Chapter 3 #2
Lizzie gazed at her adorable younger sister’s cheeky freckled face. ‘Don’t you have an early shift, Nurse Evie?’
‘As it happens, I don’t. I’m on later, tomorrow.’
‘What about you, Jules?’ Lizzie asked, turning to her elder sister and expecting the suggestion to be promptly shut down.
‘I do have to work in the morning, but I wouldn’t mind a quick drink to calm the nerves,’ she said, adjusting her hat and surprising Lizzie.
‘Right, quick drink it is then,’ Lizzie said.
Evie wore what Lizzie laughingly referred to as her moony face. ‘Look at all these dashing GIs. I wouldn’t mind walking out with one of them. What about you, Liz?’ she asked.
Lizzie shrugged. ‘Too complicated. They’ve likely got girls waiting for them back home and they’re only looking for a spot of wartime distraction. Not that I blame them.’
Evie said, ‘You’re so cynical. Whatever happened to romance and happy ever afters?’ She laughed. ‘Silly me. You’re waiting for your handsome captain to come home from bonnie Scotland.’
Lizzie held back the colour that threatened to flush her cheeks.
By now she was used to Evie’s teasing about Jack.
Even Juliet sometimes joined in, and as it was true, it was becoming harder to diffuse their suspicions.
Instead, she changed the subject, which she’d learnt was one of the most helpful tactics to deflect inquisitive people.
‘Where shall we go then?’ she asked, looking from Evie to Juliet.
Unsurprisingly, it was Evie who took the bait.
‘How about the Hammersmith Palais?’ she said, her eyes full of mischief.
Lizzie inhaled sharply. ‘Ma would have a fit.’
‘Ma doesn’t have to know, does she? When the cat’s away and all that …’
Lizzie had been dancing there with Jack a couple of times, but of course she couldn’t tell them that, so had to pretend it was all new to her.
‘Jules, what say you? Do you have the energy for late-night dancing?’
Jules replied, uncharacteristically to Lizzie’s mind, ‘Why not? I’m bored stiff lately. All I do is go to work and come home.’
‘That’s it then,’ Evie declared, positively fizzing with excitement. ‘I might even meet a handsome GI and live happily ever after.’
Lizzie rolled her eyes at her baby sister’s silliness but indulged her all the same.
She might be in enemy territory in a matter of weeks, and who knew when she’d be able to relax again?
She didn’t dare entertain the scariest of thoughts about whether she would have the privilege of going out with her sisters again, but the sinister cloud hovered in the recesses of her mind.
‘It’s a bit of a way. We’d better get going,’ Lizzie said, and they returned to the Underground and hopped back onto the Piccadilly Line.
Hammersmith Palais was smoky and noisy and packed to the brim.
If it weren’t for all the uniforms, you might think there was no war on at all.
The band struck up a familiar jazz tune, and a tall and handsome British pilot asked Lizzie if she wanted to dance.
She declined politely and sipped her drink as she looked around the lively establishment.
Half-naked women danced on the tables to one side, and the dance floor was heaving.
It wasn’t long before Evie joined the revellers, and Lizzie caught sight of her being spun around by a dashing GI, just as she’d predicted.
Lizzie checked her watch, and Juliet, who had also declined several invitations to dance, finished her drink. ‘What do you think our chances are of getting Evie out of here anytime soon?’ she said, yawning.
‘Not good, I imagine. Look at her dancing.’
They both stood and watched Evie, who was clearly having the time of her life. Lizzie’s chest warmed at the sight of her little sister having a wonderful time. She deserved it. The nurse training was intense, and she’d thrown her heart and soul into it.
‘It’s good to see her let her hair down a bit, but we’ll have to go soon, or Pa will be out looking for us. You know how he worries when we’re out late.’
Eventually, after several false starts they managed to convince Evie it was time to leave and after she parted from her handsome GI, clutching a note with his name and contact details, she practically levitated down the street towards the station.
‘I had a feeling I was going to meet someone special tonight,’ she said.
Lizzie and Juliet exchanged a knowing look. Evie was tempestuous by nature since she was a little girl and was always the first to come up with hair-brained schemes of dangerous exploits to entertain them in their school holidays.
School holidays reminded Lizzie of their cousins in St. Malo, and she wondered what it would be like to see them again.
She and Sophie were the closest in age and had always naturally paired up.
Lizzie yearned to see her cousins but half-hoped they had been called away on duty.
Her presence would endanger them all and the thought of it made her throat dry and she swallowed hard.
She hadn’t mentioned anything about the mission to her father.
Yet. She couldn’t decide whether she should.
It was his brother she was putting in danger, after all, and she suspected he would have useful information for her.
Lizzie wished Jack would come home soon so she could talk it over with him.
That night when she almost fell into bed after the long day and busy night, her last thought was predictably of Jack.
She prayed he would be home soon, and she would get to see him before she left for France.