A Girl Can Dream (18 page)

All evening Meg was left in bed and treated as if she was ill and she didn’t care because she could work up no desire to get up. She was brought a meal she was too upset to eat and numerous cups of tea by Jenny, who was as heavy-eyed as Meg was. She held herself somehow responsible for what had happened, despite many reassurances from Meg, and, wrapped in her sister’s arms, she shed bitter tears.

Eventually, though, she was calmer and said, ‘Dad said we won’t miss Ruth that much because we’re going to be evacuated.’

That was no surprise to Meg, and Jenny went on, ‘They say they send you to the country. I ain’t never been there, so I don’t know if I’ll like it or not.’

‘You will, I should think,’ Meg said. ‘It gets you away from Doris and that’s got to be good.’

‘Oh, yeah,’ Jenny said with a wobbly grin. ‘That might be the only good thing about it.’

All the children came to see Meg. Last of all was Terry, who said he had wiped the floor with his father that night.

‘I don’t blame you,’ Meg said, ‘but what am I to do now? I feel like I’ve been sort of cast adrift.’

‘Listen to me,’ Terry said, holding his sister’s shoulders and looking deep into her eyes. ‘I don’t agree for one minute with what Dad did, nor that he has arranged and signed the forms for the kids’ evacuation, but he has done it and it can’t be undone, so you have only yourself to think about. So why don’t you go for the Land Army like Jenny tells me your friend is doing? It will get you away from this place and that pair.’

‘It is tempting,’ Meg said. ‘I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forgive Dad for this and I know Doris will have had a hand in it.’

‘Probably her idea,’ Terry said. ‘Most things are.’

‘Probably was,’ Meg said with a heavy sigh. ‘Tell you the truth I can hardly bear to think about them, never mind talk to them or look at their smug faces, but with the evacuation the kids will have new things to think about and they won’t miss me for long.’

‘No,’ Terry said, ‘and I never thought I would say this, but I think it’s better if the kids are evacuated away from that she devil.’

‘I think so, too,’ Meg said. ‘Where’s Dad now?’

‘At Doris’s,’ Terry said, ‘and Uncle Robert said he can stay there. He says from what he hears he spends enough nights there already so a few more won’t hurt and he is not to come round here and upset you.’

‘Oh, I’m glad,’ Meg said with a sigh of relief. ‘I wondered how I would face him.’

‘Well, you won’t have to,’ Terry said. ‘Not yet awhile.’

However, Meg found she couldn’t just walk away from Ruth, and the next morning she asked Rosie to go with her to the Children’s Hospital to see if Ruth was still there. Rosie agreed readily, intending to tell whoever was in charge that Ruth had a loving family waiting to welcome her home.

They hit a solid brick wall. The hospital authorities wouldn’t even verify that Ruth was there and both were told pointedly that her father had freely given the child into the care of the Social Services and that was where she would stay.

Meg was tearful on the way home, but this setback strengthened her resolve.

‘I must leave here,’ she told her aunt. ‘It would be worse in a way if I stopped here, being so close to Ruth and not able to see her, and at the moment I can’t look at Dad and Doris.’

‘You can stay with us if you like,’ Rose said. ‘We’d love to have you, you know that.’

‘Thanks, Aunt Rosie,’ Meg said. ‘But it has to be a more permanent solution and I have made up my mind to apply to join the Land Army. Tonight I will write a long letter to Joy telling her everything, and much as I would like to stay with you while the formalities are completed I think the kids need me to be there as much as possible until I have to leave. They have lost a sister, too.’

But when Meg began the letter she found she couldn’t write about what her father had done to her youngest sister and she said only that as it was obvious the children were going to be evacuated. Her way was clear to go into the Land Army.

Though Joy was delighted to hear that Meg was going to try for the Land Army after all, she knew she was holding something back. She never mentioned Ruth, which was odd. But she had said that Doris had talked about going to work in munitions because it paid better than sewing parachutes, and nursery places were given as priority to the children of working mothers so Doris probably had that in hand.

Joy explained the enlistment procedure and Meg went to Thorp Street Barracks to sign the necessary forms and arranged to have a medical.

The day of the interview, in early August, was warm and sunny. Meg stood at the bottom of the white marble steps leading up to the Council House, looking up at the imposing building. She had never been inside before, but now she ran up the steps and opened one of the two large studded wooden doors that gleamed in the sunlight.

She gasped as she stepped inside for it was an impressive place; an intricate and very beautiful glass chandelier hung from the ornate ceiling and her feet sank into a thick carpet that led to a desk at the back, in the alcove of the wide sweep of a staircase. It seemed a long walk to the desk, with her feet making no sound.

She presented her appointment letters to an incredibly smart girl. She had her fair hair caught in a bun at the back of her neck and her face was heavily made up, but her smile was genuine enough as she bid her go up the steps to the waiting room situated on the first floor. The stairs were as heavily carpeted as the reception hall, and the stair rods and banister burnished brass, and at the top of the stairs was a beautiful arched window and another chandelier.

There was already quite a cluster of girls waiting, and more joined them as Meg sat on one of the benches against the wall. They all looked at one another self-consciously. They were an assorted bunch, Meg thought: girls of all shapes and sizes, and mostly fairly young, though Meg guessed that none was as young as she.

The woman at Thorp Street Barracks had asked her age. She had thought of lying, but knew she would be found out as she had to bring her birth certificate to the interview, so she had told the truth and the woman had shaken her head.

‘They may not take you,’ she had warned. ‘They are not as strict as the services and will take girls of seventeen sometimes – but sixteen, I don’t know. All girls under eighteen have to get permission from a parent anyway. Will that be difficult?’

It would be very hard to get her father to agree, Meg knew, but Doris would sign anything that would get Meg out of her hair and so she said, ‘No, that won’t be a problem.’

‘They might take you with that then,’ the woman had said, handing over the forms. ‘Best of luck.’

Well, forewarned is forearmed, Meg had thought at the time, but sitting in the room with the others she felt the confidence that had got her this far dribbling away.

Another girl, seeing the look on her face, whispered, ‘Are you nervous as well?’

‘A bit.’

‘I think everyone is a little,’ said the girl the other side of Meg. ‘Bound to be, because we don’t really know what we are letting ourselves in for.’

‘You know nothing about farming then?’

‘Does anyone round here?’ the first girl said.

‘Don’t see as that matters,’ another said. ‘We’ll have to be shown what to do, that’s all. My chap knows nowt about killing folk, but he’ll have to learn same as everyone else.’

‘Well, that’s true enough.’

‘So why did you choose farming?’ Meg asked the first girl.

‘Do my bit, I suppose.’

Others chipped in. A few would have preferred to join one of the armed services but were prevented by parents, and in one case because a young husband objected. More than one was willing to join anything to put some distance between herself and a tyrannical father. As many reasons as there are girls here, Meg thought as the interviews began and the first girl was called in.

It was just the one woman in the room, Meg saw, when it was her turn. She was very smart and spoke dead posh, as if she had a load of marbles in her mouth. Meg was glad the woman at Thorp Street Barracks had warned her what would happen when she saw the posh woman scrutinising her birth certificate before saying, ‘You are very young, only sixteen. Too young and small to be of any use, I feel.’

‘I am only sixteen,’ Meg said, ‘but I’m not that small and I am very strong and not afraid of hard work either. When my mother died giving birth to my youngest sister, I took then all on – my other two sisters and my two brothers and the baby.’

‘How long ago was this?’

‘Two years.’

‘I see. So what will happen to those children if you join the Land Army?’

Meg had decided it would do her no favours to tell the whole truth so she tried hard to keep any trace of bitterness from her voice as she said, ‘They will have a new mother because my father is marrying again.’

‘I see,’ the woman said again. ‘And tell me, Miss Hallett, have you any farming experience?’

‘No,’ Meg admitted, but remembering the chat in the waiting room she added, ‘but soldiers don’t come ready trained either, and I’m sure I will pick up all I need to know as well as anyone else.’

‘You have great confidence in your abilities, Miss Hallett,’ the woman said.

Meg knew it was important not to show one trace of the nerves that had affected her in the waiting room and so she answered, ‘Not great confidence like I was a cocky person, who thinks they don’t need to be taught, but I do pick things up quick so I will probably learn as fast as anyone else. And I can get a consent form signed by my parents.’ When the woman still hesitated she pleaded, ‘Please, won’t you take a chance on me?’

The interviewer was moved by the emotion in Meg’s voice and the look in those eyes that showed plainly that she had tasted sorrow and yet she had to say, ‘I don’t know. Possibly, but the final say rests with the committee. I will submit a favourable report on you, but get the consent form signed first, as we can’t proceed without it. We will be informing you by mail if you are successful.’

Going home, Meg turned the woman’s words over and over in her mind. She knew that she had to get the consent form signed as soon as possible and wondered how she was going to do it as Doris and her father seemed joined at the hip.

Then on the following Wednesday morning, Charlie told Meg he would be late home because there was a meeting after work to discuss air-raid precautions.

Meg’s heart leaped – this was her chance. As soon as the evening meal was over, under the guise of popping out for a bit of shopping, she left Jenny in charge and, taking her coat from the nail at the back of the door and promising ‘not to be long’, she slipped out.

To say that Doris was surprised to see Meg at her door was putting it mildly. ‘What do you want?’ she asked truculently. ‘And whatever it is, make it snappy, because I’m meeting your father later.’

‘This won’t take up much time,’ Meg said, and without further preamble announced, ‘I’ve joined the Women’s Land Army.’ She saw the glint of satisfaction in Doris’s eyes as she continued, ‘But I’m too young and need the permission of at least one parent.’

‘And you don’t think your father will give it?

‘Do you?’ Meg said. ‘But you will, because you want rid of me as much as I want to leave here.’ She withdrew the form from her pocket and passed it to Doris. ‘I’ve filled it in,’ she said. ‘You just need to write Doris Hallett on it.’

‘And I’ll do that with pleasure,’ Doris said, snatching it from Meg and signing with a flourish. ‘When do you intend to start?’ she asked, as she gave the form back.

Meg shrugged. ‘Soon. They’re just waiting for this form.’

‘And when do you intend telling your father?’

‘After the wedding,’ Meg said. ‘I’d like it if you said nothing to him about it yet.’

Doris grunted. ‘Think I’m a fool? I don’t want to spoil my wedding day and I expect he will kick up about you leaving home.’

‘Yeah, I know,’ Meg said and added a little caustically, ‘But I’m sure you will be able to convince him it’s all for the best because you have done that many a time.’

Doris’s eyes narrowed and she thrust the form at Meg, ‘There,’ she said. ‘You have what you need now.’

She seemed anxious to get rid of Meg, but that suited Meg anyway. ‘So if that’s all, you can clear off now. Like I said, I’m meeting your father.’

‘Don’t worry, I’m going,’ Meg said, but on the stairs as she went out she passed a man going up. For a moment she wondered where he was making for, because only Doris lived in the top flat, but she put it from her mind because, with the consent form signed, a new future was beckoning.

When the knock came to the door minutes later, Doris presumed it was Meg again, wanting something else. However, a glimpse of the weasel-faced man outside caused her to stagger in shock. ‘Frank,’ she cried. ‘Frank Zimmerman.’ He was an associate of Gerry’s that she had thought and hoped she would ever see again.

‘Hello, babe,’ Frank said, pushing her back inside and closing the door with his foot.

‘What’re you doing here?’ she said. ‘And where’s Gerry?’

‘Questions, questions,’ Frank said, walking round the room as he did so.

‘Well,’ Doris said, willing her voice to be steady for it was safer not betray weakness in front of this man, ‘where’s Gerry?’

‘Gerry’s dead, darling.’

‘Dead?’ Doris thought it was hard to think of Gerry as dead. She wondered at her lack of emotion, when once he’d meant the world to her, but then she had known when he fled to save his own skin that he was as good as dead, and her own instinct for survival superseded any sense of loss she might have felt.

‘He went back for you,’ Frank said. ‘It was about a month after you left. We all said he was mad.’

‘How did he die?’

‘The family of that bloke he killed got him,’ Frank said. ‘Did him over proper. I found what was left of him in an alleyway.’ He looked at Doris then and said, ‘They’re after you as well. Said you’re as much to blame as Gerry.’

‘Why d’you think I got out of there?’ Doris said. ‘I knew his family were gunning for me and I had to give the heavies the slip as well.’

‘Heavies?’