The Chandelier Ballroom (17 page)

Benjamin was sorry to hear of his sister’s death, his memory momentarily winging back to when they’d been children. But that was over sixty years ago and he hadn’t seen his sister for nigh on forty years. He wouldn’t even know what she’d looked like, being that they hadn’t written to each other for years. He had no interest in going back to England, and even if he had, was too old now to travel all that way, even without the risk of enemy submarines lurking in the Atlantic.

Among the old couple’s possessions was a sizeable house in some village called Wadely or Great Wadely in Essex, Benjamin learnt. Bit of an ancient place by the sound of it and he guessed pretty run down too. He was comfortably off enough not to bother with all that legal messing about trying to sell it, and he had no wish to be worried to death at his age having to sort out a place probably on the verge of falling down anyway.

Let it stay, he told himself. He didn’t have many more years on this earth and he wanted to enjoy what was left. He had a nice apartment on the first floor of a block of flats near to a pretty good shopping area. He could take a stroll down to the picturesque harbour where the big liners would berth end on end. Vancouver was ice-free, had a temperate climate, was surrounded by green forest and purple mountains; it had nice beaches and he still swam occasionally, though much less these past few months. He had friends, was a member of a couple of social clubs for the elderly – plenty to occupy his time and a decent pension to go with it. His sister and brother-in-law’s tumble-down house would be more of a nuisance than an asset, probably more trouble than it was worth going through all that paperwork trying to sell it.

Washing his hands of it, old Ben Lacey proceeded to get on with his own life, the house in Wadely again left to sit empty and forsaken over the next three years as the war dragged on. Few had any interest in buying houses, even to get out of London and away from what people were calling the Little Blitz being waged on specific places of importance, South Wales, Hull, Bristol, and of course London, and that only lasting a couple of months.

In Wadeley, the house, still furnished with its chandelier hanging in place now covered in dust, settled into slow, elegant deterioration, the old tales of ghostly goings on there gaining vigour until no one cared to venture anywhere near it, while little boys would dare each other to creep up its once again weed-covered drive and bang on the door.

Towards the end of those three years, Ben Lacey, now in a home for the elderly, received an official letter from the powers that be in England requesting he might care to give his consent for his empty property to be used as a billet for military personnel, assuring him that at the end of the war it would be returned to him in good order. Not caring one way or the other, he was content to allow it.

Once again Crossways Lodge found its rooms cleaned up, its grounds tidied, hedges bordering the road trimmed though remaining purposely tall so as to screen the place from interested eyes. Army huts were erected in the grounds with washrooms, latrines, mess hall and other various amenities the military allowed its men.

Soldiers would frequent the village, shopkeepers’ takings looking up, the two local pubs doing a roaring trade, the post office too, selling as it did lots of goods other than stamps. Even the local tea shop saw a good trade. The old empty house, brought back to life, suddenly became a hive of activity, locals and little boys robbed of tales of funny goings on there.

The house itself was for the staff, undergoing a complete change with the absent owner’s furniture carefully removed and stored in the several outbuildings, the large room to be the officers’ mess with more conventional furniture, the conservatory installed with a bar for drinks, stools and tables, its missing or cracked panes of glass having been replaced. Some of the other ground floor rooms became offices and storage rooms for files and such, the kitchen remaining as it was, while the upper rooms were used as living quarters for the staff.

Few used the back door other than the kitchen staff, and the far end of the narrow rear passage would often become cluttered with bits of rubbish and a deal of kitchen waste waiting to be stacked outside the back door for taking away. Few also used the old back stairs to gain the upper floors, officers preferring to use the main front door to the large hall to reach their rooms, or to go into the big room that was now the officers’ mess and the bar, or else to their place of work in the several downstairs offices.

The chandelier in the large room had been removed and carefully packed away to reside in one of the outbuildings for the duration of the war, however long that would be, although the powers at the top already felt they had the end to it in their sights at last.

Nothing had been said of course, but around autumn a vast movement of troops all across southern England had the population wondering, raising hopes that the end could indeed be in sight, as empty shops, business premises, houses, schools and social halls were used as billets for troops and skilled men. Crossways Lodge in the village of Wadely near Brentwood was one of many chosen, being handy to a major arterial road and Tilbury, in readiness for when the call came for what many people were praying would be the long-hoped-for invasion of enemy occupied territory, the so-called but so far undisclosed second front.

Thus twenty-one-year-old Corporal Norman Bowers from a village in Derbyshire was one of those who found himself billeted at Crossways Lodge in Wadeley in the autumn of 1943.

At the end of a wet and dreary October day, Corporal Bowers straightened his shoulders with relief that he’d soon be able to rest, get cleaned up and have something decent to eat after hours of gruelling travel with full pack on, a few sandwiches and the odd cup of lukewarm tea.

Following Sergeant Price across the well-trodden grass, he could see lines of huts spread across what had probably once been a fine estate. The house was big – for officers of course, lucky buggers! To one side was a NAAFI canteen, instantly reminding him how hungry he was, near the house a small swimming pool with no water in it, further on a tennis court, locked, though any keen officers would probably be able to procure a key for its use.

Sergeant Price finally halted them outside one of the Nissen huts. ‘Right, Corporal, see ’em settled in … Quietly! See they unpack and clean up before eating. You
are
up to doing that, I take it, Corporal?’ he added with a touch of sarcasm that made Norman Bowers’ skin crawl. ‘Grub in the mess hall, you’ve got half an hour. After that, too late, you go without!’

Turning smartly, he marched off as if he’d just risen from a good night’s sleep instead of having spent a whole day on a train and then in the back of a rattling army truck the rest of the way to this place.

Left to themselves, each man proceeded to claim his bed by throwing his equipment on it. Some flopped full length on theirs or sat on the edge, hands clasped loosely between the knees, heads lowered in weariness. Travelling for eight or nine hours was no joke on a packed, dawdling train that seemed to stop nearly every quarter of an hour or so for no known reason – the joys of wartime travel for everyone, not just the military – all the way from Conwy in North Wales to some out-of-the-way railway station in south Essex.

Since the end of summer they had been detailed to load endless planks of wood, iron rails, iron poles and anything else needed onto trucks destined for the docks. There was a rumour that it had something to do with a planned second front, but no one had any details. Nor had anyone been told why they’d suddenly been uprooted and sent off to Essex on the other side of the country. But then theirs wasn’t to reason why, theirs was but to go where they were sent, no matter how daft the reason; all they knew was that they’d be on continuous training and manoeuvres in readiness for something big, whatever and whenever that would be.

His stuff stashed away, Norman Bowers picked up his washing kit. Some of the men had already sloped off to the ablutions situated just behind the big house, others still too weary to bother as yet. But soon they’d have to follow their mates if they didn’t want to miss getting something to eat.

Norman thought of Sergeant Nigel Price, who’d gone off to make sure the rest of his men had settled in. He grinned as he thought about the man who rather saw himself something, God’s gift to women – tall and well-built, a good-looking man around twenty-eight, probably married, but if he was it didn’t seem to curb his pleasure for girls and before long he would most likely find himself a few of them in this village. Sporting a small moustache, he held himself very upright, his bright blue eyes ever on the prowl, not only for some likely tart but for any man who might appear to cross him.

Some sergeants were tolerably fair-minded. Price was not. A sarcastic bugger, no one ever knew how to take him. What seemed a genuine friendly remark usually turned out to be pure sarcasm, and hard luck on the poor unsuspecting soldier taking it to be a cordial gesture. Most maintained he did it on purpose just to see a man get himself into hot water.

Along with others, Norman couldn’t stand him, nor, it seemed, could Price stand his corporal. Being a corporal it was impossible to avoid him, the man taking a particular delight in putting him down at every turn, calling him a twit in front of everyone, a nincompoop, a jumped-up petty snob who thought himself an intellectual, preferring studying books to getting stuck in, a cut above everyone else and him not even with a high school education to back it up.

As he never ceased to do, Norman thought of it as he made his way towards the ablutions. The trouble was, Price was right on some things. Yes, he read widely, his parents had made sure of that, and yes he
was
secondary school material, but he was proud of what he’d achieved on just that, proud too of his upbringing. His parents were self-respecting, he their only child. They lived in the small village of Swinage in Derbyshire, went regularly to church, having made sure he went along with them from an early age. They played a large part in many functions in the area. His mother was an infant teacher in the local school, a Brown Owl and the chairwoman of the local WI. She was also on the church hall committee. His father had the village store and post office above which they lived, ran the boys club, the youth football team and was a member of the village cricket team, excelling himself as a strong leader.

Norman had therefore been brought up to regard himself as they themselves did, a little above the ordinary locals, and to excel in all he did. He could have gone to high school and maybe on to university, but his father had viewed it unnecessary to prove himself, instead deemed himself well enough equipped to teach his son a deal more on a one-to-one basis than any college or university might have done, and in fact he was right, procuring books for him he might never have read. He felt he had a lot to thank his parents for

As to Sergeant Price, according to someone of the sort that seemed to know everything about everyone, he’d been to college but failed to get any high grades. How that person knew was a mystery, but it had got around and could account for Price’s choleric attitude towards others, especially towards himself thought Norman bitterly as he stood stripped under the trickling shower.

He knew Price was deeply envious of his being more widely read and therefore a deal more intelligent than he. He’d heard that at one time Price had possessed aspirations of being smiled upon by the Commissions Board for officer material, and maybe bitter disappointment at being passed over was one reason for his trying to belittle Norman at every turn.

Norman felt he himself might have been selected had it not been for having gone no further than secondary school, and there had been no point in trying. Having been taught at home no matter how intensively by a father whose intellect might have been superior to some officers he could name, was still no recommendation for selection. But he didn’t need recognition from any Commissions Board to know that he was far superior to Price in intelligence and intellect.

‘Did you ’ear that?’ Private Dick Hobbs asked Lance Corporal Bob Macatty as they left the showers, their corporal still showering himself.

Bob, known as Mac, shouldered his damp towel, his washing kit tucked under his arm. ‘Hear what?’

‘That what Sarn’t Price said ter Corp’ral Bowers when he asked if Bowers was up to carrying out an order. Sarky bugger! If I’d been Bowers, I’d of felt like biffin’ ’im! Mind you, them two are a pair well matched. They both fink somefink of themselfs. Me, I don’t fink much of eiver of ’em. I mean, that Bowers do fink ’imself a cut above the rest of us, don’ you fink?’

Bob Macatty didn’t reply. He got on okay with Bowers. So he could be a bit superior at times and maybe he wasn’t all that good a mixer, thought of as being a bit on the snooty side. Probably the way he’d been brought up, from what he’d heard. But Mac could forgive him. He was an only child and maybe that was the reason he was a bit withdrawn. Mac, on the other hand, was one of six and knew his way around the world.

Dick Hobbs was nattering on, seeming not to notice that his previous question had not been responded to.

‘Yer can’t deny though, got a good ’ead on ’is shoulders. Would’ve made a proper officer. Real clever bugger – too clever fer words, that’s ’is trouble. Makes yer feel real small sometimes. Me, I steer clear of ’im when I can – like yer do. Beats me ’ow you tolerate ’im.’

Still not responding, Mac felt a wave of pity for Bowers. The man needed a friend. And he was tolerable enough so long as you overlooked his failings. Everyone had failings. Mac supposed he himself did.

‘You and ’im often used ter go down the local tergever when we was stationed in Wales,’ Hobbs stated. ‘How did yer find him?’

‘I found him okay,’ Mac finally answered, giving nothing away. They’d reached their hut, each making for his own bed space, Hobbs to do whatever he intended to do before going off to eat, Mac to think about Bowers.

They were just casual friends, only the stripes on their arms keeping them as such. He doubted it would be a lasting friendship. Once they were separated as happened to army chums in wartime, he’d forget him, but for now they’d probably carry on going down to the local together whenever they obtained a pass, like when they’d been in North Wales, swapping snippets about their lives before being called up, maybe talking about girls, but with Norman not very often, finding it a bit of a one-sided subject.