Letters to the Lost (22 page)

From along the passageway they heard the front door slam, and the sound of voices in the hall. It cut through Stella’s thoughts, galvanized her into action. Flustered she looked around the messy kitchen.

‘They’re back – and I haven’t made the sandwiches yet, or laid the table.’

Nancy’s expression was difficult to read as she got to her feet. ‘Where’s the bread? I’ll make a start on the sandwiches. What are you putting in them?’

‘There’s not much. I was going to grate a carrot, and there are lettuces in the garden . . . I’ll open a tin of Spam.’ She grabbed the dishcloth from the draining board and was scrubbing at the sticky residue of pastry on the table when the kitchen door opened.

Charles’s cheeks were pinker than ever and crystal droplets of rain sparkled in his sandy hair. Coming into the kitchen he looked uneasily around, and although he took in the floury surfaces, the open jam jar on the table and the spoon resting stickily beside it, he seemed not to notice Nancy.

‘Tea will be ready soon, I hope? Peter needs to catch a train.’

‘Yes. I was just about to lay the table.’ Stella gestured to the tray on the worktop, on which she’d put the cups and saucers and plates ready. Charles frowned.

‘Those cups?’ He made a little irritated sound that wasn’t quite a laugh. ‘Could we not use the ones Aunt Edith gave us as a wedding present? The rose-patterned ones?’

‘Of course . . . Sorry, how silly of me. It’s been so long since I used them I’d forgotten all about them. I’ll get them out now.’

She went past him into the dining room and opened the door of the oak sideboard. The tea set was stacked carefully on its shelves and she took out the cups, wiping the dust off them with her apron. She’d been so thrilled to receive them – how odd that she should forget about them. Placing the cups on the top of the sideboard she looked at the wedding photograph that stood there and noticed that it too was dusty. She’d just picked it up and was rubbing the corner of her apron over the glass when Charles appeared in the doorway.

‘You found them?’

‘Yes.’ She held up the photograph and smiled, feeling suddenly shy. ‘Almost a year. It hasn’t been the best start for a marriage has it?’

It was intended, perhaps not to bridge the chasm that lay between them, but at least to acknowledge it. To re-establish some connection, however tentative.

‘I’m sorry it hasn’t lived up to your expectations,’ he said coldly. ‘I suggest you stop reading those appalling novelettes and filling your head with romantic nonsense. Now, if we could manage to give Peter some tea before he leaves?’

He went out, and she stood there, still holding the photograph, feeling utterly foolish.
Nancy’s right
, she thought with a little gasp, setting it down again.
He doesn’t love me. He never has. I’ve always known but I didn’t want to admit it. He really doesn’t love me at all.

She waited for the hurt to kick in, but instead the realization was like a weight falling from her – the burden of her guilt, she supposed. In her head the clouds rolled away and the sun came out.

16

22 June ’43

Dear Stella

It was good to get your letter. I didn’t want to cause trouble for you by writing when Charles was home, but I got worried when I didn’t hear from you for so long. I don’t know what I was worried about, exactly. Maybe I just missed hearing your voice.

I guess it’s not surprising that Charles isn’t being sent back to Tunisia – things look like they might be a whole lot quieter in North Africa for a little while, thanks to your guy Montgomery. How long will he be at the training camp before this new regiment gets shipped out? I got Johnson to look up Barnard Castle on those navigator’s maps of his. In English terms he reckons it’s a pretty long way away, which is great. I probably shouldn’t say that, but – what the hell. I hate it that the guy doesn’t appreciate you, which I guess is reasonable. I also hate it that he stopped me from seeing you that night, which I know is not. It was great to meet Nancy and put a face to the name (she actually looks like a Nancy) but it would’ve been so much better to see you.

This Peter Underwood guy sounds like quite an oddball . . . From what you say he sure seems to have a strange kind of a hold over Charles. Let’s hope he doesn’t happen to bump into him again the next time he gets leave.

I’m glad the peaches went down well. You don’t have to thank me – at least, as I remember, you already did (and I do remember it . . . over and over. I really liked your Ada, but she has lousy timing). Three crates of tinned peaches was a small price to pay for a kiss like that.

Look after yourself for me, beautiful girl.

Dan

27 June ’43

Dear Stella

Edge of Darkness hasn’t reached the movie theater in Bury St Edmunds yet, but I’ll sure look out for it. Last week it was showing I Married a Witch – again. I didn’t like it much the first time around, but Morgan is nuts about Veronica Lake so I somehow found myself sitting through it a second time. Guess what – I fell asleep. Sleeping through Veronica Lake in the company of a guy I spend far too much time with anyway is nothing compared to sleeping through Myra Hess with you. (You know, I actually can’t believe I did that, or that you were so sweet about it.)

It sounds like the machines you saw on the newsreel were the same ones I fly – B-17s. They’re big, but not as big as the B-24s that are coming over from home now. They all have names and pictures painted on the nose, though don’t ask me how that started. Ours is called Ruby Shoes, and she has a painting of a beautiful redhead wearing a pair of glittering red shoes and not a whole lot more. We picked the name for our ball turret gunner, a kid called Joey Harper. He’s the youngest member of the crew and was so homesick the first three weeks of training that he barely spoke, except to say how much he wanted to go home. Since he comes from Kansas we figured that what he needed was a pair of ruby slippers like Dorothy’s in The Wizard of Oz (did you ever see that movie?). The attractive lady wearing them is just a bonus.

Things have been busy around here. We’ve almost reached the fifteen mission mark, which is when they give you a medal (I guess they figure they ought to give us something now because they don’t think we’ll make it to twenty-five). They don’t count the extra rides I’ve taken with other crews. I thought it would get easier, the more missions you flew, but if anything it’s harder because you can’t help thinking about the odds getting shorter. It’s best not to think about it at all.

Take care of yourself.

D x

2 July ’43

Dear Stella

Forget what I said about flying and medals and odds – it was a stupid remark that I never would have made if I ’d thought about it for even a half-second. You’re not allowed to be worried, OK? Right now there’s nothing at all to worry about, except that I’m going to bankrupt myself at poker. Every morning we get woken up before first light and go through briefings and breakfast, only to make it down to the flight line and have the mission cancelled because of cloud cover over the targets. After that there’s nothing to do all day but play cards and soccer, which can get pretty competitive sometimes but hasn’t resulted in any casualties so far.

I’ve put in for a leave pass. I don’t want to tempt fate and assume I’ll get it, but I think there’s a good chance – they don’t want us all hanging around here and going slowly crazy with nothing to do. If I did, what would you say to going away someplace? If that sounds presumptuous, ignore it and I’ll never mention it again, I swear . . .

Take care of yourself for me.

Dan x

6 July ’43

Dear Stella

That’s a yes? You’re sure? I mean, you didn’t quite write it big enough . . .

So – where should we go? I guess New York and Paris are both out, and London isn’t exactly an escape for you. Should we head for the coast? Is there any coast left that hasn’t been barricaded up with barbed wire and gun placements? Will it be difficult for you to get away?

Take care, for me.

D x

11 July ’43

Dear Stella

Ah – so Nancy has a long-lost mom? And a long-lost mom who’s chosen right now to get back in touch? I think I love this woman (or the woman who made her up). Of course it’s natural that you’d want to be with your friend when she went to visit. And, if she lives somewhere nice, with a great hotel, well – that would be just perfect.

I’ve never been to Brighton, but from reading your description I’m pretty sure I don’t want to. I couldn’t give a damn about being by the sea – I see enough of the stuff flying over it – and you’re right about the trains. How about Cambridge? It’s a beautiful city, and a great place to get lost in, and we won’t waste a precious day to get there. Do you think that maybe Nancy’s mom might just live in Cambridge?

Another two missions down. No word on the pass yet. With any luck it won’t be long, but when these things come through they tend to be pretty immediate. Will that be a problem?

Take care of yourself for me.

Dan x

The light was nearly gone and it was almost impossible to make out the words. But excitement rose like wreaths of smoke from the page as the plans for those stolen days seventy years ago were made.

Jess sensed a change, and wondered what had happened to bring it about. Their initial tentative friendship had entered a different phase, and there was a sort of exuberance in Dan Rosinski’s tone. She remembered what he’d said about a kiss – a kiss that had been worth three crates of tinned peaches. A kiss that had meant so much it had made him able to forget that he was regularly flying deep into enemy territory and not knowing if he’d come back. A kiss like nothing Jess had ever experienced.

The book in the library had outlined the facts, and the odds that were stacked against the young American airmen who poured into East Anglia during the war. She’d skimmed over a lot of it, her attention diverted by the photographs; crowded dance halls decked with streamers and balloons, airmen queuing for coffee and doughnuts at Red Cross vans, crews lined up beneath their planes – pin-up girl paintings just like the one Dan described visible in the background. But one statistic stuck in her mind. A tour of duty consisted of twenty-five missions in 1943, she’d read. The average life expectancy was seventeen.

Dan Rosinski must have known that, but apart from that one bit about the medal for fifteen missions, he didn’t mention it. He talked about his friends and the films they’d seen, and he focused his mind on planning a trip he couldn’t guarantee he’d be alive to take with the woman he hadn’t meant to fall in love with.

She lay back on the pink counterpane in the evening gloom, and thought about Dodge. Even at the beginning, when she’d actually believed that he loved her, she couldn’t imagine him doing anything like that for her. But then she couldn’t imagine him setting aside his own needs, his own comforts, his own plans for anything that didn’t directly line his own pocket. His swaggering selfishness had almost, ironically, been part of his attraction – it was as if his belief in his own importance had made her believe it too. Dodge prided himself on being a seasoned veteran of many a violent war-zone but they were all ones that didn’t require him to move from the horrible black PVC sofa in the flat, or shift his eyes from the huge flatscreen TV as he gunned down enemies with a beer in one hand and a spliff in the other.

When she met him she’d been working in a bar in Manchester, taking to the stage in the cave-like club downstairs to sing on Saturday nights. Living with her dad, she’d been desperate to save up some money to rent a place of her own. Lisa, her dad’s new partner, made no secret of the fact she didn’t want her there, and Jess couldn’t blame her; Lisa had two small kids of her own who’d each had their own bedroom before Jess came on the scene.

Singing was the only thing that made the long hours behind the bar and the awkward atmosphere in the cramped house bearable. For those few hours on a Saturday night she could believe that her life was going somewhere, and that there was still a chance she might achieve her ambition and be the star Gran had always said she was. Even though for the rest of the week it seemed about as likely as moving to Mars.

And then Dodge had appeared. One night, watching her from the side of the stage with measuring, speculative eyes.

He knew people, he said, in London, and she didn’t doubt it for a second. He came and went, city to city, dropping the names of clubs and DJs in his wake like stardust. That first night he’d pressed her up against the wall in the corridor and told her he’d look after her, make things happen. He said she had a voice like dynamite, and a body to match. She thought he’d release the neon-bright dreams that lit up the inside of her head and let the colours come shining out of her.

He hadn’t. It all turned out to be lies – all those hints about friends in high places and industry connections – and gradually she’d realized that she was part of the pretence; another fake accessory to enhance his image and bring in a bit of above-board cash from small-time gigs in pubs while he got on with whatever it was that paid for the TV and the BMW and the moving around from town to town. It had been pretty obvious from the moment she’d left Manchester with him that he hadn’t loved her – anyone with half a brain could work out that dragging someone off the bed by the hair wasn’t a sign of affection – and yet she’d believed him when he said he was sorry, and felt almost flattered when he told her she made him crazy. She’d known at the time that wasn’t love, but she hadn’t understood until now, reading Dan Rosinski’s letters, what real love was.