Secrets of the Sewing Bee

The forelady hardly had time to nod her approval before Dolly was clattering down the factory steps to the privacy of the brick outhouse. In the yard, she gasped great gulps of fresh air into her lungs and tried to quell the palpitations beating wildly in her chest.

Once in the toilet, she laid a trembling hand over her sternum and breathed out slowly. Dolly stared hard at her reflection in the cracked mirror over the basin. A shaft of pale autumn sunshine broke in through a gaping crack in the brick wall, and myriad threads of dust swirled in the air. In the darkness of the shelters, everyone looked the same, but now in the unexpected prism of light, she saw herself as if for the first time. Pale, exhausted and growing steadily thinner as the flesh melted from her bones.

Eleven days and dark nights on from the dramatic night of the Savoy sit-in and the taking-over of the Tube, and Dolly found it impossible to remember ordinary life as she had once known it. Eighteen consecutive nights so far, death had droned overhead and no part of Bethnal Green had escaped, from the library to the power station and too many houses to count. Three nights ago, they had even had their first parachute mine, which had elegantly drifted down before blasting the Allen & Hanburys factory sky-high. When word of it had reached them the next day, everyone had but one chilling thought. Would Trout’s be next?

Many had left streets now pockmarked by rubble and ruins – ‘trekkers’, they were calling them – fleeing to the countryside. Dolly could hardly blame them, but the folk left behind were knitted from a strong moral fibre and were adapting and surviving, beating Hitler at his own game. The steady acclimatization to life under fire had already begun. The mass panic and riots in the street that some had predicted? Dolly had seen none of that, just a plucky resolve to sit it out and get the job done.

After their takeover of Bethnal Green Tube, the authorities had quickly sealed up the entrance once more, condemning them back to the church crypt, but all over London, the shelterers’ cat-and-mouse game with the authorities was dominating the news. Try as they might, the police and the transport authorities couldn’t keep Londoners from taking over the Tubes. Huge crowds were scrambling underground, and by nightfall, there wasn’t a spot to be found from Hampstead to Leicester Square. Dolly had felt a burning pride when she had read news of it, only matched by her anger that Bethnal Green Tube hadn’t yet been sanctioned for use. But she knew it was only a matter of time before they would be forced to open up their Underground station. The people had spoken. The government would be forced to listen and take action. She was sure of it.

In a funny sort of way, the urgent fight for sanctuary, combined with the bombs, was doing her a favour. Life had been thrown into such turmoil she had found it far easier to hide her condition from the rest of the girls. Although if that doctor was to believed, that would be increasingly hard to do now.

Dolly cast her mind back to that night in Bethnal Green Hospital, when she had bumped into Flossy, and shivered, despite the warmth of the late-September morning. It had all felt like a dream when she had left her appointment, turned the corner and stumbled into the young seamstress. How perilously close she had come to revealing her secret. Thank goodness they had been interrupted by that hospital porter, not that it mattered much: in the fullness of time, Flossy would know.

Dolly would no more be able to hide the painful truth than the government would be able to keep Londoners from getting underground. The outcome of both was inevitable. The fight for life and its preservation was the rawest, most fundamental of all human struggles.

Soon enough, everyone would know what she had been hiding and her secret. The letter had been written, sealed up and placed within the small package, hidden under her mattress for when the time was right. Then Flossy would have some of the answers to the questions that consumed her. Only the dreadful burning guilt that had haunted Dolly since that fateful day prevented her from revealing its contents now.

How Dolly prayed she had the fortitude to survive the truth, though judging by her transformation since the bombs began – from a shy young lady who had lived in the shadow of her clinical upbringing to a woman on the brink of finding out what she was really capable of – Dolly had no doubt she wouldn’t just survive but thrive. How she wished she would be around to see it.

At least Peggy and Lucky finally seemed to have seen sense. In between day shifts at the factory and nights spent delivering messages to the emergency services, the devoted odd-job man had spent as much time as he could by her bedside, reading her snippets of news from the paper or just sitting gazing at her as she slept.

Peggy and Flossy had both changed so much since their arrival at Trout’s just over four months ago, and something told Dolly that they would do just fine. But the Lord had other plans for her. She knew that now. The physician hadn’t minced his words. He had forbidden her from sleeping in cold, damp or draughty places, explaining how it would exacerbate her symptoms, but even as he had been saying the words, she could sense he saw the bald futility of his statement.

‘I can’t persuade you to leave the East End, Miss Doolaney, for the good of your health?’ he had asked.

‘Leave London? Not likely,’ she had exclaimed, before adding with a feeble attempt at humour, ‘I’ve got the East End written right through me like a stick of rock.’

The doctor had not returned her ready smile; instead, he had ordered her to stop working with immediate effect.

‘You know what they call people who can’t contribute to the war effort as well as I do, Doctor,’ Dolly had retorted. ‘I will never be called a useless mouth, and my mother relies on my wage. Besides, what difference would leaving London really make to my condition?’

He had peered at her sternly from over the top of his half-moon spectacles. ‘Miss Doolaney, may I be frank? You have a disease, not a condition, and we need to treat this with the gravity it deserves. At the very least, I urge you not to shelter at the Underground; the conditions are wretched from what I hear.

‘If I had a spare bed on the ward, I would admit you immediately for a minimum of three months’ bed rest and observation, but alas . . .’ He had thrown his hands up in a gesture of despair. ‘You are strong in mind if not in body, but I will insist you attend the London Chest Hospital regularly for tests.’

‘I’ll come in for the tests, but I won’t leave my friends and family. Where they go, I go,’ she had replied firmly, a fierce pride burning in her eyes. ‘Every day I’m alive is a gift. I won’t squander it by going into exile. Besides,’ she had added, with a forced smile, ‘what can’t be cured must be endured, ain’t that right, Doctor?’

‘So is a daily dose of aspirin and the small tidal wave of beef tea my mother insists I drink,’ Dolly had snapped. ‘It’s doing little to hold back the advance of my condition. Sorry, Doctor, disease.’

At her defiant words, the physician had shrugged, knowing when he was beaten, and in silence they had both stared down at the X-rays that sat between them like an unexploded bomb.

It was the build-up of fluid in her lung tissue, he had explained – that dark mass on the scan – that was making it so hard for her to breathe. He had rattled off more terms – oedema, malar flush . . . But Dolly had stopped listening. She didn’t require the medical terminology: her body was telling her everything she needed to know.

The weight loss she could mask by bulking up with extra layers and vests; the purplish flush on her cheeks could be blotted out with a thick layer of panstick, the bluish tinge to her lips disguised with a touch of her treasured Coty rouge lipstick. Thank God for warpaint! The terrible explosive coughing fits she had attributed to the powdered brick dust coating everything. The blood that seeped into her hanky afterwards could alas not be concealed with clever make-up and clothing. Until now, she had hidden her disease in the darkness of shadows. But a new day was chasing the shadows away. She was running out of places to hide.

Dolly turned on the taps and gasped slightly as the cold water spattered over her thin wrists like icy needles. When at last her pulse had slowed, she carefully pulled down the roller towel and dried her hands, before dabbing a little violet water behind each ear. With that, she smoothed down her pinafore and returned to her duties.

Up on the factory floor, it seemed to Flossy that since the bombings had begun, the women were singing louder than ever before, or maybe it was because Music While You Work was now pumped out through a tannoy system, which Archie had had Lucky install to drown out the thump of bombs, to the general approval of all the women. Before the bombs, they had sung simply to keep up momentum; now, it felt as if they were singing for their very lives.

‘Ooh, lovely, my favourite,’ Daisy gushed, as Glenn Miller’s ‘Moonlight Serenade’ flooded through the garment factory. ‘Turn it up, won’t you?’

Soon, all the women on the line were swaying as one, as the silky melody drifted over the workbenches. To the exhausted workers, who weren’t clocking up more than a few hours of sleep each night, the music was as calming and soporific as being swaddled in a pure wool blanket.

Hands steadily fed strips of khaki material through Singers, but minds and hearts were elsewhere, hundreds of miles away, dreaming of loved ones wrenched from them by the war.

The romance of the music stirred Flossy deep inside. She knew she risked a telling-off, especially as Vera had eyes in the back of her head, but seeing as the forelady was in Archie’s office, she took a punt and removed her foot from the treadle. In a fit of spontaneity, she pulled Tommy’s letter out of her pocket and couldn’t resist reading it again. It had been waiting for her when she arrived home from work the previous evening. She had read it that many times in the shelter last night that the paper was already curling at the edges.

Judging by his words, Tommy hadn’t received her previous letter and their missives had crossed one another over the dark oceans. The fact that he hadn’t waited to hear from her before sending another filled her with joy. She mattered to him.

Dearest Flossy,

I know I haven’t received your response to my last letter, so please don’t think me too forward, but, well, I think the time for social niceties has passed. When I heard about the London bombings, my heart was filled with dread and I knew I had to write straight away.

The most terrible news has reached us about what you are all enduring. Please God you are reading this alive and well. I am praying for the same reassurances from my own family.

When I saw the pictures of the East End, my East End, burning, it filled me with rage but stiffened my resolve. I know this war we are fighting is just. The cause is the right one. And to think that you, a sweet factory girl on the Home Front, are now in as much danger as we are on a minesweeper makes me even more determined to get the job done. Germany may have started it, but we will damn well finish it. Until then, please, Flossy, write as soon as you can and put my mind at rest. The thought of you and your plight is as distracting to this lonely sailor as a siren’s call.

Your Tommy x

P.S. If I may be so bold, I would love a photograph of you if you could see your way to sending one, so that I may have a reminder of what I am fighting so hard to protect.

As Flossy came to the end of the letter, Glenn Miller’s tune faded out, jolting her from her reverie. Hastily, she stuffed the letter back in her pocket and resumed her machining just as the forelady emerged from Archie’s office.

‘Where’s Dolly?’ Vera tutted, checking her watch. ‘She can’t still be in the toilet surely? That’s long past four minutes.’

‘Dunno,’ sniffed Sal. ‘But I wish she’d get a wriggle on. I dunn’alf fancy a cuppa. I feel like I’ve run up a whole platoon’s worth of army overcoats!’

Ivy leaned over and whispered to Sal. The whisper was repeated round the room, up and down the banks of workbenches, like falling dominoes.

‘Hold the wheel,’ Daisy mouthed, as she frantically motioned to her sewing-machine wheel, which she gripped tightly in her hand. ‘And put your foot down on the treadle.’

‘But surely that will . . .’ Flossy’s words were drowned out by the rumble of thirty sewing machines groaning to a sudden halt. ‘. . . fuse the power.’

Pat shot the room a sly grin and pulled a cigarette out from under her turban, just as Dolly pushed her trolley in in a cloud of violet water.

‘Oh, here she is, thank Gawd. ’Bout time, Doll. I was starting to think you’d gone AWOL,’ said Sal. ‘My tongue’s hanging out.’

Flossy stared hard at Dolly from over the top of her Singer. The tea lady had freshly applied her make-up, but there was something different about her, like a silver spoon that had lost some of its lustre. Her banter was just the same, though.

‘All right, girls, don’t have a hairy canary – I’m coming,’ she said, blowing Sal a kiss. ‘Now I know how Polly must have felt, someone always nagging her to put the kettle on.’

‘I’m only pulling yer leg, Doll,’ Sal replied, blowing her an even bigger kiss back. ‘We wouldn’t swap you for all the tea in China, would we, girls?’

Flossy chuckled along with the rest of the girls as she rose to her feet and started to weave her way over to the tea trolley for a well-earned ten-minute break. Halfway across the floor, she became aware of Archie calling her name.

‘Flossy and Sal, a quick word in my office if you will,’ he called. The usually avuncular foreman was in a brisk mood as he stood waiting for them, tapping the door frame to his office impatiently.

It was funny how the wailing of the air-raid siren no longer filled her with dread, but the sound of her boss’s voice summoning her into his office could bring her out in a cold sweat.

‘Is this because the power got fused?’ said Flossy worriedly to Sal, as they walked to his office.

‘Nah,’ she replied. ‘Mr G wouldn’t get his knickers in a twist over that.’

Inside the office, the foreman took care to pull the blind down over the glass door before gently closing it behind him. He pulled a copy of the Sunday Express out from his drawer and slid it over the desk towards them.

Flossy felt her heart plunge to the soles of her feet, and even Sal seemed to shrink a little.

For there on the front page, in undeniable black and white, was a photograph of Sal and Flossy in the shelter of the Savoy with the other protestors. The photographer had got an uncanny close-up of them both, which gave the unfortunate impression that Sal was leading the protest. Flossy didn’t need to read the text to know what it would say.

‘One of me ARP pals gave it me last night, assumed I’d already seen it last week. What have you to say for yourselves?’ the foreman asked.

‘Oh, Mr Gladstone, I’m ever s-so sorry,’ Flossy stammered. ‘We didn’t mean to bring Trout’s into disrepute. Will you be informing Matron?’

Archie said nothing, just kept on staring at the blasted photograph. Flossy inwardly cursed. Why had she not looked away when the photographer pointed his camera at them?

Sal straightened up in her seat and defiantly flicked her tongue through the chip in her tooth.

‘I’m sorry too. Sorry that you had to learn about it this way, Mr G,’ she said. ‘I think the world of you – all the girls do, if you must know. But I’m not sorry I went along. It was me who talked Flossy into going, so you mustn’t lay any blame at her door. We weren’t some foaming-at-the-mouth mob – we was courteous – but I don’t regret standing up for what I believe in. I’d do it all over again tomorrow if I had to, but if you have to give me my marching orders, then so be it.’

Archie steepled his fingers together and stared long and hard at the girls. Mentally, Flossy was preparing herself for a return to her old job at the tiny tailor’s when finally he spoke.

‘Sack yer? Give over, you daft mare.’ His blue eyes twinkled mischievously, and the corners of his smile creased into dimples. ‘I’m proud of you both.’

‘Yeah, I am,’ he nodded, sitting back in his chair with a deep sigh and crossing his arms over his rotund belly. ‘You’ve got the guts to stand up for what you believe in. Takes me back to the battle of Cable Street, when we drove that fascist Mosley and his no-good blackshirts outta the East End.’

Archie was still pontificating over his past when Flossy leaped to her feet. She didn’t know what came over her – perhaps it was the relief of not being turned out of her job – but the next thing she knew, she had leaned over the desk and pressed a grateful kiss onto the foreman’s warm cheek.

‘Sit down, you dozy Dora,’ he ordered, but he was chuckling as he did so, his round little cheeks flushed as pink as plums. ‘I would never sack you for standing up for something you believe in. I like to think I’ve always had the guts to be counted, and I expect my girls to behave the same. Takes more than a bleedin’ Nazi to scare me.’

‘I say, Mr Gladstone,’ Vera’s voice rang out from the doorway, and she wore an expression that could curdle a milky drink. ‘Did you not hear me calling? Why on earth have you pulled down your blind?’

The factory foreman leaped to his feet like a man who had just sat down on a pin, while hastily shoving the newspaper under his desk. ‘Sorry, Vera,’ he blustered. ‘I didn’t hear you. I’m all ears.’

Flossy allowed herself a wry smile. Nazis might not scare her boss, but prickly East End foreladies certainly kept him on his toes all right.

‘If you’re not too busy in here, there’s an announcement on the wireless you all might be interested to hear,’ she remarked coolly.

Archie strode from his office, but as Flossy and Sal made to leave, the forelady stepped in front of them, barring their way.

‘By the way, girls, don’t think I don’t know where you were the night of Saturday the 14th,’ she added, her green eyes narrowing. ‘Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. I just hope you conducted yourselves in a way that brought no shame on Trout’s.’

Outside on the factory floor, every single worker, including Lucky, was gathered round the wireless, listening intently.

‘Quick, girls,’ said Daisy breathlessly, when she saw them. ‘Get your lugholes over here and listen to this.’

The wireless was tuned to the BBC Home Service, on which the newsreader was making a sombre announcement. His plummy voice sounded incongruous in the factory floor of Trout’s, as it echoed loudly through the new tannoy system: ‘Here is a special bulletin. The use of Tubes has now been officially recognized, according to a declaration to the press released today by the government. The Home Secretary has declared that although the Underground is primarily for transport, all Tube stations will now be fitted out for the occupation, and all facilities and refreshments will be provided to make them habitable for shelterers.’

The roar of approval was so loud a pigeon resting on the window ledge flapped off in alarm, and suddenly, Flossy also found herself hoisted into the air as Sal swept her off her feet and spun her round until her skirts flew up.

‘Sod yer knickers,’ Sal whooped. ‘We’re celebrating a victory. Victory for the working classes. We did it!’

Flossy’s head was still spinning when Sal planted her back down and ruffled her hair, but she shared in her friend’s deep joy at the news.

‘So does that mean they’ll be opening up Bethnal Green Tube now?’ asked Kathy.

‘Too bloody right it does, Kath,’ said Pat. ‘Not that we need a formal invite, anyway, thank you very much.’

‘Well, the government better pull their finger out and get to the job in hand and fast,’ said Dolly. ‘Jerry will be back tonight.’

‘I honestly don’t know why you want to shelter down the Tubes,’ sniffed the forelady, who, up until now, had remained silent. ‘It’ll be a breeding ground for germs and put even more pressure on the cleansing stations of Bethnal Green. How does the old rhyme go? I had a little bird. Its name was Enza. I opened the window. And in-flu-Enza. You mark my words, those tunnels will be riddled with disease in the time it takes to say “scabies”,’ Vera snapped, clicking her bony fingers together.

Daisy shook her head in exasperation. ‘Hark at Mrs Mona Lott. You don’t ’alf know how to rain on our parade.’

But not even the forelady’s dark mutterings could cast a dampener over the machinists of Trout’s, who, for the first time since the bombings began, had been thrown a lifeline.

‘Well, at least we’ll all sleep a bit easier in our shelters tonight, eh, girls. I reckon that calls for a nice cuppa to celebrate, don’cha you think?’ Dolly said with a relieved smile.

Abruptly, the wireless went dead, and each and every woman froze and looked to one another. A sickening silence cloaked the room, for they all knew what it meant when the wireless cut out.

‘Knew it. Jerry didn’t want to miss the party,’ Dolly quipped sarcastically. ‘Should have known really – it’s been a bit Blitzy today.’

‘I’m going to head up to the roof, Gov’nor,’ Lucky said to Archie. ‘See how close they are.’

The sirens regularly went off in the day, but experience had taught Flossy and the girls that the daytime alerts were mostly nuisance raids. It was the night-time bombers they need fear most.

‘Come on, girls. Let’s sit this one out in the stairwell, away from the windows, shall we?’ ordered Archie, flicking a look at his wristwatch. ‘Wish they’d hurry up. We got work to do.’

But as they walked towards the factory door, the machines started to rattle and the ceiling lights danced, as the noise of the planes quickly engulfed them.

‘Blimey!’ shouted Sal, over the noise. ‘Sounds like they’re right overhead.’

‘It’s Jerry all right. There’s a whole squadron of Dorniers and Heinkels nearly on us. Let’s get down the shelter sharpish.’

The noise rose to a deafening roar that seemed to swallow the factory whole and Flossy felt the floor vibrate under her feet.

‘No time,’ yelled Archie. ‘Quick, everyone, get under your workstation.’

The floor was a mass of confusion and noise as every machinist flung herself under the nearest workbench in a tangle of limbs.

Time seemed to freeze as Flossy frantically wove her way along the line of workbenches looking for a spare spot to shelter. The droning of the planes was deafening her, disorientating her.

The explosion was so loud it tore through the building. Flossy crashed to the concrete floor and felt the breath rush from her body. A second later, a pair of arms hooked under her armpits and hauled her under the nearest workstation.

Dolly threw her arm over Flossy just as a second almighty boom ricocheted around the factory. It sounded to Flossy as if a hundred roof tiles were raining down to earth, and a great cloud of choking grey smoke mushroomed through the factory.

The floor lay silent and still as the workers attempted to gather their wits. Slowly and steadily, Dolly clambered out from underneath her workbench. Coughing and brushing shards of glass from the blown-out windows off her pinafore, Flossy followed. Soon, all the workers were crawling out from their hiding places, their faces coated in a thick layer of dust.

Trout’s hadn’t taken a direct hit, but from the looks of it, a factory two doors down had. Flossy peered out of the shattered windows and saw that a canning works was now nothing but a smoking hole. The reverberations from the blast had caused a chimney pot on the roof of Trout’s to topple, smashing clean through the ceiling and onto Flossy’s workstation. She stared in dismay at the crumpled remains of her Singer sewing machine, now covered in masonry, and her wooden stool, smashed to smithereens.

‘Blimey, Floss. Ten minutes earlier and it would have been curtains for you,’ remarked Ivy. ‘Goodnight, Vienna, an’ all . . . You must have a fairy godmother looking out for you.’

‘No. Just Dolly,’ she replied, looking over to where a shaken Dolly was standing.

Pat hauled herself out from under her workbench. ‘I always said these were bloody good tables,’ she muttered grimly. ‘I thought me last hour had come. Cor, don’t we all look a sight?’

It might have been hysteria, or simply the relief of being alive, but Flossy started to laugh, and soon, all the women were laughing along too, shakily lighting cigarettes or retying their turbans.

In no time at all, Archie and Lucky had cleared Flossy’s workstation and the rest of the girls had rallied round to sweep up the worst of the mess from the factory floor. Flossy’s machine was beyond repair, but on Archie’s say-so, Lucky moved Lily’s sewing machine onto Flossy’s workstation. Flossy didn’t know how she felt about using Lily’s old Singer, but this wasn’t the time for sentiment: uniform deadlines still had to be met.

Lucky managed to shore up the damage in the roof and haul a giant piece of tarpaulin over it to protect them from the elements.

‘All right, girls, I think we’ve done everything we can here,’ Archie announced, dusting down his hands. ‘I suggest you take an early dinner break. Everyone clean yourselves up, and it’s back here at two p.m. prompt and business as usual.’

‘What a morning,’ said Dolly, pausing with her broom to wipe back a tendril of hair that had escaped from her turban. ‘I think I may use the longer dinner break to go up to the hospital and visit Peggy. I want to tell her about the Tubes.’

‘Mind if I tag along?’ piped up Lucky, who had been listening in. ‘I found a bit of parachute silk and I’ve had Ivy run it up into a nice housecoat for Peggy. Thought it might make her feel a bit better while she’s stuck in hospital.’

‘Be our guest,’ replied Flossy, impressed at his thoughtfulness. ‘I’m sure she’ll be thrilled.’

‘What do you mean, there’s nothing more you can do? Surely there must be something?’ she demanded.

The doctor looked at her sympathetically. ‘I wish there were, Miss Piper. Your kneecap was severely shattered in the blast and it is simply too early to tell how permanent and long-lasting the damage is. You will need to wear a plaster cast for the next six to seven weeks and then we can begin physiotherapy. I should warn you, though, it is possible that your right leg will never fully recover and you may need to use a stick. Time will tell . . .’

A weary smile flickered over his face. ‘On the positive side, your left leg should make a complete recovery once the swelling and bruising subside. It would appear the right leg bore the brunt of the impact.’

He shook his head gravely. ‘I wish I could, Miss Piper, but there is a war on and this bed is needed for incoming casualties. The nurse will be round in a moment to change your dressing and supply you with crutches and the necessary discharge papers.’

He paused and consulted his folder. ‘You’re a machinist at a garment factory in Bethnal Green, sewing army and navy uniforms. Is that correct?’

‘Good,’ he said approvingly. ‘I see no reason why you can’t return to your duties with immediate effect. I will write to your foreman and suggest you be placed on hand-sewing. You won’t be able to operate a treadle, of course, but needlework is the perfect thing to build up the strength in your right hand.’

‘Now you are out of apparent danger, you need to return to and embrace civilian life, and – dare I say it? – be grateful you still have a life. You are one of the lucky ones.’

Peggy stared forlornly at the crisp white bed sheet and watched helplessly as hot tears slid down her cheeks and dripped onto the starched linen. She knew it was selfish to admit, but she didn’t feel like one of the lucky ones. Seventeen days she had been lying here in this hospital bed, hoping and praying that the damage to her right leg was repairable, but the doctor hadn’t minced his words. The force of the impact had been too severe and she might well be permanently lame, only able to walk with a stick.

She knew the doctor was right, of course – she was lucky to be alive – but it was a blow all the same. Her right leg felt next to useless, her hand weakened and wasted from burns, and the deep laceration on one cheek would leave a scar. For a former nippy who prided herself on her immaculate appearance and slim little figure, someone who could zip from table to table, it was a cruel blow. She would look old before her time, hobbling around on crutches. Lucky’s lovely face flashed her into mind. He would never want her now, surely? The thought caused a deluge of fresh tears to flood her cheeks.

‘Peggy, you won’t believe the day we’ve had,’ gushed an excited voice, jolting her from her misery. ‘The government’s only done a U-turn and opened up the Tubes, and the factory’s copped it, a great big hole in the roof. No one was hurt, but— Oh, you’re crying, Peggy. Whatever’s the matter?’ The voice trailed off.

Peggy looked up and through the mist of tears saw Lucky, Flossy and Dolly standing by her bedside, their faces masks of concern.

‘It’s my wretched leg,’ she sobbed despairingly. ‘The doctor has just told me I might be permanently lame, which means I’ll never get my old job back now, to say nothing of how frightful and ugly I look. Look at this scar on my face – just look at it.’

‘Oh, Peggy,’ said Flossy, patting her arm soothingly. ‘I’m sure the doctor’s got it wrong. You just need time, that’s all.’

‘Flossy’s right,’ said Dolly. ‘That scar will fade in time, and you can work on your legs.’

Lucky seemed to be thinking very hard, before abruptly putting the parcel down on her bedside and pulling back the covers.

Peggy’s eyes snapped open. ‘Are you quite mad? Did you not just hear what I said about my leg, Lucky? I . . . I can’t.’

‘Can’t, or won’t?’ he challenged. ‘Look here, you’ve had a knock to your confidence, I get that, but that’s all it is, Peggy, a knock, a temporary setback. You have to face your fears before they take hold.’

‘So?’ he shrugged. ‘I’ve managed to cope all these years with my hand. It’s never held me back, and look at me now – I’m helping to save lives night after night.’

‘He’s right,’ said Flossy. ‘I’ve found a strength I never thought I had. You’ll do the same.’

‘I’m right here by your side,’ Lucky said in a voice husky with emotion. ‘And, well, I’ve been waiting a long time to say this. I know I oughtn’t to, but hang it all. I love you, Peggy Piper. I have done from the moment I set eyes on you, and now, well, I love you even more. I don’t give a fig what you look like. You have never looked more beautiful to me than you do now.’

‘Never more sure of anything in my whole life, and when your father returns, I’d like to ask for your hand in marriage,’ he said.

Peggy’s hand flew to her mouth, and just like that, the pain and fear of the past four months melted away.

‘I’m not getting down on bended knee just yet,’ Lucky grinned. ‘I’ll do that just as soon I have respectfully asked for your father’s blessing. But in the meantime, I’ll settle for a kiss.’

Peggy glanced over to where Dolly and Flossy stood watching, smiling through their tears.

‘Go on, then, gal,’ beamed Dolly, half crying, half laughing as she pulled out her hanky. ‘What you waiting for?’

Without saying a word, Peggy held out her hand, and as tenderly as if he was picking up a newborn infant, Lucky scooped her into his arms and gently eased her to her feet.

Peggy felt herself stagger a little, but Lucky wrapped both arms firmly round her waist, anchoring her to the ground, until she felt a little safer.

He drew her body closer. Their eyes met. The time for words was over. Peggy tilted up her chin, closed her eyes and felt the softest of kisses brush over her lips. This kiss had been a long time coming and she savoured every delicious moment. When at last his lips left hers, she laid her head on his solid chest. She was grateful for Lucky’s love, but also for his refusal to accept her father was dead. Thank goodness he had stuck with her. She had been too blind to see him for the man he really was, but now she had been granted a second chance.

She felt Lucky’s breath, warm and tingling, in her hair. ‘I’ll take you dancing once this war is over,’ he whispered. ‘We’ll be the envy of one and all, you’ll see.’

And there they remained, wrapped in each other’s love and acceptance in the basement of a bomb-shattered hospital, oblivious to everyone but each other.

Flossy knew they ought to leave, but there was something so spine-tinglingly romantic about the sight of Peggy enveloped in Lucky’s strong arms that she and Dolly couldn’t resist sneaking a last peek at the couple before they left the ward. To watch love blossom from the ashes of despair was a rare and precious sight.

‘Gladdens your heart, don’t it? Most East End men hide their love,’ Dolly remarked. ‘They don’t want to be seen as sissies, got to act the tough nut.’

‘Oh, don’t be so cynical,’ teased Flossy. ‘There’s someone special for everyone. “There’s always someone nearby who loves you.” That’s what you told me. There’ll be a special someone out there for you too.’

Dolly shook her head. ‘Nah, not for me, love. It’s too late. I’m too long in the tooth for all that caper.’

‘You’re only thirty-six. You’re hardly past it yet,’ she said with a quizzical smile.

‘Just drop it, would you?’ Dolly replied briskly. ‘Now, let’s talk about your chap. Have you heard from Tommy?’

‘Well . . . no . . . yes . . . I don’t know! I got a letter from him yesterday, actually. It was ever so sweet. He asked me to send a photograph, but I daren’t really. I’m hardly the glamorous sort, am I?’

‘Well, we can fix that, can’t we!’ said Dolly mysteriously. She glanced up at the clock on the hospital ward. ‘Ninety minutes until we need to clock back on. That should just about give us time by my reckoning.’

‘You’ll see,’ laughed Dolly, grabbing Flossy’s arm and leading her out of the hospital.

A short walk later and Flossy found herself standing outside Eugene’s Perms on Cambridge Heath Road.

Dolly untied Flossy’s turban so that her long brown hair fell around her shoulders. Instinctively, Flossy looked down at the pavement, but Dolly gently lifted her chin up so that their eyes met.

‘Look at me, love,’ she said. ‘I reckon a nice wave in your hair and a touch of lippy; then we’ll pop down Bethnal Green Road and get a photo taken. It’s where all the girls go to have their picture taken for their sweethearts in the forces.’

Flossy frowned. ‘I should never dare,’ she mumbled. ‘Doesn’t it seem a bit forward? He might get the wrong idea.’

‘Look around you, Flossy,’ Dolly urged. ‘What do you see? Rubble and bombsites. Who knows what tomorrow will bring? Haven’t you already had enough near misses to realize that? He’ll be happy as a sandboy. You’re a smashing-looking girl, after all.’

‘This sounds daft,’ Flossy said haltingly, ‘but I just wish I had my mother here.’

‘Oh, sweetheart,’ Dolly said with a catch in her voice. ‘Your mother, wherever she is, would be very proud of you. She would want you to live your life to its fullest.’

Tenderly, she brushed back the long curtain of hair from Flossy’s face. ‘Your youth will pass. Life flashes by so quickly, trust me. Don’t delay – do your living today.’

A sad smile quivered on Dolly’s lips. ‘You’re an unpolished diamond, sweet girl. Don’t be afraid to shine.’

‘The ordinary is often extraordinary on closer inspection,’ Dolly replied, gazing deep into her grey eyes.

Flossy stared wide-eyed up at her friend and, without saying a word, pulled open the door to the salon. Dolly was right. If she wanted to stop behaving like a downtrodden orphan, it was time to stop looking like one.

Ninety minutes later, Flossy and Dolly clocked back in at Trout’s and a chorus of wolf whistles flooded the factory floor.

‘Leave it out, Daisy,’ Flossy blushed. ‘I’ve just had a wave put in my hair, that’s all.’ She had to admit, though, as she caught a glance of herself in Archie’s glass office door, she had had quite the transformation. Her hair, instead of hanging limply down her back, now fell in soft waves about her face, and the soft coral rouge that dusted her cheeks brought out the silver in her pale grey eyes.

‘Oh, sweetheart, you look an absolute picture,’ Sal said from behind her machine, ‘and if I’m not much mistaken, you’re wearing a bit of lippy too.’

‘She is too,’ said Dolly proudly. ‘Beauty is a duty. Us girls gotta wear our lipstick to show ’em our flag’s still flying. Put your best face forward and all that . . .’

‘Too right,’ agreed Daisy. ‘If you don’t mind me saying, Flossy, when you started here, you looked like a proper drudge, and now, well, you’re a new woman.’

‘You doing it all for a special chap?’ Kathy shouted over the rumble of the machines as they started up. ‘Are we gonna have our first pen-pal marriage?’

Flossy said nothing, just smiled enigmatically as she sat down behind Lily’s Singer. Hitler wasn’t going to stop her machine from humming, not if Archie had anything to do with it. She traced her slender fingers over the cool black curves of the sewing machine and thought of glamorous Lily, singing at the top of her voice behind this very machine. The feisty seamstress had never let anything or anyone stop her enjoyment of life. Perhaps the very best tribute she could pay Lily was to live her life with the same zeal.

As Flossy started work, she also found herself musing on Kathy’s question. It was true. A part of her had wanted to look more glamorous in her photo for Tommy – but the makeover experience with Dolly had been an uplifting one too. It might be just a bit of Pan-Cake and a perm, but it had brought with it a queer sense of liberation from her past.

At the end of yet another momentous day, Flossy was beat and chilled to the marrow. The gaping hole in the roof, although covered with tarpaulin, meant the factory was perishingly cold, and by the time the end-of-shift bell sounded, Flossy could scarcely feel her fingers or toes. Despite this, she was itching to get going. The photographer on Bethnal Green Road had said that her portrait would be ready to collect after her shift finished and she was dying to see it and get it sent off to Tommy.

‘Before you all hurry off to the shelters, might I take a quick moment of your time?’ piped up Vera, seemingly oblivious to the cold, or Flossy’s love life.

‘Make it quick, will yer? I need to get home and warm my cockles before we head down underground,’ piped up Pat. ‘It’s cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey.’

Vera wrinkled her nose in distaste, before continuing. ‘I had a meeting with the WVS on my dinner break and the centre organizer informs me that the St Pancras branch managed to complete six hundred and three articles in the month since the bombings began, which is very creditable. They really have come up trumps.’

‘Quite,’ said the forelady. ‘But there is a desperate shortage of clothing in the borough. The rest centres are at breaking point, with people bombed out of their homes, and the WVS urgently need blankets, pillows and socks. To this end, and thanks to the kindness of the Red Cross, they have supplied us with fresh wool and material. Now the Tube is set to open, I hope you’ll all use your evenings there to get knitting and stitching. The WVS also plan on going down there to distribute free wool to all shelterers, and any finished articles can be handed straight to a shelter marshal.

‘I’ve also said that we can use our time down there to repair soldiers’ cartridge belts to raise money for the comforts fund. Eighteen hundred bandoliers need repairing at a charge of a penny each,’ added Dolly. ‘And please don’t forget to keep writing to your pen pals on HMS Avenge. I know some of you are closer to your sailors than others,’ she said, winking at Flossy, ‘but they’re all relying on our letters for morale.’

‘Count me in,’ said Ivy. ‘I’ll do anything to keep my mind off the bombs. Plus I’ve become quite fond of my pen pal.’

‘Very good,’ replied the forelady, as she tore open the brown paper package from the Red Cross and got ready to begin distributing the wool. As she did so, a note fluttered out.

‘You’re not the only one who likes to send secret notes,’ Flossy heard Kathy mutter to Daisy.

Intrigued, the forelady picked it up and began to read out loud. ‘This wool has been sent from Hot Springs Red Cross Sewing Circle. It will have had a long journey: one hundred and fifty miles by plane, then another thirty miles by Dog Mail Run, and then carried on snowshoes across deep snow before its perilous journey across the Atlantic. We hope you can make good use of it.

‘When we heard on the wireless the terrible news of what the Nazis are doing to your beautiful cities, we wept. Then we gathered round the one television set in the village and saw with our own eyes the devastation wreaked on your city. What a barbaric beast Hitler is. We pledge to do all we can to help you British women, and our thoughts are with you from afar. From mothers, wives, and women to a far nobler, braver breed of women than us. We are in awe of you British women. Don’t give up the fight. Knit for victory!’

When the forelady had finished reading, Dolly shook her head in amazement. ‘Well, I’ll be,’ she murmured in astonishment. ‘That proves it.’

‘That we’re not alone,’ she replied. ‘Our little sewing circle is part of something far bigger, a women’s production line that stretches from factory to office, village to town, and across the oceans.’

The girls were just about to take their leave with the strangers’ kind words still ringing in their ears when the factory door opened and in peeked the frightened face of a girl. Flossy put her at no more than twelve. She was dragging a Tate & Lyle sack behind her, and her eyes darted nervously around the factory.

‘Can I help you?’ snapped the forelady. ‘You’re far too young to work here.’

‘Pardon me, miss, but I ain’t here about a job,’ said the girl. She turned to Dolly. ‘If you don’t mind, I heard you ran a sewing circle. I seen yer in the rest centres and down the crypt. Can you help me? Only, I got a lot of mending for my six brothers and sisters. I see you’re handy with a needle.’

The girl’s face crumpled. ‘Please, miss . . . She’s dead. She got caught out in the open in a raid last week, and my dad was killed in Dunkirk, so it’s all down to me now. I ain’t gone a day without seeing my mum . . . I . . . I don’t know what to do.’

Slowly, Dolly bent down to the girl’s level. ‘Of course we’ll help you, sweetheart. You’ve done exactly the right thing. Tell you what, I’ll take you up the canteen now, make you a nice cup of tea; then you can tell me all about it.’

Archie poked his head out of his office door and tucked a ten-bob note in the girl’s dress pocket.

‘I couldn’t help overhearing,’ he said, his usually gruff voice soft with concern. ‘Give us your address and we’ll make sure you’re looked out for, all right, love?’

Flossy stared down at her workstation and tears pricked her eyes. Every day in the East End, fresh orphans were being made.

With no more words to say, wearily the women started to oil their machines in readiness to leave for another long night.

Dolly paused at the door, her arm still wrapped round the young girl’s shoulder. Her sweet voice chimed around the floor. ‘Goodnight, girls. God bless and see you in the morning, PG.’

The next morning, God had answered their prayers. Every worker clocked on at 8 a.m. sharp. Including Peggy.

Thanks to the hole in the roof, it was so cold that overnight ice had formed on the inside of the cracked windowpane and Flossy’s breath hung like smoke in the freezing air. But when she spotted Lucky tenderly carrying Peggy up the factory stairs, she felt a warmth ripple through her. Gently, he set her down and handed her her crutch, before attempting to escort her to her workstation.

‘Please, Lucky,’ she said, pushing his hand away. ‘I need to do this by myself.’

Slowly, and with a bit of a wobble, Peggy made her way across the factory floor, leaning heavily on her crutches and smiling bravely. As she passed by Pat’s workstation, the veteran seamstress rose to her feet and began to clap.

‘Good on yer, gal,’ she said, with a smile in her eyes. ‘It takes guts to come back to work so soon.’

And then an amazing thing happened. Each machinist Peggy passed slowly rose to her feet and began to clap. By the time she had reached the new-starter bench at the back of the factory floor, the room was filled with thunderous applause and every woman was standing to attention behind her machine.

It was a short walk, but it had taken a lot out of Peggy and she sank onto her stool with a relieved sigh. Flossy smiled through her tears as she furiously clapped her friend. Talk about a turnaround! Peggy’s journey from shallow and spoilt young nippy to brave and humble war-worker was complete.

‘Thank you all so much,’ Peggy said with a grateful smile, once the applause had died down. ‘I can’t tell you how good it feels to be out of that hospital bed.’

Even the forelady was grinning broadly. ‘Welcome back, Miss Piper,’ she said. ‘It’s good to have you back. The doctor tells me it’s hand-sewing only for you from now on, but there’s plenty of pockets that need doing. I’ve left a bundle on your station, and there’s a parcel on there for you too.’

Flossy popped over. ‘I best not stop long, but it’s so good to have you back,’ she grinned, squeezing her friend’s arm. ‘Lucky spilt the beans about it being your birthday. It’s not much, I’m afraid,’ Flossy said, handing over a small parcel. She had saved her rations to get Peggy her favourite shortbread biscuits.

‘Thanks ever so, Flossy,’ Peggy gushed, doing a double take as she glanced up at her friend.

‘Gracious, look at you,’ she said admiringly. ‘You look ever so sophisticated.’

Flossy blushed and patted her hair. ‘Oh, it’s nothing. Dolly talked me into getting a wave after we left you at the hospital yesterday. I even had a photo taken, which I posted to Tommy last night. I hope he likes it.’ She hesitated, and the flush spread to her chest. ‘Sending a photo of yourself to someone you’ve never even met does seem a bit . . . well, loose.’

‘What does it matter, in this day and age?’ Peggy exclaimed. ‘Besides, he’ll love it. You look beautiful.’ With that she tore open the recycled newspaper wrapping on Flossy’s gift. ‘Thank you, Flossy. You’re a treasure. I’ll share these with everyone on tea break.’

‘I shouldn’t think so,’ Peggy replied, ripping open the package. ‘He already gave me a new pair of stockings this morning . . .’ Her voice trailed off as the contents of the package spilt out onto her workstation. A pot of zinc cream, some much-coveted Max Factor panstick, a bar of Sunlight soap and a snowy-white full-length cotton underskirt.

‘Oh my days,’ Peggy exclaimed, delighted at the thoughtful gifts. ‘This is so wonderful. It would take me hours to get round the market on my leg to get all this. Zinc is known to help scarring, and look at this make-up! I’ll start to look like the old me with this. I wonder who on earth sent it.’ She riffled through the discarded brown paper, but there was no note.

Flossy felt a sudden jolt of dismay tear through her. The parcel was nigh on identical to the ones she received each year on her birthday! Her treasured bar of Sunlight soap was still sitting in the enamel soap dish on her dresser. She regularly shaved off little slithers of it and mixed it with water to make it last.

Her mind spun with the possibilities, and then came the fierce stab of disappointment. They couldn’t possibly be from her mother, for why on earth would she be sending gifts to Peggy? It made no sense. Just who was the mystery benefactor? And why had she and Peggy been chosen? Frantically, Flossy tried to reason it out in her mind, but she could reach no logical conclusion. All these years, the parcels that had arrived without fail on her birthday had been a tangible link to her past, a connection to a mother she was convinced loved her but couldn’t have her in her life.

‘How strange,’ Peggy murmured. ‘To send such a generous gift but no note to identify yourself.’

‘Very peculiar,’ Flossy agreed. In silent confusion, she returned to her workstation, the hope she had carried in her heart all these years extinguished.