‘Because I suspected that you’d try to steal the locket and make a fool of me. I wanted to beat you at your own game. That’s the only reason.’
He shook his head and gave a quick laugh, then bowed as if to concede the point. ‘You got me good. I never thought you’d do that.’ His voice changed. ‘Now give it back. Those negatives don’t belong to you and you’re heading for a mess of trouble if you keep them. I’m nice; others won’t be.’
‘More threats?’ My lips tightened. ‘They’re becoming tiresome.’
Before he could reply the Warning began its shrieking wail, sounding like a tormented animal. Leon announced that he had no air-raid shelter in the restaurant. There were public shelters nearby, he informed us. The ugly symphony of AA guns began firing, and then a noise that was unmistakable, a distant uneven drone that might have come from some far-off factory.
Michael and I exchanged looks. ‘Want to find a shelter?’ he asked.
‘I’d rather return to the club.’
He shook his head. ‘No, you’re staying with me until we work out what to do about this.’
‘Then let’s find a shelter. I often don’t bother, but the skies are clear tonight and they’ve been stepping up their attacks lately.’
When we emerged into Dean Street, the night air was filled with light and sound. The drone of planes was loud overhead and the AA guns were firing at a terrific rate. Around us was the clink of falling shrapnel. Red and green lights from tracer bullets soared towards the darkness; comet-like AA shells trailed plumes of fire and lit the sky when they burst. On the street dozens of incendiaries were bursting into fizzing balls of fire.
A sudden sharp cracking sound pierced the air, and Michael dived down, pulling me with him.
‘Rifle shot,’ he said.
‘Rifle? Nonsense,’ I replied. ‘This is London.’
Another crack sounded, then another. I suddenly realised what it was.
‘It’s the slate roofs,’ I said with a laugh. ‘When the shrapnel falls on them it sounds like a rifle shot.’
‘Oh,’ Michael said, and got up. He put his hand down to me. I took it and was hauled to my feet. ‘We’re not staying out in this. Where’s the public shelter Leon told us about?’
I pointed to where a bobby was standing on the corner, waving his masked torch in the direction of a narrow alleyway. He was a giant of a man, broad-shouldered but not hulking. The fitful gleam of the moon shone on his steel hat, illuminating the large white ‘P’ that had been painted on the front. His cape gave him the outline of a stage villain from the pantomimes I used to dance in as a child.
‘Shelter’s that way,’ he was telling the passing parade. ‘Now be sensible, won’t you, and take cover.’
The noise had increased to include the tinkling crash of shattered glass, the shrieking whine of bombs and the shuddering crump when they landed.
We followed a small group to where an illuminated ‘S’ for shelter offered safety about halfway down the alley. Michael pushed open the door and we descended a dozen or so steps into a square room fitted with slatted benches. It had a slight odour of mould and urine overlaid with Jeyes fluid, but was as comfortable as any shelter I’d been in. I thought it was a cellar or even a former crypt because the ceiling was arched and, from what I could tell, it was made of the small bricks that I’d been told dated from Tudor times.
Michael and I sat near an elderly lady who seemed remarkably chipper, given the circumstances.
‘Oh, I quite enjoy a raid,’ she said. ‘Enjoy the company, anyways. This is a friendly shelter.’ She gave me a cheery smile. ‘Aren’t you pretty. You from round here? I’m sure I’ve seen your face before.’
‘I live in Greek Street. The Theatre Girls’ Club.’
She eyed me with the interest I usually got from non-theatrical types. ‘I should have guessed. You’ve a lovely figure, deary. And so tall.’ She leaned towards me and whispered, ‘You’re not a Windmill girl, are you?’
I felt Michael’s amusement, but managed a smile. The Windmill show featured tableaux of completely naked women, who weren’t allowed to move a muscle. According to the law, if naked women were still it was art but if they moved, it was obscene.
‘No,’ I whispered back. ‘I make a point of keeping on at least some clothes during a show. I was a chorus dancer, here and in France, until the war started. A Tiller Girl. Now I drive ambulances.’
‘A Tiller Girl and now an ambulance girl,’ she said, and picked up a mass of khaki wool. ‘Well, good for you, love.’
Soon she was knitting. The clicking of her needles was a comforting sound, but we had barely settled ourselves when the anti-aircraft guns started up again. The succession of bangs became ever louder and more violent. Then, as the sound of aircraft reverberated in the confined space, we heard the crash and rumble of exploding bombs coming ever closer.
Michael had begun a conversation with another elderly woman on his left.
‘You sleep through the raids?’ he said, raising his voice to be heard over the thunder outside. He sounded incredulous. ‘How do you manage that?’
She grinned at him. ‘Well, I comes in, I sits down and reads me book, then I says me prayers. “To hell with Hitler”, I says. And I goes to sleep.’
I caught Michael’s eye and we shared a smile.
The shelter rocked as a stick of three bombs screamed downwards and landed with three shuddering crumps somewhere not far away.
You never get used to the bombing. Well, I never did. It wasn’t long after the Blitz began that I realised I was a beastly coward. But I took pride in not showing how I felt, and I soon discovered that most people were exactly like me, afraid and not showing it.
The shriek of falling bombs became louder, the thumps more intense. A crack appeared in the ceiling and brick dust floated down. The one globe that illuminated us flickered, went dead and flickered back into life.
I tried not to dwell on the stories I’d heard about shelters suffering direct hits, and although I managed to compose my face into a semblance of serenity, my hands were held in tight fists. Michael put his arm around me and pulled my head down to rest on his shoulder. I had a vague feeling that I should protest, but it felt good – right – to be so close to another human being. The entire room juddered as a bomb crashed down nearby. Michael’s arm tightened around me.
‘Anyone sing?’ asked a man with a guitar. ‘We could have a sing-song.’
No one volunteered, so he led us through all the old favourites. Most joined in with ‘There’ll Always be an England’, ‘Tomorrow is a Lovely Day’, ‘Pack Up Your Troubles’, ‘Franklyn D. Roosevelt Jones’, and of course, ‘One Man Went to Mow’. Eventually he ran out of steam. The singing became softer, and eventually faded.
Michael reached out his hand towards the man holding the guitar, and it was handed to him. He held it as if he was practised in playing. The corner of his mouth raised in his usual half smile as he began to strum gently. Then he plucked out a sweet, sad tune and began to sing in a pure baritone. It sounded like an English folk tune, but I didn’t recognise the words, sung in his American accent. The song spoke of love and loss, and death made poetic.
I knew that death was not poetic at all, not the deaths I’d seen anyway. But somehow the old words and the sweet tune brought to mind bravery and passion and sadness that had no connection to the hideous destruction going on around us.
When the last notes died away the knitting woman said, ‘That was a sweet song, mister. Do you know any more?’
He sang us three more. A travelling song about wayfaring strangers, doomed to wander. A jaunty reel about a roving sailor. A mountain song about lost love and memories blown away in the wind.
Michael had begun to sing about working in the coal mines, when we heard a banging at the door. Heads came up. The music stopped, and the banging came again. It was a sinister sound, as if Death had come knocking. Fear showed in the faces around me, a pinched desperation that caused a lack
of charity. No one moved.
I glanced at the old woman next to me, whose eyes were wide. She shook her head. ‘There’s no room,’ she whispered.
‘We have to let them in,’ I said, looking at Michael.
He put down the guitar and stood up. ‘This is nuts,’ he said, marching across to the door. ‘It’s life and death out there.’
When he hauled it open we all gasped because for a moment it really was as if Death had pushed through the blackout curtain. An apparition, huge, and caped, filled the doorway like anybody’s worst nightmare. Michael stepped back into the light and it entered, diminished and became the bobby who’d directed us into the shelter. Another man followed him in, a fair-haired man, aged around forty in a civilian suit.
‘Thanks,’ said the bobby. ‘It’s a bad raid.’
‘Is there room at the inn?’ asked the fair-haired man. His smile was tremulous; in fact, his whole body was shaking. He had a clipped accent that reminded me of the way Celia spoke.
We all nodded vigorously.
‘Harker,’ he said, turning to Michael.
Michael stalked back to where I was sitting, followed by the man, who sat beside me, swallowed and took a few deep breaths. His hair was fair and thinning, his moustache sharply delineated, and his expression toffee-nosed. ‘So well-bred, don’t you know, what?’ I murmured under my breath. Once he had regained his composure he looked quizzically at the guitar, then glanced at me and gave Michael an ironic smile.
‘Well met by moonlight,’ he said, and shuddered. ‘It’s mayhem out there.’
Michael handed back the guitar to its owner. ‘How are you, Denbeigh?’ he said.
‘Fine, fine,’ murmured Denbeigh, who was looking me up and down in a slow, considered manner, just short of insulting. ‘Haven’t seen you in months, Harker. Are you well?’
‘I’m okay,’ said Michael.
Denbeigh smiled at me. I smiled back, but guardedly.
He turned again to Michael, and said in a light, chatty voice, ‘And how is your charming wife? Vivian, isn’t it.’
Michael’s reply to Denbeigh was low, and curt to the point of rudeness.
‘Yes. Vivian.’
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
My first feeling was shock. The next, annoyance at my shock. Michael had said he was immune to my so-called charms. Well, of course he was. He had a charming wife. Why should it surprise me? Michael Harker was a twenty-eight-year-old man, presentable-looking – some might say good-looking – and charming himself when he wanted to be. For goodness’ sake, he could even sing! Of course he was married. But he could have damn well told me he was.
It changed nothing. I still had to decide what to do with the negatives. I sat back, rested my back against the wall, closed my eyes and tried to escape into memories of the chorus line at the Folies. I imagined I was one of twenty-five tall girls all beautifully dressed, standing in a row. First a little jump with our feet together and then up comes the right leg, nice and straight until toes are at eye level: the ‘eye-high kick’. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. We were the danseurs anglaise, the Tiller Girls at the Folies Bergère, who could do thirty-two-and-a-half high kicks a minute. Our show would have knocked the socks off even the oh-so-charming and married Michael Harker.
‘And who is this lovely young lady?’ asked Denbeigh. I opened my eyes.
‘Another refugee from the raid,’ Michael replied curtly. Denbeigh blinked at him, then turned to me.
‘She’s a dancer,’ put in the knitting woman. ‘Chorus line, mind, not the Windmill. A Tiller Girl.’
The major’s eyes became wide. ‘Well, I call it serendipity. A Tiller Girl. Marvellous. My dear, you’d be a shoe-in. Just what we need.’
‘What you need?’ I said. ‘What do you need?’
‘Girls like you. Young lady, you should be in the movies. Allow me to …’ He fumbled in his pockets and extracted a card.
I smiled and took it, mainly because I thought it might annoy Michael. It did. I could tell from his tightly compressed lips.
The card announced the stranger to be ‘Peregrine Denbeigh, Ministry of Information. Crown Film Unit’.
‘And I’ll tell you now without any exaggeration at all,’ he went on, ‘that we need girls just like you. Yes, just like you.’
‘How do you do, Mr Denbeigh,’ I said, with one eye on Michael’s scowling face. ‘I’m Maisie Halliday. But I don’t act, or sing. I only dance.’ Another glance at Michael. ‘I do know how to stand, though.’
I stood up and took off Michael’s raincoat, unbuttoned my jacket and slipped it off, as well. Tight sweater, tight skirt. I stood in my showgirl pose, chest out, chin up, arms by my sides, right leg slightly extended. There was scattered applause from the others in the shelter.
‘Capital,’ said Denbeigh, in a strangled voice. ‘Just a dancer, what? Capital. Perfect. No need for you to act at all.’
‘You’re a corker, love,’ a man called out.
‘She’ll up the morale of the troops,’ said another man.
‘Up something of theirs, anyway,’ said the first, sniggering. The other joined in. Michael jumped to his feet and glared at them, holding his hands in tight fists.
‘We’ll have none of that,’ said the policeman, addressing the man who had spoken. He walked over to Michael and put a hand on his arm. Michael shook it off, still eyeing the sniggering men angrily.
‘Sit down, miss,’ said the bobby to me. ‘There’s a good girl. I’m sure you’d be lovely in films, but this is an air-raid shelter. I really don’t want any fuss.’
He was quite right. I was being silly, and I wasn’t sure why. Flushing, I slipped the jacket back on, then the raincoat, and sat down.
‘Sorry, Mr Denbeigh,’ I said, ‘but I work for the London Auxiliary Ambulance Service. I can’t up and leave them to join your unit.’
‘Oh, that’s no problem at all. Easily fixed. It’s important work we do. Morale, you know. Wins wars. They’ll give you time off if we ask.’
‘No, really. I like my work. It’s important. And anyway, I don’t want to be in films.’
Denbeigh seemed shocked. He opened then closed his mouth, checked his nails and turned to Michael. ‘Can’t you speak to her? It’s a marvellous opportunity I’m offering the girl. And completely on the level, as you Americans say.’
Michael was sitting down, slumped against the wall. ‘As if Miss Halliday would ever listen to a word I said. If I told her not to do it, she would, just to spite me.’
He looked up, caught my eye and said, in a level, disinterested tone, ‘Hey, Maisie. Don’t do it.’
‘That’s unfair,’ I said, incensed. ‘And if I want to, I will.’
At that, Michael began to laugh. ‘Sure you will.’
I realised just how silly I was being, and I laughed, too.
‘Listen,’ said the knitting woman. ‘No planes. No bombs.’
The room became silent. Sure enough, the bombing had ceased. The guns barked a few times, and the hum of the planes was faint and becoming fainter. The All Clear began its long, single note of hope. People around us began packing up their belongings. And all at once I realised just how tired I was.
‘That’s more like it,’ said a woman. ‘I hate all-nighters.’
‘If I’m home quick I’ll get a nap in before work,’ said another.
‘I just hope I’ve a home to get back to. I’ve already been bombed out once.’
‘Take care moving around in the blackout up there,’ said the policeman. ‘Might be best to stay here until dawn.’
‘This one’s here for the night, anyway,’ said Michael. He nodded towards my right. When I looked, the woman whose prayers consigned Hitler to hell was stretched out, fast asleep under a tattered blanket. Michael and I shared another smile.
‘She really meant it about sleeping anywhere,’ I said.
‘C’mon kid, I’ll take you home,’ said Michael.
‘No point,’ I replied. ‘The doors will be locked. I’m
on duty in …’ I looked at my watch, ‘five hours. If I go to the ambulance station now, I can take a quick kip before I start my shift.’
‘I assume that means sleep. I’ll walk you to the ambulance station, then.’
There was no point arguing with him. Besides, I’d appreciate the company.
‘Thanks.’ I stood and picked up my handbag.
Major Denbeigh also stood. ‘I say, Miss Halliday, I meant it, you know. About being in films. You’d not have to act, just look good.’
I smiled at him. ‘Thank you ever so much for the offer, but I’m really not interested. Perhaps if the Blitz ends and I’m not needed on the ambulances any more.’ I shrugged.
He seemed genuinely disappointed. ‘Well, if you change your mind, you have my card. I have an eye for these things and I really think the camera would – as they say – love you.’
A thought seemed to strike him. ‘Are the other girls in your ambulance station who are like you? Young, I mean? And pretty?’
‘Two of them are in their twenties. They’re both pretty, but I doubt they’d be interested.’
‘Miss Halliday, are you absolutely sure?’
I turned to Michael with a pleading look.
‘She’s stubborn,’ said Michael. ‘Let her make up her mind in her own time. Right now that dog won’t hunt.’
Major Denbeigh and I both stared at him.
‘Nagging won’t cut it,’ said Michael.
The major smiled at me. ‘I get few refusals,’ he said. ‘And I am truly sorry to see you walk away. Are you absolutely sure?’
‘Yes.’
When Michael and I emerged from the shelter, it was into a pitch-black world. The bright moonlight of the early evening had disappeared, hidden behind clouds. The air was smoky, and seemed thinner somehow. It always did, after a raid, as if all joy and life had been sucked away, leaving behind a whiff of fear and the stink of misery. As always, though, I caught a top note of defiance.
‘I hope you know the way,’ said Michael, ‘because I’m not familiar with this part of London.’
I laughed. ‘I’d know it blindfolded, but luckily I’ve got cat’s eyes and can see in the dark because I eats me carrots. I warn you, it’s a twenty-minute walk. And that’s without bomb debris holding us up.’
Ambulance Girls At War Page 13