by Annie Groves
‘I hope you don’t take all night.’ Nancy pouted like a spoiled five-year-old. ‘I’ll feel a right lemon sitting outside your manager’s office for hours waiting for you.’
‘Don’t be like that, Nance,’ Gloria urged, linking her arm and doing that little wiggle she always did to show there were no hard feelings. ‘You know we’ll always be friends. You’re like the sister I never had.’
‘But I’ve got two sisters!’ Nancy said. Had Gloria completely lost her marbles?
‘I know, but you’re the one I would have picked if I could choose one of my own.’ The two of them suddenly started laughing and Nancy knew she could not stay cross with Gloria for long, although she could not hide her envious streak either.
‘What will Giles have to say on the matter, I wonder. Swanning around top-class nightclubs and hotels and being fêted by London agents?’
Gloria said nothing now, Nancy noticed.
Nancy wondered what she had done so wrong to be in this position. Tied down with a baby while the Nazis were holding her husband prisoner! She did not even have a bed to call her own now that this new sister-in-law had turned up.
‘Never mind, Nance, your turn will come one day.’ Gloria gave her a hug. ‘Your luck will come when you least expect it – you’ll see!’ Gloria knew Nancy was trying to burst her happy balloon but she was having none of it. ‘I had a letter from Giles this morning. He said he might get some leave soon.’
‘You caught Giles before he knew he was being chased.’ Nancy smiled, thawing now. Giles’s family were a cut above Gloria’s. His father bred and sold racehorses and his mother, a member of the Ladies’ Guild, gave coffee mornings. They were a handsome family and Nancy knew Gloria would have fancied his father if she had not seen Giles first!
‘Wouldn’t it be marvellous if he managed to get home this weekend? I could tell him my good news!’ The thing Gloria missed most about Giles was his masculine prowess – not to mention the divine champagne lifestyle and the swish out-of-the-way hotels. He treated her like a princess but she made sure he did not go without. Who could resist her feminine charms? Oh, Giles, come home soon … Nancy was not what she needed right now.
‘What time shall I call for you?’ Nancy said, looking forward to getting dressed up.
‘Let’s say half-past six – that way I’ll be able to go over the songs with the band and, apart from my little singsong, the night and the dance floor will be all ours.’
‘All yours, you mean.’ Nancy knew there was no ration on male attention where Gloria was concerned.
‘Your Sid won’t always be a prisoner,’ Gloria said, knowing Nancy had not been allowed to move out of her husband’s sight before he was called up. ‘He’ll be back soon enough.’
Ruling your life as always.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
‘Oh, it’s ever so posh in here,’ Nancy said as an attendant took her coat and showed her and Gloria to their table in the semi-circular booth on the raised balcony of the Adelphi Hotel. Above their heads huge glittering diamond-shaped chandeliers twinkled, and the girls’ feet sank into the thick ruby-coloured carpet. Nancy sighed; she could get used to places like this. However, she knew if it were not that Gloria was singing here regularly in the evenings, she could never afford to come to such a grand place.
‘You’re going to make the most of the luxurious facilities, you mean,’ Nancy laughed, soaking up the opulent surroundings when her best friend told her she was going to powder her nose.
The clientele were high-ranking servicemen escorting their dazzling wives or lady-friends, Gloria noticed, home on leave and out to enjoy the early Christmas party at which she had been invited to sing. It made a pleasant change from her dad’s pub surrounded by beer-swilling dockers and their harassed wives.
‘I’ll tell you what, Nance,’ Gloria said on her return, sliding into the plush banquette with the poise of a sensually stretching cat, ‘those lavatories are immaculate. I felt so spoiled when the lady attendant gave me a fluffy towel to dry my hands on, then put a blob of hand cream into my palm.’ She held out her elegant hand to Nancy and jiggled perfectly manicured crimson nails. ‘Here, Nance, have a sniff of that. It’s got a lovely perfume.’
‘Oh, I must go and have a look later,’ Nancy answered, engrossed in people watching. She had never seen so many diamond necklaces in one room. The fabulous function room, with its twinkling chandeliers, bejewelled patrons and candle-lit tables held the same enchantment as the first Christmas grotto she ever went to as a child. It was truly magical.
‘This is the life, hey, Nance?’ Gloria said, lifting her gin and lime but barely wetting her freshly applied cherry-red lipstick, savouring the perfumed atmosphere before getting ready for her big spot.
‘Hello, Nance. How are you? I haven’t seen you in ages. I buy you both a drink?’ Nancy looked up to see a handsome man impeccably dressed in the uniform of an RAF flight lieutenant. Nancy’s eyes widened! She had not seen Stan Hathaway since the week she got married.
‘Fancy seeing you here,’ she said, and was just about to tell him she would love a rum and peppermint when, to her utter astonishment, Gloria lifted an imperious hand.
‘We’re not here to be picked up, and we do not accept drinks from rogue males.’
That’s a first! Nancy thought, unable to believe what she was hearing. Gloria would usually accept a drink from anybody.
Stan grinned and said in a very formal tone, ‘Forgive me for being so forward. My intentions are honourable, I can assure you.’ Then he made Nancy smile when he said, ‘Anyway, you know me quite well, Gloria, so stop pretending.’
‘Is that really you underneath all that RAF regalia, Stan? Well, you do scrub up quite well, I must admit. Now buzz off as me and Nance are waiting for someone, aren’t we?’
‘It’s Lieutenant Hathaway to you, Gloria. Anyway, suit yourselves.’ He winked at Nancy, then said, ‘Catch you later,’ above the rising notes of the band’s opening music. Nancy scowled in Gloria’s direction, the night losing a little of its lustre. She would have liked another drink and a catch-up with Stan. It had been a long time since she last saw him. What harm could it do? Gloria was only interested in herself and hated the idea that anyone should steal her thunder.
Looking at Gloria, who was surveying the room, her body perfectly poised to its best advantage, Nancy felt a well of resentment towards her friend. She’s just a jealous cow, she thought as Stan went back to the company at his own table. How dare she dismiss her friend as if he was of no importance? Nancy watched Stan lifting a champagne glass in salute, acknowledging another RAF chum and leaning over to say something. Moments later, his pal was crossing the highly polished dance floor. Nancy nudged Gloria, who turned to look.
Gloria gasped in surprise, her mouth open, but nothing else came out. Nancy knew she could have any man she wanted – it had always been like that – but the one crossing the dance floor now was the man she wanted most of all.
‘Giles!’ Gloria squealed eventually as the officer she had been courting since last year neared their table. He was the only man who made her best friend’s eyes light up like that, Nancy knew.
‘Oh, Nance, Giles is home! He’s come to see me!’ Gloria gasped. As Gloria negotiated the balcony steps and then ran towards him with her arms open wide, Nancy felt a sudden urge to get up and leave. Unable to avert her gaze at this most intimate of moments, she realised that she would now be surplus to requirements. Gloria would not want her here now that her boyfriend was home, and Nancy felt a pang of severe envy.
She averted her eyes at last and met those of Stan Hathaway, who just so happened to be gazing in her direction. She gave him a dazzling smile. More than ever, she wanted to dance and have some fun, and as Gloria would now be completely occupied by Giles, Stan was the obvious choice of man with whom to have that fun.
But Gloria was back and had evidently seen the exchange of smiles between Nancy and Stan. ‘Oh, Nance, are you all right? I didn’t upset
you, did I?’ She looked to where Stan was sitting looking up towards the balcony. ‘I must admit, he is very handsome, but I thought he was bothering you.’
Nancy knew her friend was saving her from doing something silly, more like. She sighed and relaxed a little. ‘Gloria, you’re hopeless. I can look after myself very well.’
However, their conversation was over when Gloria turned all her attention to her own boyfriend who had now followed her over with his drink in hand and took his place beside her in the semi-circular velvet-seated booth. Giles nuzzled her neck while Gloria, obviously lapping up the attention, snuggled closer. Nancy thought it was time to go and have a look at the ladies’ room Gloria had been raving about earlier.
‘If I don’t move now, Giles, the band will never forgive me.’ Gloria’s hands slipped from around his neck, down his arm and, after a small clasp of entwined fingertips, she reluctantly moved away. ‘I’d better go and get ready.’
Nancy wondered if she could make some excuse and go home as she made her way back from the ladies’ room to the table. Gloria would not be interested in having a married friend around when her man was home on leave. Who could blame her? Nancy knew she would be just as thrilled to have her man home, keen to spend time and money on her and show her a fabulous time. She sighed, aware that it was an impossible dream; Sid was not that type of man.
‘Knock ’em dead, kid!’ Nancy said as Gloria went to change for her performance.
Just a few minutes later: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, may I introduce Miss Gloria Arden!’ The bandleader’s voice rang out as Gloria leaned into the microphone to the rapturous applause of the audience. Dressed in a gold lamé gown, instead of the white-spotted navy-blue dress with the sweetheart neckline and puffed sleeves she had been wearing earlier, she looked every inch the successful singing starlet.
With her hair now expertly swept up into Betty Grable curls, replacing the victory roll she had recently taken to wearing in support of her loving aviator boyfriend, and graciously accepting the applause that greeted her, Gloria began to sing, holding the audience captivated with the emotion of her words.
‘You have to admit, she is very good, isn’t she?’ Nancy turned to see the adoring look in Giles’s eyes. He was evidently completely smitten.
‘Can I let you into a little secret?’ he asked, leaning towards Nancy.
He shuffled a little closer, then rummaged around in his trouser pocket and brought out a beautiful, tooled leather box. He held it out to Nancy.
‘Do you think Gloria will like it?’
Lifting the hinged lid on the small navy-blue box, Nancy’s eyes widened when she saw the most exquisite, dazzling diamond ring she had ever seen in her life. Her lips formed in a perfect ‘O’ and her gasp of surprise was audible.
‘Like it?’ she said when she could find her voice. ‘I don’t think she will ever let you out of her sight again!’
‘I’m going to ask her to marry me,’ Giles said. ‘I’ve been thinking about her all these months I’ve been away and I vowed to myself to ask her the very next time I saw her.’
Without thinking, Nancy threw her arms around his neck and gave Giles a congratulatory kiss on the cheek, her eyes brimming with unshed tears, thinking it so romantic.
‘I think we need a drink.’ He sounded breathless, like he had been running up a hill, and Nancy was thrilled, hardly able to wait for Gloria to finish singing. Giles summoned an attentive waiter and Nancy felt herself relax, knowing Gloria was going to be delighted. This was the diamond she had been waiting for.
‘Champagne?’
Nancy smiled and nodded, immediately returning her attention to Gloria’s performance. She was certainly going to stay now. There was going to be a celebration and she would enjoy the night in style.
Looking over to where Stan was sitting she saw him nod and smile at her. She smiled back, giving him her best Rita Hayworth and secretly thrilled to have his attention. It was only a bit of flirting – where was the harm? She turned back to Gloria’s stirring finale of the popular Vera Lynn song ‘We’ll Meet Again’. Her thoughts fleetingly turned to Sid, her husband, and then just as quickly she pushed them away …
What the eye didn’t see …
‘They’re a bit earlier tonight,’ Dolly said to Tommy, whom she was minding for the evening, as the wail of the air-raid siren cut through the freezing evening air. ‘I was hoping to get my Christmas cake iced tonight.’
‘I’ll grab the baby, you grab the flask of tea!’ Violet said, hurrying into the kitchen. There was no time to lose as the urgent warning sound, given by the police or air raid warden’s short shrill blasts on a whistle, made them hurry.
Pop was out on ARP duties, while Sarah, in her capacity as a Red Cross volunteer, was helping at the hospital.
‘I hope our Nancy and Gloria manage to get a bus home,’ Dolly said as Violet snatched George’s tiny siren suit from the sideboard and expertly slipped him into it.
‘Looks like you’ve done that before, Vi,’ Dolly remarked as she gathered her file of important documents comprising ration books, insurance papers and identity cards. Violet, despite her horrible laugh, was proving to be an asset. She would turn her hand to anything to help out and shared some of Dolly’s domestic and voluntary load with a smile on her face.
‘Can I go down the docks and have a look at the lights, Aunty Doll?’ Tommy’s eager eyes were wide until he saw the grim expression on Dolly’s face.
Dolly could not believe her ears. ‘Indeed you will not.’
‘The idea of it!’ Violet said. ‘Have you no sense in that woolly head of yours?’
Dolly headed to the kitchen to collect the Thermos flask, and motioned for Tommy to pick up the spare blankets and stay close to her and Violet as they headed towards the brick shelter that had been built at the bottom of Empire Street, accessible to the people in the dock road, too.
‘It’s not fair,’ Tommy grumbled under his breath. ‘I never get to do anything exciting around here.’
‘What was that, Tom?’ Dolly asked, fastening her coat as she went.
‘Nothing, Aunty Doll,’ Tommy said innocently, knowing that the first chance he got he and Monty were going down to the docks. Since he had found the woolly mongrel wandering the dock road, his faithful companion had never left his heel. However, it did not matter how much he pleaded that his mate Ginger got some whopping pieces of shrapnel, Aunty Doll was having none of it. She would not let him out of her sight.
‘Put your scarf on, Tom. We don’t want that damp air getting on your chest.’
Tommy, sighing, did as he was told. He loved Aunty Doll and all the Feeny family, but they nearly smothered him with kindness, sometimes, especially since he’d come out of hospital after contracting diphtheria. Aunty Doll wouldn’t let the wind blow on him – it was worse than living with their Kitty.
Although he knew he should be grateful. Aunty Dolly was a saint compared to that awful woman he had been billeted with in Southport who had treated him so badly he ended up in hospital at death’s door. But, no matter how much he told Aunty Doll he was all better now, she still made a big hoo-ha.
‘Come on, we’ll lose our place in the shelter,’ Violet called as her long legs strode ahead. ‘Didn’t you hear your aunty Doll telling you to fasten that coat right up, Tommy?’ she added.
Every inhabitant of Empire Street was hurrying towards the shelter now and Tommy could hardly see who he was in danger of bumping into over the blankets he was carrying.
‘Come on, Tommy, no dawdling out here!’ Violet called as huge searchlights arced across the black sky while the sight of a silent silver barrage balloon was caught momentarily in the flash of searchlights along with floating flares, their strange purple glow sailing gently to the ground like a promise of precious shrapnel to come. Tommy saw the air raids as a great adventure and was eager to be out. Billy Fisher had found a tail fin from an incendiary, he’d heard. He would have to wait until Aunty Doll and Aunty Violet nod
ded off, or they would stop him going outside before the all clear and spoil his fun, and he hoped that when the Luftwaffe came over they did not miss his school!
‘Oh, we made it, Vi,’ Aunty Doll said, panting, carrying little Georgie into the shelter.
Tommy thought he had been doing a good job helping Aunty Doll but now Violet was here she would take over as usual. Tommy shivered in the cold air of the shelter though he didn’t bother to fasten the belt of his navy-blue gabardine mackintosh. Now he’d put the blankets down he was having too many problems trying to fix his cap on straight while getting tangled in the long scarf Aunty Dolly had knitted for him.
He watched Violet take George, who had been waking because he did not like being disturbed and brought out on a cold night. Tommy thought Violet was being a bit too heavy-handed with the little baby for his liking. Wrapped in his little siren suit Aunty Doll had made from an old blanket, Georgie began to grizzle, just as Tommy knew he would. Aunty Doll had made him a siren suit too. It was meant to be easy to get on and off when you had to get to the shelter quickly in the middle of the night, but Tommy thought he looked like a big baby in his – even if Mr Churchill wore one himself. Tommy thought that once George was out of Violet’s arms and back in the safety of Aunty Doll’s, he would soon nod off, despite the sounds of the air raid.
Thunderous applause for Gloria brought Nancy out of her reverie and she clapped enthusiastically. The audience loved Gloria, it was obvious, and by the appreciative look on Giles’s face, he did too. Standing now, the audience whistled and cheered as Gloria accepted the ovation with simulated modesty. Nancy could see she had it down to a fine art, but there was no getting away from the fact that Gloria was highly talented.
‘She is rather special, isn’t she?’ Giles said, holding a huge cigar between his teeth and clapping enthusiastically.
‘She could be as famous as Anne Shelton if this agent signs her up!’ Nancy said proudly as Gloria quickly made her way to Giles, accepting the salutations and acknowledging the hugs with a glowing smile honed by considerable practice in the dressing-table mirror.