Kathy sat up a little straighter, though a dreadful pain shot through her legs as she did so. ‘If Alec had been killed I don’t think my life would be worth living,’ she said almost savagely. ‘But he hasn’t been killed, Jane. OK, he’s been posted as missing, but that isn’t the same thing at all and I’ll thank you not to speak of him in the past tense because I’m
sure
he’s still alive.’
Jane looked at her doubtfully for a moment, then her face cleared and she beamed. ‘That’s the spirit, queen,’ she said joyfully. ‘D’you remember how, when we were kids, your da’ would tell us to stop meetin’ troubles halfway? Well, that’s just what I was doin’, but I won’t do it no more. If you’re sure he’s alive, then he bleedin’ well is and we’ll look forward to his coming home as soon as the war is ended.’
Kathy stood shakily on Stanley Road, gazing up and down as though she could not believe she was free from her prison at last. She was on two crutches and behind her, pushed by her mother, was the wheelchair which the authorities had insisted she would need to use for distances of more than a few feet until her legs grew stronger. But she was out, breathing the fresh December air, feeling the nip of cold and hearing the hum of the traffic and the chatter of passers-by in a way she had not done for many months.
For a great deal of time had passed – six months, in fact – since Kathy had been struck down. This was because her legs had refused to heal straight and strong and she had had three operations on them before the hospital finally decided they had done all they could. Now, as she finally emerged from the hospital, Christmas was almost upon them. She meant to go straight home for a week’s much needed rest because a great many of the balloon sites had been closed down and those that remained were once more to be run by men. Nevertheless, she would still have insisted upon returning to Balloon Site 7 had there been a balloon site to return to. The Air Ministry, acting with hindsight as usual, and far too late, announced that the work was too heavy for Waafs, that too many serious injuries had resulted from flying the blimps and that, in any event, their presence around northern and eastern England was no longer as necessary as it had once been. In the order informing the Bops of the fate of their sites, the girls were also told that they would be remustered. Jane had gone off to Scampton to be a waitress in the officers’ mess there and was happy with her lot since it brought her within a dozen miles of Jimmy at Waddington, but Kathy had no idea what fate – and the WAAF – had in store for her.
‘Kathy love, you know what the doctor said. You ain’t supposed to walk more’n a few yards and you’ve come all the way from the ward without so much as a sit-down. Why not let me wheel you the rest o’ the way?’
Kathy was tempted to tell her mother that she did not intend to use the wheelchair, that it might as well be left at the hospital, but already her legs were aching dreadfully and she knew it was only a matter of time before they simply gave way under her. Clearly, she would have to be sensible and use the chair when her strength failed her. Accordingly, she turned and took a couple of shaky steps backwards, then sank into the hard leather seat. It felt soft as a feather pillow after the strain of her short walk and she laid her crutches across her knee, then smiled up at Sarah Kelling.
‘Tell you what, Mam,’ she said cheerily, ‘if you’ll push me halfway down Daisy Street, then maybe I can walk the last few yards. Only – only I feel like a perishin’ cripple in the wheelchair, honest to God I do.’
‘Oh, you,’ her mother said, but she spoke lovingly. ‘You know very well your legs will get strong again, because the doctor said so. Why, you’ll be skippin’ about like young Billy does by the time summer comes. Anyway, them there legs of yours is war wounds and you’ve no call to be ashamed of
that
.’
As the two of them entered Daisy Street, doors shot open and neighbours came on to the pavement to congratulate them on Kathy’s safe return, their breath puffing clouds of steam into the frosty air. ‘You’ve been stuck in that bloody hospital, you poor little bugger,’ Mrs O’Brien said bracingly. ‘But you’re goin’ to be awright, queen. Once you’re on your feet, you’ll find yourself a nice feller and get married . . .’ she laughed heartily at her own words’. . . and then your happiness will be at an end, ’cos marriage ain’t no picnic, and havin’ half a dozen kids to bring up ain’t exactly a bed o’ roses either. Still, it’s what the fellers say women want and we’ve none of us got the gumption to tell ’em that marriage is only fun for the feller.’
The small crowd of women surrounding Kathy all laughed but told Mrs O’Brien that ‘she were a terrible woman, to try to scare the poor little gal and her only just out of ’orspital’, but Kathy had her own answer ready.
‘I agree with every word, Mrs O’Brien,’ she said, her own voice sounding brittle. ‘I’ve always meant to have a career with a steady wage; it’s so much more reliable than a husband.’
The women dispersed, laughing, and Kathy, who had stood up on her crutches as soon as the first door opened, sank thankfully back into the seat once more. ‘That told ’em,’ she muttered as her mother pulled the wheelchair backwards into the house. ‘If I can’t have Alec, Mam, I’d sooner be a spinster for the rest of my days, and that’s God’s truth.’
Her mother wheeled the chair into the front room and helped Kathy out of it and on to the sofa. ‘Now that’s foolish talk,’ she scolded fondly. ‘If you’ve told me once that you were sure Alec was alive, you’ve told me a thousand times. Why, for all you know, he could be back here by Christmas. And since that other feller, what was his name, the one who was in the same plane as Alec, appeared on a list of RAF personnel in a German POW camp . . . you must have been surer than ever that Alec was safe; so let’s have no defeatist talk in this house, as old Winnie used to say,’
‘Sorry, Mam,’ Kathy said humbly. She did not add that the quotation was usually attributed to Queen Victoria, or that learning one of Alec’s companions was a POW had depressed her most dreadfully, for surely if Alec had escaped from the plane at the same time as the rear gunner he, too, would have been taken prisoner by now? So the dogged hope which had helped her through the worst and most painful months in hospital was beginning to fade.
However, Kathy was coming to terms with what had happened. The dreadful nightmares which had haunted her ever since she had heard that Alec was missing had begun to diminish; they came less often and were less terrible, less explicit. In the early days, her nights had been made hideous by dreams of Alec being horribly injured as his ’chute failed a hundred feet from the ground. Then there were the dreams of the kite’s catching fire and Alec’s being badly burned. In other dreams he was captured by the Nazis and tortured, so that she woke screaming, unable to share her fears with other patients, yet equally unable to dispel them even in the clear light of day.
One good thing to come out of Alec’s being missing was Kathy’s friendship with Betty Hewitt. It was a wonderful bonus to find Alec’s mum so bright and humorous, so brave and honest, and, above all, so like Alec. Of course, the Norfolk burr which enriched her speech was so reminiscent of Alec that Kathy had had to fight back tears at first, every time Betty opened her mouth. But this had passed and the two of them had become really friendly. They did exchange telephone calls but these were rare as the only telephone box near the Hewitts’ farm was a three-mile walk away, and even had Mrs Hewitt been at ease with the instrument it would have been a lengthy and expensive business, since she had to telephone first to the main reception of the hospital, then get the call put through to Sister’s office and then wait while Kathy was fetched. But Mrs Hewitt had made the long cross-country trek from Norfolk to Liverpool twice. On the first occasion she had put up at a guesthouse but on her second visit Sarah Kelling had insisted that she spend the night in Kathy’s old room in Daisy Street. Kathy did not know what the two women had talked about after they returned from their hospital visiting, but she did know that friendship had blossomed between the two mothers as well as between herself and Betty, and was glad of it. She meant to accept Betty’s invitation to visit as soon as she was well enough, but looking ruefully at her thin, wasted legs, she doubted that she would manage it for a good few months to come. Still, now she was home, she could practise her walking skills, with and without the crutches, five or six times a day; surely if she did that, she would begin to improve more rapidly?
Her mother, popping back into the room, put an end to her musings. ‘It ain’t time for dinner yet, but I baked last night so if you could fancy a cup of Bovril and a nice thick round of me homemade bread, that should keep you satisfied for the next hour or so,’ Mrs Kelling said cheerfully. ‘Oh, queen, it’s grand to have you home, so it is. I didn’t say a word to Billy so it’ll be such a wonderful surprise to find you here when he comes in from school. I know he’s a big feller now and he’s not had a fit . . . oh, for years, but I reckon he’ll be chuffed to bits to have his sister home.’
‘I love being home, of course I do, but I’m hoping that I shan’t be here all that long,’ Kathy said presently, sipping her Bovril. ‘There must be jobs I can do in the WAAF as soon as my legs are strong enough. Oh, I know that balloons are out of the question now, but there must be
something
I can do!’
For Kathy, the months that followed seemed to last for ever, but at the end of May she was on leave at the Hewitts’ farm in Norfolk, having her first taste of country living. She had started work with the WAAF once more, though she was doing a desk job which suited her physical condition better than a more active role would have done. She had been posted to Coltishall, which was a bare twenty miles or so from Horsey, and had been grateful for the warm welcome the Hewitts offered her whenever she had leave which was not long enough for the return trip to Liverpool. Their warmth and friendliness was such that she no longer felt she had to let them know when she would be arriving but simply turned up, sure of her welcome and knowing that Betty, in particular, loved to have her company and her help around the house.
Now, the Hewitts and Kathy were having their elevenses when the door opened and the postman came in, chucking three or four letters on to the table but refusing the cup of tea which Mrs Hewitt offered. ‘I’m suffin’ awful late,’ he said apologetically, ‘so I dussn’t stop, do I’ll get wrong. See you tomorrow, missus.’ The door swung noisily shut behind him.
Kathy’s eyes were turned, irresistibly, towards the letter on the top of the pile. It bore a foreign stamp and looked as though it had spent many months on its journey, and the writing on the front was strange and spiky.
‘That come from abroad, judging by the stamp,’ Bob said, eyeing the envelope. ‘Go you on and open that ’un first, my woman, do I’ll be out of the place afore you’re halfway through the post.’
Betty obediently picked up the envelope, slit it open and pulled out the single sheet which it contained. She glanced at it and her face turned first red and then white, her hand going to her throat. ‘Thass from our Alec,’ she whispered, and Kathy saw that tears were running down her cheeks. ‘He’s alive! He’s alive and being helped by a marvellous family, though he daren’t say no more than that in case the letter gets intercepted. He say he’s going to give the letter to a chap who’s travelling to Spain and could post it there for him, just to let us know he’s still alive. He say we’re to tell Kathy.’ She smiled tremulously at the younger woman, tears quivering on her lashes, then turned back to her husband. ‘Oh, Bob, oh, Bob, I know I always said he weren’t dead, but there’s been times . . .’
Kathy sat there like a statue whilst husband and wife hugged and Betty wept and Bob tried to grin, though his mouth trembled. She felt tears slide down her own cheeks but was aware of a tremendous glow of happiness which seemed to warm her all through. He was alive! Nothing mattered but that fact.
Betty turned to her and gathered her into her arms and Bob hugged the pair of them, saying thickly that this was the best thing that had happened in his whole life. ‘I never knew no one could cry for joy,’ he said gruffly. ‘Well, I’ve heered as folk do but I never believed it afore today.’
Later, of course, when they had sobered down, it occurred to them to look at the postmark, for the letter itself was undated. The letter had, indeed, been a long while on its travels but no one was pessimistic enough to mention all the things which could have happened to Alec in the interim. They simply rejoiced that he was safe and would, in due course, return to them.
After their first excitement was over, everyone returned to work. Kathy was still on her crutches, but did not need them inside the house provided she could hang on to the furniture. This very morning, she had concocted and carried out to the pigsty, one by one and with considerable difficulty, two buckets of pigswill. It had meant frequent stops as she manoeuvred herself along, on her crutches, the bucket of pigswill swaying dangerously. But six months ago I wouldn’t have been able to reach the sty empty-handed, let alone carrying the swill, she reminded herself, watching the two enormous sows, Sandra and Belinda, guzzling the food as though they had not eaten for a week. I am getting better; in fact, if it wasn’t for the way my legs ache after I’ve done a bit of walking, you’d never know they’d both been broken. She glanced down at them, hating their thinness and the shape of them. I don’t suppose my shin bones can possibly straighten, she thought ruefully, but I don’t mind that if only they’ll let me walk normally one day.
Having fed the pigs, she turned back to the house. Her left leg dragged a bit – it was the weaker of the two – but she was sure this particular affliction would pass in time. She was longing for Alec to come home, of course she was, but she was determined to stay away from him until she was completely fit. She was well aware that in the time which had passed since they had last met, his feelings towards her might have changed. After all, she had done her best to alienate him completely when they had last spoken. If he chose to find himself another girl – a strong and healthy one – then she could scarcely blame him. Yet he had asked his mother to let her know that he was safe. Surely that must mean something?