the storeroom, especially for a role that involved driving. However, honesty compelled her to ask uneasily, ‘Permission to speak, ma’am?’
‘Yes?’
‘I haven’t met Major Thomas, and I was wondering if there could have been a mistake and—’
‘The British military does not make mistakes, Private,’ the captain told her severely.
‘No, ma’am,’ Sam agreed woodenly.
‘You will report to Major Thomas at oh nine hundred hours tomorrow morning at Deysbrook Barracks and he will brief you as to your new duties then. I do have to tell you that there will be some degree of danger involved in those new duties, although Major Thomas tells me that you will not be required to accompany him when one of his men is actually defusing any bombs. You can, of course, refuse this transfer if you wish. However, as I have already told Major Thomas, my gals do not flinch in the face of danger.’
