Kitty Little (32 page)

His eyes narrowed, most alarmingly. ‘You may decide what they perform. Which songs they sing, which recitation, what dress they wear. Everything else is under my jurisdiction. Military discipline prevails.’

Kitty was almost jumping with fury, thinking she might explode if she heard that word ‘discipline’ one more time. But before she had a moment to think of a suitable response, he continued: ‘And you will wear that damned helmet.’

She placed it on her head, tipped it to a rakish angle and saluted him with a mocking smile. ‘
Yes
sir!’

He looked at her long and hard, the grey-green eyes clear and probing which for some reason made her heart beat fast with nerves. Then he turned slowly on his heel and marched off. His silent reaction to her sarcasm left Kitty with an odd sense of embarrassment, so that she had to bury her head in the props basket to hide her burning cheeks.

Kitchener’s Army was to be sorely tested during that long painful autumn. With severe communication problems, half trained men and a serious shortage of ammunition, they faced the enemy with incredible bravery, resorting to hand to hand combat when they ran out of bullets. The Battle of Loos casualty list was to be numbered at over fifteen thousand dead and twice as many wounded. Yet it was not entirely in vain. For the first time the German line had been breached and morale remained high.

Each day as the LTP’s woke in the green French countryside, with the sound of bird song in their ears and the Somme meandering smoothly on its way, it seemed impossible to imagine the loss of so many young lives. It became all too clear to Kitty and her team as Christmas approached, the river mists rose and the rains came, that their own efforts in keeping hearts and spirits strong, could not be underestimated. Not that Captain Williams agreed with her on this. The cost of bringing the LTP’s to France was, in his opinion, a waste of taxpayer’s money.

‘Don’t think this is some sort of picnic you’re on,’ he would constantly say, as if they needed any reminding. ‘The good folk back home are suffering a forty per cent increase in taxes for you to parade around here in your fancy frocks.’

‘No one is paying us anything as a matter of fact, and we provide our own costumes. The boys like us to look good.’ The Captain simply shrugged and walked away, leaving her damning him to hell as usual.

Another time he commented, ‘dear me, it’s bully beef for supper again tonight. How you must be missing smoked salmon and strawberry tarts.’

It was certainly true that much of the time the Players were cold, dirty, hungry, tired to the point of exhaustion and frightened, but not even Tessa complained. They each of them acknowledged and then dismissed their fear, for weren’t the soldiers even braver? What right did they have to object to a few discomforts, when they’d chosen to come here of their own free will? They learned to live with that tight feeling of anxiety deep in their stomach, keeping it under control with the patience and dogged determination they’d observed and admired in the young men facing battle and possible death.

It was the young soldier boys themselves who made all the suffering worth while. They always welcomed the Players with great enthusiasm, joining in lustily with the singing, and laughing till they wept with joy at the jokes and parodies.

The day after their success in Boulogne they’d entertained a couple of hundred roaring, cheering men in a Y.M.C.A. hut. Another night they performed at an Estaminet, which was a sort of pub where the men went to relax. Then it was time to pack up the truck, or
camion
as it came to be called, and roll on to the next rest billet, and the one after that. And always the Captain would ride in his army car, some distance ahead.

‘What use are you as an escort, so far in front?’ Kitty once asked, in that no-nonsense manner she usually adopted when addressing him.

The Captain’s response was bleak but honest. ‘No point in us all being blown to smithereens if a crump lands, is there?’

Punctures continued to be a problem but Kitty always used the opportunity for impromptu rehearsals on the road, despite Captain William’s disapproval. The old men and women working in the fields around would stop and listen, then creep over to watch, delighting in these wandering minstrels who had happened by. The French peasant farmers, all who were left to work the land now their young men had joined up, would laugh and clap, though they understood not a word. And always, in the background, was the steady throbbing of guns, like the rumble of distant thunder.

At times as they drove along, the air would seem to crack apart from some explosion, clouds of dirt would rise from a nearby field as shells struck, one after the other as if pursuing them on their route. On one such occasion the camion careered out of control and they all had to leap for their lives, flinging themselves into one of the many hollows that pitted the soft earth, in order to avoid being blown into extinction.

‘What on earth possessed you to come to this hellhole?' the Captain asked, as they lay face down in a ditch. Kitty could not only smell her own fear, she could taste it in the bitter bile in her mouth, while overhead came the constant drone and squawk of enemy aircraft, threatening further death and destruction.

‘Always did love all that Boy’s Own Adventure stuff,’ she quipped, when she had her breathing back under control.

He gave a grunt, which, if she hadn’t known how ill-humoured he was, Kitty might have thought to be laughter.

‘Well that makes a change from the usual one of thwarted love which so many of the newly recruited nurses claim to be the reason which brought them out on their noble mission.’

Somewhat too close to the truth for comfort, she bit back at him. ‘That’s a pretty damning indictment of dedicated nurses.’

They were heading for yet another anonymous chateau in some unknown part of the French countryside. There were few road signs to guide them and Captain Williams didn’t enlighten anyone about where exactly they were.

‘What do you know about this rest billet?’ Kitty asked through gritted teeth, anxious to move the subject away from the sensitive subject of love.

‘Only that some official is to speak to the men first about pensions and war loans, and then it’s up to you to lift hearts and the roof, as they say.’

The roar of a plane above, strafe fire studding the road, followed by another almighty explosion. Kitty buried her face in her hands on the basis that what she didn’t see wouldn’t hurt her. After a moment or two, when silence had settled once more, she heard a bird sing and lifted her face to a weak winter sun. ‘As we always do,’ she remarked with a smile, as if nothing untoward had interrupted their conversation. ‘What more could they ask for than Kitty Little herself here to entertain them, the Nightingale of Flanders no less.’

Right at this moment she felt more like a mole than a nightingale. As she sat up, picking globules of dirt from out of her nose and mouth, brushing soil and seeds from the front of her blouse, she was surprised to see him actually grinning for once. Kitty even found herself grinning back. It was almost a declaration of friendship. Almost.

‘I see that at least you’ve decided to wear that damn hat.’

They arrived at their billet, had unpacked, eaten, and were now waiting for the show to begin. Kitty was still stinging from the caustic exchanges with the Captain. Thwarted love indeed. How dare he? It was almost as if he knew, but that was quite impossible, unless he had a sixth sense. ‘That man is impossible,’ she muttered, half to herself

Jacob patted her shoulder, a comforting gesture that had become almost a daily ritual between them. ‘How would you feel, my dear, if you were a Captain and had been detailed to nursemaid a troupe of travelling minstrels?’

Kitty gave a short laugh. ‘I should thank my lucky stars for a cushy number.’ But the remark made her think.

The audience waiting in the main salon of the chateau seemed livelier than usual, having had the opportunity to rest and recuperate. After a battalion had been at the Front for their required period of duty, they were pulled out and sent to a rest billet. Here they would have the chance of a bath and to be disinfected from lice, fleas and other verminous sores brought about in the trenches, get clean clothes and have small wounds and irritations tended to, not least the dreaded trench foot. Once all of that was dealt with, there would be drilling routines to maintain army discipline, but also good food, plenty of sleep and a glass of beer now and then.

They welcomed Kitty with a roar of approval. Just the sight of her tall slender figure walking onto the wooden stage that had been roughly knocked together, brought an eruption of cheers and a great stamping of feet. The room seemed filled to bursting with men. If they couldn’t find a chair, they sat on windowsills on every available inch of the floor, the rest were content to stand, packing the back of the hall with their boisterous presence. It was almost overwhelming.

She began to sing, and the noise vanished in a second as they drank in every note, ever word and gesture.

The show, as always, was a huge success with the men taking Kitty Little to their hearts. When it was over, she went straight off to bed, so exhausted she could hardly keep her eyes open. Yet the moment her head hit the pillow she was instantly awake, her body stiff and aching, her mind a turmoil of emotion and stray thoughts.

As she lay waiting for a sleep that refused to come throughout that long night in yet another freezing cold camp bed, Kitty wept with longing for her child, worrying over whether Dixie was missing her, whether she was right to leave her with Charlotte. But what else could she have done? Then she grew anxious about Esme, wondering where her dear friend was. Surely she would have found a new theatre company by now. And would Charlotte and Archie think to forward any letters they received from her.
 

Her thoughts moved on to the pain of losing Archie. “Thwarted love” as the Captain termed it. Kitty couldn’t help herself. It was like poking at a sore tooth. Dear Archie. How she had loved him. Would there ever come a time when she no longer looked back and wondered about what-might-have-been? He’d been a part of her life for so long it was hard to wake up each morning and know that she wouldn’t see him.
 

How far they had come since that first fateful night she and Archie had spent together. When she’d gone to him then, it was as a young girl seeking enlightenment and love. Later, Kitty had imagined that he might truly come to love her and perhaps he had, in his way. That was Archie’s problem. He always meant to commit himself to one or other of them, but had never quite managed it.
 

Kitty turned over endlessly in her mind whether there was anything at all she could have done to win him even as she knew, in her heart, that there wasn’t. Charlotte had meant to have him from the moment she’d set eyes on him and Archie had been too weak to resist. She’d manipulated them all, exactly as she pleased. Kitty realised this now, and neither herself nor Esme had ever stood a chance.

It hurt that he’d been prepared to father Charlotte’s baby but not her own. But then Charlotte had told him the truth, while she herself had refused to give any indication about the identity of Dixie’s father. As a result, Archie had never quite forgiven her for keeping him in ignorance.

Following his marriage they’d tried to go on as before, for the sake of the company, but the closeness of their earlier friendship was quite gone. Archie had other loyalties now. But it was fortunate that his relationship with Dixie remained good, and that he’d actually volunteered to take care of her while Kitty was away. Even Charlotte had agreed to be ‘a loving mother’ to the little girl, for weren’t they all still friends, she’d said, smiling sweetly.

What fools she and Esme had been. And what right did she have to criticise her friend for hanging on to the impossible dream of wanting to win him back, hoping against hope that Charlotte would grow bored with him in time or he would “come to his senses” and give up on his hasty marriage. Wasn’t Kitty’s own way of dealing with the pain even more radical? A drastic solution to a girlish folly.

Sadly, Captain Williams’s taunt had come closer to the truth than he realised. For losing Archie had indeed been the main reason she’d come to France and not, to her shame, for any altruistic purpose at all. He was right. Running away to war was hardly a sinecure, or a boy’s own adventure story. It was harsh, raw, reality. A battle of life and death. It was going to be a long, hard campaign and Kitty had no idea what she had let herself in for. The truth was that she was nowhere near brave enough to cope. She turned her tear-streaked face into the hard pillow to smother her sobs.

‘Oh Archie, what have I done? I needed you so much. Why wasn’t I enough for you? I need someone now, someone on my side to love me.’

 
After a short burst of tearful self pity, Kitty sat up and sternly blew her nose, scolding herself for this childish indulgence. She wouldn’t make that mistake again. After all, she was no longer a foolish girl but a woman, one even more determined to be independent, to have done with men and love and all the problems such weaknesses brought.

So if the image of one arrogant Captain slid into her dreams when sleep finally came, it was only by way of a warning of what she must avoid - emotional entanglement of any sort.

Chapter Nineteen

Charlotte was wondering very much the same thing. This wasn’t at all the life she had imagined when she’d plotted and schemed to get her hands on a title and all that went with it. In fact she’d acquired little more than a cold damp house in dire need of repair, a restless husband who was proving to be extremely mean with his money, and her rival’s snivelling child.