Page 12 of The Island Girls

‘Well, I never – a working woman with a real skill. That’s impressive, I’ll say,’ said Darrell, taking a big swill of the beer his mate had brought over to him, but he made a sour face as he swallowed.

‘Can’t say as I’ll ever get used to this grog though,’ he said, nodding towards his beer glass. ‘This is not what we would call beer at home.’

‘That’s a good pint of proper bitter, that is,’ said Mr Symonds proudly. ‘It’ll put hairs on your chest, son.’ The women squealed with delight as Darrell made as if to peer into his uniform shirt to see if it was working yet, and by the end of the evening, the Symonds family had named Flight Lieutenant Darrell Taylor as a close family friend who was welcome at their table, any time.

They’d seen him a couple of nights later as well, and that’s when Molly had told him about the dance on Saturday night.

‘How many of you will be going along, do you think?’ she asked him. ‘I’ll not be there, being a married woman and needing to put this baby to bed early,’ she giggled, patting her now obvious baby bump. ‘But Peggy will go, won’t you Peg?’ said Molly, giving her little sister a big nudge in the ribs.

‘Will you, Peggy? Well, if you’ll be there, I will be as well – provided we aren’t called out on a run, that is. But I should be getting Saturday off, all being well,’ Darrell said with a smile that was meant just for Peggy. And by the end of that night, it was fixed that she’d be dancing with him, at least the first three.

And now the night of the dance had come, and Peggy realised how much she was counting on Darrell being there. As she walked up the street, arm in arm with her friends whom she had gathered along the way, she checked herself, remembering that it was never a certainty that a serviceman had the power to be where he had said he hoped to be, but all the same, she was so looking forward to seeing that smiling face.

Peggy hadn’t even reached the dance hall when she saw a half dozen or so of the RAAF men whose faces had become familiar through the week. They had been waiting at the doors to the dance hall and, as Peggy approached, Darrell stepped out of the crowd and came to take her arm.

‘Miss Symonds, I believe you’ve promised to dance with me?’ he teased her, and before she even stepped into the dance hall, Peggy was certain she could predict exactly how the next year of her life was about to develop. And nothing would have convinced her on this happy night of dancing and flirting to imagine anything like the strange reality that was about to unfold.

7

POOLE – FEBRUARY 1941

Charlie Edwards checked the clock at Waterloo Station and saw he had time for a bite of lunch before his train was due to leave. He stepped across the road from the train station and pushed open the door to the tea shop where delicious aromas hit his senses like a melody from the past – a past filled with warmth, and home-cooked meals.

‘What can I get you, love?’ asked the waitress, with a tenderness in her voice that he’d not heard in so long now that it prickled the back of his throat. He wasn’t from these parts, and had never been accepted as a local, yet now, just as he was giving up and leaving, this woman reached out to him with the kindness of family. Even though half of London was missing some or all of their family after the Blitz, he sensed there was a stigma to being the only one left. For months now, he’d had nothing but hard stares and cold shoulders. So, he had decided to move on, and reinvent himself as someone who might fit in better where he was going next.

His practised accent now was southern, but not quite London. West Country, but not deep Somerset. Local, but not too local to anywhere in particular. He could have comefrom Oxford, or Basingstoke. Reading or Andover. Rochester or Hastings. Bath or Bournemouth. He’d already decided the answer to the question about where he was from: ‘All over, really – you name it, I’ve lived there.’

‘I’ll have a nice cup of tea and your soup and toast, please, love.’ He smiled, winningly.

‘The soup is leek and potato, today. Is that all right for you?’

‘Sounds just the job to warm me up,’ he said, rubbing his hands together with glee, much more thrilled that she’d not even flinched at his accent than he was about the bland-sounding soup.

‘Right away then, sir – I’ll bring it back in just a moment.’

Charlie enjoyed the soup surprisingly more than he had expected to. A meal without meat or cheese or fish didn’t sound like a meal at all, but the texture was thick and soothing on his tongue, and the hot toast was dripping with margarine and was delicious dipped into the soup bowl. The meal warmed him and filled his belly. He made his way to the counter to pay his bill, handling the coins in his pocket carefully, picking out the pennies from the shillings between his fingers to help him speed up the process once he pulled them out into his palm.

‘That’ll be threepence please, sir.’ She beamed, and he handed over the three big, round, bronze coins.

‘How do you manage to charge so little? You can’t get a meal like that for less than a shilling anywhere else,’ he answered as she rang up the till.

‘We’re subsidised now, as a part of the Ministry of Food scheme. Simple meals like the soup are only tuppence, so as everyone can afford a feed. A nasty German did that to you, did he?’ she asked, nodding in the direction of his leg. She’d noticed the limp he tried to hide. The sudden change of subject took him back to the battleground and made him flinch, and he saw byher response that she knew she’d troubled him by bringing up thoughts of war.

‘No, I’ve had this since I was a kid,’ he replied, more curtly than he had meant to.

‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you. Glad you’re home safe now though,’ she said. ‘My John is in the navy, you know. He’s out there doing his bit to protect our merchant ships so we’ve a hope of getting some more food in.’

‘He’s a good man, then,’ said Charlie. ‘And you make a lovely soup, too, miss.’

‘We’re all doing our bit. My grandad grew the veg himself, you know,’ she added with pride.

Charlie nodded his thanks, then left the tea shop, closing the door carefully behind him and bracing himself against the sharp winter winds that howled down the street. He slung his bag over his shoulder, pulled his coat collar up and gripped it with one hand, then headed back into the train station. Once on the platform again, he found a quiet corner and settled in to await his southbound train.

When the whistle blew to sound that the train was ready to board, he made his way towards the central carriage. He wanted to be not the first, not the last, just one of the crowd going about his business in a way that nobody would notice. A fresh start in a new town meant blending in as soon as he could. He shut the door behind him and walked down the carriage looking for just the right spot. He was relieved to see there were some passengers, but not too many. Plenty of people to get lost amongst, but not so many that the crowd would be pushing up close to him.

Women seemed the safest bet. So far, he’d had the most generous treatment from ladies. He chose a compartment with a mother and her two little children and another lone man in uniform. Charlie sat beside the window so he could watch thescene go by, field by field, town by town, until the fields became more than the towns and he could almost smell the sea air of the south.

When the journey was over and the train pulled into Poole, Charlie was pleased to see almost all the passengers spill out onto the platform – a perfect crowd to get lost amongst. He picked up his bag, put his head down, and went with the flow of the crowd out from the station and into the High Street.

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