The Gunner Girl (6 page)

The fields and empty roads were gradually being replaced by terraced houses, churches and mounds of rubble. The housing got denser, the roads filling with buses and bicycles, and the train
rattled on. She'd made six crocheted squares by the time they reached the station. As the train drew in, she gathered her crochet work and put it back into her coat pocket. She got up and
caught the soldier's eye.

‘It was nice to meet you,' she said.

He grinned. ‘May I know your name? I was wondering if you'd like to be pen pals?'

‘Oh, I don't think so,' she replied, brushing the dust off her coat. ‘I have someone . . .'

‘I didn't mean – I just meant to write to,' he said. It was his turn to blush.

‘Yes, but, even so . . .' she shrugged apologetically.

‘Well, my name's Bill Franks – Corporal Franks – and I'm with 32 Armoured Engineers. Just in case you change your mind.' He reached out through the sliding
window to push down the door handle and open the carriage door as the train slid to a halt.

‘Well, it was very nice to meet you, Corporal Bill Franks from 32 Armoured Engineers,' she said, smiling as she picked up her case.

She paused in the doorway and looked out over the crowds of passengers scurrying on the concourse, so busy, so purposeful. All those strangers and not a single child – there were no
children left, in London. Then she stepped off the train and joined the childless throng. There was no going back: she was one of them, now.

Vanessa stumbled like a refugee onto the concourse. Getting here had been hell. Crowds eddied and seethed around her as she looked for a sign. A miasma of steam, smoke and
London smog hung over the crowded station. She pushed through the throng, butted and jolted like a Dodgem car, until she found the notice board.
SOUTHERN RAILWAY: WHAT YOU WANT AND
WHERE TO FIND IT
, said the painted sign.

Her stomach growled and her mouth felt dry as sand. She'd been sick twice in the night, vomit splashing over the platform edge and onto the dark Tube tracks. She'd had some water
from the sink in the station toilets this morning, but nothing else, not since yesterday. Her fingers fumbled in her pockets, but there were no spare coins clinking there, not even a couple of
pennies for a cup of tea. She still felt sick, and her head throbbed.

WHAT YOU WANT AND WHERE TO FIND IT
, said the sign.

Well, what did she want? She fiddled with the papers in her pocket, eyes scanning the board. There would be a train to Devon in half an hour. The crowd heaved and milled around her. There was
the hiss of steam and the sound of a guard's whistle. Colours swam and bled like paint on tissue paper. She swallowed hard, gulping nausea back down into her empty inside. Why was she here?
To say goodbye, that was it. To give her a proper send off, with Mum and Dad. But where were they all?

‘Joan!' she thought she heard her mum's voice above the cacophony. As she spun round, the world spun with her, blurring and sliding and out of reach, until the concrete floor
was a cold hard slap and then there was darkness . . . and when the darkness went all she could see in front of her was a forest of legs and feet. A small white-gloved hand dangled down in front of
her.

‘Upsy-daisy!' said a posh voice. The voice belonged to a girl. Vanessa grasped the hand and let herself be pulled up. Now face to face with the young woman, the only thing she
noticed was her freckles.

‘Thank you,' she said. The world had stopped its wild spinning and was just wavering, hazy at the edges. She reached out and leant on the notice board to steady herself.

‘Not at all,' said the posh voice. ‘Are you all right, dear?'

‘Yes, I'm fine.' Her tongue was thick in her mouth as she struggled to articulate. A taste of bile still in her throat, the echoing rush of station noise and everything
swelling, liquid, unfocused.

‘You look quite peaky. Shall I get some tea?' the voice continued.

‘No, thanks, I'm fine.' She didn't have any money for tea. ‘I have to go,' she said.

‘Let me get you a cup of tea,' said the voice. ‘Honestly, you'd be doing me a favour. I'm going to get one myself anyway.'

Vanessa couldn't focus on the girl's face. Images kept flashing in front of her eyes, like the screen at the flicks when they reached the end of a reel: an airman with his
outstretched arms; a mess of bricks that used to be a home; the blank scream of the empty tube tunnel in the darkness.

‘I won't take no for an answer,' the voice continued, and the small, gloved hand tucked itself under Vanessa's elbow and led her towards the tea stall in the archway.
‘Just lean here a moment and I'll bring yours over,' said the voice.

The pillar felt hard and strong against her back. She was able to focus on the posh girl now: she had coppery hair and an emerald-green hat with a serge coat in the same colour.

‘Two teas, please,' the girl said brightly to the dishevelled tea-stall lady.

‘That's eightpence, duckie,' said the stallholder, wisps of grey hair escaping from her blue headscarf.

Eightpence for two teas, she thought, daylight robbery. She took the cup as it was handed to her. She clutched it with both hands, wishing they'd stop shaking. The peach-brown liquid
trembled as she lifted it to her lips. She felt it run hot and sweet down her throat.

‘I put two sugars in yours,' said the voice. ‘You look like you need it. I put two in mine as well. I don't normally, but I skipped breakfast this morning. There, is that
better? You're starting to get some colour back in your cheeks.' The posh girl was smiling, talking, drinking. She didn't seem to need any response. She talked about the weather,
the food rationing, the war – the usual.

Vanessa tried to listen, but the station was full of noise: the chug of trains, the screech of whistles, the clink of china, the hiss of steam, waves upon waves of echoing voices, and inside her
head the crash of a bomb exploding again and again. She drained her cup. Her hands had stopped shaking now. The posh girl was still talking, eyebrows jumping up into her pale forehead at every
exclamation.

‘. . . and poor old Marjorie! He's missing in action, and I said that maybe he's not dead, but they're all assuming the worst and perhaps they're right to do so. I
mean, better that than spend months in limbo. But I suppose they must be hoping, secretly – I know I am . . . but, anyway, that's why she couldn't make it to the party, which was
a bally shame because, honestly, she was the only person I really wanted to come! Do you know Glenn Miller?'

Vanessa wondered what on earth the posh girl could be talking about. Who was Glenn Miller, and why would this girl think they'd have friends in common?

‘No, I'm sorry, I don't. But thank you for the tea. Now I really think I should go,' she said.

‘Must you?' said the posh girl. ‘It's just that I've got an age to wait until my connection, and, frankly, I could use the company.'

Vanessa closed her eyes and saw clouds of powdery dust, and red hair, fanned out on shattered floorboards, sticky and matted with blood and grit. She opened her eyes.

‘Let me at least get you a refill,' the posh girl continued. ‘One for the road, as they say. Or should it be one for the tracks?' She added, and laughed.

Vanessa felt as if her mouth was going to crack with the effort of trying to smile, but she let her cup be taken and refilled. The posh girl passed it back and she said thank you.

The girl clinked her cup. ‘Cheers!' she said. ‘Shame we haven't anything a bit stronger to put in it. I deserve to get a bit tipsy today. After all, it's not every
day you join the ATS!'

Vanessa choked on the too-hot tea.

‘Steady on, dear.' The girl patted her on the back.

‘Good for you,' she managed, once she'd stopped coughing.

‘Thank you. It's all rather hush-hush, actually. Mummy and Pop don't even know I'm here,' she said, winking.

‘Where do they think you are?'

‘Oh, I'm sure they think I'm at home, sitting next to the radio and knitting, or something equally dull. But I'm eighteen now, and I wanted to do something for my
country, just like Mary Churchill. Don't you see?'

Vanessa nodded. She shifted position. Her head was pounding, and all the station noises were crashing waves of sound. Her feet still hurt in her stupid shoes, and her legs were aching and cold.
And she was so tired; it felt like the insides of her eyelids had been sandpapered. She yawned, mouth stretching up into her skull.

‘Oh, you've set me off,' said the posh girl, also yawning, covering her generous mouth with her gloved hand. ‘There's a seat over there – look, where that
girl with the grey coat has just left. Shall we sit down for a bit?'

They went over to the seat and the posh girl placed her handbag on the wooden slats. They both sat down and the posh girl crossed her legs. She had silk stockings. And she had a patent-leather
handbag that lay between them on the seat. It was so shiny that she could almost catch a glimpse of herself. Vanessa could see the smudged impression of a face reflected back from the glossy
leather. It was the face of someone – but it was so hazy and indistinct; it could be the face of anyone at all.

The girl with the posh voice was still talking. There was an ache in Vanessa's temple, and it was as if her thoughts didn't quite fit in her head, like unfolded clothes, bundled up
in an old drawer. She pulled her gaze away from the bag and took a sip of tea, looking across into the station. On the crowded platform the guard was waving his red flag and blowing a whistle. The
nearest train gave an answering whistle and puffed steam. Another one was pulling away next to it, and further on, trains were coming in, disgorging passengers. She thought about caterpillars. The
trains looked like giant caterpillars, the grimy glass station roof a cocoon. She imagined the trains emerging like butterflies, transformed, flying away into the cold sunshine on vast wings like
parachutes. Her eyes scanned the mass of people, picking out individuals to focus on. A stout lady in a cherry-coloured hat was waving goodbye to someone inside the nearest train. The girl in the
grey coat was getting on, lugging a cardboard case up the steps after her. Further on, a sailor was leaning out of a window and kissing a passionate goodbye to a blonde woman. Her curls shook and
she teetered on high-heeled shoes as the train pulled away, leaving her with outstretched empty arms.

An image pushed into her head of a man, running, with outstretched arms, shouting, and then a sudden blankness. She swallowed down the sick feeling and drained her tea.

‘Well, thank you for the tea. I'm not myself today, but I do feel a bit better now,' she said, standing up. ‘It was nice to meet you . . .'

‘Edith. My name is Edith, but everyone calls me Edie.'

The posh girl stood up and held out a hand. Vanessa took it. The hand was small, like a child's, but the handshake surprisingly firm.

‘Well, it was nice to meet you, too . . .'

‘Joan,' Vanessa said. ‘My name is Joan.'

‘Nice to meet you, Joan.'

Vanessa put her cup back on the trestle table and began to make her way back across the concourse towards the tube entrance. She was shoved and elbowed by the crowd as she limped towards the
hole where the steps plunged down into the blackness of the Underground. She heard someone calling: ‘Joan, Joan,
Joan!
' She thought the voice must be inside her head, like
earlier on. She wondered if it meant she was going to faint again. Then she felt a hand on her shoulder. It will be the police, she thought, distractedly.

‘These just fell out of your pocket, dear!'

She turned, and it wasn't the police, it was the posh girl – the girl she now knew was Edie. She put her hand out for the papers.

‘Thank you,' she said.

‘Oh, look, you're joining up, too! Why didn't you say? We can travel up together. That's a turn up for the books, isn't it, Joan? Or should I call you Private
Tucker?'

Edie laughed, and this time Vanessa joined in, laughing long and hard, gasping for breath. If she hadn't laughed, she would have cried, and she wouldn't have been able to stop.

The two young women stood in the middle of the crowded concourse, killing themselves with hilarity, as the mass of passengers swirled round them like an irritable river.

‘I say, get a move on, will you? You're causing an obstruction!' said a man with a moustache.

‘Yes, sir!' said the posh girl – Edie – giving a mock salute. The man tutted and they both laughed harder still.

When the laughter subsided, Vanessa put the documents back in her pocket, shoving them right down to the bottom, next to the airman's address. Then she turned and hooked her arm through
Edie's. And as she turned, she left behind her the ghost of poor Vanessa Tucker from number thirty-two: Vanessa the black sheep, Vanessa the orphan, Vanessa with the bad reputation and the
disappointing job. At the moment Joan turned away, Vanessa became an insubstantial shadow, stumbling back towards the tube station and back to the place where her childhood had been crushed under
falling masonry.

It was Joan Tucker who took Edie's arm and strode back towards the platform: good, nice, sensible Joan, who was eighteen and ready to do her bit for King and country. The breeze caught her
hair and pulled it back from her brows. It felt as if the wind was blowing away the smog and she could see clearly. The train was just pulling into platform five. It was her train, ready to take
her to the ATS training camp. Sunshine slanted through the glass roof.

She was Joan Tucker, she was eighteen and she was joining the ATS.

Please, God, let me get this right. Edie offered up a silent prayer as the drill sergeant opened his mouth. Behind his angry face, at the edge of the parade ground, the
sycamore trees beserked. The wind held little flecks of moisture, like spittle spraying on her face. The drill sergeant roared and they moved to the right in threes and marched and wheeled, and
this time it seemed like she got it right, like they were all getting it right, finally, like a clockwork machine that had been cranked up into action. For once, her feet and arms did as they were
told.