‘Thank heaven for your help,’ Cecily murmured.
The matinee and evening show went according to plan, beginning as usual with Cecily singing the Tommies’ favourite songs, followed by Mother Of Pearl, a one-act play by Gertrude Jennings. Queenie’s expressions and gestures were always a delight to the audience, this one including French and British soldiers who had self-inflicted wounds, which they’d hoped would send them home, plus a few German prisoners of war.
‘You’re still a star in many ways. Now you can sing to them.’ Considering she was stone-cold sober, constantly smiling and much less bad-tempered, Queenie looked even more lovely than usual. Her eyebrows were clipped to pencil thinness, delicately arched over her soft blue eyes. The sight of her always made Cecily feel plain and practical. She’d spent hours the previous day closeted with Merryn trying on and altering some of the costumes her sister had made. But right now, she was simply delighted to see her mother doing well.
‘Thanks to Johnny Boy’s help,’ Queenie said, giving the young man a light kiss on each cheek. ‘He’s spent hours making sure I sing in tune.’
Cecily frowned at this exchange. Glancing across at her sister, she noticed how Merryn was carefully avoiding his gaze. Could that be because she’d fallen out with him or was it an attempt to protect a relationship developing between them? Cecily could well understand if that was the case. Turning to Queenie, she remarked firmly, ‘It’s Sergeant Allenby we should thank for acting as prompt, minding our props, as well as helping with the sentry checks.’
‘He too is a kind young man. We were most fortunate to have you help us, dear boy, though we didn’t require too much work from you,’ Queenie said, and treated him to a gentle kiss on his bruised cheek. He chuckled with pleasure.
‘The show is over, and we can all go off to bed,’ Cecily said. ‘I’ll do any necessary tidying tomorrow.’
She smiled as Queenie and Merryn lay down on their camp beds. Badly in need of rest herself, Cecily fervently washed the stage make-up off her face with cold water to liven herself up, then avoiding her own bed desperately waited for them to fall asleep. It took some time, which left her somewhat stressed, but once she heard their breathing turn slow and regular, she quickly went to find Sergeant Allenby who was waiting for her by the wagon.
Not for a moment did she believe this to be his real name. Nor would she ever ask him what it truly was. Her only wish was to get him to safety. ‘It’s my turn to drive,’ she told him with a smile, ‘and having carefully examined the sketch map Lena gave me, I can but hope we don’t get lost.’
‘Right. We need to stay well clear of the main road to avoid meeting up with that sentry again,’ he warned.
‘The route this time will take us through this forest, not the town.’
‘Excellent. Were we to get stopped by anyone, I do have a weapon,’ he firmly stated.
They drove along a straight path through the woodland, making sure there were no lights showing on the wagon, which made the journey more difficult. Cecily could feel her heart thumping, a consequence of fear and excitement.
Possibly sensing her tension, he quietly remarked, ‘By the way, my name’s Billy, and I greatly appreciate your help to save my life, Miss Hanson. I was frequently tortured and starved at that German internment camp, then managed to escape when we were working on the railway line. You’re very brave to be helping me. Do take care you never end up in such a place.’
She turned her head to meet his gaze with a glimmer of apprehension, not wishing to consider such a possibility. ‘I’m Cecily. Pleased to help you, Billy. Now we need to keep our eyes wide open. We’ll be meeting up with a man who will take you on the escape route to the Netherlands.’
Continuing to drive slowly and quietly through the woodland, it was thirty minutes later when a man wearing the expected navy woollen hat stepped out from behind a tree and flashed his torch three times, as Lena had said he would.
‘Ah, is this the chap?’ Billy whispered.
‘It is.’ Seconds later, Cecily pulled down the window to hear him say ‘Dover’, the agreed password to which she responded, with a brief nod. He then instructed her not to hang around but head straight back. ‘Don’t worry, I will,’ she assured him.
Billy gave her hand a grateful squeeze, then, jumping out of the wagon, disappeared into the woods. Cecily quickly turned the wagon around and drove much faster back to the base hospital, anxious to arrive before her mother and sister woke and found her missing. It might have been quicker to go by road but remembering this young soldier’s warning about the French sentry, who might still be at the entrance to the town, she took care to go nowhere near it. This journey had proved to be fairly easy so she stuck to the rough trail through the forest, a sense of success and foreboding within her, delighted that she’d helped put Billy on the route to freedom. She constantly glanced around her in fear of the appearance of the enemy, but did hope to help other young men who had escaped as prisoners of war.
The following morning Merryn confronted Cecily, sorely feeling the urge to learn the truth of where she’d gone the previous evening, a suspicion shaking within her. ‘Where did you disappear to last night till well after midnight? Were you having a fling with that fellow?’ Not exactly what she assumed, but it was worth a try.
Her sister looked somewhat alarmed by this question. ‘Of course not! What a dreadful thing to suggest.’
‘You were happy to chat to that German fellow and then saved his life. You danced and chatted with a French-Canadian chap too. You always claim to be fighting for women’s rights with no desire to live a traditional domestic life, any more than our mother had. Yet like her, you seem to be cavorting with various men.’
‘Oh, for goodness sake, I accept that Mama has always been attracted by young men and enjoys chatting them up, as she did with this sergeant, let alone having flings with some of the Tommies. You should appreciate that I have no desire to do that. Are you accusing me of being a woman of loose morals?’
Merryn felt a lump of panic clog her throat. Had she said entirely the wrong thing by insulting her beloved sister? Was that because she’d personally taken a mad risk with Johnny at the dance and thought Cecily might be guilty of the same mistake with that sergeant? Why would she when she was surely still grieving for the loss of Ewan? Merryn felt an urge to apologise and pull herself out of this mess. Then a totally unexpected response came forth.
‘The point is that Mama had a bad marriage, as we know, which has created problems in her life and mine too in a way. When Queenie was performing, she’d leave us stuck in some dosshouse with our father nowhere around to care for us. Thankfully we did have Nan. Then she’d make a great fuss of you whenever she returned home. Unlike me, you were often looked upon as Mama’s favourite child,’ Cecily said with a rueful smile.
‘So you’re jealous of the favours she gave me? Queenie could be very neglectful and demanding of me too, although I’ll admit her attitude to you was far worse. Being three years younger, why would she neglect me as much? I adore her and it’s sad that we lost our father. I’ve no idea when he died. Had he already left us when I was still young? I can’t remember but surely you can.’
Cecily sighed. ‘I too was quite young at the time and it must have been fairly traumatic losing him, so I’ve probably blocked the pain out of my mind. I would still like to know if he accidentally drowned or killed himself because of problems they were going through. We surely have the right to know? And no, I am not jealous of you being Mama’s favourite child. You are my beloved sister. Nor did she ever tell us much about our father, which was entirely wrong of her.’
‘If you object to Mama not speaking of what we wished to know, then why are you keeping equally quiet about where you went yesterday?’
Her sister gave a sigh. ‘If you must know, the fact is I was simply helping Lena deal with the wounded.’
Merryn blinked with surprise and confusion. ‘How odd. What exactly were you asked to do for
that man?’
‘Sergeant Allenby was injured as a result of those explosions and bomb attack and had failed to get permission to go on leave. Eventually, I helped by taking him to the station.’
‘So he’s deserted?’
‘No, no! Lena had finally achieved the necessary permission,’ Cecily hastily said.
Filled with a sense of total disbelief, Merryn gazed into Cecily’s eyes, which looked as if she was telling a fib. And there was something in her sister’s sharp tone of voice that sounded an entire sham. ‘How strange that one minute you say that man failed to get permission, then next said he did,’ Merryn retorted, now feeling the urge to express what she’d suspected from the start of this conversation. ‘I’m convinced that this tale you’ve told me is a complete lie. So tell me the truth, Cecily. Were you with Johnny in some secret place? That’s certainly likely since he appears captivated by your beauty.’
‘Oh, for goodness sake, stop being so rude and stupid!’ Cecily retorted, her tone of voice jangling. ‘You’re talking absolute nonsense.’
‘You’re the one doing that.’
‘As I have explained a thousand times, I’ve no interest at all in love or marriage. I confess that Johnny has attempted to flirt with me, but I paid him no attention. I steadfastly ignore him. I would advise you to be wary of him too.’
A cloud of anger permeated Merryn’s head as she glared at her sister. ‘How dare you say such a thing! You’ve always been a bit of a fusspot, constantly fretting about me and giving me orders about what I should or shouldn’t do. But who I decide to love is none of your business.’
‘You’re my sister, why would I not be concerned about you? I just wish to protect you.’
‘I can look after myself, thank you. I have a much better opinion of men than you do.’
Looking around, Cecily said, ‘Oh dear, Mama is coming over. We’ll talk about this later. I’ve no wish for her to hear us quarrelling.’
Merryn’s heart sank as she saw Queenie walking across the field towards them, Johnny at her side.
‘Here we are,’ Queenie announced, sauntering over, her arm linked with Johnny’s. ‘Ready to start rehearsing.’
Glowering at her sister, Merryn made no further comment.
A day or two later, Lena asked Cecily to escort another escapee to freedom, which she happily agreed to do. Once their evening performance was over, she walked over to the wagon, and seeing Merryn approach, listened wearily to her sister’s insistence that she wished to accompany her, wherever she was supposedly going. ‘Being a team, why am I not invited to help?’
‘Because I’m happy to take the risk on my own. This is not a subject I can discuss with you any more, lovey.’
‘I’m fully aware that these lies are because you refuse to admit who it is you’re again going to have sex with, whether it’s Johnny or some other fellow.’
Cecily gave a sigh. ‘Stop accusing me of such nonsense. I’m doing nothing of the sort.’
‘Then where are you going and why?’
‘As I said, we can maybe talk about this some other time and I’ll do my best to explain, if it’s possible to do so.’ Cecily felt a bleak pain spark within her, rapidly coming to the conclusion that she should not have told Merryn a vague form of what she was involved in, her sister’s head far too wrapped up in some other suspicion.
‘You mean you’ll come up with another lie?’ Merryn tartly asked, and spinning around marched away.
Nevertheless, Cecily could hardly admit that having agreed to act as a spy, she found it easy to help escapees. Climbing into the wagon, she found Lena had deposited the next one onto the back seat, tucked under a blanket.
‘Is it just me you’re rescuing?’ he asked.
‘It is indeed. I’ll hand you over to a valiantly kind man who’ll see you safely along the escape route to the Netherlands.’
She drove through the woodland at moderate speed and let him out the moment she met the man responsible for leading these PoWs. Giving a friendly wave to his rescuer, Cecily turned the wagon around and began to drive back. After just a short distance she heard the sound of someone moving behind her. Fear escalated through her as she drew swiftly to a halt, realising she had no gun or anything at all to protect herself with. Snatching up a spanner that was lying on the floor, she pointed it at the bulky shadowed figure rising up behind her, hoping it might appear to be a gun since it was quite dark. ‘Don’t come any nearer or I’ll shoot you,’ she cried.
SEVENTEEN
TO HER astonishment, Cecily realised it was Wilhelm Ackermann. ‘What are you doing here?’ she cried, staring at him in shock.
‘When you came to see me the other week I did make a request for you to rescue me. Now able to walk again, I’ve been informed that they are planning to deliver me to a detention centre tomorrow. Seeing you come over to this wagon, I managed to slip out of the ward and hide in the back. You were so engaged in an argument with your sister, you didn’t notice me and thankfully drove off before the guards realised I’d escaped. I wish you to take me close to a German base, which I know well and is not too far away.’
‘Why would I risk doing that?’ Cecily asked, desperately striving to calm her jittering nerves. ‘If you are suggesting that I have to cross No Man’s Land in order to reach German-occupied territory, it could result in my being attacked by soldiers and their machine guns.’
‘I’m asking you to take me a little way through this forest and drop me off a safe distance away, for which I’d be most grateful. I appreciate the fact you saved my life and seeing you rescue that other young PoW just now was most interesting. Why would you not do the same for me?’
‘I really don’t think I can do that. You are not French or British.’
‘That is true, but you helped rescue me once, why not again?’
‘I made it clear I can definitely not do that!’
Giving a chuckle, he said, ‘Start driving. I have no wish for us to quarrel or to hurt you. You must simply do as I say.’
Appalled at the grimness that had now entered his tone of voice, she viewed this remark as a threat. A dark and growing fear pounded in her chest. Pushing forward the gear lever, Cecily pressed down the accelerator and began to slowly drive, feeling she had no alternative but to do as he ordered. He could have a knife in his hand and slit her throat or else strangle her, were she to refuse. Had she been wrong to save this man’s life? He was, after all, the enemy and she was clearly of no importance to him, not at all the impression he’d given when she’d visited him in the ward.
‘You’re driving too slowly, speed up.’
‘I’m unsure whether I’m driving in the right direction.’
‘You are. We turn left shortly. I’ll let you know when.’
To her dismay, they drove much further than she’d expected, turning left and right whenever he instructed her to do so, a route she confusedly attempted to remember. Panic mounting within her, he finally ordered her to stop, saying that once he’d departed, she could head back to camp by continuing along this rough road until she reached the main one a mile or two ahead. ‘Then if you turn left, it will lead you directly back to camp.’
Bringing the wagon to a halt, he jumped out of the back. Relieved to see him leave and having made a mental note of the many turns she’d made, with no wish to drive along the main road, she reversed the wagon and began to go back the way she’d come. She drove slowly and quietly, using no lights for some distance. Turning right, it was then that a German guard stepped out in front of her, gun in hand. A second one yanked open her door and with a flash of his gun, ordered her to get out. Horrified, Cecily realised she’d been captured.
Fully expecting to find herself locked in a prison cell, fear escalated through her. Would she be treated as a spy, having asked that German PoW a number of questions, as demanded of her by Lieutenant Trevain? She’d been no good at the task, being far too polite and nervous. Now she could be the one interrogated and moved to an intern
ment camp. Panic and a dark misery settled inside her at such a prospect, making her stomach heave. How did these Tommies, who saw themselves as sitting ducks, cope when they too were captured?
She was placed in the back of the guard’s vehicle and taken off in a totally different direction, her wagon being driven by one of them. Eventually, she saw a hut or pillbox ahead and was ordered out of their armoured car. A barrier was opened and she found herself marched over to a much larger building close by. It was there that she saw Wilhelm Ackermann standing in the entrance.
He glanced at her and at the two officers gripping her arms as they marched her into the building, saying not a word to her. Why on earth had she ever come to trust this man? Moments later, she found herself ushered into a room that looked very like an office, where she was directed to a chair facing the desk. The man seated behind it was clearly an officer, dressed in a smart grey uniform with stripes around the collar and cuffs. Smiling, he rose to offer her a cigarette.
‘No, thank you, I don’t smoke.’
‘Would you care for a glass of wine?’ He spoke to her in English with a slight German accent, his tone quite mild.
Cecily shook her head, confused by these offers. She’d expected to be treated with contempt, not such generosity.
‘Coffee or a cup of tea, being British? I visited England when I was a student and am aware of your preferences.’ When she did not respond to this, he told the guard who had brought her in to go and fetch one for her. With a nod, the fellow disappeared. ‘I’m the Oberstleutnant, Lieutenant Colonel, in charge of this regiment. What is your name and in what part of England do you live?’ he asked, again with a smile.
Seeing no reason not to, Cecily calmly responded without actually revealing her full address.
‘Ah, I believe Cornwall is a most beautiful land. I, however, was at the university in Oxford where I learned how tolerant the British are. They have suffered many losses, yet seem to be remarkably confident of winning this war. Why is that, do you think?’
Girls of the Great War Page 15