Читать книгу All the Sweet Promises - Elizabeth Elgin - Страница 8

The dying sun turned the hills that ringed Loch Ardneavie from green to misty grey, and trees cast long purple shadows. The new occupants of cabin 9 were tired, yet sleep did not come. Lucinda lay, gazing upward, thinking about her mother so far away in London and about last night’s misfortune, which would have pleased the Countess greatly: three miserable women spending the night on a hard station bench.

‘There you are, I said no good would come of it. Sneaking off and joining up as if this war were some marvellous crusade,’ Mama would have said. ‘It would seem that you can’t even get yourself from A to B without making a mess of it. But if you’d listened to me, you’d be married to Charles now and doing your duty as a good wife should!’

Poor Charlie. He had protested strongly when her call-up papers came. Clever old Goddy, she thought, but Charlie was quite put out.

‘The Wrens, Lucinda? But the Bainbridges always go into the Army,’ but he had forgiven her, eventually, when she promised to try to take her leave when he took his.

‘They usually let you do it,’ he’d told her, ‘if you’re engaged or married. Tell them it’s on compassionate grounds, and you’ll get away with it all right. You really ought to be wearing a ring, Lucinda. Surely there’s something, somewhere, to fit you.’

Indeed there was. Lying in the bank in a strongbox; several Bainbridge rings, in fact. There was even the ruby the first earl gave his wife to celebrate the title bestowed by James Stuart in 1604, but she would have liked a ring, Lucinda brooded, of her very own; a dainty diamond cluster she and Charlie had chosen together. Something new, and hers alone. That, probably, was why her left hand remained bare and the date of their wedding still uncertain. A little romance, she sighed, might just have tipped the scales. But she really must send Charlie her new address and tell him how peculiar it all was; about the strange customs, still revered because Nelson had established them; about rooms which were now cabins, walls which had become bulkheads and a kitchen she must now call a galley. And the saluting was beyond belief. One saluted everyone and everything, even the quarterdeck, the moment one set foot on it. She supposed she would have to salute Charlie now. And one didn’t go to work, one went on watch; pulling the blackout curtains was called darkening ship; and no one went to the lavatory, they went to the heads! Yes, she must write a long loving letter to Charlie. Tomorrow.

Vi said her rosary then prayed for Gerry’s soul. It still bothered her that she should feel so contented with her new life when Gerry was dead.

I miss you, lad. I need to tell you about yesterday, meeting Jane and Lucinda, and about Ardneavie House. It’s smashing here, Gerry. No sirens or bombs, and a lovely garden, full of flowers. Ardneavie House is big – at least ten bedrooms – and Lucinda and Jane and me are on the top floor with the boat’s-crew Wrens. Just them and us, up here in the roof, and a storeroom and a bathroom.

The bathroom’s lovely, Gerry. Hot water in the taps, lots of it. No boiling kettles and lugging the bath in from the yard. This house belonged to a shipyard owner, but the Navy took it from him for the duration and now it’s a hostel for Wrens. I suppose that man had servants. They’d sleep up here on the top floor, I shouldn’t wonder, because there’s a little back staircase that goes down to the kitchens – sorry, lad, galley! And all the rooms have big windows. You can look out and see hills and trees and not another house in sight. There’s this big depot ship in the loch and it’s got a flotilla of submarines …

Submarines. It had shocked Vi to realize that her own side fought every bit as dirty as the Germans and that German seamen were torpedoed, too. Her first sight of a submarine had brought back the pain of Gerry’s death and she’d had to tell herself that those in the loch were ours, so they couldn’t be all that bad.

Strange, how easy it had been to accept the harshness of the training depot and the lessons she had learned. Never to volunteer for anything, for instance; to keep her bedspace clean and tidy; never, ever, to forget the eleventh commandment, Thou shall not get found out; and if you were prepared to agree that every word of King’s Regulations was Holy Writ and accepted that leave was a privilege and not a right, then life in the Navy needn’t be all that bad. The time to start worrying, she supposed, was when the war was over and they were all sent home – for where was home, now?

… I miss you, Gerry. I think about you always and I pray for you. I won’t ever forget you, lad; not while I live and breathe, I won’t. And I’m sorry about my ring, but it’s best I don’t wear it. I can’t have people ask me where my husband is. It would hurt too much. I’ve never been able to say I’m a widow. I know it inside me but I can’t say it out loud; not yet, Gerry.

Goodnight, lad. I’m fine, honest to God I am. Don’t worry about me …

Vi punched her pillow and stuck her face into it. Oh, damn all this killing. Why did men have to do it? Why?

Almost dark now, and the bombers would be taking off from Fenton Bishop, heaving and thrashing into the air, into the same sun that had reddened Loch Ardneavie. How long would it be, Jane demanded silently of the darkness, before she was able to speak of Rob or think of Rob and not weep inside her? It was nearly two months since her call-up papers had come; two months since S-Sugar had not come back. She had been angry at first, then disbelieving, but finally she had gone to the aerodrome to see the padre, begging him for news of Rob.

‘I’m not his next of kin, you see, and I never knew exactly where he lived. I want to write to his mother. Can you get her address for me?’

But such things were confidential, said the padre. He was evasive about Rob too; almost as if he hadn’t wanted to talk about him.

‘Try to forget, my dear,’ he had said. ‘Accept that it must end.’

That was when she first realized that to lose someone you love is not to feel instant separation. Rather it is first like a hopeless drifting, a little apart from the world, afraid and unwilling to reach out and ask for help. That day, in the padre’s little room, she accepted it was best she should be leaving Fenton Bishop, best she should be away from the sight of the uniform Rob had worn and the constant sound of aircraft. She wanted to be a number, to dress exactly as the other numbers dressed, to be nothing and no one.

That same night she had gone to Yeoman’s Lane for the last time, accepting without pain that she had thought their love was untouchable, yet now it was as if it had never been. Now, that loving counted for nothing and all the sweet promises they had made were empty words that floated like echoes in a great grey void. Tomorrow’s promises they had been, and tomorrow never came.

‘I can’t come here again, Rob,’ she had whispered, dry-eyed. ‘Tomorrow I am going away …’

‘You awake, Lucinda?’ Midnight, and sleep still evaded Vi.

‘Afraid so. I must be too tired, I suppose. I was thinking about home, actually.’

‘Where’s home?’

‘Lincolnshire, really, though we live in London now,’ she whispered into the darkness. ‘But I love Lincolnshire and Lady Mead – that’s the house I grew up in. We lived near Donnington on Bain, right in the country. Too beautiful. I wish I could go back there.’

‘You shouldn’t have left it, queen.’

‘Had to, Vi. The Air Force requisitioned it. Lincolnshire is a flat county, you see, exactly right for aerodromes, and they took our house for the airmen, I suppose. I’d love to see it again, though I think Mama won’t ever go back there. But Lady Mead will be Charlie’s one day, so I’ll make it, eventually.’

‘Charlie’s your brother, is he?’

‘My cousin. I don’t have a brother, that’s why Charlie will inherit.’

‘Inherit?’ Vi was instantly alert. ‘You rich or somethin’?’

‘Not really. We’ve got plenty of things – goods and chattels and land – but very little money because we can’t sell anything. Something to do with entail, you see.’

Vi did not see, but people who inherited things intrigued her.

‘If you like that house so much,’ she demanded bluntly, ‘won’t it make you mad to see your cousin get it?’

‘Oh, no. I’m going to marry him, you see.’

‘Just to get an ’ouse? But you love him, don’t you?’

‘Of course I love him.’ Of course she did. She always had. Well, almost always. She hadn’t liked him very much that night on the sofa. ‘But what about you, Vi? Who do you love?’

‘I – I don’t have nobody.’ Sorry, Gerry. ‘Free as the air, I am. Got no things, neither. They was all bombed in the May blitz.’ Just two crystal goblets in a drawer in Mary’s sideboard.

‘But you do want to get married, Vi? Every woman wants her own home, and babies.’

‘Homes get bombed and babies need shoes and clothes and food. You can’t rear a baby on love and fair words.’ Why had she started this conversation? She didn’t want to talk about her other life. Her wound had gone deep and she wasn’t ready, yet, for the knife to be turned. ‘What about you, Jane? You got a boyfriend, eh?’

‘She’s asleep,’ Lucinda whispered. ‘Lucky so and so.’

Jane Kendal was not asleep. It was seven o’clock and she was in Tingle’s Wood, waiting for Rob. And it was all a mistake about his being missing because he was there now, at the perimeter fence, smiling his lovely smile, saying ‘Hullo, Jenny.’ It was her favourite fantasy. It sustained her when the pain inside her became near-unbearable, and it was not for sharing.

Morning came, silver and gold, with sunlight that skimmed the surface of the loch and gilded the poppies and roses in the garden at Ardneavie. On either side of the lane that led to the jetty, creamy-white elderflowers scented the morning air and pale pink clover and forget-me-nots grew thickly, scorning the war, denying its existence.

‘Did you remember,’ Jane asked, ‘that this is Midsummer Day?’

‘Damn! And I should have remembered to dance barefoot through the dew and bow to the rising sun.’

‘Be serious. Aren’t you feeling scared? I know I am.’

They were standing on the jetty with a score of chattering women, waiting for the launch that would take them to the depot ship Omega.

‘Nervous? I feel sick, Jane. Positively sick. I mean, what if I miss a signal? What if the man on the other end transmits too quickly and I can’t keep up with him? They do, you know. Some of those operators are stingo. Oh, it was fine at wireless school. Mistakes didn’t matter so much, but now – well, it’s for real, isn’t it, and maybe lives depending on me. Wish I didn’t have to go on watch.’

‘You’ll be all right. We both will. We can only do our best. They can’t put us against a wall and shoot us if –’

‘Hullo. You’re the new girls, aren’t you? They said you’d be coming. Bainbridge and Kendal, isn’t it? I’m Molly Malone, Mary, really, but with a name like Malone …’ The Wren who introduced herself was slim and smart in a uniform which fitted her perfectly. She had a wide smile, a freckle-dusted nose and a distinctly Irish accent. ‘I work in the teleprinter room in the CCO. Like to come on board with me?’

‘Please. We feel very strange.’ Lucinda forced a smile. ‘CCO – that’s central communications office, isn’t it?’

‘It is, and it all goes on there: wireless, coding, decoding, signal distribution. We like to think we’re indispensable, that the flotilla couldn’t manage without us. Our submarines are all operational, you see, except for a couple of recent arrivals that are working up; new boats getting a crew together, that is, doing sea trials and dummy runs with torpedoes. The CCO looks after submarines at sea and keeps –’

‘Don’t!’ Lucinda had gone visibly pale. ‘I’m so nervous I can’t think straight.’

‘Then don’t be. You’ll be working with a great crowd. Have either of you ever been on an HM ship before?’

They shook their heads forlornly.

‘Then you’ll not know about saluting the quarterdeck?’

‘We’d heard, but where is the quarterdeck, and how will we know when we’re on it?’

‘You’ll know. It’s aft, always. At the back end, that is, and as soon as you step on to it, you salute. It’ll get to be second nature, don’t worry. And you’re both wearing your blackouts, aren’t you?’

‘Yes.’ Jane frowned. ‘But what’s so important about knickers?’

‘You’ll see, when we get on board. Look! There’s the launch now. That’s Lilith’s lot bringing it in. They’re the only Wren crew in the flotilla, so they’ve got to be good.’

‘Why?’ Jane demanded blankly.

‘Because they’re women in a man’s world. We all are. Wrens rarely get a real ship, you see, and some of the old hands look on us as intruders, to say the least. A few openly resent us; that’s why we’ve got to try to be as good as they are.’

‘Resent us?’ Lucinda’s stomach turned a somersault. It was going to be worse even than she had feared. Pictures formed in her mind of bloody-minded leading hands and a frowning chief telegraphist, all of them men and all of them waiting, grim-faced, for Bainbridge, L. V. to make her first mistake; a mistake so terrible that talk of its consequences would reverberate around the Home Fleet for years to come. ‘Isn’t that a bit unfair?’

‘Well, they don’t actually resent us, I suppose. Not really. But we’ve got to live by their rules and not expect privileges because we happen to be women.’ Molly shrugged. ‘But will you look at that boat’s crew? Aren’t they as good as any men?’

The all-woman crew were bringing the launch in, leaping with fearless agility to the jetty and tying up efficiently, as though they had been born on boats and lived on them all their life.

‘Let’s have you then!’ the coxswain called. ‘All aboard. Chop chop!’

They followed Molly on to the launch, hitching up their skirts as she did as they swung over the side, taking their places beside her, feeling strange and excited and apprehensive.

‘There’ll be a high gangway to climb when we get alongside Omega,’ she told them. ‘Well, more of a ladder, really. First time you go up it can be a bit frightening, but hang on with both hands and don’t look down. Okay?’

They nodded mutely.

‘And when you get to the top you’ll be on the quarterdeck, so don’t forget to –’

‘Salute,’ they chorused.

‘Let go for’ard! Let go aft!’

A boathook pushed the launch from the jetty, a wheel spun in capable hands, the engine coughed them on their way. Then a half-turn astern, and they were heading confidently to the depot ship Omega.

‘Makes you feel proud, so it does,’ Molly beamed. ‘Men won’t ever be able to sit on us women again, when this war’s over. Lilith’s as good as any man. I never worry when we’re out in a force-eight gale; not if she’s in charge.’

Force-eight gales? High ladders from which she must not look down? And, when she reached the wireless office, men who might resent her being there and fiends who transmitted Morse at devilish speeds …

‘I feel sick,’ Lucinda whispered. ‘Very sick, and it’s got nothing at all to do with the sea.’

The shore receded, the depot ship and its clinging submarines drew closer. Now Omega was not dull grey as distance had suggested, but a mottle of khaki and black and olive-green, the colours of camouflage. Now the ship appeared ungainly and broad-beamed. Not for Omega the greyhound outline of a frigate but rather that of a clumsy old sow with submarine piglets suckling beside her.

‘It’s bigger than you’d think.’ Jane gazed up at the towering bulk. And Molly Malone was right: the gangway was little better than a ladder that clung to the ship’s side with fragile tenacity. Up and up. How many steps? Twenty? Thirty?

‘Don’t be looking so worried.’ Molly Malone’s smile was altogether too smug, Lucinda considered bleakly. And how was anyone to make even the bottom step of that wretched ladder thing when the launch was rising and falling like a demented yo-yo?

The engine slowed and died. A boathook reached out and latched on to the ship’s side, and a small, dark-haired crewgirl pulled them in until they touched with a gentle bump. Then, one foot on the launch, one on the gangway, she held them steady.

‘Carry on!’ At once the gangway came alive, trembling and shaking and bucking as forty feet slammed up it.

Jane held on with both hands, gazing ahead at Molly’s legs, counting every step, praying she would reach the top before the whole thing collapsed beneath their weight and they all fell, helpless, into the water below. Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three, and she was there. Ahead of her, Molly stepped on to the deck, lifting her right hand in salute. Bemused, Jane did the same. Now she knew why sailors saluted the quarterdeck. It was not that Nelson had died there, nor was it because many years ago the crucifix that hung there demanded obeisance. Oh, no. It was because everyone was so desperately grateful to get off the shifting, jerking, swaying ladders the Navy called gangways.

‘All right?’ she croaked.

‘Think so,’ Lucinda muttered.

‘Right, then.’ Like virgins to the sacrificial altar, they followed Molly Malone to the place where it all happened; where Wrens must learn to live in a men’s world because now the war was nearer to them than it had ever been. And frighteningly real.

The central communications office of HMS Omega was large and surprisingly light, with white-painted bulkheads and an excess of highly polished copper and brass. At the far end, eight wireless receivers stood in line abreast; doors marked Teleprinters, Coding and Signals opened off the main office space, while in its centre men sat at typewriters, index fingers jabbing furiously.

It was odd, Lucinda thought, that men should be doing a job more suited to women, but this was a real ship, wasn’t it, on which, if Molly was to be believed, women had yet to establish themselves.

‘All right, you two! Over here!’

They knew without being told that this was the chief telegraphist, whose word was law on starboard watch; knew it without seeing the three brass buttons on either sleeve cuff which pronounced his rank or the lightning-flashed wings on his right arm that told them he was the telegraphist they sought.

‘Er – Chief – er.’

‘Wetherby. And you’re adrift, the pair of you. Should’ve been here yesterday forenoon!’

‘Yes, Chief.’

‘Sorry, Chief.’

‘All right, all right. Cut out the chat! Which one of you is Kendal?’

Eyes wide, Jane stepped forward.

‘Right, Kendal. Over there.’ A finger indicated the door marked Coding. ‘Jock Menzies is your leading hand. He’ll put you right. And you, Bainbridge, over there!’ The finger jabbed again, pointing to the only unmanned receiver in the line. ‘That’s yours.’

For just a few seconds, Lucinda hesitated; for just long enough to take in the shock of white hair, the lined, weather-worn face and the tremendous size of him. Then, taking a shuddering breath, she walked in a daze to her position.

The set, she considered, was a new one or maybe one which was less used. Either way, though, there was a belligerency about it, with dials that gazed at her like eyes; mean, shifty eyes, warning her to beware.

‘All right, Bainbridge. Get your jacket off and get stuck in!’

Reluctantly Lucinda did as she was ordered, then with cold, clumsy fingers she began to roll up her sleeves.

It was all too awful. The morning she had slammed out of the house and walked through the blitzed London streets to Goddy’s office she had been out of her mind; shell-shocked, or something. An act of defiance it had been, and look where it had got her. Mama had been right. She should be married to Charlie now, and safely pregnant at Lady Mead with Nanny, and if Charlie were to phone her tonight and ask her to marry him tomorrow she would cry, ‘Darling! Yes!’ and slap in a request for marriage leave without more ado. Near-frantic with apprehension, she gazed up, eyes wide. ‘Chief?’

‘What is it, girl? You sick, or something? Got a bellyache?’

‘N-no, thanks. It – it’s just that I’m so nervous.’

‘Nervous? What of?’

‘Of getting it wrong, Chief. Or not getting it at all.’ Fear forced the words. He’d think she was an imbecile, anyway, so why not tell him and prove him right. ‘I’m scared I’ll miss a signal or not be able to read it. And I worry what will happen to those men at sea if I do. I’m afraid. Really afraid.’

‘Afraid, girl? That there’ll be one of the boats at sea and you’ll miss …’ He threw back his head and roared with laughter. ‘Afraid you’ll miss the transmission? Oh, dear.’

‘What did I say? What’s so funny?’

‘You are, Bainbridge. Oh, for Gawd’s sake, didn’t they teach you anything at wireless school? Didn’t they tell you that no ship at sea, no ship at all, would be daft enough to send out a signal – well, not in wartime, they wouldn’t! Gawd Almighty, Jerry’d have a fix on ’em before they could say “tot time”. Break radio silence? Only in the direst emergency. Never, almost. All they do when they’re at sea is take down the messages we send to them, so don’t worry about not picking up a signal, ‘cause nobody’ll be sending you any.’

‘Oh, Chief.’ Lucinda flashed him a smile of pure joy. ‘I’ve got a lot to learn, it seems.’

‘Seems you have, girl, but learn it you will. So get yourself settled. There’s one of the submarines – boats, we say – up in the Gareloch doing trials. Sparta, she’s called, pendant number P.268, and that’ll be her call sign. Now she’ll transmit in code every hour, on the hour, and you’ll read those signals and write them down then give a receipt. That’s all there is to it; nothing to be scared about in that, is there, Bainbridge?’

‘No, Chief,’ she frowned. ‘But didn’t you just say that a ship at sea doesn’t transmit?’

‘It doesn’t, girl. It doesn’t. But Sparta isn’t at sea. She’s all safe and snug in the Gareloch where Jerry can’t reach her. Safe as houses, she is.’

‘And she’ll transmit on the hour?’

‘Exactly on the hour, and if she’s only a couple of minutes late, you sing out, Bainbridge, because I shall want to know.’

‘Why, Chief?’

‘Because on the hour means just that and failure to transmit at the given time usually means one thing. Trouble.’

‘I see.’ She fixed him with anxious eyes. ‘But something like that isn’t likely to happen, is it?’ Not when I’m on watch? Oh, please, not when it’s on my wavelength.

‘No, Bainbridge, it isn’t. As a matter of fact, I’ve only known it happen once when a new submarine was doing trials. In ‘38, in Liverpool Bay. Boat called the Thetis. Bad job, that was. Terrible loss of life. But it isn’t going to happen this morning.’ He dug his hands into the pockets of his jacket and, because sailors are the most superstitious of men, he crossed his fingers. Just to be sure. ‘So get yourself settled. Sparta’ll be coming up in five minutes exactly.’ He leaned over and adjusted the dials. ‘There now, that’s just about it. She’ll make regular transmissions till eleven hundred hours then she’ll be doing a deep dive, so you’ll hear no more from her till she surfaces at fifteen hundred hours. All right? Got it?’

‘Yes, but why will Sparta stop sending out signals during the dive? I mean, you’d think it would be the one time she would –’

‘A good question, girl, and one to which there is a very simple answer. A submarine can’t transmit when it’s underwater. It’s an absolute impossibility.’

‘As I said,’ Lucinda smiled ruefully, ‘I do have a lot to learn.’

‘And as I said,’ Chief Wetherby returned the smile, ‘learn it you will, girl. Learn it you will!’ He nodded in the direction of the brass-banded bulkhead clock. ‘Nearly time. And you know Omega’s call sign, don’t you? GXU3. That’s what you’ll be listening for,’ he said as he walked away.

Questions, questions, but not a bad kid, that Bainbridge. Not like some they sent him; six weeks in wireless school and they thought they knew it all. Bainbridge would make a good sparker, given time. In spite of that plummy voice, she’d make it all right, or his name wasn’t Walter Wetherby!

GXU3, Lucinda thought feverishly, eyes on the clock. GXU3. The fingers of her right hand clutched tightly at her pencil; those of her left hand were crossed, firmly, desperately.

Oh, Goddy! She sent a silent message winging to the small room at the Admiralty. Why didn’t you tell me it would be like this? Why didn’t you warn me?

She closed her eyes and swallowed hard, adjusting her headphones, moving the dials a fraction with fingers that were stiff and cold. She would die. She really would. Before this watch was over she would be a nervous, screaming wreck.

It came up out of nowhere, GXU3 demanding her attention. This was it! Oh, my God!

Panic slapped her hard and for the splitting of a second she hesitated. Then, collecting her thoughts, shutting out all sound save that in her headset, she began to take down the message. The persistent pinging assaulted her ears and she forced it into her head. On and on. One page of the signal pad already filled; got to turn over. Careful. Don’t lose any. For God’s sake, don’t!

Dit-da, dit-da-dit. A. R. They came at last. The letters that signified the end of the message. It was over and she had done it. She had got it all! Ripping the sheets from her pad, she held them triumphantly high.

‘Ta, love,’ said the messenger, taking them from her as if they were any old signal, carrying them to the coders who would make the groups of figures into words.

Only then did Lucinda glance to her right. Only then was she aware of the telegraphist who sat beside her, who smiled and gave her the thumbs-up sign.

Elated, she grinned back. Bainbridge L. V., had done it, and nothing that happened now – absolutely nothing – would be half as bad as that first terrifying signal.

Someone tapped her on the shoulder then placed a mug as big as a chamber pot beside her. The tea was strong and sweet and laced with tinned milk, and she drank it gratefully. She was calmer now; confident, almost. For the first time in her life she was doing something for herself; doing it without help from anyone, and what was more, she was getting it right. It was heady stuff. Raising her mug, she turned again to the telegraphist at her side, giving him her most brilliant smile.

‘Bainbridge,’ she said. ‘Lucinda.’

‘Lofty.’ He raised his mug in turn. ‘Everything all right?’

‘Fine, thanks,’ she breathed. Absolutely fine. Wonderful, in fact.

Sorry, Charlie, she exulted. Afraid I’ve changed my mind. No wedding, old thing. Well, not just yet, anyway …

Vi stared into the mirror, tweaking her tie straight.

‘Mother of God, worra face.’ Funny eyes, funny nose, mouth too big and teeth too crooked. A face, she sighed, that only a mother could have loved.

‘Happy birthday, face.’

Twenty-six today. She had almost forgotten. Twenty flaming six. She could be thirty before this war was over. It was frightening, if she let herself think about it, how much could happen in a year. Last birthday there had been a card from Gerry, written on shore leave and left with Mary for posting, yet now she was a woman alone. Now, just one year later, she was 44455 Wren McKeown, V. T., a steward who would spend the remainder of the war cleaning and polishing whatever the Navy told her to clean and polish.

But at least she was alive, which was something to be glad about, so she winked at Vi-in-the-mirror then turned to the window and the almost unbelievable beauty outside. She would never tire of that view, never get used to hills that changed colour at the whim of the sun, or the trees and flowers and a sky free of rooftops and chimney stacks. And out there in the loch lay the depot ship, with only five submarines tied up alongside now because one had left. She had seen it that morning, black and sleek, leaving hardly a ripple behind it, slipping silently away on the morning tide. And farther down the loch had waited the frigate that would escort it out to sea and stay with it, someone had told her, until it reached the safety of deep water.

Vi had never imagined she could think kindly of any submarine again, but if it was one of your own then surely it was right and proper to wish it well, and raising her hand she had traced a blessing on the early morning air.

She wondered where that submarine was now and what it was called. Perhaps Jane or Lucinda would know. They were there now, on that depot ship. She had watched from the window as they walked down the jetty, anxious as a mother sending her children off on their first day at school. She thought about them a lot, wondering how it was going for them on their first real day on active service; the first day, she supposed, of the rest of their lives – of the duration, at least.

The duration. For as long as the war lasted. And how many days and weeks and years made up a duration was anybody’s guess. It had all happened one Sunday morning when an old man in London decided that that was how it would be. She remembered it clearly. Gerry’s ship had been in the Albert Dock and they had just finished papering the front bedroom. At eleven o’clock she had turned on the wireless to hear the old man tell them they were at war with Germany. Again.

But today she wouldn’t think about it. Today was her birthday and Jane and Lucinda would soon be coming ashore, bursting with news. The thought pleased her, and she smiled.

Jane Kendal’s introduction to the war at sea was far less traumatic than that of her cabinmate. She had, in fact, enjoyed her day.

‘Lucky for me,’ she said that night at supper, ‘that coders often work in pairs so there was someone to help me along. My oppo was very patient – oppo means opposite number, by the way – and he’s very nice.’

‘Young, was he?’ It was important that Vi should know.

‘Oh, no. About forty, I’d say. He’s got a daughter almost my age, but I shall like working with him.’ She could not help but like him. From their first hullo the rapport was there, for Jock Menzies spoke with Rob’s accent.

‘There, now.’ Vi was well pleased. She need not, she conceded, have worried about either of them. The young ones had done very well. ‘Anyone want more pudding? There’s plenty left over.’

‘Please.’ The baptism of fire behind her, Lucinda had found her lost appetite, and bread-and-butter pudding was one of her favourites. ‘Just a little.’ She held out her dish and Vi spooned it full.

‘Remember I was telling you how nervous I was?’ Lucinda confided, spoon poised. ‘Well, I didn’t know it at the time, but the telegraphist on the next set to mine – Lofty, he’s called – was on my wavelength too. I was really afraid I’d not get it all down, and all the time he was listening out for me. He’ll be doing that for a day or two, till I can take over my own wavelength completely. But I wish I’d known. It would’ve saved a lot of agonizing.’ She smiled suddenly, and the smile set her eyes dancing and brought the dimples back to her cheeks. ‘Look – why don’t we celebrate? Let’s go out tonight.’

‘Well, I was wonderin’ – I’ve been thinkin’…’ Vi was remembering that today was her birthday and there was the ten-shilling note in her money belt and wondering if she should ask them if they would like to see the film in Craigiebur. Love on the Dole. One of the stewards had cried all the way through it, she said, so it must be good. But Vi did not ask them because someone said, ‘Hullo. You’ll be the new lot in cabin 9.’ Someone who was tall and black-haired, with milkmaid cheeks and deep, dark eyes; eyes so deep and dark it was impossible not to notice them.

‘Who’s askin’?’ Vi demanded with Liverpool directness.

‘Lilith. From cabin 10. Lilith Penrose.’

‘Vi McKeown.’ Vi took the extended hand. ‘And these two’s Lucinda and Jane.’

‘Yes.’ Lilith nodded briefly. ‘I noticed them on the launch this morning.’

‘Well then, that’s fine, innit? Anythin’ else?’

‘No. Just wanted to say hi, and tell you about the message.’

‘Message? Who for?’

‘That’s just it. I’m not quite sure. It’s all a bit vague, you see. Look, when you’ve finished eating I think you’d better come up to cabin 10 and get it sorted out. In about five minutes – all right?’

It was not all right. Vi did not like mysteries. Nor did she like being summoned to the cabin next door, but Penrose was a leading Wren. ‘What about it?’ she asked.

‘Okay by me.’ Jane nodded.

‘Me too,’ said Lucinda.

‘Right, then. We’ll see you in five minutes.’

‘And what did you make of that?’ Lucinda demanded when they were alone. ‘A message for one of us but she’s not sure which. Peculiar, wouldn’t you say?’

Peculiar, they all agreed, but they knew they would go to cabin 10 none the less, for the deep, dark eyes held a mystery. And secrets.

The door of cabin 10 was stuck and Vi thumped it hard.

‘Hang on.’ Lilith Penrose removed the wedge that held it. ‘Glad you’ve come. Soon have it sorted out.’

Vi looked around her. The room was spacious, with two large windows and a cast-iron fireplace which was obviously used, for log baskets stood either side of it and an airer hung with bell-bottomed trousers and thick navy-blue sweaters swung above it. But it was the table in the centre of the room that aroused Vi’s curiosity because it belonged, she’d have sworn, on the landing outside. She was certain, in fact, because only that morning she had dusted and polished it. Shrugging, she gazed pointedly at two Wrens she had not met before.

‘Sorry,’ Lilith smiled. ‘Meet Constance Dean and Fiona Cole – Connie and Fenny – my deck hand and stoker.’

Vi nodded briefly. ‘What’s this message, then?’ Her gaze had returned to the circular table, and she was uneasy.

‘The message?’ Lilith closed the door and slid back the wedge. ‘You must try to understand that it isn’t a message, as such. It just came to me and I knew it must be for one of you.’

‘Came to you?’ Now Lucinda had noticed the table. She had seen one like it before – well, almost like it. Letters and numbers set at random around its perimeter and an upended wine glass in the centre. A planchette, they had called it at school. It had started as a game but had taken over their lives, almost. They’d been in terrible trouble when Matron discovered their secret, and each of them had promised never to do anything so wicked again.

‘Came to me,’ Lilith asserted calmly. ‘I get messages all the time.’

‘From the planchette?’ Lucinda’s eyes were fixed on the glass.

‘That’s not what it’s called and the message has nothing to do with – that.’

‘It’s a ouija board, innit?’ Vi had heard about such things. Mention a ouija board at Confession and it would be three Hail Marys and an extra Mass from Father O’Flaherty, soon as look at you it would.

‘It’s nothing to do with ouija, either. That,’ Lilith nodded towards the table, ‘is my own thing. If you believe, it will tell you what you want to know. It’s a part of my religion, of the old religion.’

‘It flamin’ isn’t, and I should know,’ Vi countered. ‘I’m a Catholic.’

‘The old religion, Vi, has been with us as long as time and has nothing to do with the Church of Rome. My mentor is the earth mother and my conscience is ruled by karma.’

‘And what’s karma, when it’s at home?’ demanded Vi, who knew that consciences were ruled by parish priests.

‘It’s a Buddhist belief,’ Lucinda whispered. ‘Sort of take what you want – and pay. I’m right, aren’t I, Lilith?’

‘Vaguely. But karma isn’t entirely Buddhist dogma. Everyone pays, or is rewarded eventually, usually in another life on earth.’

‘Sorry.’ Vi had heard enough. ‘We’ve changed our minds.’ She was having nothing more to do with such heathen talk, message or no message. ‘Come on, you two.’ Pushing away the wedge she opened the door with a flourish and, part relieved, part disappointed, Jane and Lucinda followed her. ‘Sorry,’ Vi said again over her shoulder.

‘So am I,’ Lilith spoke quietly. ‘Because I was just about to wish you a happy birthday.’

‘You what?’ Vi flung round to face her. ‘Who said it was my birthday? Who told you?’

‘The message told me, Vi. I had a feeling it was for you.’

‘Message my foot! You’ve seen my record sheet, haven’t you?’ It was the only way she could have known, unless Mary had phoned. But Mary wouldn’t know where to phone until tomorrow when she got the letter. ‘Haven’t you?’

‘All record sheets are confidential, kept locked in Patsy Pill’s office; you should know that. No one sees them but her and Ma’am.’

‘Then how did you find out?’

‘I don’t know. I never ask. He just said, “Happy twenty-sixth birthday, girl.”’

‘He said?’

‘It seemed like a message from a man.’

‘Girl, did he say? You’re sure it was girl?’

‘Quite sure. Does it mean something?’

‘It means nothin’. Nothin’ at all.’ Vi tilted her head defiantly. ‘Come on, you two. We’re not soddin’ about no more with rubbish like that!’

She closed the door with a firmness she did not feel then sank gratefully on to her bed, dry-mouthed and suddenly cold.

‘Vi!’ Jane gasped. ‘You’re as white as a sheet and you’re shaking. Get her some water, Lucinda.’

‘I’m all right, honest I am.’

‘No you’re not.’ Lucinda offered the glass. ‘And it is your birthday, isn’t it?’

‘What if it is? There’s dozens of ways she could have known.’

‘There aren’t, Vi.’

‘She guessed, then.’

‘I don’t think she did, but happy birthday all the same. Are you really twenty-six? Did she get it right?’ Jane smiled.

‘I suppose so.’

‘And have you any idea who sent the message?’

‘No, queen.’ Vi honestly had not. It could only have come from Gerry, and Gerry was dead. ‘That Lilith’s a good guesser and we’re goin’ to keep away from her and her funny religion, aren’t we?’

They said they were, though they knew it was not true. They would be drawn back to that table and its shining glass, nothing was more certain. Vi knew it too, for how she could prevent it she was too shaken, at the moment, even to contemplate.

‘Load of old nonsense, that’s what. Forget Lilith Penrose, eh? Even her name’s funny, innit?’

‘Lilith?’ Lucinda shrugged. ‘It was the first name in creation, some say.’

Vi gathered her forehead into a frown. ‘Who says?’ Everybody knew that Eve was the first woman. It said so in the Bible, plain as the nose on your face.

‘I-I don’t know. Someone must have said it, I suppose – that Lilith was Adam’s first wife, I mean.’

‘Well, that someone was wrong,’ Vi said grimly. ‘Just you forget such things, Lucinda. Like I said, we’d all better keep away from cabin 10 and all that carrying on. She’s been nosing around in the regulating office, bet you anything you like she has, and she doesn’t fool me!’

The smile was back on Vi’s lips again. Leading Wren Lilith Penrose would have to get up very early in the morning to catch Vi McKeown on the hop.

‘An’ it’s still me birthday, innit, and if we’re not too late for the transport into Craigiebur, I’ve got a spare ten bob I feel like spendin’. My treat. Anybody interested?’