Ambulance Girls At War

by Deborah Burrows

  We slowly descended. Michael knocked on the door and we waited. At last the door opened and, indifferent to the blackout, electric light streamed out into the tiny courtyard. It backlit John Casey, who stepped towards us holding a revolver. He glanced at me, then pointed the gun at Michael, who raised his hands.

  And that’s when I became very angry. Casey didn’t even think of watching me. I was harmless. Weak. A former chorus girl who wasn’t even standing close enough to try to grab the gun. Not with my hands, anyway. But my legs were thirty-three inches long and I could kick as high as my eye.

  First a little jump to prepare. Casey didn’t notice. Then, quick as a wink, the eye-high kick. My foot struck Casey’s hand with a satisfying thump. His hand flew up, but he still had hold of the gun. Have I mentioned that a Tiller Girl could do thirty-two kicks per minute? Up again went my leg and this time the gun went flying.

  So did Michael. He launched himself at Casey like a steam hammer. They hit the hallway floor together in a writhing mass of arms, legs and torsos. Fists hit flesh with sickening thuds. Raised arms met blows until a knee pushed brutally into the groin resulted in a high scream of pain. Casey was down and Michael had a knee on his chest. He pulled back his fist and slammed it into the man’s undefended face. Casey subsided into an unconscious heap.

  Very slowly Michael got off Casey. He knelt beside him to check his carotid pulse. Only once he was satisfied that the man was breathing did he look at me.

  ‘Neat trick, kid,’ he said.

  ‘You learn to take care of yourself in the chorus,’ I replied.

  Then I remembered Moray. I leapt over Casey’s unconscious form and headed for the living room. On the floor, in a pitiful heap, lay Moray, his face bloodied. I dashed over to him, shaking him, trying to see if he was alive. A puffy eyelid raised and a green eye stared at me.

  ‘Can you get up?’ I asked him. A nod. I helped him to his feet and over to the sofa, where he collapsed.

  ‘Would someone please explain to me what happened?’ I said. ‘Where’s Lowell? And why do you look like that, Moray?’

  Michael had tied up Casey, and put him in the bedroom. I’d cleaned Moray’s face as well as I could, but he was still holding a handkerchief to his bloody nose and lurid bruises were appearing. He tried to laugh, but a split lip meant he winced instead.

  ‘The things I do for my country,’ he said, on a sigh. ‘Lowell came this afternoon and took what he thinks is the microfilm Egan was carrying, just like we wanted him to. He’s off to Germany, via Ireland, he tells me. He also told me where to find you. Said you were safe and he’d give an anonymous tip to the police about your whereabouts.’ He looked at me. ‘Thank goodness you are safe. How did you escape?’

  I shrugged. ‘Some friends helped me out. So it was Casey who hurt you. Why?’

  ‘Casey’s a misguided patriot. Turned up not long after Lowell left and demanded the microfilm. I told him Lowell had it and he wanted to know where Lowell was. I said I didn’t know and he spent a while trying to persuade me to spill the beans, as he put it. The rest you know.’

  ‘I take it the microfilm you gave Lowell is fake.’

  ‘A carefully constructed fake. Should confuse their research into magnetrons for some time. With any luck, he’ll tell them I’m entirely trustworthy and my work here can move to a new level.’ He gave me an admiring look. ‘Well done on convincing Lowell that I was kosher.’

  I laughed. ‘A kosher anti-Semite. The drug he gave me is very odd, not a truth serum exactly. It made me want to be obliging. I think he used it badly. I was compelled to answer direct questions – yes or no questions – but all I really wanted was to be obliging. I let my imagination run riot and I sang a lot. It helped.’

  ‘You did very well. Temple will be wanting to recruit you permanently.’

  Michael came across to me and put his arm around my shoulder. ‘He’ll have to find someone else.’

  I murmured, ‘Mmmm.’

  CHAPTER FORTY

  Jim Vassilikov turned up at nine o’clock that morning in a big black car driven by an ATS girl. I’d managed to snatch a few hours’ sleep after the night’s adventures and felt vaguely human.

  ‘Moray telephoned Temple this morning,’ said Jim, who was in a lively mood. ‘He told us some of what happened, and I’m longing to hear the rest from you.’

  We set off. Jim seemed happier than I had ever seen him. He was usually very reserved, but as we drove through the streets, he kept smiling. In fact, his mood was almost euphoric.

  ‘What’s up?’ I asked.

  His face lit up in a grin. ‘Great news for Britain. Last night Germany invaded Russia.’

  I stared at him. ‘That was Napoleon’s downfall, wasn’t it?’

  ‘It was, and it could well be Hitler’s also. He will not find the Red Army a pushover. At last we have a tough fighting ally in Europe.’

  ‘I thought you hated Soviet Russia.’

  ‘I do, but my enemy’s enemy and all that. This’ll turn Hitler’s attention away from us.’

  My heart began to race. ‘Do you really think the Blitz is over?’

  ‘I do. He can’t afford to send hundreds of planes to bomb London when he needs them on the other side of Europe. We’ll still see a few bombers come across, I expect, in retaliation for our bombing of Germany, but no more Blitz.’

  I stared out the window at the ruins, and found myself wanting to sing.

  ‘We are very happy indeed with the way you handled yourself in difficult circumstances,’ said Captain Temple, whose blue-green eyes seemed almost to twinkle.

  ‘I made a lot of mistakes,’ I said.

  ‘With no training whatsoever, you did wonderfully well. Most importantly, we achieved our purpose.’

  ‘So Dan Lowell is actually off to Germany?’

  ‘Yes. He’s long been a supporter of Hitler, we now realise. Of course, the Americans are sweeping it all under the carpet. I doubt we’ll hear his name mentioned again.’ He handed me a cup of tea and proffered a plate of fancy iced biscuits. I hadn’t seen such luxury in over a year.

  ‘What about Casey?’

  Jim answered. ‘Casey’s being sent back to the United States.’

  I shook my head. ‘So he’s not a traitor, and he thought that Lowell discovered Moray was a fifth columnist?’

  ‘Yes, and that Moray had killed or kidnapped him. Hence his attack on Moray. Apparently he’s devastated that Lowell is a traitor.’

  ‘I almost feel sorry for him, but he was brutal to poor Moray. And he’s a bit of a pig.’

  As I sipped my tea Temple gave me a considering look. ‘Would you be interested in joining my little crew, Miss Halliday? You could still work with the ambulance service, much as Moray does, but I’d need you to be available when I thought I could use your particular, er, talents.’

  I’d been wondering about this possibility ever since Moray had mentioned it. Michael would be utterly opposed, of course. But, as it would be top secret, he didn’t need to know. In fact I couldn’t tell him on pain of ten years’ imprisonment with hard labour. The news about Hitler’s invasion of Russia had been the turning point in my mind, because if the Blitz was over, I’d not be needed as much driving ambulances. I hated the thought of being bored.

  ‘Yes, Captain Temple,’ I said. ‘I would be interested.’

  ‘You look pleased with yourself,’ said Michael, at dinner that night. He leaned back in his chair, took a long look at me and laughed. ‘When do you start your duties with this so-called Captain Temple?’

  I stared at him. ‘How—?’

  He smiled and shook his head. ‘Kid, you’re excited and guilty all at once and you’ve not said a word about your meeting with Temple. I figure that means he offered and you accepted. I just hope he’s going to train you properly, and he’s not sending you out of the country.’

  I reached across and took his hand. ‘Yes, he’ll train me. And no, I’m not leaving Britain. I don’t speak any other langua
ges fluently, so …’ I shrugged. ‘I can’t say any more about it, Michael. It’s top secret.’ I hesitated, then said, ‘Are you annoyed with me? For accepting the offer from Captain Temple, I mean.’

  Michael smiled and squeezed my hand. ‘Nah. I wish I could wrap you up in cotton wool and keep you safe, but I know you’d never let me. You’re perfectly able to take care of yourself and I have a strong hunch that you’ll be damned good at … whatever Temple wants you to do. But you be sure to remember your promise, kid.’

  ‘My promise?’

  ‘Our promises to each other after the big air raid. No silly risks.’

  ‘No silly risks.’ I gave him a smile and toyed with his long fingers. ‘As I recall, you made some other promises to me that morning.’

  ‘I remember.’ He curled his fingers around mine. ‘Maisie, I always keep my promises.’

  I looked up and met his eyes. ‘I’m glad.’

  But there was a war on, and some promises could not be kept.

  It was glorious, that summer after the Blitz ended. Tall grass and wildflowers sprung up amongst bomb-site rubble, as if the countryside were reclaiming London. Someone reported seeing a hawk in the skies over the ruined Temple. Old men sat in the sunshine on the steps of shattered houses under glassless windows now covered with black paper. Women still spent hours queuing for rationed food, but time went quickly, as they spent it chattering and remarking on the weather and what would go under the ration next. It was not peace; German bombers still flew across England’s starry skies carrying death under their wings. Houses were still destroyed and people still killed and injured. We remained busy in the Bloomsbury Ambulance Station, but it was nothing like the frantic, heartrending, constant horror of the Blitz.

  True to his word, Michael courted me whenever his busy schedule and mine allowed. We planned our wedding for soon after my twenty-first birthday, but then fate intervened. On Sunday the sixth of December the news came over the wireless: earlier that day Japanese bombers had attacked Pearl Harbor.

  ‘That’s it, then,’ said Michael. His eyes flashed blue in his grim face.

  ‘Your country’s at war with Japan?’

  ‘And soon with Germany and Italy. We’re all in it together now, kid.’

  His voice was surprisingly flat. In contrast, I was filled with hopeful joy. Britain had a real likelihood of winning this war if both America and Russia were supporting us. I was about to say it when I saw the look on Michael’s face. I tried to swallow, but there was a lump in my throat, and it hurt.

  ‘You’re going back to America, to join up,’ I said. It was a statement, not a question.

  He glanced at me, then stared at a point on the floor. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m twenty-one in four months. We could—’

  ‘I’m sorry, kid. This makes it impossible. How can I marry you now? When I’ll be leaving right away and I might not return for years? Or at all? When I might leave you with a kid to raise alone.’ He looked up at me and now his eyes were blue ice. ‘I won’t do that to you.’

  I leaned in and kissed him, pushing my lips against his, desperately. He submitted but didn’t respond and eventually I pulled away.

  ‘I don’t care,’ I said, staring into his eyes. ‘I don’t care if I don’t see you for years. So long as we’ve had some time together now, and so long as we’re together eventually.’

  He shook his head. I stood and began to pace the room, trying to marshal my arguments.

  ‘Don’t you see?’ I said. ‘This is the choice that faces everyone who falls in love in wartime. Ellie Kavanagh married Raymond last month. They both nearly died in the Café de Paris, and they decided that they should – should, um, gather rosebuds while they may.’

  At last he smiled. ‘That poem is called “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time”.’

  I began to unbutton my blouse. ‘Then let’s,’ I said, my cheeks flaming. ‘Let’s make much of our time.’

  He reached up to cover my fingers, stop me. ‘No, honey. Not like this.’

  I sat beside him in an abrupt movement. ‘You promised to marry me when I was twenty-one. I’m nearly twenty-one. Have you changed your mind? Is that what this is about?’

  ‘No. I will marry you, if you still want to, when the war is over.’

  ‘But that might be years,’ I wailed. ‘By then I might be old. And ugly.’

  He laughed, and shook his head. ‘Never.’

  I knew the signs. Michael thought he was right about this and had made his mind up. I blew out a breath and gave him a tremulous smile.

  ‘I’ll still hold you to your promise. Even if by the end of the war I’m a shrivelled-up old maid, living with cats and engaged in good causes.’

  ‘And I will keep my promise. I’ll marry you, Maisie Halliday, no matter what. Now come and kiss me, sweet and twenty.’

  I snuggled up beside him. ‘Is that another quote?’

  He was too busy kissing me to answer.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Tuesday 21 April 1942

  ‘Happy birthday, Maisie,’ said Celia.

  She came up to me and planted a kiss on my cheek, then sat opposite me with as much elegance as a woman who was seven months pregnant could manage. Her smocked velvet gown was in a dark blue that matched her eyes. Celia glowed as brightly as expectant mothers are supposed to do and as she looked around at the bright gaiety of dancing couples, the gypsy band and the painted walls she put a gentle hand on her stomach. She smiled at me.

  ‘Twenty-one today,’ she said. ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘And we’re all back at the Hungaria,’ said Lily, sitting beside Simon. ‘We should make it an annual outing for Maisie’s birthday. Would you like that, Maisie?’

  ‘Of course I would.’

  ‘Then we will,’ said Jim.

  ‘How are things at the station?’ asked Celia. ‘I miss everyone like blazes.’

  She had left the ambulance service five months before, and now concentrated on working for a Jewish children’s welfare organisation while waiting for the birth of her honeymoon baby.

  ‘And we all miss you,’ I said.

  ‘Poor Squire’s lost both his best friends,’ said Lily. ‘First Stephen Armstrong gets called up and then you go off having babies.’

  ‘Only one baby and I’ve not dumped Squire,’ said Celia. ‘He’s my mate. Squire and “the Missus” have been around to tea a few times now.’

  I smiled to myself to imagine big George Squire in the delicately furnished living room of Simon and Celia’s elegant townhouse near St James’s Square.

  ‘I wish Michael were here to celebrate with you,’ said Lily.

  I managed a smile. ‘So do I.’

  I had waved him off as he sailed for America on the twenty-third of January. Somehow I’d managed to keep smiling until the ship was away and then poor Lily had to take home a blubbering mess. ‘Cry it out,’ she’d said. ‘I know what I’d be like if Jim went away.’

  ‘Where is he now? Do you know?’ asked Jim.

  ‘At a training camp in Louisiana. That’s a state in the south of America.’

  ‘What’s the mail like from the US?’ asked Simon.

  ‘Oh, we write regularly, usually once a week. We number the letters so we know if one’s gone missing. But so far none have.’

  Our letters were mainly mushy stuff, because I couldn’t tell him much about what I was doing and he couldn’t tell me much about what he was doing and, apart from the mushy stuff, the censor took out the rest. I didn’t mind really. I liked the mushy stuff in Michael’s letters.

  ‘What else are you doing to celebrate?’ asked Lily.

  ‘I’m taking a couple of weeks off – I’m due a lot of leave – and I’m going on holiday.’

  ‘Where are you off to?’

  ‘Yorkshire.’

  I caught Jim’s eye. It was no holiday. We were both involved in a tricky situation for Captain Temple, my first ‘assignment’ since I’d been recruited. At least
it meant I had no time to miss Michael. Not much time, anyway.

  Wednesday 21 April 1943

  I celebrated my twenty-second birthday at the Hungaria, as usual with the Ambulance Girls. Celia’s son, whom they named David, had been born in June 1942, and was a dark-haired cherub with a mischievous streak. During the evening Lily spent a fair bit of time in the ladies’ room being sick. Jim didn’t need to explain it was because she was pregnant.

  ‘To Maisie,’ said Jim, standing to propose the toast when Lily came back, looking pale, but determined to have a good time.

  ‘And to absent friends and fiancés,’ said Celia. ‘Where is Michael now?’

  ‘Fighting in North Africa,’ I said. My tone was brusque, because I hoped no one would ask me anything else about him. I was worried that I might cry.

  After being posted to England for four glorious months, Michael had shipped out in November 1942 to take part in the Allied invasion of North Africa. It had not been a successful expedition for the US troops, who had suffered enormous losses. Michael had suffered a bout of dysentery, but no injuries.

  At times I felt very down. Celia and Lily were happily married to men who were posted to England; they were having babies and getting on with their lives. I felt as if I were standing still while time and life whirled around me. And always, every day, there was fear for Michael.

  ‘What happened to your arm?’ asked Lily. It was in a sling.

  ‘Oh, a work injury,’ I said, exchanging a look with Jim. My second job for Captain Temple had had its dangers, but at least it had taken my mind off Michael a little.

  Friday 21 April 1944

  By the time my twenty-third birthday came around, London was again under attack, what we called the ‘baby blitz’. We’d enjoyed two and a half years with few major bombings, when, in January 1944, Hitler decided to recommence the systematic bombing of British cities, and of London in particular. The raids only lasted an hour or so, beginning in the early evening and over by midnight, but the casualties and damage caused were as bad as many of the raids in the Blitz of 1940–41. Once again, Londoners had to seek shelter every night, in basements, air-raid shelters and the Tube.