Chapter 26
The next day Florence wore a blue and white spotted dress with puffed sleeves.
She’d added red piping and red buttons to be especially patriotic and was delighted with the result.
The weather was overcast but dry and now she, Jack, Gladys and Ronnie were heading to the village in the farm truck.
Florence couldn’t help smiling at the idea of what the ‘jollifications’ – as Gladys called them – would be like.
After six long years it would need time for everything to fully sink in, but this really was going to be a day to remember, as long as Mrs Wicks hadn’t done too much damage with her gossip-mongering.
Before they parked, Gladys pulled up so they could take a peek at the main street and the scene that met their eyes was exciting.
Doorways and windows festooned with boughs of greenery interspersed with spring and early summer flowers gave the village a feel of times gone by.
People wearing home-made red, white and blue paper hats were setting out trestle tables, carrying chairs on their shoulders, or delivering precariously wobbling piles of crockery.
Children in fancy dress – elves, princesses, soldiers – were racing around waving streamers and squealing, while a brass band tested its instruments, and acres of Union Jacks and red, white and blue bunting fluttered overhead.
Florence felt a surge of absolute jubilation. The war in Europe really was over.
‘Can’t imagine what they think we’re all going to eat,’ Gladys muttered as they swerved away from the main road and parked down a side street. ‘We’ll share, of course, but I haven’t got enough to feed the entire village.’
‘Everyone will bring something and there’ll be home brew,’ Jack said. ‘Lots of it.’
‘And cider,’ Gladys added.
She and Jack unloaded a small table and four chairs from the back of the truck.
‘I’m guessing a lot a people will be relieving themselves behind the hedges,’ Ronnie muttered.
Oh God, really? Florence thought, but then laughed out loud.
In this fantastic dizzying moment it didn’t matter.
To hell with it. To hell with the Nazis.
To hell with everything. Nothing mattered today but letting your hair down and having fun.
They’d waited long enough, hadn’t they? It was a glorious day. A wonderful day. A day to rejoice.
And rejoice they did. First the brass band played ‘Land of Hope and Glory’.
Admittedly not terribly well, and Florence suppressed a smile behind her hand, but still she clapped and cheered with the rest of them.
Then came a parade of the Home Guard, followed by police and local servicemen with old boys from the First World War proudly joining in, their polished medals shining.
A dense crowd of jostling villagers and children came next, and the entire motley crew ended up at the parish church where a banner proclaiming God Save the King hung jauntily on the church railings.
Nobody gave her funny looks so whatever Gladys had said, it must have put to bed anything mean Mrs Wicks might have been spreading and Florence felt relieved.
Once inside the church it was time for prayers of thanks and hymns.
But there were bittersweet moments, too.
Florence heard sobs coming from a woman at the back, because although this was a day of celebration, too many women had lost their fathers, husbands, sweethearts, sons, or brothers.
And the fact was that some of the menfolk were still away fighting the Japanese in Malaya and Burma.
She heard Churchill’s words ringing in her head.
‘Japan unsubdued … unspeakable cruelties.’
Sitting next to her in the pew, Gladys was clutching a handkerchief and dabbing her eyes and Florence’s heart went out to her.
Jack, too, was staring at his lap, clearly thinking of his little boy.
Florence put a hand on his arm, and he glanced sideways at her, nodding his acknowledgement.
She felt her eyes grow damp at the thought of her sisters in France without her, the little niece she’d never seen, and everything they’d all been through.
The vicar told them that while the darkness and danger were over and it was a day to rejoice, they must never forget the fallen, nor the terrible price that had been paid.
‘As a strong brotherhood of man,’ he added, his voice catching, ‘we must put our faith in God and build the future together.’
When the church service was over, and while the bells were ringing, Florence asked Jack if he was all right. He smiled such a sad smile it almost made her cry again. ‘I’m so sorry, Jack,’ she said.
‘Come on,’ he replied. ‘We can’t dwell on the past. Not today. The only thing to decide now is beer or cider?’
Florence pulled a face at the thought of beer, and soon after was happy to rapidly down a pint of home-made cider. ‘To the future,’ she said and smiled at him. She’d been about to say ‘to us’ but had caught herself just in time.
The cider went straight to her head, as even though Jack had suggested it might be a good idea to eat lunch before the party, she’d been too excited.
The children got up a rowdy tug of war to loud laughter when both sides let go at the same time and they all fell on their bottoms. Then Florence watched in amazement as the vicar’s son wheeled out a piano.
‘This will be good,’ Jack said. ‘Geoffrey’s a professional.’
When he began playing, she and Jack stood side by side swaying and joined everyone else belting out the tunes they all knew, starting with ‘Daisy Bell’, a song they tended to call ‘A Bicycle Built For Two’.
They followed it with ‘Pack Up Your Troubles’ and ending with a raucous ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’ and then a gentler ‘Goodnight Sweetheart’.
By now the drink was flowing freely and a young man with a limp had brought out a 1930s, hand-cranked, wind-up gramophone, which he set up on the table next to where Florence now stood a little distance from Jack and the others.
As he wandered further off, she drifted down the street in the other direction.
She smiled at everyone and grinned at the children as they wove around people’s legs, tables, chairs, shrieking and laughing whenever they tripped an adult up.
Florence had already drunk another pint of cider and felt light-headed.
It was then she saw Bruce standing behind his mother, who was sitting at a table looking pale but recovered. Bruce waved and she went across to say hello.
‘I’m so happy to see you,’ he said, smiling broadly, his hazel eyes shining. ‘Sorry not to see you since our cinema trip.’
‘My fault,’ Grace said. ‘But I’m much better now.’
‘Mother insisted on coming,’ Bruce added. ‘Even though I offered to stay at home with her.’
‘Poof!’ Grace said. ‘What kind of celebration would that have been?’
At that moment, the man with the gramophone began cranking up. After a few crackles they heard a dance tune begin to play.
Bruce glanced at his mother. ‘Go on,’ her look seemed to say, and he held out his hand to Florence.
For an hour they danced wildly to ‘In the Mood’ by Glenn Miller and other lively tunes.
Later, towards the end, they kind of rocked together to the romantic ‘Wonder When My Baby’s Coming Home’ by Jimmy Dorsey & His Orchestra.
Florence felt rather drunk and very carefree in Bruce’s arms. At the end the man with the record player put on Vera Lynn singing ‘There’ll Always Be an England’.
The dancers stilled and Florence felt the tears that had been threatening all day flow over and run down her cheeks. Bruce handed her a handkerchief.
‘It’s clean,’ he said, and smiled sympathetically.
She glanced about her and saw that practically everyone had tears in their eyes.
The bombs, the destruction of so much of their beautiful country, the buildings that lay in ruins.
The fear. The lost lives. But it wasn’t just about the past. Their transitory sadness was also tinged with anxiety about what might lie ahead – how they would live with what had happened and what kind of future they faced.
And so the afternoon passed by and as dusk fell there was to be a huge bonfire in a meadow beyond the village.
Bruce had gone to take care of his mother and Florence, realising she hadn’t seen Jack for ages, looked around for him.
She couldn’t see him anywhere. Surely, he hadn’t already gone home? He must be helping with the bonfire.
Soon after that Bruce joined her again and put an arm around her shoulder. ‘Are you cold?’
She shook her head. ‘Not at all.’
‘Mum’s having a rest in a friend’s house.’ He glanced to the right. ‘There’s tea over there. Would you like some?’
‘Oh God, yes. I’m dreadfully thirsty.’
They shared a mug of tepid and very weak tea then he linked arms with her as they set off to walk through the meadow. ‘Are you hoping to go to France to visit your sisters soon?’ he asked.
Florence sighed. ‘I wrote to them yesterday. I don’t know how things are over there. It was chaos after the liberation and still seems to be.’
She didn’t tell him she was also thinking of Rosalie and how likely travel to Malta might be. Claudette had written again of Rosalie in her last letter, and Florence hadn’t been able to put it out of her head since. I must know what happened to her, Florence, before it is too late, she had written.
As they reached the bonfire, she watched the golden flames flickering on the drunk, happy faces of the people opposite.
She felt light as air. Probably the cider – but still, it was wonderful to feel so free from care for once.
Bruce gently turned her around. ‘I’ve missed you,’ he said.
Then he kissed her on the lips, and she leant into him and forgot about everything else.