But then, that X at the bottom of his letter.
She stared at it in the wavering light of the candle flame.
He had never put an X on a letter before.
That had to be a good sign. It was a good sign. Annie blew out the candle and fell asleep with the letter against her hand under the pillow.
Spring turned reluctantly into summer and Britons learned of the loss of the Hood and the abandonment of Crete while the air raids carried on unabated. The one rousing piece of news was the sinking of the battleship Bismark. And then the Nazis invaded Russia. Though the ordinary people of Britain did not realise it at the time, the invasion pressure was off. What concerned them more was that first clothes and then coal were rationed.
At Marsh Edge Farm, Walter Cross finally gave in to pressure from fellow farmers to try sowing ley grass and cutting silage to increase the amount and quality of feed available to the greatly increased dairy herd. By June, a second-hand tractor replaced the elderly work-horse. Its variable reliability did not improve his temper, though even he had to admit that it could work faster and harder than the horse and did not need attending to each day. Annie’s letters contained accounts of these innovations and of her trips into town to meet Gwen and her occasional brushes with Beryl Sutton, but mentioned nothing of Walter’s eruptions of temper. After all, Tom could do nothing about it, and the thought of her being hurt obviously worried him. On top of that, she felt ashamed to admit, even to Tom, what went on in her family. Her letters always ended the same way, asking him if he was still coming to Wittlesham at the end of July. His answer was always the same—yes. But still she harboured doubts.
Her birthday came round. Her mother gave her a blouse she had made out of rayon hoarded from before rationing. It had square shoulders with little shoulder pads and was darted in to a narrow waist. A real grown-up garment. Gwen gave her a lipstick. Fifteen. She was now fifteen years old.
‘We could get married next year,’ said Gwen, whose birthday was a few weeks earlier than hers.
They both tried the lipstick, which was dark red. They tried to do each other’s hair up in fashionable rolls around the face, though Annie’s hair wasn’t really long enough and Gwen’s was too fly-away. Neither of them looked very much like a film star or a dance band singer, but still they were quite pleased with the result.
‘We do look a lot more grown up. That blouse is lovely, very fashionable. You are lucky, Annie, having a mum who can make you things like that,’ Gwen said.
‘Yes, I am,’ Annie agreed, stroking the silky fabric.
‘And you’ve got a boyfriend, you lucky thing.’
Two things to feel lucky about. Annie savoured the feeling. Usually, it was Gwen who had so much more than she did in the way of people in her life.
‘He’s not really a boyfriend. More like a pen-pal,’ Annie said.
‘Ooh!’ Gwen teased. ‘I’ve seen how desperate you are for a letter from him. And you never show them to me. I bet they’re full of lovey-dovey stuff and kisses.’
‘No, they’re not. We just write about what we’ve been doing.’
‘So you say. I wish I had a boyfriend. My mum and dad would go potty, but I’d really like to have one. I want to know what it’s like, being in love.’
‘Mmm,’ Annie said.
She stared at her reflection in the mirror of Gwen’s dressing table. She did look older, what with the lipstick and the hairstyle and the new blouse. No longer a little girl. Love. She imagined love being something all floaty and dreamy, like a romantic song in a film. What she felt for Tom was not like that. It was sometimes quite gnawing and painful and desperate. If he didn’t manage to get to Wittlesham …
‘Wakey wakey!’
Gwen was making faces at her in the mirror. Annie put her tongue out. Gwen crossed her eyes. Annie put her thumbs in her ears and waggled her hands. They collapsed against each other, giggling.
‘Some of the girls at work like John Sutton,’ Gwen said when they had recovered.
‘Ugh! Beryl’s brother!’ Annie squealed.
‘I know but—wouldn’t she be mad if he was my boyfriend. Supposing I married him! She’d have to be my bridesmaid—just think! And that boot-faced mother of theirs, she’d have to smile and be happy. It’d be wonderful!’
‘Why not marry Jeffrey?’ Annie teased.
‘What, that little squirt? No, thank you!’
They both screwed up their faces and collapsed into giggles again.
‘You will let me meet this Tom of yours, won’t you?’ Gwen said.
‘If he comes,’ Annie said.
‘But you will, won’t you?’
‘I expect so,’ Annie prevaricated.
She wasn’t sure. If he did come, she wanted him all to herself.
‘You’d better,’ Gwen told her.
Annie changed the subject.
The nearer it got to the last week in July, the more she wanted to see him, and the less likely it seemed that he would actually arrive. And then, if he did make it, it wasn’t going to be plain sailing. What was he going to do during the day, for a start? It was different when he was here with his family. Even if he did think the little ones were brats and the grown-ups were boring, still they were company. She could only get away in the evenings, and sometimes not even then. It was all so difficult. She turned it over in her mind all day. She lay awake at night worrying. She began to feel quite ill.
On the Friday, she was taking the cows back to their pasture in the evening when she saw a girl on a bike where the track met the Wittlesham road. As she looked, she girl waved frantically and Annie realised that it was Gwen. She waved back. Gwen made beckoning gestures. Annie shut the cows in their field and ran down the track.
‘Gwen! What are you doing here? Whose bike is that?’
‘I borrowed it off my friend at work. Look—I had to bring you this. It says “Urgent”.’
Gwen flashed a letter in front of Annie’s eyes just long enough for her to recognise Tom’s writing, then whipped it behind her back.
‘D’you want it, then?’ she teased, dodging as Annie tried to snatch it from her.
‘Yes—you know I do. Give it—please—!’ Annie squealed.
Gwen was bigger than her and had longer arms. However hard she tried, her friend kept the letter just beyond her reach.
‘Just give it, Gwen. It’s mine!’ she demanded.
She aimed a kick at Gwen’s shins, but she leapt out of the way.
‘Ooh! Kick donkey!’
Annie was practically crying with frustration.
Gwen held the letter with the ends of her fingers, a tan-talising two inches too high for Annie to reach.
‘Promise you’ll let me meet him,’ she bargained.
‘Gwe-en—’
‘Promise!’
‘All right, then.’
Anything, just as long as she could get her hands