Gunner Girls and Fighter Boys (26 page)

May was inexplicably disappointed. Pat, for all her faults, was one of the team now.

‘What about all your training?’

The girl shrugged. ‘I’ll be more use in the stores, and if you ever need anything, you just let me know!’ She winked and walked off in the direction of the stores.

‘I will!’ May called after her.

In stark contrast to the high drama of the previous night, May spent the morning on kitchen fatigues, scouring pots, her arms elbow-deep in greasy soda water. It seemed that even a heroine’s place was still in the kitchen.

After fatigues, she made her way to the infirmary. She’d heard that Emmy had been lucky, concussion and a broken collarbone. But the sight of her battered friend made her realize how close she’d come to losing her, and she gave her a relieved hug.

‘Blimey, May, you’re doing more damage than Gerry,’ Emmy said, wincing. Then she grinned. ‘Always a silver lining, though.’ She turned in the bed to get herself comfortable. ‘Guess where I’m going?’

‘Not home?’

Emmy stifled a painful laugh and nodded. ‘They said this’ll take weeks to heal. I’ve got early Christmas leave!’

‘You lucky so-and-so!’

But Emmy’s expression was serious and her usual flippant reply didn’t come. She took hold of May’s hand. ‘Wouldn’t have been lucky if it weren’t for you, May. Thanks, love.’

May spent half an hour with her friend, so it wasn’t until her off-duty hours that afternoon, when she was sewing her first stripe on to her uniform, that May remembered the letter from Peggy. After making sure the stripe wasn’t crooked, she fished the letter from her tunic pocket. It smelled of fire smoke and something indefinable. She put it to her nose. California Poppy! The sweetest smell in Bermondsey. It transported her back to Southwark Park Road and her sister’s tangled life.

The first paragraph was all about her mother. Mrs Lloyd was getting worse and one morning last week their father had been forced to go to London Bridge and bring her home. She’d decided she might as well stay there all day. But it was the second paragraph that caused May to let out a long groan.

Autumn 1941

The red siren suit was too revealing. Peggy stood in front of the mirror, looking at herself from the side, and tried tightening the belt, which only made her swelling stomach more obvious, at least to her. She would have to go back to wearing frocks at work, but the new utility styles were so ungenerous, with all excess folds and pleats forbidden, that soon she’d be showing even in dresses.

She had only told one person – her sister May – writing to her in the first sickening realization that she was pregnant. Perhaps she shouldn’t have, but she’d felt so alone, with Harry already posted to Southampton.

But although May was the only person Peggy had told, she wasn’t the only person who knew. Somehow Granny Byron had found out, using her own intuition and God only knew what other methods, a crystal ball for all Peggy could tell. Her grandmother had been waiting for her one evening, outside Atkinson’s, and Peggy had been so shocked to see her there, she’d assumed there’d been some sort of accident.

‘What’s happened?’ She’d rushed up to the incongruously colourful figure, with her hoop earrings and wide-brimmed feathered hat.

‘Nothing!’ Granny Byron had her arms folded, a large black handbag over one arm. ‘I’ve just been to see Mrs Tucker, up Alma Grove, bedridden now, poor old cow, so I do her a home reading now ’an again. I had a feeling I’d bump into you.’

Peggy was mystified. Her grandmother never came to see her at work.

‘Come for a drink with your old nan,’ she said and it was more a command than a request, as she led the way towards the Turk’s Head. The narrow old pub, with its Ottoman-looking cupola stuck incongruously atop one corner, stood on the corner of the alley leading to the factory and was a favourite drinking place for the Atkinson’s workers. She felt slightly embarrassed to be dragged in there by her grandmother. But Granny Byron liked a drink and insisted that she had been weaned on Guinness. Peggy knew that May sometimes asked their nan for a reading, but she never had. Perhaps she was less captivated than May by the Romany family heritage, failing to see how being born in a caravan had any merit at all.

But that evening Granny Byron bore out her claims to ‘the sight’. Taking a sip of the creamy-topped Guinness, wiping the foam from her top lip, putting the glass down deliberately and leaning forward over the large bag that sat in her lap, she asked, ‘How far gone are you then? Three months?’

‘Nan!’

Peggy looked swiftly round. She’d already spotted a few women from Atkinson’s, meeting their chaps here after work.

‘Keep your voice down. How do you know that? Did May tell you? Have you told anyone else?’ Peggy was panicking. She knew it had to come out, but not yet. She wasn’t ready.

‘May’s not said a word. I knew you was carrying on, ages ago. That didn’t take no crystal ball, what with your new clothes and your make-up, and gawd knows what. I’ve seen that look in a woman’s eyes before, when they come to me and want to know “Does he love me?” Weeks and weeks you’ve been miles away. Anyway, don’t matter how I found out you’re expecting. I’ve told no one. But before the balloon goes up, what I wanted to say to you is this…’ She tapped a tobacco-stained finger on the edge of the beer-shiny table. ‘You can always come to me. Don’t matter what your mother says, nor your father, nor George. If you need anything – you come to me.’

Peggy covered her face with her hand as she felt tears threaten. After a minute she drew her hand down, as if wiping away all trace of weakness.

‘That’s it, gel, you’re like me, tough as old boots. You’ll manage. Have you told the feller?’

Peggy shook her head.

‘Well, I don’t know as you’ll get any satisfaction there, love, but if you want to keep him as well as the baby, you’ll have a tussle on your hands with Wide’oh.’

Granny Byron always referred to George by the name he’d earned growing up.

‘He was never no good for you, love, you always give in to him too easily. But you might think twice about going it on your own. Look at me. I might as well not ever been married, for all the help I’ve had from my old man over the years. Still, at least I’ve lived me own life, he don’t get it all his own way.’ She paused, letting the comparison with Peggy’s marriage sink in. ‘I’m not saying it’ll be easy. It’s bloody hard work on your own, but something tells me you’d be better off.’

She got up, adjusting her wide-brimmed hat. ‘Don’t leave it too long before you tell ’em. It’s only worry making you feel sick.’

She bent down to kiss her granddaughter, the green plume of her hat falling forward, brushing against Peggy’s cheek.

‘Thanks, Nan,’ Peggy said, looking up into her creased old face. ‘I’m glad I’ve got you.’

*

Now, as she gazed at herself in the mirror, Peggy realized it was time to heed her grandmother’s advice and tell her parents. She suddenly felt a wave of nausea and dashed for the bathroom. Leaning her arms on the basin, she waited for the sickness to pass. It may have been morning sickness, but she suspected it was more the thought of telling her parents, and afterwards George, that was the cause this time. And yet she couldn’t regret what had happened. She’d lived an entire lifetime in these past months with Harry. She’d felt every emotion from ecstasy to despair, and she knew that her life up until this point had been only half lived. She had not thought of getting rid of the baby; the only question was whether she’d have to bring it up alone. For Harry didn’t know she was expecting his child and there was no guarantee he would want to take them both on when he came home –
if
he came home. He’d had a couple of brief leaves since going to Southampton and she didn’t know if he’d get another before he sailed for North Africa. For now, all she had left of him were the memory of his bright eyes and the child growing inside her. Fruit of her war, waiting, like an unexploded bomb, to blow her family apart.

She sighed and pulled on the new frock, which had taken almost all her coupons. A green print, with a blouse collar and a too-tight belt at the waist that would soon have to be let out. She’d made her decision. Today would be the day she told her parents and she would do it before her visit to George this afternoon. She spent the morning at work with a stomach screwed into knots. She’d finally been transferred to real war work, only to find that it consisted of stamping serial numbers on to metal plane parts. What the numbers meant she had no idea, but the works’ manager assured them that those numbers were vital to the war effort. The task was repetitive and far duller than working on cosmetics, and she could have wished for a ladder or two to climb, just to keep her mind off the interview ahead. She knew that if only she had her parents’ support, if only they would stick by her, then she could face George. But without them, she doubted her courage could carry her through. As she stamped another number and then another on to the metal plates, she realized she didn’t fear that George would disown her; what she feared was that he wouldn’t.

*

‘You look pretty, love!’ her mother greeted her at the door. Peggy noticed the little suitcase standing in the passage, packed and ready for her night in the Underground.

They hadn’t seen a real raid in months, for London’s respite had been other cities’ misfortune as the German bombers turned their attention elsewhere in the country. But that hadn’t made much difference to Mrs Lloyd. Bermondsey still had plenty of false alarms and lightning tip-and-run raids, which gave her mother’s frayed nerves no real chance to heal, and she still insisted on sheltering in the Underground at night.

‘I get fed up of seeing you in those trousers all the time!’

‘I fancied a change.’ Peggy forced a smile.

‘We’ve just finished our dinner. Do you want something?’ Her mother seemed in a brighter mood, and Peggy wished she didn’t have to spoil it.

‘Just a cup of tea’ll do me.’

Her father was sitting in his usual after-dinner chair by the fire. Sleeves rolled up, contentedly puffing away on his pipe, matches to the ready on the arm of his chair, his bright smile when he greeted her was like a knife to the heart. This was the worst part of ‘living your own life’, as Granny Byron had called it, the hurting of those you loved in the process.

‘You all right, love? You’re doing too much if you ask me,’ he said, as she kissed him and sat down in the chair opposite. When Mrs Lloyd brought in the tea, Peggy hesitated. It was now or never.

‘I’ve got some news to tell you.’

They lifted eager faces.

‘I’m expecting.’

She saw a flash of joy on her mother’s face, such as she hadn’t seen since before Jack died. And then almost immediately, it faded, replaced by horror. Peggy looked at her father. He’d understood straight away and his expression, robbed of its earlier warmth, hardened. He stood up, without a word, and took down his coat from the hook at the back of the door. He went to walk past her mother, but stopped.

‘You’ve broke her heart, what she had left of it,’ he said, placing his hand on his wife’s shoulder, before walking out.

The two of them sat, in silence. Peggy wished that her father had shouted at her, shown any other emotion but the contempt written on his face. She, who had lived her life to fulfil their expectations, had succeeded only in destroying them in the worst possible way.

Her mother’s face was blank with shock. ‘Oh, Peg, how could you do this to poor George? He’s been so good to you.’

‘I met someone, Mum. It’s not just a fling – he means a lot to me.’

Her mother let out a small cry of impatience. ‘What’s that got to do with anything? George is your husband!’

She made it sound so simple, as if Peggy had no choice in the matter. As if there was a ration book for love, and she had exceeded her points in marrying George. To want anything else was not just greedy; it was illegal. Ironic really, as George was the one who’d grown up breaking every rule in the book, especially the one that governed rationing. She smiled grimly. George might have given her the best of furniture, all the latest appliances, but where her own heart was concerned it had been a utility marriage, stamped all the way through with the C41 mark, and now she would pay for wanting more – extra pleats, superfluous material, unnecessary frills. She found herself growing angry. Why shouldn’t she have the choice when it came to love?

‘Well, he might be my husband, but he’s not here, is he? And he was the one made the choice to nick the stuff. He never asked me, did he?’

It wasn’t what she’d meant to say.

‘It’s nothing hundreds of others ain’t doing. And look how good he was to us, helping us find our Jack.’

Peggy couldn’t bear it, that she used this against her. ‘I don’t love him, Mum.’

‘He’s not a well man, Peg. This’ll finish him off – have you thought of that?’

How could she say that she hadn’t thought of anything at all, that it hadn’t been a matter of thought, none of it.

‘But what about me?’ Peggy’s voice rose, trying to penetrate the fortress of respectable objections.

‘Don’t you raise your voice to me. You’re the one in the wrong here. You better go and see if your husband will forgive you because I don’t think me or your dad ever will.’

Letting the door click shut behind her, Peggy stood on the front step of her one-time home, panic tightening her chest. Yet she feared that this was only the smallest of tremors, nothing compared to the direct blast that was to come. There was no turning back; she might as well wish all the bomb damage around her undone. Her life was about to become one of the ruins and she only hoped that, somehow, there would be a way to salvage whatever was precious in it.

*

The journey to Brixton this week was straightforward – no unexploded bombs, no delays – which was ironic, as today she wished the journey might go on forever, so that she never had to get off the bus or face George. But all too soon the tall chimneys of the prison rose up, black against a leaden sky, and she filed through the entrance with all the other visitors. She’d witnessed emotional scenes in the visitor room before now and had always looked away, pretended not to see and hear when domestic dramas had played out in full painful view. Today it would be her turn. She had rehearsed a thousand times what she would say, yet sitting opposite him now there seemed only one way, and without preamble she spoke.