Bluebirds

by Margaret Mayhew

  Much later, Mother had come out of her room and they had eaten their dinner in complete silence. Somehow she had forced down the haddock and the burned-tasting cabbage. As usual they had listened to the nine o’clock news on the wireless, as they sat knitting. It had sounded bad. The British Expeditionary Force was in France, German U-boats were attacking British shipping, the Russians were advancing into south-eastern Europe . . . It had seemed clearer than ever to her that she should join up, but she had not dared to raise the subject again.

  Lying in bed, she thought about Mother and tried to understand how she felt. The trouble was that Mother had never got over the fact that Father had left her. She had never forgiven or forgotten it, but allowed the wound to fester all these years and to poison her life. And she could never forget that they had once lived in a big house on the edge of Wimbledon Common, with servants. Virginia found she could scarcely remember the house now; nor much of her father. He was only a vague memory of a quiet voice and a prickly moustache and an aroma of cigarette smoke. She thought, though she could not be sure, that he had called her Ginny. She wished she knew more, but Mother hardly ever spoke of him and when she did, like this evening, it was always with a dreadful bitterness. Not only had he been cruelly unfaithful – there had been some other woman, Mother had once said, a brazen, common creature – but he had been a failure as well. The firm he had owned in the City had crashed and he had been made bankrupt. Soon after that had happened he had left them. Abandoned them when Virginia was eight years old. The big house had been sold and the servants given notice. She and Mother had moved into this dreary ground floor flat in a semi-detached house near Wimbledon Park station. She had been taken away from her private school and sent to the High School instead. When she had matriculated, the headmistress had tried to persuade her to stay on to take her Higher Certificate and go to university. She had wanted to badly but Mother had said she could not afford it and so she had left school and started work as a clerk with the Falcon Assurance Company in Holborn, travelling into town every day on the District Line from Wimbledon Park. Perhaps she ought to feel bitter about Father too. She had never found it in her heart to be so, until now.

  If Father had not deserted them, Mother would never have felt like this. She would never have become the sad and lonely person she was, and there would not have been this awful burden to carry. Mother had been right when she had called her selfish . . . she was only thinking of herself. She had said that she wanted to do something worthwhile in the war but, if she were really honest about it, the chance of getting away from the Falcon Assurance Company meant a lot too. The work was deadly dull. Sometimes she could see herself growing like Miss Parkes who had been with the company for more than thirty years and had grown as drab as the office files she sat among. She could see her own thirty or more years stretching ahead of her . . . the daily journey in on the District Line, changing at Earls Court to take the Piccadilly Line to Holborn, the hours spent in the fusty gloom of the filing department, the solitary lunch at Lyons Corner House, and then more hours with the files. Rush hour back in the crowded Underground and the District Line train rattling out to the suburbs, the walk up the hill from the station to the drab house in Alfred Road, Mother resentful in the kitchen, dinner at the table in the front room, the nine o’clock news on the wireless, the knitting or sewing or reading, and so to bed in this depressing, narrow back room . . .

  The rain was splashing down noisily on the concrete yard outside the window, where the dustbins stood. It sounded as though the gutter above was blocked again, which would mean more arguments with the landlord. Virginia lay listening to it and thinking her thoughts, until, at last, she slept.

  Two

  GETTING UP AT six didn’t worry Winnie. She was always up by that time at home on the farm and so she didn’t moan or groan like most of the other girls in the hut. Nor did she have much difficulty, like some, in stowing her bedding just the way the sergeant had shown them – the three biscuits stacked at the head of the bed, the blankets folded and put on top with one of them wrapped lengthwise round the rest to hold them together, with the join underneath. The bolster topped the pile. Sergeant Beaty had bellowed the instructions the night before, as though they were out on the big parade ground.

  ‘Folds of the blankets to the foot of the bed with the edge of the pile exactly on the edge of your biscuits . . . Are you paying attention, Potter? I’m not telling you again. You’d better get it right if you don’t want to find yourself on a charge.’

  Of course Enid had started to cry again and Winnie had had to help her make a proper job of her bedding in the morning. At breakfast she sat down beside Winnie and gave her a wan smile. Her eyelids were still red and swollen.

  ‘I don’t know how I’m going to cope, really I don’t. I wish I’d never volunteered. It’s horrible here and I miss Terry ever so much. I cried myself to sleep last night.’

  ‘Terry?’

  ‘My fiancé. I’m engaged.’ Enid held out her left hand for Winnie to see her ring. Little chips of red stones formed a flower on her fourth finger. ‘They’re real garnets, you know. It cost ten pounds, but Terry said it was worth every penny. He’s ever so generous.’

  Winnie admired the ring. She said shyly: ‘I’m engaged too.’

  Enid looked surprised. ‘Oh! Are you? Can I see your ring?’ She inspected the small turquoise stone carefully. ‘How much was yours?’

  Loyal to Ken, Winnie lied. ‘I don’t know. I’m not sure.’ She put her hand away under the table. The ring had cost less than half the price of Enid’s.

  She ate some of the lumpy porridge. It was lucky that she felt better and not sick any more or she would never have been able to manage it, or the fried bread and baked beans. The tea out of the urn tasted just as bad as before – sweet and bitter all at the same time. It made her shudder to drink it.

  Enid gave her a nudge. ‘That girl over there – the one in the blue – she’s an honourable. Did you know that?’

  ‘Is she?’ Winnie wasn’t sure what an honourable was, but the girl looked very smart in her blue costume. She was wearing a pearl necklace and some bright pink lipstick, and her fair hair had beautiful waves.

  ‘Her name is The Honourable Susan Courtney-Bennet and her father is a Lord. Someone told me. She didn’t come on the train with us. She has her very own car and she came in that. Fancy! I heard her talking to Sandra last night. She went to Buckingham Palace once and curtsied to the King and Queen. She was telling Sandra all about it.’

  Winnie stared at the girl. It seemed extraordinary to be sitting at the same table as someone who had actually met the King and Queen.

  Enid was delving into her skirt pocket. ‘Would you like to see a picture of my Terry?’

  Winnie took the snapshot gingerly between her thumb and forefinger, aware that she was handling something precious. She looked at Enid’s Terry who was dressed in some sort of sailor’s uniform with a big collar and a round hat. He was standing with his legs planted apart, as if on deck, although the picture had been taken in a garden. His hands were behind his back and he seemed to be squinting into the sun. Privately Winnie thought he wasn’t a patch on Ken, but she said politely:

  ‘He looks very nice indeed.’

  ‘Oh, he’s lovely! And such a gentleman. I’m ever so lucky.’ Enid took the snapshot away and returned it carefully to her pocket. ‘I do miss him, though. I only joined up because he’s away so much. He’s in the Royal Navy, you see. That’s his uniform he’s wearing. He’s an Able Seaman. I thought if I joined up too it’d take my mind off things . . . him being in danger at sea and that. He could be sunk any time by one of those German U-boats and he can’t swim . . .’

  Her eyes had begun to fill with tears.

  Winnie said hurriedly: ‘I’m sure he’ll be all right. You mustn’t worry.’

  Enid sniffed and dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief. ‘What does your fiancé do then?’

  ‘He works in a shop. His m
other has the village stores at home and he helps her. She’s a widow, you see.’

  ‘Oh. Well, I don’t suppose he could afford much for the ring. He’s not in the Services then?’

  ‘No, he has this asthma. They wouldn’t take him.’

  ‘Then you don’t have to worry like me.’ Enid sounded pleased.

  An aircraft went over suddenly, rattling the hut windows. Enid dropped her spoon and covered her ears. ‘They make ever such a din those things. It’s awful.’

  ‘I don’t mind it.’

  ‘Don’t you?’ Enid looked surprised again. ‘It gets on my nerves. I don’t know how I’m going to stand it, going on all the time.’

  ‘I expect you’ll get used to it.’

  ‘I’m sure I won’t. And there’s another thing . . . somebody told me we’ll all have to get our hair cut short. It’s got to be above the collar. I don’t know what I’m going to do. Terry’ll be ever so upset if I have to. He says it’s a woman’s crowning glory and he likes it long like this.’

  Winnie looked at Enid’s straight, mouse-brown hair doubtfully. It straggled wispily on her shoulders. ‘P’raps you could pin it up, or somethin’. I expect they’d let you do that.’

  ‘I don’t know how. It’s all right for you, isn’t it? You don’t have to worry about yours.’

  Winnie felt guilty about her own short, naturally curly hair. And she also felt guilty about not having a fiancé who might be sunk at any moment and who couldn’t swim. It seemed odd to her to be a sailor and not be able to swim. As odd as being in the WAAF and not liking the sound of aeroplanes. But she said nothing and started to eat her fried bread and baked beans.

  Further up the table, Susan Courtney-Bennet said to Anne: ‘I say, where were you at school?’

  ‘A place called St Mary’s.’

  ‘The St Mary’s? The one in Berkshire?’

  ‘That one. But I got chucked out.’

  ‘Heavens, how dreadful! What on earth for?’

  ‘Smoking. I got caught three times.’

  Susan blinked. ‘Well, you did rather ask for it then, didn’t you? It was awfully silly of you.’

  ‘Actually, I was glad to be out of there. I hated the place.’

  ‘But weren’t your parents frightfully upset?’

  ‘They were at first. But they got over it.’

  ‘I don’t think mine ever would. I was at Parkside. I don’t remember anyone ever being expelled from there . . . it’s a terrible disgrace, isn’t it?’ Susan picked up her knife and fork. ‘I say, this fried bread is all burned on one side. Honestly! Who on earth does their cooking?’

  ‘RAF cooks, I suppose.’

  ‘I’m Cordon Bleu trained. I expect they’ll want me to do dinners in the Officers’ Mess – banquets, all that sort of thing . . .’

  Anne somehow doubted it. Nothing so far had led her to believe that the RAF had any intention of letting them do anything other than the most boring drudgery. She wondered what dreary job she would be given, and wished she’d joined the ATS, like Kit had suggested. When she had tagged onto the end of the long queue of volunteers in the street, she had thought it was for the Army. It was only when she reached the top and was interviewed by a dragon-like woman in a blue uniform, not khaki, that she had realized that she was volunteering for the Air Force. After all the waiting, she couldn’t be bothered to change. The dragon had asked a lot of questions about what she could do. Could she cook? Could she type? Could she drive? She couldn’t do any of those things but it had seemed better not to admit it. She had said she could cook – well she had once boiled an egg – and the dragon had written that down. There had been forms to fill in and sign and she had found herself promising to serve for four years, or the duration of the war, to serve in any part of the United Kingdom, or abroad, to obey all orders given by a superior placed in authority over her, and to perform any work required of her by her superior officers. When she thought about it now, she decided that she must have been mad to promise any such thing. Being in the WAAF was probably going to be even worse than being at school. At least at St Mary’s they had not had to do the sort of horrible cleaning work which that ghastly sergeant had told them about when she had finished bawling at them about the silly way they had to fold up the bedclothes.

  ‘You will all have daily duties to perform, in rotation. You will take it in turns, in pairs, to clean the washbasins, baths and lavatories in the ablutions, and the floors, windows and stoves in here . . . Each airwoman will be responsible for keeping the floor space round her bed clean and her bed and locker tidy . . .’

  The sergeant had reminded Anne unpleasantly of one of the games mistresses at school. She wondered if Army sergeants were as bad, though it wouldn’t matter to Kit so much since he was going to be an officer. Lucky Kit. He wouldn’t have to clean baths and lavatories or stoves and if his officers’ quarters were in anything like the palatial building she’d noticed here, then he’d be in clover. His last letter home had sounded pretty pleased with life.

  Atkinson and Villiers are here too, which is a bit of a lark. And Stewart turned up last week, so we’re a merry band. They’re working us fairly hard but I don’t mind that – just so long as we get a chance to have a crack at the Hun. Latimer’s going to try and join the RAF. He wants to be a pilot. Bombers, I think. Tell Anne to keep a look out for him.

  But RAF Colston was a fighter station, so she was unlikely ever to come across Latimer with the spaniel’s eyes. The ’planes that made so much noise overhead, like the one that had just made the windows rattle, were called Hurricanes – so someone had said who sounded as though she knew. They were single-engined fighters and there were, apparently, two squadrons of them stationed here – whatever a squadron might consist of. She hadn’t a clue.

  Susan Courtney-Bennet was asking something again – whether she knew some girl who had been at St Mary’s. She really was a crashing snob and just the sort of type she’d hoped to get away from when she’d left that school. That bit in Kit’s letter about him getting a chance to have a crack at the Hun had frightened her all over again. Supposing he were sent to France . . . supposing he ended up at the Front . . . supposing . . .

  Squadron Leader ‘Robbie’ Robinson was in charge of Administration at RAF Colston. Like its Station Commander, he had been in the Royal Flying Corps during the First World War and he had assumed an avuncular role among so many younger men. He had a reputation for solving all problems and it was he who immediately found an office for Felicity in Station Headquarters. Somehow he contrived to re-shuffle things so that she was able to move into a room immediately next door to his own.

  ‘So that you’ll be under my antiquated wing, my dear. Somewhat moth-eaten and losing its feathers, but if you need anything you can just pop your head round the door and ask.’

  His kind voice, twinkling eyes and the homely pipe, almost permanently clenched between his teeth, gave her reassurance and encouragement, as did the massive copy of King’s Regulations which he lent her ‘the RAF bible, my dear’, which sat at her elbow on her desk. She referred to it constantly and feverishly, riffling through its many pages.

  She had assigned her airwomen according to the requirements. It transpired that some could offer much more than the cooking, cleaning and clerical work supposed by the Station Commander. There were half a dozen trained shorthand typists among them, two teleprinter operators, a qualified nurse and a driver who could handle three-ton lorries. Even Gloria Gibbs, who had appeared so unpromising, turned out to be an experienced switchboard operator. She had interviewed each girl painstakingly in turn, and done her best for them with the limited opportunities. It was a great waste, she considered, that some should have to do waitressing and cleaning when they were clearly capable of more. Few, though, seemed to have very high expectations and she had not understood, at first, when Winifred Briggs, the country girl from Suffolk, had asked if she would be able to work with the aeroplanes.

  ‘You mean cleaning them? Some
thing like that?’

  The girl had gone very red and shaken her head. It had taken quite a while to persuade her to explain what she really meant.

  ‘I wanted to work on the engines, madam. Help look after them.’

  ‘The engines?’ She had tried not to look surprised or sceptical. A WAAF officer must cultivate understanding of, and sympathy with her airwomen . . . ‘Is that something that specially interests you?’

  The girl had nodded mutely. She had a fresh country complexion and soft curly brown hair. A pretty girl, shy and unworldly and unspoiled, with a lovely Suffolk way of speaking. She looked strong and capable but it was hard to imagine her working alongside RAF mechanics.

  ‘I see . . . well, Briggs, I’m sure you’d probably make a very good mechanic but unfortunately that trade just isn’t open to us WAAFS. Of course, that doesn’t mean to say that it never will be. I believe that as time goes by more and more RAF trades will begin to accept us – maybe even that one. We shall have to be patient.’

  ‘Yes, madam.’

  ‘Ma’am, Briggs, not madam. Try to remember. In the meantime, I think you would do very well as a General Duties clerk. It’s not all that exciting but you’ll learn a lot about how the RAF is run.’

  A clerk. In General Duties – whatever that was. Filling in forms and such like, most probably. There were forms for everything in the RAF, she’d discovered that already. She’d much sooner have been waitressing or working in the kitchens like some of the others. This then was what she’d left home and Ken for . . . to be a clerk. I want to do somethin’ useful in the war, Ken . . . She felt like crying again, but what was the use in that? The only thing to do was to be patient, like the officer had told her, and to make the best of things. That, or give up now and go back home to Elmbury. Nobody could stop you leaving if you were a volunteer. One of the girls had gone already. Just packed her suitcase and left. She could take the train to London and then the one to Ipswich and the bus from there home. Mum and Dad would be pleased to have her back to help out, and Ken . . . well, Ken would be happy again and not have his sad face. But if she went back home it would be giving up, wouldn’t it? Giving up before she’d even tried. And she didn’t want to do that. I want to do somethin’ with my life first, before we settle down. That was what she’d said to him and she wouldn’t give up.