Churchill’s Angels (37 page)

A figure stood outside, fist raised to bang again. ‘Petrie? Good. Phone for you, Ops office.’ The messenger, whoever he was, turned and ran, and Daisy followed.

A telephone call? When had she last had a … oh, please don’t let it be bad news.

She was breathless when she reached the office that was the heart of the station. Two uniformed airmen were busy at desks but the black telephone on the table in front of the window had its receiver firmly in place. Daisy’s face must have expressed her feelings, for one of the airmen looked and smiled. ‘He’s ringing back, ma’am, about …’ and at that moment the telephone rang.

The airmen gestured for Daisy to answer it.

She did. ‘Hello,’ she said tentatively.

‘Hello, Daisy, how are you? Tomas here.’

Oh, such relief to hear her friend’s voice. ‘Tomas? Where are you?’

‘Home,’ he said, which told her exactly nothing. ‘Daisy, I’m sorry I didn’t keep my promise. I have been a little busy.’

What could she say? It was impossible to ask questions with two airmen hearing every word she said. ‘It’s all right.’

‘Are you going home for Christmas?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then let me take you out to dinner on Christmas Eve.’

Christmas Eve. Family tradition meant that the Petries went to the Midnight Service on Christmas Eve. ‘I go to church on Christmas Eve – in Dartford.’

‘We could have dinner first, Daisy, and I will explain everything. Please say yes.’

‘Yes.’

‘I will be in touch. Good night, Daisy.’

‘Good night.’

The sound of silence hummed along the wires and Daisy quietly replaced the receiver, thanked the room’s occupants, and went back to her billet.

How she wished that there had been more time to talk. She realised that she had agreed to have dinner with Tomas on Christmas Eve. Would he want her to meet him somewhere in the centre of the town? What if he wanted to meet her at the flat? She was not ashamed of her home – her parents had furnished it very nicely and it was scrupulously clean – but she worried about her mother’s reaction when she told her, as she would have to do, that she would not be at home for tea on Christmas Eve but would be dining out with a Czechoslovakian pilot. At least he was not an aristocrat; at least she thought he was not. Daisy, however, knew that a gentleman like Tomas would expect to meet a girl at her home, to introduce himself to her parents. Oh, please don’t let this be a nightmare. Let Mum be so involved with George that she forgets to worry about Czechoslovaks. And why didn’t Tomas come here to the station to have dinner with me? Where would he be staying on Christmas Eve? In Dartford? That was it. It was obvious, was it not, that Tomas was planning to spend Christmas with the Humbles?

During the next few weeks she flew several missions, twice ferrying planes and three times ferrying RAF pilots. Like every other ATA pilot she treasured her small ring-binder with its sheaf of notes on the idiosyncrasies of the different types of planes in the various classes. She wondered if she would ever get used to finding herself expected to safely fly a plane that she not only had never flown before but also had never actually seen before. In a perfect world there would have been hours of instruction in every type of aircraft but this was not a perfect world.

To her great surprise, for he was not the usual family writer, Fred wrote of how proud he was of his ‘little girl’.

A girl, and one half the size of a pint at that, flying a blooming great plane. As your dad I would have wished for a easy life for you, pet, but, again as your dad, I have to say as how my heart beats loud with such pride in you, and Rose too, working hard as a man in that factory. We saw changes after the Great War, women doing work side by side with lads, but we never thought anything like this would come. If I was to see you flying a plane my heart would jump into my mouth with fear and it’d never get back in place but I am the proudest dad in Dartford and always will be. Young George is pulling more than his weight. He’s good company for your mam and is begging me to teach him to drive. No word of his father – good riddance, I say – and George doesn’t ask. I never thought my Flora could part with our Ron’s things but she’s making over everything that’s suitable for young George, and his coupons have gone for new shoes and winter boots. He’s drawing a picture of you in a plane. Don’t know nothing about art but I can see it’s a plane and you’re in it so that’s good, right?

She folded the letter carefully and put it away with her other treasures.

A few days later Tomas telephoned again. ‘Daisy, do you know Hythe Street in Dartford?’

‘Yes.’

‘Good, there is a restaurant there, Frederick Comber’s restaurant, number eighty-seven. You know this?’

‘I have never eaten there, Tomas, but yes, I know where it is.’

‘Good, but you have not eat the food.’

‘No, but I’m sure it will be as good as any other restaurant – there are shortages everywhere.’

‘I know, but I want something nice for you. There is also a hotel named The Bull Hotel, and this is on the High Street. You know this place?’

‘Not really, although I must have passed it a thousand times.’

‘In Prague or even London I would know, but Dartford I do not know.’

Daisy smiled. As if she cared about the restaurant, but it was rather nice that Tomas wanted it to be special. ‘Tomas, it is going to be very nice sitting down and having a chat without hurrying or running out of pennies.’

‘You are kind, Daisy, and so we say then the first one. I will find it but the time is very scarce and so will you meet me there? This is rude, I know, but—’

She was relieved and interrupted him. ‘That will be very nice, Tomas.’

‘Nice? I can scarcely believe I ask such a thing and what my father would have said I shudder to think. But please believe it is not bad manners that make this necessary. Of course, I will deliver you home safely or to your church, whichever is more convenient.’

‘It’s quite all right, Tomas. It will be lovely to see you. Comber’s should be easy for you to find as the buildings opposite, really an engineering works, have been camouflaged to look like a row of terraced houses.’ She thought for a moment, ‘Well, from the air, that is.’

‘But I do not fly, Daisy,’ he said, and she liked the sound of his laughter. ‘I will find.’

Daisy wondered whether or not she could ask her next question and then decided to go ahead; much depended on his answer. ‘Tomas, will you be staying with Alf and Nancy?’

‘Yes. That is a problem?’

‘No. It’s just that, this year, I think I told you, we’re having real English ham for our Christmas dinner, and I thought, if you had air force business in Dartford, perhaps you would like to have a meal with my family.’

‘Oh, dear Daisy, how you are thoughtful but no, I must refuse your very generous offer. Alf has asked me to stay for the few days of my leave. They are very kind; I think that maybe for them I am a connection with …’

‘Adair.’ Daisy was amazed by how calm she sounded. ‘Alf told me Nancy thought of him as the son she never had.’

‘Yes, it is so very sad. But I must not talk more and return to work. I look forward so much to Christmas Eve.’

Daisy hurried away from the call box through the sleet and the biting wind. Christmas Eve, almost a year since … She stopped and two other women ran past her, yelling out, ‘Come on, Petrie, you’ll catch your death out here.’

That brought her to her senses and she waved even though they could not see and hurried after them, desperately hoping that there was nothing on the pavement for her to fall over.

The billet was warm, the blindingly hot pipe that carried the smoke from the fire out through the roof sending comforting warmth into every corner of the rather basic room.

‘Going home for Christmas, Daisy?’ asked one of the girls, handing her a mug of hot cocoa. ‘Lucky duck. I’m on this year but if I’m up on Christmas Eve, I fully expect to encounter jolly Old Saint Nick.’

The girls spent the next few hours talking nonsense but having relaxing fun, and Daisy, after a few minutes of worrying, joined in and found that her colleagues laughed with her just as they did with one another.

How wonderful it was to be a small part of this wonderful group.

A few weeks later, she walked home through the streets of Dartford, carrying her case and her carrier with its carefully chosen Christmas presents, which she had wrapped as artistically as she could in old newspapers. As she walked she looked out for a stand selling sprigs of holly. Holly, if she was lucky, complete with red berries, would make the parcels beautiful.

She had alerted no one to her arrival and so there was no one at the station to meet her. It was more difficult than ever to judge accurately when trains would be leaving or arriving these days, or even whether there would be a train at all. Daisy was determined not to think of events or realities that made her unhappy. Tomorrow, Wednesday, was Christmas Eve, and she was going out to dinner with someone she liked very much. She would think of that.

Everything was perfect. It was cold and bracing, but not raining and there was no horrid fog. She was lucky enough to find a stall that sold not only holly with berries, but also some mistletoe, and Daisy bought a few bunches of each. She bumped into old school friends, and customers of her parents’ shop but, seeing how burdened she was, everyone seemed content merely to exchange happy seasonal greetings.

Her parents, Miss Partridge and George were busy in the shop. She watched them for a few minutes, remembering, for the first time, Dr Fischer’s comment about how one day she might be glad to have simple pleasures to enjoy.

How right you are, dear Dr Fischer. She wondered where the elderly man was and hoped his Christmas was happy.

And then her father looked up from his work and saw her. ‘It’s our Daisy,’ he sang out as, George beside him, they ran to the door, ‘home for Christmas.’

The evening was perfect. A letter, would Daisy believe, had been received from Phil. It had been written weeks, even months, before, but it was wonderful to be able to read it. He was, he said, as brown as a nut, and much discussion had obviously gone on already about where his ship might be or have been. And then, just after Rose had arrived home, tired, hungry and rather dirty, an envelope was almost reverently taken down from behind the clock. Inside was a Christmas card from Sam. The same Italian priest who had kindly translated the Italian greeting had delivered the card. Of course it said ‘Happy Christmas’, but written under it in Sam’s handwriting was, ‘See you soon
.
’

It was well into Christmas Eve before they went off to bed, still wondering about exactly what Sam had meant.

‘Where’s Daisy?’ Fred looked at his wife’s face and saw signs of recent tears. ‘What is it, love? Where’s our Daisy?’

‘Don’t you remember? She told us last night, but I were that thrilled with hearing from my lads, I didn’t really take it in. She’s gone out to dinner – dinner, mark you – with that Czechoslovakia pilot, Thomas something.’

‘Well, well, well. Isn’t that nice, love? Sounds posh, off to dinner.’

Flora got up out of her chair where she had been sewing pretty glass buttons on the cardigan she had knitted as Daisy’s Christmas present. ‘Sorry, Fred, your tea’s keeping warm in the oven.’

‘Nice buttons,’ said Fred approvingly as he walked into the kitchen and took his usual seat.

Flora held up the cardigan. ‘Come off a blouse I found in the sale at the church last month. Quite pleased with them, I am, and the wool’s almost the same colour as that boy’s scarf she wears with everything.’

Flora had folded the cardigan up neatly and moved it away from any danger from her shepherd’s pie. She put a plate down, saying as always, ‘Watch it, it’s hot,’ and sat down across the table from him. ‘That’s why I weren’t happy this fellow turning up tonight, Fred. It were the holidays last year when she really got herself involved with the boy from the Old Manor family, and won’t seeing this friend bring it all back?’

Fred sniffed his pie appreciatively, ‘What you got in here today, love, fillet steak?’

As he had hoped, his wife laughed. ‘O’course, but it came disguised in a Spam tin.’ She waited while he finished one forkful and took another. ‘Rose told me he were here looking for her last Christmas. The other lad were still alive then, the English lad …’

Fred was rapidly losing his appetite. ‘Flora, there weren’t nothing underhand in that; he were here on military business and thought he’d say hello to a friend. Maybe this year he come special, maybe he were at the crypt. Alf says lads come regular, those that Adair whats-hisname taught or flew with, just paying their respects.’ He returned his attention to his plate.

For a time the only sound was the occasional clink of Fred’s fork or the soft ticking of the clock. Flora looked up at it. ‘I were planning to go to the Midnight Service if there isn’t an air raid. Miss Partridge took George shopping – he carries her errands – and she’ll feed him and take him to church with her. Wouldn’t it be lovely if our girls came too?’

‘They will if they get home in time, always have, love. Why should this year be any different?’

‘Because it is different, Fred, because of him, the pilot.’

Fred stood up abruptly. He took his plate to the sink and washed it hurriedly and certainly not as well as Flora would have done. ‘Lordy, near half-nine already. I’ll make a cuppa?’

When Flora said nothing he carried on with his self-appointed task, talking all the time. ‘This is a good opportunity to wrap that cardy, love, afore she gets home and sees it. I saw you had that nice paper with the holly leaves. D’you know, I remember when we bought that? Red Cross Christmas sale, 1939. Paid two pence halfpenny for the two large sheets, quite a bargain.’

Flora had picked up the cardigan but whatever she intended to do was interrupted by the sound of the back door opening, followed by the noise of several female voices.

‘They’ve both come home, love, and brought their friends.’

In a moment the kitchen was full. Daisy and Rose, Sally and Grace. It was a picture from the past but it was very real. Everyone hugged and talked at the same time.