The FitzOsbornes at War

  Yours fondly,

  [illegible but very familiar Colonel signature]

  How did Henry even get his address? I suppose she must have sent the letter via Rupert, and he was too kind-hearted to put her off. Of course, if anyone could wangle her a posting with the Wrens, it would be the Colonel . . . but I refuse to consider the matter until the school year is over. I’m certainly not going to bother Veronica with it now.

  Still . . . the Colonel ‘trusts my judgement entirely’? That’s a rather nice thing to say, isn’t it?

  10th July, 1943

  I WAS WALKING OUT OF Harrods this afternoon, feeling mildly triumphant about having procured a packet of sewing needles and some elastic, when I heard someone calling, ‘Sophie! Sophie!’ The next thing I knew, a girl had flung her arms round me and my face was full of honey-blonde curls. She loosened her grasp, I blinked . . . and it was Kick! Kick Kennedy, back in London!

  ‘But when did you arrive?’ I cried, after we’d each babbled about how wonderful it was to see the other. ‘And what are you doing here – Oh, American Red Cross, yes, I can see that now, but why didn’t you tell us what you were planning?’

  She grinned at me. ‘Well, I didn’t know for sure where I’d be stationed – I mean, I could have ended up anywhere, even Iceland! But can you believe it, I’m right around the corner from our old house. I’ve just started as programme assistant at the Hans Crescent Club and guess what, I’m a second lieutenant in the US Army, too! They figured they ought to make all us Red Cross girls into officers, just in case we get captured.’

  ‘You look so impressive,’ I said, admiring her smart blue-grey uniform. ‘What is it you do, exactly?’

  ‘Oh, I keep our officers entertained,’ she said. ‘Play gin rummy and ping-pong, jitterbug with them, write letters to their mothers, organise their leave passes. Often it’s just sitting and listening – sometimes those poor boys get so homesick, all they want is to talk to an American girl. But it’s exhausting, I’ll tell you that. I can’t wait for my next day off. Lady Astor invited me to Cliveden last weekend, and I’ve had dinner with Lord Beaverbrook, and next weekend, I’m going down to Compton Place with Billy –’

  ‘Oh, Billy Hartington?’ I said, and she blushed.

  ‘Well, I always knew he wasn’t really serious about Sally Norton. She’s a nice girl and they’ve known each other since they were kids, but . . . Anyway, when he broke off their engagement a few months ago, I thought, “I can’t sit around here in Washington, waiting till the war is over! This is crazy!” And I always did want to do something useful for the war effort – so here I am. He’s stationed at Alton now, did you know? That’s only an hour from London. And oh, Sophie, have you seen him in his uniform? He was telling me all about Dunkirk and boy, was he ever brave –’

  And she went on about Billy’s many wonderful qualities for some time. When she stopped for breath, I asked after her two elder brothers, who I knew had joined the US Navy. She said that Joe was flying a patrol plane near Puerto Rico, searching for German U-boats, and Jack was commanding a motor torpedo boat in the South Pacific, attacking Japanese destroyers.

  I told Kick about how we’d finally given in to Henry’s pleadings and allowed her to join the Wrens and there still being no news of Toby, and she listened politely for about a minute before shifting the conversation back to Billy. If sorrow makes one self-centred, then so does being in love. I couldn’t begrudge her that, though. I’m glad she and Billy are enjoying whatever time they have together before their disapproving parents – or the war – tear them apart.

  Kick suddenly remembered that she was on duty and was supposed to have been back at the club a quarter of an hour ago, so she had to dash off, although she shouted something over her shoulder about Friday evening and the Four Hundred as she ran. I waved goodbye, then went to catch my bus, marvelling at how rich Kick had looked, with her glossy, luxuriant hair and plump cheeks and immaculate stockings. Goodness knows how haggard and threadbare I must have seemed to her.

  When I got home, Veronica had finished the week’s grocery shopping and was weeding our overgrown vegetable patch. She was covered in dirt, but looked far more relaxed than she had for a long while. It’s been another horrible month at the Foreign Office. The leader of the French Resistance was tortured to death by the Gestapo, who also arrested many others in the Resistance, so life has become even more difficult and dangerous for Allied servicemen trying to escape into Spain. In addition, some Spanish workers managed to smuggle a bomb into Gibraltar last month and the resulting explosion set fire to the docks, so now the British are frantically trying to prevent further attacks. Worst of all, poor General Sikorski, the Polish Prime Minister, was killed when his plane crashed into the sea, just seconds after taking off from the aerodrome at Gibraltar. His death is so very convenient for the Soviets (and indeed, for the British and Americans) that there is much speculation over whether his plane was sabotaged – and if so, by whom? It is all very worrying, but Veronica said that her afternoon of ripping up weeds had been quite therapeutic.

  ‘I pretended each one was a Fascist,’ she said. She pointed to an especially thick specimen sprawled at her feet. ‘Look, that’s Goering. And that tall, limp one over there is Ribbentrop.’

  After I’d helped cart Hitler, Mussolini, Franco and all the others to the compost heap, I came inside to write letters to various family members. Henry has finished her initial training – three weeks of marching about in blue overalls – which she absolutely loved. Now she’s in Plymouth, learning how to navigate a motor launch so that she can ferry people and stores out to naval ships. As she spent most of her childhood messing about on boats, I can’t imagine any of this is particularly challenging for her – except for having to obey all the rules and regulations, of course. She wrote to say that her new uniform kit included knee-length knitted knickers, which were far too thick and scratchy to wear. As she had plenty of her own underclothes – and the sea breezes can get quite cold – she cut out the gusset of the knickers and wore them as a pullover, putting her head through the new opening, and her arms where the legs were supposed to go. Then all the other Wrens started doing the same, and when their commanding officer finally noticed, Henry pointed out it was a part of their uniform and the regulations didn’t specify how the knickers were to be worn. Lucky for her that the officer couldn’t help laughing. (Or perhaps it wasn’t luck; perhaps it was that famous FitzOsborne charm.) Henry does seem very happy where she is, but I can’t help feeling anxious about her. She’s so young. Still, it’s a comfort to know Alice lives fairly close by, just in case there are any problems.

  I also sent a page to Simon with our news. We’ve had half a dozen letters from him now, but they are carefully addressed to both Veronica and me, and are utterly devoid of any real information or emotion. Of course, all his correspondence is censored, which must be a bit off-putting for him. As it is, his letters sometimes arrive with pieces cut out of them, where he’s slipped up and accidentally mentioned the name of a place or a colleague. I can only imagine the letters of other, less careful, servicemen – their poor families must receive something resembling paper doilies.

  After that, I wrote to Aunt Charlotte and Barnes. I think they both miss Henry quite a lot – she has become a sort of substitute for Toby in their eyes – so it really was unselfish and generous of Aunt Charlotte to sign the permission forms. I feel doubly obliged now to send them cheerful missives as often as possible.

  I wrote another note to Toby, too – just saying that I was thinking of him and hoped he was all right. I don’t ever send the notes, of course. I don’t even keep them. But I find the act of writing them strangely comforting.

  21st August, 1943

  JACK KENNEDY IS A HERO! His boat was sunk by a Japanese destroyer somewhere in the South Pacific, but he rescued most of his men from the burning wreckage. Then he swam for hours, clutching one injured mate and encouraging the others, until they all managed to reach a tiny islan
d. They were stranded there for days without any supplies, but finally some natives turned up and agreed to fetch help, and the men were rescued.

  What an ordeal! Especially as Jack is really not very strong – he has a bad back and is constantly falling ill. Actually, I’m surprised he passed the medical to get into the navy, but I expect his father pulled strings. Poor Kick was worried half to death by the newspaper headlines, until she had a letter from Jack himself, who sounded the same as ever. He has refused to take any leave, and has gone straight back on patrol.

  At least all of this has (temporarily) distracted Kick from the drama of her love life. Billy has turned very serious now that the Allied invasion of France appears imminent, and the two of them are discussing marriage. Of course, it is utterly impossible. His father loathes Roman Catholics and besides, Billy will be the next Duke of Devonshire. How could Billy, the future head of one of the leading Protestant families in England, possibly wed an Irish-American Catholic girl – particularly one who insists on bringing up their children as Catholic? Veronica tried to explain some of the historical and political context to Kick, but I don’t think she took much in. She was too busy worrying about eternal hellfire. She consulted some priest and he assured her that she’d be ‘living in sin’ if she married a Protestant, and that she and all her Protestant children would proceed directly to Hell when they died.

  After Kick left, Veronica shook her head. ‘If that’s what going to school and college does to one’s brain,’ she said, ‘then I’m glad I’m uneducated. How can such an intelligent girl take those superstitions seriously?’

  ‘It isn’t only Kick,’ I said. ‘Millions of people believe it.’

  ‘Millions of people used to believe the world was flat. That doesn’t make it true. And even if something did create the universe, I very much doubt that that Creator would care, millions of years later, about one particular human being deciding to mate with another, let alone about who gets to splash some water on their infant offspring.’

  I cannot argue with this logic, but the fact is, people often behave illogically. Personally, I think Kick’s more concerned about her family’s reaction than God’s, especially as Joe’s planning to go into politics after the war, and she doesn’t want to do anything that might damage her brother’s appeal to Catholic voters. But honestly, what did her parents imagine they were doing, bringing a girl as lively and charming as Kick over here for the Season, buying her lots of beautiful ball gowns and introducing her to dozens of eligible British lords? What other result could they have expected?

  Oh, well, it will all get sorted out in the end, one way or another, but what a mess, and poor Billy and Kick, being made to feel miserable about falling in love! Aren’t there enough other things in the world right now to make us feel miserable?

  It really is a relief to turn to the uncomplicated good cheer of Henry’s latest letter.

  Our boat’s crew got inspected this week, she wrote, by a very old Lord Someone. I led the parade, because I’m the tallest and loudest and the best at drills. I gave such a good salute that he stopped in front of me, so I smiled at him, and he said, ‘Young lady, I hope you won’t smile like that if you encounter the enemy, ha ha,’ and I said, ‘No, sir! If I see any foul Nazis, I will glare at them like THIS,’ and he said, ‘Good God!’ and stepped back and his monocle fell out. Afterwards, our Petty Officer Wren said could I please be a little less egzuberant and I said yes, of course, I would try my best to do that, even tho I’m not completely sure what it is, so how can I be less of it?

  Oh! Rita just reminded me! Thank you so much for the biskits you sent, they arrived a bit crushed but everyone loved them! Also, Aunt C and Barnes just sent me an ENORMOUS bag of toffees that must have used up all their sweets ration for about two months! I am hardly ever hungry here as the helpings at meals are huge, even if the food is a bit boring for vegetarians. But when we have days off, we go into town and have fish and chips, which is my favrite food in the world!

  Really, everything is perfect here – the weather, the other girls, the work. Best of all is when a ship comes into the harbour after being at sea for ages, and we take out their letters and parcels, and all the men line the decks and cheer like mad when they see us coming! On the way back yesterday, the sun was making the waves all silver and sparkling, and the breeze was blowing in our faces, and I said to Rita, ‘Aren’t we LUCKY to be doing this job?’ and she agreed. Then she said the only other thing to make it perfect would be if Douglas Fairbanks Jr was visiting the ship and we got to bring him ashore. It might happen, too, because he’s in the US Navy. For me, the thing to make it perfect would be if Carlos could come out on the motor launch with us one day. It is very warm now and hardly ever rough – he could easily stand on the prow, or lie down if his legs got tired. I bet he misses the sea. I didn’t realise how much I missed it till I got here. Everything smells so lovely, of salt and tar and wet rope, and at night, I can hear the sloshing sound of the sea and the docks creaking. It’s almost like being at home at Montmaray. Of course, the most important thing about being here is helping defeat the Nazis, but I’m so forchunate I get to do vital war work AND have a really brilliant time sailing about the harbour!

  Better go, it’s nearly lights out. Just like boarding school, except here it’s far more useful and fun AND I get to wear trowsers every day!!!

  Lots of love,

  Henry

  25th September, 1943

  THE LEAVES ARE TURNING BRONZE and copper, the afternoons are shorter, I’ve tossed another blanket on my bed – and yet, somehow, it feels like Spring. It’s the news from Italy that is making me more hopeful, I think. Mussolini has been overthrown, and the Allies are now fighting their way up through Italy – against the Germans, because the Italians have surrendered. Could the end of the war actually be in sight?

  Veronica says the battles are not going nearly as smoothly as the newspapers suggest, but surely it can only be a matter of time before the Germans are forced into retreat? Why would they keep on fighting to defend Italy, when the new Italian Prime Minister has just signed an armistice with us and . . . Oh, the telephone’s ringing.

  Good, Veronica’s getting it. Sounds as though it’s Aunt Charlotte. But why would she be telephoning at this hour of the –

  27th September, 1943

  POST OFFICE TELEGRAM

  TO: HRH PRINCESS CHARLOTTE MILFORD PARK MILFORD DORSET

  DEEPLY REGRET TO REPORT DEATH OF YOUR NIECE HENRIETTA C FITZOSBORNE BOATS CREW WREN ON WAR SERVICE LETTER FOLLOWS.

  2nd October, 1943

  IF FUNERALS ARE SUPPOSED TO comfort the living, why do I feel so much worse now it’s over? Is it because it wasn’t a proper funeral, only a memorial service? That there was no coffin, no procession through the churchyard, no grave? But this, to me, has been the only consolation – that they didn’t manage to recover her body. That Henry slipped free, as unconstrained in death as she ever was in life, that she drifted to the bottom of the ocean and is even now making her slow way home, to Montmaray. I picture George and Isabella and all those other Montmaravians buried at sea, waiting to welcome her . . .

  But no, it’s impossible to believe she’s gone, especially here at Milford. Everything shouts of her presence. Her bedroom in the attic, which she never did tidy up properly before she left to join the Wrens. The tangle of unironed shirts shoved into a drawer, the fishing rod propped against the wall, the row of tattered Biggles books slanting along the window ledge. In the kitchen, there’s a vegetarian cookbook on the shelf beside the stove, and a black ring on the scrubbed pine table where she once set down a sizzling frying pan. Her wellingtons are lined up beside the back door. The henhouse gate is tied shut with one of her hair ribbons.

  Then there’s Carlos, curled up in his armchair upon the remnants of her old tartan dressing gown. He insisted on coming to the funeral with us – he always accompanied Henry to church services, and he knew where we were going because Barnes had put on her Sunday hat. T
he church was packed, but the woman standing in Carlos’s usual spot by the side door obligingly shifted further along the wall to make room for him. Just about everyone from the village and the surrounding farms was present – even the evacuee children staying at the vicarage, who told me that Henry used to take them for pony rides. There were Wrens in navy blue, Jimmy Smith in sapper’s khaki, three prefects from Henry’s last school in their maroon blazers, Aunt Charlotte’s stable girls in Land Army breeches, and the entire Milford Home Guard in full uniform, standing to attention in two lines at the back of the church. Mrs Jones from the vicarage and Jocko’s mother had brought in armfuls of beautiful autumn foliage to fill the vases, and the Reverend Webster Herbert delivered a lovely eulogy. But I couldn’t help imagining Henry fidgeting beside me, growing bored with all the talk, staring out the window in the direction of the river and wondering whether the fish were biting, rooting through her pockets to see if she’d brought any fishing line and wishing there was some Communion bread about that she could pinch for bait. I could almost hear Aunt Charlotte hissing admonishments at her along the pew . . . but there my imaginings died, because in reality, Aunt Charlotte was hunched and silent, aged twenty years in a week. She had managed, with considerable effort, to transform Henry into her beloved Tobias, and now both of them had been taken from her. It was an indication of how shattered our aunt was that she hadn’t even noticed Daniel, who sat with his arm round Veronica’s shoulders. Veronica herself had been a pillar of strength for days – making all of the arrangements, even telephoning my office to arrange my leave – but midway through the service, I watched her start to crumble. There was nothing I could do to help her, though. There was nothing I could do about any of it.