Come the Hour (18 page)

Suddenly, over the East End, the sky was black with death.

The guns roared, the bombs screamed and fell. Terrified people ran into their houses and crouched under the stairs, under tables, under anything they could find. Those near the tube stations crowded down the stairs to the safety of the underground stations below. Around them their world exploded and shattered and burst into flames.

In Hyde Park the anti-aircraft guns cracked through the afternoon haze. The people scattered, making for the few shelters, or crowding down the stairs into the underground stations. In the West End, the people surged into the shops and huddled into the basements and cellars of the big department stores.

It was a lovely sunny day, Saturday 7 September, and the family was at home. Amy and Dan and Tessa and Amy’s father had tea in the garden. They felt safe enough – safe for today, anyway. The threat of invasion still hung like a pall over every day, no matter how normal it seemed, how sunny and warm. There had been some scattered raids on London, but nothing to disrupt their everyday lives. They did everything they should before going to bed at night: turned off the gas, kept torches at the ready, made sure the stirrup-pump was ready in the downstairs cloakroom. The days were as usual: Dan and Amy at work, Nora looking after the house, and Amy’s father had taken charge of the garden. Tessa, on vacation from Cambridge, did her fire-watching at the hospital, usually at night, so that the day workers could get their sleep. It seemed very quiet, almost like peacetime. Amy drank her tea and ate her cake, and tried not to think about what Charlie might be doing – must be doing. It was a constant anxiety, underlying everything. She did the usual things; went to a concert: Dame Myra Hess was giving piano recitals at the National Gallery. She went to the pictures with Tessa to see
Gone With The Wind
, and
All This and Heaven Too
in Leicester Square. And all the time Charlie was with her. She almost felt that she knew when he was flying.

‘What a lovely day;’ Dan said. ‘You can hardly believe we’re at war.’

‘I’m glad we did that raid on Berlin,’ Tessa said. ‘Give them something to think about. They’ve had things too much their own way.’ She went into the house to get some more hot water. As she came out, the siren began to wail. No one moved.

‘Why do they have to have that awful noise?’ Amy’s father said. ‘They should have something stirring and British – “The British Grenadiers” or something.’

Tessa laughed. ‘What a good idea. And we could have “In The Mood” when they’ve gone.’

Amy poured the hot water into the teapot. Charlie would be flying again. ‘Damn nuisance,’ Dan said, ‘spoiling the afternoon. I expect the All-Clear will go in a minute.’ The minutes passed. There was no All-Clear.

They sat in silence, a slightly nervous silence. Dan stirred his tea, the spoon scraping against the cup. The silence was strange, he thought. It seemed to have a different quality, as if something was happening a long way away, something he could feel rather than hear. He stopped stirring. It’s just me, he thought. Letting it get to me. Attack of nerves. Suddenly the crashing sound of the anti-aircraft guns roared around them. The noise seemed to shake the very air. They all jumped, the tea spilling.

‘Good God!’ Dan said. ‘What a hellish noise. Into the shelter,  everybody.’

They tumbled down into the Anderson shelter. Dan closed the door and fumbled for the torch he’d stored inside, and for candles and matches. They sat down on the bunks and the two folding chairs. A little trickle of dry earth came down from the roof. After a few minutes the guns stopped, but there was no All-Clear.

‘I think I’ll get out and have a look round,’ Tessa said. ‘Is there anything I can get from the house?’

‘You’re staying here,’ Dan said. ‘Anything could happen.’

‘I’m bored silly,’ Tessa said.

Her father frowned at her. ‘Better bored than dead.’

Just after six o’clock the All-Clear sounded, and they emerged into the evening sunshine. Nothing was changed. There was no damage that they could see. They went back into the house and Amy put the casserole that Nora had left into the oven. They turned on the wireless. The announcements were horrifying: mass raids on London, on the East End, a monstrous air battle, many enemy aircraft destroyed. They didn’t mention losses in the RAF.

Tessa put her arms around her mother. ‘Oh Mum,’ she said.

Amy held her close. ‘They’ll be all right,’ she said. ‘They’ll both be all right.’ She held Tessa away from her. ‘Do you love him, darling?’ she said. Tessa nodded, her eyes filled with tears. Amy held her close again.

Dan was upstairs collecting more bedding and a couple of camp beds for the shelter. He felt in his bones that something had changed, that the shelter must be ready for them all to sleep in if necessary. He went into his bedroom. The window faced east, where every summer morning the sunrise lit up the window and shone, bright and golden, into the room. He looked out of the window, puzzled by a strange glow in the sky. ‘The sun sets in the west,’ he said aloud. ‘In the west.’ It was a few seconds before he recognized what he was seeing. He felt suddenly cold, frozen. It’s fire, he thought. Fire, in the east of London. London is burning, burning badly enough for us to see the light from here. For a few minutes he watched in growing, unbelieving shock. He went downstairs.

The family was listening to the six o’clock news, their faces stricken.

‘It’s the East End, Dan,’ Amy said, her voice shaking. ‘The docks and the warehouses and all those poor people. Up to a thousand German aircraft, they say. It’s been bombed to blazes.’

Saturday 7 September was a lovely day. Nora and Sara were shopping when the siren went. Among the shops was a cellar that had been made into an air-raid shelter; there was a sign outside. Nora had never been down there. Now she pushed Sara ahead of her and they hurried down. The cellar was gloomy, lit by a single light bulb, and smelt damp and musty.

‘Can’t we go home?’ Sara said ‘It’s not far. It’s horrible down here. The sirens often go and nothing happens.’

‘No.’ Nora sat down on a bench, under the dim electric light. Today, for some reason, she didn’t want to take the risk.

Sara sat beside her. ‘I haven’t got anything to read.’

Nora just clicked her tongue. Several other people came down into the cellar.

‘Nothing much happening up there,’ a man said, ‘but better safe than sorry, I always say.’

The anti-aircraft guns started in the distance and Sara took her mother’s hand.

‘Sounds as if something’s happening now, though,’ the man said. ‘If they’re bombing London they’re getting ready to invade, I shouldn’t wonder. Could be this weekend. Then we’ll know all about it.’

‘Do you mind,’ Nora said angrily. ‘There’s a child here.’

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Didn’t think.’

They stayed in the cellar until the All Clear went just after six o’clock. They hurried home and Nora made a quick meal. ‘I don’t know what we should do tonight,’ she said, ‘if they come back.’

‘Stay here,’ Sara said. ‘I’m not going back to that cellar.’

‘Help me get that single mattress down then,’ Nora said. ‘We’ll sleep under the stairs. That’s the safest place.’

They humped the mattress down the stairs and brought pillows and blankets.

‘There,’ Nora said. ‘Quite cosy, really.’

Charlie was stood down. He changed and went into the mess. He ordered a pint of bitter and sat down in a shabby leather armchair. He was weary to his bones. He was all right now, till tomorrow. He could sleep. The Spits weren’t much use as night fighters. If the bastards came back in the night it would be mainly down to the gunners.

The fact that he was still alive at all seemed crazy. They had lost another pilot from the squadron today. At least, he hadn’t shown up, so it didn’t look good. The day’s battle to get the bombers before they reached London hadn’t succeeded too well. The East End was on fire. The numbers had been too great. He had phoned home to tell them he was all right and his mother had cried on the phone with sheer relief. Tim had phoned Tessa, hunched over the phone for ages. He closed his eyes and leant his head back against the chair.

He felt a tap on his shoulder. ‘Hello, Charlie.’

He opened his eyes blearily and for a moment thought he must be dreaming. ‘Arthur!’ he said. ‘What on earth are you doing here?’ He got to his feet and shook his hand. ‘It’s good to see you.’ He looked down at Arthur’s jacket. ‘You’ve got wings!’

Arthur grinned. ‘I made the mistake of learning to fly, didn’t I? They’re running short of pilots. Let’s say I was encouraged.’

‘Sit down,’ Charlie said. ‘I’ll get you a pint.’ He came back with a beer for Arthur and another for himself. ‘How’s the family? Your mother still making her famous pastry?’

Arthur grinned. ‘As far as the rations will allow.’ He looked around him. ‘And what do you know? They made me an officer. Me – from the wrong side of the track.’ He gave a short laugh. ‘They must have thought that because I went to Cambridge I must be OK. I’ve learnt how to use a knife and fork.’

‘There’s none of that nonsense here,’ Charlie said. ‘The sergeant pilots are just as good as we are. Some of them are better.’ He paused. ‘Better pilots, better men.’

Arthur laughed. ‘Tell that to the establishment. After the war I expect I’ll be back in my place.’

They sat for a few moments in silence. Charlie well knew how Arthur must be feeling now: excitement, apprehension.

‘I expect I’ll be at it tomorrow, then,’ Arthur said. ‘They’re bound to come back.’

‘I expect so,’ Charlie said. ‘Never a day goes by.’ He took a mouthful of beer. ‘How many hours have you done on Spits?’

‘Not enough,’ Arthur said. ‘They’re turning us out like sausages. It’s your turn to teach me now, Charlie.’

Later Charlie lay in bed, listening to the sirens going.
They’re back
, he thought,
of course
. The airfield was unusually quiet. The target was London again. The parents, Tessa, Grandpa were there. He said a brief prayer. He thought of Arthur, doing it for the first time tomorrow. Nightmare.

At eight o’clock the sirens went again. At Amy’s house everyone but Tessa went back to spend the night in the Anderson shelter. Tessa, carrying her tin hat and her gas-mask, had already gone to do her
fire-watching
stint at the hospital. Nora and Sara bedded down under the stairs. And that night the real horror began. The roar of the guns, the blood-chilling sound of aircraft overhead, the crash of falling bombs lasted into the early hours of the morning. Nora held Sara close to her,
and prayed, ‘Our Father, who art in Heaven …’ Sara was surprised. She’d never heard her mother praying before. But they’d never been in such danger before. When the All-Clear went they trailed back to bed for a few hours’ sleep, Sara sharing her mother’s double bed. ‘I want you where I can see you,’ Nora said.
Oh Jim
, she said silently,
I wish you were here
. She lay in the dark, Sara asleep beside her.
It’s really started now
, she thought. How long?
How long is this going to go on
? Could they all take this, night after night? And stay sane?

The next morning Dan went to buy a newspaper. ‘It’s the East End,’ he said. ‘It’s unbelievably dreadful. Such destruction and so many people dead. And the man in the shop says there were bombs around here too. Warwick Gardens is a mess and a house is down in Pembridge Gardens, and that’s not far away, is it? We’ll have to make that shelter a bit more habitable.’

‘I’d rather stay in my bed,’ Amy’s father said. ‘They’ve driven me out of my house. I’m damned if they’re going to drive me out of my bed.’

‘You’re coming into the shelter,’ Amy said. ‘We don’t want to have to rescue you again, do we?’

‘I shall bring a bottle of whisky then,’ he said. ‘Drink to the destruction of Hitler and the Nazis.’

On Sunday night the raids came again. They got into their own beds in the early hours of the morning. ‘They’re going to bomb us at night, then,’ Dan said, ‘when our fighters can’t properly defend us. We’re in for a hell of a ride.’

N
ora and Sara crawled out of bed on Monday morning. ‘I’m going to school,’ Sara said. ‘I’m not missing it.’

‘We’ve been up half the night,’ Nora said. ‘They won’t mind if you’re a bit late.’

‘I’ll mind,’ Sara said.

‘Well, I’m coming with you. You finish your breakfast and I’ll just pop down to the phone box and tell Doctor Fielding I’ll be late.’

She walked to the phone box on the corner. She was numb with tiredness and fear. She looked around her at the silent houses. They all seemed to be intact, but she was still afraid. The noise of the planes and the bombs and the guns would frighten the dead. She had never believed that anything so dreadful would happen, even after Amy’s father’s house was hit. That had seemed like an accident, a stray bomb casually dropped. This was deliberate. Deliberate bombing of ordinary people’s homes. Hours and hours of dreadful, pounding fear. Sara had trembled beside her and put her fingers in her ears, but she hadn’t screamed or even cried.

Nora walked slowly back from the phone box. What would happen to Sara if her mother was killed, and her father far away? Who would look after her? She couldn’t bear to think of those children in the East End. Dare she ask? Would Amy say no? Would it just make an awkward atmosphere?

She took Sara to school. The children were to be let out early. ‘I’ll come back for you,’ she said. ‘Wait for me in the hall.’

Sara settled down to her lessons. The children trickled in through the morning. Their form mistress didn’t approve. ‘If our soldiers and
sailors and airmen can stay up all night fighting for you,’ she said, ‘you can come to school on time.’

She’s right, Sara thought. She thought of her dad, away at sea, fighting. Everybody had to do their bit, even the children. Anyway, she thought, I’m nearly grown up now. She could leave school next year if she wanted to. She didn’t want to, of course. She hadn’t told the teachers that she wanted to be a doctor. Not yet. If they could just get through the war, if her dad would come home, if her mum was all right. If, if, if…

Amy had left a note when Nora arrived at the house. ‘What a night, Nora. Thank God we all survived. Charlie phoned and he’s all right too. See you later.’ Nora started on the housework and then went shopping. It was beginning to take an age to get the simplest thing – queues were everywhere, even for common things like potatoes and bread. And more things were being put on ration all the time. What was everybody supposed to eat?

Amy came home for a sandwich lunch. ‘Nora,’ she said. ‘Wasn’t it awful? Were you all right? What did you do?’

‘Slept under the stairs,’ Nora said. ‘If you can call it sleeping, with all that dreadful noise and the handle of the gas meter sticking into you. Sara insisted on going to school this morning.’

‘Good for her,’ Amy said. ‘She’s a great little girl. Reminds me of Tessa when she was that age. Dead keen.’

‘I’m going to pick her up from school this afternoon, but they’re coming out early.’ Nora hesitated but plucked up her courage. ‘I was wondering,’ she said. ‘If anything happens to me, would you look after her till her dad comes home? I can’t bear to think of her in some orphanage or having to go out to work and living God knows where. I’ve got a bit of money saved up for her keep….’

Amy took her hand. ‘Of course we would, but nothing’s going to happen to any of us. We have to believe that. We’re not going to get gloomy and frightened. That’s what the Germans want, isn’t it?’

Nora smiled. ‘Yes, I suppose you’re right.’

‘If anything happens to me,’ Amy said, ‘will you look after my family, keep the house going as a home until it’s all over?’

Nora brightened and nodded. ‘Of course I will.’ They shook hands. ‘It’s a pact.’

Dan went to work on the tube. According to the wireless, some of the roads were blocked and impassable. As he went into the tube station he met a stream of people coming up the other way, people who had obviously spent the night in the underground station. They looked bleary and dishevelled: children were crying, mothers distraught. When he came out at his destination he could hardly believe what he saw: shattered, collapsing buildings, fires still burning, men digging in the rubble for survivors.

He couldn’t believe that it was happening again, that once again he would be treating the brutal wounds of war. But this time it would not be the soldiers, it would be the ordinary people, including the old, women, and children. He remembered his own words to Charlie: ‘They’ll try to frighten us to death,’ he’d said. He looked at the faces around him, grim, exhausted, but extraordinarily calm. Here and there there was even a joke, some laughter. He was filled with a kind of pride, a new respect for his countrymen.

Every night they came; every night the people of London slept in their shelters or under the stairs. Or they crowded down into the tube stations, lying together in cramped rows in blankets and sleeping bags, clutching their children, suckling their babies. Or they streamed out of the cities before night fell, into the countryside villages to sleep in barns and schools and churches as the nights grew colder. Then in the morning they came back, back to their factories and offices and shops, and the children went to school, and Hitler failed in his resolve to break them. The nation waited, nerves strung out, for the invasion, for German troops to swagger around London as they had in Paris. And still the invasion didn’t come; the warning church bell didn’t ring.

Tessa came home early one morning covered in dust and spotted with blood. ‘They got the nurses’ home,’ she said. She burst into tears on her mother’s shoulder, then dragged herself up the stairs to bath and get a few hours’ sleep.

‘I’ll be glad when term starts and she goes back to Cambridge,’ Dan said.

‘She needs to do it,’ Amy said. ‘She needs to do something. She says she feels useless compared with Charlie.’

‘Her time will come,’ Dan said. ‘Her job is to qualify. We all have to do what we do and not give in. They are not going to frighten us to death.’

Sunday 15 September, was a warm fine day. The squadron was scrambled early in the morning and ordered to 20,000 feet. Charlie shivered, tired out and feeling the cold, even through his flying jacket and boots. What now, he thought. Rumours had been rocketing round – they were coming, today, tomorrow. Most people seemed to be surprised that the invasion hadn’t happened over the weekend. The German boats and landing craft were massed on the French coast, apparently ready to go. Perhaps this was the start of it. He thought of the family waiting at home, waiting for the rumble of German tanks and shouted German orders. Never, he thought. Never.

He looked down at the Dorniers that appeared below them, making steadily westwards for London. Within seconds they were in battle again with Me109s that appeared out of nowhere. He saw the Hurricanes arrive and almost at once three of the bombers went down, trailing smoke, to crash in flames on the Kent countryside. The squadron returned to base to rearm and refuel and took off again into the mêlée.

His eyes and head flicked around constantly in a sky that seemed filled with diving, spiralling aircraft. Then once again, he suddenly found himself alone, high in a clear sky. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a black speck, rapidly getting bigger, a single Dornier, trailing smoke, limping for home. Almost casually he shot it down, and then flew back to the airfield. He flew over the wrecks of bombed houses, and over the wreckage of an enemy bomber, still burning. He flew over villages where the people below turned up their faces and danced and waved.

Once again they refuelled and rearmed and waited for the next onslaught. It didn’t come. He changed and showered and went into the mess. Tim was already there with a bunch of pilots, downing a pint. They were laughing, larking about. There was a different atmosphere,
a shift, a feeling that something had changed. For the first time it felt as if they had the upper hand. The enemy armies hadn’t arrived on the English beaches. Their swarming aircraft had had hell knocked out of them. It felt, Charlie thought, like the day they won an important interschool cricket match when he was a junior. A victory. Perhaps this was it, what Churchill called the Battle of Britain. It felt as if they had won it. The war wasn’t over – not by a long way – but it felt as if they had made a start. They had dented the German confidence.

Tim came over to him, bearing a pint. ‘It was a good day,’ he said. ‘I think we nettled them a bit today.’

‘Yes,’ Charlie said. ‘It was good.’

‘There’s one thing, I’m afraid,’ Tim said. ‘It’s bad. There’s no sign of Arthur.’

‘Oh God.’

‘He might be all right,’ Tim said. ‘He might have come down somewhere else and not phoned in yet.’ Neither of them really believed it.

Charlie didn’t answer. He went to bed early. If Arthur didn’t come back he would write to his parents. He thought of Arthur’s mother, her kindliness and motherliness, making her pastry. He thought of Arthur’s father, so proud of his son, expecting him to change the world. Perhaps he had.

The news was appalling: the East End devastated, and bombing in the West, a hit on Buckingham Palace; Oxford Street devastated, with bombs on DH Evans and Bourne and Hollingsworth, and John Lewis burnt out completely. And then the City of London. Nowhere was safe. Amy went into town to do some shopping. The local shops were running out of elastic, of all things. How to keep one’s knickers up? She passed a police station that had been heavily damaged. There was a sign outside. WE ARE STILL HERE, it read. BE GOOD. Despite everything, she had to smile.

Dan turned off the radio. ‘I don’t believe it.’

Amy looked up from her book. ‘What?’

‘Herr Hitler has apparently kindly consented to stop the bombing
over Christmas. A couple of nights off. We’ll all celebrate the birth of Christ, peace on earth and good will to men and then he’ll start trying to kill us all again.’

Amy frowned. ‘Do you think it’s real?’

‘I wouldn’t trust him for a single moment,’ Dan said. ‘Why would he stop now? After Coventry and Plymouth and all the other cities bombed to blazes?’ He sighed. ‘It’s nearly 1941, Amy. We’ve been at it for over a year and look at us.’

‘Wouldn’t it be lovely?’ she said, wistfully. ‘Charlie could come home. We’d all be together. I asked Nora if she and Sara would like to come but she said she’d rather stay at home. Something to do with thinking about Jim.’

It seemed to be real. The country was to have two nights off. No raids. Charlie managed to get home and brought Tim with him. ‘Where shall we go?’ he said. ‘It’s Christmas Eve. I want to go dancing.’

‘I still don’t trust them,’ Dan said.

‘We won’t go far, then,’ Charlie said. ‘Let’s go to the Hammersmith Palais.’

‘Oh yes.’ Tessa did a little twirl. ‘I’ve always wanted to go there.’

‘It’ll be packed,’ Amy said.

‘Just what I want,’ Charlie said. ‘A madhouse that hasn’t got anything to do with flying. And girls.’

‘Can I borrow your silk stockings, Mum?’ Tessa asked. ‘I’ve got none left. Otherwise I’ll have to paint my legs with gravy browning or something.’

Amy laughed. ‘Yes. I’ve no doubt they’ll come back in shreds.’

‘Well, we won’t be doing old-time dancing, I hope. Maybe we’ll get some Glen Miller.’

The dance hall was seething, the band playing ‘Chattanooga Choo Choo’ when they went in. The crowd seemed to be swirling around the floor in a clockwise direction, ‘like a school of fish,’ Tim said. He ducked a flying arm. ‘I think I’d rather face a bunch of 109s.’

‘Come on.’ Tessa pulled him into the mêlée. In the middle of the floor two couples were madly jiving, watched by an admiring crowd. The boys were in RAF uniform. ‘I wish I could do that,’ she said. ‘Do they teach you that in the RAF?’

Tim looked at them closely. ‘They’re Yanks,’ he said, ‘from Eagle Squadron.’

‘They seem very energetic.’

‘I believe they are.’ Tim said. ‘In every way.’

She laughed. ‘I think it’s jolly good of them to come and help us. It’s not their war, after all.’

‘Not yet,’ Tim said ‘We’ve got pilots from all over the place. You should see the Poles in action. Mad devils. Shoot down more than we do.’

Across the room they could see Charlie dancing with a heavily lipsticked blonde, his arms and legs flying.

Tessa laughed. ‘Charlie’s off,’ she said. ‘He said he wanted a madhouse.’

Tim excused himself for a few minutes. ‘Nature call,’ he said. ‘Don’t go away.’

The dance ended and the band began to play ‘Beat Me Daddy, Eight To The Bar’. Tessa looked around her, smiling. One night, she thought. One night without fear, without crouching in the Anderson shelter or crawling around on some roof, watching for incendiaries. No wonder they were all jumping about like mad things.

‘Excuse me, would you like to dance?’ The accent was unmistakable. One of the Eagle Squadron.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I’m here with someone. He’ll be back in a minute.’

He grinned. ‘We could give him the slip. He’d never find us in this mob.’

She laughed. ‘I’m sorry. I’m rather attached to him.’

‘Oh well,’ he said. ‘OK honey. Happy Christmas.’

She watched him swing away through the crowd. Isn’t that odd, she thought? That’s the first time I’ve ever talked to an American.

Tim came back and put his arm around her waist. ‘Dance,’ he said. ‘With me.’

The three of them came home in the early hours. ‘It’s Christmas,’ Charlie said. ‘Happy Christmas. He stumbled. ‘I think I’m a little bit drunk.’

‘What happened to the blonde?’ Tim said.

‘Not my type,’ Charlie said.

‘What is?’

‘I don’t know yet.’

They crept into the house. ‘It doesn’t matter if they hear us,’ Charlie said. ‘They’ll think it’s Father Christmas.’

‘They might think we’ve been invaded,’ Tessa said with a grin, ‘and give us what for.’

‘I hope not,’ Tim said. ‘I wouldn’t like to be a German facing your mother.’