After the Storm (50 page)

She was licking her spoon and Annie saw strawberries against her white teeth. Her gold charm bracelet clinked as she put the spoon back into the crystal bowl and scooped out some cream. Prue closed her eyes as she swallowed and there were faint freckles across her nose.

Annie grinned. ‘Not more strawberries surely, Prue? You’ll burst and I am not, definitely not, going to clear up the mess.’

Prue opened her eyes languidly and looked about them at the other tables, then back at Annie. ‘Do stop being boring, darling. The fly boys bring them in fresh every day just for us and I should hate them to feel that we did not appreciate their efforts; and who is that gorgeous man over there with Monica?’

Annie didn’t need to look; she knew it was Martin Edge who had come over with his battalion four days ago.

‘Nice, isn’t he?’ she grinned. ‘And I warn you that I shall remind you of the convoy’s zig-zagging and the storms if you eat very many more helpings. You’ve put all that weight on, you clot, and you were just talking of the new slim you the day before yesterday.’

‘That was then. I met the most divine man last night, darling, who said he likes a real armful, so much more womanly.’

Annie grinned as Prue finished the bowl and poured another coffee. She ran the cream over the back of the teaspoon which she held against the inner edge of the cup. It spread thickly over the surface and, when she drank, it left a white moustache on her upper lip until she dabbed at it with her napkin. Prue looked over at Annie, her eyes widely innocent as she set the napkin back beside her coffee cup.

‘Talking about self-indulgence, Miss Goody-Twoshoes, I
noticed you tucking into the salmon at Raffles last night and who was that major anyway?’

Touché
, Annie thought as she lit another cigarette, drawing the smoke deep into her lungs. She pushed away the silver cigarette-case, seeing the misting left by her finger.

Yes, she thought dryly and lifted her cup to Prue who smiled. Yes, who was the major? Someone she vaguely knew, someone to talk to and dance with. She had not liked the feel of his body as they danced past the Palm Court Orchestra and had missed Georgie and wondered where he was, if he was safe? And if he was safe, would he be so next week, next month? She narrowed her eyes against the sun and looked across as a car narrowly missed a rickshaw while a Chinese child ignored the ruction and offered to passers-by a chicken which flapped hopelessly as he held it upside down by the feet.

Sam Short had brought the letter. He had called in at the QA’s mess early this morning, suntanned and in shorts and had given her the white creased envelope which was soft and warm as she took it. Sam explained that Georgie had asked him to deliver the letter as she took it from him, eager and grateful; trying to think where she could take him for a coffee, a drink, but Australians were not allowed in the clubs because they were colonials, not Europeans. She burned with shame because she had not defied the rules and invited him anyway.

He had stood there in his hat with the strap beneath his chin, his eyes wry with amusement. He was off up-country anyway, he had said, making the clubs safe for you people to enjoy and she had put her hand on his arm. We’ll meet by the harbour, she replied, have a walk, then you can tell me how he really is, but he had shaken his head and smiled and his eyes had crinkled more on the left than the right where there was a healing scar.

He told that Georgie was fair dinkum and that they had been training together but that she must do what he says in the letter. I’m off to Penang he had said and the Japs are sure to come, Annie. He had stood there, his face in shade from his hat, his webbing and equipment hitched over his shoulder. His voice had grown suddenly urgent. Just do what he says, there’s a good girl.

She had watched as he sauntered down the steps then and merged into the bustle of the city and without waiting to reach
her room had peeled the flap of the letter back and she could see fingermarks on the envelope and hoped they were Georgie’s.

‘Penny for them, darling?’ Prue was shaking sugar on to another bowlful of strawberries and looking at her at the same time. Annie stubbed out the cigarette and caught Pruscilla’s look of distaste.

‘I’ve told you that I’ll stop smoking while you are eating as soon as you cut down on this appalling guzzling.’

Prue ignored her and took the letter which Annie handed over.

‘See what you think of this,’ Annie said.

November 1941

Central Provinces.

My darling love,

I’m writing this quickly and then sending it with Sam. I’m off to Burma. The Japs are getting active and we think they’ll go for Rangoon and maybe into India.

But I think they’ll also go for Malaya and Java and you too. Get out now. Go sick if you must but get to India. They treat prisoners badly. We’ve heard about them in China.

Come out my love, bring Prue. The C.O. is working on it too. I’ll keep you safe here. I love you. Just come out on the first ship.

I have to go. We’re moving out. My love always.

Georgie.

Annie watched as Prue scanned the letter once, then again and finally handed it back. Her hand was on the table, the sun glinted on the gold bracelet.

‘Well?’ asked Annie.

‘Look around you, darling. Does it look as though we’re in
any danger? Has anyone even hinted that we might not be safe and besides the fleet came in last night, just in case there should be any trouble. There’s a difference between us and the Chinese anyway. Europeans would not be treated in the same way, would they, should the impossible happen, which it won’t.’

Her plucked eyebrows were raised and there was a faint smile on her lips. Annie looked round at the elegant Europeans who sat as they had done for the last hundred years and would continue, it seemed, to do so for the next one hundred with not a hair out of place. But they were flesh and blood weren’t they, they would still bleed, just as the Chinese were doing? She shook her head to clear it of these thoughts, her irritation at Prue’s snobbery.

Singapore was taking precautions, she reasoned as she drew out another cigarette. The air-raid sirens went off each Saturday morning and searchlights still danced over the harbour at night but anyway everyone knew that the Japanese could not fly planes with their slant eyes, or so Mavis had said a few nights ago at the dance they had held; she had worn full evening dress and sipped champagne. It had been dry and delicious. Should slanted eyes prohibit flying, she wondered and rather doubted the sense of that sort of reasoning.

‘Why has he written it, then?’ she mused aloud.

Prue put down her spoon, her bowl empty. She rubbed her hands together. ‘That’s easy. He can’t get you to marry him any other way.’

Annie watched the rickshaw drivers and traders, coins glinting and clicking with each transaction and pencils waving as each chit for goods was signed.

‘Thought royalty were the only ones not to soil their hands with filthy ackers,’ she said to Prue who answered:

‘Let’s face it, darling. Here we are almost royalty. Look around, ducky: an awful lot of Indians and not many chiefs.’

Thank God that just this once Annie Manon is out there on top, Annie thought, trying to push Prue’s remark about Georgie away. How long was it since she had done any washing for herself or an evening without dancing until the early hours under crystal chandeliers?

‘So,’ Prue persisted. ‘So, why didn’t you marry Georgie after all the years of waiting, of missing? Then, when you could have married and stayed together, you didn’t.’

Annie collected her cigarette-case and lighter together, putting them into her bag. The lighter smelt of petrol and there was a smudge on the silver.

‘Annie, are you scared to commit yourself to anyone? Does it suit you to have him at arms length, there in the background to love and miss but not too close in case he manages to touch something inside you?’

She wouldn’t think about what Prue was saying. She talked too much, always she talked too much. She breathed deeply to release the tension in her stomach, in her shoulders.

‘Come on, Prue, shift yourself. Let’s go and admire the good old
Prince of Wales
, everyone else seems to be.’ Prue shook her head.

‘You’ll have to face it sometime, Annie Manon, whatever it is that comes between the two of you, because he’ll ask you again.’ Prue groaned as she pulled herself to her feet.

The sun was hot on Annie’s feet and the harbour was crowded and she pushed Georgie out of her mind, and Sarah too because the pain of her death had surfaced suddenly.

The
Prince of Wales
looked glamorous against the blue sky, strong and firm and all that was good about the Royal Navy. There was a buzz of well-being at the arrival of the Far East Fleet and the woman on Annie’s right was explaining breathlessly to her neighbour, ‘Nice to think she’s here, even though Singapore is invincible.’

‘Will you be at the dance tonight?’ Prue asked as she waved her gloved hand in front of her face to ward off the persistent flies.

Annie shook her head, she felt irritated now, off balance and confused. She could not forget his letter and she opened her bag and fingered it. Where was he, she thought again, was he safe and how could she leave when no one else was worried?

The air-raid sirens woke Annie four nights later, on Sunday. She heard the wail through her sleep; Don’s watch said it was four in the morning, for God’s sake, had the ARP wardens gone mad practising at this time of night? She walked across the cold tiled floor and looked from the window at the street lamps lighting the road below and at the searchlights sweeping the sky. She was tired and walked back towards the bed, then heard the guns thump and the dull drone of aeroplanes. Then there were the crashes and bangs of bombs and her room shook as she
clutched at the bed. She threw herself to the floor, her hands pressed to her ears but the vibrations shook the building and she felt and heard the explosions even though she was trying not to. Nothing was stable and she could smell the smoke and feel the rug beneath her where it was damp from her dribble of fear.

Oh God, oh God, my love, you were right, she moaned and she knew she was talking aloud because her lips were opening and shutting against the rug and her breath was puffing back up into her face.

She pulled herself upright, switched on the radio but it was only playing dance music, then she crawled to the wardrobe, pulled on her uniform and staggered into Monica’s room where together they watched the flames from the go downs as they burst into the air and the smoke and noise and dust as Singapore exploded into small pieces.

When the all-clear sounded they stumbled across to the wards. Prue was on night duty and her hair was damp from sweat, her face tense from the effort of calming the patients. Matron sent Annie to the Resuscitation Ward and, all day, casualties were brought in and it was as though Tom was here again, smelling of shock. She washed them down as she had done the pitmen, cleared them of dust and black grease, smelling the smoke in their hair and on their clothes along with the shock. They worked for the next thirty-six hours with six hours off in small bursts and at the end they picked their way over the rubble past Robinson’s, which had been hit, to Raffles where they were to meet the Andertons to celebrate the entry of America into the war.

They sipped drinks from glasses that were chilled and misty just as always, as though there had been no bombing, no death, no dust, no fear. Servants replenished their drinks and the talk was gentle and not concerned with war. Annie ran her finger up and down the glass and heard but did not listen to Prue’s chatter as she watched the big red sun go down and wondered how Americans could help hold the Japs back when they were not here.

She had learnt Georgie’s letter by heart now and knew he had been right, knew by the fear stirring in her body, making her hands go cold but she could not leave now, not with the patients coming in every minute, including military casualties
dribbling in from up-country. Casualties in khaki with drawn secret faces. And this must be only the beginning.

She eased back her head and rubbed her neck, looking round at the women in smart hats and immaculate make-up. She and Prue should return soon, Matron would need them. She listened for a moment more to talk of the tennis draw and how inconvenient this unpleasantness was and why didn’t the boys clear it up at once. So, she thought, talk had veered over to the problem and that was at least a start.

Mavis said, ‘The boys are fighting the Japs up-country and they are obviously not trying hard enough, they should have been pushed into the sea by now. They are such small people.’

Annie rose and walked back to the ward, leaving Prue to follow in her own time. She did not belong to those people, did not belong to their irritation over tennis niceties. She belonged here: taking blood pressures, checking drips, soothing Chinese who could speak a little English, Tamils who had burns from the dock fires and never complained when the dressings stuck, Europeans who were stoic. She was busy and glad of it.

The black-out was in force now, she wrote to Georgie, wondering if the letter would get out on any boat and if it did, whether it would find him.

The
Prince of Wales
was sunk and the mess fell quiet at the news. Nurses prepared more bandages and cut tattered clothes from damaged bodies as the bombing continued that night and every night.

She was too tired to feel shock but the fear was still there, fear which made her feel sick and weak because they were hearing the stories which came back with the men. And what about Georgie, was he tattered too like one of these men that she nursed?

Air-raid practices went on when the bombing paused, but were not supported because they clashed with the tennis tournament. Tension together with tiredness drew deep lines around her mouth and hammered pain across her forehead. The stench from bomb-damaged drains hung amongst the dust and made her want to vomit as she gave inoculations against typhoid.

She took Prue to coffee at Robinson’s when Matron gave them an hour off, two weeks after the bombing had begun, but Penang had fallen and refugees sat at all the tables so they
walked back to the hospital past a team that were digging for bodies, past trenches that were dug in parks, on sports grounds, past crashed aircraft and a school which they could hear rehearsing for the nativity play which was to be held on Christmas Eve at the end of the week.