by Ruby Jackson
The girls chorused, ‘Good night,’ and the four who shared the second bedroom trooped out.
They saw no one, but they believed Sheila. One of the Flemings had been on the stairs.
‘Fiona, is that you?’
They were startled to hear Mrs Fleming’s voice. She stood, with a lighted candle, at the foot of the stairs. ‘I just minded on the day’s post. There’s two for Grace, one for you and a postcard for Katia.’
Fiona pushed past Grace and ran downstairs and, having picked up the post, handed over Grace’s letters and went off to deliver Eva’s postcard.
Grace, her heart thumping wildly, did not even thank her but went to their shared room and sat down on her bed. At last, at last. She recognised Daisy’s handwriting, and the other one, which was a Forces Mail envelope, was from … oh, please, oh, please …
Dear Grace,
If I told you where I was they would cut it out but I am where I want to be. The work is endless but the knowledge that I am doing what both God and my father want me to do makes my load light. I will not tell you of the sights I see but all I will say is that war has to be the ultimate stupidity. Surely, after countless years of civilisation, it is not beyond the brains of man to find some other way of settling a disagreement.
Dear, sweet Grace, I cannot tell you how much our time together meant to me. Memories fill my mind when horrors fill my eyes. I pray that all is well with you. Should you need help of any kind, please contact my father. He will not fail you.
I have one letter from you which I keep in my pocket but from things you say I know that it is not the first letter you have written and one day, possibly, the others will arrive. I live in hope as do we all.
Take care of yourself, dear, sweet Grace, and write telling me how you are.
Jack
Grace read the letter over and over. She noted Jack’s father’s name and his address in York. She would not need his help.
‘You’ll wear the paper out reading that one, Grace. From Jack?’
Grace smiled weakly up at Sheila. ‘Yes, took ages.’ She did not add that she had looked in vain for one single word of love. ‘This one’s from my old school friend Daisy, the one in the WAAF. It should be interesting.’ Sheila moved away and Grace opened Daisy’s letter.
Dear Grace,
Life really stinks at the moment. I’d been staying with my friend Charlie in London. Such a lovely house. Charlie’s dad took us to a play and then out to supper at a posh hotel. It was one of the loveliest evenings I have ever had. I stayed at their house and had a super time. But they’re dead now, Grace. Just a few days after I got home, Charlie, her dad, who was just as nice as mine, and two of their staff. It was a bomb. Charlie’s mum had stayed in the country but I can’t begin to think of how she must feel. I hope you’re all right on your farm. I think about you a lot.
Please write.
Daisy
Jack alive and Daisy’s friend Charlie dead. ‘It’s chance,’ whispered Grace, ‘nothing more than chance. Oh, I wish this bloody war was over.’
‘Come on, Grace, you’ve had a ghastly day and now bad news from your friend. Let’s get you off to bed.’ Sheila was trying so hard to cheer her up. ‘Be positive. You and Jane are all right and so is your Jack.’
Grace undressed, put her clothes ready for the morning and got into bed as quickly and as quietly as she could. Her heart was heavy and, although she now knew that her worry of the last month was groundless, she had a stomach cramp twice as bad as her usual monthly one. Serves me right, she thought as she climbed into her bed. Now that there had been time really to think about the events of the day, she realised just how serious the tree-felling incident could have been.
Are Jane and I lucky to be alive? Yes and no. Because I propelled Jane and myself backwards, the trunk did not hit us and so we were not really in grave danger. The Flemings did worry and they did come looking. And did the shock bring on my monthly or would it have happened anyway? I don’t know, but I won’t go through that again.
Her last thought before she fell into a deep sleep was not of Jack somewhere in Europe, driving his ambulance through who knew what danger, but of Daisy, her school friend.
I’m going to save every penny, never mind summer sandals, and, if I get any leave, I’ll go home, home to Dartford.
TEN
A few weeks later, Mrs Drummond-Hay, the inspector from the Women’s Land Army, came to see the conditions in which the girls were living and could find no glaring fault. Yes, it was not the most modern of farms, having a limited supply of electricity. Farms were not on the National Grid and so generators were used. There was no running hot water, but the house was comfortable, the beds basic but warm and clean, and the meals were adequate and often seasonally supplemented by small treats from the farm’s own gardens.
‘The wife feeds the land girls the same as we have ourselves. There’s fruit and vegetables all year, bottled fruit in the winter months, but as many strawberries and rasps as they can eat in the summer. We don’t stint our workers and we all eat together in the evenings. The land girls have the use of my wireless when they want to listen to ITMA or dance music, girl things. They have good bicycles, loaned to us by the air base, and the village is scarce three miles from the front door, which they can use as easy as me.’
‘Why wasn’t I informed of the accident?’
‘Bring you out here for a broken arm? I left the farm to manage itself while I spent hours at the infirmary with the girl. Her wellbeing was my first concern. They examined her, fixed her up and sent her home. She was fine.’
‘And, for the past three weeks, has been taking a wage she has not been earning.’
‘Who says? Look at her. She’s out there now, weeding the turnips; she feeds the pigs, the Polish lassies clean them out for her, and she scours the milk churns. She frees up my wife for heavier chores. All right, maybe she’s not doing as much as the others, but you can’t say she’s not doing her bit and earning her wages.’
If Katia believed that the farmer had difficulty in stringing words together to make sentences, she would have been amazed at how eloquent he could be when cornered.
Mrs Drummond-Hay looked at him until he quailed under her gaze. ‘I am prepared to make allowances, but an injured land girl must be sent home. We are not running a charity. Jane is underage and is her parents’ responsibility.’
‘Your notes should tell you that my home is now at the bottom of a very large hole and the one remaining member of my family is, I believe, somewhere in Europe.’ Jane, her left arm still in plaster, had come in while they were talking and had certainly heard the conversation of the last few minutes.
Mrs Drummond-Hay spluttered. ‘Believe me, if I were to spend hours reading notes, young lady, I would have no time to do the work that is necessary, even vital. I’m sure, we are all extremely sorry about your sad loss but I must remind you that we are at war and hundreds if not thousands are in—’
She got no further, for Jane had walked out, saying, ‘I’ll be with the nicer pigs if I’m needed, Mr Fleming.’
The two people left in the kitchen looked at each other.
‘Intolerable rudeness. The war makes strange bedfellows but I suppose I must make allowances,’ said Mrs Drummond-Hay as she gathered up her gloves and her papers. ‘I did intend to talk to the other one, Grace something-or-other.’ She looked at him sternly. ‘You are sure that everything had been done that should have been done to make sure your land girls were adequately trained?’
‘Absolutely. They’ve all been at one of the schools and I train them myself.’
Mrs Drummond-Hay emitted another rather strange noise, possibly of disbelief, and put a tick on one of the papers.
‘I have several farms and hostels in the area to oversee, Fleming. No doubt you will be open to a spur-of-the-moment visit.’
He merely nodded as Mrs Drummond-Hay took her departure. ‘I wonder what her ladyship would think of a lady like that madam?�
� he muttered to himself. ‘And should I tell Jane that calling her a pig wasn’t too clever?’ He was smiling as he headed out to the pigpen.
Later, all the girls gathered in the larger bedroom to listen to the wireless. They danced together, pretending they were debutantes at the Ritz and, when they tired of that, they discussed the visit.
‘She’s not a bad old cow,’ said Sheila. ‘Believe me, I’ve had a dragon and a saint, and Mrs Double-barrel fits somewhere in between. After all, she did come out to check that you were all right, Jane.’
‘Yes, but didn’t exert herself enough to talk to Grace.’
‘What could I have said?’ asked Grace in some alarm.
‘You are the only person who knows what actually happened.’ Jenny surprised them by speaking up. ‘You were there the entire time and Jane was either unconscious or stunned.’
‘Mr Fleming did his best and so did we,’ Grace said, nodding towards Jane.
Grace did not want to leave Newriggs Farm, unless it was to return to Whitefields Court, where she now realised she had been happier than at any stage of her life. She had liked all the old farm workers, especially Hazel and Esau, and, she would admit to herself and no one else, Lady Alice fascinated her. A woman of birth and privilege, and yet there she was doing manual labour. She could have kept Jack on the estate for the duration of the war but, knowing that his skills were needed more elsewhere, she, and her father, had gone out of their way to have him transferred.
It was fun to live with so many girls, especially foreign ones; it reminded her of her life in Dartford, her close friendship with Daisy, Rose and Sally, the kindness of their parents.
‘I’ve never seen prettier trees than the ones on this farm,’ she said suddenly, and the others laughed.
‘What on earth brought that on, Grace?’ asked Sheila, while Katia and Eva tried to find enough English words to describe how much more beautiful Polish trees were.
‘What nonsense is this?’ The door had been thrown open and Mrs Fleming, wearing a rather past-its-best dressing gown and with her hair in curlers, stood on the threshold, a lamp in her hand. ‘The oil in that lamp has to last you till Sunday and there’s no spare candles. Anyone late in the mornin’ and I’ll have Mrs Drummond-Hay back here to deal with you. There’s a farm in the valley needs land girls an’ there’s no running water at all. Think on that.’ And she was gone.
They would laugh about the formidable sight of Mrs Fleming in her nightwear in a day or two but, in the meantime, the girls fled to their beds and almost everyone was soon fast asleep.
Grace tried to sleep but her mind went round and round, going over the evening’s conversation. The friendship that was growing between all the land girls reminded her again that she had not answered the letter from either Jack or Daisy and, although she had not heard from Sally, she knew how busy Sally’s exciting new life was. One day, she promised herself, she would see Sally on the stage.
No gossiping tomorrow, if I can stay awake after supper, Grace resolved. Instead, I’ll come up here or, I know, I’ll sit on that lovely stone dyke and write to everyone, including Jack. He’s on the front line, like Sam, and so I shouldn’t mope when his letters don’t arrive. We’re walking out. He meant that and that’s special. First chance I get, I’ll cycle into the village and post them.
She had offered to strip the branches from the felled tree trunks, knowing that her spirit relished hours of solitude in the open air. Newriggs Farm had few modern facilities or appliances, but, in its slightly old-fashioned way, it was quite lovely and Grace always felt better after merely looking closely at plants and flowers. She fell asleep, crossing her fingers that Mr Fleming would grant her request.
The job he had for her, however, was as far from communing with nature in all its beauty as it was possible to get.
‘I’ll handle the tree work, Grace, but there’s rats needs killing.’
So far, she had managed to avoid this unpleasant but necessary task. She had never before been told to do it, and Eva had even refused. ‘I not kill nothing.’
‘Bloody hell.’ Mr Fleming had looked at Eva as if he could not quite believe his ears. ‘A Polish conchie on my farm,’ but he had said no more. Now, it was Grace’s turn.
‘Now, you know what to look for – scratch marks on walls are a good indicator. You’ll maybe see tracks on dusty floors. It’s not likely you’ll see an actual rat until we bring in the grain – then you’ll see plenty – but you’ll hear them if you stay quiet; they’re grand climbers and they’re in the lofts. Be careful when you’re up there, for I’ve traps set and one accident is more than enough. We’ve barn cats, too, and they do their best but there’s too many vermin; it has to be poison.’ He pointed at the foot of the door of the old stable. ‘See them scratches?’
Grace shivered a little as she agreed that she did.
‘Rats chew constantly; if they can’t get food – and they’ll eat anything – they chew fence posts, skirting boards, you name it. Their teeth never stop growing; can you imagine that?’
‘Poor things, why don’t the teeth grow through their skulls and kill them?’
‘Because they chew and chew and chew, built-in survival. Right, now another thing to remember is that they’re creatures of habit. If they find a source of regular food, they return to it, over and over, and that helps the rat-catcher.’
‘I’m to put food, mixed with poison, out for them?’ Grace asked doubtfully.
He looked at her. ‘Did they not teach you anything at that farming school? If you weren’t such a good worker, Grace, you’d be out.’
She tensed a little. ‘I wasn’t told how to kill a rat.’
‘Right, listen and learn. First, find your infestations. Do that by finding their tracks in the dust. If you can’t see tracks then get some flour from the missus or some of that smelly white powder women put on after a bath and make a trail from where you see a lot of scratches. If rats are there, they’ll make recognisable tracks. You follow the tracks and put down some food. Just food, no poison. Get them used to a free feed. You might have to do that in different bits of the barns and sheds – until two or three days have passed and every morning the food is gone. That’s the day you lace it. All you have to do after that is pick up the dead ones. I’ll find somewhere to store them until we have enough to make a trip to the incinerator worthwhile.’
The incinerator? To Grace, rat-killing was sounding more and more horrid, but she was a land girl and there was a war on. ‘Yes, Mr Fleming.’
‘That shouldn’t take too long, Grace; a bit of looking around the farm, deciding where to lay powder. That should take you maybe until dinner time; this afternoon, you’d best work in the beet field.’
Back-breaking work, thought Grace, but at least she would be out in the fresh air. ‘Yes, Mr Fleming,’ she said again.
‘Good, and now away and find some powder. And mind and make a note for me of where the big infestations are. Every barn or shed where you put poison or find a dead rat will need to be well cleaned, but one job at a time, right?’
He walked off before she could parrot, ‘Yes, Mr Fleming,’ back to the farmhouse. Since she possessed none of the bath powder the farmer had suggested, she asked Mrs Fleming for a bowl of flour.
‘Why do you need flour?’
‘To lay a trap for rats, Mrs Fleming.’
‘Horrible creatures, Grace; ever seen one?’
‘Scurrying across the yard, I think.’
Mrs Fleming poured out some bread flour for her. ‘Dirty job, but at least it’s your turn for a hot bath before tea. Be back here just on half-past five and I’ll have water boiled for you.’
A hot bath. So exciting. There had been hot water on tap at Whitefields but here it had to be boiled and carried upstairs in buckets. If the farmer was at home, he helped but, on days when he was unavailable, the girls helped one another.
Grace was quite cheery when, carrying a large flashlight, she got back to the largest barn and p
ushed open the heavy, creaking door. The floor was a mass of dirt and dust, pieces of hay and unrecognisable droppings, but her sturdy leather shoes protected her feet.
She closed the door behind her so as to fool the rat population into thinking it was night-time, but, as she stood in the semi-darkness listening for scratching, she felt fear creeping, and then rushing up her backbone. ‘I’ll get you, rats,’ she shouted, and then, thoroughly ashamed of herself, she hurried out into the lovely sunshine and walked quickly to the old stables. Most of the farm’s horses had been sold as mechanisation came in but the two most loved by the Flemings now spent most of the warmer months grazing in an almost idyllic meadow, complete with tall shady trees and even a stream. Their stables, by contrast, were as dismal as the barn. With her newly acquired knowledge, Grace soon found evidence of infestation. The wood separating the stalls was scratched and chewed, as was the bottom of the doors. Old straw or hay and possibly a few elderly oats lay in the bottoms of the mangers and Grace decided that her first task would be to empty them. Dust flew up, causing her to sneeze but, doggedly, she carried on. Apart from the chill and the clouds of dust that were rising everywhere and settling on her hair and her clothes, Grace enjoyed being in the stable. Rising above all the unpleasantness was the smell of hay and of horses.
Grace had little experience of horses. There had been two large working horses on a farm she used to visit just outside Dartford. The farmer had allowed Grace and her friend Daisy to perch on their broad backs, but that was as much as she knew of horses. Yet she loved them, considering them the most beautiful of all animals. Grace was deep in thought as she walked from one stall to the next, digging her hands deep into the dry hay that still lined the manger. The next moment, she screamed in fright as something rustled under her fingers and jumped towards her face. Her scare inadvertently caused her to move backwards just as an extremely large rat leaped at her from the depth of the manger. Grace seemed frozen to the stone floor; she could not even scream as, in that split second, the rat flew through the air. The breath stopped in her throat and somehow her hands rose as if to stop its path to her face but, instead of clawing at her face, it landed on her shoulder. She felt its claws dig into her flesh as it fought to maintain its grip but somehow strength came from some unknown well; her vocal chords unfroze, she screamed again and the rat released its grip, slid down her back and landed on the stone floor behind her. She waited in terror, unable to move, to turn, expecting that at any moment the rat would sink its teeth into her flesh, but she heard a scurrying and when she did turn, the rat had disappeared.
