All Things Undying

TWENTY-TWO

‘There were a lot of Americans stationed in the area and we were often invited to the dances at their camps… They would send a lorry for us and would bring us back. When it was time to leave the camp the lorry was stopped at the gate and the military guards would shine their torches and ask if there were any GI’s on board and everybody chorused “no” and when we were out of the gates the GI’s would come out from under the seats.’Pat Kemp, Ministry of Food: Women’s Land Army: Index to Service Records of the Second World War 1939-1948, Series: MAF421, National Archives, Kew, Richmond, Surrey

I arranged to meet Audrey Wills at the Singing Kettle Tea Shoppe in Smith Street, just around the corner from St Saviour’s. She was already there when I arrived, chatting with one of the owners – Darren, or it could have been Brian – at the foot of a narrow wooden staircase that led up to the first floor.

I recognized her at once from Lilith’s description. Tall, impossibly thin, with cropped hair the color of tar – a color that would have been startling on a woman half her age – sticking out in spikes like an electrified hedgehog.

I introduced myself to Audrey and to Darren, who showed us to a small round table near the window, covered with a scrupulously clean white tablecloth. After studying the menu, and consulting with Audrey, I ordered the cream tea for us both.

‘Thanks so much for seeing me, Mrs Wills,’ I said, after Darren left with our order. ‘Since my visit here, I’ve become very interested in the evacuation of the South Hams during the Second World War. Lilith Price told me that you were one of the Land Army girls stationed here. I was hoping you could tell me what it was like.’

Audrey laced her fingers together and rested her hands on the table. ‘The Land Army, yes. It turned out to be a life-changing experience for me, but I really wanted to join the WAAF.’ She winked. ‘My father wouldn’t let me.’

‘The WAAF?’

‘The Women’s Auxiliary Air Force. It’s part of the RAF now. Back in 1943, to a young girl barely seventeen, it sounded like the most exciting thing in the world. Some of the WAAFs worked on codes and ciphers, which I thought would be much more interesting than slaving away as a seamstress in a sweatshop like my mother.’

Brian brought our tea – Earl Grey – along with warm, homemade scones served up on a crystal cake stand decorated with whole strawberries, segments of clementine, and slices of kiwi. Pots of proper Devonshire clotted cream, lightly crusted with yellow, and strawberry jam were delivered on a separate plate.

Brian set a silver egg timer on the table in front of me. ‘When that’s done, your tea will be perfectly brewed.’ He waggled a finger. ‘And not one second before!’

While we waited for the sands of time to tell us that the tea was ready, Audrey continued with her story. ‘For some reason, Father didn’t object to my joining the Women’s Land Army, so I went off to be interviewed.’ Audrey picked a strawberry off the plate and ate it in three tiny bites. ‘They quizzed me on my experience, of course, and I had to admit to the woman who interviewed me that the only thing I knew about country life was what I’d read in books, but that it had always appealed to me. So she asked me what books I had read, and I had to invent something on the spot. “Friendly Animals of Forest and Fen”, I told her.’ Audrey giggled like the schoolgirl she had been at the time. ‘She had to know I was green as grass, Hannah, but in spite of that, I was accepted and they dispatched me off to Herefordshire for training.’

‘Tea’s ready,’ I said, with an eye on the egg timer. ‘Shall I pour?’

She nodded.

‘Black or white?’

‘White, with,’ she said.

I passed the milk and the sugar bowl.

‘I didn’t get on with the first farmer I was assigned to,’ Audrey told me. Using the tongs, she dropped a lump of sugar into her tea, then stirred it vigorously. ‘There was never enough food for one thing, and I had to sleep in an unheated loft.’ She shivered. ‘I’ve never been so cold in all my life.’

She wrapped her hands around her cup and took a long sip of tea, as if even the memory of the cold needed warming. ‘But the last straw came when I was asked to hold the piglets while he castrated them. That was no job for a woman, and he knew it. I can hear them squealing to this very day! So I hopped on my bicycle and cycled away!

‘The Women’s Land Army was very cross with me, of course, but I already knew how to hoe, dig ditches and milk cows, so they forgave me and transferred me to Devon. I was bivouacked in a hostel in Strete, but I worked primarily on Three Trees Farm, along with three other girls.’ As she spoke, her eyes lit up. ‘I loved the work, the fresh air, the sunshine. And even digging potatoes was fun when there were others to share the task.’

‘What can you tell me about the girls you worked with, Audrey?’

‘As I said, we were billeted in Strete, in a hostel with ten other girls.’ She chuckled. ‘With all the American soldiers in the area, we were having the time of our lives. Dances every weekend. Big band music, jitterbug and jive. We taught the Yanks how to do the Lambeth Walk and the Paul Jones, which they must have found hysterical. And, oh, how we used to put it over on our supervisor!’ She leaned forward and whispered, ‘There was a curfew, you know.’

Audrey reached down and retrieved her handbag from the floor. She pulled out a small packet of black and white photographs, held together by a rubber band. ‘I’ve brought photos along, if you’re interested.’

‘I love looking at other people’s pictures.’

Audrey removed the rubber band from the pack, cleared a small space on the tablecloth between us and laid down the first photo. It showed four girls standing in front of a tractor, arms thrown around each other’s shoulders. Each girl’s right leg was extended, as if they were executing a dance routine.

‘We wore uniforms, as you can see,’ she said, pointing to each item as she named it. ‘Olive green gabardine breeches, a cream-colored shirt, green pullover, a tie.’ She tapped one of the ties, which was askew as its owner leaned against her companions. ‘If you look closely, you can see the Women’s Land Army insignia on the tie.’

In a second photo, it was winter, and the same group of four smiling girls stood in a village square wearing heavy double-breasted overcoats, beige knee socks and sensible brown shoes. Two of the girls wore soft felt hats at jaunty angles, strings tied in loose bows just under their left ears.

A third photo showed one girl riding a tractor pulling a reaper, while another stood just behind holding a pitchfork. In the far background, a farmer looked on. ‘The girl on the tractor is me,’ Audrey said with a slight smile. ‘The supervisor was none too pleased when I cut the legs off my dungarees so I could get a good tan.’

I bent over the table to study the photo more carefully. ‘Is that Mr Bailey Senior in the background?’

‘Stephen’s father? Yes. He was a handsome man in his day. Stephen favors him, I think.’

I had to agree. The abundant hair, high cheekbones, ruddy complexion, and laughing eyes that seemed to say: Life is good in the country.

I slid the photos around on the tablecloth, until the country chorus line was again uppermost. ‘The girl on the left is you, I can see that now. Who are the others?’

Audrey smiled wistfully. ‘That’s me, as you said, then Flo, Vi, and Mary.’

‘I know you married Mr Wills, but what happened to the other girls after the South Hams were evacuated?’

‘Mary got transferred to a farm in Exeter, and Flo went home to Birmingham. I don’t know what happened to Vi. I’ve managed to keep up with Mary and Flo over the years, though.’

‘More tea?’ I wanted to keep Audrey talking, and her cup was empty.

Audrey scooted her cup in my direction and I topped it up. ‘We had a reunion of Land Girls in Totnes in April of 2005,’ she continued, testing the temperature of the tea with a cautious sip. ‘The mayor was there, and they had a cake. It was good to see Mary and Flo again, but like me, they’d lost track of Vi. We always figured that she married her Yank, and went home with him to America after the war.’

Audrey leaned back in her chair. ‘The British boys were jealous of the Yanks’ success with local girls. They found it hard to compete with the luxuries the American boys could offer, like cigarettes, silk stockings and chocolate.’

‘What can you tell me about the Yank?’

‘A couple of months before they announced the evacuation – that would have been August, or early September of 1943 – Vi met him at a dance in Totnes. Oh, he was a handsome devil!’ She closed her eyes for a moment, as if trying to picture the young man more clearly. ‘Tall and lanky. Curly hair the color of wheat. A US Navy pilot, from somewhere in the north-east, as I recall. Is Connecticut in the north-east of America?’

I grinned. ‘The last time I looked at a map.’

‘Vi was crazy about Rocky.’

‘What was Rocky’s last name?’

Audrey shrugged. ‘Ever since you telephoned me, I’ve been trying to think of it. The American lads all seemed to go by nicknames: Tex, or Mac, or Buck. There were a lot of Texes.’ She chuckled. ‘We used to joke that half the American Army came from Texas.’

‘What if Vi didn’t end up marrying Rocky? What might she have done then? Gone back home to London?’

Audrey shook her head sadly. ‘I doubt it. Poor thing. Her whole family – mother, father, younger sister – they were wiped out during the Blitz. She had nobody but us.’ She crossed her fingers and held them up. ‘We were that close. Like sisters. That’s what makes it so hard to understand why Violet didn’t stay in touch.’

My heart started doing somersaults in my chest.

She’s showing me a flower.

Many women were named after flowers: Daisy, Iris, Lily, Pansy, Petunia… even Marigold. What if Susan Parker had gotten it wrong that night in Paignton? What if the flower she’d been thinking of had been a violet, and not a rose?

Ask her, Susan Parker seemed to be whispering in my ear. Ask her about the ring. ‘Did Rocky give Violet a ring?’

Audrey looked blank. ‘Could have done, I suppose, but if he did, she never wore it while we worked. We dug potatoes, mostly, so you’d lose a ring, wouldn’t you?’

‘Tell me something, then. You said the British boys didn’t get along very well with the Yanks. How did Stephen Bailey feel about the relationship between Violet and Rocky?’

‘Oh, well, you’ve put your finger on it there, Hannah. Vi might have been a little flirtatious, she might even have allowed Stephen the occasional cuddle, but it was always light-hearted, never serious. Not so for Stephen. He made it clear that he didn’t like it when she started stepping out with that American. But then the evacuation came, and just like that…’ She snapped her fingers. ‘The Land Girls were gone.’

‘And six months later, D-Day happened, and the Americans were gone, too.’

‘Yes. After all the hubbub leading up to the invasion, the land was eerily, almost spookily quiet. No people, no cattle, no birds signing. A few abandoned dogs and cats, that was all. Except for the rats.’ She shivered. ‘They were so hungry they were eating the putty out of the window glass because it had been mixed up with fish oil.’

I shivered, too. We’d had fruit rats in the Bahamas, and even though they wiggled their ears and twitched their whiskers like Disney mice, I didn’t like them one bit. ‘When did you get to return home, Audrey?’

‘Most of us were eager to go back, but we couldn’t because of all the unexploded bombs. Once the Americans returned the area, the Government brought in the mine sweepers, then the surveyors and the photographers came through to assess the damage so the government could pay compensation.’ She stared out the window for a moment, deep in thought. ‘The first viewing permits were issued in August, as I recall, but the residents didn’t actually start returning until October.’

‘Do you remember when the Baileys came back?’

‘Not until spring, I imagine. In any case, it would have been in time for the plowing and planting.’

During our conversation, I had been neglecting my scone. I slathered the second half with cream, topped it with a generous dollop of strawberry jam, and took a big bite, using the opportunity to think about what Audrey had told me.

Stephen Bailey had been sweet on a girl named Violet who spurned him for another man.

Violet had disappeared.

Susan Parker said to Stephen: She’s showing me a flower.

Now Susan was dead.

One crime to cover up another?

If so, what was I going to do about it?