Bluebirds

by Margaret Mayhew

  ‘You’re not seriously trying to tell me that it’s a good thing having these females here, Robbie?’

  Squadron Leader Robinson had known David Palmer far too long to try to tell him any such thing. At least, not directly. He said soothingly:

  ‘I don’t think it will be quite as bad as you think. Company Assistant Newman strikes me as a very sensible and efficient young lady.’

  ‘She may be, I grant you, but what about the rest of them? I mean what sort of women would join the Services? Remember the reputation most of them got in the last show?’

  ‘Oh, rather unfounded, sir, surely? The girls I came across in the WRAF were jolly good types. Put their hand to anything to help win the war. Did a marvellous job. That’s why they got the vote, isn’t it, not for chaining themselves to railings?’

  Palmer said irritably: ‘I know, I know. And it’s gone to their heads. They want to get in on everything these days just because they’re allowed to vote too. But it still doesn’t mean they’re going to be any use to us, does it? Any fool can put a cross on a piece of paper and stick it in a box. They’ll cause trouble with the men, mark my words, upset everything and be nothing but a confounded nuisance. God almighty, Robbie, we’ve got a bloody war to fight. It’s a serious business and we don’t need them causing us difficulties and distractions.’

  ‘Are you so sure they will, sir?’

  ‘Yes, I’m damned sure they will. Where there are women there are always problems, in my experience.’

  Robinson thought of the CO’s wife. Caroline Palmer could certainly be described as causing plenty of difficulties and distractions among some of the young officers on the station. He was not sure whether Palmer had this also in mind.

  He said carefully: ‘Once we get everything properly organized, sir, I really think –’

  His CO cut across him. ‘We can’t accommodate them here satisfactorily, Robbie. We’ve no proper facilities for females.’

  ‘It’ll take a while to sort out, I agree –’

  ‘And they haven’t even got any uniform – except those first two. The rest are running round in frocks and high heels and God knows what. Mind you, I don’t know which is worse, women in uniform, or out of it. All I do know is that I don’t want them cluttering up my station, whatever they’re wearing.’ Palmer shuffled some papers crossly on his desk. ‘This war’s going to be different from the last one. The Front’s not going to stay conveniently over there, at a safe distance. An operational station is a target for the enemy and the Hun might take it into his head some day to come and drop a lot of bombs on us. What’ll happen with these women then? They’ll panic all over the place, having hysterics, and then the men will worry about them instead of thinking about what they ought to be doing. It’s a recipe for disaster.’

  The squadron leader cleared his throat. His seniority in years, if not in rank, gave him some authority to speak his mind.

  ‘Personally, I think you’re doing them rather an injustice, sir. I don’t believe they would panic. Women can be extraordinarily calm and brave in a crisis. They’re by no means all prone to hysteria – in my opinion, that’s a fallacy. Look at the nurses in the WRAF – they carried on with the job no matter what the danger . . .’

  ‘Different breed, Robbie. Totally different. Nurses have a vocation. They’re dedicated to caring for the sick and wounded. They’re nurses because they’re that type of person. But these women . . . this lot we’re landed with, they’re all kinds and from what I’ve seen, none of them are likely to be a blind bit of use to us.’

  ‘I think you’ll find that’s far from the case. They all seem keen to do their best, and surely we’re going to need all the help we can get.’

  ‘You’ll be telling me next that I ought to be grateful to them for coming here?’

  ‘You may even be that – one day, sir.’

  Palmer grunted. ‘Trouble with you, Robbie, is that you’re prejudiced. You’re on their side. It’s having two daughters that does it, I suppose.’

  The squadron leader thought fondly of his two girls, Heather and Jean. The CO was childless, but whether from choice or misfortune he had never liked to enquire. Meg’s looks weren’t a patch on Caroline Palmer’s. Her hair was turning grey and her waist had thickened, but he wouldn’t have traded wives with his commanding officer for all the money in the world. There were times when he felt very sorry for David Palmer. The man had been a superb pilot – still was, for that matter, though these days he mostly flew a desk – and he clearly loved the RAF. But he had married a woman who made no secret of the fact that Service life and Service people bored her stiff – unless the people happened to be young, good-looking and well-connected young officers, in which case her interest far exceeded anything expected of a Station Commander’s wife. It was well known. Robinson was not surprised that Palmer apparently expected the worst of women.

  The Station Commander had got up from his desk and was looking moodily out of the window behind it, his hands in his pockets.

  ‘That one in charge of them . . . Newley, or whatever her name is –’

  ‘Newman, sir.’ Robinson fiddled with his pipe, poking a matchstick round the bowl. ‘As I said, she’s very sensible and efficient. Rather intelligent, too, I’d say. I gather she was up at Cambridge before she joined.’

  ‘A bloody blue-stocking! That’s just what we don’t need. Well, she may be intelligent, but she’s too damned young.’

  ‘She’s twenty-two. A lot of our chaps are younger.’

  ‘Nothing to do with it. This one’s supposed to be able to control a pack of silly, giggling girls. They should have sent some old battleaxe to cope.’

  ‘I think I’d sooner have Company Assistant Newman any day, sir, if you don’t mind.’

  Palmer smiled, and the smile transformed his face momentarily, softening the stem features. ‘Perhaps you’re right about that, Robbie. We don’t want any more like that Sergeant Whatsername. God, what a hideous woman! If you can call her one at all. She’s got one advantage, though – she won’t be distracting any of the men from their duties.’ He turned away from the window. ‘I wish this damn war would get cracking properly. All this hanging around waiting for it to get going. Nothing but practice attacks. The bomber boys have had all the luck so far.’

  ‘Dropping leaflets, sir? Taking a few pot shots at German naval bases? Nothing much to write home about.’

  ‘But at least they’re doing something. Christ, I wish I were twenty years younger, Robbie.’

  ‘I wish I were too, sir. But I’m afraid there’s not much we can do about it.’

  ‘I popped up in a Hurry the other day with Ross’s lot. Made me feel about nineteen again. Bloody fine kite. Steady as a rock. Fast as hell. Climbs like a rocket. Turns on a sixpence. I tell you, our young chaps are lucky blighters. I’d give ten years of my life to be in their shoes . . .’

  ‘That sounds as though it would rather defeat the object, sir.’

  Palmer gave a short laugh. ‘Suppose it would. Do you know, Robbie, sometimes I hate this job of mine. Tied to this desk, missing all the real fun. Being nice to bloody civilians like that woman who wrote to me today complaining about the noise our fighters make. She swears they use her house as a turning point . . . says they’re frightening her hunters. And someone else rang to say the low-flying’s stopped their chickens laying. God give me patience! They’d be quick enough to complain if we weren’t trained and ready for action to defend their blasted horses and chickens when the Huns come. What do they expect us to do? Practise flying on the ground?’

  Palmer shook his head in disgust. From outside the window behind him came the sound of high-pitched giggling. He turned round slowly, as though unable to believe his ears, taking his hands from his pockets. He rubbed at the glass between the criss-crossed brown paper strips with the side of one hand. In the roadway outside there was a small group of airmen and two of the WAAF airwomen. He watched in disbelief as one of the girls tweaked off an ai
rman’s cap, put it on her own head and ran off shrieking as its owner tried to retrieve it. Louder shrieks reached the two senior officers clearly as the airman caught up with her. Palmer drew a deep breath.

  ‘Now, Robbie, do you see what I mean?’

  When Felicity entered the Station Commander’s office he was standing with his back to her, staring out of the window by his desk. She stood waiting until he turned, unsmiling, and sat down, gesturing to her to do the same. He clasped both hands together on the desk top in front of him.

  ‘When you arrived here, Company Assistant Newman, I believe I told you my views on having women serving on my station?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘And I believe I made them quite plain?’

  ‘Perfectly, sir.’

  ‘They remain unchanged. In fact they have been reinforced a short while ago by the sight of two of your airwomen distracting a group of my men from their duties.’

  She coloured. ‘In what way exactly, sir?’

  ‘Giggling and horseplay, outside this very window. An appalling display of indiscipline such as I have never witnessed in all my years in the Service. Running about and shrieking as though this was some kind of playground.’

  ‘I’m very sorry, sir. I’ll do my best to see that it doesn’t happen again.’

  ‘You will indeed. You are supposed to be in control of your airwomen, and you are answerable for them and for their behaviour – to me. Under no circumstances is the sort of scene I witnessed ever to be repeated, do you understand? You will speak to your airwomen and make quite certain that it does not.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘I do not expect to see airwomen hob-nobbing with airmen, let alone sky-larking with them.’

  ‘Yes, sir . . . I mean, no sir. If I might say one thing, sir . . .’

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘What one thing?’

  ‘Well, sir, the airwomen will be working alongside the men, in the kitchens, on the switchboard, and so forth . . .’

  ‘I am aware of that.’

  ‘Well, sir, they have to talk to the men, as part of their work. They couldn’t very well do it properly without doing so. Then, if they come across them off-duty, about the station, as they’re bound to, it would be very difficult not to talk to them then as well . . . not to act in a friendly manner, if you see what I mean.’

  ‘I don’t think you see what I mean, Company Assistant Newman. I’m not talking about normal exchanges of conversation, in passing or otherwise, but the kind of blatantly flirtatious behaviour that took place before my very eyes. I will not allow that sort of thing at RAF Colston. It is an operational fighter station, engaged in the very serious business of waging war against the enemy. Surely you can grasp that?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  She was looking distressed but he went on without mercy.

  ‘Which brings me to another point. Clothing. Something has got to be done about it. Your airwomen are parading about the station dressed unsuitably, to say the least. Some of them look as though they are going to a party. It’s disastrous for discipline, all round. It can’t go on.’

  ‘We have no uniform at all, as yet, sir.’

  ‘I realize that. But that doesn’t prevent you from seeing that your airwomen wear more appropriate garments. I surely don’t have to spell it out in detail, do I? You must know the sort of thing I mean – sensible shoes with low heels, plain skirts, navy jumpers or cardigans . . . all that sort of thing – not frilly frocks and high-heeled sandals. I don’t want to see any more of those on my station, and that’s an order.’

  ‘I’ll do what I can, sir.’

  ‘You’ll do better than that, Company Assistant. You will carry out my orders to the letter. If the airwomen have no proper garments, they must send for them from their homes, or you must get your people to authorize the purchase of appropriate clothing. That’s all.’

  He reached for his pen and pulled some papers towards him, in dismissal. When she had left the room he looked up at the closed door. How old had Robbie said she was? Twenty-two? That was damned young for the job. Maybe he should have been a bit less hard on her? A bit more sympathetic? It must be pretty tough starting from scratch, with nothing laid down properly, no uniform, no proper accommodation, everything a bit strange . . . No, damn it, he couldn’t afford to be anything less than tough. He’d got a job to do as well and that was to make quite certain that the Station was on top line. Nothing else counted. He bent over the papers again.

  If they had no uniforms, at least they had numbers. Each had been photographed with a number on a board held beneath their chins – just like convicts, as Maureen Platt complained. She complained as frequently as Sandra Hunt asked questions. The photographs were stuck on their identity cards, called twelve-fifties, and they were told to learn their own numbers by heart.

  And they had been issued with paybooks in RAF blue, and with heavy steel helmets that they carried on their backs like humps, and with cumbersome anti-gas respirators with long elephant snouts that had to be taken everywhere, slung across their chests in canvas holders. As well as these things they had been given identity tags – two flat discs strung on a cord, one red and one green and marked with their name, number and religion, to be worn round their necks at all times.

  ‘In case of you-know-what,’ Pearl said darkly.

  Sandra looked puzzled. ‘What do you mean, you-know-what? I don’t know.’

  ‘In case they have to identify our bodies.’

  ‘Bodies?’

  ‘That’s right. These things we walk around in. If Jerry comes and bombs us we might have to be dug out of the smouldering ruins and they’ll want to be able to tell who’s who.’ Pearl tugged at the cord round her neck and fished out her two discs. ‘One’s rot proof and t’other’s fireproof. One of the men told me. This one with the two holes is for nailing on your coffin.’

  ‘Coffin!’

  ‘Sorry, dear, but you did ask . . .’

  Vera Williams, who stuttered, was examining her paybook closely. ‘It says, instructions to airmen. It’s not even for us. It should s-s-say instructions to airwomen. Listen to this. One, you will be held p-personally responsible for the custody of this book. Two, you will always carry the book on your person both at home and abroad. Three, you must produce the book whenever called upon to do so by a c-c-c –’

  Anne leaned over her shoulder. ‘Competent authority.’

  ‘S-supposing I lose it?’

  ‘You get put on a charge, I expect.’

  Vera turned the pages. ‘Oooh! There’s a place right at the end for making your will. It says, this is the last will and t-t-testament of . . . and they’ve gone and left a space for it all.’

  Pearl was replacing her identity discs poking them down the neckline of her blouse. ‘What did I tell you, Sandra?’

  Sandra had gone pale. ‘Actually, I don’t think Mummy would be very pleased.’

  RAF Colston, Anne had discovered, was like a small town. They had trailed round it in the wake of their officer, vainly trying to absorb its geography, but there were so many buildings. There were barrack blocks, cookhouses, workshops, stores, hangars, MT units . . . Station Headquarters, the Operations Room, the Sergeants’ Mess, the Decontamination Centre, the Signals and Meteorological Office . . . it was endless and she had forgotten most of them as soon as she’d been told. It wasn’t a bad-looking place, she decided, all things considered. It had been built in the late 1920s, mostly from red brick and there was a lot of smart white paint, well-kept flower beds and tree-lined avenues. You’d hardly know it was a fighter station until you saw the great steel hangars, the new wartime camouflage, and heard the ’planes.

  The Officers’ Mess was an impressive, creeper-clad building with a stone portico at its entrance and a gravel driveway sweeping up to it. Ever so posh, Pearl called it. There were rosebeds and smooth lawns in front, tennis courts at the side and squash courts nearby. A bit like a sports club.

  The kitchens, wher
e she was to work, were located, less grandly, round the back – a warren of white-tiled passageways and dark storerooms leading off a big central room. At first sight, this had looked to her like a giant’s lair. Everything was oversize. The pans were as big as washtubs, the baking dishes feet square, the knives like medieval battle weapons and the ladles the size of fish bowls. The room was divided down the centre by a row of iron cooking ranges and lit from overhead by a long glass skylight. The atmosphere was hot and steamy with the lingering odours of past meals . . . soups and stews, cabbage and sprouts, fried bacon and onions, fish and a great many chips. Corporal Fowler, the head cook, had been anything but pleased to see them when they had presented themselves at the door. He had turned round from beheading a pile of fish with a huge cleaver.

  ‘Wot the ’ell do you lot think you’re doin’ standin’ there?’

  Susan had said haughtily: ‘We have been told to report to you for duty.’ She might as well have added, my man.

  His eyes had narrowed. ‘It’s Corporal, and don’t you forget it.’

  He had turned his back and they had stood in an uncertain huddle by the doorway while he went on wielding the cleaver. Every chop made Enid jump. When he had finally finished he came over to them, wiping gory hands on a cloth.

  He had jabbed a forefinger at Susan and herself. ‘You two can do them spuds – in there. That one ’idin’,’ pointing to Enid, ‘can make ’erself useful in ’ere. And you and you,’ the finger moving on to Pearl and Sandra, ‘can start layin’ up tables. Get yourselves some overalls, all of you. You can’t work in them fancy clothes.’