The Penny Bangle (25 page)

‘I think she’s lovely, and what she’s doing is marvellous,’ retorted Cassie sharply. ‘When I was growing up in Smethwick, living in what you’d no doubt call a slum, I’d
have liked a holiday at the seaside.’

‘God, I’m sorry, Cassie.’ Stephen reddened. ‘That was mean of me. It’s just – I wasn’t thinking.’

‘Obviously not.’ Cassie shrugged, and quickened her pace along the broken pavement, skirting piles of sandbags as she went. ‘
You
were born a nob,’ she snapped. ‘Okay, you didn’t have a lot of money. But you grew up in comfort, in a lovely part of England, with a mother and a father who both loved you, and not every kid’s as lucky.’

‘Cass, I have apologised.’

‘Yes, all right,’ said Cassie. ‘But it’s a pity you said it in the first place.’

‘I’ve told you I’m sorry!’ Stephen cried, making people turn to stare at them. ‘What more do you want – my blood?’

Cassie stopped, looked up at him. She saw his face was flushed, she saw his eyes were glittering, she heard him breathing hard. ‘Stephen, are you going to have a turn?’ she asked him, putting out a hand to steady him. ‘If you need to go and lie down, or sit down somewhere for a moment, we could find – ’

‘Jesus Christ, you sound just like my mother!’ He shook her off and strode off down the pavement, shoving other people aside, and leaving Cassie staring after him.

Cassie saw Frances Ashford three weeks later, when Frances had some leave, and brought her new man down to meet her friend.

Frances and the man were staying at a small hotel in Windsor, within walking distance of the castle – yes, in separate rooms, Frances had insisted in her latest letter – and Cassie managed to get a lift there, meeting them in the hushed and shuttered bar one afternoon.

‘Oh, Fran, it’s great to see you!’ Cassie cried, delighted.

‘Hello, Cassie,’ Frances whispered blushing, then turning to the man. ‘This – this is Simon Helston.’

‘Good afternoon, Captain Helston,’ Cassie said.

‘Simon will be fine, while we’re off duty.’ Simon Helston smiled, and then he shook Cassie by the hand. ‘As you can see, the bar is closed. So would you join us for some tea and scones at the White Lion along the road?’

‘That would be lovely,’ Cassie said.

Captain Helston was a tall, fair, pleasant-looking man, of about thirty-five or so, guessed Cassie. He was a little lame, she noticed, the result of injuries he’d suffered in North Africa. These meant he wasn’t fit for active service any more, and so – as Frances had explained – he did a desk job now, at the barracks where Frances was a driver.

They walked to the White Lion. In the dusty lounge there was a trio of old men who were playing sentimental tunes on squeaky violins and an untuned piano. Elderly, arthritic waitresses were serving tea and solid-looking scones, and on the tables were little pots of watery, artificial cream and runny, blood-red jam.

When Captain Helston gave his order, their waitress beamed at him and blushed – quite obviously, he’d made her day.

Cassie looked around the hotel lounge, and shook her head.

A mere two years ago, she would have thought all this the very height of elegance, of impossible sophistication. But now it just looked down-at-heel and tawdry – dusty, grubby, faded, tired of life.

When Captain Helston said he hoped the ladies would excuse him, but he was in need of nicotine, and it didn’t do to smoke where other people were eating, Frances leaned towards Cassie, blushed, and asked her what she thought.

‘He’s very nice,’ said Cassie. ‘He’s polite – he pulls out chairs for ladies, he doesn’t smoke where other people are eating, he doesn’t boss the waitresses around. I’d say you’ve caught yourself a gentleman.’

‘But he’s old,’ said Frances, and she frowned.

‘He’s not that old,’ said Cassie. ‘I mean, he’s not too old to – well, you know.’

‘I don’t know, actually,’ said Frances primly, as she coloured up again. ‘I’m not a tart, whatever it might look like.’

‘Fran, I never said you were, don’t be so touchy.’ Cassie smiled encouragingly at Frances. ‘Does he make you happy?’

‘Yes, he does.’

‘So go on being happy – be happy while you can, that’s my advice to you, because we might all die tomorrow. Frances, does he want to marry you?’

‘We’ve sort of talked about it,’ Frances said. ‘Of course, he hasn’t actually proposed, but that’s because he
can’t
propose to me, at least not yet. If he wants to marry me, he’ll need to be divorced.’ Frances sighed unhappily. ‘Mummy will be furious if I marry someone who’s divorced.’

‘Oh, Frances, you don’t have to please your horrible old mother all your life!’ Cassie looked at Frances, shook her arm. ‘Go on, live a little, have some fun.’

‘It’s odd you should say that, Cass, with your mother – ’

‘My mother was tricked and lied to by a bigamist,’ said Cassie. ‘It sounds like Captain Helston is playing fair with you.’

Chapter Thirteen

January 1944

When Cassie had a message to say that her commanding officer wanted to see her now, this very minute, she immediately feared the worst.

Robert or Lily Taylor – which, she thought, buttoning up her jacket with shaking hands. Grabbing her hat, she jammed it on her head, and then somehow got herself across the frost-rimed barrack square.

As she walked into her CO’s office, she braced herself, determined not to cry. Robert or Lily wouldn’t have wanted that.

But Captain Lancing didn’t look as if she had bad news. ‘At ease, Corporal Taylor,’ she began, as Cassie stood there to attention. ‘I have a job for you. It’s taking a colonel from the Hampshire Regiment back to London. He needs to go right now. We’re going to move you, too.’

‘Move me, ma’am?’ said Cassie frowning, thinking, what – again?

‘Yes, so we’ll save a lot of time and petrol if you drive this officer in a vehicle that needs to be in London anyway.’

Captain Lancing glanced down at some papers on her desk. ‘You’ll be based in London from now on. Please don’t look so gloomy, Corporal Taylor, it’s a damned good posting. You’ll drive top brass and various junior officers around, do a little motor maintenance, and general garage duties as and when. You’ll be billeted in a house in Chelsea with other ATS. Do you have any questions?’

‘I – I don’t think so, ma’am,’ said Cassie, doing rapid mental calculations – did she have anything at the laundry, had she borrowed anything from any of the girls, did anyone owe her money?

‘Good girl,’ said Captain Lancing, then she grinned. ‘Your friends here in the sticks will be quite jealous. Now there aren’t many air raids, and Jerry is too preoccupied in Europe to bother about us, London is the place to be. Lots of Yanks to take you out and spend their money on you, if you’re that way inclined.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ said Cassie. ‘Thank you, ma’am.’

‘You’d better get your kit together, then,’ said Captain Lancing. ‘Colonel Floyd is waiting.’

Yanks, indeed – who wanted Yanks, thought Cassie, as she hurried back to her own quarters. But then she thought, now I’ll see Daisy often. I’ll see Stephen, too. If there’s any news of Rob, I’ll hear it straight away.

Fifteen minutes later, she was driving a big black Humber staff car, on her way to London.

Cassie wrote to Robert almost every day, but knew he couldn’t be getting all her letters, that some must go astray. So she didn’t panic when she didn’t hear from him for weeks.

Or she tried not to panic, anyway.

‘More success in Italy!’ cried a newsboy one March morning, as Cassie walked down the road to the army garage where she was due to spend the day on general motor maintenance.

More success, she thought – about time, too. Robert never grumbled, but she understood from other girls, whose husbands, brothers and boyfriends were in Italy, that the whole campaign was one hard slog, as inch by inch the British and American armies pushed the Germans north.

Whenever they gained any ground, they entered towns and villages to find the houses empty, the people dead or run away, no food, no power, and booby-traps which caused a lot of casualties, however careful everyone tried to be.

The terrain they had to cross was dreadful. They climbed high in the mountains that made the spine of Italy, and they crossed streams and rivers that in winter swelled to raging torrents, their bridges all blown up or swept away.

‘The Germans force the Italians to lay mines. They dig and wire whole districts,’
Robert wrote, when on one blessed day she heard from him.
‘Whenever our boys push the Germans out of any villages, you can be sure we Dorsets watch our step!

‘But it shouldn’t be long now, darling Cass. We’re all making slow but steady progress and, apart from a few Fascist die-hards, the Italian people are on our side. We’re on our way to Rome and, when we get there, the Germans will have to put their hands up, talk or run away. I reckon they’ll surrender.

‘They won’t have much choice. They must know they’re beaten. If we’re lucky, we’ll soon see the end of it, and we British chaps can all come home.’

It was hard to know if Robert meant it about Germany surrendering. Or if he knew this was most unlikely, but was trying to cheer her up. Or get his letters through uncensored – when they got through at all.

Robert meant it, and he was doing his best to make it happen. As the Allied armies slogged their determined way along the spine of Italy, there were plenty of chances to help Jerry make his mind up.

Over the past few months, he and his dependable Sergeant Gregory, together with some of the bravest, brightest lads in his platoon, had volunteered for more than a dozen missions behind the German lines. They’d ambushed enemy convoys as these came round the narrow mountain roads, and sabotaged German transport vehicles taking up supplies.

So far, they hadn’t taken any serious casualties, they’d managed to get their wounded back to base, and Robert dared to hope their luck would last.

‘You two don’t always have to volunteer,’ he said to Blain and Thornton, two best friends who took the most alarming risks with daring and bravado, egging each other on with hoots of glee. ‘Sergeant Gregory and I, we could take some other chaps when we go walkies in the hills tomorrow.’

‘But, sir – I want to get a medal to send home to me mum,’ protested Private Thornton, grinning.

‘So do I,’ said Private Blain. ‘A medal would shut me father up, stop him goin’ on about us youngsters knowing nothin’, that he’s surprised we manage to wipe our arses in the dark. Beggin’ your pardon, sir. Go on, sir – be a sport and let us come.’

In late April, Cassie had a letter from Mrs Denham, inviting her to go and spend a day or two in Dorset, if she could get some leave.

‘My word, that will be thrilling,’ said a driver, and she grinned. ‘Visiting your future ma-in-law – you’ll have enough of her when you get married.’

‘Ooh, you’re gonna to get the third degree,’ went on another driver, a girl from the East End. ‘I remember when I went to meet my Frankie’s mum. She’d set up all these tests.’

‘What tests?’ asked Cassie, laughing.

‘She ’ad me in the kitchen makin’ rissoles, to see if I could cook. She ’ad me in the wash-’ouse where she was boilin’ up great piles of socks, to see if I could mangle.’

‘Oh, I can mangle,’ Cassie said.

‘Yeah, and so can I. But then she didn’t like my Cockney accent. She wrote to Frankie, she told ’im it was common, that I should be savin’ up for elocution lessons. When I got back to barracks, I wrote a note to Frankie, an’ I told ’im it was off.’

‘But Mrs Denham’s very nice,’ said Cassie.

‘You wait an’ see, my girl. You’re gonna take her precious boy away. You mark my words, Cass, nice or nasty, she’ll be like a tigress with a cub.’

‘Oh,’ said Cassie, feeling anxious now.

But she found she didn’t need to worry. When she arrived in Dorset, Mrs Denham met her at the station and gave her a big hug.

‘Thank you for coming, Cassie,’ she began. ‘I must say, you’re looking very well. London obviously agrees with you.’