‘This is where I live.’ Lady Fitzwilliam pointed to the red-brick building at the top of the drive. There were banks of thick rhododendrons, monkey-puzzles, tall gum trees, bushy yews and close-clipped box hedges. Croquet hoops were set out on the front lawn, with the mallets and balls lying carelessly to one side. Like a scene from Alice in Wonderland, thought Kezzie. She gripped the handle of her bag tightly. How were she and Lucy ever going to cope with all of this?
The horse clip-clopped its way sedately around the manor house to the stable yard at the side, where Samuel helped them dismount. Then, eyeing the animal suspiciously, he led it under cover to unharness it. Lady Fitzwilliam took them through the conservatory and into the house, pulling off hat, scarf, gloves and coat, and discarding them as she went. She waved a hand as Kezzie attempted to collect some of her clothes as she followed behind her.
‘Samuel will see to them,’ she said. ‘He knows that I am far too busy to bother with things like that.’
Lucy and Kezzie exchanged glances. Lucy stuck her finger under her nose and pushed it up and to one side, wildly out of shape. Kezzie glared at her sister, but could not help but smile. Lady Fitzwilliam still had all the regal manners that Kezzie could vividly recall from her meeting with her on the boat to Canada.
‘Tea,’ declared Lady Fitzwilliam, ‘we must have some tea.’
She led them into a large kitchen. ‘It’s Sally’s night off,’ she tutted in exasperation as she searched in cupboards and looked on shelves for the tea things. ‘So inconvenient. I asked her to change, as you were arriving today, but she has an appointment with a young man, so she refused.’
Kezzie could tell that Lady Fitzwilliam considered Sally had seriously neglected her duty by taking the day off which was due to her.
‘She did say that she would lay out some supper,’ said Lady Fitzwilliam, looking around her vaguely.
Behind them Samuel coughed discreetly. ‘Perhaps if you would care to go into the drawing-room,’ he suggested, ‘I’ve lit the fire there, and I will bring through a tray.’
Lucy peered around her as they followed Lady Fitzwilliam. The large paintings and ornate mirrors which hung on the walls were slightly overpowering. The drawing-room where they had tea appeared immense to them. Bella’s whole house could have fitted easily into this one room.
‘I suppose it is wartime, and one has to make do.’ Lady Fitzwilliam sighed deeply as she handed Kezzie a plate of sandwiches. ‘Everyone has the same story. The young girls now won’t come into domestic service. They run off and join the munitions factory. I don’t know why.’
‘I expect it’s because they are paid so much more,’ said Kezzie. ‘Also it might be more interesting to have lots of company your own age.’
‘I have given these young women employment and their mothers before them,’ protested Lady Fitzwilliam. ‘They know that I will look after them.’
Kezzie thought about the girls she’d seen earlier laying the railway track. ‘Perhaps they don’t want to be “looked after”,’ she said. ‘Maybe they want to do things for themselves … as equals,’ she added.
‘Equals?’ said Lady Fitzwilliam.
‘Yes,’ said Kezzie. ‘Equality of the sexes, for one example. It might actually happen after this war is over. We have made a start, at any rate.’
‘Do you really think that this is progress?’ asked Lady Fitzwilliam.
‘I think that anything that makes people closer to each other is an improvement,’ said Kezzie. ‘And the war has done that. Men and women are working together, more truly equal than ever before. This is the beginning. And we’re not going to let it go.’
‘Well,’ said Lady Fitzwilliam, as she bit daintily into a sandwich. ‘There are things which I don’t consider to be quite seemly. Modern manners are extremely … casual. And,’ she hesitated before she spoke again, ‘perhaps we aren’t meant to be equal.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Kezzie apologised. She had hardly arrived in this lady’s house and it looked now as though she was abusing her hospitality. ‘I hope that what I’ve said hasn’t upset you. It’s just that we have to work this out. Equality must come. Men and women, rich and poor …’
Kezzie thought of the shrivelled and sometimes unrecognisable remains of humanity which she’d ferried in her van to the mortuary in the latter stages of the clearing-up operation in Clydebank. The mass burial on the Monday morning for the unclaimed victims, each person wrapped in a simple white sheet. She bent her head into her hands.
‘We are all the same in death,’ she whispered.
Lucy got up quickly and came and stood beside her. She took Kezzie by the hand.
‘My sister is tired,’ she told Lady Fitzwilliam. ‘She needs to rest.’
‘Yes, yes, of course.’ Lady Fitzwilliam rose and led them upstairs to the bedrooms she’d set aside for them.
As Lucy helped her undress and slide between the sheets Kezzie began to worry about their position in this house. Perhaps she shouldn’t have been so outspoken. She could sense that she had disturbed Lady Fitzwilliam and now she was not at all sure that she and Lucy should stay on. In the great feather bed she slipped into sleep and dreamed she was walking in bright green meadows where buttercups and daisies were growing. Yet each time she tried to pick a bunch the flowers withered as she touched them.
In the morning Lady Fitzwilliam brought her some tea.
‘Lucy and I have had breakfast and I’ve sent her to play for a little while,’ she said. ‘It will give us a chance to talk. Kezzie, I look at your face and I see a young woman who is on the verge of complete exhaustion. Please allow me to take care of you. You must go for long walks, read and eat, and pass some time away from unpleasant things. So, perhaps we should agree not to discuss serious matters such as we did yesterday evening.’ She smiled at Kezzie. ‘You must understand it is very difficult for an old lady like me, who was born in the last century, to come to terms with all these new ideas. When I was your age I had a personal maid who laid out my clothes, ran my bath and dressed me in the mornings. Yet I read in the newspaper that the Princess Elizabeth has trained as a motor mechanic so that she can service her own jeep, and the Queen herself has a ration book. So I too must change my ways.’
Kezzie and Lucy found that it took them some time to adjust to the house itself. The rooms were huge, the furniture grand and imposing.
‘It’s staring at me,’ Lucy told Kezzie one night, pointing at the wardrobe in her bedroom.
Kezzie laughed, but she could understand her sister’s apprehension. The elaborate carvings and curved handles on the triple doors gave the appearance of some strange giant from folklore lurking in the corner. The few clothes which Lucy had been allocated by the relief agencies or given by friends were lost in its depth.
But the very size of the grounds around the manor house were a benefit to Kezzie. She could wander there the whole day, stroll along shady paths or walk in the walled garden at sunrise and never encounter anyone. She would choose an isolated spot under a tree to sit with her book or some knitting in the afternoon, and generally fall asleep. Very slowly her mind began to heal, and her dreams at night were less troubled. Lady Fitzwilliam didn’t mind Kezzie’s need to be on her own. She loved Lucy’s company. They spent their time planting vegetables in the kitchen garden, or going for little drives to meet friends in the surrounding villages.
The lilac was blooming, when they heard that Clydesbank had been bombed on two more occasions. Samuel was away, so Lady Fitzwilliam herself drove into the nearest town to obtain news.
‘Not nearly so severe,’ she called as Kezzie came running to meet her on her return. ‘Very little damage.’
Still Kezzie fretted, and she hurried to the post office each day until word arrived from Peg confirming this. Peg’s letters were full of bright cheerful chatter about Ricardo and the baby. Alec was learning Italian words as fast as English.
He can say ‘I want sweets’ in two languages, Peg wrote, and he is completely spoi
led by everyone. His attempts to eat spaghetti are hilarious.
‘I worry about them,’ said Kezzie as she read the latest letter at breakfast one morning.
‘She would be very welcome here,’ said Lady Fitzwilliam. ‘Both she and the baby could have a holiday in the country.’
‘She wouldn’t leave Ricardo,’ said Kezzie. She thought about it for a moment. About the whole situation. Herself and Lucy, the evacuated children and people risking death to stay together. ‘And I’m not sure that she should,’ she added.
‘No, indeed,’ said Lady Fitzwilliam. ‘When I had the evacuee children billeted here, this village was so remote no parent was able to visit. The two that I did have went home after a few months. I tried very hard but they were terribly homesick. May I ask why you did not send Lucy away? You must have thought she would be safer.’
‘I found it impossible after what had happened to her before,’ said Kezzie. ‘Then after Coventry was destroyed we tried to, and she ran away to come home to us. So finally the decision wasn’t mine.’ Kezzie looked at Lady Fitzwilliam. ‘Do you think it was so awful not to have made her go? Perhaps I should have insisted. She could have very easily been killed.’
Lady Fitzwilliam leaned over and grasped Kezzie’s hand. ‘I don’t blame you,’ she said. ‘I wouldn’t have done it.’ She wiped her mouth daintily with her cloth napkin, and then, folding it meticulously, she placed it alongside her plate. ‘Very selfish of me, my dear, I suppose.’ She smiled at Kezzie. ‘However, one can only do as one sees fit at the time. History and,’ she smiled wryly, ‘and one’s children will eventually be the judge.’ She sighed. ‘Let us hope that they will not be too harsh. As you say, with Peg and Ricardo, their love will survive.’
Yes, thought Kezzie, better to be together. Michael was now in Egypt and had seen action. The news was uncertain and patchy, his letters censored. Was he thinking of her as she did of him? How she longed for him, to hear his voice and see his face again, if even only for a short time.
The Blitzes of May continued. City after city was bombed relentlessly, the ports in particular were targeted. Liverpool, Belfast, Hull, Clydebank, Plymouth, Portsmouth. And then on the 11th May London suffered the most appalling raid. Over a thousand people were killed in one night, bringing London’s total of civilian blitz casualties to twenty thousand. When the radio broadcast the sombre news, there was a grim, terse tone to the bulletins. It was several days before they managed to get newspapers which gave an account of the damage. The square tower of Westminster Abbey had fallen in, the chamber of the House of Commons had been reduced to rubble. The faces of the rescue workers and survivors seemed numbed and bewildered. It seemed as if the famous spirit of the Londoners might be cracking. People were weeping in the streets.
Lady Fitzwilliam read her newspaper and then she laid it to one side. Her face was white and her hands were shaking. She turned to Kezzie and whispered, ‘We can’t bear this much longer.’
CHAPTER 23
School lessons
THAT AFTERNOON KEZZIE and Lady Fitzwilliam took a long walk in the country. There was blossom on the trees and the smell of summer days to come and, as they strolled along the lanes, the idea of war and the reality of the Blitz seemed many miles away. Kezzie breathed deeply and tried to let the warmth in the sweet air act as a balm to her frayed nerves. But both of their minds carried the pictures of shattered cities all over Britain which were being relentlessly ground down into dust. Suddenly Lady Fitzwilliam stopped at a wooden gate. She turned to Kezzie.
‘The reports say that the RAF fighter planes shot down twenty-nine of theirs.’ Her eyes were tortured and she shredded her gloves with her fingers. ‘Just twenty-nine destroyed out of over five hundred. It’s not enough. Our boys cannot keep fighting night and day. There are too many of them, and too few of us.’
Kezzie put her hand on Lady Fitzwilliam’s arm. She knew that William being in constant danger was causing his mother unceasing distress. She tried to find words to say which might comfort her.
‘Last year, after Dunkirk,’ she said, ‘we were hours away from invasion. It was the flyers who fought them off. Day by day, keeping the Luftwaffe out of the skies. It will be the same this time. This is a last act of desperation to bring us down. It won’t work. We won’t let it.’
Lady Fitzwilliam leaned wearily on the gatepost. ‘William says government intelligence sometimes exaggerate their scores to keep morale up. And that the press don’t print all of our casualties. It is not always the whole truth that we read in the newspapers.’
‘I know this,’ said Kezzie. She remembered in the aftermath of Clydebank, the rescue workers and survivors, relatives of the victims, had been extremely upset at government statements which had minimised the damage and the number of people who’d lost their lives. It caused great resentment in the town which had suffered so much.
What a terrible responsibility the war leaders had. Making decisions which involved life or death for thousands of people. Trying to keep civilian hopes high and the spirits of the troops to fight on. Her grandad had often repeated the famous quote, ‘The first casualty of war is truth.’
She was aware that Lady Fitzwilliam was still gazing at her, as though in some way Kezzie might bring succour and inspiration. Kezzie searched in her mind for something to say. It was this lady, after all, who’d taken her in, offered her a home when she’d none. She must try to help her now when she was so anxiously seeking reassurance. Kezzie hesitated. Her next words might not be welcome, but she felt now she had to speak plainly.
‘I think,’ said Kezzie, ‘that we should involve ourselves more. In the war effort, I mean.’
‘My dear girl,’ protested Lady Fitzwilliam. ‘What I do already completely exhausts me. What more is there?’
‘Yes,’ said Kezzie. ‘You do at times have rather a hectic round of engagements.’
There was the ‘Save for a Spitfire’ committee, the vicar’s wife’s weekly knitting bee, and various fêtes, fund raising events and social teas. Kezzie knew that Lady Fitzwilliam was actively involved in each of them, and she herself had taken to going along to help out. But there was a nagging thought in Kezzie’s head that these didn’t take much effort. They were on the fringes of the real war. Others were working harder, doing more. Perhaps driving her makeshift ambulance, and being involved in rescuing people first-hand, would make anything else seem tame. But now that she felt better in herself, she was more able to contribute, and she knew that she wasn’t doing it. Her senses had recovered enough for her to be slightly restless at her own inactivity.
‘I know that you don’t have evacuated children living here any more,’ she said, ‘but there are some in houses round about. The village school has closed. Now, if you add on the remainder of the local children, then there are quite a few young people, Lucy included, who are receiving no education.’
‘What do you suggest?’ asked Lady Fitzwilliam.
‘We could have lessons in the house in the morning. Samuel could use the trap to collect and return the children to the surrounding farms and houses. It would be good for them, and us,’ Kezzie added. ‘I think we need something more positive to do.’
‘Yes, my dear. You are, as usual, quite correct. I’m sick to death of sitting around with the same old faces knitting comforters for soldiers.’ Lady Fitzwilliam smiled. ‘And I suppose I must find something more useful to do than embroider a cover for my ration book.’
They held the classes in the large dining room. At first it was complete chaos. They had to beg or borrow exercise books and pencils, and organising the children was extremely difficult. Some were overawed by being in the big house, others thought it a wonderful opportunity to run wild. Kezzie thought Lady Fitzwilliam was showing great patience in dealing with the more boisterous of them, and told her so.
‘Well, they are the future, aren’t they?’ she told Kezzie. ‘And it is, after all, their fathers who are fighting and being killed on our behalf.’
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p; It was finally Samuel who found the best way of controlling them and keeping discipline. Those who behaved were allowed to drive the horse on the round trip, those who didn’t were sent for an hour in the morning to collect the manure and spread it on the vegetable plots. Soon some of the mothers established a volunteer rota and the lessons and a baby and toddlers crèche were held each forenoon.
Meanwhile the war, and the restrictions, continued.
‘Clothing coupons!’ Lady Fitzwilliam announced one morning. ‘Really, it is too much. Clothing coupons! Whatever next?’
She was reading from the newspaper in tones of great indignation. ‘And we are to be allowed to utilise our margarine coupons while we await these new vouchers to be printed. What a choice to be faced with. Dry bread or a new skirt.’
Kezzie giggled. She imagined Lady Fitzwilliam calling at her hat shop in Nottingham to select something for autumn and being handed a quarter of a pound of Bluebell margarine.
Then the rationing of coal was announced. The weather was warm and the windows stood open for most of the day, but Lady Fitzwilliam was concerned. She spoke to Kezzie. ‘The house is freezing in winter. We are exposed here, sitting as it does on the top of the hill. My husband’s father planted trees to serve as windbreaks, but the gales come sweeping across at the end of the year. The children will be cold.’ She frowned. ‘If we are short of coal and there is no heating we might have to stop our school lessons.’
They began to stockpile wood in the stables. Bringing in broken and fallen branches from the trees around the house. During the holidays the children helped by making up bundle after bundle of twigs for kindling. One of their parents, a local farmer, offered to cut up logs for them.
‘The only problem is transporting them,’ he told Kezzie. ‘I’m so short of manpower, half my machinery is lying idle.’
‘I have driven,’ said Kezzie. ‘Is a tractor very difficult to learn?’
It was more unstable, she soon discovered, hanging on to the wheel as it bounced along the rutted tracks. They worked hard during the summer, attaching chains to the tree trunks and dragging them back from the woods. The farmer was impressed with how she coped with it all. He spoke to her one day.
Kezzie at War Page 25
