Chapter 38
Ernie laughed as Carol and the recruit walked off. ‘We seem to have driven your pal away. Are we that dull, do you think?’
‘I think we might be,’ Bobby said, smiling.
He shuffled round to look at her. ‘And now she’s gone, you can tell me what’s the matter.’
She flushed. ‘What makes you think anything is?’
‘Come on, Slacks. I saw your face when Carter mentioned your guy. And don’t think I haven’t noticed that white mark around your finger and the ring that’s conspicuous by its absence.’
‘Please, Ernie, don’t. I just… I can’t.’
He blinked as a tear she couldn’t keep in escaped.
‘Sure,’ he said gently. ‘If you don’t want to talk about it, that’s your prerogative. Just thought you might welcome a listening ear.’
‘Not from you.’
‘Why not? Your new girlfriends seem nice and all, but you’ve known me longer.’
‘I…’ She swallowed hard, endeavouring to push back the threatening tears. ‘Because I’ll weep all over you, that’s why. Talk about anything else. Silverdale, Canada, anything. I don’t want to think about it until… until it’s bedtime and I have to.’
‘If that’s what you want.’ Ernie was still watching her with a worried expression. ‘I hate to see you like this, Slacks.’
‘Yes, well, I hate being like this.’ She closed her eyes. ‘But I don’t want to go to bed,’ she said quietly. ‘I thought I did, but there won’t be any sleep waiting for me. Just thoughts, and pain. If you really want to be a friend tonight, talk to me. Make me think about anything else, please.’
Ernie watched her for a moment, then took something from the breast pocket of his tunic and put it down in front of her.
‘Take a look at this. It arrived today from my mom.’
It was a photograph: a man and woman in middle age, arms around each other, both grinning very Ernie-like grins.
The woman had her dress rolled to the elbows and looked merry, rosy-cheeked and like she wouldn’t brook any nonsense.
The man was the image of Ernie with a couple of decades added, handsome and grizzle-haired, with a full beard that gave him the look of a seasoned outdoorsman.
Beside them were a couple of equally merry-looking kids.
Behind was a large wooden farmhouse that looked to be straight out of Tom Sawyer, with a porch and a white picket fence.
Snow-capped mountains that would dwarf Great Bowside rose up in the distance.
‘It’s beautiful,’ Bobby whispered. ‘This is your family?’
‘Yeah. Mom, Dad, kid brother and sister.’ Ernie smiled a little wistfully at the picture.
‘When I left, young Joey there was still in braces. In another year, he’ll be old enough to go to war.
I guess Maggie will have grown up too before her big brother gets back again.
’ He glanced at her. ‘I wish you could meet them. They’d love you. ’
‘I’m sure I’d love them.’ Bobby looked again at the photograph. ‘They seem so happy.’
‘That’s the life out there. Mountain air, wholesome food and hard work. Man, my mom can cook! I can’t deny I’ve gotten fond of this place, but in the words of Dorothy Gale, there’s no place like home, right?’
‘You must miss it.’
‘Yeah,’ he said with a sigh. ‘I wonder, sometimes, if I’ll ever go back. I’d like to see the old place again.’
For a moment, Bobby thought he was talking about settling in England permanently after the war. Then she realised what he meant.
‘You will,’ she said, giving his hand a brief squeeze. ‘I’m sure of it.’
‘Seems arrogant to think I’ll be lucky when so many aren’t.
Nice to know I’m in your prayers though.
’ He looked up from the photograph to smile at her.
‘Now there’s a life that’d suit you, Slacks.
If you think the piffling little hills you call mountains around these parts are beautiful, you ought to see the Rockies.
Nothing to do but milk the cows, care for the little ones and fix your eyes on the sunset.
Not a worry in the world apart from raccoons getting in the trash and the occasional straying bear. ’
‘That sounds wonderful,’ Bobby said with a sigh. She blinked. ‘Sorry, did you say bear?’
He laughed. ‘Yeah, it’s grizzly country out there. Mostly they’re more scared of us than we are of them.’
‘I promise I am definitely more scared of them.’
‘Well, you look like a lady who could handle a shotgun. I’m sure you’d be striding the mountains like a true woodsman in no time, gun over your shoulder and a bearskin shawl on your back.’
They were interrupted by Mike, who ran over hand in hand with the officer she had been dancing with, Alfie. She took a long drink from her beer bottle.
‘Oh Lord, this is a party,’ she said breathlessly to Bobby. ‘Carol’s as tight as an owl, God bless her little spectacles. There’s gin being passed around if you want any, Bobs.’
‘Thanks, but I’m fine with beer,’ Bobby said, toasting Mike with her bottle.
‘Not asking this young lady to dance, Canada, you pig?’ Alfie said, grinning at his fellow officer.
Ernie glanced at Bobby. ‘Sorry, I guess that was rude. Would you like to?’ He smiled as the music for ‘The Lambeth Walk’ came on the gramophone. ‘They are playing our song.’
‘Oh, no,’ she said, laughing. ‘You know what a mess I always make of it.’
‘Suit yourselves.’ Mike dragged Alfie back to the floor.
Bobby followed them with her eyes. Dilys had hitched her skirt up past her suspenders while she did the Lambeth Walk, displaying knickers that were quite definitely knockouts and not blackouts.
Carol was tripping over her feet and giggling as she attempted the steps, having sought solace for Ernie’s neglect in gin, while her equally drunk partner took advantage of the situation to let his hands wander where they shouldn’t.
Mike was whispering something to Alfie – of what nature Bobby could only guess, but Alfie flashed his partner a very suggestive smirk in response.
Bobby glanced at Ernie. He was watching too, scowling.
‘What did I tell you?’ he muttered. ‘You put women in uniform, let them loose in a camp and pretty soon they’ve turned into a bunch of drunken pick-up girls. These your new friends, are they, Slacks?’
‘That isn’t fair,’ Bobby said. ‘OK, so Mike and the rest like to have a good time. I don’t see what’s so wrong with that. They’ll only be young once.’
‘The dame with the glasses can barely stand up. If a WAAF officer sees the Welsh one flashing her panties in uniform, she’ll find herself on a charge before she can blink.
And I don’t suppose Alfie’s noticed the mark on that phoney blonde job’s wedding finger where she’s taken her ring off – not that he’s the type to care.
’ He looked at Bobby. ‘What is it? Fiancé?’
‘Husband,’ she said, flushing. ‘But it’s more complicated than that. They’ve got an understanding.’
His gaze flickered to her own wedding finger, and the mark left by her engagement ring. ‘I don’t suppose…’
Bobby scowled. ‘Really? That’s what you think of me?’
‘No.’ He rubbed his head. ‘Sorry. That was a low thing to say. I guess I just don’t want to see you end up that way.’
‘What way is that?’
‘That way,’ he said, nodding to the women. ‘Exposing yourself to a roomful of strangers, too drunk to stand, getting cheap kicks with guys you just met.’ He curled his lip at Carol. ‘There’s nothing uglier than a drunken woman.’
‘While you boys go back to your dorms for prayers and Bible study of an evening, I suppose,’ Bobby said, glaring at him.
‘It’s different for men.’
‘Why? Because you have to fight?’
He shrugged. ‘Partly.’
Bobby shook her head. ‘You think you’re so bloody noble, don’t you?
Dealing with this great weighty conflict while we’re typing and swooning over you, to be patted on the head like good little girls or sneered at like tarts, depending on whether we meet your approval.
Just playing at war, aren’t we? Secretaries and cooks and surrogate mothers, and surrogate wives when that’s what you need, sanctioned in best blues. ’
Ernie blinked at her. ‘That was a hell of a speech.’
‘I just don’t see what right men have to look down on us because we can’t fly. Could you win this without us? Could you?’
‘I never said what you girls were doing didn’t matter, did I?’
‘Then why so holier-than-thou about how we choose to let off steam when we’re off duty?’
‘This is why disease is rife in the services. Women who were probably nice girls in civilian life, acting fast just because they can. Men taking God knows what back home to infect their poor wives with. It’s disgusting.’
‘It takes two people to do that, doesn’t it?
’ Bobby countered. ‘I know what men get up to when they’re away from home, and airmen the worst of the lot.
“Running After Fluff”, right? Isn’t that the joke?
Is it so surprising that women want to live in the moment just as men do, when times are so uncertain? ’
‘Well, perhaps not, but—’
‘Or do you think that because you’re risking your lives, you’re entitled to treat us as a perk of the job?
’ she went on. ‘I’ve heard the crude things people call us in the WAAF.
Airmen’s comforts. Pilots’ cockpits. Men who think airwomen and their bodies are no more than playthings to amuse them between ops.
I thought you, at least, might have the gallantry to show us a little respect. ’
His scowl lifted, and he smiled at her. ‘You know, I’ve missed you telling me off.’
Bobby folded her arms. ‘I never met anyone who deserved it as much as you do.’
‘It’s only for being friends with you that I’ve come to realise what a massive hypocrite I am.’ He nudged her. ‘Truce? Come on, we were having a nice time before.’
Still Bobby frowned, however.