Izzy's War

by Isla Dewar

  And the band played, roaring out songs of the day. The dance floor was a mass of swirling legs, girls being tossed in the air, slung between their partner’s legs – a vibrant show of stocking tops and knickers.

  Izzy wasn’t up for any of that, but she did enjoy jiving. Here was a dance she could do. Waltzing and other dances bemused her. She’d find herself face-to-face with someone she barely knew, forced to chat but unable to think of anything to say. She’d be gripped tightly and whirled about. She’d drift off into a daydream, forget her partner was leading and stand on his toes. But jiving was just jumping about to music, and she loved it. Every now and then a pair of jiving masters took the centre of the floor and performed acrobatic dancing feats. Izzy and Jimmy stood back and cheered them on.

  Towards the end of the evening, after they’d been dancing for a couple of hours, he asked if she wanted to step outside. ‘Cool off a little.’ The band was blasting ‘Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy’. He had to shout.

  Izzy nodded.

  They squeezed their way to the door, past airmen in wheelchairs, on crutches, bandaged, almost immobile, who couldn’t make it to the dance floor. Jimmy knew all their names.

  The night was soft. Under a slip of a moon, couples smooched. He took Izzy’s hand and led her across the grass. ‘You’re awfully quiet. Don’t you like dancing?’

  She told him she just wasn’t very good at it.

  ‘Doesn’t matter if you’re no good at it, you’re meant to have fun.’

  She said she liked jiving. ‘It’s fun.’

  He pulled her to him. ‘I think you’re happier in the air than you are on the ground. In fact, I think being on the ground scares you.’

  ‘Don’t be silly.’

  ‘I think you’re happy up there.’ He pointed to the sky. ‘You can just sit up there and be you.’

  ‘I fly because I can,’ said Izzy. ‘It’s something I can do. It’s mine. It’s the only thing I stood up to my father about. I’m not very good at anything else.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ he said. He put his lips to her ear, whispered, ‘Fucking, you’re good at that.’

  She tried to ignore this. ‘I wasn’t all that clever at school. I can’t sing. I never mastered the piano. Can’t cook. I’m not very good at dances. When I stayed at home, and there was a dance at the village hall, my dad was always there. He’d give the heaving eyebrow to all the boys who asked me up, and he always had the last dance with me and took me home. I never got the chance to be naughty.’

  Music from the dance drifted across to them. He held her close, did a little slow shuffle dance with her. ‘But you are here and your father is hundreds of miles away in Scotland, you should grab the chance to be naughty. Naughtiness is good. Lifts the spirits.’

  He was all confidence. Cocksure, Izzy’s father would have said. He wouldn’t approve of, or even like, Jimmy. This made him very appealing to her. How did people get to be like him? How did a person get the knack of jazzing through life, rushing from moment to moment, arms spread, expecting only happiness? Why did she feel she slouched, head bent, expecting rejection, apologies always on the tip of her tongue? And what did it take to join the confident people who did whatever they wanted to do? Damn it, Izzy thought, I want to be like them. She wanted to feel the joy she felt when flying down here on the ground.

  She blamed her father. He’d taught her to be humble. ‘Conceit will get you nowhere,’ he’d told her. But Jimmy wasn’t conceited. He was confident. And so were the ostentatiously voiced women she worked with. And there was nothing wrong with that. ‘The meek will inherit the earth,’ Hamish often said. Izzy was beginning to doubt that. She rather agreed with Elspeth, who’d declared that if ever the earth was up for inheriting, the meek would get trampled in the rush. She had never mentioned this to Hamish.

  Recently, she’d been worried about him. His sermon about there being tears in German homes, too, hadn’t gone down well. He’d been sure that the rumblings about his being a German sympathiser would go away, but they hadn’t. In fact, Izzy’s mother had written in her last letter that they’d got worse.

  Jimmy stroked Izzy’s face. ‘Next time you come, I’ll book us a B and B,’ he said.

  ‘You mean a dirty weekend?’ Izzy brightened at the thought.

  ‘If you want to put it like that, yes.’

  ‘I’d love to.’

  He kissed her. ‘There, it’s a deal.’

  They were well into their second kiss when Claire found them. ‘I’ve been searching everywhere.’ She said she wanted to go home. ‘I’ve had enough of jiving and Coca-Cola.’

  On the drive back to her parents’ house, Claire said she needed to catch an earlier train than they’d originally planned. ‘I’ve things I have to do.’ She wanted to see Simon.

  Izzy said, ‘OK.’ She told Jimmy she’d get another two days off in thirteen days’ time. ‘Thirteen days on, two days off.’

  Jimmy said he could come over and see her before that. He had a bit of time off coming up. ‘OK, Pork Chops?’

  ‘Pork Chops?’ said Claire.

  ‘My nickname,’ said Izzy.

  ‘She deserves it,’ said Jimmy. ‘She can out-eat me. She sure has a capacity for pork chops.’

  Claire snorted. Izzy thought, Damn. Now Claire would tell everybody at the base and they’d all call her that. She didn’t think Pork Chops a suitable name for a woman about to jazz through life, rushing, arms spread, towards happiness.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The Orange

  ‘MOON.’ DUNCAN BOWMAN stood at the door of his hut, hands on hips, cap shoved back. ‘I’ll see you in my office.’

  It was after six. All the girls were in the dining shed; Elspeth could hear the clatter of dishes and the waves of chatter and laughter and longed to join them. She was hungry.

  She was always late for meals. She had to feed and water her horse before she fed herself. She had rinsed her hands in the water trough and was drying them by wiping them on her dungarees as she walked. The ground, once a quagmire, was baked hard. It hadn’t rained for weeks.

  ‘Won’t take a minute,’ Duncan said. He noticed her long sad glance towards the dining hut.

  ‘It’s lovely and cool in here,’ she said. Her skin stung from a day in the sun. She sat on the dubiously shaky wooden chair across from his desk.

  ‘You’re doing fine with the horse,’ said Duncan.

  She nodded, a little disappointed to find he was pleased with her. Her hopes of getting sacked were fading.

  ‘So,’ Duncan went on, ‘I’m going to increase your quota. Sixty logs.’

  ‘A day?’ said Elspeth. ‘I have to take sixty logs a day to be loaded on the lorry?’

  ‘That’s what I said.’

  ‘That means I have to run back and forwards one hundred and twenty times a day.’

  ‘You’re young and fit. There are quotas to meet and there’s a war on. Though, from the way you young lasses behave, nobody would know it.’

  She said nothing. Shifted in her seat, a little guilty at this remark.

  ‘There’s goings-on in the woods.’

  ‘Well,’ said Elspeth. ‘People have to amuse themselves somehow. There’s not a lot to do out here.’

  ‘And there’s miles and miles of forest to get up to what you’re calling not a lot to do.’

  Elspeth sniffed and studied her fingers.

  ‘It needs to stop. I’m not having any of you girls getting in the family way. I’d need to send them home and there might be no replacements. I’m putting you in charge of that.’

  ‘In charge of stopping girls getting pregnant? You want me to give contraceptive advice?’

  ‘Don’t be stupid.’

  ‘Do I get a whistle?’ asked Elspeth. ‘I can walk about blasting at people I see getting into mischief.’

  He ignored this. ‘You need you arrange some entertainment. Play your accordion. Do something to stop people wandering off and . . . you know . . . getting up to things they shoul
dn’t be getting up to.’ He waved her away. ‘That’s it. New quota and arrange something to take people’s minds off –’ he searched for a word ‘– things.’

  She rose, said she’d see what she could do.

  As she was leaving, he said, ‘Oh, and I’ve got something for you.’ He opened a drawer in his desk, peered inside.

  Please don’t let it be a whistle, Elspeth prayed.

  Duncan brought out an envelope and an orange, slapped them on the desk. ‘There. A letter for you. And that, it’s an orange.’

  Elspeth, never one to hide her feelings, swooned. ‘An orange. An actual orange. I haven’t had one for years. Where did you get it?’

  ‘I get things from time to time.’

  ‘But an orange,’ said Elspeth. ‘They’re awfully good for you. Are you sure you don’t want it for yourself?’

  ‘Can’t be doing with fruit,’ said Duncan. ‘It’s not proper food.’ He waved her out, a long sweep of his arm, gesturing towards the door. ‘Away you go and have your tea. And remember, sixty logs tomorrow.’

  Elspeth slid into her seat beside Lorna at the table. ‘Guess what.’

  ‘What?’ said Lorna.

  Elspeth started to eat her Spam, potatoes and carrots. ‘I’m starved.’

  ‘Just as well, or you wouldn’t eat this stuff,’ said Lorna.

  ‘Actually, I’m getting a taste for Spam. I quite like it.’

  Lorna said, ‘Good. Now, what am I to guess?’

  Elspeth turned to her, eyes agleam. ‘Guess what Duncan Bowman gave me. You never will.’

  ‘A kick in the bum,’ said Lorna.

  ‘No.’ Elspeth shook her head, looked solemn. She took a slice of bread, folded it over, put a slice of Spam in the middle and bit into the sandwich, eyes shut. ‘So starved.’

  ‘A puppy,’ said Lorna.

  Elspeth shook her head. ‘Don’t be silly.’

  ‘An engagement ring, a kiss, a bottle of gin, a bunch of red roses, a whistle, a quick look at his . . .’

  ‘Stop,’ said Elspeth. ‘You’re getting rude.’ She leaned over, whispered in Lorna’s ear. ‘An orange.’

  ‘Really, a real one?’

  Elspeth nodded, a furiously eager bobbing of her head. ‘An actual orange.’ She gripped Lorna’s arm. ‘We’ll sneak away and eat it after supper.’

  Tricia, sitting across from them, suspicious at their fervent whispering, asked what was going on.

  ‘Nothing.’ Elspeth’s voice went up an octave. She never could tell a lie.

  ‘It’s Duncan,’ said Lorna. ‘He’s given Elspeth –’ She stopped, leaned down to rub her ankle where Elspeth had just kicked it.

  ‘He’s given me a new quota,’ said Elspeth. ‘And he wants me to organise a concert or some sort of entertainment.’

  ‘Why?’ said Tricia.

  ‘To stop you all slipping into the woods and having hanky-panky.’

  The girls round the table, who’d been listening, gave a loud whoop. ‘Oooh, hanky-panky.’

  Elspeth put a firm palm on the table. ‘It has got to stop. We’ll have a concert to take your mind off it.’

  Somebody said she’d rather slip into the woods for a bit of slap and tickle than go to a boring concert.

  Elspeth protested, ‘It won’t be boring. It will be a merry evening of music, songs, jokes and skits. Can anybody do anything?’

  Lorna said she could flare her nostrils, and gave a demonstration. Elspeth shook her head. ‘I don’t think people at the back will see that. Or people at the front, actually.’

  Tricia said she could play the William Tell overture on her head. Her boast was met by calls to prove it, and she did. She tapped on the top of her skull, and by moving her jaw, opening and closing her mouth, she made a wide-ranging variety of notes. ‘Took me ages to learn a tune,’ she said. ‘Got a real headache at times.’

  Girls round the table drummed on their heads while opening and shutting their mouths.

  ‘How did you discover you could do that?’ Elspeth asked.

  ‘Holidays at the seaside. We rented a caravan and it always rained. We’d be stuck inside with nothing to do. It was really boring. My sister could play “Land of Hope and Glory”. She’s dead now. A bomb fell on her house.’

  The tune-makers stopped, everyone sighed.

  Lorna said she was sick of this war. Everybody she knew had a relative or friend who’d died. ‘Too many people are dying. Just think, right now somebody is dying.’

  Communal gloom – everyone round the table, except Elspeth, had lost somebody. Thinking about brothers, lovers, fathers, cousins and friends was kept for private moments in bed with the blankets pulled over their heads when nobody would see them cry.

  Elspeth’s black moments came when she thought that probably some of her old friends had died, but she didn’t know for sure, she’d lost touch with them all. Her blackest moment was when she realised she had nobody to lose. Everybody she had ever loved was gone from her. Except Izzy, of course. Fingers crossed for Izzy.

  She took Lorna’s arm. ‘C’mon, let’s go for a walk before we get all maudlin.’

  They strolled up to the stables, then took the steep path that led down to the spot where Elspeth and Tyler had picnicked. The ring of stones where he had built the fire was still there. And the grass was flattened slightly in the place beneath the trees where they had lain many times since, making love.

  Lorna looked round. ‘Lovely spot. How did you find it?’

  ‘Tyler,’ said Elspeth.

  It was still warm. The river widened here, gathered into a pool that was glassily still. Nothing moved.

  ‘Is this where you and him get together?’

  Elspeth nodded.

  ‘You’ll have to be careful. You don’t want to get in the family way.’

  ‘I won’t,’ said Elspeth. ‘I take precautions.’

  ‘You do? Golly.’ Lorna thought Elspeth the most sophisticated person she’d ever met.

  ‘I have a cap. Don’t you?’

  Lorna shook her head. ‘No. How would I get one? I’m not married.’

  ‘I just went to the doctor and told him I was going to get married and didn’t want a baby yet. Of course that was some time ago. Before I came here. Long, long before I came here.’ She’d only brought it with her because she thought her cottage might be requisitioned (it would be empty, after all), then some stranger might find it. A Dutch cap was not the sort of thing a single woman was meant to own.

  ‘I just don’t let Freddie go all the way. I don’t want to get pregnant. Sent home in disgrace. God, my mother’s face if I had to tell her I was expecting.’ Lorna put her hand to her mouth, imagining the horror of her mother’s expression. ‘She’d go off her head. She’d fold her arms and glare at me and tell me I’d let her down. That’s how she brought us up, by feeding us boiled cabbage and potatoes and glaring at us if we were bad. Actually, that’s why I like it here. I’m miles and miles away from my mother. And the war, and everything.’

  ‘I like the smell,’ said Elspeth. ‘And Harry the horse. And the companionship.’ But other than that, she felt stuck. Far away beyond this forest, all sorts of things were going on, and she was missing it. She sank her hands into her pockets, felt the letter Duncan Bowman had given her. She’d read it tonight.

  She brought out the orange. She held in her cupped hands, breathed in its scent, handed it to Lorna. ‘Smell that.’

  Lorna took it, turned it over and over. ‘It’s perfect. Not all old and wrinkled and dried up.’ She held it to her nose. ‘Orangey. I’d forgotten that smell.’

  Elspeth slowly peeled it, split it in two and gave half to Lorna. They ate in silence, wiping with relish the stray streams of sticky juice that ran down their chins. It was a moment too precious for talk. They tenderly took segments to suck, eyes shut, as they drifted through memories of oranges past. Christmas oranges stuck in the toe of the stocking at the foot of the bed, a bowl of oranges on the dresser in the best room, an orange
hurriedly eaten in the school playground, sticky hands wiped on gymslipped bum as the bell rang.

  ‘This is the best orange I’ve ever had,’ said Lorna. She stroked her lips with the back of her hand. ‘I’ll remember this for the rest of my life.’

  ‘Me, too.’ Elspeth got up, walked to the bank to rinse her fingers in the river. Squatting, hands wrist deep in the water, she was tempted to jump in. It was that time of year when, this far north, twilight lingers late. It never quite got dark. The air was soft, still warm and there wasn’t a ripple of a breeze. ‘Oh, to hell with it, I’m going in.’

  Quickly, before the impulse gave way to common sense, she pulled off her clothes, tossed them into a heap beside her. Then, she sat on the bank and eased herself into the river. Shrieking, gasping as the sudden chill hit her chest, she waded into the deep holding her arms aloft. ‘Bloody hell, it’s freezing.’

  When she was finally out of her depth, she took off swimming. Head held above the surface, she moved out to the middle of the pool, turned and called on Lorna to join her. ‘It’s lovely.’

  Lorna was shocked. ‘I can’t come in. I haven’t got a swimming costume.’

  ‘Neither have I,’ shouted Elspeth.

  Their voices, shrill in the quiet of the forest, ricocheted round the small clearing, rose up, seemed to bounce off the trees and sounded a lot louder than they actually were.

  ‘I know!’ Lorna shouted back. ‘You’re naked.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with naked,’ said Elspeth. ‘Skinny-dipping in the evening in a cool clear pool is a splendid thing to do.’ She could see Lorna was tempted.

  ‘I can’t get naked,’ said Lorna. ‘Nobody’s ever seen me without my clothes.’

  ‘What? Nobody?’ Elspeth laughed.