The Penny Bangle

by Margaret James

  You keep a grip, girl, don’t you give away your heart.

  But as they walked back to the cottage, she could still feel the warmth of his broad palm against her own, still feel a silly, happy smile playing round her lips. More than almost anything, she wanted him to hold her hand again.

  ‘I’ve got my marching orders too,’ said Stephen, as they rolled out the churns and waited for the lorry one March morning.

  ‘Oh, Steve, where are you going?’ Frances looked suddenly stricken, Cassie noticed, ashen-faced and fearful.

  ‘Only up to London. I’m being seconded to the General Staff, and I’ll be working in an office.’ Stephen winked at Cassie. ‘You wouldn’t know it just to look at me, but actually I’m pretty good at reading, writing, all that kind of thing. I’ll make sure the army gets its bombs and shells and bullets, that there are plenty of lorries, tanks and guns.’

  ‘Basically, he’s going to run a quartermaster’s stores,’ said Robert, laughing as his brother punched him, falling back and groaning as if he was really hurt.

  ‘When will you be leaving?’ Frances whispered.

  ‘I think it’s Friday week.’

  ‘But what about us?’ said Cassie, frowning. ‘We can’t manage everything between us.’

  ‘Dad’s going to get Mr Hobson from the village to help out,’ said Stephen reassuringly. ‘So you’ll be all right.’

  ‘But Mr Hobson is so old,’ objected Frances.

  ‘He’s going to bring one of his sons with him. Daniel Hobson’s backward, so he won’t be called up, but he knows his way around the cows.’ Robert smiled his most beguiling smile. ‘Ladies, will you write to us?’

  ‘If you’ll write back,’ said Cassie. ‘I haven’t got time to sit around and write to people who will use my letters to wipe their arses on.’

  ‘What a suspicious mind you have,’ said Stephen.

  ‘As if we would do anything like that.’ Robert laughed at Cassie’s frown. ‘I’ll write back,’ he promised. ‘Cross my heart and hope to die. We’re going to miss you, aren’t we, Steve?’

  ‘You can’t wait to get away,’ said Cassie, but only to herself. She understood that he was restless, for she was restless, too.

  In spite of liking being in the countryside, and working on the farm, and having all these new experiences, she also missed the hustle and the bustle of the town.

  She didn’t miss the dirt and smoke and grime. But she missed the noise, she missed the rush, she missed the shops and trams, the streets and crowded buses, the glamour and excitement of going to the cinema and to the local dance hall with the girls with whom she’d been at school, because she loved to dance.

  She missed the food, especially the Italian hokey-pokey, the meat-and-jelly-filled pork pies, and the golden, fresh-fried fish and chips.

  She missed her granny. She worried about Lily all the time, and hoped she wouldn’t get caught in a raid. Lily didn’t seem to think she was in any danger. She thought that if she said her prayers and lived a holy life, she’d be all right.

  Cassie said her prayers for Lily, too.

  She didn’t know what she’d do if Lily died.

  ‘I think Robert likes you,’ whispered Frances a week later, as she and Cassie did the washing up after they’d all had their mid-day meal. Mr Denham was having forty winks, the twins had gone to town to buy some stuff they’d need before they went away, and Mrs Denham was outside on the drying green, getting her washing in.

  ‘He likes you, too,’ said Cassie.

  ‘You know what I mean,’ said Frances, blushing.

  ‘He’s been cooped up here for months and months,’ said Cassie, knowing she was reddening too. ‘He’s been like an eagle in a cage. He hasn’t had a chance to spread his wings. Frances, he’s a cock, and I’m a hen, and so it’s only natural – ’

  ‘Oh, Cass, you say the most outrageous things,’ said Frances, laughing.

  ‘Well, I’m not trying to be out-whatsit, don’t you even think it.’ Cassie scrubbed a saucepan with unnecessary force. ‘Frances, listen – don’t misunderstand me, don’t take this the wrong way. The fact is – I like everybody I’ve met here in Dorset. You’ve all been good to me. But you’re a bunch of toffs, and I’m a guttersnipe from Brum. Men brought up like Robert don’t value girls like me.’

  ‘That’s nonsense, Cassie.’

  ‘No it’s not,’ snapped Cassie.

  ‘How do you know, then?’

  ‘I might tell you one day.’ Cassie pulled the plug out, let the water gurgle down into the old zinc bucket underneath the sink.

  ‘Gosh, that sounds mysterious.’

  ‘Frances, Stephen told me that you wanted to join the ATS,’ said Cassie, wishing she hadn’t got into that previous conversation.

  ‘Yes, I did. But Mummy said – ’

  ‘How old are you, Fran?’

  ‘I’m twenty-two.’

  ‘So you’re officially grown up. Frances, listen – it’s your life, not Mummy’s. Why don’t you do what you want, for a change?’

  ‘I suppose I don’t want it quite enough,’ admitted Frances, shrugging as she hung a couple of damp tea-towels on the plate rack. ‘It’s so much easier, doing what my mother says. I’m a coward, too. I wouldn’t want to leave my home and to go off on my own.’

  ‘Well, I don’t want to bury myself in Melbury all my life.’ Cassie grinned. ‘So why don’t I come with you?’

  ‘Cassie, if we leave, poor Mrs Denham is going to be stuck,’ said Frances gravely. ‘Perhaps we ought to stay?’

  ‘Oh, don’t make excuses, Fran,’ said Cassie. ‘All she has to do is get on to the Ministry of Labour, or put an advert in the Farming Times. She’ll easily find new girls for Melbury.’

  ‘Do we dare?’ asked Frances.

  ‘Let’s find out what’s available,’ said Cassie. ‘On our next half day, we’ll both go into Dorchester and go to the recruiting offices. We can make enquiries, and see where we’d fit in.’

  ‘My mother had better not find out,’ said Frances.

  ‘Well, I’m not going to tell the mean old maggot.’ Cassie grinned again. ‘She doesn’t sound like the sort of person who would speak to me in any case, unless I was her charlady or serving in a shop.’

  ‘Well, that’s just Mummy, isn’t it?’ Frances shook her head. ‘It’s funny, don’t you think, how things work out?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You and Robert – may I be your bridesmaid?’

  ‘Oh, don’t be ridiculous,’ said Cassie, going scarlet. ‘I know you like to tease me, Fran. You don’t mean any harm, but sometimes you take things too far.’

  Cassie wished she didn’t still dream of Robert every night.

  But, once she’d closed her eyes, he came and took her hand, and then he pulled her into his embrace, and they were kissing, more than kissing, and she woke up horrified by what they’d done – or almost done. She remembered Father Riley’s lectures to her confirmation class, when he’d talked extensively about all kinds of sin.

  As the time for him and Stephen to remain in Dorset ticked away, she almost wished he would go sooner. Then she might have some peace.

  It was so difficult, seeing him all the time and wishing he would brush her hand, would touch her hair, and it was so embarrassing to start grinning like a halfwit whenever he happened to glance in her direction.

  Everyone must have noticed she was making a right old exhibition of herself. So perhaps it would be better if she was going away?

  As she thought about it, the more it seemed desirable, and – what was more – achievable. So what she was a woman, not a man?

  She’d have liked to have adventures, too.

  Chapter Five

  After the twins had gone, it was so quiet.

  Mr Hobson and his son were silent and methodical as they went about their work. Daniel didn’t speak at all, and Mr Hobson didn’t approve of chatter. He shook his head at Cassie if she talked or sang while she was milking.r />
  ‘You’ll upset them cows, the way you carries on, warbling away the way you do,’ he muttered darkly. ‘You ain’t no Gracie Fields or Vera Lynn, and that’s a fact.’

  But Cassie didn’t care if Mr Hobson didn’t appreciate her warbling. She went on singing to the Jerseys, especially the songs which Rob and Steve had sung to them, a mix of big band numbers she’d heard on the wireless, and the hymns they all sang every Sunday in the local church.

  After a long, hard winter, spring was here at last. People and their animals were shaking off the sluggishness of all those cold, dark days, and everyone was getting on with life.

  Or giving birth to it.

  There were two new babies in the village, and there were skipping lambs in all the fields. There were several dozen new pink piglets in Mr Hobson’s pens, six of the cows had calved, several of the hens had fluffy broods of golden chicks, and there were fragrant yellow flowers growing on all the banks.

  ‘Primroses,’ said Frances, who couldn’t believe that Cassie had never seen a primrose in her life. ‘They grow like weeds all over Dorset.’

  ‘What about those things that look like primroses, but smaller and with lots of little flowers on every stem?’

  ‘They’re cowslips, and those other yellow flowers are daffodils.’

  ‘I know what a daffodil looks like,’ Cassie muttered, huffing rather crossly. ‘Do you think I’m ignorant or something?’

  ‘God, perish the thought,’ said Frances, laughing. ‘Cassie, isn’t it a lovely day? You’d never know there was a war on.’

  Cassie nodded. On a blue and gold spring day like this, if you didn’t listen to the wireless, if you didn’t go down to the beach and look at all that concrete and barbed wire, it was almost possible to forget.

  Mrs Denham had got hold of dark blue paint from somewhere, and she’d spruced up her front door.

  About time too, decided Cassie, who thought she’d never understand the posh squad’s lackadaisical and easy-going ways. Lily Taylor washed and cleaned and polished all day long. But Rose Denham’s stone-flagged kitchen floor often didn’t see a mop or broom from one week to the next.

  ‘Three more people looking for work,’ she said one April morning, as they were having breakfast and she was busy opening the post.

  ‘Anyone with any experience, though?’ asked Mr Denham, looking up from his Farming Times, and wheezing like an ancient pair of bellows as he lit another cigarette.

  ‘Yes, two girls in their twenties who are on farms in Devon at the moment, but want to be near their parents’ homes in Dorset. They say they’re used to dairy herds and heavy horses. So I think they’d be ideal for us.’

  Mrs Denham looked at Cassie and Frances. ‘But we don’t need them, do we? So they’ll have to stay in Devon. Or join the ATS. I heard on the Home Service the government wants more women in the army.’

  Cassie glanced at Frances, raised one eyebrow.

  But Frances shook her head.

  ‘But why can’t we leave?’ demanded Cassie, as they mucked out the shire horses’ stables, later on that morning.

  ‘I think it would be very mean,’ said Frances. ‘Mrs Denham’s such a good employer, and she’s been so kind to us.’

  ‘Fran, she gets her money’s worth!’ cried Cassie. ‘All right, she feeds us properly, she doesn’t overwork us, but she makes flipping sure we earn our wages, every single penny of them.’

  ‘But I thought you liked it here in Dorset?’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ said Cassie. ‘But Frances, think about it – Dorset isn’t going to go away, and there’s a great big world out there.’

  ‘Yes, and lots of horrid things are going on in it. Cassie, Mr Denham isn’t well.’

  ‘Mr Denham’s past it.’ Cassie shrugged. ‘Mrs Denham runs the place, and all Mr Denham does is sit around, and do the books, and read the Farming Times.’

  ‘I suppose she could have those girls from Devon,’ said Frances thoughtfully.

  ‘Yes, she could,’ said Cassie. ‘She’s got Mr Hobson and his son. They do as much as Steve and Rob, or more. If she has a couple of girls, as well – ’

  ‘She’ll be all right.’ Frances looked suddenly wistful. ‘It would be quite nice to have adventures, and to see a bit of life.’

  ‘Of course it would.’

  ‘We’ll talk to her on Friday evening, shall we?’ Now, her growing excitement blobbed two spots of pink on Frances’s pale cheeks. ‘When Mr Denham goes off to his farmers’ meeting at the village hall.’

  On Friday evening, Cassie ate her supper very quickly. She forked up every single grain of barley and then mopped up her gravy with some of Mrs Denham’s fresh-baked bread.

  Frances was staying to supper too and, after she’d finished her raspberry jam and roly-poly pudding, she told Mrs Denham to put her feet up for a change.

  ‘Cassie and I will go and get the washing in,’ said Frances casually. ‘We’ll do all the pots and pans, and have a tidy up.’

  Rose Denham looked from one girl to the other. ‘Oh, I see,’ she said, and smiled at them.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Denham?’ said Cassie, blushing.

  ‘It’s time to go and have adventures, is it?’ Mrs Denham pushed her empty pudding bowl aside. She ran her fingers through her long, dark hair, looping back some errant strands and pinning them up again. ‘I was thinking yesterday, it’s been a long time coming.’

  ‘Adventures, Mrs Denham?’ repeated Cassie glibly, aware that she was going even redder in the face, embarrassed to be so easily found out.

  ‘I don’t think I’m mistaken, am I, Cassie? You’ve both been so restless since the boys went back. I don’t think it’s natural for two young girls like you to want to spend your lives stuck on a farm, out in the middle of nowhere, milking cows.’

  Mrs Denham stood up then, brushed the crumbs from off her pinafore, and went to fill the big black kettle. ‘So, Fran and Cassie, which is it to be? The Wrens? The WAAF? The ATS?’

  ‘Mother of God, they don’t have my sort in the Wrens,’ said Cassie, laughing and wrinkling her nose. ‘The Wrens is just for nobs. Frances would be all right, of course. She’s pukka, aren’t you, Fran? Your old mum might let you join the Wrens?’

  ‘Oh, do shut up, midget,’ said Frances, not unkindly. ‘Mrs Denham,’ she continued, ‘we quite fancy being in a battery, so we could help to shoot down German planes. Or we could ride motorbikes, delivering dispatches. Or we could drive lorries. We think we’d like to move around a bit.’

  ‘It’ll have to be the ATS, then,’ Mrs Denham said. ‘But Frances, I’m not sure if Lady Ashford’s very keen on lady soldiers? I can’t imagine she’d want you to be one! What about your granny, Cassie? Didn’t she want you out of danger’s way?’

  ‘Mrs Denham, could you write to Mummy?’ Frances looked beseechingly at Rose Denham. ‘She would listen to you. Maybe you’d write to Cassie’s granny, too?’

  ‘I should suggest you leave the safety of the farm, to go and risk your lives in ack-ack batteries, or driving through the blackout?’

  ‘Well – ’

  ‘Oh, Fran, don’t look at me like that!’ Rose Denham smiled again and shook her head. ‘I wasn’t always old, you know,’ she added. ‘When I was your age, I wanted to have adventures, too.’

  ‘So did you, Mrs Denham?’ Frances asked.

  ‘Yes, I became an army nurse,’ Rose Denham told them. ‘I served all over France, and then I went to Russia. Very well, I’ll write to Cassie’s granny and Lady Ashford later on tonight. But, if I were you, girls, I’d get your applications off right now. I dare say you’ve been to get the forms?’

  ‘Well actually, Mrs Denham,’ admitted Cassie, shamefaced, ‘we got them yesterday.’

  Frances came to work a few days later to report that Lady Ashford had taken to her bed, and also that her father was going on and on about their daughter being ungrateful and unkind.

  But Lily Taylor’s letter to Rose Denham was very fair and reasonable, consider
ing the fuss that Cassie had been almost sure her grandmother would make. All Mrs Taylor said was that she’d like a visit from her granddaughter before she took her posting up, wherever it might be.

  ‘You’ll have time off for that, of course,’ said Mrs Denham. ‘Frances, when Cassie goes to see her granny, maybe you should go along, to keep her company?’

  ‘Yes, Frances, come and meet my granny,’ Cassie said. ‘I’ll take you to a café for a decent meal,’ she added, after Mrs Denham had left the kitchen and gone to see her hens. ‘We’ll have some big, fat bangers, with a pile of mash. Or fish and chips. Or a piece of haslet. Or a nice pork pie.’

  ‘They don’t waste any time,’ said Frances, showing Cassie the official-looking letter telling her to report for a medical on Monday week, at the army camp in Dorchester. ‘I thought it would be ages before we got replies.’

  ‘Well, there is a war on,’ Cassie said. ‘I’ve got a letter, too,’ she added. ‘So we’ll ask Mrs Denham if she’ll let us have next Monday off. If we do the milking, get the churns all ready for the lorry, then go and feed the chickens, we can scoot off and make a day of it. We could have our dinner in a café. Go to the flicks, perhaps.’

  ‘What if we fail our medicals?’ asked Frances. ‘We won’t feel like going to the cinema if we fail.’

  ‘We’d better flipping pass then, hadn’t we?’ said Cassie. ‘I’d like to go and see that film about the Battle of Britain, starring Dawn Adaire and Ewan Fraser. I think he’s really cute.’

  ‘He’s married, actually, to Rob’s and Stephen’s sister,’ Frances said to Cassie, and she grinned. ‘Sorry, midget, he’s been nabbed already.’

  ‘He’s Daisy Denham’s husband?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why didn’t you say?’

  ‘I thought you knew. There’s a photograph of him and Daisy in the sitting room. They’re at a premiere or something, and they’re dressed up to the nines. They’re gazing at each other in that soppy sort of way that people do when they’re in love.’