Authors: June Gadsby
‘I think, Ferguson,’ Mary said, looking the girl directly in the eye, ‘that you’ll have to find that out for yourself.’
The next morning everyone was up earlier than usual, most of the girls complaining that they hadn’t slept a wink all night because of the
excitement
of being posted and wondering just exactly what they would be doing in a few days, and where.
After breakfast, which they hardly touched, their appetites cut by anticipation, there came a fluctuation of moods as the postings were given out. Not all the girls were happy with their lot. Kate Holland and Alice Leatherby were to be billeted in Northampton and were to drive ambulances, while Sally Ferguson was to go back to Yorkshire, where she would drive for the big brass officers. A few were given postings in Plymouth and Liverpool, but the rest, they were informed, would go to London, where help was needed more than anywhere else in Britain.
‘Just to make sure, I’ll read out the names allocated to our London postings,’ the officer in charge said, having to raise her voice to be heard over the sudden burst of conversation and girlish giggles. The list was long and she read it alphabetically, Mary’s name coming next to last.
‘Hey, what about me, then?’
There was a subdued groan as a gruff voice called out from the back of the crowded training hall. Mary turned her head, but couldn’t see Effie, whose voice it was. The CO looked slightly ruffled and waited patiently for a lull, watching incredulously as the tiny figure of Effie Donaldson pushed her way through to the front.
‘I have read out every name on this list,’ said the CO. ‘You must have missed yours. Weren’t you listening?’
‘Aye, I was, and you never mentioned us.’
‘Us? There are more of you?’ The CO was getting decidedly hot under the collar and glancing about for support.
‘No, just me, but ye didn’t mention us,’ Effie insisted.
‘She’s right, ma’am,’ Mary stepped forward and took up position at Effie’s side. ‘And the word “us” is just her way of talking. It … it’s like dialect. It’s the way some Geordies say “me”.’
‘Goodness gracious, whatever next?’ The CO turned back to Effie. ‘What is your name, girl?’
‘Effie Donaldson,’ Effie told her, puffing out what little chest she had. ‘And I
am
a FANY, just like this lot here. I’ve got all me papers and that.’
The officer searched the list in front of her, reading the names under her breath as her finger traced each one in turn.
‘Charlton, Crow, Dawson … ah … Donaldson, Eunice? But I called out that name. Didn’t you reply? I’ve got you ticked.’
‘But I’m not Donaldson, Eunice, miss … er … ma’am.’ Effie pouted and her eyes shrank to slits. ‘I’m Donaldson, Effie.’
The older woman’s eyes returned to the list, then widened
perceptively
as her finger stabbed the page. ‘I see! There are two Donaldsons. I must have missed one.’
‘Aye. That’s what I thought, an all.’
‘Donaldson … oh, but this is Donaldson, Euphemia…?’
A loud sniff emanated from Effie and she stared down at the toes of her brown leather brogues, which were already scuffed and lacking in polish.
‘Aye, well, me mam called us that. She had fancy ideas. But everybody calls us Effie.’
‘I see … yes, well …’ the CO cleared her throat loudly and folded away her list. ‘Donaldson … Effie … you are to go to London too. There is a great need for messengers around the dockland area.’
‘Gawd, that’s a bit too near the bliddy Jerries for my liking.’
There was a titter of laughter, well hidden behind hands and disguised by polite coughs and sneezes, but even the CO was having difficulty
keeping
a straight face.
‘That’s one way of putting it, Donaldson,’ she said. ‘I’m sure you will carry out your duties with the utmost efficiency. Having seen the way you ride that motorcycle of yours, I do believe you could easily dodge any bomb that came your way.’
For the first time, Mary saw Effie really smile, then the smile became a grin and the girl looked almost happy. She turned and gripped Mary’s arm, then punched Iris’s shoulder, making her wince with pain.
‘Did ye’s hear that? I’m comin’ to London wi’ ye’s. Eeh, do ye think we’ll get to see the King and Queen?’
As it turned out, the girls were sent home on a forty-eight hour pass to allow them to spend some time with their families, but Effie opted not to take advantage of this. She went off on her motorbike, a canvas
haversack
on her back containing her dress uniform and some spare
under-clothes
, saying she was going directly to London. She wanted to make sure she saw Big Ben and Buckingham Palace before the Germans dropped bombs on them.
‘See youse down there, mebbe,’ she told Mary and Iris as she roared off in a black cloud of exhaust fumes.
‘Good luck, Effie!’ Mary called after her.
‘She’s crazy,’ Iris said with a shake of her head.
‘Maybe that’s not such a bad thing,’ Mary said. ‘I sort of envy her, you know? I wish I had her courage.’
Two days later Mary and Iris met again at the station. There was a brisk wind blowing in from the north, driving rain clouds before it, so that there were periods of sunshine alternating with showers and no real warmth to the day.
Or was the cold shiver that kept running amok through Mary’s body simply a case of nerves, she wondered? She hadn’t felt too badly about going down to London, until her parents heard about it. Her father had been characteristically silent and broody, but her mother was distraught and pleaded with her not to go.
‘I have to go, Mum. I’ve joined up for the duration. How would it look if I backed out now?’
Jenny West was not persuaded. Unlike her husband, the West family pride was less important than having her girls safe at home.
‘We might never see you again, Mary,’ she said. ‘If the Germans do invade, London’s the first place they’ll head for. They shouldn’t be
sending
innocent young girls to places like that. It … it’s criminal, that’s what it is.’
‘Mam, I volunteered,’ Mary said, trying to sooth her mother’s fears. ‘We all did. The FANYs are a wonderful bunch of people. I would hate to let them down by letting them think that I don’t have what it takes. Besides, for the first time in my life I really feel as if I’m doing something worthwhile.’
‘Why don’t you ask them to let you stay up here in the north-east? Let them send somebody else to London.’
‘I’m not the only one going, Mam,’ Mary told her. ‘Anyway, I’ve never felt so passionate about anything in my life.’
‘You could help your country here, where you belong, down at the munitions factory, or back at your old job with the Pensions Office.’
‘Yes, Mam,’ said Mary, thinking how boring it would be making nuts and bolts or inking in ledgers day after day, and being constantly on the
alert for the few men left at home who thought they were the answer to every woman’s prayer because men were in such short supply.
The station porter’s call of “all aboard” and his final whistle jerked Mary back to consciousness. Iris was gripping her arm, squeezing it tightly.
‘Do you think it’s too late to change our minds, Mary?’ she whispered as the train gave a few short jolts forward, then stopped again. ‘Look, we could jump off right now, if we wanted to. You don’t want to, do you, Mary?’
‘No, I don’t, Iris Morrison!’ Mary scolded her. ‘And neither do you, so don’t say such daft things.’
‘I’m not sure that it’s daft. Up here in the north it’s dangerous enough driving around ferrying medical supplies and patients, without having to do it in the London black-out.’
‘I don’t think …’ Mary started to tell her friend that she didn’t think things would be as bad as the newspapers reported, but she stopped at the sight of a figure racing down the platform. ‘Goodness me, I do believe they’re holding up the train for her!’
‘Who?’ Iris leaned over Mary to see whom she was referring to.
Anne Beasley, her newly styled blonde hair disarranged as she ran, cap in hand, followed by a red-faced porter carrying her heavy baggage, reached their carriage and hauled herself in, pulling in her valise after her and throwing the porter a few coins for his trouble.
‘Oh, hello!’ She let an elderly gentleman help her push her valise up on to the luggage rack, then fell into the seat opposite Mary, breathlessly blowing out her cheeks. ‘What a coincidence! You going down to your London posting, are you? Jolly good. Me too!’
‘Yes,’ Mary said, eyeing Anne’s insignia. ‘I see you’re a lieutenant now. Congratulations.’
Anne gave a short laugh. ‘Daddy fixed it. It’s a jolly good thing to have a father who’s a brigadier and a brother who’s a major. Alfred got his promotion last month.’
‘Very useful,’ Iris remarked through gritted teeth, and studied her toes with a tight grimace.
‘She’s not going to be sick or anything dreadful, is she?’ Anne asked, indicating Iris with a jerk of her chin.
‘Of course not,’ Mary said, hoping that she was right, because Iris did, in fact, look rather pale.
Happily, Iris was not sick, but she remained silent for most of the
journey
and Mary suspected that she had been quite serious about wanting to
get off the train. And to be honest, though she didn’t like to admit it to her friend, she too had felt a rise of panic as the train started off. It was like going on a journey to the unknown where danger awaited them in many guises. She wondered whether Anne’s careless bravado was genuine or merely a camouflage for how she really felt. Or, Mary wondered, watching the pretty blonde girl from her childhood, would she still be the bossy but naïve girl she had always been? She was now, after all, an
officer
, even if she had arrived at that level with little or no real experience.
The train shrieked as it pulled into King’s Cross Station. Carriage doors banged as they were flung open. There was the sound of whistles blowing, steam hissing, metal clanking and, horror of horrors, the wail of an air-raid siren.
‘Oh, not already!’ Iris complained as they joined the crowds of
travellers
stampeding out of the station and dashing down behind sandbags and into air-raid shelters like rabbits diving into burrows.
Mary and Iris dived with them, and the ground shook beneath them as bombs fell on London. They had become separated from Anne the minute they got off the train. Mary shouted to the girl to go with them, but Anne simply stared back with a blank expression and didn’t move.
‘I should have grabbed her and brought her with us,’ Mary said, as much to herself as to Iris.
‘Who are you talking about?’
‘Anne Beasley. I thought she was just being snobbish and stubborn, but now I’m not so sure. I think, maybe, she was scared.’
‘I know I am,’ Iris said in a hoarse whisper and she stuffed her fingers in her ears as another explosion rocked the whole shelter.
Shards of wood and stone showered down on their heads. The
temporary
lighting in the shelter stopped working and they were plunged into darkness, except for the glowing ends of cigarettes. Women screamed, children cried, men shouted, but until the lights came back on nobody could do anything.
Five minutes passed, then everything went quiet. The lights were restored as the all-clear sounded, loud and jubilant. Outside, people were rushing here and there, or moving in dazed slow motion. Ambulances screamed and fire-engines jangled as they raced about the urgent business of rescuing the injured and dowsing the flames leaping from a variety of buildings.
‘Well, don’t just sit there, you two! What do you think those uniforms stand for, eh?’
The old woman next to Mary was glaring at her angrily.
‘What’s she getting at?’ Iris said in a shaky voice as she brushed herself down, raising clouds of dust.
‘You’re soldiers of a sort, aren’t you?’ the woman went on, and others in the shelter turned to look at the two uniformed girls.
‘She’s right,’ Mary told Iris. ‘We’re here to help people.’
‘But, we’re not on duty yet …’
‘Does it matter? Come on. Let’s see what’s to be done, then we’ll try and find our way to our billets.’
‘Go on then,’ Iris said. ‘You first.’
As they stumbled over a jumble of sandbags and rubble, Mary caught sight of Anne Beasley. The girl was curled up, just inside the entrance of the railway station, her hands over her ears, her eyes tightly shut and her face crunched up into a fearful mask.
Mary had been right. Officer or not, Anne Beasley was terrified. The training they had received had not really prepared any of them for the real thing and, Mary suspected, this initiation into the day-to-day life of wartime London was only the tip of the iceberg. She had an awful
feeling
that from now on it was going to get very much worse.
The fear in Anne’s eyes when she looked up to see who was tugging at her arm quickly turned to humiliation.
‘Come on, Anne,’ Mary said, ignoring the fact that she was addressing an officer. ‘There are people who need our help.’
‘I … I can’t …’ Anne was stuttering, her whole body quivering.
‘You haven’t even tried yet.’ Mary was aware that she sounded hard and unsympathetic, but she knew that if she treated Anne with gentleness the girl might collapse altogether. ‘Come on. Iris, take her other arm and let’s get her to her feet.’
‘Helping your own first, are you?’ The same old woman clambered by them, unaided, though there was blood pouring from a cut in her
forehead
. ‘You’re a right good example, aren’t you?’
They ignored her and got Anne upright and walking. The street was a mass of smoky rubble. The ARP wardens were already on the job, as were the Red Cross and the police. Mary approached a warden and asked what had happened.
‘A couple of sticks of bombs got us, miss,’ he told her. ‘Bloody Gerry was probably looking for the airfield and got lost.’
A burly police sergeant pointed a thick finger at the three girls as they emerged into the late afternoon sunshine and bawled at them in a loud voice.
‘Here! You lot there. You’re FANYs, aren’t you? Well, get your bloody
fannies moving. You can take the walking wounded to the first-aid posts. That’s them, over there.’