An Army of Smiles

by Grace Thompson

  It was two a.m. when they gave in to tiredness and began to make their way back to the tent. Ethel’s sense of direction was good, having been brought up in a country village with fields and woods for her playground, and they crept inside intending to flop into bed fully dressed, and sleep. One of the beds was occupied and an extremely pompous voice told them to, ‘Please, do be quiet!’

  Searching for their belongings with only dim torches to help them in their overtired state was difficult; trying to be quiet as well was their undoing. Rosie choked back stifled laughter but she was unable to suppress her giggles. The others quickly joined in, their exhaustion and the newcomer’s reaction causing it to increase in volume as the occupant of the fourth bed became more and more angry. When she told them to stop acting like children, Rosie squealed and threw a pillow and soon a pillow fight ensued which succeeded in weakening the guy ropes of the tent. The walls lurched inward and, leaving the irate newcomer to sort out the problem, they grabbed what blankets they could, returned to the canteen, and slept on the floor.

  Still longing for a cup of tea, which neither Kate nor Ethel had managed to produce, they had finally dropped off to sleep on their uncomfortable bed when the siren warned of enemy aircraft approaching. Half asleep, they held a blanket around themselves and scuttled to the dubious protection of the counter, pushing pans and boxes of supplies out of the way to get as far underneath as possible.

  ‘Fat lot of use this is as protection against bombs,’ Ethel muttered.

  ‘We should have kept your hat, Rosie,’ Kate chuckled.

  ‘Better than a tent,’ Rosie spoke with such seriousness the overtired girls laughed, until the first ear-numbing blast of the guns took away the humour and they clung to each other in fear. A wailing, moaning roar filled their ears and was eventually identified as low-flying planes. They had never been so close to one before and the sound seemed to fill their heads, confusing them and terrifying them with its volume. They squeezed their eyes tightly shut and clung to each other.

  When the guns finally ceased they crept to the doorway and peered out. As their eyes became accustomed to the poor light, they saw figures emerging from buildings, running around in what appeared to be a haphazard manner. There were men and women on bicycles wobbling their way along the roads, and voices were heard shouting orders. Heavy doors rumbled open and shut, other doors slammed. Buckets clanked. In the distance, vehicles were heard driving around the airfield, their headlights barely visible.

  As they continued to watch, planes began to land. Seeing them flying low over their canteen made sense of the noise and no longer frightened them. An irate man ran past them, stopped, and shouted, ‘What the ’ell you doing in there? I’ve been looking for you.’

  ‘You didn’t expect us to stay in a tent, did you!’ retorted Ethel.

  ‘Where’s your tin hats?’

  ‘Tin hats?’ they queried in unison.

  ‘Probably in the tent,’ Rosie whispered.

  ‘We haven’t been given any!’ Ethel said loudly. ‘Fine protection we’re getting from Hitler’s bombs: a flimsy tent to sleep in and not even a tin hat. What sort of an outfit is this!’

  ‘A bunch of amateurs,’ Kate added.

  As the man turned away, Ethel grinned, her teeth bright in the early morning haze. ‘Best form of defence is attack, eh girls?’

  They opened Rosie’s large shoulder bag again and finished a packet of biscuits on the instructions of Rosie who insisted that Nan said carbohydrate was good for shock. ‘A feed of cake or biscuits and a good pee,’ she added knowledgeably. ‘Takes away the shock better than anything.’

  Two young RAF boys woke them at six thirty and stayed to help them scrub the store cupboards which were then filled with supplies delivered during the few hours they had slept. They were on ‘jankers’, punishment for some undisclosed misdemeanour. They also lit the fire in the ancient oven range which the girls had fervently hoped had nothing to do with them.

  ‘You mean we have to light that every morning before we can have a cup of tea?’ Kate groaned, as other men in airforce uniform wandered in to look at the new arrivals. ‘And cook cakes in it?’ shrieked Ethel.

  ‘It isn’t difficult.’

  ‘It took you long enough!’ Kate complained.

  ‘It’ll draw better tomorrow now the chimney’s warmed up.’ The man who spoke wore the unmistakable uniform of a pilot. He offered a hand to Ethel and then the others. ‘I’m Duggie. Don’t worry, there’ll be plenty offering help to three beauties like you. There’s nothing this lot likes more than damsels in distress. The lads will make sure you have plenty of dry wood. The men who were here before managed all right.’

  They were told to expect supplies from the temporary canteen which was now closed and they left the kitchen girls to finish cleaning cupboards, and concentrated on the seemingly impossible task of cooking cakes and making sandwiches in time for the first break.

  Walter came with instructions for their first morning, with recipes and prices, and warnings about how much money he was expecting from each batch of ingredients.

  The bad-tempered geyser blew out gases on two occasions, making them run for cover, but apart from that the next two hours went reasonably well. The net bar, displaying small necessities like soap, toothpaste, combs, writing paper and all the usual needs of men away from home, was open for business. Two lots of rock cakes and several kinds of sandwiches were ready by eleven o’clock when they opened the doors for their first customers.

  Kate unlocked the door and was pushed back as a crowd of uniformed customers flooded in.

  ‘Blimey, we’ve got the whole of the airforce in here,’ she said, flicking her hair with her fingers, pulling her hat to the back of her head at a saucy angle and smiling at the eager face in front of her.

  ‘Char and a wad, please, miss.’

  ‘What the ’ell’s that?’ Ethel asked, to much amusement.

  Rosie, who had been busy behind the scenes finishing off the cooking, was given the job of clearing tables, but when she walked in and saw the sea of faces smiling at her, and heard the welcoming remarks flying about, she backed out and hid herself in the kitchen. ‘I’ll wash every dish you can find me and never complain, so long as I don’t have to face that lot,’ she gasped, shyness colouring her cheeks and spreading up into the roots of her hair.

  It was Rosie who soon learnt the knack of dealing with the oven and, ignoring the instructions of Walter, when the three of them were on duty she did most of the cooking. Ethel and Kate served at the counter in their blue uniforms, and they all shared the preparation and the cleaning. So different in personality, but they made a good team.

  Chapter Three

  The hours of duty for the three girls were seven a.m. until eleven p.m. with a few hours off during the afternoon. For those whose turn it was to light the boiler, the morning began before six. Their first task was to deliver tea and snacks to the hangars for the men on early shift. The trolley was not easy to push with its small wheels and the occasional expanse of grass, and behind it, Rosie’s small figure was almost horizontal as she struggled to manoeuvre it over the uneven surface. From some directions the cart with its urn, boxes of snacks and cups and saucers seemed to be moving unaided. Men usually saw her coming and ran to help, her shyness making her dread as well as welcome their assistance with its accompanying teasing.

  There was a great deal of cleaning to do: besides the piles of dishes to be washed and dried and stacked in their places, there were tables, cupboards and floors to be scrubbed. They were so tired that on their afternoons off they slept. The occupant of the fourth bed in their tent had not returned. Walter had been persuaded by the flirting of the glamorous Kate to find them some extra blankets and they had dragged the beds together for added warmth and slept in reasonable comfort. By the end of their first week they were rested and able to consider going out during their hours of freedom.

  Walter came in daily to inspect the books and deal with the
money. He attempted mild flirtation with both Kate and Ethel, who played up to him in the hope he might deal kindly with any requests. He often asked for tea and cake and they all insisted that he paid for them as he constantly reminded them that they were on ration the same as the rest of the population and shouldn’t take more than their entitlement.

  ‘There are perks of the job,’ he said smiling at Kate, ‘if you know the right way about it.’

  ‘Interesting…’ said Kate.

  Ethel refused to go into town. ‘I don’t mind a walk through the fields and into one of the villages, but I don’t fancy town.’

  They pleaded, but to no avail. Ethel was adamant. Her worst nightmare was walking along a road and coming face to face with her father. She didn’t know how helpful the service would be if her parents asked to be told her whereabouts. She had lied about her next of kin, giving a completely false name and address, telling the board she had been brought up by an aunt who was now dead. Perhaps they would check, but she depended on there being so many people arriving and departing that checks would be minimal.

  Remembering Ethel’s hasty, last minute arrival into their railway carriage, and the way she had held back at each station, Kate and Rosie guessed she was avoiding someone. They had all spoken a little about their families, but Ethel had not been very forthcoming. She was running away from someone or something, rather than joining the Naafi out of a need to support the war effort. But who or what they couldn’t guess.

  They got on well but they hadn’t known her long and weren’t sure enough of her friendship to question her. ‘Let’s give it a few more weeks,’ Kate suggested when she and Rosie discussed it. ‘Then, if she hasn’t mentioned it, we’ll be bold and ask.’

  ‘I agree. We might be able to help at some time, if we know.’

  They had been on the camp for a couple of weeks, and when Ethel refused an invitation to go to the pictures with two of the RAF boys it seemed a good opportunity to bring up the subject of her wariness. Kate waited until she and Ethel were alone and asked quietly, ‘Who are you running away from, Ethel?’

  ‘Running away? Don’t be soft.’

  ‘Boyfriend? Someone you’ve upset?’ Kate persisted. ‘Come on, we’re stuck here together and we have to be friends and trust each other. And Rosie and I might be able to help if we know the facts. Run away from a boyfriend, have you?’

  ‘Hardly. In fact my boyfriend ran away from me,’ she said bitterly. She was standing looking out of the canteen window, a duster in her hand. ‘Rosie’s coming.’ She pointed through the window at the hurrying figure of Rosie, pushing the trolley she had taken to the hangars with the mid-morning drinks and snacks. Kate looked through the now clean, shiny windows and waited. Perhaps Ethel didn’t want to discuss the problem in front of Rosie. But when Rosie came she talked to them both.

  ‘My father is a foul-tempered bully. He’s always fighting, threatening, getting his own way because he’s known as a hard man,’ she began.

  ‘You mean he hits you?’

  ‘Not badly, until earlier this year.’ She paused, her mouth working nervously, obviously having difficulty relating the next sentence. ‘My sister Glenys was sixteen years older than me. My brother Sid was fifteen years older. I was a mistake!’

  ‘Your father took it out on you as if it was your fault?’ Rosie coaxed.

  ‘No, he seemed protective, but nothing more. I was pushed around a bit when he was drunk, but no, I had a good childhood really. Dad was gruff but never unkind. In fact he ignored me most of the time. Being so much younger than my brother and sister I was protected and loved. It was like having two sets of parents looking after me. Dad was away a lot, long hours driving the lorry, and he was in prison on occasions, for unruly behaviour of one sort or another, mostly fighting. They usually managed to keep me well out of the way when Dad was home and in one of his rages.

  ‘When he was away there was only Mam, Glenys, Sid and me. No other family and few friends called. In fact, even when he was home he was rarely in the house. There was the garden where Mam and he worked for hours every day. When he wasn’t driving or working outside, he was at the pub. That was my life and I never thought about the different lives other people led.’ She paused and her two friends waited in silence for her to continue. ‘Then… then something made him really angry, he went wild, forbade me to see Wesley and drove him away. I didn’t believe it at first but Wesley was so frightened by his violence on that awful day that he never came back. He left and joined the Naafi without a word. And soon after,’ she paused again before saying the words that still seemed impossible to believe, ‘my sister killed herself. From then on everything got much worse.’

  The two friends muttered conventional words of sympathy and waited.

  ‘It was the week of my birthday when it started. Something had happened that made Glenys kill herself rather than face it, and no one will tell me what it was. My father came home in a drunken state and attacked Mam and my brother and called me horrible names. Mam wouldn’t go to hospital and refused to say who was responsible, although many guessed. Sid left without telling us where he was going and we haven’t heard from him since. Dad was really out of his mind with rage. He dislocated my shoulder, throwing me against the wall, knocked Wesley almost senseless and beat my mother so I thought she was dead. Then I found my sister in that barn.’

  ‘You found her?’ Rosie gasped. ‘Oh Ethel, you poor thing.’

  ‘My father started watching every move I made. I wasn’t allowed to see Wesley Daniels any more though he and I were more or less engaged to be married. If I was seen talking to a boy, the boy was threatened and told to stay away from me. Thank goodness we needed the money and I was allowed to work. Apart from the café I wasn’t allowed out except when Mam went with me, and Mam didn’t want to leave the house. Dad met me from work whenever he could. I didn’t know when, so I was too afraid to do anything except go straight home as fast as I could.’

  ‘Your mother didn’t stop him?’ Disbelief showed in Rosie’s wide blue eyes.

  ‘I think she was afraid of upsetting my father even more.’

  ‘Didn’t you have any friends who would help you?’

  ‘I thought I had Wesley. I was convinced that once he recovered from the beating my father gave him he’d be back to take me away, put everything right. He and I have been friends since we were about seven years old. I thought I could always rely on Wesley. But after that hiding from Dad he went away too. His mother relented and told me he had joined the Naafi and was serving on a ship but I don’t know any more than that. He probably can’t face me after running away like he did.’

  ‘So you ran away and joined up and you’re still scared of being found by your father and taken home?’

  ‘I’m never going back. I’d kill myself first, like Glenys. I want to know what went wrong, what turned our home into such a battlefield, but I’m not curious enough to ever go back. I don’t know where I’ll go on my weekends off, but it won’t be anywhere near my family.’

  ‘My Nan’ll have you, don’t worry about that,’ Rosie told her fervently.

  ‘Don’t stay in hiding, Ethel. Come to the pictures. You can’t let him ruin your life. If we see your father we’ll protect you,’ Kate said.

  Ethel laughed. ‘You’d run if he said boo! He’s over six feet tall and his red hair denotes his temper. Red hair and temper don’t always go together but in my father’s case they do, believe me.’

  ‘Oliver Hardy and Stan Laurel are on at the pictures,’ Kate coaxed.

  ‘Nan sent me some home-made coconut ice…’ Rosie added enticingly. Food was always the deciding factor, and they went.

  There was a lorry departing when they left the guard house, having declared their intentions; it waited for them around the corner of the lane and gave them a lift.

  It was the first of many such outings as Ethel’s confidence grew. They began to know the young airmen, accepted dates, and watched as the planes took off, th
en with beating hearts counted those returning, dreading the homecomers being fewer than those who had left.

  The evenings in the canteen were enjoyable. There was a piano and always someone who could play. Duggie came when he was free and would help a still-shy Rosie to clear the tables and stack the dishes near the sink.

  Ethel sometimes stood and watched the young men and wondered how they could appear so carefree when at any moment they could be called to climb into their aircraft and set out to take part in a battle, fight for their lives.

  For all three girls the worst time of their day was the early morning. Dressing in the tent, where the heater had gone cold during the night and with not enough time to justify relighting it, washing in cold water and having to wait for that first cup of tea. They took it in turns to get up earlier to walk through the darkness and open the canteen to get the fire lit and the heaters on.

  It was an unpleasant start to the day, that solitary walk across two fields, pushing their way through dripping hedges and across grass that was white, stiff and crackling with frost. The camouflaged building offered no light, no reminder that there were people near. The wait for the wood, then the coal, to slowly catch light, warming stiff, painful hands, and the long wait for the kettle to boil for that first cuppa were a constant nightmare. The girls used water from the bad-tempered boiler even though they were not supposed to. Its occasional blow-back, rattling the cups on the shelves, had Walter or one or two light sleepers coming in to complain, with a cup of tea offered to them as consolation.

  Another tedious job was filling the boiler and the tea-urn, ladling it in and out with a heavy saucepan. Rosie, being smaller than the others, found it very difficult and had to climb a chair. She was always grateful when one of the lads came to help her. Duggie hadn’t been around for a few days and she wondered if he had been transferred to another airfield.