by Isla Dewar
They walked back down the garden. Hamish kept his arm round Izzy. ‘A good thing. A very good thing. You made Allan happy. I’m proud of you.’
Izzy thought how odd it was that you were sure you knew all about someone close, then found out you didn’t.
Chapter Eight
Christmas and a Brief Lesson in Line Shooting
ON THE DAYS leading up to Christmas, the weather was foul. First there had been choking hail-laden gales battering in from the sea, hammering the airbase, then the fog came down. Izzy said that if ever she were to lose control and step outside to shout at the weather, it would be fog that brought on the outburst. It was stubborn weather – damp, thick, yellow, silent, shrouding everything, hiding the sky.
The pilots were grounded. Edith was exasperated, fifty planes waiting to be moved and nothing to be done about it till the air cleared. She phoned other bases to see what the weather was doing there. Foggy. She bustled to the met room to ask if there was any sign of it lifting. No. She tutted and went back to the ops room.
In the mess, pilots read the scant newspapers of the day, played cards or backgammon, drank tea, sewed. Dolores stood on her head, ankles propped against the wall. This, she claimed, was good for the brain. And she’d be needing that as soon as the fog cleared. There would be a large backlog of planes to be shifted. Julia filled in her logbook. Diane knitted.
Izzy wrote to Elspeth and to her parents. From time to time, she’d lean back, listening to the squall of voices nearby. Full, rich, rounded words surrounded her. Women saying things she couldn’t. She found it impossible to call a plane a ‘darling thing’ or a ‘sweetie’. But she envied those women whose enthusiasm didn’t just pour from their lips, it oozed from their whole bodies. They keened forwards laughing as they spoke. ‘Darling, that Hurricane was such a sweetheart.’ Izzy knew if she said such a thing at home, there would be mockery – her father would burst out laughing. But then, perhaps he wouldn’t. He was turning out to be surprising.
Sometimes, hearing someone trilling about a plane or an adventure in the sky, Izzy would wince. At such moments, Diane would often stop knitting, reach over and touch her hand. ‘It’s only how they talk. Doesn’t mean they’re not the same as you.’ Often, Izzy would walk to the window, stare out, sigh and rest her forehead on the pane. ‘Yes, Izzy,’ Diane would say, ‘banging your head on the window and sighing is a well-known way of changing the weather.’
Often, as the morning wore on, things got rowdy. There would be challenges. Who could lift a chair by one leg, hold it aloft and carry it across the room. Who could make it from one side of the mess to the other without putting their feet on the floor. When that happened, Edith would bustle to the CO’s office, and tell him that the troops were getting boisterous. ‘Tears before bedtime, I fear.’
Carlton Willoughby would look at his watch, then out at the weather and say, ‘Send them home. No flying today.’
Edith would busy back to the mess, stick her head round the door. ‘It’s a washout, folks. You can all go home.’
On Christmas Eve, Julia left to spend time with friends in London. Claire went to her parents’ house outside York, taking with her a turkey she’d bought from Mrs Brent. Izzy was working.
Christmas turned out to be a good day. The fog lifted. It was still bitterly cold with a strong wind shoving out from the sea. There was a heartiness in the air, everyone shouting, ‘Merry Christmas!’ Cook had baked scones, and, for those who were around at lunchtime, there was turkey. The mess was decked with boughs of holly. Long colourful paper streamers hung criss-cross from one end of the ceiling to the other. A tree from the woods behind the base had been dug up, brought in and decorated. A carol service played on the wireless.
Izzy and Diane were given Spitfires to take to Marriat Hall – a huge country house in North Yorkshire that had been taken over by the MOD as a storage unit. Its lawns, once lush, were cluttered with planes waiting to be moved on. Giant gaps had been cut in the hedges to make a runway.
‘Good-oh,’ said Diane. ‘I love Marriat Hall. Used to go to parties there, and they had a jolly good hunt once upon a time. C’mon, Izzy, tally-ho.’
Twenty minutes later, they were in their planes ready to taxi. Dolores was first up to the runway, Harry Norton straddling the tail of her Spitfire to keep it steady in the crosswind. It was probably the excitement of being on the go after days of sitting about watching the weather that made Dolores forget Harry was there. She didn’t pause at the end of the runway to allow him to jump off. Instead, she speeded up, rushed along, preparing to take to the sky.
From her vantage point in the queue, Izzy couldn’t see Harry’s face, only his body hanging on and his fists flailing against the side on the plane. There were half a dozen ground engineers running up the runway, shouting. Sensing something was wrong – the tail felt heavy – Dolores braked. Harry jumped off. Izzy couldn’t hear what was said, but she could see it. Harry standing shaking a furious fist, foul language pouring from his lips, and Dolores peering down at him, looking slightly, but only slightly, sorry.
The flight was over frosted fields, country roads and hills. The world below seemed empty, though, now and then, Izzy saw a car wending along winding roads. People off to visit relatives, Izzy thought. Once, she saw a church and, outside, a milling group of people. This was the first time in her life she hadn’t gone to church on Christmas Day.
She looked at her watch, twelve o’clock. Back home, the service would be over. The congregation would have sung ‘Hark the Herald Angels Sing’, her father’s favourite hymn. Soon, everyone would be off home for their festive lunch – mock goose or mock turkey, whatever that was. Izzy didn’t know.
And there wouldn’t be many Christmas puddings. Suzie, at the local shop, had told Izzy she had five hundred registered ration customers and only two Christmas puddings for sale. Izzy didn’t care. She hated Christmas pudding.
Marriat Hall was hard to find. It was tucked behind a small copse and covered with camouflage nets. But Izzy could see Diane in her cockpit give a thumbs-up. Time to land.
From her place in the sky, it was clear to Izzy that Diane was having the time of her life. She had bumped down, a small bounce, and was now whooshing over the grass airstrip through the hedges. It was a gallop.
Izzy followed, opened the canopy, checked her brake pressure, flaps down, the plane pitched a little, nose down. Still, she had to tilt her head to the side to see the ground. Then she was speeding forwards, through the hedges – grinning.
They taxied to the delivery bay. Then climbed out and went to find someone to sign their delivery chits.
Diane was pink-cheeked. ‘Wasn’t that splendid? Makes you long to go back up and do it all again.’
An elderly man, part of the Home Guard, signed their chits, then took them to a room at the front of the house where they could watch for the taxi plane that would pick them up and take them back to base. He brought them each a mug of tea. ‘Fresh leaves for the ladies,’ he said with a wink. ‘Merry Christmas.’
‘Look at this place,’ said Diane. ‘This used to be a beautiful house.’ She waved her arm at the mess. ‘Chipped paint, posters everywhere. When this war is over, I doubt anyone is going to be able to put everything back the way it was.’ She sighed and stared out of the window. ‘It’s all terribly sad.’ She took out her knitting, settled back and started work. ‘So, what did you make of Dolores’ little faux pas?’
Izzy shrugged. ‘She forgot Harry was there.’
‘Well, that’s obvious. But what d’you think she’ll make of it? What line will she shoot?’
Izzy shrugged again.
‘Will she say she had an instinct something was wrong? Or will she overplay the thing and say she took off with him aboard, felt the tail heavy and came back down again and Harry might be given a dressing down for taking an unofficial flight?’
Izzy chose the unofficial flight. Diane shook her head. ‘I think the instinct. Care for a wager? Two shilling
s?’
‘OK.’
They shook on it.
‘Izzy,’ said Diane, ‘you must learn to line shoot. I’ve noticed you don’t do it. But it goes with the job, relieves the tension.’
‘It’s telling lies,’ said Izzy. Though, who was she to disapprove of such a thing? She was the queen of liars.
‘It’s embellishing the truth. It’s verbal bravado. After all, it isn’t death everyone fears, it’s that moment when you know you’re going to die that brings you out in a sweat. When you’ve mucked up, made a stupid mistake and are about to get bumped off, that’s what we all dread. So, when that happens and we somehow don’t die, we shoot a line or two. You should try it. It makes you feel braver, relieves the tension. It’s fun to swagger a little now and then. You should take it up.’
Izzy said that she’d been brought up to think telling lies and swaggering were wrong. ‘Not that I haven’t told the odd lie. I just can’t help thinking I’ll get my comeuppance for doing it.’
Diane, knitting furiously, said, ‘Nonsense. Embellishing the truth and swaggering are good for the soul. I urge you to take them both up and abandon all religious nonsense that shuts you off from the juicy things in life.’ She leaned forwards. ‘Sin a little, Izzy, before it’s too late.’ She looked out of the window. ‘E, F, B, C, D, A.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Izzy asked.
‘I’ve got a physical coming up and I’m revising the eye chart. I have it memorised.’ She tapped the side of her forehead.
‘Isn’t that cheating?’
‘Of course it’s cheating. How else am I to pass the eye test? I can’t see the damn chart without my specs.’ She sighed. ‘Where’s that bloody taxi?’
The Anson, when it finally arrived at half past two, was full. Marriat Hall was its last stop. There were twelve other pilots on-board, all keen to get home. Dick Wills was at the helm, smoking. Lighting up was a sacking offence, so he called his cigarettes ‘instant dismissals’. ‘Time for another instant dismissal, folks. What about a singsong, a few carols?’
They started with ‘Oh Come All Ye Faithful’, and were swaying from side to side, belting out a hearty ‘Ding Dong Merrily on High’, ‘Glo-ooo-ooo-ooo-ria . . .’, pink-cheeked and giddy with song, when they landed at Skimpton. In the van taking them from the end of the runway back to the base, Dolores said, ‘Did you see that guy hanging on to my tail? He didn’t jump off. Something told me something was wrong. An instinct. Pilot’s instinct. Born with it, I guess.’
Diane nudged Izzy. ‘Two shillings.’
Dolores asked Izzy what she was up to now. ‘Going home to a huge meal?’
Izzy shook her head. ‘There’s nobody but me at the cottage at the moment. I’ll have whatever I can find and a cup of tea.’
‘You could come eat with Alfie and me if you want. We’re having duck.’
Izzy declined. It was rumoured that Dolores had stopped living in the flat above the garage at Hiddlington Hall and moved into Lord Alfred’s bed. Not that Izzy cared about that. And she thought Julia’s tales about the pair of them chasing one another up and down the mansion’s long corridors, Alfie wielding a riding crop, Dolores dressed in little more than a riding jacket, hat and black stockings, were just a flight of Julia’s fanciful imagination. No, it was the way Dolores said Alfie that made Izzy turn down the invitation.
‘Alfie,’ she’d said, deepening her voice, keeping the name in her mouth for as long as possible, as if it were the most beautiful word in the world. Tempting as a plate of roast duck was, Izzy guessed that, on this most special of nights, she’d be playing gooseberry.
Besides, she was tired. She had her evening planned out – a bath, then she’d eat, open the parcel her mother had sent, listen to the wireless and go to bed early. She was looking forward to it.
She cycled home. The evening was bitter and turning indigo, darkness falling, early stars glimmering – it looked like Christmas. At home, her mother and father would have eaten – roast chicken, if they could get it, and pudding, heavy with dried fruit her mother would have saved from her rations. They’d have opened the parcel Izzy had sent – tins of pears, salmon and condensed milk, cologne, soap, tobacco, a dressing gown and pyjamas for her father and a silk blouse for her mother.
Now, they’d be preparing to go out to the evening service. The sermon tonight would be softer than her father’s usual scolding rant. They’d definitely sing ‘Once in Royal David’s City’, another of her father’s favourites. Izzy sang it as she swished along over the frosty road, watching the small flickering light beaming the way ahead. She was alone now, the bus had passed, and the car taking Edith and Fiona home. Dolores had thundered by on the motorbike, honking as she went. Izzy had rung her bell, and kept ringing it long after Dolores had disappeared. She was happy.
Once home, she followed her plan – a bath, food, then the present. Mrs Brent had, at some point in the afternoon, come to the cottage and left several slices of turkey, cold roast potatoes and a pot of gravy to be heated. Izzy thought this splendid. This was how Christmas ought to be, sitting in the kitchen wrapped in a comforting, if unflattering, dressing gown, eating and listening to the wireless. She opened the parcel from her mother, and found a hand-knitted navy jumper with a dark red collar and cuffs. It had been made from a couple of her father’s old jumpers, rattled down and knitted anew. Izzy could see her mother in her chair by the fire, needles clicking as she listened to the wireless. Her father would be in the chair opposite reading. The jumper smelled of home. Izzy held it to her face, breathed it in – old damp house, wood fire, lavender polish, her mother’s cologne, her father’s pipe tobacco – and felt a pang of homesickness.
She’d write a thank you note to her parents immediately, while the joy of the new jumper was still with her. She fetched her notepad and pen. It was a Parker, fat and tortoiseshell with a gold nib, a present from her mother. ‘No excuse not to write now you have this.’ It was a beloved possession.
Someone on the wireless was singing a Christmas song. She was thanking her mother for the jersey – ‘I’m wearing it now, as I write’ – which wasn’t true, but was what her mother would want to read. And someone was banging on the front door.
It was Jacob. He followed her into the kitchen, sat at the table. ‘I heard you were alone. I thought you might like some company.’
‘I’m fine,’ said Izzy. ‘I’m happy on my own.’
He told her that she wasn’t fine, couldn’t be fine. Nobody who spent Christmas on their own was fine. He’d had a wonderful time with Mrs Brent and her family.
Izzy offered him a cup of tea. ‘I’ll refresh the pot.’
He asked if she didn’t have anything stronger. ‘It’s Christmas.’
‘No,’ said Izzy. She didn’t drink much. She put the kettle on.
‘I should have brought something with me,’ he said.
Izzy shook her head. ‘Not for me, you shouldn’t.’
‘It’s Christmas. You need something stronger than tea.’
The kettle boiled. Izzy filled the teapot. Poured him a cup. ‘Tea’s fine.’
He took the cup, smiled and asked if she’d like to go to the cinema with him.
Izzy’s mother had warned her about men. Though the advice had been vague – some men weren’t very nice, some were only out for what they could get and, when they got that, they’d leave you high and dry. She never specified at the time what it was such men wanted.
Elspeth had been more worldly wise. It wasn’t just men, she’d told Izzy, there were people who were wild inside. ‘You can see it in their eyes, a certain glint. They don’t set out to hurt you, but they do. They draw you in, but when you get too close, they push you away. Some people never really look you in the eye, they look over your shoulder to see if there’s someone better just down the road. Some people are always strangers. Even if you’ve been married to them for years, they’re strangers.’
Izzy looked long and hard at Jacob. She knew she wa
s seeing someone who’d always be looking over her shoulder, checking that there wasn’t someone better just down the road. He would always be a stranger. She said no.
‘You won’t go out with me because you are a pilot and I’m just a driver.’
‘I won’t go out with you because you are married.’
‘I didn’t say I wanted to sleep with you. I just wanted your company.’
Izzy shook her head. ‘I don’t go out often. Too tired.’
‘I just want someone to talk to, someone like you who doesn’t belong.’
She asked what he meant by that.
‘You don’t talk like the other women. Don’t walk like them. You look at the ground, they stare straight ahead. When this war is over, they’ll go back to their tea parties and their balls and their big houses. You won’t. You have changed your life. It’s not that you’ve nothing to back to. It’s that you can’t go back.’
This was true. Izzy knew there was no going back for her. Her mother and father wanted her to settle down. Settle down? What did that mean, exactly? Get married, have a baby, do the washing, dust the mantelpiece, darn socks. Oh no, she didn’t think so. She worried about what would happen to her when the war ended. ‘What about you, can you go back?’
‘Going back is all I think about. It fills my life. But what to? My country in ruins. My wife, my mother, my father – are they even still alive? Who knows? And, if they are, what will they have done to stay alive? They may not be the same people. I am not the same man. Maybe one day we’ll be able to sit together and talk about little things, the weather, what will we have for supper – but I think it will be a long time before the things we’ve seen, the pictures in our heads, fade away.’ He stood up. ‘I should go.’
Izzy showed him to the door. He turned, touched her cheek. ‘Perhaps you could have a drink with me, or a walk by the river. We could chat. We could tell each other our stories, our lives, our plans.’
Izzy said, ‘Why not? We could do that.’ It seemed to her, though, that as he spoke, as he stroked her face, he was looking past her, over her shoulder into the cottage, taking it in, sizing it up.