Life after life

November 1940

PAMELA HAD SENT a parcel of baby clothes that Gerald had grown out of, and Ursula thought of Mrs Appleyard. She might not have thought of Mrs Appleyard as she hadn’t kept up with the residents of Argyll Road since she left for Egerton Gardens, something she had rather regretted as she had been fond of the Misses Nesbit and often wondered how they were faring under the relentless bombardment. But then she had had a chance encounter with Renee Miller a few weeks ago.

Ursula had been ‘on the town’, as he put it, with Jimmy, who had a couple of days’ furlough in the capital. They had been stranded in the Charing Cross Hotel thanks to a UXB – sometimes she thought unexploded bombs were more of a nuisance than exploded ones – and had taken refuge in the first-floor coffee lounge.

‘There’s a rather tarty girl, all lipstick and teeth, over there who seems to know you,’ Jimmy said.

‘Ye gods, Renee Miller,’ Ursula said when she spotted Renee waving eagerly at her. ‘And who on earth is that man with her? He looks like a gangster.’

Renee was effusive, as though she had been best pals with Ursula in some former life (‘She’s a lively girl,’ Jimmy laughed after they’d escaped), and insisted that they join her and ‘Nicky’ for a drink. Nicky himself seemed less than enthusiastic about the idea but nonetheless shook hands and signalled to the waiter.

Renee filled Ursula in on ‘the doings’ in Argyll Road, although little seemed to have changed since she left a year ago for Egerton Gardens, except that the army now had Mr Appleyard and his wife had a baby. ‘A boy,’ Renee said. ‘Ugly little thing.’ Jimmy guffawed and said, ‘I like a girl who knows when a spade’s a spade.’ Nicky was rather put out by Jimmy’s personable presence, especially as by the time she had downed another watery gin Renee had begun to flirt (almost professionally it seemed) with him.

Ursula overheard someone say that the unexploded bomb had been dealt with and when Renee said, ‘Get us another round in, Nicky,’ and Nicky began to glower Ursula thought it might be politic to move on. Nicky refused to let them pay, as if it were a matter of principle. Ursula wasn’t sure she wanted to be beholden to someone of his calibre. Renee hugged and kissed her and said, ‘Come and see the old dears, they’d love it,’ and Ursula promised that she would.

‘Good God, I thought she was going to eat me,’ Jimmy said as they manoeuvred around rubble on Henrietta Street.

She made good on her promise to Renee, prompted by the parcel of Gerald’s old clothes. She reached Argyll Road not long after six, getting away from work early for once. She had not, after all, donned a uniform of any kind yet, as there seemed hardly enough time to eat and breathe between work and the bombs. ‘Your job is war work,’ Crighton pointed out, ‘I would have thought that you would have enough on your plate. How is the Ministry of Some Obscurity these days?’

‘Oh, you know. Busy.’ There was so much information to be logged. Each individual incident – what type of bomb, the damage done, how many killed or injured (the tally was mounting horribly) – streamed across their desks.

Occasionally, she would open a buff folder and find what she thought of as the ‘raw material’ – ARP typed reports or even the handwritten reports they were based on – and wonder what it was like to be in the heat of battle, for that’s what the Blitz was, wasn’t it? Sometimes she saw bomb-damage maps, once one that had been drawn by Ralph. He had signed it in faint, almost indecipherable pencil on the back. They were friends, she had met him at her German class, although he had made it clear that he would like them to mean more to each other. ‘Your other man,’ Crighton called him, amused.

‘How kind,’ Mrs Appleyard said when Ursula appeared on her doorstep with the parcel of clothes. ‘Please come in.’

Ursula crossed the threshold reluctantly. The previous smell of boiled cabbage now mingled with the more unappetizing smells that could accompany an infant. Sadly, Renee’s judgement on Mrs Appleyard’s baby’s pulchritude, or lack of it, turned out to be true – he was an ‘ugly little thing’.

‘Emil,’ Mrs Appleyard said, handing him over to Ursula to hold. She could feel the dampness of him through his rubber knickers. She almost handed him straight back. ‘Emil?’ she said to him, making a face and grinning at him with forced jollity. He stared back at her, rather truculently, his paternity not in doubt.

Mrs Appleyard offered tea and Ursula excused herself and scurried up the stairs to the Nesbits’ eyrie.

They were their usual benign selves. It must be quite nice to live with one’s sister, Ursula thought. She wouldn’t mind living out her days with Pamela.

Ruth grasped one of her fingers with her own twig-like ones. ‘You’re married! How wonderful.’ Oh darn, Ursula thought, she had forgotten to take off the wedding ring. She demurred, ‘Well …’ and then, seeing the complexity, finally, modestly, ‘Yes, I suppose so.’ They both offered triumphant congratulations, as if she had achieved something spectacular.

‘What a shame you have no engagement ring,’ Lavinia said.

Ursula had forgotten their penchant for costume jewellery and wished she had brought them something. She had a little box of old diamanté buckles and clips that Izzie had given her that she knew they would have appreciated.

Lavinia was wearing an enamel brooch shaped like a black cat. A little rhinestone winked for an eye. Ruth sported a weighty carbuncle of topaz pinned to her sparrow chest. It looked like it might topple her insubstantial frame.

‘We’re like magpies,’ Ruth laughed. ‘We love all the shiny little things.’

They had the kettle on and were happily fussing over what to feed her – toast with Marmite or toast with jam – when the siren began its infernal warble. Ursula looked out of the window. No sign of any raiders yet although a searchlight was already sweeping the black sky. A beautiful new moon had stamped a crescent of light out of the blackness.

‘Come along, dear, down to the Millers’ cellar,’ Lavinia said, surprisingly chipper. ‘Every night an adventure,’ Ruth added, as they gathered up a great amount of stuff – shawls and cups, books and darning. ‘Torch, torch, don’t forget the torch!’ Lavinia said gaily.

As they reached the ground floor a bomb thudded down a couple of streets away. ‘Oh, no!’ Lavinia said. ‘I forgot my knitting.’

‘We’ll go back, dear,’ Ruth said and Ursula said, ‘No, you must take shelter.’

‘I’m knitting leggings for Mrs Appleyard’s baby,’ Lavinia said, as if that were a good enough reason to risk her life.

‘Don’t worry about us, dear,’ Ruth said, ‘we’ll be back before you know we’ve gone.’

‘For heaven’s sake, if you must have it then I’ll go,’ Ursula said but they were already creaking their old bones up the stairs and Mr Miller was bustling her down to the cellar.

‘Renee, Dolly, everyone – look who’s come to join her old pals!’ he announced to the occupants as if Ursula were a music hall turn.

She had forgotten how many Millers there were, and how starchy Miss Hartnell could be and how downright odd Mr Bentley was. And as for Renee, she seemed to have quite forgotten the ardour of their previous encounter, saying only, ‘Oh, lawd, another body using up the air in this hellhole.’ Renee was – reluctantly – dandling a fractious Emil. She was right, it was a hellhole. In Egerton Gardens they had a rather salubrious basement that they retired to, although Ursula (and Crighton too if he was there) often took her chances and stayed in her own bed.

Ursula remembered the wedding ring and thought how confused Hugh and Sylvie would be if they saw it on her body if she were to die in a raid. Would Crighton come to her funeral and explain? She was prevented from slipping it off by Renee suddenly thrusting Emil into her arms just before a massive explosion rocked the building.

‘Crikey, old Fritz is really trying to put the wind up us tonight,’ Mr Miller said cheerfully.

Her name was Susie, apparently. She had no idea, she really couldn’t remember anything. A man kept calling her out of the darkness. ‘Come on, Susie, don’t go to sleep now,’ and ‘How about we have a nice cuppa when we get out of here, eh, Susie?’ She was choking on ash and dust. She sensed something inside her was torn beyond repair. Cracked. She was a golden bowl. ‘Quite Jamesian, really,’ she heard Teddy say. (Had he said that?) She was a great tree (how odd). She was very cold. The man was holding her hand, squeezing it, ‘Come on, Susie, stay awake now.’ But she couldn’t, the soft dark was beckoning to her with the promise of sleep, endless sleep, and the snow began to fall gently until she was entirely shrouded and everything was dark.