Ruby Jackson - On a Wing and a Prayer

‘You’ll get there, Chrissy, and secretaries make lots more money than cleaners. That cottage with roses round the door is just a matter of time.’

No one from Rose’s group had been selected for officer training.

Cleo had been selected for driver training. At the most, she could drive and, thanks to Rose, she now knew where to put petrol; Phyllis had been chosen for reasons even she could not begin to understand to join an anti-aircraft crew, looking out for enemy aircraft with the help of radar and searchlights.

‘Please don’t do any firing until you can recognise every type of plane in existence,’ Rose warned her, half seriously. ‘Don’t want you shooting down my sister.’

‘Only men fire guns.’

‘That doesn’t fill me with confidence,’ retorted Rose, and again everyone laughed.

Next they turned on Rose. ‘Come on, Rose, why so quiet and modest? What job have they given you? Chauffeur to the American general?’

Rose smiled and tried gamely to hide her bitter disappointment as she said, ‘No, very sensibly they’ve put me down as a mechanic – trainee, that is; it’s usually a man’s job. What’s your betting they still give me a woman’s wages?’

Each of the young women had been told that her wages would be two-thirds of that earned by the men. For Chrissy, it was still better than she had earned as a cleaner, and was, in her eyes, a definite step up.

Cleo hugged Rose. ‘I’m so sorry, Rose. They should have made you a driver. Probably there’s been a mistake. They’ll discover that and change your posting.’

‘I’ll be a good mechanic, Cleo. Honestly, I’m delighted; I was always afraid they’d throw me out altogether. Pity we won’t be together, though. It’s been fun.’

Promising to keep in touch, they continued to walk back towards their hut, where already packing-up was going on.

Cleo stopped. ‘I’m going to make a bet that by this time next year you’ll be a driver.’

Rose tried to smile. ‘For Mr Churchill, naturally.’

‘Of course. Just wait and see.’

Two days later, the newly ‘embodied’ auxiliaries boarded a bus heading for the station, the first step to their new posts where each one would have the rank of private. Cleo, in the window seat, noticed as the bus drove out that there was some unusual activity at the toilet block.

‘Goodness me. Don’t look, Rose; it’ll just upset you.’

Naturally Rose had to look. She sighed. ‘Let’s be charitable and say we’re glad for the next lot of trainees.’

The girls turned their heads again, looking towards the exciting future. Behind them auxiliary staff were – after many requests – hanging curtains on the fronts of the toilet cubicles.

Preston, Lancashire, July 1942

It could have been worse. She might have been sent to Scotland. Not, thought Rose, that there was anything wrong with Scotland, but it was just so very far away from Dartford.

Preston was not too far really, and what she had seen from the train looked almost familiar. They were not stationed in the town itself but a few miles out. There was a river, the Ribble. Rose liked the sound of water flowing, jumping over stones on its way to the sea. She thought it would be pleasant to walk, run or cycle in the area around the base. It was mainly moorland and there was a high point called a fell not too far away. It was called Beacon Fell, possibly because beacons were lit on it on special days or to warn nearby inhabitants that trouble was coming.

She wondered if the beacon would be lit to warn of an air raid, then scolded herself for being silly. If she ever got time off she could get a train from Preston to London, and then another from London to Dartford. Cleo was in a place called Arundel. She’d have to look that up, but niggles in her brain hinted that Arundel was a lot closer to Dartford than it was to Preston. A really bright spot, however, was that Chrissy was here with her. To arrive at a new base and know not one person there would have been awful.

‘Pity we’re not in the same billet, Rose, but for me it’s lovely to know at least one person.’

They were sitting in the canteen enjoying their dinner of corned beef, potatoes and carrots – at least Rose was. Chrissy was merely pushing her carrots around.

‘I’m delighted you’re here too,’ said Rose, ‘but you don’t look too happy, Chrissy. I’ll fetch us a nice cup of tea and you can tell me what’s bothering you…if you want to, that is.’

She walked across to the tea trolley and poured two cups of tea. ‘Good heavens,’ she said aloud. ‘It’s too weak to run out of the pot.’

‘Very funny, Petrie. We’re lucky to be getting any tea at all. Kitchen does its best, but with rationing—’

‘Rationing? When was tea rationed?’

‘You been in outer space, girl?’ asked the irate cook. ‘At least two years.’

‘Since 1940? I was working in a munitions factory in ’40, but my parents sell tea, high-end market as well as the housewife’s choice, and I don’t remember a word about it.’

‘Parents don’t tell their offspring everything.’

Rose thanked the cook, apologised for complaining and then walked back to her table, remembering recent conversations about parents and the sacrifices they were prepared to make for their children.

‘Here you go, Chrissy, can’t exactly stand a spoon up in it, but it’s hot, wet and sweet enough!’

‘Just the way I like it,’ said Chrissy with an attempt at a smile.

Rose sat down beside her. ‘What is it? You can tell me and I’ll help if I can.’

Chrissy looked at Rose for a long moment. ‘It’s my Alan,’ she said at last, ‘my son. I haven’t had a word from him in weeks and I’m worried sick.’

‘Where is he?’

‘That’s it. I don’t know. He said in his last letter as he might be going overseas. Really excited, he was, and I pretended I were, an’ all. See the world: Paris, France, the mysterious East.’

‘Letters from overseas take much longer than from – where was he stationed?’

‘Aldershot.’

‘That must have been nice, not an awful long way from Guildford. Did he write to you in Guildford?’

‘Yes, but he won’t know this address if he didn’t get my letter telling him.’

‘That won’t matter, Chrissy. If he sends a letter to Guildford it’ll be sent on to you. Happens every day of the week, but try not to worry.’

Rose knew all about worrying over absent loved ones. They had waited for letters from Ron, and Flora would always treasure the few he had written before his death in action. Rose could not speak of her brother’s death to anyone, and especially not to a woman who was worried about her only son.

‘My brother Phil’s at sea, Chrissy. Sometimes it’s months between letters and then five or six arrive at the same time. He numbers them now and so Mum knows if one’s missing. Sometimes they do get lost and sometimes the lost one turns up months later. And when my brother Sam was on active service, Mum got letters every week and then it was months between…It doesn’t mean he’s not writing, Chrissy, just that there’s a hold-up somewhere. You have to stay positive.’

‘I’m sorry to be such a nuisance, Rose. I’m trying to concentrate on the typing and the shorthand but then I start worrying about Alan and I can’t see the keys or the symbols – all I can see is Alan’s face.’

That was what it must have been like for Mum and Dad with the boys. Did I give them half the sympathy I’m giving Chrissy? I hope so.

‘You haven’t touched your tea. Don’t blame you really. Doesn’t even smell like tea. We lived above the shop and if we weren’t smelling Mum’s baking, we were smelling tea leaves – lovely. Some of them’s really exotic, you know, from China and places like that.’ She picked up Chrissy’s cup. ‘I’ll fetch you another cuppa.’