Hazel Gaynor - The Girl From The Savoy

Published by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

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www.harpercollins.co.uk

Published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers 2016

Copyright © Hazel Gaynor 2016

Cover layout design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2016

Cover photographs © Ilona Wellmann/Trevillion Images (girl); Shutterstock.com(pattern).

Hazel Gaynor asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books

Source ISBN: 9780008162283

Ebook Edition © June 2016 ISBN: 9780008162306

Version: 2016-04-14

For my sister, Helen.

With love, and a large G&T.

… men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars.

– F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph

Prologue

ACT I: Hope

Chapter 1: Dolly

Chapter 2: Dolly

Chapter 3: Loretta

Chapter 4: Dolly

Chapter 5: Teddy

Chapter 6: Dolly

Chapter 7: Loretta

Chapter 8: Loretta

Chapter 9: Dolly

Chapter 10: Dolly

Chapter 11: Teddy

Chapter 12: Dolly

Chapter 13: Loretta

Chapter 14: Loretta

Chapter 15: Dolly

Chapter 16: Teddy

Chapter 17: Dolly

Chapter 18: Loretta

Chapter 19: Dolly

Chapter 20: Dolly

ACT II: Love

Chapter 21: Loretta

Chapter 22: Dolly

Chapter 23: Teddy

Chapter 24: Dolly

Chapter 25: Dolly

Chapter 26: Dolly

Chapter 27: Loretta

Chapter 28: Dolly

Chapter 29: Dolly

Chapter 30: Teddy

Chapter 31: Dolly

Chapter 32: Dolly

Chapter 33: Dolly

Chapter 34: Teddy

Chapter 35: Dolly

Chapter 36: Loretta

Chapter 37: Dolly

Chapter 38: Teddy

ACT III: Adventure

Chapter 39: Dolly

Chapter 40: Dolly

Chapter 41: Dolly

Chapter 42: Dolly

Chapter 43: Dolly

Chapter 44: Loretta

Chapter 45: Dolly

Chapter 46: Dolly

Chapter 47: Dolly

Epilogue

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Also by Hazel Gaynor

About the Publisher

Lancashire, England

March 1916

In my heart, I always knew he would go; that they would all go, in the end. Now the dreaded day has arrived. Teddy is going to war and there is nothing I can do to prevent it.

Everything is a blur. I don’t remember eating breakfast. I don’t remember laying the fires or doing any of my usual chores. I don’t remember hanging up my apron or putting on my coat and hat. I’m not even sure I closed the door behind me as I set off for the station, but I must have done all these things because somehow I am here, standing on the platform, and he is pressing a bunch of daffodils into my hands. Somehow, he is really leaving.

‘I’ll be back before you know it,’ he says, brushing a tear from my cheek. ‘They won’t know what’s hit them when we arrive. Look at us. Tough as old boots!’ I glance along the platform. The assembled conscripts look like frightened young boys. Not soldiers. Not tough at all. ‘I’ll be back for your birthday and I’ll take you to the village dance, just like last year. You’ll hardly notice I’m gone before I’m back.’

I want to believe him, but we all know the truth. Nobody comes back. The thought breaks my heart and I gasp to catch my breath through my tears.

Mam had warned me not to be getting all maudlin and sobbing on his shoulder. ‘You’re to be strong, Dorothy. Tell him how brave he is and how proud you are. No snivelling and wailing.’ And here I am, doing everything she told me not to. I can’t help it. I don’t want to be proud. I don’t want to tell him how brave he is. I want to sink to my knees and wrap my arms around his ankles so that he can’t go anywhere. Not without me.

‘We’ll be married in the summer and we’ll have little ’uns running around our feet and everything will be back to normal, Dolly. Just you and me and a quiet simple life. Just like we’ve always wanted.’

I nod and press my cheek to the thick fabric of his coat. A quiet simple life. Just like we’ve always wanted. I try to ignore the voice in my head that whispers to me of more than a quiet simple life, the voice that speaks of rowdy adventures waiting far away from here. ‘Head full of nonsense.’ That’s what our Sarah says. She’s probably right. She usually is.

A loud hiss of steam pierces the subdued quiet of the platform, drowning out the muffled sobs. Doors start to slam as the men step into the carriages. Embraces end. Hands are prised agonizingly apart. It is time to let go.

I reach up onto my tiptoes and our lips meet in a last kiss. It isn’t lingering and passionate as I’ve imagined, but rushed and interrupted by my wretched sobs and the urgency of others telling Teddy to hurry along now. We part too soon and he is walking away from me. I can hardly see his face through the blur of my tears.

The shrill blast of the station master’s whistle makes me jump. Mothers and daughters cling to each other. Wives clutch their children to their chests as they bravely wave their daddy good-bye. Great clouds of smoke billow around us and I cover my mouth with my handkerchief as the pistons yawn into life and begin turning on their cranks. The carriages jolt to attention, and he is going.

I start to move, my feet falling in time with the motion of the train, slow at first, and then a brisk walk. All along the platform, women and children reach out, clinging for all they are worth to prolong the very last touch of a coat sleeve, a fingertip, the last flutter of a white handkerchief. And I am jogging and then running, faster and faster, until I can’t keep up and he is gone.

He is gone.

He is gone.

I slow to a walk and stand among the suffocating smoke as my heart cracks into a thousand shards of helpless despair. Everything has changed. Everything will be different now.

I put my hands in my coat pockets, my fingers finding the piece of folded paper in each. I glance at the hastily scribbled note from Teddy in my right hand: Darling Little Thing, Don’t be sad. When the war is over, I’ll come back to you, back to Mawdesley. With you beside me, this is all the world I will ever need. I glance at the page in my left hand, ripped from the morning paper as I lay the fire in Madam’s bedroom. SOCIETY DARLING AND BRAVE NURSE VIRGINIA CLEMENTS REVEALED AS WEST END STAR LORETTA MAY! I look at her beautiful face and elegant clothes, the perfect image to accompany the glowing report of Cochran’s latest dazzling production and the enchanting new star of his chorus. I stare at the two pieces of paper. The life I know in one hand. The life I dream of in the other.