A Ration Book Daughter Page 6

  Cathy kicked the back gate so hard it bounced against the wall behind her and sprang back, glancing against her arm and shoulder as she wheeled Peter’s pushchair into the backyard.

  Slamming on the brakes, Cathy unclipped Peter, hauled him out and sat him on her hip. Taking her shopping bag from the tray beneath, she stormed through the back door.

  Dumping her shopping on the table and setting Peter on his feet, she took off his outer clothes. Throwing them on to a chair as she passed, Cathy stormed through to the back parlour with Peter trotting behind her.

  Violet was sitting in her usual chair by the fire with her feet up on the pouffe, listening to Forces Fanfare as she cradled a cup of tea in her hand.

  Seeing Cathy’s furious face, a smug expression slid across hers. ‘Been to the bank, have you?’

  ‘You’ve got a bloody nerve,’ shouted Cathy.

  ‘No, I’ve got my Stanley’s hard-earned savings and,’ she took a sip of tea, ‘I’m going to keep them safe until he gets home.’

  ‘I suppose it was your idea, wasn’t it?’ said Cathy, as her son clung to her legs.

  ‘I did suggest it to Stanley, yes,’ her mother-in-law replied. ‘He thought it was a good idea after the way you treated him when he came home on leave last time.’

  ‘How I treated him!’ said Cathy. ‘I was the one who couldn’t show my face in the market for a week because of his fist.’

  ‘Well, it’s no more than you deserved,’ Violet replied. ‘Cheeking me and giving him a lot of old lip. Who’d blame him for wanting to put his money somewhere safe to stop the tinker slut he married squandering it.’

  ‘Squandering it!’ Cathy placed her hand on Peter’s sandy-coloured curls. ‘I suppose you mean keeping a roof over my son’s head and food on the table.’

  ‘You’ve got more than enough to do that,’ Violet replied. ‘When I ran this house, Stan had meat in his lunchbox every day and a hot dinner to sit down to when he came in from work, all on two pounds a week.’

  ‘Yes, but now the rent is five bob more than it was then,’ said Cathy. ‘An onion costs more than five pounds of potatoes, if you can find one. The bacon and butter rations have been cut again, and all a shilling’s worth of meat ration buys you some weeks is a bit of shin or a scrag end of lamb.’

  Violet regarded her coolly.

  ‘It’s not my fault if you’re a bad housewife,’ she said, taking another sip of tea. ‘And before you ask, no! I’m not giving you any more than half a crown a week. In fact, you’re lucky to get that. My dear Norman didn’t slave over a desk for fifty years at the Eastern Gas Company just so you can live in luxury. If you don’t like it, you can sling your hook back to your mother’s. It’s my Stanley’s army wages that pays for everything and after the way that poxy sister of yours and your Irish tinker family have treated him, you’ – she jabbed her finger at Cathy – ‘ought to be grateful he gives you anything.’ Her mother-in-law gave her a syrupy smile. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to drink my cup of tea in peace.’

  Maintaining her sweet expression, Violet reached across and turned the volume dial of the brown Murphy wireless and ‘Chattanooga Cho Cho’ blasted out.

  Cathy glared at her for a moment then, sweeping her son up from the floor and into her arms, she turned and marched back into the kitchen, running through some of her gran’s more colourful curses in her head.

  ‘I was hoping Hitler had forgotten about us in East London,’ said Sergeant Mills, rain dripping from the peak of his helmet. ‘But no such luck.’

  Archie gave a mirthless laugh. ‘Well, he’s got to take his temper out on someone, I suppose.’

  ‘You mean with the Russians holding out in Stalingrad?’ asked the officer.

  ‘Aye,’ Archie replied. ‘You can’t call yourself the master race and then get your arse whipped by people you’ve mocked as peasants to your adoring followers, can ye now?’

  It was just after midday on the last Tuesday in November and Archie was standing in Dock Street, just a stone’s throw from the Tower of London and St Katharine Docks. Behind him, sitting in the comfort of the van that was tucked safely behind one of the high warehouse walls, was D Squad. They were passing the time by playing cards, scoffing plate loads of sandwiches and knocking back gallons of tea, supplied by the grateful café owners in Cable Street.

  Smudger, the clerk from the control room, had handed Archie the ticket for a Cat-A bomb almost the minute he’d walked into the depot that morning. After gathering the men together, he’d set off on his motorbike, leaving the rest of them to follow.

  That was five hours ago, but for once they hadn’t been digging their way through London clay because the bomb they had been sent to defuse was dangling from its parachute. This time it was tangled around the signals at the western end of the Minories-to-Blackwall railway, which ran along the viaduct at the other end of the street. In fact, as it was a sea mine, it wasn’t even really their bomb.

  Early in the war, when the first bomb disposal units were scraped together from the Royal Engineers and Tunnelling companies, there had been a bit of a tussle among the army and navy top brass as to who should be in charge of the whole shooting match.

  Understandably, the population, with bombs raining down on them night after night, was more interested in the unexploded bombs being made safe and less concerned about who did it. So, in the best of British compromises, it was agreed that the army’s bomb disposal units should grapple with German land bombs while the navy’s bomb disposal units should deal with naval mines, which is why Archie was now standing in the pouring rain behind a rope with a yellow rag tied on it denoting a police cordon.

  Behind them, other than the odd ARP warden checking that everyone who had been told to evacuate had left, the street was deserted.

  ‘They’re taking their time, aren’t they?’ said Sergeant Mills, looking at his watch.

  The A Squad’s grey-haired section sergeant had a figure that put considerable strain on his uniform jacket’s silver buttons and belt. Archie and the good sergeant had been standing around long enough for him to discover that although the officer had completed his twenty-five-years’ service in the capital a month after war broke, he’d volunteered to stay on to do his bit by plugging the gap left by younger men who had signed up.

  ‘As you said yerself,’ Archie replied, ‘it was a busy night last night.’

  Reaching under his rubberised cape, Sergeant Mills pulled out a five pack of John Players. Flipping it open, he offered one to Archie.

  ‘That’s good of you, but no,’ said Archie.

  Sergeant Mills shook the pack. ‘Go on, I’ve another pack back at the station.’

  Archie shook his head. ‘I’m grand.’

  ‘Where you from, lad?’ the sergeant asked.

  ‘Glasgow,’ said Archie.

  ‘No, I mean originally, like?’ the officer asked as he lit his cigarette.

  Archie raised an eyebrow. ‘Where did I get my lovely tan?’

  The officer nodded.

  ‘My father was from Trinidad,’ Archie replied. ‘Why?’

  ‘My mate Jacob’s old man comes from Jamaica,’ the officer replied.

  An engine roared behind them. Archie turned to see a five-ton Bedford lorry bouncing over the cobbles towards them. It screeched to a stop a little way behind them and a naval lieutenant in a flat cap and sea boots jumped out of the cab on the passenger side.

  Spotting them, he gave Archie the usual curious look and then strode over, the rain forming dark spots on the thick fabric of his camel-coloured greatcoat.

  Archie stood to attention and saluted.

  ‘Lieutenant Unwin,’ the officer said, returning his salute. ‘Right, Sergeant . . . ?’

  ‘McIntosh.’

  ‘Right, McIntosh. What have we here, then?’

  ‘Looks to me like a Luftmine B 1,000-kilo dangling yonder,’ Archie replied.

  The officer, six inches or so shorter than Archie, raised his weather-r
oughened face and followed Archie’s gaze.

  ‘Shall we check?’ He strode off.

  Archie caught up with him in half a dozen strides. They walked abreast to inspect the eight-foot-long metal tube packed tight with high explosives that was hanging by its nylon guy ropes above them.

  They stopped beneath it and, taking off his peaked cap, the naval officer looked up.

  ‘You’re right, Sergeant,’ said Unwin, scratching his head through his sandy-coloured hair. ‘It’s a Luftmine B. And you’re all bally lucky it hasn’t gone off.’

  ‘Triggered by the rail’s magnet fuse, you mean?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Unwin. ‘So we’d better get a shift on and defuse it.’ He raised an eyebrow. ‘I’m surprised it still has its parachute.’

  ‘I don’t believe in the spoils of war, Lieutenant, so there’s no pilfering from my lads,’ Archie replied flatly.

  The officer’s pale eyes studied Archie’s face for a second then he saluted.

  ‘Good work, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘We’ll take it from here, so you and your boys hop off and get something hot down you.’

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ Archie replied, returning his salute.

  Leaving Lieutenant Unwin to get his crew organised, Archie marched back to the Austin where his squad were sheltering. Going around to the rear, he lifted the tarpaulin cover aside.

  A cloud of cigarette smoke escaped, revealing D Squad sitting on the side benches huddled in blankets and cradling enamel mugs of tea.

  ‘All right, lads,’ Archie said as he leaned over the tailboard, ‘the navy’s taking over so we’ve to stand down.’

  There were murmurs of ‘about bleedin’ time’, ‘what kept them?’ and ‘fank gawd’ as the men started packing away their kit.

  ‘It’s all right for you, little pets. Some of us have been standing out in this,’ he said as rain lashed against his face.

  The men laughed and a couple of them blew him noisy kisses.

  Archie grinned.

  ‘Away with you, you ugly bunch of Sassenachs,’ he said. ‘I’m for getting meself something to fill me belly so I’ll meet you back at the base once I have.’

  Fred climbed over into the driver’s seat and turned on the engine. Archie banged on the backboard and then stepped away.

  ‘And try to keep yourselves out of trouble for once,’ he shouted after them as the lorry rolled away.

  ‘You not going with them?’ asked Sergeant Mills as the vehicle disappeared around the corner.

  Archie shook his head. ‘I’m going to get myself some grub first. Can you point me in the direction of a decent café or something?’

  ‘Well, there’s a British Restaurant around the corner from St Dunstan’s Church, but I’d recommend you try the WVS canteen in St Breda and St Brendan’s Rest Centre,’ Sergeant Mills replied. ‘It’ll only be a few moments from here and as it’s Tuesday you’ll be able to enjoy Mrs Lipman’s lamb stew and dumplings.’

  Having retrieved his bike from Bassington & Co’s loading bay, where the dispatch manager had allowed him to store his Triumph, Archie pulled up outside the rest centre just as the rain started to ease. Anchoring the waxed cover over his seat with a couple of elasticated straps and chaining his front wheel to one of the upturned cannons that served as bollards, Archie strolled in.

  Judging by the full-width stage and sprung floor, the hall had clearly been the social hub of the area. It still was, but now it served a different purpose for those who’d once enjoyed themselves beneath its arched roof.

  As Sergeant Mills had predicted, the delicious smell of lamb filled his nose as Archie walked through the double doors into the hall.

  Naturally, as it was just after one, the canteen area, which was situated at the opposite end of the room from the stage, was a sea of khaki and navy and was packed with ARP wardens and members of the Home Guards, plus the odd fireman and ambulance driver sprinkled among them.

  The other uniform colour very much in evidence was the forest green of the WVS women, who were busily serving meals, sorting out clothes and household items ready to be given to families who had been bombed out or helping fraught mothers with children. There was even a group of more mature volunteers helping younger women with their knitting and sewing.

  Taking off his field cap, he stowed it in his right epaulette then started for the serving hatch. However, he’d only taken a few steps when a woman’s throaty laugh made him look around.

  He stopped dead. There, bending over to admire a little girl’s rag doll, with a soft smile lifting her full lips, was the woman who had run out of the church after her child a few weeks before.

  Cathy! That was her name. Cathy.

  He wondered in passing why he should remember her so clearly. After all, they’d only exchanged a few words, but oddly he had. Vividly, too.

  However, although his memory had been right about her shapely legs and her slim figure, it hadn’t fully registered her pleasing curves. Also, now he could see her corn-coloured tresses were plaited into a figure of eight and secured low on the back of her head, which set him wondering how far down her back her loose hair would fall.

  There was something else. He’d thought her easy on the eye, which she certainly was, but it was her lovely open smile that set her eyes sparkling that now had his total attention.

  His hunger forgotten, Archie just stood there, mesmerised as she talked to the child. He studied her for a moment or two then, pulling down the front of his jacket, he made his way towards her.

  ‘So, what did you ask Father Christmas for, Ruby?’ Cathy asked the eight-year-old girl.

  ‘A new doll. But now the letter’s gone with everything else,’ replied Ruby.

  ‘Don’t worry, sweetheart,’ said Cathy, smoothing a stray curl of light brown hair from the child’s forehead. ‘Father Christmas knows, so I’m sure he’ll have one in his sack for you. Now I can see your mum’s at the front of the dinner queue, so why don’t you go and join her?’

  Ruby gave her a brave little smile then trotted over to the canteen area.

  ‘We meet again,’ a deep voice said behind her.

  Cathy turned and found herself staring up into the light brown face of the soldier she’d met outside church a few weeks before.

  He smiled. ‘I don’t know if you remember me but I—’

  ‘Stopped my son’s dash for freedom.’ Cathy laughed. ‘Yes, I remember.’

  How could she not? Even without his brown skin, standing well over six foot and with eyes the colour of cornflowers and lashes any woman would envy, this bomb disposal sergeant wasn’t a man you could easily forget.

  He glanced around.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ added Cathy, studying his strong square jawline, ‘I promise you won’t have to sprint after him today. He’s with Auntie Muriel in the nursery.’

  They stared at each other for a couple of seconds then he spoke again.

  ‘So, you’re in the WVS.’

  Cathy glanced down at her uniform. ‘What gave it away?’

  He laughed. ‘Just a shot in the dark.’

  Cathy laughed too, feeling oddly light-hearted.

  ‘I volunteer here most days,’ she replied. ‘I deal with the second-hand clothes usually, but at the moment I’m also in charge of sorting out the children’s Christmas party. It’s only four weeks away and we’ve got about thirty kids coming, so I’m trying to make sure Father Christmas has a toy for every child. Which reminds me, I must make sure I label up a doll for Ruby Freeman. She’s the little girl I was talking to when you came over. Her family were bombed out two days ago and they are staying with relatives nearby.’

  ‘Poor lass.’ A sentimental expression softened his angular features. ‘She’s about the same age as ma Kirsty.’

  Cathy smiled. ‘So, what brings you here, Sergeant?’

  ‘A parachute mine in Dock Street,’ he replied. ‘I’ve been keeping an eye on it since first light but have finally handed it over to the navy fellas. I’ve sent the
lads back to base, but I’m looking for some grub.’

  ‘Well, you’ve come to the right place because they’re just dishing up,’ Cathy replied. ‘It’s lamb stew today.’

  ‘I know, it was a recommendation that brought me here.’ He glanced at the canteen area. ‘It’s filling up.’

  ‘Yes, Mrs Lipman’s lamb stew is famous,’ Cathy replied. ‘You’d better get in the queue before it’s all gone.’

  ‘Aye, I’d better,’ he replied, not making a move to do so. ‘Well, nice to see you again.’

  ‘And you,’ said Cathy, conscious of her friends sorting the clothes sending her curious glances.

  ‘I’m Archie, by the way.’ He offered his hand. ‘Archie McIntosh.’

  ‘Cathy Wheeler,’ she replied, taking it. ‘Mrs.’

  ‘Nice to meet you, Mrs Wheeler,’ he said.

  As his fingers curled around hers, a little ripple of pleasure started up her arm, but she cut the feeling short.

  ‘You too,’ she said, taking her hand back. ‘I hope you enjoy your dinner.’

  ‘I’m sure I will,’ he replied. ‘And perhaps I’ll see you again sometime.’

  Cathy smiled.

  He smiled back, then turned and headed for the canteen.

  Cathy watched him stroll across to join the queue.

  She shouldn’t really be eyeing him up, of course, but a woman would have to be dead from the neck down not to find herself studying how his broad frame stretched the shoulders of his battle jacket or the way his khaki trousers fitted snugly around his long legs.

  Dragging her mind back to the pile of clothing waiting to be sorted, Cathy made her way back to the bench on the other side of the hall.

  ‘All right,’ said Maureen Morgan, who was a year or two older than Cathy and lived in King David’s Lane just off the Highway, ‘spill the beans, Cathy, who was that dusky dreamboat you were talking to.’

  ‘Oh, no one really,’ said Cathy, tucking her skirt under her as she sat. ‘Just someone I – well, actually Peter – ran into a few weeks ago.’

  She told them how Archie had stopped Peter running into the road.