The Women of Waterloo Bridge

by Jan Casey

  ‘Go on then.’

  Evelyn dodged her way around hammers and jacks, slabs of stone, steel rods and timber to where Sylvie was vibrating the concrete. She signalled with arms above her head and Sylvie held up a finger. One minute. The skip expelled the last of its load, which Sylvie worked on to the last foot. Then she laid the vibrating machine aside. ‘I’ve just had a break,’ she said. ‘But I might be able to nip off again if I’m careful.’

  Evelyn tugged at her sister’s hand. ‘It’s not a break,’ she said. ‘Take your turban off and come with me. Grab your face shield.’

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘To surprise Dad.’

  ‘What?’

  Evelyn explained as she pulled Sylvie along.

  ‘We might get discovered yet,’ Sylvie said as they stopped behind a line of hopper cars to touch up their lipstick from the tube she kept in her bib pocket.

  ‘Carry on as normal,’ the photographer said. Gwen did as she was told, hunching over her flame. It hadn’t even seemed to register with her that anything out of the ordinary was going on. Evelyn removed her shield every time the photographer snapped and Sylvie didn’t even manage that pretence, looking straight at the camera and grinning.

  ‘No. Ladies, please.’ The photographer shuffled from foot to foot. ‘Just get on with what you usually do.’ So, Evelyn kept her face covered but stood tall and Sylvie held her mask in her hand, inspecting the next reinforcement rod in line. ‘That’s a good one. Should be in Tuesday morning.’

  But it wasn’t. All that appeared was a short article about the bridge that Dad read aloud:

  CONSTRUCTION OF NEW WATERLOO BRIDGE

  The new crossing at Waterloo Bridge is pressing forward despite the inevitable setback caused by the labour shortage. The men on the bridge are working long hours and are willing to turn their hand to any task that needs to be undertaken in order to complete this vital link between north and south. In addition, the men are taking advantage of green labour to perform unskilled roles. This allows them to utilise their expertise, which is critical to complete what the government terms ‘this building work of strategic importance’.

  ‘Is that it?’ Sylvie peered over Dad’s shoulder.

  ‘That’s it. No snap of my girls.’

  ‘Turn over, Dad. There might be something on the back,’ Evelyn said.

  ‘No. Nothing there.’

  ‘Well, I’ll be blowed. We’ll never get in the films now.’

  ‘Perhaps they’re saving it for another day. When everyone could do with a cheer-up. Ah.’ Dad chuckled. ‘Here’s something that should interest you.’ He spread the pages on the table and pointed to a headline. ‘Clothes rationing begins on the first of June.’

  ‘How could they!’ Sylvie snatched the paper.

  ‘Let’s have a look,’ Evelyn said.

  Sylvie sat on the arm of the chair so Evelyn could read the article with her.

  ‘Oh, it’s not so bad,’ Evelyn said.

  ‘Not so bad? Maybe you could manage but I have appearances to keep up. Look, a jacket, one jacket, will cost twelve of your sixty coupons.’

  ‘We only need our overalls during the day so we can spend everything on our going-out clothes. Besides, everyone’s in the same boat.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ said Sylvie. ‘By the way, what’s green? Green labour.’

  ‘You,’ Dad said.

  ‘Me and Evelyn?’

  ‘All you girls. Never done anything like this before, have you? It’ll be a miracle if it stands half as long as the old bridge.’

  Evelyn cuffed Dad around his head with the paper. ‘Right, you can get your own tea tonight.’

  ‘Not likely,’ he said. ‘Out of my chair you two and in the kitchen.’

  Whatever she was called, green or otherwise, Evelyn was pleased that she didn’t have to queue with the hundreds of women who’d left it to the last minute to register for war work with the Employment Exchange. She supposed they would be asked what kind of work they preferred, but it might not be easy to place them where they wanted to be. She hadn’t thought she’d stick this for long. It was only meant to be a stopgap until she found something in an office or teaching in one of the services.

  If she did want to change, now might be a good time, but she didn’t want to. She loved it. The work was doing wonders for her figure, especially her arms, there was plenty of fun in the dinner break and, although you had to do the same tasks over and over again, it wasn’t anything like the soul-destroying monotony of housework. It felt good to see the evidence of what you’d accomplished and the progress that was being made. Wages in your hand on a Thursday afternoon was a good feeling, too; she was pleased to be able to give a few bob to Dad and have a bit left over for herself. But some of the women complained they took home much less than the men and Evelyn did wonder a bit about that, too, from time to time.

  *

  Sylvie rubbed her eyes and yawned, pushing her plate of savoury mince aside.

  ‘Don’t you want that?’ Evelyn asked.

  Sylvie shook her head. ‘You have it.’

  ‘You should stay in once in a while. Keep Dad company.’

  ‘Wouldn’t have made any difference this weekend. No one managed any shut-eye. You look awful.’

  ‘Take a look in the mirror yourself.’

  There was a guffaw, followed by the banging of cutlery from the tables at the back of the canteen. A tall, wiry woman with the curled ends of her hair escaping from her flowery headscarf called out to them. ‘Sylvie, Evelyn. Over here. Sit with us.’

  ‘She’s such a laugh – Olive. Shall we join them?’

  Evelyn nodded. ‘I’ll get my afters and see you in a minute.’

  Olive was in full swing when Evelyn squeezed in on the end of the bench next to a well-built young woman with high cheekbones and a ruddy complexion. Empty plates, smeared with congealing gravy or custard, were all around them; the smell of tepid fat less appetising now their stomachs were full.

  ‘I said to him,’ Olive went on, ‘I said, “I’ll be glad when you’re sent to wherever it is you’re going. I could do with a bleedin’ rest.” “Oh, come on,” he says. “This might be me last time.” So I says, “You’ve been saying that for the past fortnight,” and he comes back with, “You can’t say no to a dying wish.” “Oh, can’t I, you dirty bugger,” I says.’

  ‘So did you?’ Sylvie asked, her chin on her hands.

  ‘That’s a bit too close to the bone,’ Olive said, crossing her legs and pursing her mouth. ‘Let’s just say I’ll be leaving me pushbike in the shed for a while.’

  The tableful of women burst into laughter again. More knives and forks and plates were pounded on the table. Evelyn joined in with her bowl but could feel the heat reaching her ears. She turned away before anyone could see and point it out to the others. The high colour on the cheeks of the girl next to her – who couldn’t have been more than nineteen – spread over her entire face and seemed to be throbbing. Evelyn was mortified for her when she saw Olive glance over and grin, a comment about to take aim.

  ‘Oh look,’ someone facing the door whispered. ‘Isn’t that your partner, Evelyn? What’s her name: Gwen?’

  Evelyn nodded. Through a hand on her brow, she watched Gwen take what must have been the desecrated remains of the mince, veg, spotted dick and custard and slip into the place closest to the door, her back to their crowded table.

  ‘How do you stand it?’ asked the woman next to Olive. ‘She never speaks. I tried a couple of times with her but all I got for my trouble was a shrug.’

  ‘And her hands…’ someone at the other end said with a shudder.

  Evelyn felt a knot in her stomach. She didn’t like the way this conversation was going and tried to think of how she could bring it back to Olive and her husband’s late-night larks. She’d thought the same things herself about Gwen, many times, but now she felt a loyalty towards her. ‘Oh, she’s not that bad,’ she said defensively. ‘She’s a work
horse.’ But no one seemed to hear and if they did, they chose to ignore her.

  ‘I don’t know how she manages to hold anything. It’s a wonder she hasn’t had a nasty accident,’ the woman opposite Sylvie said, leaning in and lowering her voice.

  ‘Oh, I hope not.’ Olive beat on her chest with an open palm and closed her eyes. ‘She’s already had something horrible to put up with. So I hear.’

  ‘Haven’t we all,’ someone sniffed.

  Now Evelyn tilted her head forward, eager to hear the story. ‘What happened?’

  ‘Her boy ran off one night end of last year. Bad night it was. Got caught in one of Hitler’s packets and that was that. His dad found him. Well, so I’ve been told.’

  Evelyn thought about the kids she could have had with Ron and the ones she hoped to have with someone else. She thought about Rosie Harrison and all the other children who’d been in her class. ‘That’s so sad,’ she said. ‘What about the others?’

  ‘Two of them left. Boy and girl, I think. Been sent to Wales now.’

  ‘Two?’ Evelyn was sure Gwen had said she had three children. ‘I thought… She told me…’

  Every face was turned towards her, waiting for another titbit. She shook her head. ‘Never mind.’

  ‘Still,’ Olive’s friend said, nodding towards Gwen’s back. ‘We could all be like that, couldn’t we? No help to herself or anyone else.’ That seemed to be the murmuring consensus as chairs were scraped back and cigarettes appeared from pockets. Evelyn took out her pack of three and offered one to the girl next to her, whose face had settled back down to its natural pink flush. As much as she tried, she couldn’t stop herself looking towards Gwen, whose shoulders were huddled over what must by now be a stone-cold dinner.

  Picking up an ashtray, Evelyn walked across to Gwen’s table and sat down opposite her. Evidence of Gwen’s good manners, her knife and fork lay together on top of the plate from which only a couple of mouthfuls had been eaten. The bowl of afters Gwen was staring at was untouched, the nose pads of her spectacles green where Evelyn thought salty tears had settled for months on end, her cheeks rough and dry.

  But now there was no weeping. Perhaps she was all cried out and left with that blank, faraway expression that Evelyn had come to expect on her partner’s face. She wanted to say something, but couldn’t think of the right words and, besides, they wouldn’t have made it past the lump in her throat. She went to put her hand over Gwen’s but hesitated and they both jerked away at the same time. Gwen looked up then, her mouth tight and her eyes narrow, daring Evelyn to come closer. Evelyn cleared her throat. ‘Come and sit with us,’ she said.

  Gwen looked at her as though she was simple, took off her glasses, wiped hard at her face. Then she left without saying a word.

  ‘There’s nothing you can do,’ Sylvie said, making room next to her. ‘Don’t be bothered.’ But Evelyn was.

  *

  Three weeks later nothing mattered except they’d somehow lived through the weekend. Dad was a wreck – and for him to be alarmed meant things were bad. For the first time he forbade Evelyn and Sylvie to go out. They didn’t protest, but followed him down to the Tube where they dozed on and off in a sitting position, squashed into a space that seemed about the size of a packet of rationed tea. When they emerged into the smoky haze the following morning, they stood still for a minute taking in the devastation. There was nothing new. They’d seen it, heard it, smelled it all before, but there was simply much more of it this time. More bulging roads and burst water pipes, a shoe with a torn foot laced into it. Row after row of crushed houses and flats with their sides ripped off, the intimate settings of everyday life laid open to scrutiny. The smell of burning more intense, the moan of sirens unwavering. They hurried along, watching every step.

  ‘We’ll make sure everything’s okay at home, then see what we can do,’ Dad said. His mouth sounded dry.

  A warden was walking up and down Mayes Road, jotting notes in his book even though much of the terrace stood solid and upright, proud of making it through the night.

  ‘This one yours?’ He pointed to their front door.

  ‘That’s the one,’ Dad said. ‘Everything alright?’

  ‘You’re lucky. Very lucky. They took it at both ends but the middle’s intact.’ He shook his head. ‘Funny how it goes. Could have easily been the other way around.’

  Dad closed his eyes then forced himself to look at the blackened houses to the left and the right. Evelyn stepped back to take in the whole road at once and Sylvie joined her, clutching at her arm. ‘Number fourteen. Look.’

  ‘Just the walls, hanging there.’

  ‘Who’d have thought they had such poor taste in wallpaper?’

  ‘Sometimes you go too far, Sylvie. That’s not funny.’

  Sylvie’s voice was hoarse. ‘It wasn’t meant to be,’ she said.

  There was no gas, no water. They gathered together a few biscuits, a torch and bandages and went along the road where they’d lived all their lives to see which neighbours needed help.

  The House of Commons had taken it along with Westminster Abbey, the soap factory, Victoria Station and Big Ben. ‘Dear old chap,’ Dad said. ‘Still chiming though. It’ll take more than a few bombs to stop him.’ Then, two nights of eerie silence during which the warning sounded a number of times followed immediately by the all-clear. Despite that, Dad was adamant they stick to their routine of bedding down in the underground, waiting for another night like Friday and dreading what they would find when they climbed out of their hole in the ground. But each morning what lay before them was almost unchanged from the night before. Sylvie hoped that was that. Perhaps it was finished and done.

  ‘Or maybe,’ Evelyn said, ‘we’ll just have time to clear this lot up and it’ll start all over again.’

  By Monday morning they were exhausted. The number 29 took so many detours they didn’t recognise where they were most of the time, and the streets that should have been familiar were crumpled and distorted. From Oxford Street they caught the Tube to Waterloo and converged with the swarms of women and a handful of men making their way towards the bridge. Shuffling down to single file past the guards, every head in front of Evelyn turned to stare at a hole in the underside of the temporary bridge, twisted steel and girders hanging from it like entrails from a gaping belly. She took her turn to gawp.

  ‘That’ll put us back,’ Sylvie said.

  ‘Wonder if the new one’s been hit.’

  ‘We might have to start all over again,’ someone said. But Evelyn didn’t think so; their work was here, above and around them. There might be a minor setback but that was all.

  Quickly changing into dungarees and boots, the women shook out an array of coloured scarves and tied them into knots on their heads. One of the ladies, in a blue overall, stuck her head through the door and told them to hurry. ‘Jim’s called a meeting,’ she said. ‘And it sounds important.’

  Evelyn followed Sylvie to the top, turning her collar up against the fresh breeze. A smouldering residue lingered in the air, but after two nights without bombing, they could clearly smell the tang of the Thames wafting around them. Fumes, mud, silt. It was lovely to smell the river again. For some reason the men stood on the right, the ladies on the left. How silly, Evelyn thought. But every meeting was the same.

  There’d been some ruckus from the men at the beginning about their jobs, but none of the women could do the skilled work anyway. Fetching and carrying, a bit of welding, that was about it. Some of the senior ladies had a bit of responsibility but they were few and far between. All the women who took a man’s job had to sign a piece of paper saying they’d step aside when the men returned, so there was no need for them to worry. Daft buggers.

  Evelyn scanned the crowd and nodded to two or three women behind her. Right at the back and standing away from everyone else was Gwen, her gloves under her arm, the tips of her fingers in her mouth. Evelyn caught her eye and waved, but Gwen turned away. Okay, be like that yet again
, she thought. Despite the rebuff, Evelyn decided to have another go. She excused herself through the crude lines being formed and took up the empty space next to Gwen.

  Evelyn nodded at her partner. ‘How did you manage the weekend?’ she said.

  Gwen put her hands behind her back and studied Evelyn for what felt like a long time. Her eyes in their red sockets lost their glare and softened a bit. ‘Part of our place took it,’ she said.

  ‘Worse luck. Everyone alright?’

  Gwen looked down at her boots and nodded.

  ‘What will you do?’

  ‘It’s nothing George can’t fix. We’ll stay with a neighbour till then.’

  Jim blew a whistle to get their attention. The men opposite made a point of facing forward, arms folded and lips shut tight. Jim had to blow again in the women’s direction, after which the laughter and talking died down. Gwen mumbled what sounded like ‘ta’.

  ‘Sorry?’ Evelyn leaned closer to Gwen’s face.

  ‘Ta. Thanks for asking.’

  Evelyn held a wide smile until she got the shadow of one back from Gwen.

  Holding a loudhailer and fiddling with his necktie, Jim said, ‘As I’m sure you’re all aware, the temporary bridge took a hit on Friday night. A bus was caught up in it too, but that’s now been cleared.’

  ‘My nephew’s wife was on that bus,’ a tiny woman said. ‘On her way home from town.’

  ‘The damage has been inspected and I’ve been instructed to tell you about redeployment.’ He took in the workforce standing in front of him. ‘Unfortunately, most of you will now have to be diverted to implement running repairs on the temporary bridge so that it can be reopened as quickly as possible. I’ve consulted with the foremen and together we’ve decided who will be assigned where. For now, carry on with your duties here and I’ll make the rounds during the day to tell you who’s going to work where, as from tomorrow.’

  ‘I hope we’re able to stick together,’ Gwen said.

  Evelyn started. Coming from Gwen, that degree of sentiment was unnerving. But perhaps there’d been a breakthrough. ‘We’ll make sure we do,’ she said, certain that no one else would be tripping over themselves to work with Gwen.