The Grafton Girls (30 page)

‘You could say that you got mixed up a bit,’ Diane told her, refusing to give up. ‘After all, with all that was going on, no one would be surprised by that.’

Myra looked at her speculatively. ‘Why should you be so keen for me to do anything? After all, it’s no skin off your nose what happens, is it?’

‘No skin off my nose? I should have thought it would be a heavy weight on
your
conscience, Myra, if a man got accused wrongly of killing another man because you hadn’t told the truth.’ Diane knew immediately that she had said the wrong thing.

‘What do you mean, “accused of killing”? If you think I’m going to go saying something to the police that would get Nick into trouble—’

‘You’re the one who’s going to be in trouble if you lie about what happened, Myra,’ Diane warned her. ‘After all, Ruthie was there as well, and she saw what happened too.’

‘Much good that will do her.’

Diane looked at her. There was nothing for it, she was going to have to do something she had no desire to do at all, but she had no other option.

‘Have you told Nick yet about Jim?’

The effect of her question was every bit as dramatic as she had guessed it would be. Myra leaped off the bed and reached for her cigarettes, her hand trembling as she lit one.

‘If you’re trying to threaten me—’ she began.

‘I was simply asking you a question,’ Diane told her. ‘You’ve talked non-stop about Nick and that rock he’s given you,’ she nodded in the direction of the ring Myra was wearing, ‘so naturally I wondered if you’ve told him yet that by rights you should be wearing another man’s wedding ring on that finger. That’s what happens when you tell lies, Myra. They have a habit of coming back to haunt you when you don’t want them to.’

For a moment Diane thought she had won and that Myra would give in and agree to tell the police what had really happened, but then to Diane’s disappointment she burst out angrily, ‘Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing but it won’t work. If you’re that keen to get someone else blamed for that Walter’s death it must mean that Glen is in a lot of trouble. Anyway, it’s like Nick said to the police, we were just coming round the corner, minding our own business…And as for Jim, you go ahead and tell Nick if you want. It won’t make any difference to him.’

Not now it wouldn’t, Myra decided triumphantly, because with Walter dead that meant that Nick
needed her to support his story. A wife couldn’t give evidence against her husband – she remembered reading that somewhere or other. Nick had no option but to marry her now, she decided smugly, and Diane was a fool if she thought she was going to threaten her into changing her story.

Diane watched with a sinking heart the way Myra’s expression changed. She had gambled and lost, she could see quite plainly. But she had promised Ruthie that she would help her, which left her with only one option. She would have to talk to Lee and ask him if there was anything he could do – perhaps speak to Glen’s commanding officer on his behalf, or at least suggest that he looked more closely into the stories of the men supporting Nick’s allegations that Glen and Walter had had a quarrel. Her heartbeat accelerated as though it was a plane on the runway and about to lift off on a dangerous mission. Or was it simply taking wing and soaring with joy at the thought of being with Lee, no matter how bleak the circumstances?

‘If Major Saunders comes in today, I wonder if you would mind, please, giving him this note for me?’ Diane tried to look far more composed and professional than she felt as she handed the sealed note she had spent so long agonising over last night to the duty sergeant on the desk in the foyer of Derby House.

The sergeant was eyeing her rather suspiciously. ‘Would this be a personal letter?’ he asked her disapprovingly. ‘Because—’

‘In a manner of speaking, yes, it is,’ Diane smiled with what she hoped looked like frankness. ‘Major Saunders was kind enough to provide me with the address of the young pilot who crashed out near Nantwich, so that I could write to his parents. I wanted to thank him.’ The truth was that she wanted to see him but of course she wasn’t going to tell the sergeant that.

The sergeant’s expression was relaxing, the nod of his head almost approving, Diane noticed guiltily,
but she had to keep her promise to Ruthie, didn’t she?

Ten minutes later, when she stepped into the Dungeon, she was swept into more than enough work to keep Lee out of her mind, though, of course, it didn’t. With each swing of the doors opening her concentration was broken as she looked up anxiously, hoping to see him.

The morning passed, she could barely eat her lunch, and then it was back to work, monitoring the positions of the Mosquito planes protecting the convoys. The minutes and then the hours ticked by and she was just on the verge of giving up hope when she looked up and saw him walking towards her.

‘You wanted to see me?’

Diane nodded. ‘But not here…’

There was a narrow corridor that led to a seldom-used storeroom.

There was no valid reason for either of them to be there, but Diane couldn’t tell Lee what she needed to say in the middle of the busy Dungeon.

The minute they were on their own he started to reach for her, groaning, ‘You don’t know how much I’ve missed you. I don’t know what’s made you change your mind, but whatever it is…’

For a second Diane allowed herself the luxury of leaning close to him and letting herself daydream – but only for a second. Pushing herself away from him, she told him quickly, ‘This isn’t about us, and I have not changed my mind. In fact, the Group Captain has made it clear to me—’ she broke off.
There wasn’t time for her to talk about their own situation.

‘I don’t know whether or not you’ve heard about it yet, but there was a fight in Liverpool over the weekend, as a result of which a young GI has died.’

‘Yes, I’ve heard about it,’ Lee frowned. ‘But what’s it got to do with us?’

‘Nothing. That’s what I’m trying to tell you, Lee. This isn’t about us. Myra and Nick Mancini lied about what happened on Saturday. Myra has as good as admitted that to me, although she isn’t prepared to say so publicly, and because of that an innocent man is being blamed for Walter’s death.’

‘What does this have to do with us?’ he repeated

‘Nothing, except that I’ve promised to do what I can to help Ruthie – that’s Glen’s fiancée. She was in a terrible state last night, having been taken up to Burtonwood thinking she was going to be interviewed by Glen’s CO prior to him approving their wedding, only to find that her fiancé was under armed guard for the death of his best friend, because Nick Mancini has put pressure on some of his platoon buddies to support his claim that Glen and Walter fought over an unpaid gambling debt. The poor girl is distraught. The truth is, apparently, that Walter caught Nick cheating at cards and said so, and because of that Nick had a grudge against him. Glen’s CO won’t listen to Ruthie and, of course, none of the others are going to admit they are lying. You’re the only person
who can help them, Lee. You could speak to Glen’s CO, let him know what’s been going on and then he can—’

‘Stop right there,’ he told her sharply. ‘First off, what you’re asking me to do is against army protocol; second, you’ve only got this Ruthie’s word for it that the others are lying; third, if you knew anything about the US Army you’d know that getting a decision overturned because it was based on a pack of lies that were accepted as truth is harder than turning base metal into gold.’

‘Hang protocol! We’re talking about a man’s life here, Lee,’ Diane protested. ‘If Glen is found guilty he’ll be facing the death penalty. We can’t let that happen to an innocent man. You must see that.’

‘Listen, what I see is that even if he is innocent – and I’m not saying that he is – even if his CO were prepared to listen to me and order a full inquiry, Mancini sure as hell isn’t going to admit that he’s lied and corrupted the truth by putting pressure on others to lie as well, when he knows if he does,
he’s
the one who’s going to be looking down the wrong end of a death sentence. That stands to reason.’

Diane knew that he had a point but she still persisted.

‘The only way he can have persuaded the others to lie has to be by threatening them. They probably didn’t realise when they agreed what they were doing to an innocent man. Lee, please.’ Diane reached out pleadingly and put her hand on his arm.

To her shock he shook her off, his mouth tight-lipped with anger. ‘When I got your note and I saw the way you looked at me when I came through to the Dungeon, all big eyes and soft lips like you wanted me so much it hurt, I thought you’d changed your mind about us, that you’d realised how precious and special what we could have together would be, but you were just putting it on, weren’t you? All you wanted was to use me to help your friend. How far were you prepared to go to do that, Di? All the way to my bed?’

Overwhelmed by her feelings, Diane would have slapped his face if he hadn’t grabbed hold of her wrist.

‘If you knew anything about me – anything at all – then you’d never say anything like that to me,’ she told him passionately. ‘You’d know too that sometimes a person shows their love more by what they do not do than what they do, and that loving someone sometimes means sacrificing your own feelings for their protection. If I wanted to help Ruthie it’s because I know how I would feel if I were in her shoes and the man I love was in Glen’s.’

Lee had relaxed his grip of her wrist and she pulled herself free of him, turning on her heel to walk away.

She had almost reached the end of the corridor when she heard him say rawly, ‘God dammit to hell, Di,’ followed by the sound of him walking swiftly towards her.

She didn’t turn round because she couldn’t. She
was too afraid to let him see what was in her eyes. She felt his hands on her shoulders and stiffened as he turned her round, and then kissed her almost savagely.

‘No,’ she began but it was too late, her body was already saying ‘yes’.

Lee was breathing as though he’d run a race when he finally released her and she knew her own heartbeat was ragged with the intensity of her emotions, as she clung to him, torn between her need to be with him and her need to punish herself for giving in to it.

‘OK, I’ll see what I can do,’ he promised her, adding, ‘I can’t give you up, Di, and I don’t intend to. We need to talk properly.’

‘Not here,’ Diane objected. ‘We can’t.’

‘No…Look, what about meeting up at that dance place the day after tomorrow?’

‘The Grafton, you mean?’

‘Yeah.’

Diane nodded.

‘Jess, I need to talk to you.’

The quiet desperation in Ruthie’s voice made Jess frown. What on earth was wrong? Surely Glen’s CO hadn’t refused to let them get married?

‘Go on then,’ she encouraged her as she finished pushing her hair up out of the way, ready for work.

‘I meant in private,’ Ruthie whispered, glancing over her shoulder.

‘Well, let’s hang on here a minute until the coast is clear, then,’ Jess suggested, waiting until the others had left the cloakroom before saying, ‘OK, what is it?’

‘It’s Walter. He’s dead.’

Jess stared at her in shocked disbelief. ‘He can’t be,’ she protested. ‘You told me he’d just been knocked about a bit. How can he be dead?’

‘He is. He died at Burtonwood,’ Ruthie insisted. ‘That’s what Glen’s CO wanted to see me about, not…not me and Glen getting married. He wanted me to make a statement, because…because he says that it’s because of Glen that he died.’

Whilst Jess stared at her in disbelief, fresh tears spilled from Ruthie’s eyes, swiftly followed by the words spilling from her lips as she told Jess what had happened.

‘You mean that that Myra deliberately lied?’ Jess’s voice was sharp with incredulous anger. ‘By golly, if she were here right now I’d be letting her know what I think of her.’

‘Diane has said that she’ll have a word with her and try to get her to tell the truth.’

‘Huh…’ Jess began, about to say in no uncertain terms just what chance she thought Diane had of succeeding, when she saw the strain in Ruthie’s eyes. There was no point in upsetting her even more, she decided. The poor kid was having a hard enough time of it as it was. For herself, it was only just beginning to sink in what had happened and that Walter was dead.

‘Poor Walter. I think I need to sit down for a bit,’ she confided to Ruthie. She may not have loved Walter in the way that Ruthie loved Glen, but she had liked him and she had thought of him as a friend – a good friend. She raised her hand to wipe the back of it over her eyes and brush away her tears. Who would tell Walter’s girl? She hoped that someone would. She pictured herself getting a letter telling her that Billy was dead, that he had died whilst she had been going about her own daily business and she hadn’t known anything about it. A feeling gripped her like someone twisting a sharp knife inside her chest. It was so intense that she actually lifted her hands to her
chest and pressed them against it. What a truly dreadful thing to have happened. And poor Ruthie, to have to cope with hearing that, because of other people’s lies, her Glen was going to be accused of causing Walter’s death.

Jess was still grappling with her shock an hour later as she went through the motions of filling her shells, her movements automatic and neatly efficient. Unlike Ruthie’s, she recognised, as she looked up from her own work to see Ruthie’s hands trembling so much that she spilled some of the TNT.

Going over to her, she told her gently, ‘Come on, let’s get this wiped up, otherwise you’ll end up with burns.’

‘’Ere, have you heard the latest?’ Mel interrupted them excitedly, ignoring the warning look that Jess was trying to give her to alert her to the fact that Ruthie needed a bit of peace and quiet. ‘They’re going to search everyone’s locker, on account of that Alice’s watch going missing. Mind you, I’m not surprised. I told the foreman meself that I thought they ought ter do summat like that. They announced it whilst you two were still in the cloakroom. Said that we all had to line up at dinner whilst they went through everyone’s locker. Cor, look at you,’ she laughed when she saw Ruthie’s white face. ‘One look at you and they’ll have
you
pegged down as guilty and no mistake.’

‘Give over, will you, Mel,’ Jess told her sharply. ‘Can’t you see that Ruthie’s got enough to worry
about? Not that she’s any need to worry about Alice’s ruddy missing watch. We all know that Ruthie wouldn’t take it.’

Mel sniffed and tossed her head in the air. ‘Well, as to that…’

Before she could say any more, the foreman walked onto the shop floor, accompanied by one of the managers. Automatically all the girls stopped working.

The manager looked angry, and his voice was sharp and clipped as he informed them, ‘A theft has been reported, and since we treat this as a very serious matter, a thorough search of everyone’s locker and outdoor clothes pockets will now be conducted. For this purpose you will all go to your lockers and stand in front of them whilst the foreman and I open them and check their contents.’

Immediately a low buzz of speculative conversation broke out amongst the girls, swiftly silenced by the manager, ordering them into single file to march out into the yard and then across to their cloakroom area.

Each worker was made to line up opposite her locker and face it whilst the manager went down the line, one worker at a time, demanding her key and then unlocking her locker and searching through it.

It was a laborious process, and there was an uproar when, halfway through it, the foreman announced that because of the time lost they wouldn’t get a proper break.

Ruthie’s locker was the next to be inspected.
Not that she cared. She was too wrapped up in her despair over Glen to think about anything else. Numbly she handed over her key, watching obediently as the locker was opened and the bag containing her personal belongings removed.

There was nothing there should not have been amongst them, and the manager was just on the point of putting the bag back when he stopped and frowned, holding it in one hand whilst he reached deep into the locker with the other.

‘What’s this?’ he demanded ominously, holding up to Ruthie the box filled with packets of sugar, which he had removed.

Automatically Ruthie looked at Maureen, but the other girl was refusing to look back at her. Ruthie could feel her face starting to burn.

‘I…I…’ She swallowed hard. What could she say. It was obvious that the sugar was black-market goods, and not just one packet but a whole boxful.

Jess looked on indignantly, willing Ruthie to tell the manager that it wasn’t her who had put the sugar in her locker, but Maureen, but to Jess’s dismay, Ruthie looked too shocked and distressed to think of defending herself.

‘I’ll see you about this in my office later,’ the manager told Ruthie grimly before handing the sugar over to the foreman for safekeeping and going on to the next locker.

Miserably Ruthie watched as the manager moved on down the line.

‘Why didn’t you tell him that you was the one
who put that ruddy sugar there, instead of letting Ruthie take the blame?’ Jess hissed angrily to Maureen.

‘’Oo says I did?’ Maureen returned challengingly, lifting her hand to scratch at the raised rash of red lumps on her wrist. Jess stared at them, her eyes widening as she remembered Alice saying that her watch had made her itch, but before she could say anything to Maureen the foreman was ordering them to get back to work.

It was only when they were all back at their benches that Jess realised that Ruthie was missing. At first she assumed that she had gone to the ladies’; but when five and then ten minutes went by without her returning, she began to worry, remembering how shocked and distressed the other girl had been.

‘Ruthie’s gone missing,’ she told the others. ‘I’m going to go and look for her, so cover for me, will you? And as for you,’ she told Maureen sharply, ‘if I were Alice I’d be asking to compare that rash on me wrist with the one you’ve got on yours.’

Maureen’s face turned a dark shade of red, but Jess didn’t stay to argue with her. She really was worried about Ruthie.

The girls weren’t supposed to leave the factory during their shift without permission, but no one had tried to stop Ruthie as she stumbled across the yard and out through the gate in a state of anguished shock. It felt as though her whole world had been turned upside down and all the
happiness Glen had brought into it extinguished. Her sensitive nature made her shrink in shamed distress from the notoriety she knew she would gain from the sugar being found in her locker. It would be almost as bad as actually being branded a thief. But nothing like as bad as what had happened to Glen. Tears filled her eyes as she wandered aimlessly down the street, not knowing where she was going and not caring either, just knowing that she couldn’t bear to stay at the factory with everyone talking about her behind her back.

Jess saw her from the factory gate and called out her name, but Ruthie simply kept on walking. Jess hesitated. By rights neither of them should have left the factory and they would both be in trouble if they were found out, but Ruthie, of course, would be in the worst trouble because of the sugar. She needed to come back and be persuaded to tell the manager who had really put the sugar there. Jess glanced back towards the factory gates. She could always tell the foreman that Ruthie hadn’t been well and had had to go home. He would guess the truth, of course, but at least it sounded better than having it discovered that she had just walked out. And she would be there to tell him about the sugar. She took a step back towards the gate. Ruthie had almost reached the end of the road. She looked so forlorn and vulnerable. She would be crying her eyes out and worrying herself sick about her Glen. She wasn’t really in any fit state to be on her own.

Jess shook her head as though regretting her own folly, and set off after her.

‘I’m not going back, Jess. I can’t…Not with them all thinking…what they will be thinking.’

‘Well, whose fault is that? You should have told the manager about Maureen?’

‘How could I? It wouldn’t have been right.’

‘Of course it would. Do you think she’d keep mum to protect you?’ Jess challenged her. ‘Oh, come on then.’ She gave in when she saw how genuinely ill Ruthie looked. ‘Let’s get you home. Then I’ll go back and tell the foreman that you were taken bad.’

‘You don’t have to go with me,’ Ruthie protested.

‘Not half, I don’t,’ Jess told her bluntly. ‘You should see yourself. You look as sick as a cat.’

Jess was on the bus on her way back to the factory, having seen Ruthie safely home, when they heard the explosion. A dull crump, followed by a series of sharp ear-shattering bangs that caused the bus driver to stop the bus and the passengers to fling themselves to the floor.

‘Bloody hell!’ the large woman who had been sitting next to Jess puffed seconds later, as they all got apprehensively to their feet. ‘Ruddy Hitler’s getting a cheek on him, bombing us during the ruddy day…’

‘It ain’t Hitler, it’s the ruddy munitions factory,’ someone else called out.

‘Look.’

All the passengers crowded to the side of the bus and looked towards the factory where they could see flames and smoke pouring from part of the building.

Jess’s heart slammed into her ribs. Her friends were in that factory. Automatically she started to push her way past the other passengers to get to the bus door.

‘’Ere, mind where you’re putting yer feet,’ one woman objected.

‘I’ve got to get to the factory. I work there,’ Jess told her frantically.

‘Sorry, miss, but you can’t do that,’ the conductor informed her, blocking her exit. ‘ARP’ll have the whole place cordoned off by now, just in case Hitler has dropped a bomb on it. Course, if you ask me it’s more likely to be one of them fifth columnist spies wot’s done it,’ he announced, referring to the news items they had all read concerning Hitler’s spies within the country. Must have infiltrated the place, like we’re allus being warned, and then gorn and blown it up.’

‘’Ere, my niece works up there,’ another passenger said worriedly, followed by two more saying anxiously that they had family there too.

By now the whole bus was in an uproar, with the conductor barring the exit and saying that it would be more than his job was worth to let anyone get off.

‘Don’t be daft,’ someone protested, but the screams of sirens as fire engines raced past them towards the factory, followed by police, proved
his point that no mere civilians would be allowed close to the place.

One of the passengers started to cry noisily, but all Jess could do was stare blindly towards the smoke and flames.

‘I left me overalls in me locker, and there’ll be hell to pay if they get damaged,’ she told the woman standing next to her. ‘Dock me wages for them, they will.’

‘Sit down for a minute, love,’ the woman told her in a kind voice, adding gently, ‘You’ve had a nasty shock, I dare say. Lucky you wasn’t up there, if you ask me.’

Jess shook her head. The munitions factory was huge, and all the workshops separated from one another just in case of any kind of accident or incident. Everyone who worked there knew how dangerous the TNT was and how little chance they would have of surviving if their workshop ever took a direct bomb hit.

Another fire engine raced past the stationary bus, followed by an army lorry.

‘I expect they’ll have the bomb disposal lot up there. Bound to get them, if you think about it,’ one man commented knowledgeably. ‘I wouldn’t do their ruddy job for all the tea in China, I wouldn’t. A lad down the road from us was wi ’em. Lasted four weeks, he did. Blown to bits. Told his mam that all they’d found were his little finger.’

Jess made a strangled sound deep in her throat. Please don’t let them send Billy there, she prayed. Please, please don’t let them.

‘Where the ’ell do you think you’re going?’ the conductor demanded as she wriggled past him before he could stop her.

‘’Ere, you come back,’ he yelled after her as she started to walk and then run towards the factory, but of course she didn’t pay any attention to him.

The ARP wardens, aided by the police, were turning back everyone who tried to get close to the factory, warning them that as yet they had no idea what had caused the explosion. The factory had obviously been evacuated because Jess could see where, on the other side of the road, the women were standing huddled together in their overalls.

‘Well, it weren’t no bomb being dropped,’ Jess heard one man saying firmly as she wriggled her way to the front of the crowd gathered at the end of the street. ‘Mind you, I can’t say I’m surprised. What else does the bloody government expect if it lets a load of daft women loose with explosives,’ he added with contempt.