‘Still prefer my own bed though.’ Edith loved her little attic room, which had few extra comforts but all the essentials. Before coming to the Victory Walk home she’d never had her own room. It was her haven, and she resented every air raid that took her from it. ‘I’m tempted to go up and have forty winks now before the evening meal, but it won’t be as warm. Gladys, that fire’s lovely – come on, Al, let’s sit right beside it now it’s blazing.’
Gladys beamed in triumph. ‘Me ma always said I was good at getting a fire going. When we had any coal to burn, that was. Sometimes me little brothers would come back with wood they’d found and we’d use that.’ She brushed her hands across her apron. ‘I’d best be going, I’m on duty at the first-aid post tonight.’
‘How’s it going?’ asked Alice.
‘Very well. I love it,’ said Gladys honestly. ‘The most difficult thing is to get me sister to help out at home. That’s why I want to be off now, so I can leave again in good time for my shift. Our Evelyn, that’s the one who’s only a couple of years younger than me, needs to get into the habit of being the cook around the place and I ain’t giving her any chance to make excuses.’
‘Quite right.’ Edith frowned. ‘You’ve done more than enough for them, Gladys. You’re needed elsewhere now.’
‘That’s what I says to them,’ Gladys replied with determination. ‘Give that fire a good top-up before you eat and it’ll keep going all evening. See you tomorrow, then.’ She hurried out.
Alice shook her head. ‘Doesn’t sound as if that sister is making life easy.’
‘Don’t you go worrying about it, Al, you can’t make no difference. We did the best we could, teaching Gladys to read. She’s got to sort out things at home. High time her sister stepped up, but it’s not our business.’
‘I know.’ Alice sighed and stretched back in the wooden carver chair she’d pulled as close as she dared to the roaring fire. She rolled her shoulders back a few times, easing out the tensions of the day, made worse by cycling around in the cold. Then she brightened. ‘I forgot, I had a letter today.’ She dug around in the pocket of her Aran cardigan, a present from her mother on her last visit home to Liverpool.
‘Is it from Joe?’ Edith asked eagerly, her dark eyes gleaming. She knew Alice received regular letters from Joe Banham, and plenty of the nurses speculated that this meant there was romance in the offing, although Alice maintained it was no such thing.
‘No.’ Alice’s face grew solemn. ‘I haven’t heard from him for a while. Not that it means anything,’ she added hastily as Edith’s expression grew anxious, ‘there might be problems with the post.’ With Joe in the navy, they were never sure where he actually was at any given time.
‘Of course.’ Edith was equally determined not to jump to the worst conclusion. Joe would be all right. He had to be. His parents had been through enough when they believed his brother Harry was dead – as had they all, her more than anyone. Harry was the love of her life and she had felt as if part of her had died too; now he was slowly recovering, there was not a day that went past when she didn’t count her blessings. ‘So who is it from, then?’
Alice drew out the envelope and showed her friend the handwriting on the front: bold, forward-slanting lettering. ‘Dermot,’ she said.
‘Oooooh, Dermot.’ Mary had arrived, her face breaking into a broad smile at the mention of the doctor who had temporarily worked at a local surgery when the regular doctor had been unwell. ‘How is the divine Dermot? Still breaking hearts all along the south coast?’
‘You’re late back,’ Edith said, watching as Mary found another carver chair with a faded cushion and pulled it across to join them. ‘Was there a problem?’
‘No, not really. Mr Emmerson was feeling a bit lonely, that’s all, so I stayed for a chat,’ Mary explained, warming her hands in front of the flames. ‘He misses his sons, poor old devil. But then one of his daughters-in-law popped round so I left them to it.’ Mary’s elderly patients loved her as she had the knack of getting them talking. She often said that it wasn’t simply their aches and pains that needed attention, it was that since the war broke out more and more of them were on their own. ‘So what has the lovely Dermot to say for himself?’
‘Anyone would think you had a soft spot for him,’ teased Edith. ‘Better not let Charles hear you saying that.’
‘Chance would be a fine thing. Charles has been too busy recently to hear me say anything. I hardly see him.’ Mary’s face fell and her chestnut curls drooped a little. Her boyfriend was a captain in the army and, even though he had been based in London for much of the war, he found it difficult to spare time away from his duties at headquarters. ‘So, cheer us up, Alice. What’s the news?’
Alice scanned the sheets of paper, covered in vivid navy ink. ‘All right … good … he’s well, he sends his best. Reading between the lines, they’re working flat out, there’s no let-up even though the raids over the airfields have died down. Lots of his colleagues have gone to serve abroad so there’s twice as much to do for those left on the home front.’
‘Sounds familiar,’ said Edith.
‘No budding love interest, then?’ Mary was always keen to hear about other people’s romances as hers had gone into the doldrums.
‘If there is, he isn’t saying.’ Alice looked up from the letter and folded the top sheet. ‘He might not tell me, of course.’ She counted herself immune to Dermot’s considerable charms as he’d trained as a doctor at the same time as she had studied for her first nursing qualification, back in Liverpool. Their relationship had always been that of colleagues, whereas his arrival in Dalston had caused uproar among the single nurses, and even those not so single.
‘That’s too bad. Well, I live in hope.’ Mary’s good mood had bounced back.
‘He’s wondering what it will be like treating American troops, now they’ve joined the war,’ Alice went on, skimming the second page. ‘He’s going to be working alongside a couple of surgeons from New York, by the sounds of it.’
Belinda rushed in, her dark, tightly curled hair a tangled mess. ‘Budge up, I’m frozen solid,’ she said, bringing across yet another chair to the fireside. ‘I thought I was going to be late for the meal, the ambulance took so long. Woman in labour with a breech birth,’ she explained hastily. ‘Did somebody say “American troops”? Go on, Alice, tell me about my favourite subject.’
Alice pulled a face. ‘Nothing specific, sorry. Were you hoping for news of a battalion of them to be stationed up the road?’
‘We should be so lucky.’ Belinda made a face as well. ‘Look, I know Pearl Harbor was terrible but we have to look on the bright side. All those handsome young men coming across the ocean just to rescue us.’ She rolled her eyes.
‘Bringing gifts of nylon tights and chocolate …’ Mary sat up straighter. ‘I know, I know, better not let Charles hear me say that. Still, you can’t deny that things might start to get interesting.’
‘Exactly.’ Belinda beamed in anticipation.
‘The only good thing is, it might mean that the war is over faster,’ Alice said seriously.
‘True. No, you’re right, I realise that,’ Belinda said hastily. ‘It’s just that you’re not looking for a boyfriend, are you, Alice, but some of us like to keep on the alert just in case. There’s a bit of a shortage of eligible men around here if you hadn’t noticed. So if there are thousands of them about to board ship for Europe, then I for one intend to be ready. What are you looking at me like that for? I’m just saying.’
Edith got to her feet. ‘Looks as if the meal’s ready. Stew again, by the smell of it.’ She reached for her bag as she rose. ‘I’ll take this back to my room and see you down here in a mo.’
Alice