by Diane Allen, Rita Bradshaw, Margaret Dickinson, Annie Murray, Pam Weaver
Completing the blackout of her ward and carrying out a quick check of all her patients, Lil hurried to meet Alice.
‘Eeh, lass, what brings you here? I wasn’t expecting you . . . Oh, Alice, love, you look all in.’ As she held her, she felt her dear friend’s fragility. Her bones were not comfortable to hug as they had hardly any flesh on them. ‘Come through to the rest room. I’ve a few minutes to spare afore I have to do me medicine rounds.’
A huge log fire crackled in the grate of the ornate fireplace. It was a grand room that had been set aside for the nurses to take respite in.
‘Sit yourself down, lass. Warm your cockles, as Gillian would say.’
‘How is Gillian? Mildred said she was full of a cold. Poor girl. Do you think she will ever get over losing her sister, and . . . well, the attack on you both?’
Alice’s words shuddered the memory of Alfie’s revenge through her. When he found out she had left his home, he arranged for her to be attacked and raped. Guilt seared her as it did every time she thought of how Gillian had got caught up in that attack and suffered so much. Shaking the thought away, Lil answered Alice. ‘Naw, Alice, I don’t think Gillian will ever get over it, but I reckon her going off after Christmas to be a Land Girl might help. I hope so. Now, don’t let’s talk about it. Tell me what’s brought you here, as I can see all is not reet with you.’
‘It’s Mother. I’ve been to the nursing home this morning. They’d called me in and told me she hadn’t got long . . .’
‘Eeh, lass . . .’
‘It’s all right, she rallied. Oh, Lil, there is so much conflict in me where Mother is concerned, and today, when I thought I would lose her, I tried to reach out to her, but she still had no time for me.’
‘I’m sorry, love, it must be hard for you. But you do reet to keep in touch with her. None of what happened is your fault, and the circumstances around the past have a lot to do with how your mam behaved, you know that.’
‘But that doesn’t excuse her, Lil, and what’s worse is now I’ve found out so much about what happened to my father, in some ways Mother’s behaviour is even harder to live with. Anyway, I didn’t come for sympathy. I came to be with you. I have such a lot to talk over.’
‘Naw, don’t tell me. They haven’t accepted that you want to go back into action, have they?’
‘Yes, they have. I rang my superior when I got home from my visit to my mother. I begin training next week, with a view to being deployed a few weeks after Christmas.’
‘Deployed at what? Can’t you tell me?’
‘Don’t ask me, Lil, you know I can’t reveal what I do, or where I will be going.’
‘By, I’m sorry. Whatever possessed me? Eeh, lass, it’s so easy to let yourself down when with friends. I know I should never ask such things, but it came so natural. And that’s exactly why you shouldn’t tell me. But whatever it is, keep safe, love. I couldn’t bear to lose thee.’
‘I will. And don’t worry, it was an easy slip. Now, let’s talk of something else. Christmas, for instance. I mean, it is only just a week away, you know.’
‘Aye, I know, but I haven’t given it much thought.’
‘Neither had I till today. I came away from the nursing home lifted a little in how I have been feeling lately. Mother was weak, but was out of danger, and that in itself gave me some relief. It seems she has a mild form of pneumonia. But she has a strong constitution and doesn’t look anywhere near ready to go yet, thank God.’
‘Nice to hear you say that, love.’ It surprised Lil to realize that Alice had said this last as if she really meant it. But then, there’s nowt thicker than blood, they say.
‘I know, I can’t believe how much I mean it myself. Anyway, it set me thinking and I realized so much is happening after Christmas, but asked myself, what about Christmas itself? Why don’t we make the best of it that we can? Will you be free any of the days of Christmas week?’
This put a warm feeling into Lil, and marked a huge step forward for Alice. How much of that was down to her being accepted to go back to whatever it was her war effort entailed, or how much to her mother rallying, Lil didn’t ask. She was too happy at the change in Alice’s spirits for that to matter. ‘Aye,’ she told her. ‘I will. It’s just one, but I’ve been given Boxing Day off. I finish at 7 p.m. on Christmas Day night, and I don’t have to be back until midday the day after Boxing Day, when I’m on a late shift. What have you in mind?’
‘I haven’t made any definite plans, but I thought we could all be together: you, me, Mildred and Gillian, at my house, and have the best traditional day we can have. It can be on Boxing Day, and you can all stay over. If you all come Christmas night, we can do the present-giving, then have a late fireside supper, and get up in the morning and have eggs . . .’
‘Eggs! By, lass, that’ll be sommat. Can you get eggs . . . ?’
‘I can. My new gardener, an old man who has worked on a farm in this area all his life, has started a kind of smallholding on part of my land. He has chickens, and grows vegetables for the house, and seems to be able to get his hands on a few things that I ask no questions about. He has already said he has a broiler marked for execution for Christmas dinner . . .’
There was a moment when Lil felt repulsed by the expression Alice had used, but looking at Alice’s face fit to burst with laughter she felt a giggle bubble up and let it have rein. It felt good to laugh together and with the laughter came a feeling of excitement. Christmas, and in a big house, with all her friends around her . . . Eeh, the thought lifted her.
And her laughter increased as Alice mimicked her way of speaking and said, ‘Eeh, it’ll be grand, lass. Grand as owt.’
Their fit of giggles deepened to a belly laugh that resounded around the room. A knock on the door stopped them. A young man, with a bandage over one eye and leaning heavily on a crutch, stood there looking apologetic. ‘I’m sorry, the sound of merriment, like I never thought to hear ever again, drew me. It was like music to my ears.’
‘And mine.’ Another officer stood behind him, one arm of his pyjama top loosely tucked into his pocket. And another, then another, until there were ten or more of them all standing with a look of hunger on their faces. A hunger for laughter . . . A sad and poignant hunger.
‘Well, you will hear plenty of that next week, gentlemen. We are going to have a Christmas to remember, right here in the ballroom, if we can get permission, and if you can muster enough strength to clear it and get it ready.’
This, from Alice, shocked Lil. Where did she dream that up from, and more importantly, how was she going to manage it? ‘Alice?’
‘It can be done. I’ll find a way. In the meantime, chaps, set to! Find any talent amongst you and organize a concert. Any talent at all – singers for a choir, jokers to make us laugh, writers to compose some verse and musicians to form a band. I’ll sing a song or two, I’ve been known to in the past.’ The wink Lil received from Alice reminded her of an unlikely evening, but a very enjoyable one, that she, Gillian, Alice and Mildred had spent at a free ’n’ easy, when Alice had sung! Her being there at all had been amazing, but hearing her belt out a Vera Lynn number had topped all Lil had ever thought to see in her life. But then, war was a great leveller.
To the officers’ looks of astonishment, Alice said, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll make it happen, and I will supply everything we need, from musical instruments to food and drink. We are going to have a Christmas party, gentlemen, and put our two fingers up to Hitler.’
A cheer went up, the like of which Lil never thought to hear in this place, and it made her heart swell to see that those once haggard and fearful faces now held excitement and anticipation.
The Boxing Day Party
Alice stood with Lil and looked around the ballroom. A joint effort of many of the local businesses and the doctors and nurses had made this happen. And all the families had risen to the challenge to provide things. A phone call to Alice’s old friend, Rosamond, whose parents had given this house
to become a wartime hospital, had revealed that the family’s Christmas decorations were still stored in the attic. Retrieving them meant that now every corner twinkled with the tiny lights that adorned bunches of holly and streamers strung from them to the centre of the ceiling. In the corner a huge tree, cut from the many in the garden, looked a picture – laden as it was with glass baubles that caught the light and reflected it around the room. Fighting sadness as memories of past times haunted her, Alice allowed only the good feeling of a mission accomplished to seep into her. Lil’s words helped, as always: ‘Eeh, it looks grand. It’s like the war and all its misery has been shut out and a magic has taken over. Men who only knew pain and suffering and whose crying bounced off the walls at night have changed into folk with hope, whose music and chatter have replaced the tears. Their talk is all of tonight, and of being with their families again. It is wonderful how many can come. You’ve done that, Alice. You deserve a medal, lass.’
‘Oh, no, Lil, I have gained as much as I have given, as making it all happen has helped me, too. That is thanks enough.’
Tears came again as the band struck up, but these were tears of joy shed by the families and comrades of those making the music. As Alice listened to the music – music a professional would probably scream at but which to her sounded divine – she looked along the row of chairs next to her. Gillian sat holding both Mildred’s and Lil’s hands, and though her cheeks were wet with crying, her expression showed a joy, something that hadn’t been in her since the loss of her sister and the vile attack on her. Everything has been worth the effort just to see that.
On her other side, her mother sat in a wheelchair dressed in her finery and wrapped in a fox fur, even though it was warm in here, and she looked lovely. Next to her was Mother’s friend, Lady Elizabeth, Bren’s mother. Lady Elizabeth had never made the connection between her son’s death and Mother’s actions, and Alice felt glad about that as she was the only friend Mother had left from her heady days as a feted socialite. All others had snubbed her after Father had been shot as a traitor. Don’t . . . don’t think about bad things!
A voice that could only belong to Lil cut into her thoughts as the piece the band was playing came to an end. ‘Reet, lads, that were grand, but can you play owt of Vera Lynn’s? Come on, Alice, up you get. Eeh, you’re all in for a treat. Our Alice has the voice of an angel.’
Hot with embarrassment, but thinking it better not to protest, Alice rose. A voice beside her snapped, Alice, don’t you dare! It is so undignified!’
Freezing in a half-standing, half-sitting position, Alice was struck by her childhood fear as if a hand had slapped her. Mother’s face held all the hatred of the past.
‘Louisa, no. You promised you would be good if I brought you here. Alice has done all of this to give these wounded officers something special at Christmas: now don’t you dare spoil that for them or for her!’ Lady Elizabeth’s tone had a sternness Alice had never heard the gentle woman use before.
Mother looked blank. ‘What is the matter, Elizabeth? Alice? Where is Alice, is she here?’
Seeing the bewilderment and the lost look on her mother’s face cut Alice in two, and she realized she’d rather have her mother angry at her and knowing it, than this confusion that encased her, not knowing from one minute to the next what she was saying, or who her daughter was.
A chant of, ‘Alice, Alice,’ set up.
‘Go, darling. Go on. Knock them dead, as they say in showbusiness. I’ll take care of your mother.’
Lady Elizabeth’s encouraging smile made her mind up. As she walked towards the stage, her fears and nerves left her. She loved to sing, and this one she would sing for her Steve and darling Gertrude . . .
A silence fell as the piano played the introductory chords, then Alice felt her voice carry far beyond the rafters of this beautiful room and touch every heart in it as she sang ‘We’ll Meet Again’.
When she came to the second rendition of the chorus, she fixed her eyes on Mildred, Gillian and Lil and gestured to them. As they walked towards her, their voices joined hers, and a feeling of great pride filled her, to know them and to be one of them.
Yes, they were unlikely friends: she from the upper classes, Lil and Mildred from the working-class North and Gillian an East Ender, but the war had thrown them together, and it had been like finding the missing links in her life. She knew they felt just the same.
As the cheers deafened them, the girls all hugged. Someone shouted, ‘Let’s clear a space and dance!’
Nothing had ever warmed her heart more than seeing these broken men, helped by their wives and families to feel and look whole again as they jigged to the music in the best way they could.
She stepped down to stand beside her mother’s wheelchair. A feeling of shock hit her. A hand had found hers and held it. Mother was holding her hand! Something she had never done in her life. Tears threatened, and she let them fall. They were a release. Gillian brought her out of them.
‘’Ere, love, me and Lil are going outside for a breather, you coming?’
‘I’ll be there in a moment.’
Mildred leaned over and said, ‘You go, lass, your mother’ll be fine. I’ll take care of her.’
Looking from Lady Elizabeth to Mildred and then to her mother, Alice hesitated.
‘Yes, run along, dear. I have my maid with me.’
This, from her mother, left Alice not knowing whether to laugh or cry, but one look at Mildred showed she didn’t mind being thought of in this way. Lady Elizabeth winked and said in a low voice, ‘Take it all in your stride, dear.’
Outside, the stars twinkled a welcome and the moon provided a light they didn’t want to see, as, though air raids were less frequent, it was a perfect night to send out our own pilots on missions.
A roar of engines told her that was exactly what was happening. Fighter planes had taken off from Biggin Hill.
‘One, two, three . . .’
‘What you counting, Lil?’ Gillian asked.
‘The aircraft. We all do it, then we count them back in to see how many we lost. The men like to light a candle to them.’
‘Let’s not tonight, Lil. Let’s just pray for them to all return and leave it at that. I would rather not know.’
‘Aye, you’re reet. Tonight is special and I know as our prayers will bring the lads home.’
A silence fell for a moment. Alice broke it. ‘I’m glad you’ve had your acceptance, Lil, and that you are going to go to France. But I worry about you. It is so dangerous.’
‘I’ll be reet. We all will, I can feel it in me bones.’
‘Well, I know as I’ll be OK, I’m really looking forward to working as a farmhand.’
‘You’ll love it, Gillian. And just think, lass, you can use the manure for perfume, then you won’t notice the stink.’
They all giggled at this, a giggle that turned into a belly laugh as Gillian said, ‘An’ I’ll bottle some and keep it for you, an’ I might just sell it up the market when this lot’s over!’
As the laughter died down, Alice opened her arms. Both girls came into the hug and smiled up at her as she told them, ‘It is ten o’clock, the hour when I look up to the stars to connect with someone very special who does the same.’
They didn’t question her, but looked up with her. Are you gazing up at this moment, my darling Steve, just as we promised each other? Somehow, she knew he was and her heart warmed.
‘You know, Alice, I’d thought of this as a wounded Christmas, but you mended it, not just for us, but for all them inside that hall. Just for a few hours, you put them together again. You’re a grand lass and I love you like you were me sister.’
Lil’s words were bittersweet, as she thought of her half-sister, Gertrude, but Gillian helped the feeling of sorrow to be diminished by joy as she said, ‘It’s a Christmas to remember and to take us all forward. And I tell you what’d be good. Why don’t we do as Alice just did? Connect, I mean. Look up at the stars whenever they are o
ut, just before ten so that we don’t interfere with Alice’s special time, and think of each other. That’ll bring us together wherever we are.’
‘Aye, let’s. That’s a grand idea. And I’ll never think of Christmas as wounded again, ’cos I’ll always have this memory of a day of love and friendship.’
Alice could only hold them close in a moment that held all the emotions of war. A moment that was shattered as the door opened and a young officer shouted, ‘Hey, what are the three best-looking girls doing out here? We need you inside, they’re playing a jive. Come on, I may only have one arm, but I can show them Yanks a thing or two about dancing.’
All three, caught up in the laughter and anticipation of this, skipped up the steps, and Alice thought: Never have I ascended these stairs so eagerly as now. And somehow I feel that Steve, and Gertrude, and yes, Bren, Bren more than any of them, are climbing them with me.
On entering the ballroom the music whipped up that wonderful feeling inside her of freedom and expression as her body began to sway to the rhythm. Yes, there was a lot to face, but for now all demons had left her – she had mended a wounded Christmas.
A Childhood Christmas Eve Memory
MARY WOOD
THE THIRTEENTH CHILD
OF FIFTEEN CHILDREN
‘The table was laden with coloured crêpe paper, paste made from flour and water, and scissors. Mum cut the crêpe paper into strips and we children plaited three colours together into long chains. The fire crackled and spat angry sparks onto the rug.
A gust of wind heralded the older brothers coming in. A grotesque head dangled from a golden-feathered body – from somewhere, no one knew where, they had found a cockerel. And not only that: one of them held a sack aloft and out of it peeped holly branches heavy with berries.
Soon the excitement built. Taking it in turns to pluck the bird, the brothers then singed the remaining stubs, while we girls collected up the mounds of feathers, giggling as fun-time took over and we threw them at each other. Mum was cross, but only for a moment.