by Jenny Holmes
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
‘All credit to Mr Churchill,’ Jean declared as she and Mary set off briskly on Sunday morning to walk around the reservoir. Their friendship was developing nicely, each gravitating towards the other once they realized how much they had in common. They were warmly dressed in thick socks, scarves, berets and jumpers and had set off straight after breakfast at Jean’s suggestion. ‘I hear on the wireless that he’s pressing for General Chiang to sign up to fight against the Japs.’
Mary too had listened to the report. ‘The prime minister and Mr Roosevelt will manage it between them,’ she agreed. ‘We’re due some good news in amongst our ships being sunk off Brittany and what with the dockers deciding to go on strike.’
Jean was determined to look at the positives. ‘We’ve got the Italians with us now, don’t forget. And I’m sure we’re building up to something very big – if not this year, then next. Douglas and Hilary say we’re likely to be busier than ever, coming up to Christmas.’
Mary didn’t see how she and her fellow ATA pilots could work any harder. She herself had moved three planes out of Rixley in a single day – short hops admittedly but they’d left her hardly knowing whether she was coming or going. On each occasion she’d again impressed the ground crews at the airfields where she’d landed and her confidence was soaring. She’d even thought of volunteering to work today if Douglas needed her but Stan had wagged his finger and advised Mary to take a day off while she had the chance. ‘No one will thank you for spreading yourself too thin,’ he’d told her. ‘It’s Sunday tomorrow; have a lie-in, write a few letters and do a spot of ironing …’
Mary had laughed and told him that she’d rather be behind the controls of an aircraft any day. But she’d taken his advice and now here she was, striding out with Jean, with the grey, glassy reservoir stretching before them. Ducks flew low and landed on the water with a splash, while leaves fell and mud squelched underfoot.
‘Talking of First Officer Douglas Thornton … I didn’t know what to make of him for long enough,’ Mary admitted as they reached a fork in the footpath. The water was to their right and to their left there was an ancient, ivy-covered manor house – apparently still lived in to judge by a goat tethered to a post in the overgrown front garden and by three or four red hens pecking at the gravel by a side door. ‘I considered him stand-offish.’
‘Douglas?’ Jean’s face coloured up and she blustered her way through. ‘Oh, he’s fine once you get to know him.’
Mary reacted to Jean’s blushes. ‘Oh, crikey! Did I put my foot in it?’ Choosing the path close to the water’s edge, she forged ahead.
‘Not at all. And yes, Douglas is a good friend, in case you were wondering.’ Jean followed in single file, looking out across the reservoir to the hills beyond and discovering the freedom to be frank with Mary. ‘More than a good friend, as a matter of fact.’
‘You don’t say?’ Mary stopped and turned, causing Jean to almost bump into her.
‘Yes; what’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing. Nothing at all.’ A smile creased Mary’s smooth features. Jean and Douglas made a fine if unexpected couple. But then she spared a thought for poor, lovelorn Stan and her face grew more serious. ‘I’m happy for you,’ she said with an effort. ‘Does anyone else know?’
‘I don’t think so. I wasn’t sure myself until Friday. You’re the first person I’ve told.’
‘Ah, then I’m honoured.’ Mary turned and walked on, swishing through wet ferns to either side of the narrow path. After a while she spoke again. ‘Jean, do you mind if I ask your advice?’
‘Fire away. But if it’s about revs per minute and maximum altitudes, I doubt that you need any. I’m sure you know as much as I do about engines and so forth.’
‘It’s about Cameron.’ Mary walked steadily on. The wind off the water and the spiralling leaves gave her a similar willingness to share confidences. ‘I don’t know why but he’s taken me under his wing.’
Jean suppressed a smile. ‘Yes, I had noticed, along with everyone else at the Grange.’
It was Mary’s turn to blush. ‘We’re chalk and cheese, though.’
‘In what way?’
‘Our families and such like.’
‘That’s true.’ Though Jean didn’t know much about Mary’s background, she’d assumed that there hadn’t been a penny to spare when she’d been growing up.
‘I’m not ashamed of where I come from,’ Mary insisted untruthfully. ‘But the thing is, Cameron wouldn’t have a clue about what my life was like.’ She thought of the shared privy in the back courtyard, the sound of clogs traipsing down the street at seven in the morning, of her father coming home drunk from the pub.
‘Does it matter?’ Jean got straight to the point. ‘Cameron is no snob, I can guarantee.’
Mary slowed down to clamber over a fallen tree. ‘It’s caught me by surprise, that’s all. I’m wondering what to do about it.’
‘Do you have to do anything, if Cameron has been making the running?’
‘That’s true,’ Mary said slowly. Evening drinks with fellow officers at the Grange had ended in moonlit walks – just the two of them. Professional exchanges about flying routes had led to arrangements to meet whenever possible – for a snatched cup of tea in the canteen or when Cameron had gone out of his way to pick Mary up from a destination ferry pool. ‘You don’t have to put yourself out,’ Mary had protested. ‘I can easily get the train back.’ ‘I don’t have to but I want to,’ Cameron had insisted. Events were moving swiftly and Mary felt swept along.
‘But I hope I’m not giving him the wrong impression,’ she said now.
‘In what way?’ Jean was quick to compare Mary’s situation with her own. ‘No, no need to explain; I think I know what you mean. But honestly, you don’t strike me as the type to play games.’
‘Thank you.’ Mary felt reassured. ‘I do like Cameron, but it’s early days and I’m not sure where it’s leading – or where I want it to go.’
‘Then tell him that.’ Jean swung one leg over the fallen tree and sat astride it. ‘Say exactly what you’ve said to me. He’ll understand.’
‘It won’t put him off?’
‘I doubt it.’ Jean slung the other leg over the smooth grey trunk. ‘I’ve seen the way he looks at you, Mary. Cameron is smitten, believe you me.’
‘Look who it isn’t!’ Teddy ran down the steps into the stable yard to intercept Angela and Bobbie. ‘Where are you two girls off to this fine morning?’
Instinctively Angela stepped between him and Bobbie. Her face gave nothing away as she answered him. ‘We fancied a breath of fresh air, didn’t we, Bobbie? How about you? Are you going for a spin?’
‘Sadly, no. Hilary collared me over breakfast. He wants me to check through some paperwork with him, worse luck.’ Teddy’s words gave the smug impression that he’d become indispensable to Rixley’s commanding officer. He side-stepped Angela and stood face to face with Bobbie. ‘Hello there. It’s good to see you out and about at long last.’
She blinked and took a step back.
‘I’ve been worried about you,’ Teddy insisted as he took in Bobbie’s waiflike appearance. Despite several layers of thick woollen clothing, it looked as if the slightest breeze would blow her clean away. ‘We all have: me, Hilary, Douglas – everyone’s wondering how soon you’ll be able to report for duty; not too long now, by the look of things.’
Bobbie summoned the presence of mind to return his gaze. Here he was, smiling at her, standing hands in pockets, pretending he cared. ‘I’ve asked Douglas to put me back on tomorrow’s rota,’ she said with a nervous frown.
‘Champion. And I hope that means we’ll see more of you in the evenings in the weeks to come. Life has been dull without you.’
Bobbie threw Angela a panicky look.
‘Give the girl a chance.’ Giving Bobbie a quick, meaningful glance, Angela shouldered her way between them again. ‘Anyway, consider my feelings well and trul
y hurt, Flight Lieutenant Simpson.’
He responded with a careless laugh. ‘Why? What did I say?’
What did the look mean? Bobbie wondered. Why was Angela flirting with Teddy in spite of Bobbie’s revelation?
Angela would explain later. Meanwhile, she went ahead with the charade. ‘That life has been dull without Bobbie. I’ve been trying my very best to keep you entertained, and all the while you were secretly pining away.’
Raising his hands in surrender and grinning, Teddy backed away. ‘Ladies, please; no squabbling over me.’
‘Don’t flatter yourself.’ With an arch look and a sudden switch of mood, Angela whirled Bobbie away, linking arms and guiding her out under the clock tower. ‘Hush,’ she whispered. ‘Don’t look back. Let Teddy Simpson draw whatever conclusion he wishes.’
By coincidence, Bobbie and Angela’s planned route took them in Mary and Jean’s footsteps around the reservoir. They walked slowly between the bare trees, stopping for Bobbie to catch her breath by the rusty iron gate that led to the crumbling manor house. From here they gazed out over the flat expanse of water towards a long, straight dam at the far side.
‘Let’s hope Jerry never scores a direct hit on yonder dam,’ Angela remarked. Despite her light-hearted manner, war was seldom far from her thoughts, however peaceful the scene. Feeling a sudden, hard shove against her back, she turned in alarm to see a black goat with curved horns and green eyes peering over the garden wall and thrusting its nose at her. The creature had apparently broken free from its tether and was preparing to cause mayhem. ‘Oh, no you don’t!’ she cried as it gripped one corner of her red silk scarf between its teeth. She tugged hard but the goat refused to yield.
‘Satan, let go!’ An old woman came out of the door and hobbled towards them, stout walking stick in hand. She thwacked the stick against the goat’s bony hind quarters, which only served to infuriate it and make it tighten its grip.
Bobbie flashed a look of astonishment at Angela. The old woman could have stepped straight out of Hansel and Gretel, with her hooked nose and hunched shoulders, wispy white hair and long, checked skirt. A second thwack missed its mark and the stick whistled close to Angela’s ear.
Time to beat a hasty retreat. In danger of being strangled, Angela loosened the scarf from around her neck and watched Satan bound off across the garden with it in its mouth. ‘That scarf came from Harrods,’ she complained.
‘The goat doesn’t care where you bought it,’ the old woman observed phlegmatically, ‘as long as it tastes good.’
Which it obviously did. Angela and Bobbie watched the goat drop the scarf to the ground then gobble it up.
‘Is its name really Satan?’ Bobbie’s eyes were wide.
‘Aye – devil by name, devil by nature.’ Resting on her stick, the goat’s owner wondered aloud how she would recapture the miscreant. ‘I’ll never catch him by myself.’
‘Why not let us …?’ Bobbie began.
‘Absolutely not!’ Angela hissed from behind her hand.
‘It’ll have to wait until Jeremiah gets home.’ Unbothered by the prospect, the old woman shuffled off towards the door through which she’d emerged.
‘Jeremiah?’ Bobbie’s jaw dropped. ‘What mother would name her baby after the weeping prophet from the Old Testament?’
‘Yes; I expect this one’s a bundle of joy, too.’ Angela chuckled then shivered as she set off along the path through the wood. ‘Brrr; I’m feeling a wee bit chilly.’
Are you feeling chilly? Totally without warning Teddy’s voice filled Bobbie’s head and the dread came rushing back. Chilly.
There’s a stove in the corner, he’d said. The room had been dark, cold and empty, with furniture stacked to one side. There had been stone steps leading up to it and skylights in the roof.
‘Angela,’ Bobbie whispered.
‘What is it?’ Angela turned to wait.
‘I’ve remembered where Teddy and I were when it happened.’
Mary and Jean had followed the footpath across the top of the dam and were completing their circuit of the reservoir when they came across Angela and Bobbie.
Bobbie was sitting on the ground with her head in her hands while Angela crouched beside her.
Jean was the first to react. ‘What’s happened?’ she asked as she ran towards them. ‘Did Bobbie fall?’
Angela put up a warning hand. ‘No, no. Stand back; she’ll be all right in a minute or two.’
Seconds later Mary arrived to hear Bobbie sobbing her heart out.
‘She’s all right,’ Angela insisted for a second time.
Mary refused to be fobbed off. ‘Why is Bobbie crying?’
‘It’s private, darling. Please don’t make a fuss.’
Ignoring Angela, Mary squatted down and put her arm around Bobbie’s heaving shoulders. ‘Carry on,’ she encouraged softly. ‘Don’t mind us.’
Recognizing Mary’s voice, Bobbie rested her weight against her. Shafts of light filtered between her fingers. Darkness slowly lifted. Are you feeling chilly? Teddy had lit a fire and dragged a mattress across the room. Bobbie had sunk to her knees.
As Bobbie remembered more details, Jean led Angela to a safe distance. ‘What’s going on? Who’s upset her?’ she demanded.
‘I promised not to say.’ Through Bobbie’s sobs, before Jean and Mary had turned up, Angela had learned some vital new facts. The assault had happened in the grooms’ quarters above the stables. Teddy had used force. The haunted look on Bobbie’s face as she’d revealed these things would stay with Angela for a long time.
‘I understand.’ Jean knew not to press for more and turned her attention to the practical problem of getting Bobbie safely home. ‘She’s not injured?’
‘No, but I doubt that she has the energy to walk.’
‘Then we’ll carry her,’ Jean decided. But then again; the old house was nearby. Perhaps they could ask there for help.
Angela guessed by the direction of Jean’s gaze what she was thinking and shook her head. ‘We’ll wait a while,’ she insisted. ‘There are only so many tears a girl can cry.’
Kneeling beside Bobbie and hugging her tight, Mary thought back to last Sunday morning when Bobbie had materialized at the edge of Burton Wood in only her petticoat. No one knew what had led to this; all they knew was that Bobbie had been in a daze and had to be given clothes and taken back to the Grange. Mary remembered standing at the bathroom door and hearing Bobbie cry, scrub and cry, scrub again. ‘Hush,’ she said now. ‘We’re all here. No one’s going to hurt you.’
‘I can’t break my promise.’ Angela’s voice was strained as she and Jean continued to talk in rapid whispers. Anger against Teddy surged through her veins. ‘But Bobbie has told me all I need to know and I swear the person responsible will not get away with this.’
‘Hush.’ Mary rocked Bobbie backwards and forwards. ‘You’re safe now.’
The darkness lifted and Bobbie saw once again Teddy’s face, heard his voice, tasted his whisky, felt herself trying to push him away. She looked up at Mary through her tears. ‘Safe?’
‘Yes. Tell me all about it if you can.’
Bobbie lowered her head and hid her face behind her hands. ‘I thought I’d dreamed it but I hadn’t. It was real and it was partly my fault.’
‘How could it be?’ Mary pictured Bobbie standing in her underthings at the edge of the wood, her face as pale as death, with not a clue as to how she’d got there.
‘I let myself down, I did things … He said I let him.’
‘Men say that.’ Take Frank, Mary’s black-sheep brother; that was exactly what he’d said about fifteen-year-old Molly Carson: ‘She let me. She wanted to.’ ‘Where are your witnesses?’ the constable had asked Molly’s father when he’d stormed to the police station to accuse his feckless, ne’er-do-well neighbour. No witness, so no trial before a jury, the constable had said. But the next day Arthur Carson and his two sons had cornered Frank in a dark alleyway and thrashed him. They’d war
ned him never to show his face in the town again. It was rough justice, but justice nevertheless. ‘Who are we talking about?’ she asked Bobbie. ‘Who’s “he”?’
‘This is Teddy Simpson’s fault!’ Jean spoke angrily and broke away from Angela. She saw it all in an instant: how Teddy had romanced Bobbie by whirling her around the dance floor in Northgate then sitting with her in the back seat of Douglas’s car, how he’d whisked her off from the stable yard for a moonlit walk in Burton Wood. ‘Bobbie, why didn’t you say something?’
Angela hurried after Jean and pulled her away. ‘It’s worse than you think,’ she began to explain. ‘Teddy plied her with drink.’
Mary helped Bobbie to her feet. ‘Teddy said you let him but that’s not true,’ she continued softly. ‘He never gave you any choice.’
Jean looked in alarm at Angela. The word for what Teddy had done to Bobbie stuck in her throat and almost made her choke. ‘He forced himself on her?’
Angela nodded in acknowledgement. ‘I’m afraid that’s right.’
‘This is not your fault.’ Mary spelt it out slowly for Bobbie. ‘You didn’t imagine it. Teddy planned to do it all along.’
‘He got you drunk on purpose,’ Angela added. ‘My poor dear girl; do you understand?’
Bobbie struggled to breathe. She tilted her head and stared up through the branches of the beech trees, saw black rooks sail across white clouds. On the morning after, she’d come to her senses and found herself alone and without her clothes. Teddy had vanished. The last thing she’d been aware of before she’d passed out the night before had been his weight on her, pressing her down and the word ‘no’ on her lips. ‘I had to run away,’ she whispered.
Mary, Angela and Jean gathered round to shield her from the wind. There were more tears, friends’ hands holding her up, soft words spoken.
‘I didn’t know what else to do so I ran away,’ Bobbie repeated. ‘I was scared that Teddy would come back and find me – that’s why.’
Douglas waited until all the chits were issued before he called in a favour from Harold Inman, an old friend currently working as a consultant at the King Edward Hospital in Highcliff. ‘Can the test be arranged on the q.t.?’ he asked over the phone. ‘Wednesday afternoon, you say? Thank you, old son; I’m much obliged.’ Douglas carefully replaced the receiver in its cradle.