‘Hess? Here? Piffle and tommyrot, Leading Wren!’
Hitler’s right-hand man in Scotland? Whatever next? The Admiral dismissed the rumour without a second thought and concentrated on more important matters: his goddaughter’s immediate entry into the Women’s Royal Naval Service, no less.
Poor child. Her mother wasn’t the easiest person to live with, but joining up! Surely she’d have done better to marry young Charlie Bainbridge and settle down to starting a family. Been on the cards for ages, that wedding. Strange that Lucinda should not want to stay in London. It was a rum do, and no mistake.
He regarded his in-tray with a weary eye, then, sighing, picked up his pen again.
Jane awoke without effort, Missy’s cold nose on her cheek.
‘What is it, girl?’ Her eyes were wide in an instant. The bombers were coming back. Missy had heard their engines long before a human ear could pick up the first faint sound and had come to tell her.
‘Can you hear them, then?’ She pulled back the curtains and opened the windows wide, patting the seat beside her.
The sky was light to the east, streaks of red and gold piercing the grey. Birds were starting their morning singing, roused by the missel thrush in the pear tree. Below her, in the orchard, apple and pear and plum frothed pink and white with blossom, and over in Tingle’s Wood a sea of bluebells rose out of the morning mist.
It was all so normal, this May-morning canvas, but soon the bombers would return, stark silhouettes against a pale sky, reminding her that the war was real, setting the frightened pulse in her throat beating again.
She saw them before she heard them. Two Halifax bombers, wheels already down; two black nightbirds coming home to roost. She held her breath, listening. They had taken off with ordered precision; they would straggle home in ones and twos, their engines making a different sound in the thin morning air.
‘That’s the first of them, Missy.’
She reached into her pyjama jacket and hooked out the chain that hung around her neck. On it were her confirmation cross and the farthing Rob had given her soon after they met. It was bright and new, with the King’s head on one side and on the other a wren and the date, 1941. Rob said it was appropriate, since that was what she was going to be. ‘Keep it for luck, Jenny-love.’
She had done better than that and taken it to a jeweller to be plated and put into a mount so it could hang on her chain. He had been obliged to tell her, of course, that it was an offence to deface a coin of the realm, but he had done as she asked because women brought sentimental tokens to him every day of the week and, anyway, it was only a farthing. To Jane, though, it was precious and priceless and she wore it always. Now she held it in her hand with the cross, a silent pleading for Rob’s return.
The ninth bomber came out of a lightening sky at six o’clock exactly, and though she sat there for another hour, it was the last.
‘… and three of our aircraft have failed to return,’ the man who read the news would intone on the midday bulletin. Were they just words he was reading, or did he realize that three aircraft meant twenty-one crew, and countless women waiting anxiously for the phone call that would tell them their man was safe – or the letter that would tell them he was not?
She began to dress, cold clumsy fingers fumbling with buttons. How soon before she could phone the aerodrome? Not quite yet. Crews had to be debriefed and they would have to eat, too. Yesterday morning it had been all right. Eleven bombers had taken off; eleven came home. But three crews not back yet – oh, please not Rob!
Long before the sun was making shadows, she was standing beside the phone box at the crossroads outside the village, willing the minutes away. Soon it would be half-past seven, and exactly at half-past seven she would ring the aerodrome.
She always used the public box when she phoned Rob. Police telephones were not to be used for private calls, said her mother. It was better that way, she supposed, though if things had been normal at home Rob could have phoned her there. Just a quick ‘Hullo, Jenny. Everything’s fine.’ And perhaps a whispered ‘I love you.’
But things weren’t normal at home because her parents had said she must not meet Rob. Her parents were old and had forgotten, if ever they had known, what it was like to love someone as she loved Rob. And she wasn’t waiting any longer, damn it.
Impatiently she wrenched open the door and, taking the pennies from her pocket, picked up the receiver with a hand that shook.
‘Number, please?’ The switchboard answered quickly and it seemed like a good omen.
‘Can I have 220, please?’ She arranged her pennies in front of her.
‘Just a minute, Jane.’ This morning it must be Ruth on duty. Ruth knew everybody’s voice, even when they had a cold. ‘Have two pennies ready.’ The coins clinked into the slot. ‘Press button A. There you are, now …’
Jane pressed hard, the pennies fell with a clatter and a voice said, ‘Fenton Bishop 220.’ It was a Scottish voice and it gave her comfort.
‘Can I have the aircrew mess?’ she whispered, stiff-lipped. Her hand was wet and she gripped the receiver tightly, thinking back to the night of the February dance and how the telephone was fixed to the wall beside the door.
She took a deep breath. In just a few seconds Rob would be talking to her and it would be all right. It would.
When she asked for Sergeant MacDonald there was a pause, then the man on the other end of the line told her to wait. She had thought she would hear him calling Rob’s name but instead he hissed, ‘It’s Mac’s girl.’
The background noises stopped and she knew he had put his hand over the mouthpiece. She closed her eyes tightly. She felt very sick. She wanted to put the phone down and pretend it wasn’t happening but the noises came back and a different voice said, ‘Sergeant MacDonald isn’t here at the moment. Could you phone back later?’
‘Has he gone out?’ Panic had her now; ice-cold, screaming panic. ‘Has he left the camp?’
‘Well – no.’
‘Then where is he?’
‘I’m not sure.’ He was prevaricating but his voice was kind; too kind. She took another breath then let it go before she asked, ‘When shall I phone?’ She was shaking and her mouth had filled with saliva.
‘Look, do you think you could leave it until tomorrow? Or maybe you could get in touch with the Adjutant’s office, or the padre?’
She knew what he was trying to tell her, and tomorrow wouldn’t do. ‘He was flying last night, wasn’t he?’ she made herself ask it.
‘Yes, love, he was.’
He seemed reluctant to talk to her, but probably this man was aircrew, too. Perhaps talking to her about Rob made him feel that someone was dancing on his own grave. She whispered, ‘Please tell me.’
‘Sergeant MacDonald isn’t back yet.’ The words came in a rush. ‘He’s – he’s overdue, but don’t get upset. He could have ditched or landed down south somewhere. Try not to worry.’
A sudden hatred came over her; a cold, bitter hating of everything that lived and breathed. She wanted to hurt the man who had told her Rob hadn’t come back, but he had tried to be kind and anyway she couldn’t think clearly. There was a noise in her head that was making her dizzy so she whispered, ‘Thank you,’ and put the receiver down. Imagine, she’d thanked him for telling her Rob was missing! Clasping her arms over her stomach, she tried to stop the writhing inside her. O God, God, God! Why did you let this happen?
She did not remember going home. She’d pushed her bicycle most