The Girl on the Beach

by Mary Nichols

  She found a boarding house advertising bed and breakfast and booked in there, but she had no sooner been shown to her room than the siren wailed. If it was a doodlebug, she had no time to find a shelter because the warning the authorities were able to give was so short. It was one of the reasons why the bombs struck so much terror. Night or day made no difference, except that during the day there were more people on the streets. As soon as one was spotted, everyone rushed for cover and flung themselves down, praying the engine would not stop. Florrie squeezed herself under the bed and covered her face with her arms. She had no sooner done so than the whole building shook and the windows rattled and pictures fell off the walls. And then the shaking stopped and there was silence. She emerged from under the bed just as her landlady called up the stairs. ‘Are you all right, Sergeant?’

  ‘Yes, I’m fine.’ She went out onto the landing to see her hostess peering up the stairs. ‘One of your pictures has been smashed.’

  ‘Is that all? Pictures can be replaced. I’m making tea. Would you like a cup?’

  ‘Yes, please.’ Florrie went downstairs to join her. ‘Where do you reckon it came down?’

  ‘Can’t say. It seemed to be over Bermondsey way. There’s far too many of them and it’s just not fair. We don’t get enough warning.’

  Florrie followed her to the kitchen. ‘Is anything fair in war?’

  ‘No, I suppose not, but at least in the Blitz we had time to take shelter. Sit down. I’ll soon have the kettle boiled.’

  Florrie watched her moving about the kitchen and wondered how she could be so calm. ‘Were you here during the Blitz?’

  ‘Yes. I lost a few windows and the door blew in once, but I was lucky, the house stayed up.’

  ‘I’m looking for someone who lived round here in the early part of the war. I think she was bombed out, but I lost track of her. I’ve got a picture of her in my bag. I’ll go and get it.’

  She raced upstairs and came back with Julie’s picture. ‘You don’t by any chance recognise her, do you?’

  The woman studied the picture. ‘No, can’t say I do. You could go to the council offices and ask to see the casualty lists. They might help you.’

  Florrie agreed that might be a good idea. She did not tell her hostess that she had no idea what name to ask for and reading lists of meaningless names would be a fruitless exercise. But Eve had become Eve while in hospital. ‘Where would the wounded have been taken?’

  ‘To one or other of the hospitals, probably St Olave’s.’

  Florrie thanked her and, having been given directions, went to St Olave’s the following morning. The hospital was very busy; dozens of casualties were being admitted from the latest flying bomb attacks and the staff had no time for her. ‘Try the Edward the Seventh in Windsor,’ a nursing sister said as she hurried along the ward in the wake of a stretcher being carried to a bed. ‘We used to send some of our casualties there.’

  Florrie was coming to the conclusion she was on a wild goose chase. She had no idea what Eve was called before she met her, was not even sure Eve had correctly remembered the circumstances of being bombed out or if, remembering, she had deliberately concealed some of the facts. ‘All I’ve got to go on,’ she told the matron at the Edward the Seventh, ‘is that she lost her memory and adopted the name of Eve Seaton. And I believe she had a broken leg and arm.’

  ‘And what is your interest in the young lady, Sergeant?’

  ‘She’s a friend and she’s gone missing. She could be in trouble if I don’t find her.’

  ‘I’m afraid it will mean trawling through hundreds of records and I really haven’t time to do that for you, Sergeant.’

  ‘I could do it.’

  ‘Certainly not. Patient records are confidential. I’m afraid you will have to pursue your enquiries elsewhere, Sergeant.’

  ‘There is nowhere else.’

  ‘Then I’m sorry. Perhaps she’ll turn up of her own accord.’

  ‘If her memory came back suddenly, would she forget everything that had happened since she lost it?’

  ‘Possibly. Maybe not. It depends.’

  Realising she was getting nowhere, Florrie thanked her and left. It was time she returned to Manston or she would be in trouble too. What should she – what could she – tell Section Officer Murray? And there was Alec. Perhaps it was a good thing he was many miles away and unaware of what was going on. Of course, her guess could have been wrong and Eve’s memory had not returned. In that case, where on earth had she got to? She found a call box and rang her mother. Eve had not arrived. ‘If she turns up, ring me at Manston,’ she told her. ‘I’ve got to go back there now.’

  Chapter Twelve

  You couldn’t get anyone to do a good day’s work these days, Ted told himself. He had had the devil of a job to find a stonemason to make the memorial stone he wanted. True, he had asked for a carved cherub on each side and twining ivy, as well as the words, but that shouldn’t have been beyond the capabilities of a good sculptor. ‘There’s a war on,’ he had been told, which was everybody’s excuse for not doing what they did not want to do. ‘It’ll take too long and we haven’t got the staff now.’ Money had talked in the end and the monument had been erected to his satisfaction. It looked a bit too large and a bit too white compared to the weather-beaten, lichen-covered stones surrounding it, but it was done now. He stood admiring it for several minutes, then turned to leave. He would go and see Josie and tell her to come and see it. He’d better take a few presents for the kids too; they seemed to expect it whenever he visited, which wasn’t very often. He had no time for kids.

  He stopped suddenly and skipped behind a gravestone. That Paterson woman was standing by the Walker grave and she was not alone. Standing beside her with head bowed was a living breathing Julie Monday. He had been right all along; it was not Julie in that grave but Rosie Summers. Where the devil had Julie been all these years? She was in a WAAF uniform. A sergeant too. What a turn up for the books! There was hay to be made from this, he felt sure, though it would need some thought.

  ‘I remember that gnome,’ Julie said. ‘Harry bought it in Southend when we were on our honeymoon. It made me laugh. I said it was Happy, one of Snow White’s dwarves, so he bought it and carried it home on the train and put it in the garden. He said it would be a reminder of how happy we were.’

  She and Grace had talked and talked over supper the previous evening, during which Julie remembered more and more detail of what she had forgotten and Grace reminded her that Harry was her husband and as far as she knew was still alive and still in the air force. It had been Grace’s idea to visit the grave. ‘It might remind you of just how much you loved him and how much you owed to him,’ she had said at breakfast that morning. Julie hadn’t slept well; there was too much swimming round in her head and questions she couldn’t answer.

  ‘Harry stood it outside our Anderson shelter. Why did he bring it here, do you think?’

  ‘He said it was to keep you smiling in heaven.’

  ‘Oh.’ She felt the tears well in her eyes and slowly run down her cheeks. She had loved Harry beyond everything, and he her, right from that first meeting on the beach when he had befriended a skinny little orphan from a charitable home. It was why he had chosen that same seaside resort for their honeymoon. Believing her dead, he had put the gnome on the grave and said his goodbyes. That must, in his eyes, have seemed final. He would have gone on with his life without her, might even have found someone else. Had she any right to upset him by suddenly reappearing? Should Julie Walker stay dead? Her head told her one thing, her heart another.

  ‘Let’s go,’ she said suddenly, and turned away. ‘I’ve got a lot of thinking to do and I must go back to Manston before I’m posted absent without leave.’

  They returned to the flat in Shoreditch where Julie picked up her rucksack.

  ‘You will do what is right, won’t you, Julie?’ Grace queried as she said goodbye. ‘And let me know what happens. And if you ever need hel
p, you know where to come.’

  ‘Yes.’ Julie smiled as she hefted the rucksack onto her back. ‘I’ve always known that.’ She kissed the old lady on the cheek. ‘Look after yourself.’

  ‘And you.’

  ‘Do what is right’ echoed in her mind as she walked down the street towards the Underground station. But what was right? Go back to being Julie Walker and cause mayhem to those whose lives had moved on, or stay Eve Seaton? But even if she did that, she couldn’t marry Alec. Should he be told the whole truth or should she simply say she had changed her mind about marrying him? She could not do either until he came home on leave; it was not something you could put in a letter to a man risking his life on the battle front. And she wanted to see Harry again.

  She was so immersed in her thoughts that it was some time before she realised she was being followed. She quickened her pace, but so did her follower and he was gaining on her. She stopped and twisted round to find herself face to face with Ted Austen. He was grinning, his thin lips stretched over tobacco-stained teeth. ‘Well, well, well,’ he said. ‘If it isn’t my old friend Julie Monday. Or should I say Julie Walker? What do you call yourself nowadays?’

  ‘What do you want?’ He was the last person, the very last person, she wanted to see. He had always spelt trouble and his sudden appearance had her quaking.

  ‘Me? Well that depends. There’s a café just round the corner. Come and join me for a cup of tea. I might even stretch to a bun if you’re good.’

  ‘Why should I want to spend any time at all with you, Ted Austen, never mind join you for tea?’

  ‘Because I could do a deal with you to our mutual advantage. And I’m curious about you. Did you deliberately walk out on your husband? What a clever ruse it was pretending to be dead.’

  ‘I didn’t pretend to be dead.’

  ‘No? Harry thought you were. So did his family. They had a funeral for you and the nipper.’ He took her rucksack from her. ‘Come with me and I’ll tell you all about it.’

  She seemed to have lost her will to resist and allowed him to guide her into the café where he pushed her into a chair and called to the waitress to bring a pot of strong tea. It was not the sort of place to use cups and saucers, nor even tablecloths. The teapot was placed on the greasy oilcloth that covered the table. Two chipped enamel mugs were put beside it, together with a jug of milk, a bowl of sugar and a plate containing two plain buns. She ignored them.

  ‘Now,’ he said, pouring the tea, because she made no move to do so. ‘Let’s have a little chat.’

  ‘There’s nothing to chat about.’

  ‘Oh, but there is. You disappeared for goodness knows how long and let your husband and all your friends think you were dead. You even had Rosie’s grieving parents scouring London looking for her. That’s not the action of a rational person.’

  Rosie’s parents scouring London? Grace had already told her that, but she had no idea Rosie had known Ted and it gave her a nasty jolt. She must be careful not to let him see that; he’d make sure to add to her discomfort if he did. ‘It’s none of your business.’

  He ignored that. ‘Am I to take it you now propose to reappear and shock everyone out of their wits? What can be the reason for that, I wonder?’

  ‘It’s still none of your business.’ Her tone was flat. Her mind was struggling to come to terms with the dilemma that faced her. And this horrible man wasn’t helping.

  ‘I can make it my business. Now let me guess what happened. You left your baby with Rosie Summers so that you could go to your lover. And when she conveniently died in your place – owing me money incidentally – you decided to take advantage of that and disappear. Now your lover has ditched you and you are looking for a new protector. Who better than your husband—?’

  ‘That’s absolute nonsense.’

  ‘Nonsense you had a lover or nonsense that you intend to go back to your husband?’

  She stood up, unwilling to answer that and angry with herself for listening to him. ‘I’ve had enough of this. I’m off.’

  He grabbed her arm and pulled her down again. ‘I could help you, you know. If you wanted to stay dead, that is. It might be the best all round, don’t you think? People have moved on; they don’t want to be confronted with a ghost. A little contribution and my lips are sealed. Besides, I never did get the money Rosie owed me.’

  ‘Blackmail.’ Her voice was as scornful as she could make it, given that she was nervous of what he could do. ‘I might have known. If you think I’m going to give you money, then you can think again, Ted Austen. I’ve nothing to hide.’ She picked up her rucksack from the floor where he had dropped it and made for the door.

  ‘You might be sorry for that decision, Mrs Walker,’ he called after her.

  Anger kept her going as she hurried down the street to the Underground station and took the tube back to Waterloo, anger overcame her nervousness of the Underground. It was there, while waiting for the train to Manston, that she sat on a bench and let it go. It left her limp. Ted Austen was a nasty piece of work and there was no telling what he would do. Did he know where Harry was? She really should have turned the tables and taken the initiative to find out exactly what he did know and what use he intended to make of it. It was too late now.

  ‘Eve Seaton, where the hell have you been?’ Florrie flopped down on the bench beside her. ‘I’ve been looking high and low for you.’

  Julie turned to look at her friend and the enormity of what had happened struck her again. She couldn’t find the words to explain. ‘Wandering about,’ she said.

  ‘But you’re going back to Manston now?’

  ‘Yes. I don’t want to be posted AWOL, do I?’

  ‘Thank God.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘That you remember me and where you’ve come from and that you know you have to go back.’

  ‘Of course I do. Why shouldn’t I?’

  ‘You were on that train that got hit by a buzz bomb and disappeared afterwards.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘Section Officer Murray rang me at home. She thought you might have come to me. Why didn’t you?’

  ‘I wasn’t thinking straight.’

  ‘You bet you weren’t. She said you had sustained a brain injury and needed to go to hospital.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with my brain. I wasn’t hurt at all except for a few cuts and bruises. I just needed to think.’

  ‘And I can guess why.’ She stood up suddenly as a train steamed into the station. ‘Here’s our train. You can tell me all about it while we go along.’

  Julie followed her friend onto the crowded train. They couldn’t find a seat and had to stand in the corridor. It was not conducive to conversation, particularly the sort of conversation that Florrie expected. ‘Just where have you been?’ she demanded as soon as the train jerked into motion.

  ‘To Southwark and Bermondsey, Shoreditch and Highgate Cemetery.’

  ‘Looking for your past?’

  ‘You could say that.’

  ‘And did you find it?’

  ‘Sort of.’

  ‘What kind of an answer is that? Am I to assume from that your memory has come back?’

  ‘Florrie, don’t quiz me, please. I’ve got to sort this out on my own.’

  ‘Then I was right, you have remembered and by the looks of you it isn’t something to celebrate.’

  ‘It’s complicated.’

  ‘OK, so it’s complicated. But I hope you’ll think about Alec while you decide what to do. He’s out there fighting for us and his future with you. He loves you and deserves the whole truth.’

  ‘I know that. You don’t have to rub it in.’

  ‘Sorry. I’m concerned, that’s all. We’ve been friends for ages, you’re like a sister to me. I was expecting you to become one officially when Alec came home. You do still love him, don’t you?’

  ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘There’s no one else?’

  People w
ere passing up and down the corridor, pushing past them and their rucksacks, and their conversation was punctuated with ‘Excuse me’ and ‘Thank you’. After it happened the fourth time, Julie, glad of the excuse, said, ‘We can’t talk now. I’ll tell you everything later.’

  Florrie had to be content with that and they lapsed into silence which lasted for the remainder of the journey; neither could think of anything to say that did not hinge on Julie’s dilemma. When they arrived back at camp, she was told to report to Section Officer Murray immediately and it was late that evening before she and Florrie were able to talk properly, which they chose to do by going for a walk. On a busy station it was the only way they could be sure of not being overheard.

  ‘What did Murray say? Did you get a wigging?’

  ‘No, why should I? I didn’t overstay my leave.’

  ‘No, but you did disappear when you should have gone to hospital.’

  ‘So she said and I’ve got to report to St Hugh’s in Oxford. Apparently they have a unit there specialising in brain injuries and psychological trauma. It’s a complete waste of time – I know exactly what happened and how it happened.’

  ‘Then I wish you’d tell me.’

  ‘I will if you give me half a chance.’ With double summer time it stayed light until nearly ten o’clock, but now daylight was just beginning to fade and the air was cooling. Julie stopped to gather her thoughts. ‘I’d better begin at the beginning, when I was a little girl and went to the seaside for the day.’

  ‘I don’t need your life history.’

  ‘It’s relevant and please don’t interrupt.’

  ‘Very well. I won’t say another word until you give me leave.’

  They started walking again, turning to walk round Pegwell Bay between the golf course and the beach, while Julie talked. Once she had started the words tumbled out and Florrie listened in astonishment, but true to her word she did not interrupt until Julie finished. ‘There you have it. I always suffered from claustrophobia. I had to summon all my courage to use the Underground. That, together with a bump on the head and being trapped in that air-raid shelter, took my memory. It came back when I was stuck in the wreckage of that train and I thought it was the same day.’