Henrietta's War (3 page)

Both reading letters from their sons

It would be different if we could all produce thrillers like Muriel, whose son had to empty himself (I think that is the right expression) out of his aeroplane and came down in a parachute on to some telegraph wires, where he remained hanging for half an hour, while the villagers passed him up mugs of beer on a stick.

As told by Faith, it was an extremely good story, though I missed my bus staying to listen to it. But you can't very well dash away with your friend's son in mid-air, can you? But since then I have heard it five times; once from the hero's father, a second time from Muriel herself, twice from a grandmother (whom I was able to correct over the number of beers provided by the kindly villagers), and once from our gardener, whose sister ‘obliges' Faith for two hours every morning.

So when you actually
ask
for news of my children I feel rather like a lioness who has been fed on scrambled eggs for a month and is then suddenly presented with a carcase. But it is with my newly-acquired restraint, dear Robert, that I tell you that Bill is still afraid the war will be over before he can get to it, and the Linnet comes home every Saturday and sleeps the clock round . . .

We have had a week of lovely warm weather.

Charles and I revelled in it, and so did the birds, who started a little tentative singing at dawn, as thrilling as strawberries on Christmas Day, but much sadder. It made me think of spring, and that reminded me that I hadn't planted bulbs in pots, so after breakfast I rushed off to buy some.

‘What! Buying bulbs
now
?' said Mrs Savernack with relish. ‘Mine are up at least half an inch!'

I wish I were the sort of woman who remembers to plant bulbs in time. I wish I were the sort of woman who Shops Early, knows how to look up trains, and Accounts for Every Penny. I wish I were the sort of woman who sets one day aside every week for the linen cupboard, remembers people's names, never wastes the soap, and sends her luggage in advance.

I am not, but I am always your affectionate Childhood's Friend,

HENRIETTA

December 20, 1939

M
Y DEAR ROBERT
Digging for Freedom is not nearly as romantic as it sounds. Ever since the war, Charles and I have been worrying about a patch of No-Man's-Land at the bottom of our garden. Every time we looked at it, we felt we were betraying the Empire.

Not that Charles looked at it much. His gardening consists in refusing to talk to the gardener, and, occasionally, very occasionally, when the sun is really warm, taking his before-Sunday-lunch sherry down the garden path and saying: ‘Is that an apple-tree or a pear-tree?'; and ‘There seem to be a lot of weeds'; and ‘Of course, I'd like to do some gardening myself, but a doctor has to think of his hands;' and finally, ‘It would be much cheaper to lay it all down in asphalt.' Then he goes indoors to roast beef with a self-satisfied expression on his face as of one who has spent the morning close to Mother Earth.

I, on the other hand, take what is called an Interest in the garden. I shout at the gardener, for he is very deaf, standing for hours in a cold wind; but as he never takes any notice of what I say, I can only conclude that he doesn't hear me. I wake in the night and Worry about the Weeds and next morning attack them in a frenzy, and spend most of the afternoon trying to get my hands clean. I ask for cuttings from my friends, and sometimes steal them, and go out into the woods and stagger home with leaf-mould in a sack.

But there are times when I agree with Charles about the asphalt.

When the war started, practically everybody, in the most laudable way, rushed off and began doing the thing they hated most. Faith forced her way into the Cottage Hospital, and stayed there for nearly a fortnight, doing ward-maid's work; Mrs Savernack bought a book called
Brush Up Your French
; and Lady B, not to be outdone, bought a book called
Brush
Up Your German
, which some people thought rather unpatriotic. Practically everybody who owned a car began driving somebody else's and Colonel Simpkins, as a protest against ‘all this tomfoolery', took lessons in ballroom dancing.

I, of course, immediately felt it was my duty to Dig, and announced my intention to the gardener in a penetrating shriek.

Took lessons in ballroom dancing

‘Yu can dig 'un up if yu wants,' he said in a pitying way, and went on pruning the roses.

So as I had a free day on Monday, I put on a pair of Charles's shorts, took a spade in hand, and started.

The gardener was outraged at the sight of my legs, and spent quite half an hour peering at me in shocked surprise from behind the gooseberry bushes. Then he emerged and stood beside me for another half-hour watching my efforts with a superior smile. After that he went and sat in the greenhouse and had some tea out of a Thermos flask.

Bindweed is a crawling plant which has its roots in Australia.

I dug grimly for two hours, and then, quite suddenly, somebody plunged a dagger into the middle of my back. At least, that is what it felt like. I tried to straighten myself, but a scream of pain burst from my lips, and sweat broke out on my forehead. So, in a bent position, my chin bumping against my knees, I shuffled back to the house. The gardener, who was now eating a large slice of plum cake, was moved to laughter as I went by.

Charles, who like all doctors, dislikes Illness in the Home, said it served me right for digging, half naked, in an east wind, and ordered a Day in Bed.

Oh, but Robert! – what luxury is a day in bed, even with lumbago! To appreciate it to the full it is a good plan to wake up several times during the night and say to yourself: ‘I haven't got to get up to-morrow morning.'

But perhaps the most exquisite moment of all is when you sink back on your pillows and listen to everybody else getting up. It is madness to spoil this enchanted hour by getting up yourself to brush your teeth. You must lie where you are, relaxed, happy, and dirty, calling weakly for your letters, the morning papers, and another hot-water bottle.

To have visitors during a Day in Bed is a grave error. It means getting out to do your hair, make up your face, and have your bed made. A little talk on the telephone with some sympathetic friend who is really interested in your symptoms is the only social intercourse that should be allowed. A good deal of pleasure can be derived from asking for your fountain-pen and notepaper, and then not writing any letters . . .

Lady B who just dropped in – a welcome visitor at any time – says she got so angry with Lord Haw-Haw the other night that she took off her shoe and threw it at the wireless, and broke a valuable vase. Now she has adopted a different technique. Before going to bed she sits down and writes a letter to Hitler, telling him just exactly what she thinks of him. She says it has never failed to give her a good night's sleep. I think her great-grandchildren will enjoy those letters, don't you?

Always your affectionate Childhood's Friend,

HENRIETTA

December 27, 1939

M
Y DEAR ROBERT
You know the way Faith has of suddenly producing celebrities out of a hat? Her latest is a Conductor of singing, not trams – and the whole village has become vocal-conscious.

Snatches of song are heard on all sides. Yesterday the plumber spent two and a half hours in our bathroom, which is particularly good for sound, singing Mi-Mi-Mi-Mi-Mi on a top G instead of mending the tap in the basin, and the gardener has started Bay-Bee-Bar-Bo-Boo in an arpeggio, to lighten his hours of inactivity in the greenhouse.

It all started with carols at the vicarage. The Vicar, who pounced on Faith's Conductor like a hungry lion, gave him to understand that there was a great deal of suppressed musical talent in the village which only needed encouragement.

The encouragement turned out to be the Conductor, Faith, Lady B and myself. The vicarage drawing-room was cleared for action, and the Savernacks' chauffeur was there, and the post-mistress, both looking rather self-conscious but nobody else.

The Vicar pounced on Faith's Conductor

Faith, who had somehow managed to make herself look like a choir-boy, turned on her best social manner and kept up a flow of bright chatter, but after a time even her spirits began to flag, and the Vicar hurried out into the highways and byways to compel somebody to come in.

The Conductor, in the meantime, thought we had better make a start, so he handed us each a copy of a carol and said we should come in after he had counted four.

He counted four, and the only thing that happened was a shattering boom from Lady B which shook the vases on the mantelpiece.

‘Come, come, now!' said the Conductor, who was behaving with such kindness and patience that I began to be afraid he might be snatched up to heaven, ‘We can do better than that. Everybody must sing.
Everybody
. Open your mouths wide, as though you were yawning. One, two, three, four – '

Everybody yawned, so we had to start again; but this time we really did sing, including the Conductor himself – and immediately the door flew open and about twelve excited villagers, who had apparently been lurking in the bushes outside, burst into the room. Almost immediately afterwards the Vicar returned with two more, and the Conductor began sorting us out.

‘What do you sing?' he said to an enormous young man whose head was bobbing about just below the chandelier.

‘Treble,' squeaked the young man, and the Conductor reeled as under a blow.

‘And you?' he said to a small, rosy-cheeked boy.

‘Bass,' he boomed, in a voice that rivalled Lady B's.

We sang and sang. Just behind me was a tenor who fluted loudly and firmly throughout the evening on one note. The Conductor, who must have been in torment, continued patient and smiling, begging us to yawn and wait for the beat. Everybody got very hot and excited and forgot all about the War, the Income Tax, Rationing, and the fact that we must shortly endanger our lives creeping home in stygian darkness. At the end cakes and tea were handed round, and it became apparent what the one-note tenor had really come for.

If I were the Minister for Propaganda, Robert – and I often feel it is a pity I am not – I would make everybody sing every day, provided, of course, that enough saint-like Conductors could be found to go round.

The other piece of fun this week was a most enjoyable rehearsal of an air-raid warning.

We were told that it would take place at 9.30 a.m. At 9.29½ a beaming young policeman poked his head out of the little bit of police-station window which is not covered, and spread a sheet of newspaper on the sandbags. On this he tenderly laid the siren, pressed a knob, and immediately the air was filled with what we have been taught to call an intermittent warbling note.

The result was electrical. You would have thought that siren was a herald of good tidings instead of possible death and destruction. Delighted faces appeared at every window. People in the streets were wreathed in smiles and some were doubled up with laughter. Quite a little crowd gathered in front of the police station, where the young policeman, flushed with success, changed the key, like a cinema organist with the floods on him.